How’s your supply of adaptive capacities?
Your adaptive capacities make-up your resource pile of coping skills. All those people, behaviors and action items that restore you. Ground you. Allow you to keep going when the demands of life are telling you to pack it in and quit. Think of it as your emotional tool box that makes life both tolerable and enjoyable. The possibilities are endless, be it yoga, nutrition, community, spirituality, pets, creative and expressive arts, sleep, nature, 12-Step meetings, therapy, …
The quality and quantity – the depth and the width – of your personal supply of adaptive capacities will determine not only your emotional health, but your overall wellness. Life’s stressors are inevitable and to a large degree, unpredictable. Because of this, it is not necessarily the amount of stress we are encountering that determines our physical and emotional state. It is our ability to adapt and cope that makes the difference.
So, get busy building and strengthening your adaptive capacities. Sharpen your toolbox. Shop for additional skills. If you do that, you have the highest chance of coming through life’s hardships shining.
Cliff Note Version: In a crisis, triage. Go into massive action to rid or decrease the stress. But, when life hands you some downtime, stockpile your adaptive capacities. Your future self will appreciate such deposits when they are made early and often. Because, more storms are coming, and we want to ride the waves, rather than be knocked down and out.
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