The Main Allure
The Main Allure podcast is inspired by the need to tackle the big questions with a healthy dose of humor and authenticity.
Her goal is to inspire and motivate you to embrace who you are in order to attract what you want, because you are the main allure.
The Main Allure
Ep. 6 | Bouncing Back: Strategies to Build Your Resilience Muscle
Have you ever wondered what separates those who crumble under pressure from those who somehow find a way forward? The answer lies in one critical emotional muscle that often goes untrained.
On this episode of The Main Allure podcast, we dive deep into the concept of resilience, not as an innate superpower that some possess and others don't, but as a skill anyone can develop with practice. Using the metaphor of resilience as a fluctuating Wi-Fi signal, we explore how this emotional bounce-back capacity helps us navigate everything from minor setbacks to major life challenges.
🎶 Daft Punk - Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
Disneynature: Penguins (2019)
Welcome to the Main Allure podcast with your host, Laura. Welcome back to the Main Allure, the space where we glow up from the inside out. I'm Laura, your resilience cheerleader, self-discovery navigator and the girl who once cried over a broken nail, but I am stronger now. Today we're going to talk about resilience, aka your emotional bounce back muscle. We often care about our quads or doing squats, but in reality, this muscle is the most important one of all because it helps us get through the difficult times. And, spoiler alert, it's not just for people running marathons or surviving a crazy challenge, it is for all of us. Resilience isn't about being unbreakable. It's about bending without snapping, like a flexible yoga mat, but emotionally, it's what helps us survive heartbreak, job rejections, those awkward DMs that you end up sending your crush that they never responded to, and that weird transactional phase where life feels like a loading screen, where you're not sure what's going to happen next, but you have to be prepared for it. Think of resilience like a Wi-Fi signal and some days it's strong. You have those five bars, you're thriving, you're living life, everything's great, and then one day you show up at a you know, maybe you're in a random location and you need to send that one important email, and little do you know. Now you have one bar. Everybody there is using their phones. You're not sure what you're going to do. You're freaking out. That's what resilience is. Is not giving up. It's knowing that, hey, I still have this one bar, keeping a positive mindset. On most days you probably have five bars, but in this particular day it's blinking red, it's buffering. You're trying to send this email and it's not being sent, but you're still trying. That's you, you're trying, and that's enough to start. Let's be real for a second. Life throws curveballs faster than you can catch them, faster than the group chat that you're in that sends you 10,000 memes every day.
Laura:And with our resilience, every setback feels like a personal apocalypse. It feels like the end of the world, but with it you end up winning emotional endurance. You have those fewer meltdowns. You're not going crazy, wondering what's going to happen. You're not in this doom and gloom mentality. Instead, you focus on the momentum. Right, you're being pushed back before you can move forward. You also gain clarity under pressure, because crying in your car is valid. I mean, would you rather cry in a Pinto or in a Porsche? At least in a Porsche you could say well, I ended up here because I tried, I didn't give up. And that's the whole idea Staying consistent, staying clear, having that self-control, controlling your emotions, so that you can have those solutions come to you and you can take care of it before you hit that doom and gloom moment that we all hate.
Laura:And the more you do this, the more you're going to feel confident, not because you fall, but because you get up every single time. These failures and setbacks, they're going to happen all the time. If you're cruising through life, then hey, you're one of the lucky ones, maybe one of the chosen ones, but we're all going to go through something. We're all going to experience failure and setbacks. But the important thing is that when you do go through them, it's going to make you appreciate your successes and your wins even more. We have to learn to appreciate those failures because they teach us. They always teach us something which, in turn, will help us succeed in the future. Embrace your failures, learn from them. When you go through it, ask yourself this sucks, this is not what I expected. Now what? And always add that now what or so what? Because then you're going to force yourself to look for solutions, to look for opportunities to learn and grow and that's when those new ideas, new concepts, whatever it is that you're trying to figure out, they're going to come to you. So, again, you got to build that muscle and before you know it, you're going to have Michael B Jordan type of muscles. I don't know if you guys have seen Sinners, spoiler alert, but those muscles are going to be muscling. Okay, the more you practice your resilience muscle and we all win, right, when the muscles are muscling, we all win.
Laura:There was a time in boot camp where we needed to pass a swim test and, having grown up in New York City, you know we don't really necessarily go to the beach. We go to the beach, but we don't necessarily, you know, go swim in the waters. They're okay, but it's not paradise, right. So during my bootcamp challenge, one of the requirements was to take a swim test and I thought to myself okay, no big deal, I can swim. I mean, I've paddled here and there and what could go wrong? There's nothing alarming about it. But when I showed up to the place, there was a diving pool. It was like 20 feet deep and my friends have heard the story many times because they always laugh at me, but I'm going to tell you anyway.
Laura:You had to jump from a diving board into the pool. Everybody pretty much is there watching, because we're all going through that same process and the goal was to swim from one end of the pool to another. Again, I was confident, I was very sure, I thought that I could achieve it. You know, I was ready to complete my challenge. Well, lo and behold, I jump into the pool and I couldn't swim. I was so upset, I was embarrassed. Everybody just looked at me like oh my God girl, like how are you joining the Navy? And you can't swim. And yeah, that was me. So the divers threw me a stick so that they could pull me out. They don't even jump in to save you, by the way. Again, even more embarrassing. So they sent me to this kiddie pool in the back. You get some 30-minute swimming lessons and you're on your way back to the diving pool so you could pass your test.
Laura:That was a challenge to me. I could have chosen to freak out and decide okay, I can't do this, because if I fail they were just going to send me back home to New York. But I didn't want to do that. I was so convinced and so determined to pass my test that I just needed to just get there and figure it out on my way. Again, I jumped in the pool one more time and then I improvised, I decided that instead of swimming my way there and back I believe there was a time that was like two minutes, but I decided to just float my way there. Nobody I believe there was a time they were like two minutes, but I decided to just float my way there. Nobody said you couldn't float. It wasn't forbidden for me not to float. So I just floated my way down the pool while everybody's swimming as fast as they could and I did pass my test.
Laura:So again, if I would have buckled, I would probably never passed. I would have been sent home. I would have been crying. I would probably never passed, I would have been sent home. I would have been crying, thinking of doom and gloom and my life sucks. But instead I decided to think positively and figure out what I can do so that I could make this challenge go away, because it was hindering my time and my opportunity to graduate. So luckily it all went well. My time and my opportunity to graduate so luckily it all went well, but that's just one example for how you can look at the bright side of every adversity that you go through, because sometimes that's all it takes for you to improvise, figure out a solution and wait until the next one, because it's definitely going to come.
Laura:I don't want to paint things like everything is always sunshines and rainbows, because there's also the risk of going through too much adversity, and you can think of people who grow up in a war zone, or children who are neglected or abused. This could have a lasting effect on their mental health over time, and the problem with that is that you almost become too accustomed to experiencing adversity, to the point where it becomes the norm. It becomes something that you always expect, that you always think it's going to happen and, as a result, your mind shifts into this idea that, well, I just have to grin and bear it, nothing is going to change, because this is the way it is. But the truth is that we have to also consider that these types of adversity could have a lasting effect. Maybe the first time you go through it, you say, okay, sure, you live and learn. But if it happens the second time, you say, well, resilience got me through it right. But if it happens the second time, you say, well, resilience got me through it, right. This is the whole positivity thing, that you can overcome anything and just figure it out.
Laura:But then, when it happens a third and fourth time, you ask yourself well, what haven't I learned? And this is when your mental health starts changing and your coping mechanisms begin to shift to a sense of survival, and oftentimes we start to not only blame ourselves but also externalize things, because now there's nothing that we could do, we are helpless. Now you're thinking that everyone else is the problem. You're going through things because of everyone else, and so we have to kind of understand and remind ourselves that we can still have a positive outlook, to the point where you don't have to think that the world is against you. You don't have to embrace that victim mentality. You should instead look on the bright side and seek to make changes, to change what is no longer serving you. And that is the point where perhaps it's a good time to seek professional help in order for you to change that mindset, from blaming the world to now focusing on yourself, and begin to build that muscle, that resilience muscle that you so need. Now. Here are some ways that you can strengthen that bounce back muscle, and you could do this anywhere. You don't need a gym membership.
Laura:So I will give you some pointers on how you can strengthen this, and the first one is to reframe how you speak to yourself. Instead of saying, woe is me, my life sucks, how is this happening to me? Think of why is this happening for me, what is it trying to teach me? And again reframing that mindset to think what is the world trying to think, what is the world trying to teach me, what is this problem trying to teach me and what can I learn from it, is a good way to start.
Laura:The next one is to normalize failure, and sometimes I mean it would be amazing if none of us failed ever. But if nobody failed, then we would kind of be desensitized from success. Probably Failure isn't the opposite of success, it is part of that process. Make sure that you're embracing your failures, like I mentioned before, because without failures you don't get to appreciate your successes in the same way. So embrace your failures and learn from them.
Laura:The third one is to build your bounce back routine. There are going to be times in which you're going to go through adversity, challenges, problems, but always remember that you have to figure out a way to bounce back every time, and sometimes it's going to require a routine. Maybe you like to journal. Maybe you like to eat you know your favorite burger, because that's what gives you comfort. Maybe it's just blasting music. You know I have a crappy music playlist that anytime something bad happens, I go listen to it. It's filled with upbeat music, music that I love, music that makes me smile, that makes me want to dance and it makes me forget about the problem. Once I do that, it makes me want to recharge and start thinking about what can I do better, how can I improve myself, and that's part of the plan.
Laura:Sometimes we think that being resilient means that you could do everything on your own, that you don't need anyone, and the truth is that we do need people. We do need to lean on each other. Resilience isn't a lone wolf energy. It is okay to borrow someone else's strength once in a while, just so that you can rebuild yours. It is okay to ask, whether it's a friend, a parent, a neighbor, you know, even your pet. Whatever kind of support you can get, try to lean on it when you can so that you're not dealing with it alone, because the truth is that when we deal with too much adversity on our own, it does tend to wear on us. It does tend to make us feel tired and not wanting to push forward anymore. So I definitely encourage you that if you're feeling like you need to speak to someone, even if it's a professional, please do it. You know, find ways to cope. Cope, because that's one of the most important things about resilience is knowing how to cope, knowing how to bounce back.
Laura:And the last thing is to celebrate your wins. If you don't celebrate your wins, you know what is the point. The same way, you tend to focus on the problem and how horrible things are going. That's when you need to go in and celebrate when you do overcome it. And when you overcome it, think back to that problem and say, wow, remember how miserable I was back then or how upset I was because this happened. And sometimes you look back and even laugh about it. I remember doing that with a friend recently where we were like hey, remember that time when we worked together and we were just going through so much and then, boom, before you know it, we're just laughing about it because it's something of the past and we're both in better places now. So remember that. Don't just tend to dwell and ruminate on your problems. Make time to celebrate your wins.
Laura:You answered that tough email that's a win. You got out. You answered that tough email that's a win. You got out of bed in the morning that's a win. You ate half of your fries instead of the whole. You know large, that's a win. Celebrate your wins, and no win is too small.
Laura:Now for homework. Hey, remember, this is why you're here. This is why you're here, this is why you're listening. So your main alarm mission this week is to write down one thing that recently knocked the wind out of you. You know something that you wish would have gone differently, which would have had a better solution, a better outcome, and then list the three ways that you bounce back or are starting to bounce back. Maybe it's something you're going through right now. You're more resilient than you think, and so make sure that you give yourself credit. Write it down. Think about where you are right now, where you're going, and start practicing, Start building that muscle today.
Laura:If you ever find yourself looking for inspiration on what it looks like, what it feels like, to have resilience, I want you to look up this documentary called Penguins and yes, you heard that right, it's not about people, it's about penguins. And penguins, to me, are some of the most resilient species I've ever seen. And in the documentary you will see this penguin called Steve. I call him little Steve because I just became so enamored with him, and the reason is because, when I tell you that this little penguin was all over the place, he didn't know where to go. He found himself in the wrong place. He was kicked out of one group, but despite everything that he went through, steve was always you could tell that he was just always taking things in stride. He was always shrugging things off. He was like, hey, you know, things happen, let me keep going, let me keep looking for my mate. So he went looking for a mate. He ended up having children finally. They would trek hundreds of miles just to feed their babies. He was just that embodiment of resilience, because he was not someone that you would think would make it, and he did. He did overcome so much.
Laura:The funny thing about penguins is that they go through all these things just to raise their children. They go through heavy winters, almost die in the process, and then, once spring comes, they just say hey, children, you're on your own now. Bye-bye, they just go off to spring break, and it's the most fascinating thing. So I highly recommend that you watch it. It's going to teach you a thing or two about resilience. So whenever you're feeling like you don't have it and maybe you need some motivation, I highly encourage you to watch Penguins.
Laura:Remember that everybody is going through some form of adversity and we all deal with resilience in our own way. So whenever you're going through something, there's someone out there who's going through the same thing, probably worse. Your neighbors are probably going through some things, people in your family, friends. Don't feel like you're the only one who is going through something. Your resilience will get you through each and every time. Resilience isn't about being fearless. It's about facing life anyway. With the messy hair, with the tears running down your cheeks, there's a whole lot of grit that comes with it. And you've got this. You have to keep rising. You have to keep laughing through it, keep becoming the main allure of your own story. You got this. Thank you for listening to the main allore podcast. I appreciate you for listening. Don't forget to like, share and subscribe, and until next week, bye.
