Resiliency Reader - Fall 2015
Welcome to the Fall 2015 edition of the Resiliency Reader eNewsletter brought to you by the Al Siebert Resiliency Center.
We hope you will find the information and articles below useful in your quest to become more resilient. Please join in the conversation either at our online forum, or by submitting your article, review, upcoming event or other resiliency-related resources to us for possible publication. We welcome your submissions!
Table of Contents
- Molly's Corner: Sharing One Skin and Big Magic
- Resilience 101 - Five Ways to Recharge Your Wellness Batteries (article by Michelle Atlas)
- Developing Resiliency in the Young (article by Glen Fahs)
- Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear (book review by Molly Siebert)
- MONSTERS! (article by Glen Fahs)
- Resiliency Quote of the Quarter
- Research Question of the Quarter
- Worthwhile Read: Chosen to Live: The Inspiring Story of Flight 232 Survivor Jerry Schemmel
by Jerry Schemmel with Kevin Simpson- Mailing List options
Molly's Corner: Sharing One Skin and Big Magic
Happy Fall Everyone,
To conclude my Native American focus from the last newsletter, I wanted provide a link to an article I received and really enjoyed right after we published our previous edition. I attended a day excursion to Celilo Falls on the Columbia River (now underwater due to the The Dalles Dam between Oregon and Washington) with a small group led by David Osborn of Wapato Valley School. He provided several articles related to the Columbia River and how progress has impacted the river as well as a way of life for Native Americans and others. One article I particularly liked is called "Community: Sharing One Skin" by Jeannette Armstrong (Okanagan), Director of the En'owkin Centre in British Columbia, that speaks eloquently to the relationship of the Natives to the Columbia River from a Native perspective. I truly enjoyed the article.
Regarding my thoughts and review of Elizabeth Gilbert's book Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear... READ MORE...
~ Molly Siebert, Director, Al Siebert Resiliency Center
"My life sings of connections with life, spirit and you!"
Resilience 101 - Five Ways to Recharge Your Wellness Batteries
~ by Michelle Atlas
At age 13 my best friend and I, asked each other over and over, why many of our peers and family members who experienced hardships (related to work, health, relationships...) reacted with resentment, pessimism and a victim mindset. We observed that a rare few expected things to work out well, sought ways of problem-solving that would benefit everyone and became stronger, wiser and kinder versions of themselves, through adversity.
Resilience is a capacity. READ MORE...
Developing Resiliency in the Young
~ by Glen Fahs
In Margarita Tartakovsky's article on "10 Tips for Raising Resilient Kids," in the summer issue of Connections, (also found online at psychcentral.com), she notes that common childhood challenges of sickness, competition, bullying, loneliness, and social hurts are not easily handled. But resilient kids face tough situations and problem solve. Anxious parents need to gradually pull back from making things too easy and comfortable, thereby creating dependent, unimaginative children.
To help young people, READ MORE...
Book Review: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear,
by Elizabeth Gilbert
Review provided by Molly Siebert
When I flipped through the pages of Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert (author of Eat, Pray, Love), I read the last page called "In Conclusion" with great delight. I saw a connection to my late husband's work, The Survivor Personality. Here is what it says:
Creativity is sacred, and it is not sacred.
What we make matters enormously, and it doesn't matter at all.
We toil alone, and we are accompanied by spirits.
We are terrified, and we are brave.
Art is crushing chore and a wonderful privilege.
Only when we are at our most playful can divinity finally get serious with us.
Make space for all these paradoxes to be equally true inside your soul, and I promise — you can make anything.
So please calm down now and get back to work, okay?
The treasures that are hidden inside you are hoping you will say yes.
The word "paradoxes" triggered my sense of connection. Those who knew Al and his work will know his delight at the discovery that very mentally and physically healthy people have paradoxical attributes and feelings and these contradictions are very healthy indeed. In fact, READ MORE...
View book information on Amazon
MONSTERS!!!
~ by Glen Fahs
Ye ha, ha, ha, ha, HA!!
Evil doers seem to find humor in others' fears. Conquering fears is a big step toward vanquishing evil and ensuring good wins out.
We grow up afraid of the dark, of the monster under the bed, the vampire, the werewolf, the growling dog down the street.
We learn from our heroes that there are many ways to vanquish a monster — READ MORE...
Resiliency Quote of the Quarter:
~ Eleanor Roosevelt, You Learn By Living (1960 / 2011 Harper Perennial 50th Anniversary Edition)"You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you stop to look fear in the face.
You are able to say to yourself, `I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.'
The danger lies in refusing to face the fear, in not daring to come to grips with it. If you fail anywhere along the line, it will take away your confidence. You must make yourself succeed every time. You must do the thing you think you cannot do."
Extended quote courtesy George Washington University's page of Eleanor Roosevelt quotes.
Research Question of the Quarter:
Throughout her book, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, Elizabeth Gilbert provides a perspective in the development of a strong sense of self for creative and artistic people who singularly follow their pursuit of their dreams or perhaps are driven to pursue their artistic endeavor no matter what. She poses the question:
"Do you have the perspective to appreciate the value of your own joy?"
Worthwhile Read:
Chosen to Live: The Inspiring Story of Flight 232 Survivor Jerry Schemmel
by Jerry Schemmel with Kevin Simpson
Hardcover, 213 pages, ISBN: 978-0965208659, ©1996 Victory Publishing,
In 1989, on a flight from Denver to Chicago, the rear engine exploded minutes after takeoff and the pilots made a mercy landing in Sioux City, Iowa. Jerry Schemmel was aboard that flight and miraculously survived. Read the story behind the movie FEARLESS.
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