Want to Be More Resilient? Try Engaging in These Activities

Since resilience is a state of being, our level of resilience is constantly changing. Sometimes we feel very resilient, which allows us to be more adaptive, flexible, and collaborative.

After experiencing high stress or trauma, we may find our resilience has slipped and we know this because we become more irritable or moody, or maybe we have trouble sleeping (see characteristics of low resilience).

To develop and maintain your resilience, you can incorporate resilience enhancing activities into your regular routine. When you sense your resilience slipping, increase the time you spend on these activities to give yourself a resilience boost. 

Luckily, there are hundreds of activities you can engage in that build resilience. Here are just a few examples divided by the five resilience factors:

Self-Care

• Exercise regularly

• Dance

• Sleep 7-9 hours per night

• Eat a healthy diet

• Drink plenty of water

• Avoid toxic people

• Schedule down time for yourself

• Take a vacation

• Take a mental health day

• Engage in breathing exercises

• Get a pet

• Manage your workload

• Engage in quiet reflection and contemplation

• Meditate, practice mindfulness, pray

• Play sports and games

• Read fiction

• Engage in a hobby

• Sing or play music

Social Support

• Work on your relationships with friends and family

• Talk about what you’re going through with a trusted friend or mentor

• Nurture new relationships

• Commit to regular social interaction (virtual during coronavirus)

• Ask a friend or colleague to lunch (virtual during coronavirus)

• Host a dinner party or social gathering (virtual during coronavirus)

• Join a club/team

• Organize an interest group

• Develop peer mentors

Problem Solving

• Ask for help

• Set boundaries and say no

• Ask questions and be a good listener

• Anticipate change and view change as an opportunity for growth

• Give yourself adequate time to process change

• Identify and address the source of problems you’re facing

• Develop a logical way to work through problems – ask why

• Prioritize people and things that are important to you

• Focus on things that you have control over

• Use a to-do list

• Know when to quit

• Drop burdens and negative thoughts

Meaning & Purpose

• Volunteer

• Join a religious community

• Write down your personal and professional goals

• Engage in activities that bring you a sense of personal satisfaction and fulfillment

• Have a passion for something

• Take time to think about the feelings of others

• Identify your core values

• Self-reflect about your meaning and purpose in life

Positive Outlook

• Focus on the part of your life that is going well

• Limit negative and self-defeating thoughts

• Visualize yourself being successful and happy

• Keep a gratitude journal

• Write down three good things each day

• Compliment other people

• Reframe how you view negative events

• Show authentic appreciation to others

What do you do to build resilience? What can you start doing today?

___________________________

To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. And, check out my online Resilience Leadership course.

5 Things I Learned From My Thank You Note Resolution

Researchers consistently find that gratitude builds resilience. A 2006 study published in Behavior Research and Therapy found that Vietnam War veterans with higher levels of appreciativeness experienced lower rates of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. A 2003 study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that gratitude was a major contributor to resilience following the terrorist attacks on September 11.

To test this in real life, I decided a few years ago that my New Year’s resolution would be to write a thank you note every workday to a colleague to whom I was grateful. Here's what I learned:

My Resilience Improved

Spending a few minutes every day thinking about how colleagues helped me gave me a much more positive outlook. It forced me to focus on the positive events of the day, minimizing annoyances or irritations. Writing down my appreciation helped me clarify why I was grateful.

It Was Hard

I underestimated how much self-discipline I needed to spend 5-10 minutes every workday thinking about whom I would send a thank you note. It was easy to get absorbed in my work and forget to write a card. To stay on track, I posted reminder notes and put the cards where I would see them.

Having a Routine Helped

At the beginning of the year, I kept forgetting to write my cards because I hadn't set a time of day during which I would write. After trying several options, I settled on writing a card at the beginning of each day. I created a recurring calendar entry as a reminder. The added value was that I started each day thinking positively about everything people had done the day before to help me.

People Love Personalized Cards

I printed cards in bulk on moo.com using photographs I had taken. By personalizing the cards, I made a connection I had not anticipated with recipients. Recipients wanted to learn more about where I’d taken my photos and were glad to see I had a passion outside of work. These cards ended up being much more impactful than cards I bought at a stationery store.

Team Resilience Improved

One significant benefit of this practice was that people loved receiving a handwritten thank you note. I realized that I was fostering team resilience by showing consideration to colleagues, one of the 7Cs of team resilience. Members of my team appreciated that I was taking the time to say thank you and commenting on their positive impact.

Consider giving this a try in 2021 and tell me in the blog comments how it goes.

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To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

How to Know When Your Resilience is Low

2020 has been a tough year hasn’t it? We are still in the midst of an unprecedented global health crisis. Sharp divisions and social unrest in our communities has many of us on edge. It’s not surprising that many of us are exhausted, worn down, and struggling to keep up with simple tasks and responsibilities.

Resilience helps us thrive despite the adversity we are facing. Resilience is a state of being that can fluctuate depending on the levels of trauma or stress we are experiencing at any given time. It is helpful to know the common characteristics of low resilience and what behaviors you may exhibit when your resilience is slipping, so you know when you should engage in resilience enhancing activities or need to assist others in addressing their resilience.

Not everyone exhibits the same characteristics, which range from mild to severe in nature and can last for varying durations. For example, I have trouble sleeping when my resilience is low and I find myself getting irritable much more quickly than normal. When I see that I'm not sleeping well and am irritable, I prioritize spending time rebuilding my resilience.

Here are some common characteristics of low resilience:

Irritability/Anger

Being quick to anger and irritable is one of the most common characteristics of low resilience and often leads to conflict in the workplace. When my resilience eroded after Iraq, I found myself being more combative with peers and quick to fight about an issue. As I rebuilt my resilience, I became much more patient and collaborative.

Persistent Illness

One of the most frustrating characteristics of low resilience is constant illness. Since our immune systems are depressed when our resilience is low, we cannot fight off the viruses and bacteria that naturally bombard our systems. I normally never get sick, but for two years after I left Iraq, I seemed to catch every bug in the office and had constant stomach ailments. Once I bounced back, I rarely got sick again.

Trouble Sleeping

Trouble sleeping is extremely common among people with low resilience. Many of us focus on how to sleep better without realizing that instead, we need to enhance our resilience. For two years after leaving Iraq, I rarely slept more than 4 hours per night. I thought it was just part of growing old but once I bounced back, I started sleeping much better and when my resilience is high, I sleep great.

Becoming Isolated or Over Clingy

As our resilience diminishes, people can either start to isolate themselves from other people or become too dependent on having family or friends around them. I stopped socializing and making new friends. Unfortunately, by isolating myself, I cut off an important way to enhance my resilience which is to build a social support network.

Moodiness

As resilience decreases, there can be a change in our body's hormones that causes mood swings. We can experience extreme highs and lows, sometimes several times a day.

Overreaction to Normal Stress

When a car cuts us off on the highway, most of us are slightly annoyed. A person with low resilience may overreact and become enraged. Small irritants become major problems.

Easily Depressed/Crying

Some people with low resilience find they feel sad a lot and cry more easily than they used to.

Poor Memory

In the State Department, we often saw this when personnel would study a foreign language after serving in a dangerous overseas posting. They would struggle to learn the new language because of their lack of memory. Once their resilience improved, they found language learning much easier.

Lack of Hope

The most troubling characteristic of low resilience is the lack of hope and a vision for the future. This can sometimes evolve into despair. This makes it hard to plan and problem solve and can manifest as cynicism and a lack of caring. People may also find themselves taking unnecessary risks or engaging in reckless behavior because they just don’t care.

By paying attention to your behavior, you'll soon learn how to tell when your resilience is low. How do you know your resilience is low?

To learn more about building your resilience, check out my other blog posts.

 ___________________________

To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

How to Make a Resilience Resolution That Will Stick

It's hard to believe that 2021 is just around the corner. Given how tough 2020 has been, consider making a New Year’s resolution that will improve your resilience.

Review my blogs and identify one resilience enhancing activity to incorporate into your routine in 2021. Then, follow these steps to ensure that your resilience resolution becomes a reality:

Limit to One Activity

It is much easier to maintain your focus if you have only one change you want to make. Creating a laundry list of changes can be overwhelming, and you're more likely to give up. For example, one year, I wanted to increase gratitude in my life, and I resolved to send a thank you note to a work colleague every workday. Focusing on this one activity made it much easier to turn this resolution into a habit.

Be Specific

Write down a clear and measurable change you'd like to make in your life. If you want to exercise more, specify how many hours per week. If you pledge to spend more time with friends and family, identify how many days per month you want to socialize. This way, you'll know whether you've met your goal.

Identify Barriers

Accurately identifying what will prevent you from doing something is crucial since it will determine your change strategy. If your efforts aren’t working, check to make sure you’ve identified the right barriers. For example, when I resolved to exercise four days per week, I thought my barrier was not having time. However, my strategy to address this didn’t work. When I reconsidered, I realized that my barrier was laziness. I then changed my strategy and was much more successful!

Devise a Strategy

Develop a strategy to minimize or remove the barrier you’ve identified in step three. For example, if the barrier to practicing your hobby is not having the money you need, a strategy could be to create a separate hobby bank account with automatic deposits so you’re not competing with other financial pressures. My strategy to overcome laziness was to permit myself to watch my favorite TV show only when I was on the exercise bike.

Build-in Motivation

Make a plan to stay motivated. Having friends or colleagues who will join you is a great way to stay motivated. For example, if you want to walk 30 minutes every day, find a group of colleagues who will meet you at a set time and walk together. You're less likely to skip the walk if other people are waiting for you.

Hopefully, these simple steps will help you become more resilient in 2021! What’s your resilience resolution for 2021?

___________________________

To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

How to Prevent the Holidays From Eroding Your Resilience

The next few months may be rough for many people. Many of us will miss our traditional gatherings with family and friends. Non-Christians may feel excluded and isolated.

While winter holidays can be joyful and rewarding, they can also be emotional and stressful. There might be stress at work over who gets to take annual leave for important holidays.

Some families find the pressure of deciding which relatives to visit or host on meaningful days overwhelming. There’s even more stress this year since we have to decide whether or not to cancel holiday gatherings. We may travel long distances to be with family, which is exhausting in ordinary years and precarious this year.

There may be endless parties and an expectation to be cheerful. There may be social pressure to celebrate on New Year's Eve when we'd rather curl up with a good book. Watching everyone else have fun can be incredibly lonely for people without close friends or family.

If you find the holiday season particularly stressful, develop a strategy for staying resilient. Here are some tips that might help:

Build Social Support

If the holidays make you feel lonely, be proactive about finding people with whom to spend time either virtually or with social distancing. Let people know that you'd love to be invited to their virtual events. Host a virtual holiday event or a safe in-person gathering and invite others who would otherwise be solo.

Make Time to Recover

While it can be tempting to visit loved ones over the holidays, understand the risks you are taking. If you plan to travel, build in time to recover by carving out time just for yourself. If you can, add a day or two of vacation that is just for you and immediate family.

Say No

Clarify your holiday boundaries ahead of time and communicate those boundaries to family and friends. Say no when requests come in that are outside of your boundaries, explaining the reasoning beyond your decision.

 For example, a boundary could be that you travel only once every holiday season. When requests come in for additional travel, you can explain that you find that more than one trip is too much for you and your family over the holidays, and you hope to make a trip later.

 Another boundary could be that you will only spend time with people outside of your household if you all agree to stay outdoors and maintain social distance.

Volunteer

Consider volunteering at a local organization that helps others during the holidays. You can find meaning and purpose in what may otherwise have been an empty or lonely celebration by helping others.

Reframe

If you don't get to take leave over the holidays this year, ask yourself if anything positive can come from working during the holidays. Are you earning points at work for pitching in over the holidays? Would taking leave at another time spare you the horrors of holiday travel during a pandemic?

If you have to cancel traditional gatherings, remind yourself that you’ll all hopefully be together next year.

Manage Your Indulgences

While it is fun to indulge in holiday treats, resist the temptation to stress eat or drink. If you find yourself getting overstressed, make sure you continue to eat enough fruits and vegetables and try to set a limit on indulgences.

Permit People to Opt-Out

Recognize that some people find the holiday season extremely difficult to navigate, especially this year. Be understanding if they opt-out of the office party or family gathering. Resist pressuring them to "have holiday fun."

What helps you stay resilient during the holidays?

___________________________

To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

This Thanksgiving Commit to Being Grateful

Next week is Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday because it always makes me feel re-energized and resilient. I call it the resilience holiday because it focuses on one of the most effective ways to increase resilience - expressing gratitude.

There is a growing body of research on how gratitude improves our wellbeing and resilience, and luckily, gratitude is a social skill that can be cultivated and enhanced. For authentic appreciation, strive to go beyond praise (good job!) and focus on the details and reasons why you are thankful (your contribution saved me hours of work).

Unfortunately, many of us focus on gratitude only at Thanksgiving, thinking back over a full year to find what we appreciate the most. In addition to expressing thanks and gratitude this Thanksgiving, commit to incorporating gratitude into your daily life.

Here are some ways you can ensure you are grateful every day and not just on Thanksgiving:

Write Appreciation Letters

Buy thank you cards in bulk and make a habit of writing appreciation letters to people in your life to whom you are grateful. Start with writing one card per week. Express your enjoyment and appreciation of that person's impact on your life. Once in a while, write one to yourself.

Thank Someone Mentally

If you don't have time to write a thank-you note, think about someone who has done something for you. Explore why you are grateful and mentally thank the individual.

Keep a Gratitude Journal

Before going to sleep, write down three things about your day for which you are grateful. Be specific and think about the emotions you felt when something good happened to you.

Pray

If you are religious, use prayer to cultivate gratitude. Even if you're not religious, think about developing a daily practice of giving thanks. 

Meditate

When you meditate, you focus on the present moment without judgment. Although people often focus on a word or phrase (such as peace or compassion), you can also focus on what you're grateful for at the moment.

What do you do to cultivate gratitude?

___________________________ 

To learn more about how you and your team can thrive in adversity, visit my website, and follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

Are You Feeling Stressed From Coronavirus? Try Coloring

Photo by Customerbox on Unsplash

If chronic stress from the coronavirus is eroding your resilience and you’re looking for a quick and inexpensive way to de-stress and rest your brain, consider coloring.

After her 10-week-old son's death, Dee Ledger found that coloring calmed her nerves and helped soothe her grief.

Devin Kent started coloring after a bad car accident left her with extreme anxiety. Coloring leaves her calm and confident, able to conquer the world.

Lydia Mansel discovered that coloring left her with fewer headaches and less back pain. When she started coloring, her sleep improved, and she ate less. 

Research supports the wealth of anecdotal evidence that coloring helps people recover from stress and trauma.

A 2006 study found that art therapy for women with cancer helped significantly decrease physical and emotional distress during their treatment. Another study found that coloring an intricate geometric design reduced anxiety among undergraduate students. 

According to psychologist Nikki Martinez, coloring can calm down our amygdala, the part of the brain that, when active, keeps individuals in a heightened state of worry, panic, and hyper-vigilance. She explains that coloring can have an exceptionally recuperative effect by taking you out of your present stresses and concerns.

Craig Sawchuk, a clinical psychologist at the Mayo Clinic, says that coloring books work like other mindfulness techniques such as yoga and meditation. Coloring can help slow down your heart rate and respiration, loosen muscles and stimulate the brain.

Sawchuk recommends that people who are new to coloring start slow, with a limited amount of time, and gradually increase every few days. He explains that some people focus better while working on simple symmetrical designs while others benefit from more complex, abstract patterns. People should try both types to see what works for them.

It’s not surprising that coloring books for adults are best-sellers. One of the first coloring books specifically for adults is Johanna Basford’s Secret Garden, and it has sold more than 11 million copies in 22 languages since its release in Spring 2013. In France, the publisher Hachette's release of "Art-Therapie: 100 Coloriages Anti-Stress" was such a success that Hachette launched 20 more coloring books, selling nearly 20 million copies. 

There are thousands of coloring books adults can choose from and many websites that offer free coloring pages. If you’re looking for a quick way to build resilience and recover from stress during this global pandemic, give coloring a try.

Do you color? What impact does it have on your resilience and wellbeing?

I help individuals and teams thrive in adversity by providing practical skills and tools I developed over several decades as a U.S. diplomat in challenging environments. Visit my website to learn more about how I can help you and your team better adapt to stress and adversity. With resilience skills and tools, you and your team will be more creative, innovative, and collaborative. Resilient individuals and teams are less likely to suffer from burnout and are more open to change. Follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

This is Hard! And, That's Okay

Photo by Edwin Hooper on Unsplash

It has been over five months since the World Health Organization declared a global public health emergency, and many of us have been in lockdown for all of this time. We are adapting to a new normal filled with a myriad of stressors. The future is unpredictable, and no one knows when the pandemic will end.

If you are close to or at your breaking point, you are not alone. This is hard! One of the best ways to manage during an extended crisis is to accept how hard it is and give yourself permission to struggle.

If you are feeling vulnerable right now, you are not alone. It's our vulnerabilities and weaknesses that make us human and that will help us get through challenging times.

Here are some suggestions on how to accept your vulnerabilities and weaknesses:

Take Off Your Armor

Many of us are reluctant to show weakness, so we put up a front, trying to appear more courageous or dauntless than we really feel. It's time to stop and take off our mental armor. Pretending we're not negatively impacted by the pandemic takes significant mental energy that erodes resilience over time. Have the courage to be imperfect. Check out Brené Brown’s TED Talk on the power of vulnerability.

Be Authentic

Authenticity is essential for creating sincere connections with other people, a key resilience factor. Let go of who you think you should be and be who you are. If you’re afraid, don’t hesitate to share your fears with others. If you’re sad, express your emotion. If you’re angry, it’s okay to let others know. If you bottle up these negative emotions, it’s harder to connect with others. Suppressed negative emotions will often come out in unpredictable and destructive ways.

You Are Good Enough

Remind yourself that you are good enough to get through this crisis. You are not less capable than anyone else. We are all struggling. If you see others who seem to be thriving despite the pandemic, remind yourself that they might be more vulnerable than they appear.

Ask for Help

It is reasonable to need help during a long-term crisis. Needing help is often a normal reaction to a very abnormal situation. Reach out to trusted friends to talk through your emotions. Consider seeing a mental health professional who can help you work through the impact the pandemic has on your well-being. Many therapists now offer virtual therapy, which can be a lifeline during tough times. 

Focus on Essentials

This is not the time to write your first novel, lose weight, prepare for a marathon, or achieve some other significant personal goal. The pressure to come out of this crisis a better person can have the opposite effect. Focus on your core essentials - a safe home, healthy food, supportive relationships, and immediate financial and health needs. Everything else can wait until this crisis is over.

What are you doing to accept your vulnerabilities and weaknesses?

I help individuals and teams thrive in adversity by providing practical skills and tools I developed over several decades as a U.S. diplomat in challenging environments. Visit my website to learn more about how I can help you and your team better adapt to stress and adversity. With resilience skills and tools, you and your team will be more creative, innovative, and collaborative. Resilient individuals and teams are less likely to suffer from burnout and are more open to change. Follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

You Need Vacation Now More Than Ever

Last week, I should have been packing my bags. I'd been planning a trip to Europe for over a year and was excited about visiting friends and exploring new cities. Instead, the airline canceled my flights, and I'm not permitted to enter most European countries. I'm not sure when I'll be on a plane again.

While it's tempting to keep working and skip summer vacation this year, I feel stress from the coronavirus pandemic. I need time to rest and recover so that I return to work re-energized. I need a vacation.

It is easy to skip summer vacation this year, especially if you've canceled travel plans. A staycation may be less appealing since many of us are at home all the time now. Many of us don't want to take precious annual leave when we can't go anywhere.

The risk of taking this approach and just skipping vacation is that we will wear ourselves down. As a result, we may experience common characteristics of low resilience, such as low energy, irritability, and getting sick. During a crisis, we must maintain high resilience to remain adaptable and flexible despite the adversity. 

Here are some suggestions on how to take a vacation during a global pandemic:

Make It Short

If it feels like a waste of annual leave to take off work without going somewhere, take just a few days that coincide with a weekend or holiday. A four or five day weekend is often enough time to feel refreshed.

Go on Day Trips

Research day trips you can take without risking exposure to the coronavirus. Pack a picnic and have lunch in a park. Hike local trails. Drive through new neighborhoods and look at the homes. Research a small town close by and go exploring.

Play Games

Pull out your old board games or playing cards and declare a game day. If you’re on your own, see if friends or family will join you virtually. Have a tournament with prizes at the end of the day.

Turn Your Home into a Hotel

Create a minibar, give yourself turndown service, and set out a happy hour buffet. Grab a beach towel and sunbathe in your backyard. Give yourself a spa pedicure. Sleep in and "order" a room service breakfast. Treat yourself to unique cocktails and meals you can have delivered.

Movie Binge

Spend a day watching your favorite movies. Think about where you were and who you were with when you first saw each movie.

Travel Back in Time

Spend a day or two reviewing your old travel photos. Consider creating scrapbooks or virtual slideshows for each of your previous trips.

Take a Virtual Trip

Many of the world's most famous tourist attractions have live webcams and video feeds. Select your favorite sites, either from previous trips or places you want to visit, and take a virtual trip to see them.

Read a Travel Book

Immerse yourself in a good travel book for a day or two. Check out this website for the best travel books of all time.

Plan Next Year’s Vacation

Spend some time planning for next year. Research possibilities. Set your dates and map out your itinerary. Anticipation is half the fun when it comes to vacations.

What are you doing for vacation this summer?

I help individuals and teams thrive in adversity by providing practical skills and tools I developed over several decades as a U.S. diplomat in challenging environments. Visit my website to learn more about how I can help you and your team better adapt to stress and adversity. With resilience skills and tools, you and your team will be more creative, innovative, and collaborative. Resilient individuals and teams are less likely to suffer from burnout and are more open to change. Follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

Why You Want to Play During a Crisis

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As the coronavirus pandemic continues, many of us are getting worn down from the chronic stress associated with staying healthy, caring for others, worrying about finances, and concern for our futures. While this is a grave crisis, taking out time to be childlike can be one of the best ways to cope with the stress you are experiencing.

According to writer Jared Keller, research shows that people of all ages benefit from unstructured playtime as a respite from the grind of daily life. Playing is when you engage in activity for enjoyment and recreation rather than a serious or practical purpose. Research shows that play can relieve stress, boost creativity, improve brain function, and strengthen our relationships with other people.

Keller reports that play is on the decline in the United States, with negative consequences for kids and adults. A 2011 article in the American Journal of Play shows how much children's playtime has declined, and how its absence in adolescence can lead to behavior issues later in life, including depression and anxiety. 

According to Peter Gray, a professor of psychology at Boston College, children's free play has been in continuous decline due to the belief that children learn best from adults, and free play with other children is a waste of time. He argues that "play, especially social play with other children, serves a variety of developmental functions, all of which promote children's mental health. In the absence of such play, children fail to acquire the social and emotional skills that are essential for healthy psychological development."

In his book Play, psychiatrist Dr. Stuart Brown MD, illustrates that "play is anything but trivial. It is a biological drive as integral to our health as sleep or nutrition. We are designed by nature to flourish through play."

Play is not just important for kids; adults also need to play. “We don’t lose the need for novelty and pleasure as we grow up,” according to Scott G. Eberle, Ph.D., vice president for play studies at The Strong and editor of the American Journal of Play. Play brings joy. And it's vital for problem-solving, creativity, and relationships.

Play does not have consequences in the same way that real life does. When we want to blow off steam, play is an appropriate way we do it without having trouble. Play is how we can explore the world around us, experiment, and try out a new hypothesis without consequence. We can color outside the lines without people telling us the right way to go, without bosses or anybody looking over our shoulder. Play is critical not just for self-discovery and freedom, but also for joy.

Think about what you did as a child that made you happy and try to recreate that activity today. Play during coronavirus could be building a fort in your living room, dressing like a clown, having a pillow fight with family members, putting on a puppet show for friends via Zoom, finger painting, or playing with Legos. Laughter Online University offers even more ideas to experience childlike playfulness as adults.

 During this crisis, re-ignite your inner child. By carving out time in your schedule to play, you'll be boosting your resilience and ability the thrive despite adversity.

Do you play? How does it make you feel?

I help individuals and teams thrive in adversity by providing practical skills and tools I developed over several decades as a U.S. diplomat in challenging environments. Visit my website to learn more about how I can help you and your team better adapt to stress and adversity. With resilience skills and tools, you and your team will be more creative, innovative, and collaborative. Resilient individuals and teams are less likely to suffer from burnout and are more open to change. Follow me on Facebook and Twitter at @payneresilience.