Resilience meets vulnerability………

Before lockdown resilience was the buzzword in coaching, people needed to show more resilience, businesses wanted a resilient workforce who could deal with difficulties and take them in their stride. So here’s the thing, in another community surfaced Brene Brown, with her now famous Ted talk and you tube clip of how to be more vulnerable. Both of these concepts I get, when bad or difficult things happen we don’t want them to floor us, put us out of action “be face down like a star fish on the floor” for those familiar with Bridget Jones, unable to function. But in the case of vulnerability we are encouraged to voice how we are feeling, admit that we have a difficulty and are less than perfect, that we need some help and support to deal with certain situations. This approach would historically be frowned upon in business and work as being 'weak’ and not a strength that we are looking for in an employee, or indeed often a friend. Now we hear phrases like “its ok not to be ok” and are openly encouraged to talk about our mental health and things that we may be struggling with. I have seen for some time this continuum at play, how do we know how to scale this? Can we be vulnerable and truly heard or do we need to show how resilient we are? It’s a minefield that many people are finding difficult at the moment, especially on the subject of returning to work (in whatever way or shape that may be). When I became a mental health first aider the thing that struck me was that the action most needed was simply having a conversation, its that simple. So if we are talking to friends, partners, colleagues, line management, HR we can all take the approach of those open, caring, interested questions that can promote vulnerable and resilient conversations “tell me how your feeling right now”, “can you talk to me about your lockdown experience?”, “what did you find easy and what did you find challenging in lockdown?”, “Is there any way I can help to make this transition any easier for you? How can I help” and with a genuine curiosity not to try and fix things but just being present and hearing that person. By doing this - holding space for that person (to take from a healing modality), allowing them to be seen and heard in all their glorious humanity can be life changing for them. By accepting their authenticity in allowing the vulnerability to shine through the resiliency will follow, does that make sense? Go try it, I encourage you, and I would love to hear your experiences of what happens when we slow life down enough to allow this process to unfold - it is very much a mindful way of coaching people through what may have been quite a traumatic experience for them. And a continuum is just that we can move from one end to the other, at times showing resilience and others vulnerability, it’s a great interplay if we allow the process to happen naturally.

I am always available for a discovery call if you would like to explore how coaching can help you with this process.

With love and support