PART II
Foundations of a Daily Constitutional - Self-Compassion to Self-Care
 
For better or worse, most of us experience our minds as an elephant who sits on our shoulders – sometimes heavy when life is tough, sometimes weightless when life is grand. This elephant breathes down our necks, much less observes social distancing, no matter how much we try to push it out of the way. The elephant represents that inescapable voice in your head, which critiques your every move. How quickly does your mind jump to negative self-talk when confronted with events beyond your control? For most of us, it is likely all too often. Self-evaluation is a common habit in our hyper-drive culture.
 
To clarify, negative self-talk is not your conscience telling you to do the right thing or reflect constructively on your personal behavior in consideration of others.  The negative-self talk, like living in constant comparison to others, is toxic judgement and destructive self-criticism that has no productive purpose in your personal growth (see Resources – Carson and Helmstetter).
 
Consider envisioning your elephant operating like a mental feedback loop in your life. When your behavior produces desired results, you continue to do that behavior to continue to get the results you want, like a reinforcing or positive loop. The elephant feels relatively light; you hardly notice it is still sitting on your shoulders. When your behavior does not produce desired results, the elephant feels like dead weight. Its weight is a wake-up call to pay attention to its presence and it rarely goes away on its own. Try seeing the weighty feeling as a signal, a balancing loop - an opportunity for self-reflection and learning. Wisdom tells us that sometimes, the greatest gifts in life come in ugly wrapping paper. Negative self-talk blocks your ability to reframe challenges in constructive ways. It feeds your deepest fears and activates your defenses. Sometimes, it causes destructive behavior thus reducing your chances of attaining the outcomes you want. Reflective learning acts like a course correction and helps you constructively modify your behavior, putting you on a path toward achieving your aims.
 
How do you prevent slipping into the destructive cycle of negative self-talk? There are two, interrelated strategies – self-compassion and self-care. Both involve developing a sense of mindfulness about how you relate to yourself, others, and your world. Self-compassion (Neff, 2009, 2011) is being kind to yourself, as a friend would treat you when you seek their advice or the support you share with friends suffering through a tough time. Self-care (Denyes, Orem & Bekel, 2001) is the practice of activities individuals initiate and do on their own behalf to maintain life, health and wellbeing. It entails taking care of yourself – physically, mentally, and spiritually – understanding you are as worthy of care as anyone else. Putting on your oxygen mask before helping others in an emergency is an example of the principle of self-care. You help others best when you are primed to do so effectively - not depleted and inept. Self-compassion allows you self-care. Together, these two work best when you practice them regularly. To learn more about these strategies, check out the recommended reading selections. A mastery of self-compassion and self-care serve as a foundation for you running your life and not vice versa.
 
Routines for Purpose, Productivity, and Progress
Once you have a self-compassion and self-care in practice, you are ready to evaluate how you spend your time. Re-establishing new routines facilitates continuity and coherence when these practices truly reflect your life’s purpose as expressed in the time you spend that essentially reflects your values and priorities.  When you feel adrift, distractions make it hard to focus on what matters most. Start by taking stock of your current schedule and compare it with your priorities. Do they match or are they out of alignment? Dig into the details by documenting everything you do for a week. This comparison can be starkly revealing of priority gaps between what you think is important and how you spend your time.  Examine how you spend your hours. Compare your priorities and values with the amount of time you actually spend devoted to them.  For example, if you believe relationships are your top priority, then why are you spending more time at work than necessary? Are you at the center of your life? Or, is your work the center of your life? What do you need to do to shift more time toward what really means the most to you?
 
When we hear Harry Chapin’s Cat’s Cradle (1974), we rarely connect it with our own lives, yet it illustrates precisely the disjoint between values and actual time spent aligned with them. Are you spending your time aligned with your values and priorities? If not, then assess your life in terms of people, places, and activities occupying your time by asking – who and what boost or deplete your energy. Who supports you? What drives you? What entraps you? Self-evaluation is also self-confrontational – it takes fortitude to declutter your life of people and things that do not add meaning and value to you. Discomfort stemming from constructive self-reflection is not an excuse to pass on this opportunity for personal growth. You have just encountered your comfort zone – stretch! This is no time to stay stuck on autopilot in your relationships, your career, or your health, or your spirit.
 
While this pandemic necessitates physical distancing for health and safety reasons, experiencing restlessness, feeling unmoored, and psychic numbness compound a sense of isolation and powerlessness. Recognize your ability to act has not been paralyzed. When you get an anxious sense that you are drifting and aimless, it is time to assess your goals, priorities, and values relative to your life’s purpose or mission. Establishing new routines will help you feel a sense of structure and continuity as you reimagine your life. What does that look like?
 
Maybe it looks like honoring yourself - recognizing you deserve to keep your commitments to you! Fundamentally, it means nourishing your mind, body, and spirit with positive engagement, healthy food, daily exercise, sufficient sleep, and inspiration. You monitor the quality of the media you consume. You might read more, meditate, get your financial house in order, take an online course, or learn a new skill. You may schedule down time for your relationships with others or blocking time for yourself to reflect in a journal, explore art, start gardening, develop a craft, master a musical instrument, or virtually volunteer.  What brings you joy? Think creatively - try revisiting activities you loved during your childhood and adolescence to bring them back into your life or try exploring activities you have dreamed about doing.
 
Take some time to consider what works best for you in concert with the rhythm of your life – more or less structure. What keeps you engaged and motivated? When are you most energetic and least? Use your energy flow to reimagine your schedule. Leverage what has worked for you in the past and tailor it to your current reality. Strike a balance between productivity and play.  Once you are comfortable with your new routine, write it down and post it visibly to remind you of your commitment. Over time, your new habits will become constitutional anchors for your life going forward.

Like most of us, you may find this process challenging on your own. Professional coaches and mental health experts can guide you toward you running your life so it is not running you.

This pandemic is a major disruption in our lives. During disconcerting times, we have an opportunity to notice natural beauty as a tonic for stress that we often overlook in our busy lives. Momentary mindfulness of the beauty around us as we move through our days helps develop appreciation for the cycle of life as a continual process of revitalization. Use this opportunity to creatively destruct old routines and learn new ones that serve your future. For Part I of this article or more about Learned Resilience, see www.maryedson.com.
 
References:
Caspi, A. & Roberts, B. W. (1990). Personality continuity and change across the life course. In L. Pervin (ed.), Handbook of Personality: Theory and Research. Guilford Press. pp. 300--326.

Chapin, H. (1974). Cat’s Cradle. Verities and balderdash. New York: Elektra.

Hall, E. T., & Trager, G. L. (1953). The analysis of culture. Washington, DC: American Council of Learned Societies. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED035325.pdf
 
Maslach, C., Jackson, S. E., Leiter, M. P., Schaufeli, W. B., & Schwab, R. L. (1986). Maslach burnout inventory (Vol. 21, pp. 3463-3464). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting psychologists press.
 
Neff, K. D. & Vonk, R. (2009). Self‐compassion versus global self‐esteem: Two different ways of relating to oneself. Journal of personality, 77(1), 23-50.
 
Denyes, M. J., Orem, D. E. & Bekel, G. (2001). Self-care: a foundational science. Nursing science quarterly, 14(1), 48-54.
 
Recommended reading:
Taming Your Gremlin, David Richard Carson (1984, 2009)
What to Say When you Talk to Yourself: Powerful New Techniques to Program Your Potential for Success, Shad Helmstetter (1986, 2017)
Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself, Kristin Neff (2011)
Take Time for Your Life, Cheryl Richardson (1998)
The Art of Extreme Self-Care, Cheryl Richardson (2009)

PART I
 
If COVID-19 has you staying home for prolonged periods, managing your time can be unnerving. Long spans of unstructured time can leave you feeling unmoored and restless. These feelings can slip into disorientation, malaise and hopelessness if not promptly and properly addressed.[1] Sometimes, we can feel as if we have lost our way.
 
Keep in mind; feelings of rootlessness are common during transitions like starting a family, beginning a new project or business, leaving a job for a career change, divorce, or retirement. Transitions prompt us to re-imagine our lives and our roles in society. COVID-19 presents societal upheaval – a type of transition from a public focus to a private focus. This transition, prompted by necessity, requires re-imaging our lives on many levels - from how we work to how we interact with one another.
 
We are accustomed to lives designed around societal structures, so COVID-19’s disruption is naturally perturbing. Normal routines are no longer sustainable; yet, routines are vital for a preserving our notions of purpose and progress. Routines provide a sense of coherence and continuity in our lives. Disruption indicates it is time to put on our design thinking caps to rethink our lives. If we want and expect different outcomes, we must reorganize our lives by creating structures and routines that serve our current realities going forward.
 
This is the first of two posts that address re-imaging our lives in light of the pandemic. In this article, we look at the importance of routines and norms, as well as start down the path toward reconsidering them in light of a designing new, not same old, life.  
 
The Importance of Routines – Norms
 
From birth, our lives and roles in society are organized and structured through behavioral norms formed and routinized by repetition and reinforcement (Hall & Trager, 1953). Norms become routines and institutionalized over time. Norms come from our families, communities, schools, and religious institutions through explicit and implicit rituals, rules, and behavioral expectations. These are our “roots” grounding us as we form our individual identities. Norms are also artifacts of societies that mold and delineate acceptable and unacceptable behavior at individual and group levels. They are the rhythm and cadence of cultures reverberating through our daily lives from the time we wake up to the time we go to sleep. Through these institutionalized expectations and behaviors, our time is structured, bounded, and evaluated – even judged. Norms provide us bonds and boundaries of our relationships, thus coherence and continuity in our lives.
 
As members of groups, communities, and organizations from an early age, many of us follow norms without much examination. We rarely question norms or institutions from which they emanate, particularly when we see shared benefits are generally accepted and they appear to be broadly beneficial to us individually. For example, most of us see the wisdom in traffic laws – predictable order and safety.
 
When we adopt norms, instead of reinventing or resisting them, we conserve rather than waste our time and energy. We can apply our energies elsewhere, possibly in creative and productive ways. When we assume group norms to be a member of a community, we tacitly consent to let others prescribe the use of our time and schedules to some extent. For example, we arrive, participate, and leave school, work, church, and community meetings at specific times. If we want a job, we show up for the interview on time. If we want to fly to Hawaii for vacation, we arrive at the gate at the scheduled departure time. If we do not comply, then we lose the opportunity and have to make other arrangements, which is often inconvenient and time consuming. Compliance has its benefits – saving time and effort. Compliance also imposes limitations on individual freedom and expression – laughing loudly in a library raises eyebrows and elicits a, “Shhhh!”
 
Norms represent our commitments and obligations to others, as well as ourselves. Adults often have the tightest of schedules to manage their work, family, church, and community obligations. The decision to start a family comes with a shift in prioritizing work and children from their birth to adulthood. Shuttling children to school, activities, appointments, and events becomes a full-time job in addition to a “real job”. Adults caught between caring for young children while also caring for aging parents feel squeezed by dueling needs for their time and attention. After a lifetime of obligations, it can feel like life is running you instead of you running your life. Life becomes regimented you go on autopilot as you check the boxes on your “to do list”.  
 
Before we know it, decades have flown without much acknowledgement of our own personal experience of life’s ups and downs, as well as nuances, because “tomorrow is another day”. For many, losing perspective of who we are becomes problematic when what we are is limited to what we do for others. We become vessels for the expectations, hopes, and dreams of others but not for ourselves. Becoming mentally and emotionally numb is a risk. Extreme doing at our own expense that sacrifices our well-being becomes burnout (Maslach, Jackson, Leiter, Schaufeli & Schwab, 1986). Loss of identity derived from one’s sense of purpose sometimes accompanies burnout.   
 
Burnout forces self-reflection when our life’s purpose becomes blurred. Hence, the adage to slow down so we can see we are human beings not merely human doings. Pausing our lives, as we are now during COVID-19, can be unsettling as we reflect upon the truism that, for many of us, our lives are steered by others more than we might like to acknowledge. We may not want to accept the imbalance going forward. In a way, this pause is a gift, and opportunity to stretch ourselves beyond our comfort zones. The question we must ask ourselves is, “Do you want to stay stuck or do you want to expand your zone?”
 
If you are looking to stretch beyond your comfort zone and re-imagine your life during this pandemic, Part II will explore how self-compassion and self-care underpin designing healthy,  sustainable routines as a hero at home. Until then, check out the Resources, especially Take Time for your Life by Richardson. Stay tuned! Part II will be posted on May 1.

[1] If you have a sense of hopelessness, contact a mental health professional promptly, or contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
 
References:
Hall, E. T., & Trager, G. L. (1953). The analysis of culture. Washington, DC: American Council of Learned Societies. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED035325.pdf
 
Maslach, C., Jackson, S. E., Leiter, M. P., Schaufeli, W. B., & Schwab, R. L. (1986). Maslach burnout inventory (Vol. 21, pp. 3463-3464). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting psychologists press.

Resources:
Take Time for Your Life, Cheryl Richardson (1998)

In my last post, we explored the balance between individualism and interdependence. Understanding the dynamics between these two existential ways of being is not only important during a crisis, but it is essential to living a robust life. When you understand when to act independently and when to act interdependently, life eases. It entails recognizing when acting for the benefit of the whole also benefits you as an individual, as well as when acting as an individual benefits you but may harm others. Ironically, when you exercise good judgment in this balance of solo versus in concert, you become less harshly judgmental of yourself and others. So, how does one get in tune with this delicate balance? Let’s start by examining needs at the individual and group levels. A good way to think about this is your personal needs and the needs of your partner, family, your neighborhood, your workplace, your community, your region, your country, and, yes, our shared home – earth.

Getting our needs met depends on not only having a healthy relationship with ourselves, but mutually beneficial relationships with others. Every day we negotiate these relationships to take care of our families, our communities, and ourselves. We have commitments to our individual wellbeing as well as the collective wellbeing as members of society. From a systems perspective, the matrix that yields relational integrity of individuals and communities relies on self-respect and mutual respect, much like interstitial fluid bathes tissues in the human body. One might argue that systems work best when the relationships between individuals and the communities in which they are members are functionally healthy. Functional health depends on constructive feedback that enables individuals and communities to evolve in ways that are mutually valuable (we will explore values in a future posting) in meeting individual and group needs.
Let’s explore needs, yours and your communities’, through two different lenses – a psychological lens and a philosophical lens. These two lenses are tempered by the realities of human development in childhood through adulthood. The first, psychological lens is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (1943), which he originally presented in his Theory of Human Motivation. Maslow has presented needs in a five-tier triangle (Figure 1).


Figure 1. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
By FireflySixtySeven - Own work using Inkscape, based on Maslow's paper, A Theory of Human Motivation., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=36551248





In the five-tier model, the foundations of the triangle are basic, physical, individual needs like air, food, water, and shelter. Moving up the triangle, physical needs shift toward relational needs, increasing in complexity like love, belonging, and esteem (self and from others).  In the 1970s, Maslow refined his model to include enhanced needs, which added tiers and distinctions to his existing model as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2. Maslow’s Expanded Hierarchy of Needs            Figure 3. The Chakra System

Figure 2. Sullivan, R.G., Dwyer, M.F., & Rogers, K.N. (2016). Conceptual frameworks for human interactions with public lands in the western United States. Argonne, IL: United States Department of Energy, Argonne National Laboratory.  Retrieved from: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert_Sullivan6/publication/301698819_Conceptual_Frameworks_for_Human_Interactions_with_Public_Lands_in_the_Western_United_States/links/5723725008aee491cb3772ae/Conceptual-Frameworks-for-Human-Interactions-with-Public-Lands-in-the-Western-United-States.pdf
Figure 3. The Chakra System.
Nearents, J. (2014). The Chakras: A Practical guide to everyday life. Retrieved from: https://www.slideshare.net/JenniferNearents/chakra-basics

In Maslow’s expanded model, the needs progressively move toward personal growth, self-actualization, and transcendence. This progression recognizes and reflects wisdom from Eastern philosophies. Energy centers represent needs in the subtle body found in ageless meditative practices like Tantra and esoteric Hindu traditions, like kundalini yoga and the chakra system. The latter is illustrated as seven major energetic wheels, starting at the base and working upwards, as well as several minor ones. Figure 3 shows this system simply, so you can see the parallels with Maslow’s hierarchy – a bridge between psychological and philosophical models.

Why is understanding the bridge between these models important? The bridge illustrates the interplay between individual and collective needs, in the context of psychological and philosophical meanings that we can relate to and understand as dynamics in our daily lives. These models help us make sense of our individual experience and the shared human experience. While there is so much depth to explore in these models, one lesson is clear. In sum, we cannot get all our individual needs met on our own. In other words, no one is an island. Thinking such is foolish. If we are to progress toward attaining higher levels of needs, such as love, self-actualization, and legacy, we need relationships gained through communities. As much as we would like to believe the myth so many films, particularly Westerns, we are not ruggedly, independent cowboys out on the range. We develop individual skills we share with society for mutual benefit and reciprocity – safety, security, satisfaction, growth, and prosperity.

In this pandemic, it is critically important to remember that your individual safety depends on your consideration (your behaviors) of others’ well-being as much as others’ consideration of your health. View it as a version of the Golden Rule, “Do unto others as you would have done to you.” If you expect others to respect you, respect others. Right now, this is how we keep our communities safe for you and everyone. We all drive on the right side of the road not only because it is the law. It makes sense to avoid accidents and ensure traffic flow. Likewise, mindfulness of your behavior in public is vital to public health. Being a hero at home and using preventative measures when we must go out, we mitigate the burden on medical professionals and resources for survival. We really are in this together.  By doing your part, more of us will be here to celebrate when the sun finally breaks through the clouds.

For more information contact Mary at resiliencecoach@msn.com.

During this pandemic, the best thing we can all do, if possible, is to stay home, stay safe, and save lives. If anything, COVID-19 is teaching us is: YOU'RE a HERO by STAYING HOME.
If you are an essential member of a medical team, employed by municipal services (fire, police), utilites (e.g. water, power, gas, cable, communications), or delivery services, you likely don't have the option to stay home. Please know your critical work is appreciated. Words cannot express our gratitude for your dedication.
For those of us who have options, the most patriotic thing you can do to keep your community healthy is to consider how your actions impact the health and well-being of others and your loved ones. Stay home unless it's absolutely necessary for you to go out. When you do, protect yourself and others by taking precautionary measures recommended in your area. Here are some ideas for making the most of your home time.

Managing Time and Focus
The pandemic has put us in a love-hate relationship with time – too much versus too little. At first, having time on our hands presents opportunities to do things we have wanted to do but delayed. For some, we had warning with time to prepare when others affected early did not. That time filled quickly with demands of family, work, or filling out forms for unemployment, medical care, child-care, and other necessities of survival. For others, reaching out to help the neediest in our communities found us with not enough time. Even the busiest face occasional moments filled with dread. It is natural to be overwhelmed at times like these. Avoid being too hard on yourself. Developing your attention and mindfulness practices can help you appreciate aspects of life we overlook in our overbooked lives. Check out the self-compassion resources at the website, see https://www.maryedson.com/resources.html.

In the thick of a crisis, staying focused feels nearly impossible. It seems like distressing news is coming from all directions and it is difficult to tune-out when our loved ones need us most.  Finding time to re-balance is out of reach. Burnout is very real. We face the pressing question: What can I do to maintain some semblance of sanity? We can start by taking a deep breath (see more about this the previous blog post) and seizing the moment to appreciate the present and acknowledging to ourselves that we are not alone in this pandemic. People are reaching out to help one another, which fills the void when our leaders are unwilling or unable. So, we must take charge of ourselves. Mastering our own destinies in this time of crisis requires a degree of self-discipline tempered with self-compassion.  In sum, taking charges of ourselves means cultivating good judgment of when to have a plan and follow it, while recognizing when the plan needs to adapt to changes in the current environment. It means scanning your environment for changes and modifying plans to meet current and long-term needs.  These skills require individual and collective agility in ways we  have not faced historically. How did we get here and what is the path forward?

Balancing Individual Needs with Community Needs
In the United States, one of our beloved myths is we believe we are "rugged individualists," an extension of the "pioneering spirit" from the days of exploration and settlement of the country during its first two centuries. Think about Ralph Waldo Emerson's  essays on self-reliance. While the independent pioneer archetype serves us well in some regards, like all archetypes, it has its downside (Jung referred to is as the "shadow") too.  Healthy systems have balances of individualism and collectivism to leverage the best aspects of both while mitigating their inherent limitations (see https://corecounselling.ca/how-we-contribute-to-the-collective-shadow/). For example, competition leads to innovation in the best of circumstances; but competition can lead to anarchy in the worst circumstances.  An example of innovation is healing technologies like prosthetics. An example of devolution is William Golding's (1954) metaphorical Lord of the Flies. Understanding the propensities of the shadow help us develop ways to avoid archetypal extremes.

In other words, "there is a season" for both self-reliance and interdependence. They function in tandem and interact as feedback loops in systems. Knowing when to call on each of these requires good judgment and leadership. While we have little control over what is happening nationally right now, we can harness our own lives - using structure and self-organization to provide a foundation for survival while calling upon our relationships and networks for ideas and support in times of change and adversity.
Personally, finding the balance of structure and flexibility is uniquely your own process. We'll explore how to find your "sweet spot" for resilience in upcoming posts. Until then, remember, we are all in this together while standing six feet or more apart.

Resilience in an Age of Uncertainty
Given that we are facing the COVID-19 pandemic as a nation and global community, it is time to address a pressing question: How do we become resilient when adversity is upon us and we are unprepared? No one has all the answers, yet here are five critical ideas, or 5-Cs, you can personally put into practice immediately:

•  Calm Yourself: Overstimulated minds with information overload do not function optimally. You may have heard the adage about putting on your oxygen mask first so you can help others in an airline emergency. Prioritizing your well-being is essential now. Mindfulness of your own experience is a first step to establishing mental space so you can focus on developing a plan of action. The advice that says to “breathe” actually has a physiological basis. Deep, abdominal breathing massages the vagus nerve, which coaxes your parasympathetic nervous system into the relaxation response. To learn more about this phenomenon, see https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201705/diaphragmatic-breathing-exercises-and-your-vagus-nerve.  Mindfulness of your breath and body helps you catch yourself before you overreact. By short-circuiting an impulsive reaction, you can think and respond in ways that help not harm yourself and others. A small notebook or journal can help you become mindful of your moods and enable you to work through frustrations. These notebooks and journals will become treasure troves of adaptive strategies when you face adversity in the future. To learn about beginning journaling see; https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shyness-is-nice/201404/how-keep-thought-diary-combat-anxiety.
• Constitutional Care: No matter what stage you are in your life, when faced with long spans of unplanned time off, you may find that it is all too easy to lose track of your time and goals. This may result in feeling unmoored and drifting. Yes, take some time to regenerate your batteries while setting up a structure for your life – routines you can count on to give you a sense of purpose. Use this time for projects you have put on the back burner. On the other hand, burnout is a very real risk during times like this, especially if you are a caregiver. The oxygen mask metaphor applies again. You cannot help others if your well-being is at risk. You will be in better position to support others and recover your health, should something occur, when you have practiced regular self-care. Your own physical constitution is the foundation of immunity. Honor yourself by establishing daily routines for getting enough sleep, eating nourishing food, engaging in exercise for strength and balance. Get better sleep by implementing a bedtime ritual for slowing down from the day, like showering or listening to relaxing music. Plan your meals with balanced nutrition in mind and cook/freeze ahead to ease the stress of throwing something together at the last minute. Make exercise a self-care habit by making it fun. Keep it simple by taking your dog for a rigorous walk. Kick up your routine by a few notches with favorite tunes. Start a yoga or Pilates routine. If you would like to try a yoga routine at home, see https://www.yogajournal.com/practice/yoga-sequence-help-commit-daily-practice#gid=ci020756ab60152620&pid=cat-cow-pose.
• Connect with Others: Let’s dispel the myth that we must be self-reliant and solve our problems solo. Pandemics pose unique problems like health and financial stressors for individuals, yet pandemics are public health issues too. Individual problems cascade through society and are interrelated to the overall public well-being. As part of society, we are interconnected and interdependent through our communities and social systems. Just like you, others are experiencing similar worries, as well as their own unique set of problems. Going it alone to reinvent solutions is inefficient and unnecessarily painful. Reach out to your support system, being mindful to everyone’s safety – family, friends, communities, experts, and government representatives, especially those whom you find constructive and helpful. Stay connected through virtual means whether email, texting, video chats, and teleconferences. When social networking, keep it positive and useful. Venting occasionally may be cathartic, but limit it to a few minutes a day. Do not allow yourself to be engulfed in a vortex of negativity, which adversely affects your mental health. For more about how relationships can help you weather crises see https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-reconnect/201804/are-we-biologically-wired-help-others-during-crisis.
• Create Conditions for Problem Solving: No doubt, this pandemic will be catastrophic for many people. However, avoid catastrophizing as it is counterproductive to finding solutions that can reduce pain and improve outcomes. Wayne Dyer has said, “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” Shifting perspective can help you move out of the paralysis of panic toward problem solving. You can start shifting your perspective by creating conditions for constructive thought by tapping your resources. What enables you to be a creative thinker? What opens your vision to possibilities? It might be putting on some inspiring music, sitting down with a pen and paper, and brainstorming ideas. It may be burning off energy by running or dancing then using that flow to design a Mind Map of possibilities through an online tool like Coggle, see: https://coggle.it/. Try design thinking, see https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/design-thinking-explained. Another option is to press your critical thinking skills into service, see https://www.essentiallifeskills.net/thinkcritically.html.
• Conceptualize Success: Think back to when you successfully overcame an obstacle in your life or career. Reflect upon what went well, what did not go well, and what you would change. What skills did you call upon to overcome the obstacle? Write these ideas and thoughts in your journal. What can you draw upon that applies to your current dilemma? Did you reach out for certain resources or do research of your options? Whom did you call upon to help you? Do you know someone who has been in a similar situation and came through it well? If you have succeeded in dealing with a variety of challenges in the past, have confidence that you can do it again by identifying the relevant skills you used and modifying them for your current situation. Keep in mind, you can adjust your strategies along the way with different tactics. In your mind’s eye, visualize success. What does that look like to you? Hold that image in your mind and make it tangible with a drawing, diagram, or storyboard. Post it in visible place in your workspace. If you have children, involve them in the project and post it in a readily seen location in your home, like your kitchen. Creative visualization is a helpful technique, see https://www.newworldlibrary.com/Blog/tabid/767/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/35/Four-Basic-Steps-for-Effective-Creative-Visualization.aspx. Be sure to set up ways to hold yourself accountable, such as regular check-ins with a colleague, friend, or family member. Accountability incentivizes you to take action toward manifesting your vision – a key to success.

The 5-Cs - Calm, Connect, Create Conditions, Conceptualize, and Constitutional Care provide a solid foundation for building your resilience during uncertain times like these. Use these techniques to start your journey toward greater confidence and thriving despite chaos. Know in your heart that we are all in this together. Stay well!

You’ve likely seen the use of ∞ as a sign of infinity or eternity in mathematics, science, and elsewhere. The use of this symbol relative to resilience is evocative of the Adaptive Cycle researched and developed by Lance Gunderson and C.S. “Buzz” Holling, published in Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems (2002). Their model illustrates the cycle of adaptation as exploitation, conservation, release, and reorganization. My group development research drew parallels with this model extending it through principles of complexity – self-organization, hierarchy, emergence, and learning. This forms the foundation of learned resilience. Be sure to check out the blog and future newsletters for more details about how this cycle applies to you and your life.

Be sure to check out the just added newsletter section of the website. The first issue of the Learned Resilience Newsletter is hot off the keyboard! This newsletter will be published monthly to update you about current workshops, events, publications, and resources, as well as give you an inspirational boost.  Just click on the Newsletter tab to download the latest issue.  Enjoy!

Before we dive into whether or not resilience can be learned, let’s examine what makes for effective learning. In the West, formal education historically emphasized “book learning’, the accumulation of knowledge by passive reading. Book learning was accompanied by passive listening to lectures. Reading and listening were separate from experience, for example testing in a laboratory or in practice. Pause for a moment to imagine the challenges of learning about dynamic living systems by reading two-dimensional pages or chalkboards, often limited to black and white images, if any. Today, in a technologically enabled educational environment, it seems like an archaic way to learn. Book learning is not particularly accessible to those whose learning style is predisposed to kinesthetic and visual learning styles, as opposed to an auditory learning style (Markova, 1996).

Toward the end of the 20th century, educators recognized the limitations of passive, two-dimensional learning. They sought to improve learning outcomes with an eye toward comprehension, retention, and integration of cumulative knowledge with critical thinking in innovative ways such as assignments conducted in small groups (Springer, Stanne & Donovan, 1999). At the dawn of the 21st century, teaching emphasis shifted toward active student engagement – application of theory in practice - through experiential learning. During my dissertation research (2011, 2020), educators asked my thoughts about student learning through project teams. I observed that meaningful and long-lasting learning occurs when students not only combine theory and practice, but also when education incorporates regular reflection. Reflective learning through techniques like appreciative inquiry (Cooperrider & Srivastava, 1987), especially deployed throughout experiential learning and particularly during debriefing, closes the loop to reinforce lessons for future application by students. In future posts, I will discuss appreciative inquiry, debriefing, and other ways learned resilience is effectively achieved.

Returning to the “teach-ability” question, in my experience learned resilience is similar to other complex processes that result in sustained competency and intelligence. Learning is ideally a continuous cycle throughout life – personal and professional. It begins with acquisition and organization of information resources. Then, cognitive and operational frameworks develop using that information. Mental models form and can be formalized through design incorporating emergent ideas. Depending on their suitability, models are tested in laboratories, through simulations, or put in practice. The outcomes of implementation determine the extent of success or failure of the model. Repeatability necessitates evaluation no matter what the outcome for future refinement and application. Three critical questions must be addressed during debriefing:

• What went well and why?
• What did not go well and why?
• What needs improvement and how will it be resolved before moving forward?

These three questions are essential in cultivating resilience (Edson, 2011). To foster resilience, it is important to understand what resilience is and what it is not. Learned resilience is a cycle of adopting its principles, applying them in practice, and reflecting on the experience. This adaptive cycle is the nature of learned resilience throughout personal and professional life.

References:
Cooperrider, D. L., & Srivastava, S. (1987). Appreciative Inquiry in Organizational Life in Research in Organizational Change and Development: An Annual Series Featuring Advances in Theory, Methodology and Research

Edson, M.C. (2020, forthcoming). Team Systems Theory: Building Stakeholder Value through a Learning Culture for Organizational Resilience in The Handbook of Systems Science. Singapore: Springer.

Edson, M.C. (2011). A Systems Perspective of Resilience in a Project Team. Ann Arbor, MI: ProQuest.

Markova, D. (1996). The open mind: Exploring the 6 patterns of natural intelligence. Berkeley, CA: Conari Press.
 
Springer, L., Stanne, M. E., & Donovan, S. S. (1999). Effects of small-group learning on undergraduates in science, mathematics, engineering, and technology: A meta-analysis. Review of educational research, 69(1), 21-51.

Learned resilience is a successful result of an individual's, team's, or organization's adaptive capacity. Adaptive capacity is the extent to which an individual, team, or organization is effectively enabled to maintain  functional integrity during times of change, and adversity. Resilience is achieved through recovery and adjustment. Learned resilience is distinct in that learning is an essential competency in the construction of adaptive capacity. Reflective learning is applied during times of continual uncertainty to enable adaptation, innovation, and thriving.

Learned resilience contrasts with "learned helplessness". According the Maier and Seligman (1976, 2016), learned helplessness occurs when faced adversity, an individual "learns that its behavior and outcomes are independent, and this learning produces the motivational, cognitive, and emotional effects of uncontrollability." Learned helplessness stems from an individual's acceptance of their powerlessness. In sum, they give up. They discontinue attempts to escape or avoid the aversive stimulus, even when alternatives to it are evident.  They capitulate to circumstances, which results in undesirable outcomes. A common example learned helplessness is the overwhelmed college student who seeks the intervention of parents rather than proactively using university resources to address their concerns.

As opposed to learned helplessness, learned resilience enables awareness and agency to options available by cultivating self-reliance. Both terms are related to the psychological concept of "self-efficacy." According to Bandura (1982), self-efficacy is "how well one can execute courses of action required to deal with prospective situations."  In coaching, our goal is to help clients achieve self-efficacy and self-reliance, which includes building competencies like adaptive capacity.  

As your coach, I will help you develop learned resilience to face life's obstacles confidently.  In future postings, you'll have opportunities to find out more about the cycle of learned resilience and how to make it work for you.

References:
Bandura, A. (1982). Self-efficacy mechanism in human agency. American Psychologist. 37 (2): 122–147.  https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.37.2.122
Maier, S. F., & Seligman, M. E. (1976). Learned helplessness: Theory and evidence. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 105(1), 3–46. https://doi.org/10.1037/0096-3445.105.1.3
Maier, S. F., & Seligman, M. E. (2016). Learned helplessness at fifty: Insights from neuroscience. Psychological review, 123(4), 349–367. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000033

Sometime between college and 30 many adults begin to review their lives and ask, "Is that all there is?" The incredible pace of learning has slowed. Life's routines have become mundane. A rocketing career may be leveling off and not as engaging as it once was as unconscious competence sets in. What to do?

No doubt, reflection and review can be helpful. A career coach may be helpful to you in developing a sense of how far you have come and where you can go. Even so, a lingering question may remain. Even with a new career, new locations, new relationships, once you master these you will return to the same question, "Is there more?" Here is an approach to stay engaged life-long: Get curious and ask questions about everything that interests you. In other words: Develop a habit of life-long inquiry and learning.

As a professional coach, I have worked with recent college grads and early career professionals who are high performers yet disillusioned by their careers. They expected their brains to be fully engaged in problem solving and product/project development, which would give them a sense of fulfilling their potential - something they were told by adults when they were children along the lines of "You can be anything you want to be." For these clients, the day-to-day routine has become mind-numbing. They feel underemployed bordering on depression while pushing themselves to deliver high quality performance on the job. They dream of leaving their current employers to start new jobs, new careers, or new ventures. They may want to find new opportunities. Some feel trapped due to real life obligations. Even so, they acknowledge a reality and responsibility of making a living. So they continue to daydream about finding ways to fulfill their potential living with dissatisfaction setting up a vicious cycle of perturbation.

During coaching session, this sense of feeling trapped becomes evident quickly. There are a few approaches that can be taken. Generally, professional coaches will advise their clients to "keep their day jobs" while exploring new opportunities after hours, either as part-time ventures or hobbies. This is typically sound advice. Yet, there's another approach that doesn't get as much attention - developing a life of appreciative inquiry.

Appreciative inquiry (Cooperrider, 1995) can be viewed as a formal research method and an informal approach to investigating one's own life. It's a way toward self-determined change in individuals, groups, and organization. To learn more, check out:  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appreciative_inquiry

To leverage appreciative inquiry in your life, it helps to reframe one's thinking about life as a learning journey - that life is more about experiences and lessons learned along the way to develop wisdom rather than the destination itself. In other words, it's less about attaining the goal and more about what you learn along the way that lends value and meaning to life (Weick & Sutcliffe, 2009).

If you adopt this frame of thinking to your life, then appreciative inquiry is a helpful tool to begin understanding your life and your relationship to others and the world in constructive ways. In future posts, I will explain further how to use this approach to not only make sense of your life and engage fully in it, but also how to become comfortable with complexity and uncertainty, which are increasingly perplexing humans as they face increasing sociological alienation due to rapid technological advances resulting in isolation and pathology.  Today, it feels as if, on one hand, we're gulping life from a fire hose. That's all doing, doing, doing. On the other hand, we're wondering whether the numbing info overload is all there is. What's missing is human being, being, being. After all, we're human beings not human doings. Let's explore how to make your life's journey a worthwhile adventure in terms of human experience that you value most.