5 Psychological Strengths In Times Of Crisis

The Roman poet Horace used to say that adversity has a curious effect. Talents that we were completely unaware of can emerge in us; psychological strengths that act as balm and catapult at the same time; skills that allow us to face difficulties a little better, appease fears, reduce the tangle of anxiety that entangles and paralyzes everything …

However, why not say it: I wish we did not have to make use of these sleeping “gifts”. I wish difficult times would never knock on our door or ours. We would love to be able to lead a life in which we are immune to suffering, where fate and its last-minute setbacks will not paralyze our world without permission or notice. And yet it happens.

As the cognitive psychologist Albert Ellis pointed out, one of the main psychological enemies that people have is our need for life to always treat us well, for the future of our existence to be always easy, harmless, and rewarding.

We don’t tolerate adversity too well. However … how to do it? Nobody has prepared us for it and most of the time we enjoy a placid day to day where everything is under control.

We have the full right to such a happy, safe and satisfied life where we do not know what difficult times are. However, in case these appear, we have an obligation to act. These would be some mechanisms.

Psychological strengths to face adversity

One of the first contemporaries to look at psychological strengths was Martin Seligman. It was in 2004. The father of positive psychology focused this analysis on happiness because he wanted to understand what approaches happy people apply to achieve that state of satisfaction and fulfillment.

Over the years, and despite the fact that the study of happiness continues to be a hot topic, the field of psychology is more interested in another aspect. We talk about resilience and that ability to handle and face adversity.

Thus, studies such as those carried out at the University of Jaén, Spain, want to understand what psychological strengths those older people who have left behind a life of adversity and complex events have applied.

According to its authors, doctors Elena Ramírez and Ana Ortega, these strategies and skills often act as protection mechanisms against many of these disorders associated with advanced age. Let’s see what dimensions we are talking about.

1. Acceptance

Sometimes when it comes to dealing with a tough and complex situation, willpower doesn’t do much good. What’s more, most of the time we are not forced to fight, but to stand still, to accept reality.

Although it may surprise us, this is one of the most valuable psychological strengths, knowing how to see things as they are, assuming them and not doing anything else.

No resistance, no negatives.

2. Self-control

The term self-control can be ambiguous and needs clarification. When we talk about psychological strengths, for example, it is common to assume that the word “force” is associated with ideas like strength, endurance capacity, courage, etc .

Self-control can be confused with the ability to control oneself and even to suppress emotions. Nothing is further from reality.

Self-control is regulation, it is being able to modulate our reactions. This implies being able to understand and accept our emotions, but without encapsulating or denying them. It also means not giving power to irrational thoughts, those that make us fall into panic behaviors that help us so little. It is, in short, to ensure that our mind, emotions and behaviors go in favor of our interests.

3. Meaning and purpose

There is something that should be clear, adversity by itself will never make sense. There is nothing as illogical, hollow and cold as a loss.

However, there is an aspect that we must understand and that acts as one of the best psychological strengths: in the midst of the most complex difficulty, let us never stop keeping in mind our meaning of life, our purposes.

As Viktor Frankl, the father of logotherapy and survivor of the Nazi holocaust, told us: there is nothing in the world that enables a person to overcome external difficulties and internal limitations as much as the awareness of having a task in life . Remembering the meaning that life has for us will serve as a mooring.

4. Curiosity as open-mindedness

Sometimes we neglect the exceptional ingredients that go into one of our best psychological strengths: curiosity. In it is the openness to understand and accept what is happening around us.

There is also the ability to accept uncertainty, to understand that not everything that happens is under our control.

The unforeseen is part of the change and the change of life. In this context, we can always react in an original way, making use of helpful and catharsis strategies.

5. Psychological strengths: knowing how to give and receive help

Asking for help is a challenge for the brave… when acknowledging a weakness often makes us stronger. Because strong is not the one who endures the longest without raising his hand, the one who prefers harm to question his autonomy or leadership. In reality, knowing how to fall is an act of courage and necessity. Allow us to ask for help when it is something valuable and necessary.

On the other hand, and no less important, is the art of offering good help, of which it is not only words and good intentions. The most valuable help is the one that acts, the one that knows how to be present without overpowering or judging.

To conclude, as Charles Dickens said, sometimes things happen that break our hearts, making us believe that we are going to die of pain. And yet we get over it. The resistance of the human being is a mystery, in the end we get up and almost without knowing how we can walk and breathe again …