Resilience is a buzz word of the moment. While it is intrinsic to mental health, because without it, you can’t bounce back from the inevitable vicissitudes that life throws at you, it doesn’t appear to be in over-abundance in the youth of today, to the extent that resilience classes, designed to teach young people how to be resilient, are part of the curriculum in countries like Norway, the United Kingdom and Australia.
Resilience is defined as ‘the ability to “bounce back” from stressful or challenging experiences. It involves being able to adapt to changes and approach negative events, sources of stress and traumatic events as constructively as possible.’
Why don’t children and young people have resilience? My first reaction would be, perhaps the shiny images reflected back through social media of the happiness of others throws our own lives into stark relief, miserable by contrast, just as it conveys unrealistic expectations about how life is supposed to be? If our lives are not like those presented for our gaze and admiration, then perhaps the corollary is drawn that it is our own fault, instead of a narrow snapshot of recreational pursuits from lives at play. The pictures we see are rarely of our peers engaged in the humdrum mundane tasks that constitute the bulk of the daily grind.
Meanwhile, the unembellished past we are familiar with is represented in grimy black and white photographs, excellently highlighted in the spoof film, 100 Ways to Die in the West, which posed the question, why don’t people smile in old photographs? I could just as easily ask, Why do people always smile in current photographs? Perhaps the historic poker face was born of the desire not to be captured mid-grimace for posterity. The overall impression all those unsmiling visages leaves is of thoroughly unpleasant times. No need to call it the Great Depression. I have already formed that view.
Closer inspection would reveal that young people are under more pressure to perform and meet a higher standard, often self-imposed, than in a previous era. Once upon a time, it was enough just to survive the photo shoot. Now one needs not only to survive, but to triumph, and present the glowing cine-reel as proof. Pressures that young people are increasingly subjected to have been identified as: “a faster-paced society; the bombardment of technology, social media and persistent, aggressive marketing strategies; an increase in academic testing and exams, and more family breakdowns.” (Ricci, SMH) The lives of our youth are the subject of studies by social media marketing research companies, dissected, analysed and pre-packaged demographically, for exploitation by advertising campaigns – the meaning of life – mass-consumption. I use, despoil and destroy, therefore, I am.
Having identified an absence of resilience, how is one meant to acquire it, and how was it developed in earlier times? Anecdotally, we are familiar with our parents and elders opining, “Life was tougher back in my day.” Was it? And how does that relate to today, and resilience?
Life was undoubtedly physically harder. It took more effort to get things done. Healthcare, medical breakthroughs and the widespread availability of better food as well as better knowledge about nutrition have made significant changes to people’s diet as well as ultimate longevity. There have also been immense improvements in technology and communication, so paradoxically, people have never been better connected than they are now. Therefore, it is safe to conclude that resilience is not a characteristic nurtured by the technological advances of modern times. It is born of a lack of communication and technology precisely because lack builds inner strength, the stuff that resilience is made of. Without hardship overcome, there can be no resilience.
I was six when I met my grandmother. If she wanted to go to town, she first had to catch the horse. She was 70. Among her daily chores were milking her two cows, from which she would make butter and cheese. She watered the gardens, dug up potatoes, carrots and parsnips for dinner. She baked bread every morning. Neighbours would drop by during the day to draw water from her well, because she had a good supply of fresh water and her well was deep, and if they were close friends, they would also stop to have a cup of tea. I listened with my six year-old ears to tales of premature death and horrific farm accidents. My grandmother, Alice, had given birth to six children, losing one in infancy. This was considered quite a good survival rate, back then. That is something we take for granted, living in developed countries where wealth is abundant – the high survival rate of our offspring.
Resilience would have been an ingrained part of my grandmother’s character. If she wanted something, she had to get it herself, and save up for any luxuries. A luxury might be a new pair of walking shoes. I remember how excited she was when she bought a new set of laces for her shoes that she paid for with the money she’d earned from selling eggs. Resilience was something she naturally acquired. She grew up in an era where there was no television. News was gleaned from neighbours, or read in the newspapers when one went into town, which was never more than weekly. For entertainment, there were card nights, music and dancing in neighbours’ houses. She never worked outside the house or earned an income; everything she needed was supplied from her own labour.
My own mother was one of 10 children. She was taken out of school at age 16 and sent to work. She gave her pay to her mother, who gave her back enough for the bus and new stockings. It must have seemed like her life had ended. My father left school at 11. He worked on the family farm, and on neighbouring farms. He had no expectations of getting what he wanted. He worked hard and he played hard. To say he had no expectations is putting it mildly. He passed away recently. I don’t think he had any expectations at all of life, except to work and raise a family. In this, he did admirably and was fortunate enough to have a long and happy retirement. He passed away at age 81, having played a round of golf in the morning and shared a beer with his friends at the club, before driving away. He never made it back home because he suffered a stroke in the afternoon from which he never regained consciousness. His only complaints in life were that, as he aged, he couldn’t accomplish what he once could with ease, which indicates that his sense of self-worth was tied up in his physical strength and determination.
Then along comes my generation. I am the eldest girl in a family of seven children. I was born with resilience. I rarely got my own way. We had two bicycles to share. If you got the bicycle for the day it meant that you’d been the bravest fighter, and fought like you had nothing to lose. I helped out with more than my fair share of chores. When I went on to have children of my own, I determined that they would not have to perform the chores I did. So maybe in that, I’m as guilty as any parent in producing the generation that lacks resilience? Compared to me, my children had it easy. I never asked them to help around the house. They grew up in a double income home, never wanting for anything, playing all the sport that the hours in the day and days in the week could fit. I made a cross for my own back by ferrying them to and fro between meets. Would I do it differently? No. In many ways, my children had the life I didn’t times 10. I’m fortunate. I have no guilt feelings about how I raised my children. I didn’t stint them anything.
I read in the newspapers in Australia that this is the generation that can’t afford their own homes but the baby boomers had it easy. Well, I know I didn’t have it easy. I didn’t expect it to be easy. If an entire generation can’t afford to get into the housing market, it’s not about the baby boomer generation. Here in Australia, that problem has a different genesis – the combination of high immigration, a 50% waiver in capital gains tax on assets after 12 months of ownership, even for investment homes, and negative gearing – the ability to offset losses against one’s income. It speaks to a loss of faith in elected representatives. If you want to change the laws, get out and campaign. Join unions. Stand up for rights hard won by earlier sacrifice, and relinquished with barely a batting eye-lid.
But resilience itself, in a more personal and individual way, how do people build it? I suspect that it is developed through an ability to postpone gratification of needs and desires. I would also suggest that resilience is built through experience, over time. Young people lack life experience. Problems loom big when they have little to compare them to, or they are facing them for the first time. My life outside of work revolved around taking my children to sport. In this way, I led them to believe that their wants and needs were consistently more important than mine. Watch any movie from the 80s and 90s, from "Ferris Bueller’s Day Off" to the "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" – parents’ role was to pander to their children. Even “Little Miss Sunshine”, though a dysfunctional view of modern life, shows parents sacrificing everything to help their children to achieve their dreams, however dubious their aspiration. It’s a far cry from “Little House on the Prairie” where children were more likely to be engaged either in school activities or doing their chores.
I think the notion of resilience is related to expectation. If reality doesn’t match up to our expectations, then somehow we think it’s our fault – or that we can fix it, instead of accepting what we can’t change and working on what we can - and being grateful for what we have. If our life expectancy is 80, then how much of our lives are we going to spend wishing we had something unattainable, and how much will we spend actually being grateful for what we have achieved? Setting realistic goals is the first step to achieving happiness. Perhaps young people don't know what is realistically attainable, because they are being confronted everywhere with the false facades of everyone's pretence?
https://wayahead.org.au/mental-health-information/fact-sheets/building-resilience/
