The Power of Resilience

I hope you are all enjoying the long weekend. The weather here has been quite beautiful the last few days but before that we experienced some very chilly weather (for Florida). I know it does not compare to the chilly temps in the northeast but what I realized during our cold snap is that I have fully adjusted to the Florida climate. I was kind of laughing at myself; at how much the cold weather here was bothering me considering I spent most of my life in the northeast.

This is what got me thinking about how adaptable and resilient we are. Obviously it is not super hard to adjust to warm weather but there are plenty of other things that we adapt to all the time. We have to shift expectations, change course and modify our plans and when we do that we are training the brain in resilience. It often starts with an acceptance of how things are in the moment, and then we can deploy that special combination of strength and flexibility of our thinking and that helps us shift our mindset. That’s resilience. 

Resilience in the body works in a similar way and the body can be our teacher for this practice as well as many others. On the mat I asked my students to set their intention for our practice by honoring a time or situation in their lives that they didn’t think they could handle but with resilience they did. Through our asana practice  we began by noticing what was available and accepting what might not be. Then we paired strength and flexibility together targeting specific muscles groups with both strengthening and stretching and celebrated the chance to cultivate that resilience in both the body and the mind. Often it is perspective that allows us to access our own resilience both on and off the mat. 

As I write this newsletter about resilience my dog Avery lays next to me. It has been a month since we lost our other dog. We adopted both of them at 12 weeks old therefore Avery had never known life without her sister until a month ago. I am watching her resilience in real time; her adjusting a little bit more day by day, with a combination of acceptance and grief in her eyes. As I coax her out for walks she seems willing to go a little further each day as well. There are still moments when she looks at me with pain in her eyes- disbelief that this is her new life, but then she comes over for some pets and pushes through. This is resilience; the will and understanding to adjust to the unexpected and to the things out of our control. Both animals and people understand this power; this magical combination of strength and flexibility paired with perspective offers us the incredible power to work through life’s challenges and celebrate the positive unexpected outcomes. Being both strong and flexible in the mind is truly a key to happiness.  I am wishing that for all of us this week.