5 ways of resilience to improve mental health coping

I’ve suffered my share of grief, depression, anxiety-laden periods, panic attacks, trauma triggering, yet I’ve also discovered some things that work for me.  As I share, I hope they might help you.

1.             Functional Denial – I’d never advocate people do what many people do, and that is to deny the mental health struggle they have, preferring anger over facing sadness and fear, among other denials.  And, of course, denial is a natural though maladaptive phase of the grief process.  But functional denial is one way to show resilience in the depths of pain and despair.  It’s simply choosing to function by denying the effect of pain and suffering, even though you know they’re there.  This is really a fully-fledged faith.  In choosing to function, it’s not as if the denial denies the suffering reality—it can’t, because it’s right there in front of us.  In choosing to function despite the pain, we grin with a wince while showing we can do the thing through gritted teeth.  The more we do this, the more we prove to ourselves we can.  It’s important to note that functional denial is more correctly a denial of the paralysing impact of pain even while it’s still bleedingly obvious it’s there.

2.             Seek Revelation – another faith construct here.  Revelation can only come from without us INTO us, as if we had an idea come to us.  Particularly in terms of anxiety, for me, I seek the answer as to WHY I’m feeling so anxious.  It can take hours, days, or weeks to suddenly understand why, but with every concerted exploration, there’s a good chance the answer will be revealed to you.  When we break the moment down and discover the list of attributes or reasons for our pain, having identified them, you can decide to let go of those factors for which you cannot control.  In terms of depression, the amount of times it’s dawned on me what the problem is—“Oh, I’m depressed!”—it’s amazing what that knowledge proves to be in terms of being a corner to turn in turning out of despair and toward recovery.

3.             Share the Burden – sounds so simple, and yet what is so powerful is also something most people who are struggling avoid.  They’d rather suffer alone.  I’ve found that the more I’m suffering, is truly the more I need calm, affirming people in my life.  There’s something very powerful and cogently reassuring in sharing the burden with someone who cares enough to listen, who will also reflect back to us true living perspective.  Once you’ve experienced this, you want to give it back it’s that powerful.  For me, it was one sponsor who so often said, “Steve, how important is it?”  And every time without fail, my anxieties always loomed larger than their realities.

4.             Self Talk – this can be seen as a faith perspective, i.e., hearing the voice of God through scripture, but it can also be about affirming the true, the good, the right things that we would say to others and that others would say about us—to ourselves.  We second-guess ourselves and doubt ourselves so easily, yet we look at others and think they must be so confident.  Most people ‘fake it until they make it’ more often that we would realise.  Speaking to ourselves in tones of good narratives (or stories) about ourselves is incredibly powerful, especially when we consider that we’ve nullified the opposite reality—when we speak judging and condemning words to ourselves.  Judge or condemn yourself to your peril and yours alone.

5.             Look Forward – this is not about avoiding the past, but it’s very much about having 3 or 4 things in the immediate week ahead that you look forward to.  The reality of having these activities to look forward is powerful as it speaks to the hope we all thrive on, when despair kills the spirit.  You know that feeling of knowing something really cool is only a day or two away.  It fills us with peace and joy.  Therefore, you’re more able to face the tough day ahead, or do the hard thing, because something positive is just around the corner.

Many people will find that some or all of these strategies don’t work for them.  It’s really important to remember that this is MY experience.  And they’re just five I thought of as I got the inspiration to write on the topic.  Your experience of grief, depression, anxiety, pain will be different to mine.  If none of these work for you, it does not mean anything negative about you.  I validate your experience as being real, true, and hard.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash