Resilience from the Inside Out

Thank you very much for having me, Joan.

So, Sally, let's begin the conversation with the definition of resilience.

What does it mean to be resilient?

It's an ability to be flexible, to be adaptable, to be able to pivot in the face of challenging circumstances.

Very atypically, it's that ability to fall down and pick ourselves back up.

Does resilience come naturally for some people?

I think it's something that is, we learn resilience in an ideal family situation.

If we're raised in a family where we're loved, honoured and adored and heard, then we can develop resilience.

But for those of us who aren't raised in those circumstances, you can develop resilience as adults.

What determines if we're a resilient person?

Our family structure, our family experience mainly.

When we're children, we're really powerless.

So it's what happens to us when we're children.

So my book begins with my story, which I can just give you a quick recap on, is that something terrible happened to me when I was seven.

I told my mother and she said, never mention it again.

And she was really angry with me.

And I took it that I'd done something terribly wrong and it was all my fault.

So in those circumstances, that was a pivotal moment in my life that I thought I was something wrong with me.

And that kind of depicted how I thought and felt about myself until I was 35 years old and I had a follow-up conversation on that same theme with my mother.

And that kind of answered loads of unanswered questions.

But that event had made me feel that I wasn't resilient and that I was a bad person.

I was

a bad, failed person.

And that happens in families all the time.

It doesn't have to be dramatic.