514 | Restoring Your Resilience

Chris LoCurto 0:00
There are plenty of things in this life that will zap your strength, steal your courage, and drain your resilience. What are you going to do about it? That is coming up next.

Welcome to the Chris LoCurto show where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are. Welcome to the show, folks, I hope you're having a fabulous day, wherever you are. One of the topics that we get asked a lot to talk about on the show is along the lines of strength, courage, and resilience. So it's not strange when you think about it. There are plenty of things in life, that zap the strength that steals our courage, and drains us of our resilience. Everyone alive today might feel that they could be a little bit more resilient. These are tough times. And we've no promise that tomorrow will be a bed of roses, either. I think everybody listening to this would agree that there's a really good chance that tomorrow is not going to be a bed of roses. Maybe well, hopefully, we'll but we don't know. And we do know that times are tough. For a lot of people times just continue to get tough, or Bruce Lee, I love that I get to quote Bruce Lee, someone known for his strength, endurance, and resilience once said, do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one. And folks, I so agree with that, you know, used to be early on in my prayer life, when tough times or difficult times would come up, I would pray that God would get me out of it. And Lord helped me to get out of this and helped me, you know, take the situation or do whatever it takes. And one day, God just kind of knocked me upside the head. And he's like, Well, if you want me to remove this difficult time, then quit asking me to make you into the person I want you to be. I started realizing a lot of the difficult times I went through, or because I kept asking for God to make me a better version make me more Christ-like, right? So it's interesting that I started recognizing God uses these difficult times in my life, to mold and shape me. So instead of asking God to get me out, I started asking for him to teach me exactly what he wanted me to know. Help me to learn from what it is you're trying to teach me or what you want me to learn from this situation. I have also added in there, do it as fast as you can. Because I don't want to sit in this. But I want to learn and grow, I want to become a better version. And so if a difficult time or a tough time is something that God wants me to experience, then so be it. But Lord, please help me to learn and grow in this. Resilience is the capacity to withstand or recover quickly from difficulties. It's genuine, toughness. And you know, if you're somebody who goes well, I'm not tough. Let me say it another way, I want you to think about resilience. You know, think about, you know, a stretchy dough, if you're somebody who likes to cook, you know, if you stretch it out, is it stretched out? Or does it bounce back? Right? Does it go back into its previous form, you know, that that, for me? Resilience is something that can take a hit and stay where it is. Or maybe it has a very quick recovery, right? It doesn't have a long recovery. A lack of resilience is that dough that when stretched out, that's it. It's done. It's not stretchy, right? It just is taken on a new shape, or it's not coming back to its original shape. So it's not very resilient.

We want to be resilient people. And we want to be able to be a person who knows how to perform in good times, but also how to stay strong and courageous, and determined in tough times. And the trying times because they're all around us. So how do we make sure we can bounce back? What kind of picture do you have in your mind? When you think about what it looks like to be resilient? Think back to some rough periods in your life, right? What if you had been more resilient and weathered some of your tougher storms? Now obviously you're here. So you did weather the storms. But was there a more resilient way to do so? What if you've been able to bear up under certain stresses and certain difficulties in life? Would things have looked different? Would you have made different decisions? Would you have had different outcomes? I can tell you there are things earlier in my life that the outcomes would have been different if I would have been more resilient, right? If I was able to take knocks easier back then and then bounce right back. You know, what would it look like for you to encounter some of the same adversities today? Would it look different, I can tell you, for me considerably, considerably different. I think I'm much more resilient now than I was earlier in life. And that's because of a lot of the things that we're going to talk about today. So here's the deal. You can grow your resilience, you can put things in place to make you stronger, and when you come back, learning how to be more resilient. Folks, if you've been listening to me for any length of time, then you know, the number one issue, when it comes to business, when it comes to the family when it comes to friendships, is having a lack of high-quality communication, to make sure that you are absolutely winning in every aspect of your life, it all starts with having great communication, the best way to get that communication is to understand your personality style, and to understand the personality style of the folks that you're spending the most time with, whether it be at work, whether it be at home, the best way to do that is to go to Chrislocurto.com/store. And get your personality profile and personality profiles for your team today, get it for your family members. Today, as you go through that profile, you will begin to see the greatest ways to communicate go to Chrislocurto.com/store. Today.

Well, folks, we live up on, what we call the ridge live up on the ridge, it's about 900 feet up. And from where most of the people live in Tennessee. And or at least in the Nashville area and routinely and you know, a couple of times a year, it is not uncommon for the power to get knocked out. There can be some high winds from time to time. And for some reason, I still don't understand this. But it's common a couple of times a year for our power to get knocked down. And we've got to go put things in place we know where the flashlights are, we know where the candles are, we know you know where the generators are, we know all of those things. We've done this before we've been through this drill before we know what to do, we've, we've become incredibly confident in knowing what we're doing when that storm knocks something out. And many times, because we've experienced this before many times, we just wait it out a little bit. And we know that it's going to come back on in 25 minutes or so. Not easy to do if it is super cold or super hot. But no matter what happens, we know how to handle the situation. It's like this something takes over inside of us and says go do this, this, and this. And so this is the first thing we will talk about when it comes to being resilient. How do we make it where you can bounce back? How do we make it where when the negative hits you or the trying time hits you, you bounce back? So let's use a saw this great example on top of like a, like a teeter-totter, right? You've got that fulcrum in the center. Think of negative things on one side, you know, trying times and difficulties on one side, and positive things on another side. You know, if it's perfectly balanced, then it's just sitting there, well balanced. But what if something lands on the training time? Well, then that starts to drop down, and the positive things. Now they're not even to or outweighing the negative things right, we'll add another thing. Well, then it continues to weigh heavier on the negative side. Well, now let's look at it as not perfectly you know, the fulcrum doesn't stay in the center, but as one side gets heavier, that the fulcrum shifts like the teeter-totter slides in that direction, right? So think about it, where if you're getting negative after negative will eventually that teeter-totter board will slide towards that negative side and the fulcrum will be more towards the positive, making it much more difficult to bounce back to the positive side. So hopefully that makes sense.

Hopefully, you get that picture in your mind. Now let's switch it around what happens when we overload the positive side? So much so that the fulcrum is Light is backward towards the negative side. And anytime something negative hits that negative side, it bounces off. Or maybe it lifts on the positive side, but the positive side goes back down. That's the resilience we're looking for. Right? We want to be able to be resilient, that when tough things hit us, or hard times hit us or difficulties hit us that it doesn't knock us down. Or if it does knock us hard, we're able to bounce back because of all the things that are overloaded on the positive side. So we're going to talk through some things today that you can do to make the positive side outweigh the negative. So that fulcrum slides, so it makes it really harder. So negative, things bounce off of you much easier, right? The first thing is training, training, training training, I want to give you three keys about training, which will help you to create that shift in the fulcrum, right, that will help you to balance better, and be able to be resilient. Now I've said these things before with regard to the business world, but the same is true for us personally, so let's kind of adapt them. For us as individuals, the number one that is first key is training forms the foundation of an organization's culture. Now culture breaks down into actions and attitudes. So what are we saying here? Your training, you know, we're talking about your routines, your habits, your patterns, your training will predict how well you perform under pressure. So let me say it this way, if you want to see how well you're going to perform under pressure in the future then take a look at the routines, the habits, and the patterns happening now. I've talked about people who are conditioned because of their thinking patterns to be traumatized over the littlest things. I almost spilled my coffee, oh my gosh, my day is ruined. You know, I think we're all seeing those people right now where the word trauma is being used in situations that are not traumatic. But they believe that they are. And they've been conditioned to believe that almost spilling their coffee is ruining their day or some aspect of the day. How is your training, keeping you from being in that position? How is your training, putting you in a place to perform better under pressure? So that when you almost spill your coffee, you just almost spilled your coffee, and you get over it and you move on? Right? You don't freak out. You're not traumatized, you're not. Your day is not ruined. Right?

What happens if you spill your coffee? Dang, it spilled my coffee. This sucks. I got a, I don't know, spilled it on my pants, gotta change my pants, got to do something, whatever. Alright, let's get that down and get moving. The things that you are doing right now the habits, the routines, the patterns that you have, are going to help you to be able to quickly bounce back. What would be a pattern in that situation? What would be a great training or habit? Well, I have to solve the problem. Instead of sitting in the problem complaining about the problem. Wanting other people to hear about my problem, putting a social media post out about my problem. What if I just fixed the problem? What if I just solved the problem? And moved on? What if part of my thinking was it doesn't matter what anybody thinks about my current situation? Solve it and get over it. I don't need to post socially and see how many people I can get to sympathize with my current situation. As a matter of fact, social media should not be my first thought clean pants should be. You know, what do I do about the spilled coffee? What if instead of having a bad reaction, which it's okay to have a bad reaction, there's nothing wrong with that? Usually for me something like that in the first 30 seconds are shoot, that was stupid. But I'm somebody who very quickly goes into solution mode. Well, it's done. Go do something about it. Right. Go fix it. Go solve it. Why? Because what's the point in sitting in it? It's a waste of time. Yeah, but Chris, I can get people to feel sorry for me. Okay, well, if that's what you want to do, I guess. Go after it. But I bet you start spilling I found yourself more often. If that's your goal, the thing you have to understand is that your patterns, your habits, your reactions, and your routines, they're going to shape the way you are resilient. So take a look at what you're doing now. Number two, training means cultivating diligent, consistent disciplines. So we're talking about repetition here. So let me give you an example. What is the first thing you do in the morning? Well, if you're like most people, then you probably reach for your phone. You probably look at your notifications, you probably read through some emails, you might look at the news and some negativity, and you might determine it's better to stay in bed. You know, you probably scroll through some social media and determine you need to stay in bed, I don't know. Is that what you do? Is any of that stuff? Sound familiar? Do you center on yourself? Do you focus on something quality? Do you find time to maybe take a moment to breathe or to pray or if you're not a believer have at least you know, some quiet time, not focusing on negative things, not focusing on all of the things that are telling you your day has already begun, you know, read meditate journal, something like that, right? We're talking about conditioning ourselves, we're talking about training ourselves, we're talking about strengthening our core our ability to be resilient. So for us, for me and my wife, the first thing is to get up and get into Bible study. For me, I can get moving pretty quickly, my wife does need a few minutes, and the coffee needs to hit for her. So she might need a little bit of a, you know, noneducational, first few moments. But we get into prayer and scripture.

We tried to start our days with God, we don't try we do. That's our focus. Not every single day, not 365 days a year works out that way. Sometimes we might have had a difficult night, or maybe we didn't sleep well. And, so it takes a little bit longer, maybe we have to spend a little bit of time focusing on something else or just have conversations. But for the bulk of the year, almost every single day. That's what our day looks like. Getting up and creating, not even creating it's already a pattern. It's a habit, it's a routine. Spending time with God, conditioning ourselves growing ourselves. We make sure that things don't impede that time. Right? We don't let things get into that timeframe. Again, I'm saying you know, out of 365 days, there's probably a handful of days that it doesn't work out that way. But the bulk of it, it does. Alright, that's important. Number three, and key number three, training determines a team's resilience to future challenges. So here's the bottom line, the more we embrace discipline, and hardships, the more we toil in good times, and the more easily we preserve during the truly tough times. So if you get outside and go for a run every day, or you know some other routine for training, then one race day comes, you're up to the challenge. If you never get out there, if you're you know, couch to 5k type of person, well, then you've got a process to speed on, right? But if you're somebody who gets out there and trains well enough, then you're gonna be ready. However, if you're not training regularly, or if you're not hitting the gym on a regular basis, then guess what you're not going to be able to, you know, deadlift something over your head, it's not going to happen, right your body while putting part of what it is, you're not gonna be able to put a decent amount of weight over your head. So the question is, how are you preparing yourself for more weight more adversity for more difficulty? What are the things that you're doing to build up that resilience? Again, I want to go back to this, this concept of this fulcrum that is shifted on the teeter-totter. the more weight you put on that positive side and think of the positives as being training as being quality habits being quality disciplines. Then when something hits the negative side, it almost bounces off. Right, because there's so much weight on the positive side. So training matters immensely. Point number two. fight the fear. You have got to fight fear. I want you to notice something that Teddy Roosevelt once said.

He said I wish to preach the doctrine of the strenuous life the life of toil and effort Hurt, of labor and strife, to preach that highest form of success, which comes not to the one who desires mere easy peace, but to the one who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil. Now, folks, I gotta say, outside of places like this, that's probably not a message you have heard lately. But that is a message we believe. We don't like it, but I enjoy the easy path. But I will tell you this, it is not something I'm looking for. I enjoy working hard, I enjoy preparing myself for strenuous stuff, and I enjoy being able to work through difficult situations and problems. I enjoy getting out and working hard, physically, working hard and mentally, and strenuously with my team. I enjoy these things. Why? Because it just matters more. The outcome is so much better, the outcome is so much bigger. It makes it easier to work through things. It's amazing how much we can work through as a business, or as individuals because we've been doing it for so long. We've allowed ourselves to work through strenuous stuff, you know, it's funny for new team members who come on. A lot of times, they don't want anybody to know that they've made a mistake, that they've screwed something up. And we gotta say it around here. Listen, if you're not making mistakes, you're not doing anything, you're not moving stuff around. So don't be fearful that you've screwed something up. We have a simple system, what happened? How did it happen? Why did it happen? How do we fix it? How do we make sure never happens again? Let's move on. Just don't keep doing the same mistake over and over again, right? The key is, if you're not busting at doing something, then you might not be making mistakes. If you're not making any mistakes, I'm going to start asking some questions. Why aren't you? Is there more that you could be doing? Right? So I will tell you I like that. I like what Teddy said, you know, because the more you actually make it through a strenuous life, the more you focus, I'm not saying go make your life difficult. Teddy's not saying that. He's not saying go make life painful. What he's saying is to put out the effort. toil, work hard. Do things that matter. The more you do that, the more resilient you will become. So when tough times come along, you don't cringe at them. When difficult situations come along. You don't cringe at them. I, you know, it's funny how people think I don't stress. So many times my wife has said, you just don't show stress. And I'm like, really? I feel like I do. He's like you don't you just solve stuff. You move on to things, you know, you get things done. And the truth is I do I do that a lot. But I have plenty of stress in my life.

I think it's just the habits that have been built up. Don't allow me to sit in it. Right. And I don't think there's any point in just sitting in stress I want I want out, I want to do something about I want to fix it. How do I get over this? And many times it starts with prayer. Lord, you already know what I'm going through. So instead of me trying to fix this on my own, let me come to you first, teach me what you want to teach me, and then help me to solve this and move forward. So the truth is when we tend to gravitate towards ease and comfort and we shy away from pain and toil, then unfortunately, we shrink from danger. We shrink from hardship. We shrink from toil. We do it all the time. If that is not our, you know, if we're not working at becoming stronger and more resilient in those areas, then we will shrink from danger, hardship, toil in relationships and our finances and our physical being or our mental being our mental labor. Our self-discipline is definitely our spiritual discipline. You know, on and on. Those are areas that we're going to shy away from in fear keep us from focusing on the hard stuff, the toil, the labor, right? It keeps us from going after and tackling the bigger challenges in our lives. It keeps us confined, and contained. It keeps us without courage. Fear will hold you back. It's going to keep you from getting up and slaying the dragon Again, right it's gonna fear is going to keep you thinking, hey, the dragons out there ready to devour me, I'm just gonna stay in bed. Right? Fear can cause you to be lethargic. Well, I just hate the thought of that right fear that can keep you from being resilient. Right fear will paralyze you. And for a lot of people. I hate to say it, but for a lot of people, fear is a consistent thought it's a consistent reality. What if What about this? What if this happens over here, the truth is fear zaps us of our strength that keeps us down. It keeps us drained. It keeps determination away from us. And the truth is, it ruins your resilience. So go back to that fulcrum on that teeter-totter. Think of fear as being the heavy weight on that negative side where that fulcrum shifts all the way towards the positive side because the hit on the negative side is so heavy. Tell me if this doesn't make sense. How many times have you seen people who are so full of fear that when positive stuff comes their way, it hits that positive side, it bounces off? Right? Because the negative outweighs it doesn't allow it to stay. So the thing is got to fight the fear. When we come back, add perspective to your perseverance.

Speaker 2 26:44
Freedom, it's so powerful, I feel rejuvenated, almost renewed, I just felt so welcomed and loved and accepted for who I am, and not an ounce of judgment. So I was very comfortable there that had a really big impact on me, and that's going to be worth it. It's going to be hard. But it's going to be even better. On the other side. For me, it was just, it was just very refreshing. And I want to say life-giving for me, it really was, you know, I would go through Next-Level Life again. And probably again, and probably again, because it's so powerful.

Chris LoCurto 27:20
If you want to experience the same kind of life transformation, the same kind of self-awareness and freedom that they have. Or maybe you're just curious what the process would look like for you, then head on over to Chrislocurto.com/next level life.

So point three is the power of perspective. So let me read you a verse from the message. Don't lose a minute in building on what you've been given. complementing your basic faith with good character, spiritual understanding, alertness, discipline, and passionate patience, each dimension fitting into and developing the others. With these qualities active and growing in your lives. No day will pass without its reward pool. Just so strong. So powerful. Character understanding or perspective, discipline, and endurance are all connected, and they all have a payoff a reward for the person who uses them, for the person who spends time building on them. Right? The person who doesn't the person whose day is focused on building their social media, following and getting the most number of likes, and the person who's focused on fear and building there, their, you know, concern with all the things that might possibly happen, maybe that person doesn't have that reward. Their reward is negativity. Their reward is not getting through the difficulties, their reward is feeling pummelling. Right? We need to learn to build on what we've been given engaging them every day, each day is a gift. It's like we talked about in Episode Five Love and mastering time and money each day is a gift you have today to build on that. So speaking of building, see that fun transition right there. How are you building your team in your business? are you approaching things with purpose intentionality and a clearly defined strategy, leaders can end up living in a stressful whirlwind around their office. We call that the leadership Crazy Cycle and maybe you've noticed some of that craziness or maybe you lack general confidence when approaching problems, situations, or other people in your workplace. Fear can be a paralyzing Think factor, even for leaders. Maybe you feel like you don't see many or any options with what you're facing. Or is there unnecessary drama on your team? Does your team lack really clear expectations? Are you experiencing disunity among members is miscommunication rampant or at least common? If that's you, or folks on your team, then get yourselves into the Next-Level Leadership Live Event in April, it will absolutely change your life, your team, and your business, go to Chrislocurto.com/events and reserve a spot for you and your leadership team. Registration is open and seats are selling out. So don't put this off. The keynote lessons are geared to equip you to build a high-performing team, cultivate excellence in every corner of your business and grow your revenues. So go to Chrislocurto.com/events and get ready to get past what's holding you back. Now let's get back to building up your resilience.

So let's add one more component that will help you restore and replenish your resilience. Resilience is as much about your perspective as it is about perseverance. So they go hand in hand. What is it that you don't know that you need to know in order to push through whatever that is? Go after it. And what's true about fear is true also about the unknown. In fact, much of what we fear is the unknown. It's the imagined it's usually not based on reality or even probability. This might happen. What if this does happen? And you know, usually when you ask somebody, how many times has that happened? Well, it hasn't happened yet. Well, then why are you worried about it? Why are you fearful? Why are you concerned? Why are you affecting your mind in your day? Why are you affecting your resilience? By not focusing on something positive? Why are you focused on fear? So whatever the thing is that you need to know that you need to grow in that you need to learn, get after it, because here's the deal, not facing it, or ignoring the unknown or fearing the unknown, it can absolutely tax your resilience. Ignorance is not bliss, folks, it's not. Sometimes we avoid doing the hard thing of slaying those dragons in our lives because we're afraid of what we might find there. Some people avoid doing their taxes not smart. They may avoid a spouse because of conflict or a family member because of conflict. They won't get that lump checked out that they should have had checked out, they some of them aren't going to look at their bills and figure out what needs to be taken care of them. Some of them will not come through the Next-Level Life even though they know that they're supposed to and they should write sometimes. Why? Because what they might find the number one fear, depending upon personality. So if you're D, you're gonna say well, I don't fear anything.

The number one concern coming through Next-Level Life is the unknown. The least attended, let me speak to all your highs out there. All the highs are afraid that they will find out something bad or negative or something they don't want to see about themselves. And so they don't show up. It's the least attended personality style. It's just crazy. People are afraid of finding that well, what if I find out something I don't like? What if you do? Fix it, do something about it. But here's the crazy thing and over 500 NEXT LEVEL life events, not one single person we've had plenty of eyes that have come through. Not one single person has walked out going oh my gosh, I so don't know myself. I'm so shocked and stunned at all the things I learned about myself. What people walk out saying is, wow, that was eye-opening. Well, I've never seen it that way. And they walk out with a plan. So folks, what you've got to understand is the thing that you're afraid of whether if it's being afraid of something that you might find, the problem isn't just going to go away if the problem exists if there's something there. It doesn't go away with you ignoring it. And guess what? The fear is going to wear you out what if but what if I find out what if you know what if this thing over here does it What if this? All that's gonna do is wear you out? So take the initiative, list out what your fears are, gain perspective on them, dispel the lies, define the facts, and get to reality. You can't replenish or restore your resilience until you've gained perspective on what's real, and what you're really dealing with. And chances are that you're gonna find out that the fear was way, way, way, way worse than actually tackling the problem. I think there are 500 folks that have come through Next-Level Life that would aim and the daylights out of that right there. Usually, the fear is way worse than the actual thing you're going to discover. So, to wrap this up, I want to take a little test. Let's see which side of this you score more points on. So try and keep some score here. There are five things that resilient people tend to do. And there are five things that nonresilient people tend to do.

So let's start with the five things resilient people tend to I want you to tell me how you score number one, they maintain emotional equilibrium and their composure under stress. That doesn't mean that they're not experiencing it. It doesn't mean that it's not difficult and stressful, it just means that they don't lose their minds. They don't, you know, they're able to hold themselves together because they see that there's a better way out or better purpose number two, when upset, they do not agitate others by spreading tension and anxiety. Number three, they tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty and adapt readily to new situations. Number four, they handle mistakes or setbacks with poise and grace. They stay rock steady. Number five, they put stressful experiences into perspective, and do not dwell on them. What's your score on the now let's talk about the five things nonresilient people tend to they can easily get agitated and or afraid when up against the deadline. They ruminate after difficult situations, tough conversations, or conflicts. Now, ruminating is not a bad thing. But how long do they spend time thinking about that situation and running through it over and over and over and over again, right? Number three, they have trouble staying focused, they quickly are losing their train of thought. Let's say it that way. Number four, they have little bandwidth for dealing with the unknown, it is an absolute stressor. Number five, every new problem tends to wear them down, and they get overwhelmed. So here's the question, did you notice yourself as being more on the resilient or the nonresilient side of things? Which one?

If you find yourself being more on the resilient side of things, I will tell you, I do. But I can tell you the younger version of me nonresilient, mostly still resilient aspects, probably in the middle. But definitely much more on the resilient side now, because of all the things we've talked about today, right? Putting in those training, having an actual game plan of becoming more resilient. So my question to you is, What's your game plan? What are you going to change about your habits, your routines, your patterns, and your training, right? What do you need to eliminate fear, fear of failure, fear of getting let down fear of being disappointed or hurt? What do you need to eliminate those things? Where do you need to gain perspective about what you're facing? Have you quantified your strengths and weaknesses? What did you learn coming out of your past performance? Did you gain some quality perspective, from your last failure? So use the perspective to train today for a better tomorrow. If you do these things, you will be creating a much greater level of resilience in yourself. And I can tell you, this is a resilience that you will be able to draw strength on and from for years to come. So put these things in place and make the decision today to build on all of these aspects to make you more resilient. Get that teeter-totter, that fulcrum moved more towards that, that negative side and get that positive side weighed down, with training with habits with patterns with things that you do that you work on, to make you more resilient, so when the negative things hit you, they bounce off. They can't flip your teeter-totter. There's your picture for the day. Well, folks, that's all the time we have for today. I hope this information has helped you. As always, I want you to take this information and change your leadership. Change your business, change your life. And join us on the next episode.