A few days ago I was lucky enough to spend a weekend in the bush with a good friend of mine. The couple who invited us to stay are both in their late 70′s and have been married to each other for 54 years – they met each other when they were 16.

This is the first time I had visited their home, which is situated in the heart of the bushveld, along a rutted and almost impassable track.

They live there alone, with only the company of their domestic helper during the day. Water is pumped up from a small pump that is situated five kilometres or so away from the house and electicity comes from solar panels and a wind generator (which they maintain).

This couple have spent their lives living all over the world in remote locations and had endless colourful stories to tell.

Stories about growing up in a rural community, shearing sheep, riding broncos, teaching underprivileged children in South America (in Spanish!) and now being involved in environmental and wildlife conservation programmes.

(And here I am referring only to our lady host!).

They are both quite frail now and have had a series of health challenges, from knee and hip replacements to a stroke, and yet they are totally dedicated to their projects and are enthusiastic about their lives.

Their stories and lives are inspiring! No predictable, dull or “comfort zone” existence for them.

They made me think a great deal about the importance of having a resilient personality – to be able to bounce back in the face of crises and adversity. (Resilience is an importance concept in positive psychology).

I believe that we all need to foster a sense of resilience in order to live our lives

to the full and to live to our full potential.

In future posts I will talk about ways to develop and strengthen personal resilience…

Every week a psychologist colleague and I get together for peer supervision (we have been having these meetings for more than two years). We both work from a health psychology and positive psychology orientation and also practice clinical hypnotherapy ( including ego-state  therapy and Eriksonian approaches) with our respective clients.

This week one of the subjects under discussion was psychological resilience and effective coping. My colleague works a great deal in a medical setting, where she is called in to counsel patients who are undergoing radical surgery, such as amputations.  She mentioned that she is struck by how some patients manage to bounce back psychologically from this type of traumatic experience whilst others seem to lapse into a state of hopeless depression. (This is an important issue as research has consistently shown how crucial a person’s mental outlook is to their speed or recovery and general prognosis)

We went on to talk about the concept of resilience and whether positive coping and resilience is a given in the personality or if it can be acquired or strengthened through psychotherapy. One’s coping style is so so much part of who we are and on our outlook on life!  If we have meaning in our lives and feel needed and fulfilled, we will have more a stronger motivation to fight for our health and for our life when the going gets tough!

We spoke about how it is only when we are faced with a trauma or a crisis that our coping skills and our resilience are tested.

How do you respond in a crisis? Do you need to develop your own coping ability and your resources?