Building Resilience

Resilience is a set of practical skills that allow me to be strong, flexible, creative, hopeful, and positive, and to successfully adapt to stressors, and bounce back from difficult experiences.

I intend to continue to practice and build simple health and physical resilience habits (drinking water, walking, better food choices, and care of my body), because these habits will help me to age gracefully, reduce the risk of diseases, be strong through the crises which will come, improve my mood, enjoy life, and care for my family for years to come.

 

I also intend to work at emotional and mental resilience skills (such as mindfulness, awareness, purpose, and community-building), because being able to adapt to stressors and bounce back from difficult experiences will allow me to be a wise, flexible, creative, hopeful, and positive leader for my family, community, and for the earth.

Agenda:

1. Read "The 5 Resets":

For Lent, I'm reading "The 5 Resets: Rewire Your Brain and Body for Less Stress and More Resilience" (2024), by Aditi Nerurkar. My goal is to get wiser, stronger, and more adaptable.

Last week I started the first reset - to Get Clear on What Matters Most. I set some realistic goals, and made a realistic plan: I want to eat less processed foods; I want to be more emotionally grounded, aware, and regulated; and I want to make lots of art, because it's what gives my life meaning.

She goes on to talk about two kinds of happiness: The first she calls hedonic, which are activities like playing phone games, buying a latte, binge-watching romances, and drinking ciders. These are great temporary gifts of pleasure, and a respite from routine. Sometimes they are just what we need.

But they don't last long, and they can leave you with a craving for more. And too much hedonic activity can be a burden if you are spending too much on them. We can't rely on them to cure stress or make us truly happy. For that we need eudaimonic experiences, centered on meaning and purpose: Art-making, gardening, being with my family - things that put me in the flow, and challenge my brain and my body.

One way to discover eudaimonics is to think of things I enjoyed as a kid: Drawing paper dolls, making gifts for people, reading Tolkien by a fire, pruning roses, walking on the beach (even teaching kids is something I enjoyed when I was still just a kid). She calls it "finding my buried treasure".

2. Choose joy-filled activities:

Last week I decided on my endgame for the next months - By Easter I will have: 

adopted many healthy choices for snacks and meals without processed food, and be less addicted to easy carbs;

integrated most if not all of the Emotional Balance Workbook exercises into my everyday life, and feel emotionally grounded, aware, and regulated;

and completed at least three art projects of some kind. 

This week I will add daily joyful activities, such as planting starts, painting, writing lessons, and doing art with my grandsons.

• Monday: Design banner, draw lettering + dig out a sand pit!
• Tuesday: Write a Transform Your World lesson + art with Artie.
• Wednesday: Library visit - find book.
• Thursday: Paint banner letters
• Friday: Sew banner together
• Saturday: Plant bok choy, kale, beets