Does taking control of the change, mean resilience?
I moved to the UK a few years ago from Bulgaria. Since I moved, I discovered a massive
difference between people from home and here, when it comes down to resilience and well
being.
Many times I have witnessed people going on stress leave from work, which is something that I
have never seen before where I come from. So I started thinking about the reasons. I looked at
different personalities, the working environment, and how they affected resilience.
Based on the latest research, more than 80% of the companies in the world are going through
big changes. No matter if it is the transformation change of a whole business, change of
workplace, change at C-levels, or even just change of desks in one small office! Based on that
research, more than 80% of the employees are feeling stressed and insecure during the
process.
So why is that?
We are all going through changes every single day. We change our clothes, our morning coffee,
our route to work. We change apartments, houses, cities, doctors, partners, and even names!
We sometimes change our whole lives. But when it comes to a change in work, we somehow
lose control, we are no longer resilient. When it comes to a point where someone else is making
decisions for us, we put our resilience on “Stand by. As a result, we stress out as we do not
control the change. I think the biggest mistake people make is not trying to get control back
when work changes. We just keep getting more and more frustrated and unhappy.
We spend more than 8 hours at work every day, which is 253 days in one year and more than
half of the time, we are stressed. As we are not resilient to the working change, we bring that
stress home. Home is where we can control things, so we end up making our family stressed
and unhappy too.
The simple and sad equation we all live in:
Stress at work + control at home = unhappy, stressed, angry, tired, and mentally overwhelmed
humans!
More and more companies offer resilience courses and meetings with specialists. This is
different from in Bulgaria, where perhaps people are more resilient themselves – it feels part of
people’s nature.
But what is Resilience?
Google the word! You get millions of videos on how to help yourself to be more resilient - and
thousands of articles and the same number of books for self-help! This is all great, but it feels
like all those guides have been written to be the same for all of us. Yet we are all different. What
I am resilient about is probably completely different from you. Mine changes based on different
situations too.
I think it's really important to understand what situation happens to trigger your resilience? So
the first question, we need to ask ourselves is “what is the source of my own resilience”.
Some of my friends take long walks during lunch breaks, some like to listen to music and others
try to keep their mind empty and focused only on work. Some don’t think that working change is
a bad thing and see opportunity.
I believe this is the first step to building resilience - having a positive mindset.
Then there are lots of tool kits that help us build our resilience and many of them have one thing
in common. They all say we need to know ourselves, very well. If you know your own
boundaries and limits, you can find the best way to build your personal resilience.
But this is the hardest part. To get to know yourself means to face your fears, to dig deeper in
order to find out what worries you and why you are stressing. To admit that you are not perfect
and even that you need help!
It is human nature just to block our own fear and that means we don't take responsibility
ourselves. To blame the company, the environment, the best friend, the boss, or anyone or
anything else. Anything that can make them feel better and avoid owning a situation. But by
doing this, we just go deeper into the “rabbit hole”.
So many researchers have tried to explain how our brain works and what our limits are.
Ultimately they all fail on a very personal level because no one else will know your limits better
than yourself.
If we get to a point where we know and can control ourselves by being happier and less
stressed - then we will able to develop the skill to help others as well.
Then everything around us gets better.
So, here are a few steps that can help as a start:
• Try to keep positive thinking in every situation. After all, we always have a choice and
there is sunshine after every storm
• Find something that makes you smile every morning – a cup of coffee, favourite song a
or even a funny t-shirt!
• Write down the 3 things you have done, that made you feel happy at the end of every
day.
• Try to listen more to what is happening around you and talk with colleagues, friends,
and family often.
Here is my simple and happy equation I think we should all try to live by:
Positive thinking + taking responsibility = resilient, happier, less stressed, energetic, and helpful
humans!
It's my formula for us all to get fit for the future!
Love, Y. Yaneva