Consistency is the Key to Resilience

Last week, we talked about men­tal health and pro­vid­ed some resources to get edu­cat­ed and to get help, if you or some­one you know needs it.

But you don’t have to wait until you need help to be proac­tive. Start to build the habits that build your strength and resilience, now. You’ll be bet­ter equipped to han­dle stress­ful sit­u­a­tions, when the come, and recov­er more quick­ly when you’re hit by some­thing rough. 

Con­sis­tent resilience rit­u­als are a pow­er­ful strat­e­gy to help you to thrive and sus­tain high per­for­mance no what­ev­er life throws at you.

These are the rit­u­als which charge your ener­gy bat­ter­ies, calm you down and make you stay excit­ed about your life and your work.

Your Rit­u­als, Your Choice

These rit­u­als aren’t pre­scrip­tive. No-one tells you what to do or how to do it.

Some peo­ple need time in nature and oth­ers vol­un­teer or paint. You chose the activ­i­ties that are most enjoy­able and mean­ing­ful to you that:

• Take care of your body to keep you fit and strong
• Take care of your mind to help you men­tal­ly re-centre
• Take care of your spir­it, light you up inside and give your life meaning

Just as you com­mit your time and ener­gy to oth­ers, this is the time you com­mit to your­self and your wellbeing.

And resilience rit­u­als are non-nego­tiable. No cheat­ing. No procrastinating.

An Evolv­ing Practice

As I look back, I real­ize that my resilience rit­u­als have con­tin­ued to evolve, through­out my life.

When I wrote it Your Oxy­gen Mask First, my rit­u­als includ­ed more adren­a­line-induc­ing activ­i­ties like dri­ving rac­ing cars, motor­cy­cles, and dirt and snow bikes.

Now that I’m in a dif­fer­ent stage of life, with my kids grown and doing their own thing, I find that my pri­or­i­ties are spend­ing qual­i­ty time with them and oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers, and mak­ing sure I have enough recov­ery time because my life is busier than ever. My rit­u­als include pro­tect­ing at least a four-hour block of time, on the week­end, with no plans, and no com­mit­ments. This is time to do what­ev­er I want – or not.

Resources 

• Cre­ate your Resilience Rit­u­als using the Your Oxy­gen Mask First Work­book (page 20 – 23).
• Com­plete the Your Oxy­gen Mask First Self-Assess­ment Tool to iden­ti­fy what you need to do to be much more effec­tive, in the next three to six months. It takes less than five minutes.
• Watch my Resilience Rit­u­als webi­nar here.

The Chal­lenge

• In terms of your resilience rit­u­als, what do you need to start doing, or change doing?

Oth­er Blogs

• Dou­ble Your Per­son­al Resilience
• Charg­ing Your Batteries
• Are You Get­ting Sev­en Kinds of Rest?

Old­er Podcasts

• How to Pre­vent Mondayitis