How to Build Resilience

Resilience isn’t about being tough or unfazed. It’s about the ability to bend without breaking—to face difficulty and still find your way forward. Whether you’re dealing with loss, relationship struggles, identity challenges, or simply the weight of everyday stress, resilience is what allows you to adapt, recover, and keep growing.

For some, resilience is born out of necessity. Take Jason, a gay man in his 40s who spent years masking parts of himself to stay safe at work and in his family. When his long-term relationship ended, it shook not just his sense of being loveable but his sense of belonging. Therapy helped him stop internalizing rejection and begin building inner security based on his own values—not others' approval. He started reconnecting with old friends, carving out time for art, and slowly letting himself be known in new ways. His resilience grew not by toughing it out, but by softening where he once felt ashamed.

Or consider Lisa and Mark, a straight couple raising two kids while juggling financial uncertainty and aging parents. When Mark lost his job, their marriage hit a wall. Tension, blame, and fear crept in. But instead of shutting down, they leaned into it. They began practicing regular check-ins—naming what they were feeling before it erupted. They asked for help from friends. And they found small ways to ground themselves—walks together, shared laughter, and remembering that being strong didn’t mean going it alone. Resilience, for them, meant choosing connection even when it was hard.

Building resilience doesn’t mean never feeling anxious, angry, or overwhelmed. It means knowing how to ride those waves without drowning in them. It’s learning to name your pain without letting it define you. To ask, What can I learn from this? rather than Why is this happening to me? It’s about pausing to breathe, returning to what matters, and trusting that even in uncertainty, you still have agency.

Resilience grows when we create space for both struggle and support. It lives in the choices we make daily—to care for ourselves, to reach out instead of retreat, and to believe in the possibility of healing, no matter where we start.

You don’t have to be fearless to be resilient. You just have to keep showing up.