Reframing resilience – collective care, ‘staggered breathing’ and permission to be vulnerable

The word ‘resilience’ has become one of the ubiquitous buzzwords that has been favoured in fields from education, to workplace wellbeing, to psychology (in both pop and clinical forms) for quite some time. While I’m in favour of finding ways to pick ourselves back up when we’ve been knocked down – and occasionally even partial to a Kelly Clarkson karaoke moment – I find myself asking questions whenever the concept of resilience comes up. I might wonder whether it’s the most helpful word to use in the given context, and how it’s being understood. For example, I used to offer wellbeing support to a woman who had been through an extraordinary amount of adversity and trauma in her life. When I met her, she still faced some significant challenges, but the way she had turned things around and overcome massive obstacles was remarkable. Any time people heard her story, they would comment on how unusually resilient she was. There’s no denying the truth of that, but she internalised the message that she was ‘a resilient person’, and struggled to reconcile this with her experience on days when she felt overwhelmed and less able to cope. We worked on reframing the idea of resilience, reflecting on the idea that it’s not something we are, but a part of us that we might feel more or less in touch with at different times. We also considered the potential confusion between resilience and stoicism, since she would say things like ‘I know I’m supposed to be resilient but some days I don’t feel strong and I just want to hide from the world’. Sometimes, when people think about resilience, they might place it at odds with vulnerability. We might conflate the old ‘bootstrap’ mentality (where painful experiences are ‘character building’) with the idea that adversity can lead to more ability to bounce back in future. But of course, it’s not a given that experiencing more difficult or traumatic experiences leads to greater resilience – it’s true that humans are masters of adapting and adjusting to our circumstances, but getting used to difficult experiences is not the same as becoming more skilled at coping with, and growing through them. That depends on a number of factors, such as what support and resources are available to help us to rest, reflect, make sense of things, safely connect with others and express emotions. If anything, developing greater resilience requires us to have permission to be vulnerable enough to let ourselves fall, be caught and learn, as well as the courage to get back up and try again.

The connection between resilience and supportive human relationships feels crucial to me, and I’ve also spent a lot of time recently thinking about how the idea of resilience is used in workplace contexts, especially where wellbeing and working conditions are concerned. There are so many challenges we’re all facing right now, from economic crises and funding cuts, to political unrest, law and policy changes, and widespread health issues. Most of us are being asked to do more with less, and the helping professions are seeing higher levels of need and crisis. It’s not all bleak, but there’s no doubt that this is a context that requires practically superhuman levels of resilience. It seems like a big ask for each individual to build up enough proverbial muscle to carry more and more cognitive, emotional, physical or other labour – not for the first time, I find myself asking how much responsibility lies at the level of the individual, workplace, community or government. I’ve seen organisations struggling with dramatic funding cuts and getting into disputes with employees over increasing workloads, staff sickness and a lack of time and space to process traumatic events. Senior leaders with responsibility for preventing service closures and protecting staff from as best they could from the worst effects of sector wide challenges were at their edges, and responded defensively to staff concerns. The top-down messaging in these situations was often simply, ‘you need to be more resilient’. Sometimes, this was delivered along with a checklist of the wellbeing support on offer to those who felt they needed more support, but reminding traumatised and burned out frontline workers and managers that lunchtime yoga was available did not tend to go down well. Intentionally or otherwise, this is the sort of situation in which the concept of resilience can be weaponised, and used to locate problems at the level of the individual. Given the importance of relational support and connection in terms of resilience building, this is unlikely to be a winning strategy. It’s also a way to avoid taking on the daunting task of considering the systemic issues that might be causing or contributing to challenges. This in itself requires a level of resilience and robustness that it can be difficult to get in touch with when we’re in survival mode and under-resourced. This, for me, highlights the importance of protecting space to take some time out to really reflect, create the conditions for genuinely reflective, vulnerable, honest and challenging conversations (with outside support if necessary). Developing strategies that will lead to more organisational or collective resilience needs to start with this level of listening and honest reflection.

I’m pondering the idea of collective resilience, and how this might be a helpful goal in workplaces and communities. What might collective resilience look like, and how do we develop it? Firstly, there’s a sense of shared responsibility. This means not over-relying on one person (distributed responsibility, collaboration and transparent information sharing come into play here). It balances the rights and responsibilities of each individual with the needs and responsibilities of the collective. We’re not individually let off the hook here – each person needs to uphold their end of the bargain as best they can. There’s an acknowledgment of our flawed, vulnerable, diverse and brilliant humanity in this. Teams and communities that benefit from a range of different perspectives, skill sets and experiences are demonstrably stronger. And in a group of humans, it’s a guarantee that people will get sick, experience traumatic life events, have bad days or become overwhelmed with their responsibilities at some point. A resilient collective would have enough resources to make contingency plans and to let people step up and support each other when needed. If everyone is at their edges, it’s very difficult to shoulder the extra responsibility needed to keep things running smoothly when one person finds themselves in crisis. As a lifelong choral singer, I was delighted to come across ‘staggered breathing’ as an analogy for this recently. Staggered breathing is a technique that choirs employ in order to be able to sustain long notes and phrases far beyond what one person could manage on their own. People take breaths at different times, knowing that the group will keep singing when they need to refuel, and the audience experiences this as an uninterrupted sound. Skilled choral singers pay close attention to the breathing patterns of their neighbours, in order to create a more staggered effect and ensure that if the person next to them is breathing, they are singing and vice versa. Maybe it's the choir nerd in me, but I find this to be a perfect analogy for the ways that communities can support each other. It’s well established in grassroots organising spaces, where burnout is common and expected. Being aware of, and responsive to each other’s needs lets the community as a whole sustain its work more effectively.

I also connect collective resilience with the ability to disagree, withstand conflict and learn from relational challenges. Rupture and repair is a well rehearsed idea in the therapy world – this means that successfully navigating and repairing after conflict leads to a stronger foundation in relationships. This concept is closely related to the idea of resilience, with the experience of not only surviving, but also learning from a difficult experience building a sense of confidence that future challenges will also be manageable. This feels especially pertinent in situations where teams and groups are under pressure and different views, communication styles and needs potentially lead to getting stuck. And learning the skills to be in community with people in spite of difference and disagreement feels more necessary than ever, in the wider political context. This is something I struggle with personally at times – my neurodivergent justice sensitivity and experience of being ‘othered’ can make it tricky to let go of a desire to stick with those who align most closely with my values at all costs. But in the context of algorithmic echo chambers and purity politics, the chances of minds being changed or short term compromise for long term gain are low. Being able to humanise and hear each other when we disagree seems to offer the best shot of developing nuance, reducing othering and building resilience. Having said this, I’ve heard this argument used to pressurise oppressed groups into arguing for their rights with those who wish them harm. I admire people who feel able and willing to take on this kind of risky emotional labour, but it shouldn’t be an expectation. It’s easy for calls for building bridges to spill over into platforming human rights violations and hate speech – whether a group of people deserves to be considered to be fully human and treated equitably is not something I am willing to debate or ‘agree to disagree’ on. So, there is a need for boundaries and clear social contracts, within which, rupture, repair and different perspectives can lead to growth. And I have to hope that it’s possible (though no doubt relatively rare) that, with enough resilience and connection, prejudicial beliefs might be changed. My idealised vision of a resilient community involves having enough resources, time, space and will to meet everyone’s needs and value each member equally (even when we’re frustrated with each other). Under these circumstances, the chances of dehumanising, scapegoating or weaponising ‘resilience’ as a demand for people to withstand increasingly difficult conditions, are pretty low. As utopian as this might sound, the business of creating these conditions is hard and messy work. But in my experience, the move from prioritising individual resilience (or stoicism) to collective care is very much worth the effort.

Is there a good time for difficult conversations?

Almost two years of intermittent lockdowns gave us opportunities to reflect on what’s working or not, challenged our assumptions about what’s possible and necessitated a bit of a review of our needs and resources, both on individual and collective levels. For many people and organisations, this has pushed a need for change and exploration of potentially challenging topics further up the agenda. At the same time, events like the murder of George Floyd and resulting groundswell of support for the Black Lives Matter movement triggered a flurry of questions about social justice and what this means for us as individuals and communities.

And yet, all of this exploration has been taking place in a context of collective trauma, burnout, grief and uncertainty. The overwhelming message I’ve heard from people returning to changed workplaces and tentatively stepping further out into the world is that they are tired and perhaps a little more fragile than usual. Sure, there are those who have flourished in recent times and (provided it’s not at the expense of others) I’m happy to hear that. But for most, a sustained period of relentless change, restriction, uncertainty and potentially trauma has had an impact. So, what do we do with a context that includes big questions and burnout? Is this a bad time for difficult conversations? Is there such a thing as a good time for them? Below, I outline what considerations might be part of a healthy and effective approach to these tricky questions.

With any significant discussion or project, I believe that contracting and checking in about how we’re doing are among the key elements for success. The bigger picture of the contracting process involves things like establishing what we’re trying to achieve by setting aside time to explore a specific theme. If everyone has a broadly similar idea of what’s expected, the risk of misunderstandings can be lessened, and there’s more opportunity to ensure genuine, informed ‘buy-in’. Beyond these broad brushstrokes, we get into the nuts and bolts of contracting – the ‘when, where, who’ and logistics. But the question of ‘when’ is more than just a logistical one. Diaries can be hard to synchronise, both in professional and social worlds at the best of times. And when we’re at our edges, scheduling takes on extra significance. Many of us have found that what had previously seemed like a manageable number of meetings, social engagements and projects now seems like a real overstretch. Stamina and expectations may have shifted, and some interactions may be more emotionally costly than they once were. With this in mind, figuring a bit of decompression time in following a difficult conversation might be particularly helpful.

Asking ourselves, ‘is this the right time’ is a matter of honestly assessing a number of factors - the purpose and how urgent it is, whether we have capacity to do the conversation justice, our energy levels and resilience, and whether there’s a chance we could be avoiding the conversation because it’s likely to be uncomfortable. A quick assessment of what the risks and benefits of tackling the issue now or saving it for later could be a good start – what might happen if you do or don’t discuss this? How far away is ‘later’? As someone who’s spent years working with my tendency to start what feels like a hundred projects at a time, put the low priority ones off until ‘later’ and then forget about them entirely, I’m well aware of the risk of using ‘later’ as an avoidance tactic. I’m writing this at the end of a tough year – looking towards a new year is often a great time to pause, reflect and set goals. So, putting things in the ‘for the new year’ pile might make a lot of sense right now – but is there a specific plan and timeframe, or are you really saying ‘too hard, not now’?

Whether addressing a possibly friendship-ending disagreement on a political issue, making difficult organisational decisions or taking steps to improve a tense working relationship, some of the underlying themes are the same. Humans are so hard-wired for belonging, that this arguably shapes all of our interactions with others and heavily influences our sense of self. Ultimately, what makes difficult conversations difficult is often related to fears of being rejected or a strong sense of ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’ – establishing an in-group and an out-group. We might worry about being judged, about causing hurt and the consequences of this, about not being heard or having our dearly held beliefs called into question. These are significant concepts, and there can be a lot of shame attached to them. We’ve evolved to cooperate or risk rejection and death – it sounds dramatic, but the parts of our brain that are first to respond to a potential threat haven’t caught up with the fact that an argument with a colleague about, say, pronouns in an email signature, generally isn’t a life-or-death situation (but an important caveat - since we’re talking about pronouns, it is worth noting that a 2018 study found that the use of correct name and pronouns significantly decreased depression and suicidal ideation in transgender youth). Knowing that we may be carrying these fears or defensive positions into a difficult conversation, and that we’re doing this at a time when we may be feeling less resilient than usual, what can we do about all of this? Here are a few tips for the difficult conversations you’ve decided you need to have now.

·        Gather your resources, work on your resilience

If you’re feeling a little tired and rough around the edges, coming into stressful situations with a well-equipped toolbox is of extra importance. Take some time to think about what helps you to be at your most present and grounded, rested, calm and confident? You might want to make a list of objects, actions, people, places, words, and consider how you might take support from them in the run up to and during a hard conversation.

·        Bring in an outside perspective

When you are enmeshed in a situation, it can be hard to step outside the perspective you’re seeing things from in the moment. In a one-to-one or group environment where everyone has a stake in the outcome, it’s understandable that things might escalate. Bringing in an outside person to hold space can be useful. I won’t say that they’d provide an ‘objective’ view – on some level, they’d be bringing their own life experience, beliefs and knowledge into the room. But what’s crucial is their distance from the outcome of the situation at hand, which can provide a wider lensed view. This is something that can be done through professional intervention (consultancy, therapy, a senior colleague from another team) or in a more informal way, if you can identify a fairly impartial person who might offer a bit of a mediating role in a personal conflict.

·        It’s worth taking the time to really connect

Recognising the common humanity underneath our differences can mitigate the urge to put everyone into ‘them’ and ‘us’ boxes – that in-group/out-group default setting. It might not make a huge impact on fundamentally different views, but I’ve found it incredibly helpful in terms of promoting listening with open minds and hearts. It’s worth considering how you’ll connect as fellow humans before you launch into the Big Topics – for example, this might be done through a check-in (with the question ‘how are you really?’ in mind), some mindfulness work or even ‘just’ space for a coffee and a chat before getting stuck in.

·        Plan what you’ll do if it goes ‘wrong’

A bit of consideration of how to deal with overwhelm can go a long way. Even with good communication and planning, sometimes trauma triggers are hit and limits are reached. It happens! Thinking about offering time-outs and breaks, the ability to renegotiate for another day if you get completely stuck and opportunities to debrief later can support you in getting back on track and prevent a situation escalating further.

So, to return to the question ‘is there a good time for difficult conversations?’, the answer is yes, there can be. And with all the right support and planning, you may find that the conversations aren’t so difficult after all.

Need support with a difficult conversation? Contact me to find out more…