Life, for most of us, is a thorny bush of roses or a game of snakes and ladders, with change being the only constant. My inbox has been inundated with letters from students who are coping with the situation the best they can and would like some guidance. Take Debanjan, a college student from Calcutta.

There have been many instances in his life when he felt that he had hit rock bottom. But each time life tripped him and dumped him in a hole, he somehow found the courage to dust himself off and climb back up. But it isn’t easy. Says Suranjana, a high-scoring student from Durgapur, “I look at my fingertips and think about the stories they could tell of persistence, hard work and, sometimes, just clinging to that last vestige of hope.” Life throws all of us challenges; the difference between those who give up and those who fight back is resilience. How do we build resilience and increase our ability to sail through all the ups and downs of life?

There is no one specific way to build resilience as it is a constant process. Just like you have to do different sets of exercises regularly if you want to build up all your muscles, there are certain things you must do to maintain positive mental health. Some of them are:

⚫ Check in with your emotions regularly
⚫ Learn to positively channel your negative and positive emotions
⚫ Learn to manage stress when you face problems or failure
⚫ Identify your strengths and areas of challenge so that you can leverage them productively
⚫Think beyond your own needs and give back to the world

Here are 10 habits you can develop to increase your resilience:

1. Get into problem-solving mode and face challenges squarely instead of getting paralysed by hopelessness and going down the negative energy spiral of “why me”.

2. Treat mistakes as a necessary part of your growth and learning process. The thing that makes each one of us interesting is that we are unique individuals. We can’t all succeed at everything. Each one of us will have our own journey towards success. By letting go of our disappointments and forgiving ourselves for our mistakes, we can create the space for new thoughts and ideas.

3. Visualise your goals and constantly keep reminding yourself of what you hope to achieve. Keep your goals flexible but stay true to your values. Your goals may change with time but the desire to achieve and the desire to make a difference can keep you focussed.

4.Focus on what you can control, not on what you cannot. Each of us has a limited scope of impact and we can be more productive this way. Repeating the serenity prayer is really wonderful for this exercise.

5. Accept that you cannot control other people and their actions but only your emotions, your feelings and your response to their behaviour. Then you can stop trying to control others and focus on your own growth.

6. Expect change; nothing in life is permanent — neither the good nor the bad times. So whichever phase you are going through now will not last forever. Seasons of life will change and, once you expect change, you can accept it more easily.

7. Instead of ruminating over what you could not do this week, focus on the one activity that you accomplished successfully. Instead of getting into the self-critical loop, remind yourself of your own successes and firmly establish your own weekly benchmark for success.

8. Before you fall asleep at night, think of at least one good thing that happened to you that day. It could be a pretty bird you saw, a smile from a stranger or a lick from a friendly dog. Just make a habit of counting your blessings and see how your perspective can change. The duality of life means that negative and positive will always go together. If we focus on our troubles, the negative energy will grow and if we focus on our blessings, it will increase our sense of well-being.

9. Remember, there are always people you can turn to and ask for help. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness but of maturity as it helps you to take advantage of somebody else’s expertise and also connects you emotionally to other people. Take giving and receiving help as part of your own growth process.

10. Do a good deed. The ability to do something for others is an experience that fills us with a sense of abundance. Make “pay it forward” or “random acts of kindness” more than just words that get thrown around in social campaigns; if you live those words sincerely, you will reap the benefit of positive mental health regularly.
Think of resilience as building blocks that you gradually put one on top of the other to build a tower of positive mental health that enables you to face challenges and overcome them with grace and courage.

The writer has master’s degrees in career counselling and child development