Believe The Hope

Paul Nottoli: 00:29

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Believe the Hope podcast. I'm your host, Paul Nottoli And today we're going to talk about resilience or building resilience. So this is how to bounce back when life gets hard. What does it really take to keep going, especially when everything in us wants to give up?

Paul Nottoli: 00:48

So let's explore resilience together. Defining resilience means resilience isn't about being invisible or unaffected. It's not about pretending everything's okay when it's not. Resilience is the ability to bend without breaking. It's the quiet strength that rises, not in the absence of struggle, but right in the middle of it.

Paul Nottoli: 01:09

If you've ever faced something that shook you, like a loss, disappointment, burnout, heartbreak, and somehow you found your way forward, that was resilience. And here's the good news. Resilience isn't something that you either have or don't have. It's something you can build. So what builds resilience?

Paul Nottoli: 01:30

Resilience is like a muscle. The more we use it, the stronger it becomes. Number one, perspective. Sometimes the most powerful shift comes from how we see what we're going through. Asking questions like, what might this be teaching me?

Paul Nottoli: 01:45

How can I grow through this and not just go through it? It doesn't mean we have to be grateful for the pain, but we can look for the meaning in the middle of it. Number two, connection. We aren't meant to do this life alone, whether it's friends, family, a therapist, a support group, etcetera, some form of community. Having someone to talk to can make all the difference.

Paul Nottoli: 02:09

Resilience often grows in community, not in isolation. Grounding practices, so everyone has something that helps them stay centered. Maybe it's meditation, a prayer, journaling, breath work, time in nature, something you enjoy that gives you peace. Turning to something deeper, something greater than ourselves can help us stay anchored when life feels chaotic. So just a real moment on my end that I to share with you and be real with you is a moment of resilience on what's been going on the last few months and why this podcast has taken a while to come out for season two is back in November, right before Thanksgiving, long story short, our house flooded.

Paul Nottoli: 02:58

Water heater broke and sprayed water everywhere when we got work for like five hours. We don't have a basement, so it basically covered the entire First Floor. So our entire First Floor when we came home from work was completely flooded. Luckily, it was mostly just floor damage and some baseboard. It didn't take out any furniture, a few rugs, etcetera.

Paul Nottoli: 03:22

But that entire process was daunting. If anybody I know I've talked to, whether clients, etcetera, that's had any flood, you know, it's not something fun that you want to have. They got luckily, they came out that night. They started mitigation, etcetera. But we were basically living in a tore up house.

Paul Nottoli: 03:44

And then Thanksgiving happened, Christmas happened. So there's a lot of things that just got delayed. And for months, we were living in other places. We didn't have much of a kitchen. We didn't have much.

Paul Nottoli: 03:54

We were living upstairs in a few bedrooms because everything was tore up, dust everywhere, etcetera. But then finally, after a few months, we were able to move back in. The only problem was is we were living in a place at the time and the construction company told the insurance company that they were done when they actually weren't done. And so insurance us and said, You have 24 to get out of your rental. Meanwhile, we were working till eight that night.

Paul Nottoli: 04:22

So we worked all day and then we moved out of our rental till, so we worked till like eleven that night, moving everything back into our house. And yeah, so what that taught us is that there's often delays, but we have basically all new flooring, new, we painted, we had a bunch of stuff cleaned out, so our house is even better than ever, but it was extremely difficult, extremely stressful while we're trying to work, while we're trying to take care of our pets, we're trying to live in a tore up house with dust everywhere. We're trying to move back in and we're slowly getting that done still, and that process went for months. But that's often how things go when you're going through things is that those months don't seem like they're moving very quickly. And then the next thing you know, things are better and they're better on that end.

Paul Nottoli: 05:15

And so that's just a story I would like to share. I know it's not something that's terrible, terrible, but I know people have shared that or have dealt with water damage or anything like that. It's extremely frustrating, extremely especially when you're trying to just do everyday life, it is extremely difficult. So that's just one example. I know there's many more.

Paul Nottoli: 05:37

I know my guests have shared many more. And so to close, what I want to tell you, what I want to leave with is some everyday tools for building resilience. And if you're looking for ways to strengthen your inner resilience, here are a few tools that might help. Gratitude check ins. So every day jot down three things you're grateful for, even if they're small.

Paul Nottoli: 05:57

It shifts your focus and rewires your mindset. One of my mentors even said that sometimes gratitude in the midst of chaos and negativity and just when things are punching you in the face, it's not necessarily gratitude. It's literally listing down some evidence, an evidence of something that's going positive in your life. Because it's hard to have that gratitude when things are really, really crappy, or I'll just say really, really shitty, like when our house was flooding and trying to deal with all that stuff. So I had to just do some evidence every single day that things were moving in the right direction.

Paul Nottoli: 06:32

Sometimes that was just like the insurance check came, so that means things will be paid for. So whether it's maybe gratitude, if things are going a little bit better or not as bad, or just some evidence that you had something positive happen in your life, even one thing. Daily stillness, so five minutes of silence, breath, or reflection create space in a noisy world. That stillness may be just turning off your phone for five minutes or turning off social media every day for five minutes, giving yourself a break periodically through your day, whether the weekend off of social media, something that gives you time for that stillness. Moving your body, so physical movement has a powerful effect on emotional health.

Paul Nottoli: 07:15

So that simply can be going for a walk, working out, lifting weights, playing basketball, riding your bike, whatever that may be. Just do something that moves your body, some yoga, some stretching, simply walking up and down your stairs a few times. And then speaking kind words to yourself. So your inner voice matters. So make sure it's a voice of compassion, not criticism.

Paul Nottoli: 07:38

I always have a saying, I probably heard it from somewhere, but be careful what you say to yourself because you are listening. So those words of kindness, not being too hard on yourself, not being critical of yourself, telling yourself that you do matter, that you are powerful, that you're going to get through this. Yeah, those types of things. So make sure your voice is of compassion, not criticism. So again, resilience isn't about getting it all right.

Paul Nottoli: 08:06

It's about showing up, trying again and learning, growing, and believing that you are being shaped into someone stronger and wiser than you've ever experienced. So wherever you are today, whether you feel strong or barely hanging on, please remember, you are more than capable than you know, you have more strength in you than you feel, and this moment doesn't define your whole story.