# 14 Resilience 101: The Superpower That Boosts Mental Mojo – Art of Life Podcast

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Welcome to the Art of Life podcast.

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This is a podcast where we ponder over some questions, some mindsets,

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some beliefs to get better at life.

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Today we are going to talk about resilience and dive deeper into that.

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See what we can do to become more resilient, what sort

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of attitude we can have.

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Towards the end, I really want to leave you with really one big key takeaway.

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And hopefully, that's a driver and a motivator for you as

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you continue your journey.

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Cool.

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Let's get started.

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First things first, let's unpack what resilience means.

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Now to me, it's almost like the elastic band in our houses.

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We stretch them and then we stop stretching them and they

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take the shape back together.

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It's almost like bouncing back, bouncing back in life from whatever

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life throws at you, whatever's happened, bouncing back, the capability

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of being able to bounce back.

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There could be certain things around your life, maybe your phone's fallen down

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a couple of times, or your computer's taken a bad hit and still survived,

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maybe there are some resilient objects around you, maybe your car, there could

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be other people as well who you would think that they're very resilient,

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because no matter how life flows, maybe it goes really up and down, but

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they seem to travel through it okay.

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They don't seem to be weathered as much with what life's bringing to them.

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There are other people who can be really traumatized by events, and it's not to say

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an event is a big or small, no labeling like that, but some people can really take

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it to heart, whereas others can live life.

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Things will happen, they will still have generally the same attitude, the

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same positive attitude that keeps going through, and they're somehow able to

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bounce back through it, through all the hardships and difficult circumstances,

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and they're almost coming out at the other end, almost unscathed.

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That's resilience, and those are really resilient people.

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Now, why is resilience important?

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Of course it's important for the individual because it allows

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you to live life and like living life in terms of living life.

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Because life will go up and down, somebody will cut you off in traffic.

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There will be other hardships in life, like you might not

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get a job that you wanted.

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There will be other situations that are really out of your control as well.

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At the moment of recording this podcast, I have a family member going

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through some serious hospital stuff and I know my life's going to change.

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But resilience would be that ability to come back, to still be able

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to survive with the change, to be okay, and to enjoy my own life.

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By doing that, I also give permission to the people around

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me to enjoy their life as well.

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It's almost like a tree, right?

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The tree, yes, as such, it's standing in its place, but it's giving shade,

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maybe it's giving fruit as well.

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People come in, sit down, play around the tree, lie down in the sun.

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have some shade when the sun's very hot.

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But the tree is that figure which holds that space for them when life's hard.

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If I'm resilient, I give permission to people around me to relax and to be okay.

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If I looked at this in a work life sense, maybe there's some absenteeism

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in the team, the manager would really be more capable of handling that absence

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of managing that stress, if somebody took a long leave, suddenly they could

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be capable of handling that, managing the whole team dynamics while that

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is happening and engaging with other people at a better emotional level

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as well to allow them to be safe and to really be okay with the change.

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Let's say there was a legislation change that had some team impact, and then it's

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around setting the energy in the space and being okay with it that people around

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you feel comforted and feel okay as well.

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At home, with your family, it's again being able to cope with whatever life

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is throwing at you, that when you come home, you're providing a safe

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and a nurturing environment for your family, for your partner, for your

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kids, and all the other loved ones.

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Now sometimes there can be a confusion between resilience and perseverance.

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Are resilience and perseverance the same?

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Resilience is around bouncing back in life.

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Something happens.

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Maybe it's a death, maybe it's an illness, maybe there's a hardship, like

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job gets taken away, or COVID that we've all experienced in some shape or form.

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Resilience would be being able to take that and not letting it

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affect you internally as much.

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It sort of happens, happens around you.

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You feel it, you work through it, you're able to talk to it, do

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the things that you have to do, but doesn't impact you as much.

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That's resilience.

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Perseverance is probably a small part of it, which is

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trying to go on no matter what.

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You would persevere for a goal that you really wanted to achieve.

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Let's say you wanted to climb a mountaintop, you will train and

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train and you will get there.

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But perseverance can be up and down in terms of emotions, you might really

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feel great sometimes, you might not feel motivated sometimes, but you

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still keep going, that's perseverance.

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Resilience is a little bit different.

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Resilience is that emotional stability.

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And it's not to say it's all the time, it's 100%, a person who's resilient

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is going to be resilient 100 percent of the times, no, we all have our ups

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and downs, but resilience would be being able to take all of that and

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still being generally buoyant with it.

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Still being at a place where your family, your friends, your

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work, the life goes on as usual.

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It's not impacted for them.

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You can still perform things as you generally do.

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Yes, you probably will have some breaks here and there, but largely you can carry

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on no matter how life is going for you.

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Things around you, the processes, the people, they're all okay.

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They don't have to worry about you.

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And you, by yourself, also feel okay.

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That no matter what happens, whatever change is happening, you're still

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okay, and you're like, that's alright.

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What separates a resilient person from a non resilient person?

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Like, what's the distinguishing factor?

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And in my mind, there's this concept around life.

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Now, I'll ask you this question.

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Are you living life or are you managing life?

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It's a deep question.

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Think about it again.

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The resilient people, I believe, they are living life.

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Life will automatically have its ups and downs.

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That's how life is supposed to be.

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That's how life is designed to be.

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But oftentimes, we can get caught up in trying to control it.

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Let me give you examples.

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Let's say my child comes back.

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He's got low grades.

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And I go like, mm mm, I've got to fix it.

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And I try and think of what I need to do that I fix them.

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The classes that he will go to or blah, blah, blah.

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And yes, there's a part of me as a parent that's supposed to do that.

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But there's also other part of the whole equation, which is the child and then the

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child's ownership in wanting to improve.

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Living life would be to live life, as in to do the steps that you're

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supposed to do, but allowing the other person a freedom, free will, to choose

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what they want to have in their life.

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Let's talk through another example.

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Let's say you have a partner and he or she is not eating properly

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and you're genuinely concerned.

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You want to control them.

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You want to tell them this is what you eat in the morning or

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have you eaten this much, right?

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Now again, question comes back to are you living life or are you managing life?

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You see, if you start managing life, then you're trying to control it.

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And to some extent, you can't control it.

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Another person, whether that's your partner, whether that's in a

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work environment, any colleague, they will do what they wish to do.

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That's outside your zone of control.

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The only person you can control is yourself.

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It's not in a limiting way, it is more understanding that,

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all right, that's what happens.

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It's more doing your duty, doing your part, doing what you're supposed to do,

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but establishing a boundary for yourself more than for anybody else that, okay,

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I won't cross this line because this is where somebody else's boundary begins.

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Let me look at another example, another way of explaining this.

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Think of the balcony and dance floor.

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I've talked about this a couple of times previously as well,

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but it really helps explain it.

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In your life, where are you at?

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Are you in the balcony?

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Or are you in the dance floor?

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Dance floor is where life's really happening, where you see all the people

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around you, somebody's running around throwing newspapers in the morning.

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Somebody is rushing to school.

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Somebody is getting late to work.

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Someone is cooking.

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All of that chaos in the morning is happening in the dance floor.

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When you step up in the balcony, then you can start seeing how the newspaper

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is affecting the person who wanted to get up and read the newspaper in

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the morning, maybe, or how someone's breakfast is impacting something else.

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In the balcony, you get a whole big picture of what's really happening.

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In your own life, things that are happening right now.

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They can be very big in the moment.

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It's almost like you are in the dance floor of your life.

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It seems to be all coming at you.

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And if there's a change, like in my example, there's a little change going

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on in the family and I am nervous as well about it, but as nervous as I am, if I

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step back into the balcony and watch that this is happening and then start thinking

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around, okay, what is the bigger lesson?

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What do I have to do?

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How will life evolve?

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How will life shift?

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The moment I step in the balcony, then I am not worried or

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tangled in the emotions as much.

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My decisions that I take, they will be much more neutral.

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They'll be a lot more rational.

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And needless to say, it will be a whole lot easier for everybody

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around me because I'm not panicking and I'm not nervous at that time.

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Can resilience be taught?

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Can resilience be learned?

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And I'll leave that to you to answer.

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Because we can all evolve in life as we want to.

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It's our life, we will pick up things that we like.

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We will pick up things that, for whatever reason, they're not good

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for us and we still want to do them.

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That's our birthright as individuals, as human beings on this planet.

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We all have a right to live and learn as we want to.

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But for yourself, I want you to think whether you are living your life

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or whether you are managing life.

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Are you managing it for yourself?

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Like how will your day go today?

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Are you super nervous, anxious around it?

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Like am I trying to, for example, control the outcome?

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I guess I'm better off to some extent doing my job and then letting life be.

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We try and control life, but in reality, even though I'm trying to

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control it too much, there's many things that are outside my control.

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It's a lot easier to do my part and then be okay with life and have a faith

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in life that it's going to be okay.

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That life's always working out for me.

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If I have that faith, and that's what I find a lot of the resilient people

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really believe that life is working out for them, there is that undeniable

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faith, that undeniable understanding, belief, that life is working out for them.

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And that's why they stay resilient.

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Now, hindsight, if you look at your life and look at some of the really

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difficult circumstances, maybe you lost a loved one, maybe there was something

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terrible that happened and you thought you would never survive this, I urge

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you to go back to that time and not exactly that time, but after that

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time and see the growth that happened.

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There's a lot of growth that happens from pain.

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A lot of the times we think about the pain, of course we don't want the

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pain, but there's also growth, there's learning that happens from the pain.

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Yes, sometimes you might feel that what's life.

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is doing is giving you shit right now.

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And that could be absolutely correct.

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But think about how much stronger, how much more capable, how much more

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evolved as a human being you will be once you've learned your life lesson.

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How much will you become more resilient, more sure of yourself because of

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the hardships you're going through?

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The other aspect of course is, even if you don't believe that life

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is working out for you, I'd still encourage you to believe that anyway.

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Believe that there is a higher power.

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Believe that there's a universe that's actually standing there

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supporting you, cheering for you, wanting the best for you.

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Because you came on Earth wanting to have all of these life experiences.

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When you were a soul, you picked up this body, you also picked up largely

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the experiences you were going to have, because these were some of

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the tasters that you wanted to do.

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These were some of the life experiences that you really wanted to experience.

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Now you could ask yourself, why, why did you pick this one?

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We go sometimes to a Japanese restaurant, sometimes to a Chinese

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one sometimes to a Mexican one.

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We might not always like the food that we tried, but there's that experience.

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There's the learning.

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There's awareness after trying a particular cuisine

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that, Oh, I didn't like that.

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It's similar thing with life as well.

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Sometimes the downs help you appreciate the ups.

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And that is what life's about.

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I hope the question around living life and managing life resonates with you.

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Do let me know what you think about it.

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And maybe the next time when there is a graceful moment happening in life,

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like how it is happening in my life, I'd encourage you to think around

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living life versus managing life.

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I'm going to do the same.

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Now, if you're wanting to build resilience, my life makeover

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program is It's an absolutely fun way of building resilience.

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The whole aspect of being in the balcony versus the dance floor, that's literally

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what the entire program is about.

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Being in balcony is more about being neutral, being able to

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observe things and really learning to operate from your intuition.

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Life Makeover program teaches you that with art therapy meditation.

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In every class, you sit down, you play with some colors, and have fun while

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improving the energy of some space.

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For example, in one class you might play with the energy of time.

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Now last time I did a class on time, there was a gentleman who'd come...

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He complained about his work being really, really busy.

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And after we did the class, he came back and said, Oh, you wouldn't believe it.

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My whole team has taken leave for one reason or the other and I have

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got a week of almost nothing to do for no reason at all because it

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wasn't even like the holiday season.

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It wasn't school holidays.

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It wasn't anything particular.

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But yet he had his whole calendar free.

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That's when we play with energy of time, there are times where we

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play with manifesting, where we heal our past traumas, where we

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connect more with our intuition.

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It's really designed to help you with every single aspect in your life,

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whether that's personal, whether that's professional, whether that's spiritual.

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And the beauty of it is because it's all really art therapy meditation based,

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you're playing with colors and you're having fun while you are really changing

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and shifting the energy around you.

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Whether you want to manifest relationships or you wanted to get really great jobs

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that give you a whole lot of money, have a business that has hundreds

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of clients or thousands, I believe really strongly that the life makeover

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program can provide that to you.

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And if not, well, there is 100 percent money back offer.

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You will start noticing a shift with every single art therapy session that you take.

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Every session is an hour, it's an hour of play.

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And with that, you experience a shift in your life.

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That's it for the Art of Life podcast for today.

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If you have enjoyed listening to the show, please do reach out to me, respond

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how you felt about the question around living life versus managing life.

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If you have a little bit more time, also leave a review, share the podcast

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with your friends, because that's how the podcast gets known to more

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people and that's how this message can go to more people in the world.

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Thank you for doing your part.

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Thank you for listening, and I will connect with you next week.

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See ya, have a lovely day.