Self Care and Resiliency: How to Build a Healthy Outlook in Difficult Times - Career Success Tips
Over the past few months, the #BEheard Blog featured a series on Remaining Resilient in a challenging and ever-changing economy, covering topics from how managers can keep remaining team members motivated to how employees can set boundaries at work as their responsibilities change.
Whether you have been through a recent job loss, had to adjust to co-workers no longer being a part of your day-to-day, or are faced with the task of managing a team that looks a little different than it did a few weeks or months ago, prioritizing self-care and keeping a resilient attitude will be essential to weathering the storm.
But what exactly is resiliency, and how does it differ from self-care?
The (Non-Commodified) Principles of Self-Care
The term “self-care” is becoming very familiar these days. Especially since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, companies have been using the term with more frequency than ever before, both as a marketing ploy and a well-intentioned reminder that there’s a limit to how much stress we can endure at a given time.
Self-care is a critical step before resiliency. It can include a day at the spa, yoga, guided meditations, or any other small luxuries we may want to enjoy, but the concept is much bigger than that; it’s about nourishing your body and mind with no end goal other than your health.
There are the basic steps, of course: clean eating, exercise, the occasional digital detox, and getting enough rest are essential to keeping us feeling healthy and sane, but additional practices are key to counteracting the physical symptoms of stress. Yoga and other exercises that focus heavily on stretching will help repair the damage we do to our bodies when we sit at a desk all day; breathing exercises will help calm a constantly spinning mind; meditating will help train our brains to realize that the world will not fall apart if we step away from our phones for a few hours; and affirmations about our goals and our self-worth will help us weather the hit our self-esteem is likely to take when we encounter such challenges.
In our busy and often over connected yet disconnected world, it’s easy to forget the important role our community plays in our well-being. Reaching out to people who can help you process a loss, vent frustrations, or endure the sting of rejection during a job search keeps us feeling supported and cared for. As part of your self-care practices, don’t forget to nurture your connections, both personal and professional, in order to maintain a sense of community.
Resiliency: How to Pick Yourself Up and Keep Moving Forward
Resiliency takes the principles of self-care a step further by incorporating a strategy for getting yourself back into the ring. It’s a culmination of long-term skills we strive to develop over a lifetime of challenges that help us feel confident we can survive whatever dark times may be ahead.
Resiliency includes finding a positive outlook or silver lining in a difficult situation and maintaining hope that better things will come as a result of a current setback, no matter how discouraging it may feel in the moment. Negative experiences are hard to endure, but they are often our most valuable opportunities to learn how to move forward, ensuring one bad experience doesn’t determine what happens in the future.
For example, if you froze during an important presentation at work, the first step will be acknowledging what was in or out of your control: did you need to set aside more time to practice, or did the internet in your building cut out at the wrong moment? Next, define key elements that were the most challenging: were you intimidated because your boss was present? Was it harder than you expected to speak from memory? Finally, make a plan to address those challenges. If you’re unsure of how to take that step, private coaching can be very effective in helping you identify and break down barriers that are holding you back.
It also means developing healthy coping skills so a bad situation isn’t made worse by taking out a bad mood on a loved one or searching for temporary relief in unhealthy habits, and having those skills, like exercising or fostering beloved hobbies, already incorporated into our everyday lives.
Most importantly, a key part of building resiliency is accepting a situation for what it is. You may be in a challenging moment, but a bad situation is not a reflection of your worth or evidence that your life or career are doomed; it may be a temporary source of stress, but it is not a permanent state of being.
If you’re able to find a healthy mentality in the midst of a difficult time, it can be extremely helpful to turn your attention to helping others. It’s tempting to believe we need to be hyper-focused on finding solutions 100% of the time, but by getting out of your own head, you will be teaching your brain that putting your problems aside for a minute to help someone else with theirs will not be a detriment to your productivity. It will also keep you out of a depressive spiral and prevent you from becoming your own bully.
A healthy practice of self-care will help to build a resilient mindset, and a resilient mindset will help you feel emotionally secure, optimistic, confident in setting boundaries that will benefit your mental wellness, and ready to tackle the inherently vulnerable task of putting yourself out there.
About the Author
Jackie Miller launched Bespoken in 2015 to channel years of professional performance experience into techniques that improve public speaking, presenting, and professional communication skills. She holds a B.F.A. and M.A. both from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.
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