Product Description

Resilience is a crucial ingredient–perhaps the crucial ingredient–to a happy, healthy life. More than anything else, it's what determines how high we rise above what threatens to wear us down, from battling an illness, to bolstering a marriage, to carrying on after a national crisis. Everyone needs resilience, and now two expert psychologists share seven proven techniques for enhancing our capacity to weather even the cruelest setbacks.

The science in The Resilience Factor takes an extraordinary leap from the research introduced in the bestselling Learned Optimism a decade ago. Just as hundreds of thousands of people were transformed by "flexible optimism," readers of this book will flourish, thanks to their enhanced ability to overcome obstacles of any kind. Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatté are seasoned resilience coaches and, through practical methods and vivid anecdotes, they prove that resilience is not just an ability that we're born with and need to survive, but a skill that anyone can learn and improve in order to thrive.

Readers will first complete the Resilience Questionnaire to determine their own innate levels of resilience. Then, the system at the heart of The Resilience Factor will teach them to:

• Cast off harsh self-criticisms and negative self-images
• Navigate through the fallout of any kind of crisis
• Cope with grief and anxiety
• Overcome obstacles in relationships, parenting, or on the job
• Achieve greater physical health
• Bolster optimism, take chances, and embrace life

In light of the unprecedented challenges we've recently faced, there’s never been a greater need to boost our resilience. Without resorting to feel-good pap or quick-fix clichés, The Resilience Factor is self-help at its best, destined to become a classic in the genre.




From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21766 in Books
• Published on: 2003-10-14
• Released on: 2003-10-14
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Amazon.com
In the capable hands of psychologists Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatté, resilience is not a Band-Aid or a buzzword. It is a habit of mind. The Resilience Factor is a practical roadmap for navigating unexpected challenges, surprises, and setbacks at work and home. Their premise--that your thinking style determines your resilience--underlies the books promise: you can boost resilience by changing the way you think about adversity.

The authors synthesize decades of research in cognitive psychology, particularly the work of Aaron Beck and Martin Seligman, to create seven practical strategies for bouncing back. Each strategy demonstrates how "thinking styles" affect emotions and behavior. "The secret is accurate thinking, not positive thinking," they explain. After completing a "Resilience Questionnaire," readers learn to turn off negative thoughts, avoid thinking traps, detect "icebergs"--the basic beliefs that cause us to overreact--and restore perspective. Each strategy is illustrated with vivid examples, including acting-out teenagers, battle-torn marriages, downsized workplaces, and the loss of loved ones. This insightful book offers clear descriptions of resilient thinking and workable tools for changing our minds. --Barbara Mackoff

From Publishers Weekly
Reivich and Shatté's book is reminiscent of the bestselling Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, not just in the number of skills it discusses, but in the approach the authors take, too. They focus on the thinking rather than feeling side of the human psyche, but their intent is to ultimately affect readers' emotional reactions through helping them reprogram their thoughts. University of Pennsylvania professors Shatté and Reivich argue that feelings are a result of thinking; therefore, by changing the way one thinks, one can control one's emotional reactions to stressful situations. They promote an "ABC" system: "A" stands for adversity ("what pushes your buttons"), "B" is your inherent belief about life, which triggers your responding actions and feelings, or "C" ("consequences"). The A's are bound to keep hitting us, but if we analyze and revamp our B's, our C's will improve, resulting in greater peace and happiness. Although skeptics may not be convinced that changing one's thoughts can change one's life, the book could be of help to those who feel powerless over their emotions. Agent, Richard Pine.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Download Description

Resilience is a crucial ingredient -- perhaps the crucial ingredient -- to a happy, healthy life. More than anything else, it's what determines how high we rise above what threatens to wear us down, from battling an illness, to bolstering a marriage, to carrying on after a national crisis. Everyone needs resilience, and now two expert psychologists share seven proven techniques for enhancing our capacity to weather even the cruelest setbacks.

The science in The Resilience Factor takes an extraordinary leap from the research introduced in the bestselling Learned Optimism a decade ago. Just as hundreds of thousands of people were transformed by "flexible optimism," readers of this book will flourish, thanks to their enhanced ability to overcome obstacles of any kind. Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatté: are seasoned resilience coaches and, through practical methods and vivid anecdotes, they prove that resilience is not just an ability that we're born with and need to survive, but a skill that anyone can learn and improve in order to thrive.

Readers will first complete the Resilience Questionnaire to determine their own innate levels of resilience. Then, the system at the heart of The Resilience Factor will teach them to:

• Cast off harsh self-criticisms and negative self-images
• Navigate through the fallout of any kind of crisis
• Cope with grief and anxiety
• Overcome obstacles in relationships, parenting, or on the job
• Achieve greater physical health
• Bolster optimism, take chances, and embrace life

In light of the unprecedented challenges we've recently faced, there's never been a greater need to boost our resilience. Without resorting to feel-good pap or quick-fix clichés, The Resilience Factor is self-help at its best, destined to become a classic in the genre.

Customer Reviews

Exploration of Resilience Using Cognitive Behavior Therapy
****
This book was an exploration, via cognitive behavioral therapy, of resilience, and gives the reader seven skills to master to increase their own resilience. The two authors, who are also resilience researchers, call these skills: emotion regulation, impulse control, empathy, causal analysis, self-efficacy, and reaching out. These seven skills can be measured (and the book includes self-tests), learned (through practicing concepts discussed in the book) and continually improved.

Although this book was enormously helpful to me, it does cover only the aspect of resilience that responds to CBT, and thus is somewhat narrow in scope. It doesn't explore spiritual aspects of resilience, or other approaches, just cognitive behavioral therapy. However, it does this quite well. In addition, the writing style was academic, so I felt as though I was reading a text, and it was a bit of work to get through it rather than fun. Note that in this paperback version the text is small; I struggled especially with the text size in the inset boxes. Still, with those limitations, it covered the topic well and will be very useful to me.

Recommended.
****

Exactly right
All self-help has the same message -- you can only make positive choices in your life if you can figure out what choices you are making without any thought and then changing course by adding understanding. Most processes expect you to figure out why you do what you do by yourself and then layer their method on top to solve your issues. This process has so many different ways to explore your old habits that you can not help but change and make better choices. My only caveat is that you read this book over a long period of time; perhaps one chapter a week to truly process all of the information.I also suggest reading that chapter before bed and letting your subconscious mull over its lessons overniight. Excellent!

Extremely insightful book
Here you will learn (among other things) the ABC method of raising your optimism (closely aligned with resiliency) which has the potential of curing what many people call "depression". This book is so important, that I selected it from among hundreds to use in a teleclass I am teaching to other coaches in the Professional Coaches Association of Michigan about Positive Psychology and Strengths-Based Organizations.

The book discusses the Resilience Factor index, a free online assessment that assesses your resilience along several factors. A very worthwhile book, to study as well as to simply read.