Emotional resilience is the ability to bounce back after a setback and to thrive, not just survive, in the midst of challenges. Emotional resilience rests upon strong emotional intelligence: to be resilient, you must recognize what you're feeling and have strategies to respond to and engage with those emotions.
Coaching expert Elena Aguilar spoke with ASCD about some practical ways educators can build their skillset for emotional resilience and why this work is essential to the future of education.
A very simple strategy for cultivating emotional resilience is the ability to pause between an event and your response to it. In that gap, ask yourself: "What's the story I'm telling myself about this thing that's just happened?"
For example, I've recently been in conversation with a teacher who is really frustrated with students coming to class late. Her energy is being critically drained because, in her mind, she's translating this as: "They don't respect me." That's what's undermining her resilience. It's not that kids are coming to class late; it's the way that she is interpreting their behavior that's going to lead to burnout. If we can intervene there, in the stories that we tell, the mindset that we walk around in, we can have a much greater impact on resilience.
A complementary strategy to pausing and identifying the story we're telling is to also identify and name the emotions that arise. ("I feel sad." "I feel angry." "I feel scared.") If we cultivated our ability to recognize and accept our emotions, we'd be in a different place in our schools. When I see the stereotypical cranky, resistant teacher, I see someone who hasn't been allowed or offered the opportunity to express their emotions. When I talk to them, what comes out is that they are sad, feel unseen, and are afraid. If they can identify and name these underlying emotions, and be seen and heard by someone else, it changes things.
Leaders can learn how to ask questions and offer suggestions that invite teachers to examine their mindset, perhaps shifting it to a more empowering one. If a teacher is really frustrated about something, get them to pause and identify the story that they're telling themselves and the emotions they're feeling. Sometimes that's all a leader needs to do to catalyze some of the resilient skillsets in their teachers.
My commitment to teachers cultivating resilience is twofold. We deserve to feel good when we go to work and the more resilience we amass, the more energy we'll have to start dismantling some of the systems of oppression under which we—and our kids—suffer. There's a connection between creating more just and equitable schools and building our resilience, and it can't be disentangled. We only exist in community with others. When we're in communities with others who are suffering, it's our responsibility to do something. But we can't do something if we're depleted and exhausted.
