How to Build Resilience to Survive Difficult Phase in Life?

Difficult times are unavoidable in life, nobody wants them but they are good teachers in life. Sometimes we do not see that tough time/failure/ layoff is making a person strong rather has making him/her devastated. 

Why is it that only a few people come out of tough times effectively, whereas some suffer a prolonged demoralized state and cannot ever recover from it?

For example two middle-aged persons lost their job under a layoff process in their company, both with similar family and financial background, while one felt humiliated, lost confidence and therefore had difficulty finding a new job, the other analysed the situation, spent time identifying his strengths, saw it as an opportunity for growth and found himself a senior manager’s role in a new company.

Today, Counsellor Shivani Misri Sadhoo shares important life skills that can help a person to survive a difficult time.

Don’t just be optimism, be resilient too

During bad times being optimistic is essential. In fact, optimism is referred as “the quality of being full of hope and emphasizing on the good parts of a situation, or a belief that something good will happen”, there is a difference when it comes to resilience.

Resilience is defined as “the quality of being able to return quickly to a previous good condition after problems.” In other words, it’s about moving on from a difficult situation without just emphasizing the positive parts and blindly believing that something good will happen. Instead, it’s about seeing both sides, good and bad, being aware of the potential issues of the situation and taking action accordingly while keeping hope alive at the base of it all.

Avoid the thinking of being completely failed

Think, analyse and realise the truth that a so-called failure is not a setback rather than a time for growth and redirection that otherwise you have been missing to do in all this time. Even though failure hit you hard, remember it’s actually just a symptom of big success because most of the huge successes in life come from 80% failure and 20% intended outcome. And the only failure is when someone does nothing, doesn’t try and just wallows in the injustice of a situation.                

Focus on your strengths rather than your weaknesses

When passing through tough time in life, people tend to get focused on their weaknesses and feel fearful. Remember this will not help you in the situation, rather make it worse. Instead look towards your strengths and tune your direction accordingly when things appear to go wrong. Focusing on your strengths is how you can acquire growth while focusing on your weaknesses only ultimately serves as a reminder of why we fail.