 Welcome back to happiness isn't brain surgery with Doc Snipes practical tools to improve your mood and quality of life We're going to finish our third and final segment on building resilience in This section we're going to explore the concept of hardiness as it relates to resilience Learn how to bolster your reserves that we kept talking about in the last section develop a crisis plan and Look at how to become your own MacGyver using learned resourcefulness So hardiness is a concept that was proposed back in the late 1970s and in which It was proven that people who have three characteristics commitment control and challenge tend to bounce back or are more resilient from physical health problems like Open heart surgery then other people and they went on in the 80s to do more study to found find out that the same is true for mental health issues. So depression and anxiety and Situations that cause you emotional upset people tend to bounce back from those better if they've got commitment control and challenge But what are those commitment to what? Commitment means big commitment to a various areas of life Resulting in a sense of purpose that can carry you through turbulent times. So There are a lot of aspects of your life your family life your work life your health and fitness life your hobbies your pets All all different things that are probably very important to you So when something bad happens if you can focus on those things that are important to you You can recognize What you also have going for you. There is this setback here this unpleasant thing, but there are all these other Things that you're committed to keeping going keeping moving forward too. So, okay In order to keep moving towards those things, how can I deal with this current situation? So your commitment to achieving your goals your Commitment to becoming the person you want to be can help you look at something bad that happens and figure out Alright, how do I integrate this into the plan? It's kind of like if you're going on a road trip Somewhere and about halfway to where you're going you get a flat tire Well, that's an unpleasant event. It kind of stops you in your tracks for a second But then you're committed to getting to your destination. So you call triple-a or put on the spare tire or do something like that Control is the next characteristic Understanding what is and is not within your control Something happens, you know, let's say with the flat tire metaphor for a moment. That's unpleasant You may get angry at first. It's like kind of put a damper on the plans and it's going to put us behind But you are in control of your thoughts reactions behavior and environment So ideally before you left you made sure that you had a spare tire that would kind of be the environment thing But you're also in control of your thoughts reactions and behavior so you can either focus on how horrible it is how hot it is outside how Unfortunate how late you're going to be and all the negative stuff or you can focus on the fact that well We were able to safely pull over to the side. We're going to be a little bit late, but you know Nothing catastrophic happened here. So you can choose how you look at the situation You can choose what you continue to tell yourself if you continue to tell yourself Angry stressful things you're going to continue to surge cortisol and adrenaline and just drain yourself dry and Challenge viewing the situation as a challenge instead of a threat Accepting that change is a normal part of life. So looking at the situation and going, you know, what this wasn't what I anticipated I Didn't anticipate having to get a new tire right now didn't anticipate having to spend the money But you know what I'm going to drop back in punt because there's nothing I can do about it. So Let's figure out how to make this work There are other situations that we can look at this For example if If you're in a job and you really don't like your job But you're committed to those other aspects of your life keeping a roof over your head and your family and all that kind of stuff So you're like, okay I'm committed to achieving these other goals for right now This job is what's putting food on the table and helping me achieve those goals It's also got a lot of unpleasant stuff associated with it. All right, so there's the commitment Control is looking at what is and is not within your control. Can you change whatever's unpleasant about the job? Maybe maybe not Can you change your reaction to it at least for the short term? Now that you can do you could say, all right, maybe your boss is an unreasonable witch You can breathe and think to yourself. All right, you know, every time she speaks to me I'm going to tell myself something positive And and that's going to help me get through it or I'm gonna remember that this is only a short-term situation And in that situation you do have control over whether you stay at that job So you may choose to change jobs completely which is changing the environment So there are things within your control can they happen as quickly as you want like tomorrow? No You know It may take a little while before you can find another job that enables you to leave the one you don't like But it gives you hope and it is a challenge to help you work toward You know your future goals And then again viewing the situation is a challenge All right, this isn't a threat. It's not going to kill me to continue to work here it's Something that I've got to figure out how to deal with and that's the change that's the normal part of life Normally you would probably prefer To do things one way But in this particular job with this particular boss, you've got to do it some way that seems completely basakwards But that's okay. You can say all right Change is a normal part of life. I need to breathe, you know, I'm not going to get my way on this one And then, you know, when I find a new job, then I can move on so I can endure this for the short term So you've got commitment control and challenge. This helps you handle unpleasant events when they come your way But as we've talked about in the last two segments, you need to be healthy ahead of time. You need to be strong You need to be resilient. You need to be on your a game as much as possible ahead of time So bolster your reserves by engaging in positive health behaviors And that's between you and your physician generally But basically nutrition sleep exercise sunlight, you know Don't use use reviews drugs Recreation it's important. So is relaxation. Why? Why do I have these here? How can those bolster your reserves? Well, your body is either relaxing or it's in or In a fight or flight sort of mode. There's very little middle ground there So if you're always in fight or flight, then you're always draining your reserves You're always draining that battery if you are relaxing Then you're helping Store up some of that energy think about it like plugging your phone in, you know, when you are Plugged in and you have the phone sitting on the desk. It is relaxing. It is charging up. There's nothing draining the battery When you're working And or when you're talking on your phone and you're playing on your phone and doing whatever else And draining the battery Then it's not recharging and even if you have it plugged in is not going to recharge as quickly So you need to take some time out to allow yourself To recharge But what about recreation? How does that fit in that takes the energy to go out and have fun? Yes, it does But again, it's kind of this mixture you have your stress chemicals Your fight or flight chemicals and you have your relaxation chemicals If you're not pushing out those stress chemicals, then how about increasing those relaxation chemicals to help you feel happy Imagine that so you're having this balance And ideally you want to have More amount of a greater amount of time each day that has happy chemicals and calm chemicals flowing through your body Then the stress chemicals And engage in purposeful action to avoid wasting energy You know, there's a lot of stuff that we do that you look back and you're like, you know what? That wasn't necessary This past week couple of weeks i've been sick And normally I do laundry every single weekend and it's just one of those things that I do And last weekend I didn't do laundry because I was just I couldn't do it And you know this weekend i'm getting ready to Do laundry But nobody died there was no major consequence because I skipped a week Of doing laundry in order to take care of myself and rest and recharge So looking at that purposeful action, you've got to balance what you're doing with what's important to you And what your body needs at the moment because some days you're just not going to be able to give a hundred percent Have a crisis plan It's a whole lot better to have a plan ahead of time than to try to figure out something when you're in crisis So know ahead of time write it down. So it's right there When something bad happens How can you get a grip? How can you get control of things for me? I'm an extrovert. I tend to talk it out Other people will go on a run go on a walk if they're more introverted because they need to clear their head Whatever works for you, but since I need to talk it out It usually helps if I have somebody to talk it out with So I have a list of people that you know my common contacts that you know, I can call and just kind of vent if I'm having a bad day That's step one in my plan for emotional regulation Ask yourself does staying miserable serve a purpose You know if you're feeling unhappy Just ask yourself what can I do to not feel miserable or to improve the next moment Another thing you can do if this unpleasant feeling is still hanging on a little bit Redirect your anger or fear impulses metaphorically. So if you want to rip somebody a new one Well, you know people feel that way sometimes One of the things you can do is get out an old phone book or something that needs to be shredded And just shred the heck out of it tear paper If you feel like you just you want to escape you want to run away. You got to get away from it all Go on a run go on a hike out in at a at a state park or something If you feel like you need to get something off your chest do some push-ups You know it is a metaphorical way of handling it But it can help you kind of diffuse some of that initial rush of adrenaline and fight-or-flight energy Identify and address the problem. Yeah, this wasn't first. Was it this was second when something happens Your first the first time you realize there's a problem is when you start feeling angry or scared or Devastated. All right So you need to get that feeling under control for half a second So then you can say, all right What is really going on here? This is when you're getting into your wise mind and you can say This is the situation. What are my options? And you can start creating a plan for figuring out how you're going to integrate this how you're going to deal with it and integrate it into Your life because it is what it is. You can't make it go away now Look at what must be done Who can you call on for social support? And what boundaries do you need to set when you are feeling? You know completely overwhelmed or anxious or whatever So these are all things that you need to think of kind of ahead of time What is it that you need When you're in crisis and what is it that you can do to deal with that initial flood of emotions? When efforts to change something are successful then your expectations are often generalized to other situations So if you ever watched the show magai ever back from the 80s MacGyver could take, you know a match book a twist tie from a pack of bread and a bottle of alcohol And figure out how to escape a prison. I don't know how he did it But he was always able to put stuff together and somehow get out of sticky situations Well, normally you wouldn't think of a match book and a twist tie and a bottle of alcohol as really all that significant Well, those were resources that he had. Remember we keep talking about building up resources. So emotionally and and Cognitively you want to have as many resources as you can and in your environment You want to have as many resources as you can. So when stuff Happens You can draw on those resources and go okay. I have all this at my disposal How can I best use it to help me get through this situation? When you're doing that Focusing on previous successes will help you feel more confident and competent. Remember those two C's Look at others who are similar who have succeeded, you know, if they've dealt with other things This is why support groups are so wonderful um For people who have experienced some sort of a loss or who are experiencing chronic pain Because they're able to see other people and learn from other people's strengths and coping skills And elicit positive self-talk and supportive statements from yourself But also from others Get a get a cheering section get a crowd go on that can go you got this, you know, it stinks right now What can I do to help you? And manage your physical arousal Using radical acceptance and distress tolerance skills because if you continue to get emotionally Blinded if you will whenever you have that adrenaline rush, you're not thinking as clearly as possible You're probably going to make mistakes. So if you can control that emotional arousal and just Moment by moment when you feel a feeling except what it is and say how can I improve the next moment? If you feel another unpleasant feeling say all right It's back. It is what it is. How can I improve the next moment? This is one of the ways that when I experience a loss I deal with it because initially you think about it a lot And it comes back and you're like, oh crap. I'm thinking about it again And okay, you know instead of getting upset and beating myself up for thinking about it again. I go, okay Yeah, that happened can't change it. What can I do to improve the next moment? So when life sucks, what can you do? support others Reach out and try to help others feel better. You can get outside of yourself So you're not focusing as much on what's devastating you at the moment, especially if it's something unchangeable like a loss Take stress breaks You can't focus on solving a problem 24 hours seven days a week You know focus for an hour or two on whatever it is. This is why counseling you do it for an hour once a week Or an hour a couple of times a week, but you're not doing it 17 hours a day even when I worked in residential treatment We had four hours of therapy a day and that was it the rest of it was Dedicated to relaxation recreation and rejuvenation So it's important to take stress breaks and get some fun in there get some relaxation remember your comebacks Because you're going to get knocked down sometimes, but remember the fact that you have bounced back before Identify your strengths and resources. So when life sucks, you go, okay What is it that I have to get done right now? And how can I pull on my strengths and resources to get this done? most efficiently and effectively Take care of yourself physically Even when life sucks, you know, we talked about building resources But when something bad happens, it's easy to either sleep too much or not sleep enough or stop start drinking alcohol Or do things that are unhelpful to allowing our body to make the Hormones and chemicals it needs to help us feel happier and deal with the stressors as they're coming Practice radical acceptance recognizing that each moment is the opportunity for a new beginning What happened happened and now we're past it now what? View adversity as an opportunity for growth I love this when people say it to me right after something adverse has happened, but it's true So when something bad happens go, okay What can I learn from this and What's my next step? practice optimism recognizing what you do have or an attitude of gratitude if you will And focus on small positive changes, you know, if something happens life sucks and You're not dealing with it really well, okay? Well, if you start dealing with it a little bit better give yourself A pat on the back, you know, if you went from crying Six or seven times a day to only crying three or four times a day That's positive forward movement if you went from not being able to get out of bed at all To being able to be up for two or three hours That's real positive forward movement So don't expect to go from being bedridden to running a marathon in a month Focus on the small incremental positive changes That are helping you move forward to get through whatever this tragedy was that made life suck Focus on those things you can control by changing the situation causing the distress if it's possible Sometimes it's not possible You know, if there's a death you can't change that If you are working in a place at a job that's really unpleasant you may not be able to change that There are certain situations that you just can't change when after the last election people were just devastated for months You know, you can't change the election it happened. So you can't Get that get the current president out of office right now Now in the future could you well, yeah So if you want to focus on trying to put a better candidate up against him in the next election that you can do But focusing on changing the election that already happened you couldn't So sometimes you can't change the situation. So if you can't then you step back Control the meaning of the situation the severity the importance and how much you're personally responsible You know in the big scheme of things how much Is this really going to negatively impact your life And what can you do to buffer against that? Once you go through that you're probably going to realize that there are some still some things that are sucky about it And it may have some negative impact on your life And the only thing you can do at at that point once you have tried to change the situation or Controlled the meaning so it wasn't all your fault or it wasn't totally devastating. You're looking at the positives You're looking at what you can control The next thing you can do is control the stress response by practicing relaxation Exercise and I have here verbal or written expression either talk it out or journal about it to try to help get it out so you're not mulling it over constantly and Continuing to tell yourself negative stuff sometimes if you just get it out on paper Then you don't have to think about it Commitment control and challenge are all aspects of responding to a stressor which increase resilience So focus on all those things that you're committed to when something happens along the way Look at it and go. Okay. How can I? Address this situation and keep moving forward towards what's important to me Focus on those things that you can control And let go of the ones that you can't otherwise you're just you know trying to move a house 10 feet by pushing it with your shoulder It ain't gonna do any good and you're just gonna wear yourself out And look at things as a challenge as an opportunity to learn new skills or to figure out something new about yourself Remember that even the best vehicles can't run without energy So to be as resilient as possible you must take care of yourself and have energy in your proverbial reserves When bad things happen accept that they are without fighting or telling yourself what should or should not happen And just stop and say okay What now how can I improve the next moment? When answering the what now or how can I improve the next moment question? Remember your goals and values and choose actions and reactions that move you closer to those things And people which are most important to you instead of Saying okay, what now well, I need to escape. I need to have a drink Well, does having a drink get you closer to those things and people that are important to you? Probably not So this comes to the purposeful action. So commitment control and challenge Ask yourself When something bad happens What's the next step to get me closer to my goals? And choose those actions that do get you closer to your goals If you like this podcast, you can subscribe on your favorite podcast app Join our facebook group at docsnipes.com slash facebook or join our community and access additional resources at docsnipes.com