Resilient: How to Grow an Unshakable Core of Calm, Strength, and Happiness

by Rick Hanson

Spreading to the farthest corners of the globe, even walking upon the moon, humans have become so wildly successful through depending on each other:

If others are dependable, we develop trust in them as well as faith in our own worth.

They may still need to deal with their own forms of insecure attachment, but at least you are doing your own part.

you might have stayed awake at night thinking about what you wished you had said.

If you’re ruminating about an issue with someone, focus your attention on self-compassion.

The key people in your life still think you are a basically good person.

Independent of all achievements, fame, and fortune, there is always goodness in the core of your being.

A person could slow down and do less. But the realities of work and family usually make this hard to achieve.

You may not have been all right in the past, and you may not be all right in the future, but in this moment you are OK, protected, and resourced.

Those extra seconds before you speak help others feel less like they’re on the receiving end of a rat-a-tat-tat barrage of words and emotional intensity.

deep inside the basal ganglia in your subcortex, a region called the nucleus accumbens contains a small node that helps regulate the sense of liking something and a separate node that regulates the sense of wanting it.

No matter what might be missing in your life, there is still the abundance of nature, so many kinds of living things enabling you to live. Let yourself feel supported, protected, and fed by the fullness of life.

As you pursue your goals, notice what it feels like to guide yourself and what it feels like to criticize yourself.

This is the essence of motivation: being able to sustain action based on knowing in the core of your being that you should do something.

Intimacy rests on a foundation of personal autonomy, empathy, compassion and kindness, and unilateral virtue in relationships.

As you open up and invest in relationships, you inevitably become more exposed and vulnerable.

It helps us make sense of tone and nuance, read intentions correctly, recognize the hurt under anger, and see the being behind the other person’s eyes.

a little monitor inside your mind that pays attention to how well you are paying attention. In your brain, this involves a region called the anterior cingulate cortex.

As you find compassion toward this person, you may feel less challenged or upset. Know that whatever this person has done cannot alter the fundamental goodness deep inside your own heart.

no matter what the other person does, in your heart you’ll know you did what you could.

Good relationships are based on good interactions, and it’s hard for a relationship to improve if its interactions don’t.

If you emphasize one while someone else emphasizes the other, think about ways you could anticipate and address that person’s priority while still being true to yourself.

Relationships go better when we lead with authentic and reassuring answers to the questions in the minds of others. Often a simple word or look or touch is enough.

You may need to put someone out of your life altogether. But do you need to put this person out of your heart?

Sometimes you do need to discuss the past to explain its impact on you or to give an example of what you hope will be different in the future.

What we communicate has three inherent elements: the content, the emotional tone, and an implicit statement about the nature of the relationship.

repair—to clear up little misunderstandings and ease points of friction. More seriously, you may need to work through conflicts, reestablish trust, or change aspects of a relationship.

repair as a primary factor in how satisfied two people will be with each other and whether they will stay together.

You deserve fairness and common decency just like anyone else.

Relationships require trust, and trust comes from reliability.

As you face what the relationship needs to be, there could be a sense of loss, dashed hopes, frustration, or disenchantment. Be mindful of this and compassionate toward yourself.

When you act to make a relationship better for you, sometimes it gets better for others as well.

Speaking wisely means saying things that are well intended, true, beneficial, timely, not harsh, and, if possible, wanted.

you have done your part and everything else is not your responsibility.

the best predictor of the future is usually the past.

activity that would be a good fit for you: nurturing and appreciative, with room to breathe and room to grow.

Tendencies toward altruism were both protected and valuable, and they became woven into our DNA. In many ways, we are Homo beneficus: the generous human.

give yourself permission to make changes if a relationship is out of balance, and give what you want to give.

The word “compassion” comes from the Latin roots com and pati, which mean “to suffer with.”

a teacher of mine once described taking a small boat down the Ganges at dawn and seeing beautiful rose-lit towers on the left and smoking funeral pyres on the right. She talked about the need to develop a heart that’s wide enough to include both of these aspects of life and wise enough to hold them in balance.

full pardon. It’s a complete pass for whatever happened, and you wipe the slate clean.

You have some understanding of the forces that led people to do what they did. You feel compassion for them, perhaps with the sense that their actions were driven by their suffering. You value their good qualities as human beings, and are willing to give relationships a fresh start.

secondary gains—that can keep a person tangled up with grievances, such as the pleasures of righteous anger.

Others may reject your efforts or doubt your sincerity. As time passes and you keep demonstrating your good intentions, they could move toward disentangled forgiveness or even a full pardon.

You’re doing what’s right for its own sake.

Whatever you did was the result of many forces, so by definition it wasn’t all your fault. And no matter how big it was, in the sweep of time and space it’s such a tiny part of everything.

If it’s meaningful to you, you could ask God to forgive you.

you blew it. You really hurt someone. But you’ve taken responsibility, been fully remorseful, and done everything you can to fix things. You need to make sure you never do it again. And—you are forgiven. I forgive you. I forgive myself.”

Consider the forces that shaped them into the adults they are today. Reflect on how their lives, like yours, have been hard in various ways. Get a sense of their burdens, worries, losses, and pain.

As you give, the world gives back—helping you become even more resilient.