10 Tips to Build your Psychological Resilience

A crucial component of living a healthy lifestyle is injury prevention, a topic we focus on a lot at Lifemark. We encourage you to stretch properly to avoid a sprain or wear the correct shoes to minimize shin splints, but what about when it comes to your mental health?

You can prevent an “injury” to your mind, so to speak, by building up your psychological resilience.

Psychological resilience is defined as “an individual's ability to successfully adapt to life tasks in the face of social disadvantage or other highly adverse conditions. Adversity and stress can come in the shape of family or relationship problems, health problems, or workplace and financial worries, among others.”

10 Ways to Change your Mindset about Overcoming Adversity

1. Keep a gratitude diary - Every day, write down something for which you are grateful. You can be as detailed as you like, or simply keep it to a sentence.
    
2. Build a social support network - Having a strong social support system (ie. friends, family, co-workers or mentors) is an important factor for a healthy, low stress life.
    
3. Perform an act of kindness - Do one kind thing daily for yourself, a loved one, and a stranger. It's as simple as holding a door open, giving a compliment, or making a trip to your favourite coffee shop. 
    
4. Do what you enjoy – Carve out time in your day to do something that you enjoy; reading, exercising, watching a movie, or visiting with a friend or family member.
    
5. Embrace change - You don't have control over everything. Sometimes this can be frightening and lead to more stress. Learn to accept change and how to cope with it.
    
6. Be optimistic - Think on the bright side! Life isn't always easy but you find ways to make it a little better. See failure as an opportunity for growth and helpful feedback.
    
7. Establish goals - Daunting tasks can be overwhelming, so take a step back to assess, brain storm solutions, and create small reasonable steps to manage circumstances.
    
8. Ask for help - Knowing when to ask for help is essential. During a time of intense difficulty, it can be beneficial to consult with a qualified mental health professional. They can help you confront the problem and develop new coping strategies. Support groups, message boards, and books are other sources of assistance that can provide continual support and motivation.
    
9. Focus on progress, not goals - Yes, establish goals, but remember it is easy to become discouraged when you focus on the gap between your current circumstance and your preferred circumstance. Set yourself up for success by acknowledging your progress - this will reinforce further action and your goals will be attainable.
    
10. Nurture a positive view of yourself - Identify your strengths and develop confidence in your abilities. We are quick to pinpoint our faults, and to some degree this may facilitate change in behaviour, but it's important to foster a positive mindset.
     

Integrate these tips into your daily routine and you’ll start to build up your mental fortitude in no time!