reativity of their minds.
By the way, in order to pass time, Tom practiced sailing in his mind. He got very good at his mental imagery sailing, and was able to create a wide variety of ocean conditions to test his sailing skills. Upon his return to America, his sailing abilities had improved dramatically. Prison is a painful, lonely place. Joe and Tom had the resilience to develop a plan, like building his dream home in his mind, maintaining that focus for several years, and maintaining the belief that one day they would be free.
The Body, Mind, and Spirit of Resilience
Most of the research on resilience has focused on the mental side of it, but resilience also involves body and spirit. Resilience can be compared to the bamboo, which is strong, yet capable of bending with the strongest winds – without breaking. That’s easy to understand from the mental side, but we can’t ignore the physical aspect.
Optimizing every aspect of physical health improves overall resilience. If you have been chronically ill and debilitated, and you are dealing with a lot of stress, the task is much more difficult for you than for someone facing the same stress who is physically strong and healthy.
Just the physical basics — diet, exercise, deep breathing, and drinking enough water — will go a long way to strengthening your body. A strong body makes for a much stronger and more flexible mind. In looking at the physical side of resilience, the philosophy and practice of yoga comes to mind. When you go to a yoga class, you’ll learn practices that develop flexibility, strength, and balance. You’ll also learn to relax and the practice will help with mental tranquility and flexibility.
The spiritual component of resilience involves: meaning, faith, hope, connection and purpose. A strong connection to God/Goddess/Higher Power helps develop and secure a strong foundation and core. The spiritual connection is like providing someone a lifeline, an additional support without which many people get overwhelmed by stress. “Faith” is not simply the belief that God will arrive at the last second with a miracle to bail us out. Faith is defined as, “Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing. A belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.” A person can be an atheist and still have faith that, “Somehow I always make it through.” That’s a person with strong faith in himself, perhaps in deeper or higher levels of himself he is not aware of. From the springs of faith arises hope. If a person is basically hopeful, he is optimistic that things will work out. Spiritual connection leads to faith . . . which leads to hope, and results in resilience.
Resilience is one of the most important predictors of success in life and work, and in recovery from crisis and sudden change. We can assess our own level of resilience and then decide what we can implement at the mental, physical, and spiritual levels in order to become more resilient.