Micro-Resilience: Minor Shifts for Major Boosts in Focus, Drive, and Energy

by Bonnie St. John

Learn powerful, science-based techniques to boost focus, drive and energy hour-by-hour throughout the day--every day.

As leadership consultants and executive trainers, Bonnie St. John and Allen P. Haines have heard the same complaints from clients for years; periodic burnout, lack of focus and low energy. So they dug into the latest research on neuroscience, psychology and physiology looking for big answers. Instead they found small answers; proof that small adjustments in daily routines, including thought patterns, food and drink, rest and movement can fight the forces that sap our energy and store focus and drive. They call these amazing efficient restorative techniques "micro-resilience." Thousands of men and women from all walks of life have already found effortless ways to incorporate these little changes into the busiest of schedules. Dozens of entertaining anecdotes from real people using micro-resilience demonstrate that when our brains fire faster, our energy increases and we can cope with almost any surprise, pressure or crisis.

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, Business, Psychology, Personal Development, Productivity, Audiobook

272 pages, Unknown Binding

Published February 7, 2017

About the author

Bonnie St. John is one of the nation's leading inspirational speakers and has been featured on the Today Show, Montel Wiliams, CNN, Good Morning America, as well as People magazine, the New York Times, Essence, and many others. Despite the amputation of her leg at age five, she became a silver and bronze medalist in downhill skiing in the 1984 Paralympics at Innsbruck, Austria. She went on to graduate from Harvard University, win the Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford, and was appointed to the White House National Economic Council.

Reviews

[LIV · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this book after hearing Bonnie St. John speak on Dan Harris' podcast "10% Happier". I was pretty excited about it because I enjoy many of Dan's recommendations and I am always up for some self-improvement.

I can get on board with the idea of making small changes instead of doing a life overhaul as that's less feasible for most people. I found it fell short though because it seemed to lack realistic and innovative ideas that one could implement in their daily life. I was listening to the audiobook so I didn't realize it was a 200-ish page book. That's not a really large book and I felt like most of it was dedicated to the counselling services and programs that have been created around the idea of micro resilience. It seemed like most of the book's real estate was dedicated to getting the reader to delve further into those resources and perhaps purchase them.

I think this book is good if you are new to self-help and this style of making tweaks to your everyday life because it does provide tips (making checklists as well as to do lists, keeping an inspirational joy kit handy). Overall, I found many of the tips to be recycled and it seemed that the book was speaking from a different era. It doesn't read like something published in 2017. I would recommend it to anyone who wants a quick foray into self-help, it's a good place to get started.

[Jess Macallan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an e-copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I've read a number of books on the topic of resilience, and found Micro-Resilience to be a nice addition to the books currently available. What sets this book apart is the focus on micro-resilience as opposed to macro-resilience. I'd never thought about the difference, but the authors present a smart and sound reason for their approach. Through a series of micro shifts, you can create resilience to stressful situations and build toward lasting change. I found this book to be geared more toward career-focused individuals, but the exercises are applicable to anyone who needs a better handle on dealing with daily stressors. I also believe the exercises are simple enough that anyone should be able to do them and create positive changes. The authors also offer plenty of research and expert advice in each chapter. The examples of real people were helpful for showing how the exercises can be applied as well as how to deal with common pitfalls.

The only thing I wasn't crazy about was the section on nutrition. The advice offered is fairly standard, but generic, and not all of the advice was great. For example, I wouldn't recommend protein shakes to most of my nutrition clients. They're convenient, but whole foods offer the body and brain better protection against daily stressors than a processed food like a protein shake.

[Eileen McDargh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love love love the book. So many small gems that add up to a big result. Read it in one sitting and immediately found application in my life as well as current research I could pass along to my clients. Practical. Doable. Personal. it is a great companion to my book, Your Resiliency GPS. I was thrilled to be given an advance copy!

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is chock full of strategies, exercises, and thought experiments that you can implement immediately. I really enjoyed it, and I'll be thinking about it for a long time.

A star for each colored square on the cover.

Total score: 5/5 stars

[Brandi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Micro- Resilience has several life enhancing tips, but ultimately it was disappointing. The authors recommend making small daily changes to improve your everyday life vs. major life shifts. Some new helpful concepts: making checklists in addition to to-do lists, creating joy kits that you keep on your phone or in your car to enhance your mood throughout the day were inspiring but many recommendations felt old and recycled (drink more water, be optimistic). Overall, I would not recommend this book.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great reminders of strategies to use daily!

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book after listening to Bonnie St. John talk on Dan Harris's 10% Happier Podcast. My expectations were very high for some reason and this book fell pretty short. All in all ok surface level read but I would have liked if they went more in depth with some of their methods. However I feel like there deeper intentions are to sell you this book and then sell you their counseling services online so that's kind of a bummer. Other people might find this book more helpful. I lent it to a friend and I'm interested to see what she says.

[Julia Kulgavchuk · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't finish. And you don't need to finish it either if you've read a few of articles on productivity, on how to keep your energy high etc. The book is structured in 5 chapters:
1. Refocus Your Brain
2. Reset Your Primitive Alarms
3. Reframe Your Attitude
4. Refresh Your Body
5. Renew Your Spirit.
Take pt. 1 as an example. The advice is: don't multitask, get into the zone, write down and manage your tasks, use checklists, exercise. That's pretty much it. Sounds familiar? But yeah there's "stories" and "science" so it's a "book".

[Caroline · Rating 2 out of 5]

A lot of reused and repurposed content. A good book, and the author is engaging (I've seen her give several talks). But, if seeking out a book of this style, I would recommend Grit, by Angela Duckworth and Atomic Habits, by James Clear, as far superior tomes.

[John Turlockton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Me and Haines and St. John seem to have a different idea of resilience. Resilience for me is getting through difficult times and having the determination to keep working towards an important goal even though you feel terrible and the work is unrewarding. Haines and co-author talk about methods to deal with anxiety, lack of focus and then give some nutrition advice. I can see how this could be useful and could fit some people's definition of reslience but it seems more like general 'stay happy' advice rather than specifically dealing with motivation and resilience.

But the advice is mostly based on science and research, so it's ahead of most of the resilience or motivation books out there.

[Evelyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

A short and easy to read book, Micro-Resilience is one of those self-improvement books that are aimed at people who are stressed, busy or are struggling to find where they fit in at a 'normal' work environment. It offers some useful tips and tricks for making small changes to your daily life to help you achieve 'more', but ultimately, it falls short of the mark in terms of originality and lands firmly into the 'common sense' category of self-help books (e.g drinking more water makes you more alert).

If you've read even just one of these types of books, you can definitely skip this.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Did a quick skim on this book to review for its relevance to my consulting work. I like the easy flow of the writing and the brief vignettes of real-life clients. The book is probably more applicable to individual coaching versus large group education. The format of the philosophy and book allows a reader to focus on their own priorities and the book could be read out of sequence, narrowing in only on what the reader wants to improve. The book can function as a workbook using the two appendices as a short format, then referring the to correlating chapters for deeper engagement.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Engaging look at micro-resilience skills. Macro-resilience refers to those lifestyle habits and coping styles that, over time, protect us from the day to day hassles and life stress that afflict us all. Micro-resilience skills are the small psychological 'hacks' and tools that can have an immediate impact on reducing stress levels. Well presented. Easy to understand. Integrates research and theories from a number of psychological sources. Recommended.

[Tom Anichini · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, excellent, excellent.

My default assumption about a book of this type is, "it should have been a blog post." (In an earlier time, "a magazine article.")

Definitely not the case with Micro-Resilience. This book is dense with sound tactics for revitalizing yourself in a brief few moments, including examples and context.

Helpful appendices at the end summarize all the tips nicely.

[Wee Meng Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

This novel gives so much expectations in the ways suggested from this self-help book. Bonnie has given a handful of tips to make your day through despite having the toughest challenges coming in your way at work and even managing relationships with girlfriend or family at home.
These tips will be helpful on a day-to-day basis if you can apply them when crisis happens psychologically

[Kate Seow · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall, this is a good book which provides some actionable advice. The best section of the book is "Reframe Your Attitude" where Bonnie suggested having a Joy Kit, using the ABCDE reframing method and Reversi Reframe to alter some of our reactions to things. While some of the other advice (such as sufficient hyration is more generic), it serves as positive reminders.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was designed well. In each chapter it includes: a story (context and relatability) what that person did after being coached (steps and example), how that improved their life (result), and then actionable tips (call to action).

The chapters are short and the font is large. I took one piece and am already positively implementing it.

[Michael Esposito · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great “tips” book for those who are proactive. I’m sure the book could offer more to those who don’t generally read these kinds of books, but I also found value at a lot of the suggestions they made for refocusing and reframing complex situations. The appendixes are a wonderful resource to keep going back to.

[Karl Lopes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Never thought I would go through this book twice

Usually I peruse self help books and largely skim the material looking for actionable tidbits. This book is chock-full of the same. I really enjoyed reading it.
Would be great if they built an online self help community to share their micro-resilience actionable hacks.

[Jamie Ratermann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyed this book. Gives you the tools to make small changes in your day. I specifically felt the Attitude Reframe was most helpful. Mindsets toward tasks and people can clog up your day and mind's capacity. Keeping it handy to reference often.

[smfairbanks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes we think we need to make big changes to make things happen. This book proves that small things can add up and over time get us where we want to be. Thanks for sharing the practical tips for building my resiliency. Already putting them into practice!

[Oliver · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is an easy read that I think will fit very well to those who just started to work on realigning their mental thought process with need of something tangible to follow. The exercises provided are simple and are manageable with clear results. There are several gold nuggets along the way.

[Rita Arens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quick read, well researched, easy tips based in science.

[Tina Reynolds · Rating 3 out of 5]

The introduction worried me and made me think that this might be quite woolly but actually there were lots of interesting tips and sensible suggestions. Worth a read.

[Michael Zhang · Rating 3 out of 5]

Practical tips for improving focus in today’s world. The suggestions are backed by research and explained through stories so this book feels a bit easier to read than the typical self-help book.

[Sheeranzrock · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the ideas in this book.

[Karla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frameworks come together by daily habits, not multi-tasking
Renew your spirit, your energy- find purpose
collection of transformational stories

[Candace Armstrong · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love how there is an Appendix that is a summary to use for execution reminders. Great book.

[Emeli Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book and think that the techniques presented will be really useful going forward.

[Kat Petty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Had some good ideas on increasing your resilience but was difficult for me to get through.