RESILIENCE AND MENTAL WEALTH
Resilience can vary based on the experiences and attitudes of individuals. If desired, resilience can be learned and enhanced through building on one’s mental wealth. It is thought that three key enablers of resilience include; purpose, connection and well-being, thus being aware of these, is key to enhancing one’s resilience.
Purpose is fundamental to being resilient, and is strongly correlated to one’s identity. Purpose largely encompasses hope, goals, planning and determination. Hope for example, might be thinking about what the future could look like, when it can’t be seen at present. Documented planning and goal setting allows for aspiration, and a timeline of review for the future. Determination is an enabler of achieving goals, being enhanced when a deeper purpose is felt, especially when it’s very clear to one why one they are doing what they’re doing.
Well-being and feeling better fosters a greater ability to increase resilience. Every individual likely has certain things in life for which they need to feel happy and be well. For some, exercise and movement may be a large enhancer of well-being, especially with the chemical enhancement it has on the brain and body. For others, or in synergy, practising gratitude, celebrating and enjoying the little things likely contribute to their well-being.
Connection for many often helps to boost mood, reduce stress and strengthen a sense of meaning in life. Connection is essentially the link between purpose and well-being. It may consist of family, friends, networks and the wider community. At a deeper resilience level, one might think about the people that they turn to in the face of adversity and who is needed in their lives.
One definition of resilience is the ability of a person to recover readily from adversity. When people come through adversity, they need to be able to hit pause to review the process and abilities they’ve developed to get through issues. With resilience identified, one can further shift their perspective to enhancing mental wealth. A concept that refers to mental health, as if its anything one might work towards developing, similarly, to building investments, learning a new skill or training to run a marathon. For example, if people can understand and identify the things that cause them pain, they can become competent in dealing with these sources of pain, thus enhancing their resilience.
Workload and the changing nature of farming can be a major cause of stress in agriculture, contributing to mental health considerations. Identifying the stressors that can and can’t be controlled, can be a way of regulating stress to manage performance and enhance mental wealth. In turn, this helps to manage a healthy level of stress which helps people perform, without reaching unhealthy stress levels that in turn can cause issues such as burnout. Self-awareness and acknowledgement of one’s capacity, is essential for establishing boundaries to aid in managing one’s capacity and where to devote their time.