Busting The Myths: Resilience and Toughness

Resilience And Toughness: Are they the same thing?

In fact, resilience is all about flexibility and adaptability to change. This extract from The Resilience Dynamic® book busts the myth that resilience is about being tough. Read on to start to shift your thinking!

Extract On Resilience And Toughness – The Resilience Dynamic® Chapter 1

“Hands up, do any of the following statements resonate with you? Or are they part of your organisation’s culture? 

• Don’t show your emotion unless you’re happy and smiling.
• Just say everything is ‘fine’.
• Don’t show you are feeling vulnerable.
• Don’t show you are stressed.
• Don’t show you don’t know.
• Beat yourself up for being so stupid, but only after they have gone. 

• Do show when you’ve punched through the challenge.
• Do show when you’ve beaten the opposition.
• Do show when you’re ok.
• Do show when you’re feeling smart.
• Do show when you’ve done a lot of smart things.

Any of these statements running around your own head? Unvoiced possibly, but still driving your action? Do any of these drive your organisation? You may have a lot of learnt values from your upbringing, your workplace, your friends. You may collectively live this kind of culture. And these result in a set of values, not necessarily your own, that drive the way you live.

It ends up a bit like a set of polarities that you have to choose sides on:

[…] Resilience defined as being all about mental or physical toughness can be a very strong driver within organisations, groups and teams.

However, instead of enabling flexibility (which is true resilience), it encourages a resistance towards something, a toughening up ‘in the face of ’, a push against. If sustained, this forcefulness leads to brittleness which in turn destroys the possibility of a truer, more flexible set of responses.

Being tough can lead to burnout. If this is one of the myths that you are attracted to, you can start to shift your thinking. Start by noticing.”

Interested in focusing on your personal resilience or your team’s resilience? 

If you find yourself with this kind of either-or thinking, then resilience is the answer.  

Being resilient shifts the mindset. Your first step is “to be present” to your own thoughts and feelings about a situation, and to others’ thoughts and feelings too.  

Being present is like a set of muscles in the mind and body. It takes a bit of practice to get them moving! Why not give yourself 5 minutes to connect with just being in the moment? 

If you’re keen to know more about how to support your own and others’ resilience, why not get The Resilience Dynamic® book of our research?   

Are you a leader looking to boost your team’s workplace resilience? 

How often are you and your colleagues stuck in this kind of mindset? 

A resilient culture ensures that options and solutions are being generated, no matter what’s going on. 

What can you do to build a resilient culture? 

1. Explore our innovative technology and coaching solutions – we have the know-how to build healthy high performance for you and your people.
2. Buy The Resilience Dynamic® book by CEO Jenny Campbell – read more about resilience and what it means for you. 
3. Learn about our approach – discover how we have supported organisations, teams and individuals to build healthy high performance.

Are you a coach wanting to support your clients’ resilience? 

How often are your clients stuck in this kind of polarity thinking? 

Being present, awareness, acceptance, compassion and curiosity, are critical to unlock client thinking. 

How are you bringing this specifically into your practice? 

Do you want to understand how resilience translates to enabling healthy high performance? Buy The Resilience Dynamic® book to dive into our 15+ years of resilience research. 

If you want to become a Resilience Dynamic Accredited Practitioner, with a 3-year flexible license to practice using our research frameworks and tools, click here to learn more about the Resilience Accreditation Programme.

Do get in touch if this article has prompted a query: [email protected]. We’d be delighted to help.

Author: Jenny Campbell Founder and CEO of the Resilience Dynamic

Follow Jenny on LinkedIn for more of her thoughts, resilience research, and ideas.