One of the best things about the resilient zone is that it can grow! This is because our brain adapts as we grow in managing our stress.
The resilient zone is a concept from Social Resilience Model and is the space in which we function at our best. When I first learned about this it seemed vague. A simple way to think about this is that it is the zone where we experience balance between calm and stress.
This does require us to pay attention to our body and mind to see how we are experiencing stress and calmness. When I pay attention to myself I know I am getting stressed by noticing my heart is beating faster, having a pit feeling in my stomach, tightness in my chest, my body starts to clinch up, and my thoughts become scattered. In comparison when I am feeling calm I notice I’m breathing deeper, my shoulders and body relaxes, the tightness in my chest loosens, and my thoughts become more cohesive. This is what it looks like for me, but it is important to notice what stress and calm looks like for you.
As we build resilience we are able to tolerate more stress and have more balance. When our resilient zone is small we can become overwhelmed by stress more easily and it can become more difficult to calm ourselves. Often our resilient zone in smaller because we have experienced trauma in our lives or have been stuck in one of the survival modes, flight, fight, fawn, or freeze, for long periods of time.
Author Matthew Bennett talks about a great analogy of this concept using various sized glasses. In his book Connecting Paradigms A Trauma-Informed & Neurological Framework for Motivational Interviewing Implementation, Bennett discusses the concept that being outside of our resilient zone is like having a cup that is overflowing. When our cup or resilient zone is smaller it does not take much for the cup to overflow or for us to be overwhelmed by stress. But as we practice tools to build resilience our cup gets bigger and we can withstand more without being overwhelmed.
There are many ways that we can build resilience. But one of the most powerful things we can do is to notice and pay attention to our body and mind. Tracking within ourselves and paying attention to ourselves is powerful and can help us to see the resilience we already have and allow us to build even more resilience. This doesn’t have to be complicated and can be simply noticing or journaling about your observations.
Reference
Bennett, M. (2017). Connecting Paradigms A Trauma-Informed & Neurological Framework for Motivational Interviewing Implementation. Bennett Innovation Group, L3C.
Blooming Resilient 