What was most impactful for the participants of the 3-month resilienceprogram I just finished with a client?

 

Last week, my client was so generous to share the results of the internal survey they do after every training with me.

What we did in this training, based on the bodymindconnection:

– introducing the body as a precise and workable access point to shift the mental and emotional state
– education and experiencing the nervoussystem and its stressresponses
– somatic awareness and how to shift from a dysregulated into a more solution-oriented state
– how repeated stateregulation turns into better stresstolerance
– how to spot and meet the individual stressresponse within specific contexts to avoid their autopilot reaction
– which type of selfcare is appropriate when
– how to spot red flags of exhaustion before they lead to consequences

… as you can tell, it was quite a dense program. Resilience as a part of sustainable selfleadership is a life skill, and it is incredibly empowering to experience oneself actually being able to choose how they want to show up.

To be honest, I had expected the feedback be referring to this exciting quality of embodiment-based skill-development, getting out of the head and actually observing oneself becoming this new person, having more and more of the good days full of tiny wins.

I had forgotten about what was most meaningful to me and had to come before learning how to change. It was the heartfelt understanding that

I was not weak.
I was not a failure.
I wasn´t even alone in my experience.

The immense relief when I found this permission to let go of constantly „holding myself together“. I can still recall the sensation of so much tension leaving my body, the spaciousness this created in my upper body, the ability to suddenly notice my exhaustion. The sense of urgency of doing it better, that left my body with it and finally allowed me to take at least little breaks.

This might actually be the most empowering bit for many, when it comes to sustainably performing great in modern work environments: Deeply integrating the acceptance that occasional sense over overwhelm is no question of talent or predisposition, it is a human and normal response and at some point experienced by everyone. Nothing to feel ashamed about.

This is exactly what the survey brought back to my awareness. The spaces in which people got to share their experience, understand that everyone has their challenging contexts, being heard without judgment – this was the bit that had the most important impact on them. The naturally evolving empathy it created between them as peers was a bigger support than I could possibly provide as an external trainer. THIS was the place they needed to be before we could actually roll up our sleeves and go into experiencing how-to-do-it-differently.

And this mindset must, at least informally, be lived in corporateculture more than any free yoga class or fruit basket.

 

Your thoughts?