5 steps to develop resilience & challenge your core beliefs

Core beliefs are the very essence of how we see ourselves, other people, the world and the future. They often motivate our behaviour and how we respond to people around us. It is often our beliefs that keep us stuck in repetitive negative cycles that we no longer enjoy or pursuing dreams not yet realised.

If we take a closer look at some of our beliefs, some of our core beliefs start to be shaped when we are tiny babies and develop through childhood as our experiences grow. In reality by the time we reach adult life most of our core beliefs already exist even if we are not conscious of them, they are there beneath the surface.

So why is this a problem?

Well, perhaps they are not, perhaps you have grown up in a very loving balanced home and have internalised some good and useful beliefs about yourself and your surroundings, but as most of us are not perfect and we are not perfect parents, we all form distorted beliefs or false beliefs.

These kind of false beliefs are often rooted in deep unexpressed fear and instead of creating opportunities for growth they are causing all kinds of problems in relationship at home and work.

Five steps to develop your resilience and challenge your core beliefs

It is important to make the connection between your behaviour and their roots. Not so you can dwell on the past and become even more anxious and depressed, but so you can build resilience, shape your future and challenge your core beliefs.

Resilience is the mental toughness to face and overcome adversity. It will keep you up and running a long time after others have given up. Nothing is more important to success than resilience.

Nobody is born with resilience; babies are the opposite of resilient. Resilience emerges through your life experiences, your thoughts and the beliefs you adopt about yourself and your place in the world.

If you want to be successful in love, life and all relationships you must be willing to challenge your core beliefs and build an antidote to overcoming fear and lies through the renewal of your mind.

Master your emotions before they master you

When resilient people feel a strong emotion, they step back from it before taking action. They decide whether to harness that emotion to move them forward or to simply let the emotion run its course.

You must be first aware you are experiencing the emotion to harness it, as most of us are very good at avoiding our feelings and have adopted some great distraction techniques over the years!!

But if you allow yourself to experience the feelings then you have a better chance of deciding what you will dwell on and allow to run around in your mind all day challenging your core beliefs!

I can and do prepare myself for the future

Be prepared. Resilient people are committed to growing their skills. They see themselves as being in constant training to face the next set of challenges. Don’t just be a sitting target, fill your time, mind and efforts in life with things you enjoy and that build you up. Surrounding yourselves with people who build you up and not tear you down will enable you to adapt quickly when things go wrong.

Learn more from failure than success

Resilient people may not welcome failure but they don't fear it, either. A core belief of a resilient person is 'failure is crucial to development and growth'. It is the best way to learn to be great quickly. It sounds mad, but some of the most successful people have had some of the biggest failures. Resilient people are not afraid to fail and they don’t avoid failure. Start to adopt the belief that 'failure is good it helps you to grow'.

Take criticism constructively not personally

Resilient people don't care whether criticism is meant to be constructive. They listen to it, decide if it's valid and then take corrective action, if appropriate. Don't take it personally instead of allowing criticism to wound you and tap into your false beliefs, allow criticism to strengthen your belief muscles.

Always have more to give

Resilient people do not allow limited resources to stop them from doing anything. Giving when you have needs to be met is not a very logical principle. But the more you give, the more it will come back to you. Resilience will always find the extra resources to complete what is truly necessary.