Resilience might be eligible for word of the year. You hear it everywhere you go. We talked a lot about resilience during the Pandemic. How do we bounce back and adapt?
One definition of resilience is “The capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.”
Clearly, we need to embrace resilience as human beings. In a chaotic, unpredictable world where the only constant is change, you might drive yourself mad if you cannot adapt.
But more importantly, how is the skill of resilience strengthened, taught, or learned?
Today I share two examples from my childhood on how I learned resilience that I hope will not only enlighten you, but entertain you. (HINT: One involves my theater geek high school days!)
To access this episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Key Takeaways:
- Practice having a growth mindset – it is not about being externally praised, it is about your innate desire to practice and improve and look at what can be tweaked to change the outcome on your next attempt.
- Learn from those losses in your life. You can process the grief of losing but still embrace the opportunities in front of you.
- Try anyway! Even if you don’t have all of the boxes checked for whatever you’re aiming to do, try anyway, you may surprise yourself with what you do accomplish.
I learned from moments like that to process my grief over what I’d lost, but embrace what was in front of me – and make it my own. — Maria Ross
Episode References:
- Dinah Manoff from Grease: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001503/
- Growth Mindset: https://hbr.org/2016/01/what-having-a-growth-mindset-actually-means
- #Hypewomen: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hype-women/id1704488532
- Greater Good, Five Science-Backed Strategies to Build Resilience: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/five_science_backed_strategies_to_build_resilience
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FULL TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
Welcome to the empathy edge podcast the show that proves why cash flow creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I’m your host Maria Ross. I’m a speaker, author, mom, facilitator and empathy advocate. And here you’ll meet trailblazing leaders and executives, authors and experts who embrace empathy to achieve radical success. We discuss all facets of empathy from trends and research to the future of work to how to heal societal divisions and collaborate more effectively. Our goal is to redefine success and prove that empathy isn’t just good for society, it’s great for business.
Hi, welcome to this month’s hot take where you get me solo in your ear guest free. And I hope you’re having a wonderful February, the month of love, the month of Black History Month. And I hope you’re able to celebrate all forms of love, platonic love, romantic love, parent parental love, love for your job, love for your community, love for your pets.
All of the things, whether you’re celebrating with a romantic partner or you enjoy celebrating Galentine’s Day. I hope you have a wonderful month full of love and actually I hope you have a wonderful year full of love. But today I wanted to talk to you a little bit about resilience because resilience might be eligible for word of the year. You hear it everywhere you go. We talked a lot about resilience during the pandemic, and how do we bounce back and adapt. One definition of resilience is the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties or toughness. Now, clearly, we need to embrace resilience as human beings. In a chaotic, unpredictable world where the only constant is change. You might drive yourself mad if you can’t adapt. But more importantly, how is the skill of resilience strengthened, taught or learned, can only be built when you face change or disappointment? Is it kinda like skydiving, like you only learn how to really do it by jumping out of the plane? And how can I teach it to my son before he actually needs to draw on it. So thinking back, I got lessons in resilience and rejection early from professional acting as a child where I never held on to any one opportunity to lightly and was on to the next if I wasn’t cast to participating in plays at school. While I got many juicy roles in school plays I remember the ones that stung, particularly one a school theater director organized a joint seventh, eighth and ninth grade summer production of the musical Grease and I wanted to be Marty Mara Tino so badly. She was the sophisticated red haired Pink Lady brilliantly portrayed by Dinah man off in the movie version. My favorite line of hers was on Marty Mara Tino as in Cherry. Before the audition, I studied the lines I watched the movie, I perfected my sex pot pout, even though I had no idea what I was doing it 1314 15 However, however old you are, when you’re in eighth grade ninth grade, the director somehow knew I wanted the role so it was mine to lose and lose. I did. While I have been a choir singer for a very long time. I was and still am very insecure about singing solo. So I bombed the singing portion of the audition, singing Freddie my love off key and likely to softly the director even sharply I might add, ask me later what happened? I don’t know. But the role went to a much more deserving classmate who did a fabulous job. And I got the part of Dorothy the cheerleader. I loved that my school plays would often give names to the extras so we didn’t have to simply be known as cheerleader number five, but I could play Dorothy and give her a whole backstory. I got to be an every dance number I sported a very fun fifth. cheerleading outfit. And I even got to do the hand jive with a cute boy during the big dance scene. I learned from moments like this to process my grief over what I’d lost, but embrace what was in front of me and make it my own. Play Dorothy to the hilt and perhaps, maybe even steal the show. I mean, I was voted best pickpocket in the seventh grade production of Oliver. Another unexpected resilience lesson came when I was in middle school. I desperately wanted to be on the drill team, which was the middle schools and high schools dance squad. I loved to dance, channeling Whitney Houston and Janet Jackson with my bestie to their iconic 80s hits on her living room couch. I even gained some brief notoriety with an unforeseen gift and rhythm for Dirty Dancing. We shall not speak of this. But my Achilles heel was not being able to do the splits. Despite being you know, a person who took ballet and gymnastics as a little girl, this flexibility eluded me, I even remember following random remedies like stretching after a hot bath or doing five minutes a day of slips against a wall. If you were on the drill team, you knew how to do the splits, high kicks and all of that. But that didn’t stop me from trying out three years in a row. I tried out in seventh, eighth, and then ninth grade for the high school team. The feedback, I nailed the routines. My smile was magnetic, but I couldn’t do the kicks or splits. And competition was fierce. So others made the team when I did not. With each disappointment, I still got up and tried out the following year. What can I do better? How could I finally limber up enough to do the splits? Could I make up for this inability with precision moves and bringing the energy. They now call this a growth mindset. But it just came naturally to me. It wasn’t about being praised. It was about my own innate desire to practice and improve. What could I tweak to change the outcome next time. A popular girl’s mom was on the selection committee one year and even told her to tell me how amazing I was at tryouts that I had such a great smile, but that the splits stopped me. But here was what I consider the truest test of resilience. Back then there was no email. So you had to go to the school on the designated day and check the list posted on the door to see if you made it or not. Once again, my name was not on it. But two of my good friends were. And I remember being on the phone in my kitchen with one of them. As we compared notes, weeping in silence. As we talked, I found a way to share in her excitement, through tears. She didn’t know I was crying. I said I’m so happy for you. You deserve this. She said all the right things that she was sorry. And it wasn’t fair. But in the end, she made it and I didn’t. on that phone call at the tender age of 13. I learned how to hold my own disappointment and check while still being happy for my girlfriend. Talk about hashtag hype women. Thank you, Aaron Gallagher for naming this needed ability, starting this movement in 2023. And showing how it only lifts all of us up. None of this answers my initial question about how you can teach resilience without any real fire actually testing your strength. There are some great science backed ways presented in an article by greater good on ways to build resilience. And I will put that link in the show notes. Some of their advice, change the narrative, face your fears, practice self compassion, meditate and cultivate forgiveness. But I submit that these are more like things you can do to shore up your foundation. So when you need to practice resilience, you’re ready. I don’t know if these tips actually build resilience because I’m still not sure it can be built until you’re actually tested. I believe that they make your internal landscape more amenable and open to resilience. They seed the soil, so to speak. Happy to hear other opinions about this. So ping me on Instagram or LinkedIn. I’m curious how you have learned resilience in your own life as a child or an adult? Do you intentionally do things to set up a better environment for yourself to be resilient when you need it? Did you have good role models? Or was this something you had to teach yourself? Please let me know. As you think about resilience as you think about shoring up your foundation. I hope you go on to have a wonderful week. And until next time here on the empathy edge. Remember that cash flow, creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care and be kind. For more on how to achieve radical success through empathy, visit the empathy edge.com. There you can listen to past episodes, access shownotes and free resources. Book me for a Keynote or workshop and sign up for our email list to get new episodes insights, news and events. Please follow me on Instagram at Red slice Maria never forget empathy is your superpower use it to make your work and the world a better place.
