Resilience and Recovery

Resiliency–the ability to get back up after a setback knocks you down–is a trait we all cultivated in order to survive the recession and one we’ll be falling back on during the slow recovery. But while survival often dictates that we find a new job, learn to live with less, or adjust to a “new normal,” bouncing back emotionally can present a greater challenge. Just ask motivational speaker and entrepreneur Lisa Nichols, who describes the path to resilience in her acclaimed book, No Matter What! 9 Steps to Living the Life You Love (Wellness Central; $24.99). While helping others, Nichols found herself in an abusive relationship that shattered her self-confidence and threatened her personal and professional life.

“I felt like a total fraud and failure,” says Nichols, the 43-year-old founder of San Diego-based Motivating the Masses (www.lisa-nichols.com) and CEO of Motivating the Teen Spirit L.L.C.  Ten years ago, when Nichols was establishing her motivational speaking business, it was not unusual for her to be standing in front of hundreds of people, teaching them how to realize their dreams. Yet the fact that her own personal life was in such turmoil made her question her choices and her professional credibility. “I felt as if I was unworthy to do this work because my personal life was falling apart,” she says. “I was ashamed of what I was going through and felt like I wasn’t qualified to tell anyone anything.”

It’s not unusual for people to question their abilities following a major setback because “your self-esteem automatically plunges,” says Sheri A. Wilson Ph.D., a licensed psychologist and CEO of DRW Support Services Inc., a behavioral services company in Washington, D.C. If you lose your job, you may think you’re a poor manager; if a relationship ends, you may become consumed with your personal flaws. But the key to resiliency is acknowledging these feelings without buying into them. As Nichols would later prove, self-confidence can be revived.

First, you must start with the end in mind, Nichols says. “Paint the picture–vividly describe how you plan to come out of this [situation] and who you will be when you emerge.” Part of painting the picture means coming up with a greater purpose for what you’re going through. One night, while still living with her abuser, Nichols sat on the edge of her bed crying. ‘”What’s going on? What am I supposed to get out of all this?’” she recalls asking aloud.  “And God spoke back into my heart, ‘You’re going to help wounded people heal.’” The thought that her ordeal could ultimately inspire someone else to get out of a bad situation gave her the strength to at least come up with a plan. “In that moment, there was a calm that came over me, and that’s when I tapped into my higher purpose,” she says. “I still had to get out of the mess, but I had something that could pull me through.”

The next step is to create action steps to achieve results, or what Nichols calls “deliverables.” She plotted a strategy to escape her abuser; she would move out while he was away on a trip. “Before he was 100 miles away I was already relocating,” she says of her swift departure. But while she’d made it through the physical danger, she was left with an emotional land mine.

Despondent, Nichols saw a doctor who told her she was clinically depressed; for the motivational speaker, the diagnosis signaled a professional defeat. “I had worked with clients who were depressed so I thought, ‘I’m now that person who comes to see me.’ ”

To confront her feelings, Nichols did what she calls “mirror work,” a practice she continues today in which she stands in front of a mirror and repeatedly expresses reasons she’s proud of herself, things she’s forgiven herself for, and her intentions for the future. During this process, she took the third step involved in overcoming a setback, which is to own the part you played in the experience Nichols acknowledged that she had allowed an abusive man into her life. If you blame others for your setback, she says, “You’re

not in the driver’s seat of your life. You’re in the passenger seat, the backseat–sometimes you’re in the trunk.” She then asked trusted friends and family members to tell her what they saw in her. Their positive reinforcement taught her yet another lesson: “There are times when someone can see something for you that you’re not seeing for yourself, and you can borrow their faith in you.”

As Nichols became stronger–a process that took a little over a year–the shame she felt about the relationship subsided until she was ready to take step four, which is to reframe the setback into a positive experience. “Every setback can be used as a learning tool for future endeavors and plans,” says Wilson. Nichols realized that she wasn’t motivating and inspiring others in spite of her setbacks and breakdowns, but because of them. “I get to apply everything I talk about, and I get to show that it works,” she says. “Every breakdown has a breakthrough attached to it.” She’s living proof.

STAYING RESILIENT IN BUSINESS

When economic times are tough, it’s more important than ever for business owners to make sure their efforts pay off. Here’s Nichols’ advice for reaching customers during hard times and bouncing back after the recession:

Create a SNAP statement. Instead of giving people your profession or job title, describe your business with what Nichols calls super networking at an accelerated pace, or SNAP–a statement that explains what the business can do for potential customers. When describing her motivational company for teenagers, for example, Nichols would say, “Motivating the Teen Spirit teaches teens how to fall madly in love with themselves and how to make integrity-based decisions.” Not only is the statement “clear, concise, powerful, and quick,” she says, but you let the listener know what’s in it for them.

Magnify your focus. Most entrepreneurs spend their days doing a little bit of this and a little bit of that and “you look up and it’s six hours later, and you haven’t really done anything,” Nichols says. Instead, allot periods of one or two hours to specific tasks, such as marketing, sales calls, or strategizing. Let nothing else distract you during that time. By spending every day between 10 a.m. and noon making sales calls, Nichols grew her business by 175% in two years.

Keep your business relevant. For a business to survive, it must be unique, timely, and efficient. If your business is missing one of these three components, adjust your business model. Nichols explains, “[Your business] must serve the market like it’s never been served before at a time that it needs to be served with a product or service that works.”

This article originally appeared in the December 2009 issue of Black Enterprise magazine.