Resilient summary

Ever watched a nature documentary? If so, the following might be a familiar scene. A herd of zebras is peacefully grazing on a lush grassland somewhere in Africa. They’re alert, keeping an eye out for predators, but also relaxed and content. There’s no hint of tension. All of a sudden, a lion shows up. Panic erupts, the herd bursts into activity, and animals run in all directions. Then it ends as quickly as it started, and the herd shifts back to a state of calm but watchful rest.

In a nutshell, that’s the blueprint for all of our lives. Sometimes we’re quietly responsive to our environment; at others, we must urgently react.

When renowned psychiatrist Viktor Frankl was struggling to survive the horrors of living in a Nazi concentration camp, he observed something that left a deep mark. Eventually, he wrote a book about it, titled Man's Search for Meaning. What he observed was that certain people had the ability to remain generous and help others despite their own immense suffering. This often took the form of comforting their fellow prisoners or giving away their own meager rations. He called it “the last of human freedoms” – the power to choose our response, no matter the situation.

If it’s possible to exercise this power in the most terrible of human circumstances, it’s possible in everyday life. It boils down to exercising agency – the beginning of true grit.

Think about the last time you felt thankful. Maybe you were appreciating a tasty dinner that a friend cooked for you. Or perhaps it was a more abstract feeling of gratitude, like looking up at the clear sky on a beautiful day. No matter the occasion, it felt good, right?

We often get so stressed and exhausted trying to make sure we’ll feel good in the future that we forget about all the ways we feel good already. But if you take a few moments to think about it, you’ll probably find plenty of things in your life that you’re thankful for.

Have you ever seen toddlers learning how to walk? If so, you might have noticed that the most eager ones get the right kind of encouragement from their parents. While making sure their children don’t get hurt, they also give them the freedom to explore – and just enough help that they feel capable and happy.

By the time children turn two, they’ve collected countless experiences that shape how they interact with other people in their lives – as well as with the world around them. These experiences inevitably affect their sense of confidence.

If you’re an animal in the wild, there are generally two kinds of mistakes that you can make. First, you might convince yourself that there’s a tiger lurking in the bushes when there isn’t one. Not the most pleasant feeling in the world! You might get needlessly scared, but no harm done.

The other mistake animals can make is to believe there’s no one in the bushes – exactly when the tiger is about to pounce. This kind of mistake is often much more costly. 

Imagine you’re having dinner at a friend’s place. After stuffing yourself with an amazing meal, you polish off two desserts. Then, your friend brings out a third one, gives you a taste, and asks if you like it. Of course, it’s delicious, and part of you is tempted to ignore the fact that you’re far too full to have another bite. In other words, you may like the dessert, but at that specific moment, you don’t want it.

This example goes to show that liking something and wanting it are very different things. Sure, liking can bring you a lot of pleasure. But when it becomes an insistent want, that’s when our sense of motivation can lead us astray – and eat away at our resilience.

What kind of life did you imagine for yourself as a child? Perhaps you wanted to be an astronaut, or maybe a movie star. And what are you doing now? Chances are, as you grew up, you let go of many of your dreams. These days, you might even think of them as silly. It’s all too easy to talk yourself out of dreaming and, instead, settle for less.

But if you ignore or dismiss your dreams, you could be missing out on a much more fulfilling life.