resilience is a we thing, not a you thing

I do a lot of work around the word "resilience." The more I talk about this word with people, the more I dislike it. Not because being resilient isn't a good thing, but because too often I think the way we see resilience - and the way we promote it in others - can do more harm than good.

Here is a definition I found for resilience:

The process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or significant sources of stress.

So that's a good thing - right - responding well in the face of adversity? The problem is, when it comes to helping others develop resilience, helping them develop their capacity to respond well to adversity, we too often reduce it to "you need to toughen up" or you need to "just get over it and move on."

Too often I see and hear resilience described as a "you" process instead of a "we" connection. For too long we've been a culture that leans into the mantra of be strong and be courageous.

Again - I'm a big fan of strong and courageous. But, I think the starting point for resilience is having someone strong and courageous enough to allow us to say I am broken.

I need help.

When I talk about resilience, I often tell people the one thing that I almost always see proceed strength and resilience is a meaningful relationship with someone else. We almost always need someone in our life who says I see your brokenness, I accept your weakness, let me be your strength - prior to us actually finding our strength - our resilience.

For Christians, isn't that at the core of our faith, this idea that Christ says to us that if we want to have a meaningful relationship with him the first thing we need to do is tell him just how broken we are? Isn't that what Christ did on the cross - share with us in the most intimate way imaginable his own weakness?

Christ didn't leave this earth shouting "suck it up and deal with it." He left begging us to let him be by our side in our weakness.

Almost all research I do around friendships and community and connection says we don't have them. A majority of Americans continue to say they don't have one meaningful relationship. When considering their connections, I believe, in their minds, people are asking themselves how many people do I have in my life that I can just unload how weak I feel - how broken I am?

For a growing number of people that answer is zero.

We have a culture of people running around pretending to have it all together, all the while longing for someone to know they are a falling apart mess.

We have a culture of people running around feeling the pressure of a world telling them to just get over it.

We have a culture of people running around the world desperately wanting NOT to get over it, but for someone to come along and gently walk them through it - together.