Happy New Year.... I hope your year is off to a good start. Thanks for coming back here for another visit, and for keeping the readership numbers on this newsletter  humming along. The numbers continue to increase each month, and they have been quite high over the holiday period, which I guess is the time we are more likely to relax and read things. The holiday period too, is the time that family stress levels can increase, due to a whole range of factors.

Here in Christchurch New Zealand, stress levels for many people have increased for another reason over the holiday period, namely the return of some quite nasty earthquakes, just when we were all beginning to relax and  enjoy their apparent departure. The experts are now telling us that we can expect earthquakes to come and go for the next 3-4 years. (Bruce groans loudly.....). With the latest round of quakes, the true gems of humanity, (who no doubt have high levels of resilience- an important topic for today) have been out and about helping folks. I wrote about them once before.

An important task for us all during the year ahead will be to reflect on how we will handle our own stress levels, which are in turn likely to be influenced for many of us here, by the earthquake factor. So I'm talking today about resilience, not only in the face of earthquakes, but all the other stressful events that life on this planet can throw at us. Part of being a living breathing human being, is remembering that with life, comes stress. Not just human-relationship type stress, but from time to time, stress comes from disasters of epic proportions. I for one, had gotten in to a long-standing and misguided belief that hard things dished out by Mother Earth (eg., fires, floods and other disasters) really only happen in other countries, and not in our cosy little corner of the world. Boy oh boy- how naive.

Our individual ability to deal with such external stress factors are in turn  shaped by our own levels of resilience. Some of us are likely to be more resilient than others, because pure and simply, that's the way we have been built, (though there is of course much more to individual resilience than pure biology). However, there are always things we can do, that will enhance our resilience, which in turn will equip us better to deal with the stressful stuff of life, be that earthquakes or whatever else that life launches in our direction.

 Some things to think about which will enhance resilience levels include the following:

1. Remember that it is our thinking about the stressful stuff in life that is crucial. This is so important- it is not the even itself, but what we actually think about the event. (Useful hint: will we be overwhelmed by the event, or will we remind ourselves that we can cope, that we have coped with challenging things before, and have survived them).
2. In the face of hard situations, do we model calmness and confidence for others (and therefore ourselves) around us, or do they instead see us as being panicky and overwhelmed? 
3. If you are feeling overwhelmed yourself, do you feel better if you are in the company of negative and agitated people, or are you better in the company of calm people who are practical and level-headed?
4. As I've stated before, even if we cannot always genuinely feel calm or confident, pretending to feel this can actually be a very important first step. 
5. Will you be resilient, or will you be resistant? Knowing that crises and difficult times are usually associated with change, can we accept change, and know that it is part of life, or do we find any change difficult? (Useful hint: remember that you have negotiated your way through much change in your life already....)
6. If the stressful event is occurring over an extended period of time, can you focus on other things, so that the stressful event does not become the total center of your being? (Useful hint: making yourself do other things, especially pleasurable things, will be important, even if to start with, it all feels a bit forced and shallow).
7. Know who your supports are. We are naturally more resilient when we can talk with others about what we are experiencing. This helps us to make sense of situations, to process and move forward. (Useful hint: if you notice the people you are talking to are getting too immersed in the conversation, that their own outlook is quite bleak and negative and you are feeling worse as a result, then it's time to be selective about who you talk to).
8. Weigh up whether you are proactive or reactive in the way you conduct your life. Admittedly it's hard to take charge of some events that can seem really huge. But it's still always important to be thinking about those day to day situations and how to stay in the driver's seat of our own lives. With the smaller events of life,  are you in charge of your life and charting the direction you want to be moving in, or are you instead just using all your energy to survive whatever difficult stuff next comes along?

Get an understanding of your own resilience levels by doing this quick quizz over at the psychology.com site.

Talk soon,

Bruce