On the interplay of well-being, happiness and resilience

Well-being is commonly defined as  a state of being healthy and happy. Contemporary psychology adds  “resilience” as an indispensable component of happiness. The word initially used in physics defines body’s ability to absorb an impact. Resilience is featured as the preparedness to transcend challenges. It is the inner force which uplifts the person after a failure, defeat or a disappointment. Resilience empowers us to continue on whatever our pursuit is in life.

The eminent neuropsychiatrist and writer, Boris Cyrulnik known with his lifetime work on resilience describes it as a process :

What we have to face obliges us to “knit” ourselves. We might feel that, if a single stitch holds, we can start all over again.

It takes heart, endurance and willpower to hold up and start all over again whatever our stance is in life. What makes us happy, as humans, is well-being, it is triumph over misfortune. It echoes the verses of  Rumi, the magestic poet of the 12^th century  :

If you have become ash,
Then wait, you become a rose again.
Do not remember how often you have become ash
But how often you were reborn in ashes to a new rose.

For happiness to become more sustainable, one’s resilience should evolve. Resilience evolves with auto-suggestion and persistent practice of self-mastery.  Common practices drawn from neuropsychology and philosophy aim at attaining states of happiness in tandem with self-mastery  :

• Attention and mindfulness : Taking a 2-3 minute pause a day to review the one’s thoughts, choices, actions, reactions, and then measure self-contentment.
• Seeing the good : Spending effort to seek the good in whatever happens even though it may not be outright evident.
• Self-awareness : Seeing the virtues and strengths as well as the faults and weaknesses of oneself, be willing and persevering to improve, and yet forgive the irreversible mistakes.
• Physical well-being : Well taking care of the body, bearing in mind that a healthy mind-psyche is attained in a healthy body.
• Altruism : Helping others which brings heartfelt joy and sustains happiness.

Duygu Bruce