Building Resilience
What is it and what builds it
Ed Sipler
South Eastern Trust
February, 2104
A way of working together…
What ground rules can
we agree on?
What ground rules can we
agree on?
Why is resilience and mental
health important? Mental health is the
• There is no health
without mental
health
• By 2020 mental
disorders are
expected to be
second only to
heart disease as a
leading source of
disease.
emotional and
spiritual resilience
which enables us to
enjoy life and to
survive pain,
disappointments and
sadness. It is a
positive sense of well
being and an
underlying belief in
our own and others
dignity and worth.
NI Promoting Mental
Health Strategy
What do you think resilience
means?
• The word “resilience” is derived from
the Latin verb “salire,” which means
to jump. The prefix “re-“ means
“back” or “again.” Thus, “resilience” is
literally about jumping back.
RESILIENCE is…
The capacity for healthy development and
successful learning in spite of challenges.”
( B Benard )
Resilience is the capacity to spring back,
rebound, successfully adapt in the face of
adversity and develop social, academic, and
vocational competence despite being exposed
to extreme stress or simply to the stress that is
inherent in today’s world. (Henderson and
Milstein, 1996)
The challenge of promoting
resilience
While our understanding of processes that
promote resilience is extensive, we need a better
range of practical applications.
A ray of hope
One of the most important thing things that
came out of the years of research is that
“there is no age that has a monopoly on risks
and no age beyond which it is too late to
intervene”. (Rutter 2000)
Are we born with resilience or is it
shaped?
•
•
•
•
Risk factors are cumulative
Transition points are both
threats and opportunities
Acute stresses are usually
less harmful than chronic
ones
Building our strengths or
assets
How resilient are you?
Road to resilience…
Models of building resiliency
What we do does
matter.
Resilience can be
built
The Road to Resilience
We just need to
know how
Opportunities Positive
For Meaningful Relationships
Participation & Bonding
Set and
Communicate
High
Expectations
Provide
Care
And
Support
Set Clear,
Consistent
Boundaries
Teach
Life-Skills
Factors
that build
resilience
Adopted from
Resiliency in
Schools Making it
happen for Students
and Educators,
Henderson and
Milstein 1996
The 7 C’S
Kenneth Ginsburg
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Competence
Confidence
Connection
Character
Contribution
Coping
Control
Building blocks of resilience
I have, I am , I can
• I HAVE
• I AM:
• I CAN
• Supports and supportive
people around each
individual to promote
resilience
• Inner strengths of
confidence, self-esteem,
and responsibility
• Use and develop
skills/make use of support
Grotberg, E. (1997) ‘The
international resilience
project’.
Strengths related to
resilience
Being in charge of our emotions
Create thinking time
Analyzing the cause of problems
Maintaining realistic optimism
Having empathy for others
Believing in our own competence
Reaching out
Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte (2003)The Resilience Factor
Which do you like best?
Building skills that build resilience- Low
Intensity CBT Tools: Build on skills found in
INSYNC
• Building resilience
thinking
• Self Calming
• Deep core beliefs
• Self care- Feeling
positive in the midst
of stress
• Using support
• Principles of coping
• Action plan
What do you think of this
statement?
We can’t control
everything that
happens to us.
What we can control
is how we how we
react.
How our thinking manages our
emotions
Feelings
Thinking
Calm times
Strong emotions
Our Thinking Affects What We
Feel and Do
Something happens. We think about it. We respond.
Events
Thoughts
Response
To help us, let’s think of it as learning our ABC’S:
• (A) Something bad happens (Adversity)
• (B) We have certain thoughts (Beliefs)
• (C) Feelings/behaviour follow (Consequences )
What influences our thinking?
Unhelpful thinking
habits that are automatic
Style of explaining things
Emotional and physical
well being
Core beliefs about
ourselves and the world.
(Rules, demands,
assumptions)
How can we deal with stress? It is
more than just “think positive”. It is
about recognizing our feelings and
developing “good thinking skills”
Why the ABC’s are so important:
The B/C connections
Thoughts
•
•
•
•
Feeling attacked, our rights violated…
Loss or loss of self worth ………
Future threat ……………………
Comparing yourself others neg
• Hurting someone else……………
Feelings
Anger
Sadness
Fear. Anxiety
Embarrassment
Guilt
The beliefs (our thinking) matter because they will shape the intensity
of our feelings and what we do. When we are more resilient we
are not saying we don’t have strong feelings… We are able to
regulate and control them to respond to situations in ways that work
better for us.
Ten Common Unhelpful Thinking
Habits
Have we learned
to view life and
every day
situations with
negative goggles
on?
All or nothing thinking
Jumping to
conclusions
Overgeneralising
Making a mountain
out of a mole hill
Emotional reasoning
Should Statements
Taking things
personally
Wishful thinking
Mental filter
Discounting the
positive
The change skills
• Catching that unhelpful, initial reaction
• Putting on the brakes. Stopping that chain
of unhelpful self talk
• Create thinking time. Examine what is
really going on
• Being flexible and creative in your
thinking. Challenging negative thinking
Substitute more reasonable thinking
Looking After Yourself
So what is stress?
Stress is the perception that
something is more of a problem than
the resources you have for coping
with it.
Stress puts your well being at risk.
Using positive emotions in the midst
of stress
1. Notice
positive things
2. Express these positive things
3. Gratitude
4. Mindfulness
5. Positive rethinking
6. Focus on your strengths
7. Attainable goals
8. Acts of kindness
I would like to share a poem to
finish today with: Attitude
Found in the Bouncing
Back workbook on
page 14
Our other work
• Self help materials for
adults and young people
affected by substance
misuse in the family
• Self help material to help
people look at their
drinking or drug use
• Self help material to help
people change
behaviour
All these resources can be
found on the South Eastern
Trust web site the under
healthy living tab
www.alcoholandyouni.com
Thanks for having me here today
“Blessed are the flexible, for
they shall not be bent out of
shape.”
Dr. Michael McGriffy
ed.sipler@setrust.hscni.net