You are stronger than you think

COVID-19 will possibly be the greatest global crisis of our lives.

Fortunately, insights gained from previous crises humanity has faced provide us with a playbook for how to not just survive COVID-19 but be far stronger as a result of it.

For example, in 1987 a large passenger ferry called the Herald of Free Enterprise sunk in the English Channel. Of the almost 500 people aboard 193 tragically died.

There was no warning. No time to sound the alarms. No chance to say good bye.

"People collided with one another, crashed into walls and slipped under the ice-cold water as portholes imploded and water flooded the passenger areas. Electricity went out. The darkness reverberated with screams and shouts of pain and terror. As dead bodies floated in the icy water, many expected death, many lost loved ones, many witnessed unimaginable horrors."

This excerpt from Professor Stephen Joseph's book titled What Doesn't Kill Us gives us just a taste for the trauma the survivors of the Herald disaster must have faced.

Not surprisingly many of the survivors subsequently developed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Professor Joseph's (pictured above) doctoral study focused on the survivors and the roadblocks to recovery they faced.

One of his early findings that can guide us in this COVID-19 era is that

"those who were most distressed were the ones who reported feeling helpless during the accident".

Joseph also found

"the most traumatized were the ones who were least emotionally expressive and who lacked social support".

Further Joseph's research revealed that

survivors who self medicated with alcohol, drugs, smoking, sleeping pills and tranquilizers made themselves feel better in the short term but had poorer psychological health and greater difficulties in the long term.

Clear evidence here for us all to ensure during the pandemic:

1. we focus on what we can do to help ourselves and others at this time,
2. we take the time to journal, blog, talk, zoom and share what we are thinking and ask others how they are going, and
3. we are aware of the long term cost of blocking out the stress in the short term via self medication.

But these findings were not Joseph's most relevant and powerful by any means. Later in his doctoral study he discovered something that changed his and the world's approach to treating trauma survivors that is so important for us all to understand re COVID-19.

Three years after the tragedy Joseph posed the following question in a survey to some of the survivors.

How has your view of life changed since the disaster?

The response shocked Joseph and his fellow researchers.

Almost half of the responses were positive. 43% said their view of life had changed for the better.

The result was so surprising that Joseph has retested this question with survivors of other crises and the strong positive response repeated. From another passenger ferry disaster of those that responded positively:

• 94% said they don't take life for granted anymore
• 91% said they value their relationships much more now
• 91% said they no longer take people or things for granted
• 88% said they value other people more
• 83% said they feel more experienced about life now.

This is just half the list of ways people described how their life view had improved.

What Joseph realised is that

post-traumatic stress can be an engine for transformation.

Since this time he has relentlessly researched how to increase the likelihood of growing from trauma, or as he and others now refer to as 'post-traumatic growth' (PTG).

Joseph's book is well worth reading. In it he shares a fantastic model based on the acronym THRIVE. So you can start benefiting from THRIVE straight away I've provided a quick summary of it below.

Top tips on turning trial into triumph from 3 decades of research (THRIVE)

1. T is for 'taking stock' - find time to reflect on how you and those around you are going. When we feel under attack our brain's ability to reason gets compromised making it harder to think rationally. Create some space in your life to take stock of what's happening, what you can control and how you can help yourself and others. Eat well, get quality sleep, exercise, keep or create new routines, meditate, and be kind to yourself and others. As mentioned previously avoid self medication and minimise exposure to triggers that will make you spiral such as the evening news and social media feeds. Cultivate positivity around you by watching comedies on tv, listening to music that brings back happy memories, looking at photos from great times in the past, contacting old friends and family you haven't spoken to, helping out a neighbour.
2. H is for 'harvesting hope' - give yourself permission to imagine your world post COVID-19, what you have learned from this experience about the important things in life, how your life is better, and what you are most proud that you achieved and how you behaved during this crisis. With that future state clear in your mind now break it down into pathways you can take to get there. For example, if the future you is 10kgs lighter then what are two or three ways you can start tomorrow to work towards that goal. It's important to have more than one pathway just in case one of the pathways is too hard or doesn't work. That way you won't lose hope in reaching your goal. Finally reflect on how you have previously grown from adversity and what you have achieved in the past, reminding yourself of your incredible capacity to not just survive but thrive in times of trial.
3. R is for 're-authoring' - this one is all about how we think about our relationship with adversity. We have all felt hardly done by at times in our lives, like victims of how other people have treated us or situations that have happened. And we may well be justified in feeling this way. Terrible things do happen to people. However by thinking like a victim we give our power away to do anything about the situation. As my old mentor used to say 'the price of innocence is impotence'. We can however 're-author' our relationship with crises. Instead of getting stuck focused on what has happened to us we can focus our attention on what we are going to do in response. We can challenge ourselves to see set backs not as a challenge but as an opportunity to learn, grow and ultimately become a better version of ourselves. It's a matter of making the decision to spend our lives not as a victim of circumstance but as a master of choice. This path puts you back in the drivers seat.
4. I is for 'identifying change' - Everyday our brains are bombarded by information. To sort it out we create filtering mechanisms called schemata to process what is deemed relevant. The problem is if our schemata are biased to detecting threats then that's what we will find. Fortunately we can hack our own software but actively finding examples of positive change. The more we do this the more we will find and the more likely we are to experience the world that way. Some simple ways to do this are by sharing around the dinner table / zoom room / email group one thing that day that you achieved, learned or made you laugh OR some positive news you heard about the crisis OR how you helped someone else. You can do this by yourself to via journaling, blogging, meditating or prayer.
5. V is for 'valuing change' - building on the last point as you notice more and more positive change in your life give yourself permission to really appreciate what you have. Survivor's guilt is a well known phenomenon following crises, so much so that is one of the symptoms of PTSD. Joseph found 60% of the Herald survivors felt this way. This can be a major barrier to moving forward. There will sadly be many victims of COVID-19 but far more survivors. We owe it to those that pass away or whose lives are significantly effected to sensitively but proactively move forward and play our role in rebuilding families, communities, companies, countries and the global economy.
6. E is for 'expressing change in action' - the new insights and world view we develop from this COVID-19 era are pointless unless we translates our thoughts and feelings into action. People all around the world have changed their behaviour dramatically over the last month. Thankfully some of these changes like 'physical distancing' will be temporary. But hopefully others will stick, like the so many 'random acts of kindness' I hear about between every day people. There are many great examples of 'big business' helping out by diverting their profitable enterprise to social enterprise, such as LVMH making hand sanitiser instead of perfume, IKEA fitting out new hospitals, a brewery in Sydney making ethanol for disinfectants instead of beer. Wouldn't it be great if every business post COVID-19 continued to pursue both profitable AND social enterprise. As we journey thru this crisis you will have opportunities every day to step up and express the growth of your thoughts and feeling thru action. Take note when you do this and replicate it. Over time, like singing Happy Birthday while you wash your hand 20 times a day, it will become habit.

Dealing with COVID-19 is a marathon not a sprint and we have only run the first couple of miles. There is much outside of our control about this crisis, but so much we can do something about.

How we come out the other side of this pandemic is very much dependent on each of us choosing to be masters of choice and not victims of circumstance.

Thank you Professor Joseph for your research and the THRIVE model described above. You have given us all hope that

adversity does not have to lead to disadvantage, rather it may just be the ultimate source of transformation.

Stay well.

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Rich Hirst is a leadership, change and high performance psychologist. His insights are based on real world experiences from his work with 10,000+ leaders and over 1,000 CEOs, underpinned by his knowledge as an organisational psychologist and expertise as a change agent supporting organisations for more than 20 years going through major transformation.

For more information please go to www.richhirst.com or contact me via email on [email protected]. For daily leadership tips on LinkedIn search for #dailyrichtips.

Please find below links to my previous monthly posts.

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2. Why we do dumb things and how to stop it!
3. How is your 2020 vision?
4. How to be the best of the best and 10x the rest
5. 10 career lessons I learned the hard way
6. Don't make this high performance mistake in your company!
7. 7 Tips to World Class Performance
8. Winning in the turns
9. The #1 predictor of career success is not what you think
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11. Blasters, badmouthers, bottlers, brooders and builders. Which one are you?
12. P.S. I love you
13. The great change trap-eze!
14. What is your New Year's Evolution?
15. How to lead when change is NOT constant
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18. Australia: The distrusting country
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20. Finding your moonshot
21. Sleeping your way to the top
22. How to supercharge your influence
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24. Time to terminate HR?
25. Too busy or not too busy. Is that the question?
26. Who inspired you in 2017? My top ten!
27. The missing link of high performance
28. The future belongs to people with this skill
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30. Good Grief
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32. Australia is still lucky... but for how long?
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41. From counting people to making people count
42. Five novel tactics for better leadership
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