Four ways to build emotional resilience

Emotional resilience is simply the placing of one’s ability to adapt to unpleasant situations such as in a crisis, or stress. It is an inner force by which one can hold themselves through the tough times in life. Stressful situations are common realities to each of us and almost nearly unavoidable. Try as we may, there’s not so much we can do to completely avoid moments of crisis. 

Because even if from our ends we manage to steer clear of situations which trigger crises, we have no control over others and how they might cause mayhem which may affect us.

Therefore, our best bet is building our emotions to be resilient to moments of crisis by containing the situation.

The four guiding steps to building resilience are:

• Build Up Your Level Of Patience

By practising patience in stressful situations, one can build up their resilience to the unpleasant times. Patience is the capacity to accept or tolerate obstacles or delay [which could be caused during times of crisis]. By being patient, one gains the capacity of restraint in hard times.

What is equally important as practising patience during hard times is learning how to maximize the wait or delay. For instance, what lessons might you need to learn about a difficult time? What mistakes may have triggered the delay? Or even what strength or weakness have you exhibited or learnt about yourself during the situation and how can you either minimize or maximize them?

These assessments can make one’s period of patience a truly productive one.

• Manage Your Thoughts

What does your mind dwell on during hard times? Is it on the crisis itself or on sourcing means to escape the situation. Should this be the direction your thoughts are taking, then it’s important to get rid of such mindsets.

Times of crisis or delay may not necessarily be your fault or anyone’s for that matter. Which is why it’s important to dwell on the positive side of every crisis.

Focus your thoughts on the goal you may have in mind and how to adapt accordingly. Focus on the lessons to learn from the situation and how to be a better person. Deliberately conditioning your mind to see beyond the dark clouds of delay or crisis will help build up your resilience to stressful times. 

• Do Not Fight Your Emotions

One of the worst things to do during a time of crisis is to suppress the emotions one might be going through. This is so because by refusing to admit to the emotions they are feeling, they are invalidating their emotions, therefore, making room for zero progress or room to solve the problem at hand.

Should you be experiencing hard times, take out time to actually feel the emotions you may be experiencing whether it’s sadness, anger, or frustration. By doing this, you acknowledge the problem at hand making your mind ready to source for solutions. 

• Perseverance

To persevere means to have hope in the process one is in despite the challenges which might occur. It’s the ability to ditch the feeling of hopelessness or helplessness during a crisis or challenge and moving past these obstacles knowing that there is a goal ahead.

By constantly conditioning your mind to persevere, you’re building your capacity to handle stressful situations life may throw at any time.

Emotional resilience is a powerful mind tool everyone should build up in their lifetime because unfortunately, bad days occur and it’s up to each of us to handle them responsibly.