<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"I&amp;#039;ve always been a couple of quarts low in resilience, the elusive quality that lets some people rise to challenges with a clear head, a surge of optimism, and a sense of humor. This coping deficit revealed itself during a real estate crisis last fall. My husband and I put our circa-1830 cottage on the market and got an instant offer \u2014 but then the buyers&amp;#039; inspector announced that our foundation might be rotting. Before the test results were even in, I imagined us rebuffed by our buyers, losing the new house we&amp;#039;d bid on, and living out our days in a collapsing, moldy hovel. Instead of thinking my way out of this setback, I spiraled into hysteria, then sank into paralysis. Luckily, our broker had a different MO. She kept her cool and hired a second inspector, who found only minimal repairs were required We were settled in our new home before Thanksgiving.  I came away from the experience knowing that I needed to change. Determined to discover the secrets of people with a gift for bouncing back, I sought out women who&amp;#039;d faced \u2014 and conquered \u2014 a range of challenges. I also spoke with experts who study the most effective ways to handle tough situations. Resilience, they say, can be learned \u2014 and they outlined five essential coping strategies.  CONTAIN THE FIRE Terri Alpert&amp;#039;s consumer catalog company, Uno Alla Volta, was going strong. In four years, she&amp;#039;d built a $10 million business in North Branford, CT, serving more than 90,000 customers and employing 50 people. Then, in September 2006, Terri&amp;#039;s database crashed, damaging three days&amp;#039; worth of vital records. &amp;quot;We were looking at not fulfilling some orders and double-shipping and double-charging others,&amp;quot; says Terri, 44. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m not calm in a crisis, and I make other people not calm in the process.&amp;quot; But the database meltdown shocked her into realizing that she had a choice: She could freak out and fan the flames of disaster, or she could &amp;quot;contain the fire,&amp;quot; as psychologists who study resilience put it. &amp;quot;The problem was so bad and so real-time that I knew I didn&amp;#039;t have the luxury of panicking,&amp;quot; Terri says. &amp;quot;I was going to have to think hard and fast.&amp;quot;  Calmly, she led her team away from catastrophic thinking and put things in perspective: Fall was a better time for the crisis, she pointed out, than Christmas, their busiest season. Under her levelheaded leadership, the crew pulled together, working over the weekend to untangle the mess. Terri quickly learned a lot about databases \u2014 and started mapping out a way to make hers more secure. The result: She felt increasingly confident and optimistic, two traits that are associated with resilient people. And her anxiety level seemed to have been permanently lowered, even during emergencies. &amp;quot;A little anxiety is motivating. A lot of anxiety is paralyzing,&amp;quot; says Karen Reivich, Ph.D., a psychology research associate at the University of Pennsylvania and author of The Resilience Factor.  LIGHTEN UP Arlene Jimenez, 43, of Edgewater, NJ, had worked as a graphic designer at the same company for more than 17 years, so she was shocked when her job was eliminated in a corporate restructuring. She made all the right professional moves, sending a nice note to her boss and putting out the word that she was looking for work. She also decided to throw a big party. &amp;quot;I was entering another chapter in my life,&amp;quot; she says, &amp;quot;and I decided I should celebrate it instead of feeling sorry for myself. That night I looked around at everyone talking and laughing and thought, Everything is going to be OK.&amp;quot; She was right. She went on to start the food business she&amp;#039;d always dreamed of, and now her Tia&amp;#039;s Flans are sold locally at Whole Foods stores. &amp;quot;Arlene turned a negative into a positive,&amp;quot; says Jane Bybee, Ph.D., a professor of psychology at Suffolk University in Boston. &amp;quot;She reframed the situation: Instead of seeing losing a job and entering the unknown as a frightening problem, she saw it as a tremendous opportunity to do something new. You can&amp;#039;t change what&amp;#039;s already happened to you, but you can redefine it. And your emotions may change to follow your redefinition Bybee also notes that laughter is a great tension diffuser. In fact, it&amp;#039;s measurably good for your mental and physical health, says Lee S. Berk, Dr.P.h., an associate professor at Loma Linda University School of Medicine and Public Health in Loma Linda, CA. It triggers the release of your body&amp;#039;s &amp;quot;feel good&amp;quot; chemicals, including endorphins, and reduces blood levels of the stress hormone cortisol. The better you feel, the better you cope. When things go awry, he suggests, seek out proven sources of smiles, whether it&amp;#039;s goofing around with your 3-year-old nephew or watching Seinfeld reruns. And if laughing seems impossible, Berk adds, imagine a favorite activity \u2014 shopping, say, or seeing a movie. Do you get a little rush of anticipatory pleasure? Then chances are, he says, it will help improve your mood.  VENT Liz, 35, had been an on-again, off-again journal keeper. But she found herself writing every day when her marriage began to go bad. She&amp;#039;d moved far from her friends and big, close family, and she didn&amp;#039;t want to worry them. &amp;quot;The journal started as a sounding board,&amp;quot; says Liz, who found herself in nightly arguments with her husband. He accused her of exaggerating the intensity and frequency of their fights. &amp;quot;So the journal became a sanity check,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;I needed to keep track of what was really happening. I could also see that I was recording the same problems over and over. That helped me realize that I was going to have to leave.&amp;quot; Writing exercises can help create clarity and reduce anxiety, says Bruce Rabin, M.D., a professor of pathology and psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine \u2014 and the lower your anxiety level, the greater your capacity for resilience. Dr. Rabin&amp;#039;s favorite technique doesn&amp;#039;t require the commitment of keeping a journal: Find a quiet place where you won&amp;#039;t be disturbed for 15 minutes. Write continuously about something that&amp;#039;s bothering you. If you run out of things to say, repeat yourself. Don&amp;#039;t worry about grammar, and don&amp;#039;t stop to read what you&amp;#039;ve written. At the end of the 15 minutes, tear up the piece of paper and toss it out. &amp;quot;People feel calmer afterward,&amp;quot; says Dr. Rabin. &amp;quot;Negative thoughts seem to float to the back of the brain GET PAST GUILT Diane, 39, an editor who lives in Connecticut, felt emotionally steamrolled after her first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. &amp;quot;When the little heartbeat didn&amp;#039;t come up, I was devastated,&amp;quot; she says, recalling the routine ultrasound that brought the sad news. Although her doctor assured her it was a chance occurrence and she could conceive again, Diane was burdened by guilt, convinced that she had done something to cause the miscarriage. Women are prone to feeling guilty about situations over which they have little or no control, says Jane Bybee, especially when it comes to problems affecting family. Two things helped Diane move on. The first was getting past the notion that she was to blame, that she could have prevented the miscarriage. She found solace in cold, hard facts. &amp;quot;I did a lot of reading and asked lots of questions,&amp;quot; says Diane, now the mother of two toddlers. &amp;quot;I came to trust that my body had done what it was supposed to do when there is a genetic problem.&amp;quot; The second was creating a ritual that allowed her to remember and honor the memory of the baby she lost. &amp;quot;I gave my little girl a name that I shared only with my husband,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;When I make donations to charities, I make them in her name. It&amp;#039;s my way of keeping her in my heart. Invoking her name to help others brings me a sense of peace.&amp;quot;  Women tend to blame themselves unnecessarily, Bybee says. But what if something we did, or failed to do, really does cause a big mess? How do we bounce back from trouble that is our fault, wholly or partially? Getting over it, Bybee says, requires acknowledging responsibility and offering to make amends. &amp;quot;Start with a sincere but simple apology,&amp;quot; she recommends. &amp;quot;Say something like, &amp;#039;I&amp;#039;m sorry. I handled that badly. If I could do it again, I would do it differently.&amp;#039;&amp;quot;  And if the apology is rebuffed? Try to keep the conversation going, Bybee urges, allowing the other person to have his or her say. If you listen respectfully, and agree when you can do so honestly, you might defuse the anger. If not, give yourself credit for doing the right thing and taking responsibility for your actions.  DARE TO MOVE FORWARD Susan McCarty, 39, of South Riding, VA, faced tragedy when her son, Finn, was just 10 weeks old: Her husband, Paul, died in a car accident. Friends and neighbors rallied to help, organizing an annual benefit golf tournament to raise money for Finn&amp;#039;s education. &amp;quot;I got a big check in 2003, the first year,&amp;quot; says Susan, &amp;quot;but better than that, it gave me hope. After Paul died, my primary concern was our baby. With my community&amp;#039;s support, I know that Finn will be taken care of no matter what. This was an enormous weight off my shoulders.&amp;quot;  Still, she fought succumbing to her sadness. &amp;quot;I knew I could be bitter and angry and allow those emotions to destroy me,&amp;quot; Susan says. &amp;quot;Or I could accept the new course of my life instead of fighting against it.&amp;quot; A first step forward, away from sorrow, was a decision she made before the second annual golf benefit. &amp;quot;I learned that another woman in my town had lost her husband to a car accident,&amp;quot; Susan recalls. &amp;quot;I knew it would mean more to me to make her the recipient of the money from the event than to keep it myself.&amp;quot;  And each year since then, Susan and her benefit committee have identified a different local family in need, presenting them with the check. In August 2006, the fourth annual tournament raised $43,000 for a South Riding woman with three children whose husband had died of cancer. &amp;quot;I get so much out of helping someone else,&amp;quot; says Susan, who now heads the Cormac Finn McCarty Foundation. &amp;quot;It makes me feel fantastic \u2014 something I never thought would be possible again after Paul died.&amp;quot; If you&amp;#039;re having trouble moving forward, remind yourself that you can create benefits from setbacks, even those that seems insurmountable. &amp;quot;Tell yourself, &amp;#039;I will learn from this. I will grow from it,&amp;#039;&amp;quot; counsels psychologist Susan Jeffers, Ph.D., author of the Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway book series. Over time, you&amp;#039;ll come to believe it. &amp;quot;The truth is,&amp;quot; she says, &amp;quot;that you can&amp;#039;t learn resilience without being challenged.&amp;quot;  CRISIS-PROOF YOUR LIFE You can prepare in advance for tough times. (We hope they don&amp;#039;t come, but experience suggests they&amp;#039;re inevitable.) Try this exercise for reducing anxiety and gaining perspective, from psychologist Karen Reivich, Ph.D. 1. Imagine encountering a serious problem at work or at home. Draw three columns on a piece of paper, and in the far left, list worst-case scenarios \u2014 every terrible outcome that pops into your head (&amp;quot;My neighbors stop speaking to me&amp;quot;; &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll be fired&amp;quot;; and so on). &amp;quot;Putting things on paper offers a reality check,&amp;quot; Reivich says; you&amp;#039;re better able to tell when you&amp;#039;ve gone overboard.  2. Then, in the far right-hand column, record all possible positive consequences of this sorry state of affairs \u2014 including the wonderful but wildly unlikely ones. &amp;quot;People have a hard time with this, but I encourage them to be playful and silly,&amp;quot; says Reivich. (Example: You bravely take responsibility for the problem; the boss admires your spunk and instantly promotes you.)  3. In the middle column, list the most likely results of the snafu. &amp;quot;People write things like, &amp;#039;I might need to hire some temporary help.&amp;#039;&amp;quot; The more reasonable and realistic the scenario, Reivich says, the more optimistic you&amp;#039;ll feel. Now you&amp;#039;re ready for the final step: Turn over the paper and jot down your desired outcome, plus two or three concrete things you can do to make it happen. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/health/wellness/advice/a17211/emotional-health-advice-may07/?src=shelter_footer>