Resilience: What Keeps Us Going When Life Feels Hard
Life has a way of throwing curveballs—illness, loss, caregiving, financial stress, unexpected changes. We can’t always control what happens, but we can strengthen the way we meet it. That strength is called resilience.
What Is Resilience, Really?
Resilience isn’t about being tough or pretending nothing hurts. It’s the ability to bend without breaking, to keep moving even when life feels heavy. In plain language, resilience is our capacity to recover, adapt, and continue showing up when challenges come.
Think of it like a tree in a storm. A rigid tree snaps in strong winds, but a flexible tree sways, bends, and eventually stands tall again. Resilience is the flexibility that helps us weather the storms of life.
A Story of Resilience in Action
A family I know lost their home in a fire. Overnight, everything they owned was gone. Instead of collapsing into despair, they showed up at their community center the very next day—to help sort clothing donations for other fire victims.
Were they devastated? Absolutely. But their choice to focus on helping others gave them strength. By creating small moments of purpose and even joy in the middle of tragedy, they found a way forward.
Their story shows that resilience isn’t about never falling down—it’s about choosing, again and again, to get back up.
Joy as Fuel for Resilience
Here’s where joy comes in. Resilience and joy are deeply connected. Joy isn’t just a “nice-to-have” emotion—it’s the fuel that helps us endure hardship.
When we cultivate joy in daily life (even in tiny doses), we build an inner reserve to draw from when things get tough. Joy reminds us of what’s still good, even in difficulty, and that reminder strengthens our ability to keep going.
- Pleasure might distract us.
- Happiness might come and go.
- But joy roots us, reminding us that meaning, love, and hope are still present.
Increasing our joy doesn’t erase pain, but it increases our resilience because it gives us a reason to keep moving through it.
A Daily Resilience-Building Practice
Here’s a simple way to strengthen resilience through joy:
The “One Good Thing” Practice
- At the end of each day, pause for one minute.
- Ask yourself: What was one good thing about today?
- It might be a laugh, a cup of coffee, a hug, a sunset.
- Write it down or say it out loud.
Over time, this builds a mental habit of noticing joy, which strengthens your capacity to endure hard moments. It’s like doing a tiny workout for your resilience every day.
Closing Thoughts
Resilience isn’t about perfection—it’s about persistence. And joy is what helps us persist. Every time you notice a small joy, you strengthen your ability to bend instead of break, to rise instead of stay down.
The storms of life will come, but with resilience—and the joy that fuels it—you’ll be able to weather them and keep growing.
