{"id":35437,"date":"2017-08-14T06:00:21","date_gmt":"2017-08-14T13:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/?p=35437"},"modified":"2017-08-09T13:39:40","modified_gmt":"2017-08-09T20:39:40","slug":"strength-in-the-face-of-adversity-practicing-resilience-in-daily-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/strength-in-face-of-adversity-practicing-resilience-in-daily-life-0814174","title":{"rendered":"Strength in the Face of Adversity: Practicing Resilience in Daily Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"SeniorThe term antifragile, developed by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, refers to the idea some things actually gain from disorder. The book explores different areas where antifragility can occur, including in businesses, biological systems, and Greek mythology. When exploring how the term fits into psychological well-being<\/a>, Taleb (2012) defines antifragility as \u201cposttraumatic growth\u201d (p. 691). This begs the question: what if adversity can make a person stronger? This is not a new concept, as the idea of \u201cwhat doesn\u2019t kill you makes you stronger\u201d can be found in lyrics of hit songs from the past decade (Clarkson, 2011, and West, 2007).<\/p>\n

While solid research on the topic of antifragility is still in the beginning stages, another concept similar to this that has been researched extensively is resilience<\/a>. Once believed by some scholars to be a “magical” ability, research indicates resilience can be purposefully achieved.<\/p>\n

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Resilience is defined as the ability to \u201cbounce back\u201d after adversity. In Resilience<\/em>, a book by Southwick & Charney (2012), the authors identify 10 research-based factors that give a person a stronger likelihood to overcome a difficult life event. As they point out in their text, some research indicates more than 90% of the human population will experience at least one adverse event in their lifetime. This could include the death of a loved one, a car accident, a debilitating disease, or a natural disaster, to name a few. The 10 resilience factors fall into roughly four categories: beliefs, attitudes, environment, and health. See below for a description of these factors.<\/p>\n

Beliefs<\/h2>\n