Building Resilience

by | Aug 23, 2024 | Articles, Biblical Financial Principles

By Amanda Van Noppen

Registered Psychotherapist, MA, RP, CCC

(Amanda Van Noppen was a guest on “Let’s Talk Money with Dave and Reb” episode #391. She graciously added more of her thoughts around resilience and our financial journeys.)

Resilience is not the lack of stress—it’s the ability to go through it.  

There is no way around it, sometimes life can be hard. We feel the exhaustion of managing and pushing through and at times it can feel like we have nothing left. In these moments, what do we use to carry on and keep going? The word resilience comes to mind. 

What is resilience? 

“Resilience is a process to harness resources to sustain well-being”.1 

Resilience can sometimes be stereotyped as a character trait that we’re born with. It is depicted as strength, toughness, grit, or stoicism. However, more and more research is showing that resilience is a skill or process that we use. It’s more about getting through something, rather than being strong doing it. 

Each of us has had our unique experiences that shape our ability to utilise and build resilience, and that may impact how resilient we feel. We also have areas where we feel more resilient than others. 

A key to remember when thinking about resilience is that it’s not something we just have or don’t have. It’s something that ebbs and flows with the resources around us, the capacity we currently have, and the skills we’ve been able to add. Resilience—or lack of it—is not an indication of weak character, failure, or being less. It typically reflects on how much support we feel we have, how much internal resources we have available, and how much we feel we have the skills to get through a current situation. 

Pushing through

We all have areas where we feel more adapted and comfortable pushing through. One person may feel very resilient in their physical lives (lifts heavy things, runs far) but finds their mental strength waxes and wanes with time. Some people have immense emotional resilience, holding others’ emotions and being empathetic, but finding they are depleted when problem solving. 

There are many types of resilience and it can be helpful to know your areas of skill and growth. Here are some examples:2

  1. Psychological—mental capacity 
  2. Physical—body’s ability to adapt 
  3. Emotional—ability to manage/process emotions through crisis
  4. Social—capacity for a group of people (often seen in community crisis)

In all of this, we may wonder if we can grow resilience, or whether we will remain stuck in current circumstances. This is key to resilience building—understanding that we can change, and grow it in our lives. 

Here is one model that can help us grow our resilient muscles. The 7Cs of Resilience3 lay out different ways we can feel more resilient in moments of overwhelm. 

  1. Control—A feeling of autonomy. This is identifying what we have control over and practising boundaries related to what we do not. 
  2. Coping skills—Feeling like we have the coping skills to manage distress and discomfort from stress. We are learning new skills and adapting our current ones.
  3. Contribution—Feeling connected and able to give back to others, helping others, thinking beyond ourselves. 
  4. Character—A sense of purpose where values push us forward with a sense of what is right and wrong for us.
  5. Connection—Engagement with people where we feel that others understand us. We are part of a community.
  6. Confidence—The belief in our own abilities where we review what we have done in the past and understand that just like in the past, we will get through again. 
  7. Competence skills—Learning the skills directly related to the adversity. For example you may go to counselling and learn about mental health symptoms, or you may sign up for financial coaching to help with understanding money and your behaviour around money. 

What is the story we are telling ourselves about what is happening? 

Our internal narrative matters greatly in how we face difficult times. Are we telling ourselves we are alone, unable to handle things, abandoned by people and God, unable to do anything? Our internal narrative can lower our resilience and impact the 7Cs just by what we tell ourselves. 

Another key to the journey is understanding that we don’t have to feel like we’re thriving to be getting through something. Resilience is not the lack of stress—it’s the ability to go through it.  

Money, financial decisions, and current world situations can create a lot of concern and anxiety within us. Circumstances around money behaviour and conversations around money can really stretch us. You may be feeling that you have very little resilience in the area of money. Remember what you have already been learning. Return to the 7Cs of how we grow and maintain resilience, even in the midst of financial stress. 

Here is an example of how we might use the 7Cs in the midst of financial stress.

  1. Label what we have in our control to better allocate our limited resources to where we can actually do something or have the ability to make change. De-prioritize the areas that we cannot change.
  2. Focus on our coping skills that help us de-stress and manage discomfort. As backwards as it feels, we want to make sure we’re contributing or giving back in moments like these. 
  3. Contributing may not be in money but in time, in providing a listening ear, or just being empathetic to someone around us. This will lead us to connection. Our own story isn’t the only one being told.
  4. Connection helps us feel like we have people around, supporting us. It can be helpful to take small moments in the midst of these stressful moments and re-centre ourselves on what we do have, and see how the journey is growing our character.
  5. Character development and understanding purpose in the journey is important. This may look like reminding ourselves of our God who loves us, or of the larger picture that has been created for us. 
  6. Confidence is built throughout these moments when we remind ourselves that we have walked through difficult times before, and we have done so successfully. We have the ability to continue on.
  7. Competence is the final C, and means never hesitating to learn things that will help us grow. This building of competence can happen with coaches, therapists, friends, and family—people with knowledge who can listen, support, and guide through tough times. 

To learn more about Amanda, go to https://vannoppentherapy.com/ Or on instagram: vannoppenpsychotherapy.

  1. (Panter-Brick & Leckman, 2013).https://acamh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jcpp.12057
  2. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/four-types-resilience-abd-basheer-phd/  
  3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6824889/