A well known professor was once asked at a dinner party, “Professor, you have children in different generations. From your experience, what would you say is the most important thing you could teach your kids to thrive in life?” And he answered, “Resilience. The most important skill is having the ability to fail, or fall down, or be embarrassed, and then to rise back up and keep going on.”

If we miss the lesson from our own upbringing, what’s a person to do? Resilience is commonly understood as a process, not a personality trait. In my experience, I have discovered that it is true what neurobiologists say about our brains: they are plastic. We can continue to learn all kinds of skills throughout adulthood. So while my early 20s were disasterous in some ways, with some help, I started to teach myself about the rigor or resilience and my experience of life – its ups and down – improved.

There is material resilience and psychological resilience. Material resilience is how a rubber band functions: “it absorbs energy when it is deformed elastically and then upon unloading to have its energy restored.” Psychologically speaking is rather like being a human rubber band, though we as humans may also adapt and “steel” ourselves effectively so as to be prepared for another round of similar adversity. (source Wikipedia)

The insights and principals of sufficiency offer a path towards developing and sustaining resilience. The pervasive conversation of our culture and times of not being enough or having enough or doing enough certainly thwarts a person’s ability to experience joy and their inner wisdom. When we compare and blame and engage in any of the Weapons of Scarcity, we are distracting ourselves from what is working, what there is to be grateful for, what resources are available. As a mindset and a set of practices, sufficiency draws us towards being resilient.

We talk a lot about the tools and skills needed to lead and thrive within the uncertainty, unpredictability, and insecurity of our times, how to make peace with the mystery. That is resilience, that is sufficiency.