MENTAL RESILIENCE
Building a positive mindset
Growth mindset
Facing challenges successfully require a growth mindset. This perspective emphasizes learning instead of achievement, and expects challenges instead of an easy path. Who you are and what you know is not fixed in time. Even intelligence can change! Rather than having a fixed mindset, think about what skills and knowledge you need to gain and how you can learn what you need for your goals.
When people focus on achievement, they will develop a black-or-white perspective and tend to feel demotivated and discouraged when they don’t achieve what they want. With a growth mindset, there can be no failure. As long as you are learning, you are making progress! You are more likely to persevere and figure ways how to improve by not focusing on achievement. Identifying what needs to improve is no longer a death sentence, but a means to keep growing and moving forward.
Why hide deficiencies instead of overcoming them? Why look for friends or partners who will just shore up your self-esteem instead of ones who will also challenge you to grow? And why seek out the tried and true, instead of experiences that will stretch you? The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset. This is the mindset that allows people to thrive during some of the most challenging times in their lives.
Carol Dweck
Remembering the positives
Research has shown that cultivating positive emotions and character traits through simple psychological exercises can increase happiness and improve mental health. Doing any of these exercises once or twice a week will help you gain a more positive perspective in life.
- Three good things
Write down three things that went well each day and their causes every night for one week. In addition, provide a causal explanation for each good thing. - Gratitude visit
Think about someone who has been especially kind to you but you never had the chance to properly thank them. Write a letter of gratitude to them and deliver it to them in person or in the mail. - You at your best
Think about a time when you were at your best, when you felt productive or happy or when you overcame a difficult time. Write the story down in detail - with a real beginning, middle and end. Read this story daily for a week and every time you read it, identify your personal strengths or positive qualities you displayed during that time. Were you brave? Honest? Curious? Caring? Finally look at the strengths you have identified and consider how you can make the most of those strengths? How can you display them in your daily life? - Identify and use your signature strength
Find out what your character strengths are by completing this questionnaire. Consider how you can use one one of these top strengths in a new and different way every day for the next week.
Changing mindsets
Thinking styles
When something happens, how we perceive the event and explain it to ourselves (thoughts) affect the way we feel (emotions) and determine what we will do next (behaviour). It’s the A-B-C of events.
A-B-C of events
A = Affect (Emotions)
B= Behavior
C= Cognition (Thoughts)
Sometimes we develop patterns of negative thinking styles that pop into our head automatically whenever you face a situation. For instance, when someone gives us weird look, we might think “this person doesn’t like me”, even if there is no other evidence supporting that thought! These negative self talk lead us to feel bad about ourselves, anxious, sad or even angry. Subsequently, we may lash out, withdraw or avoid people or the situation.
Take a look at the list below and see if any of these thinking styles sound familiar.
Common negative thinking styles
- All-or-Nothing Thinking: This is also known as black-or-white thinking. It’s either perfect or complete failure; strong or weak. There is no grey or middle zone. For instance, when John got one negative remark among 4 positive comments on his work appraisal, John saw himself as a loser because he didn’t get only positive comments: “I can’t do anything right! My boss thinks I am a bad worker.”
- Over generalization: This is the tendency to take one single event as representative of how things have always been and will always be. For instance, when Jean didn’t get invited to a social gathering, she automatically thought to herself “I never get invited to anything! People always see me as unimportant!”
- Mental Filter: Imagine having grey colour filter that taints the whole picture. Having a mental filter leads you to focus on a single negative detail to the point that nothing else matters and the whole picture looks dark and grey. For instance, all of Shu Yi’s students liked her class but one student said she was critical. She focused on that comment for days and all the other comments became less positive after.
- Discounting the Positive: When someone says something nice about you or when something good happens to you, you discount the positive things. You might say to yourself, “She’s just saying that because she’s trying to be nice”, or “I’m just lucky that I got the promotion”. When you discount the positives, good things are brushed off and you may continue to feel bad about yourself.
- Jumping to Conclusions: This happens when you draw negative conclusions without all the facts. This might happen by mind reading - assuming someone is thinking something negative without explicitly clarifying (e.g. “she is angry at me”); or fortune telling - predicting something bad will happen (e.g. “I will fail this test”).
- Magnification/Minimizing: You magnify the importance of the negative aspects of yourself, or the parts of you that you don’t like, and downplay the importance of your good qualities.
- Emotional Reasoning: Emotions are taken as evidence of the truth. For instance, “If I feel guilty, it must mean i did something wrong”, or “If I feel like a loser, that must mean I am one”.
- “Should statements”: Should statements indicate the rules that we believe in and the expectations that we have. These rules are often subjective and influenced by significant others, but we hold them to be objectively true. We may also use words such as “musts”, “oughts”, or “have tos” to keep ourselves in line. Whenever we break these rules, we often feel guilty and frustrated. For instance, Nur feels guilty because she is sad that she got a bad grade, and she should not feel sad, she should be OK with whatever she gets. We have these rules for ourselves and also for others. These rules make it difficult for us to accept the way others are or what they do.
- Labeling: Labeling focuses on traits rather than behaviours. Traits are seen as something unchangeable and a part of the person’s identity. Negative labels include “loser”, “ugly”, “lousy” or “crazy”. These labels become the go-to insult to ourselves or others.
- Personalization and blame: Personalization happens when you take responsibility for things that are outside your control. For instance, Janet blamed herself for her parents getting a divorce. “If only I was good enough, my parents wouldn’t argue so much.” Blaming happens when you blame others completely for your problems. The truth is that in most situations, there is no one single person responsible for the event. Looking at your contributions will help you figure out how to change the situation.
When you face a difficult and challenging situation and start to feel bad, write down your thoughts and see if you can identify any negative thinking styles. Then see if you can see the situation from a different and more helpful angle. Instead of black-or-white thinking, consider the in-betweens. Instead of the should statements, consider them as subjective preferences that can be modified.
Rumination
Rumination happens when people focus on their negative feelings, possible causes and consequences. It is a negative cycle that people get stuck in and they feel worse and worse the longer they remain in the cycle. Common themes of rumination are inadequacy, rejection and worthlessness. Rumination stops people from problem solving and from feeling better. Get out of the negative spiral by focusing on positive things or looking at the problem objectively and problem solving. Trying to figure out why something happen may actually be stopping you from having more positive experiences.
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