40: Lessons in Resilience. From Personal Struggles to Public Success with Jodi Samuels

I think you will too and find Notes on Resilience on Apple podcasts and , if you like the show , please subscribe and leave a review . We'd really appreciate it . Thanks , hi , jodi . I'm so excited to be talking to you today . Thanks for being here . Thank you for inviting me .

So , before we get started on who you are and why we're talking , I'm curious if you could have a superpower , what would that be ?

My superpower is I have an amazing ability to take on an incredible amount of stress and , no matter what comes with me , I stay perfectly calm and I'm totally able to be able to say that's in box A and I don't have to worry about box A until I'm finished with box B , and box B needs my attention right now .

So my superpower is just being able to know that there's a lot going on and compartmentalize , and that's how you don't sweat , because some of the things you're worrying about are not things that you can deal with anyway right in the moment , so they just cause you anxiety or distract you or unfocus you .

So in order to be able to not sweat the small stuff , you have to compartmentalize .

I also am an entrepreneur , a mom , and I run an upper profit , and I'm one of these people who bites up more than I can chew every hour of every day . I'm the person who gets out of bed in the morning because I really believe that I can make a difference in this world . I can't change the whole world , but I can change my corner of the world .

I can make an impact in my world and I'm highly driven and excited to do that every day . But I do do probably more things than I should . In one word , so called Pittsburgh , wisdom and wine , the journey of an unstoppable mom .

And I have also a very popular blog that I write around it and I share my life , jody's life , unfiltered , basically , and I talk about the real challenges of being Jody , but that's the real challenges of being any of us , and we all have these real challenges and sometimes we live in a world of social media and that where we put filters on and everything

looks picture perfect . But life isn't picture perfect and the message of my book and the message that I'm out there is to tell people how they can be unstoppable Regardless of life's challenges .

It's that ability to bend . I think of something like a tree has inbuilt for resilience it can sway in the wind , it can move with the forces . Sometimes forces do knock it out , or sometimes it's old and it gets uprooted .

But I'm saying resilience is that ability to go with whatever the environment is pressuring , challenging , influencing or moving in your direction . That's what I think of resilience . Now the question is how do you implement resilience ? It's a very different question .

When people are in action , they feel they are taking control . You may not change anything . Writing a list or doing certain an internet or reaching out to another parent with the same challenge or speaking to a doctor doesn't mean you solve the problem . What you feel you're doing is you are taking control of the issue at some level .

So sometimes it's that action word . You know , like Nike , just do it . Yeah , you just have to do something to start building your resilience , because you can lie in bed , you can stare at a wall , you can drink a bottle of wine , but that's not going to build your resilience . You start building resilience through action .

The second thing is when you sometimes take on the role of leading others . Sometimes you are not necessarily an expert in something . You just a few steps ahead of someone else in a situation . You know you haven't yet proven that you've overcome breast cancer , but you so far have gotten through treatment and everything .

You can be a support , a help to someone else , and when you are giving to someone else and you're sharing , that helps you to build resilience . I think a third part of resilience for me is gratitude and attitude of gratitude . Because we so often spend so much of our time why me ? And that attitude of gratitude is about how versus why .

If you understand , like , why me ? Like , nobody probably can answer that and we have to change why to how . What am I going to do ? So when you switch that one to how , like why , why did I have a special needs child ? Why is this person injured in a car accident ?

Well , we can't really answer that , but that's not going to build your resilience , even if you could . How am I going to deal with that ? And having gratitude not just ? You know there's two levels of gratitude . You could have one letter and say , wow , thank God , I only lost one leg . I could have lost two .

But there's another level of gratitude and just looking around you and seeing that you do have blessings in general , so often , and especially in today's world , and I think it's part of the challenge why we have so much teen crisis and suicides and so much going on and anxiety and depression in our world is that everybody is comparing themselves to someone else .

Social media has made that real time and true gratitude is that ability to say thank you for what I have , not what I don't have . What my neighbor has and you didn't give me . That is great and that helps to build resilience . And you know like I think a lot of us grew up with people saying , well , smile , and the whole world smiles with you .

But actually psychologically there is something about that . You know when you go out there and you put one foot forward , you put a smile on your face immediately . You change your whole persona . You know they're feeling like you can get up in the morning and I've spoken to so many people who now work from home and work on Zoom .

The beginning , when we all went on Zoom , we like put makeup on and did out here , and now people like come in their sweatpants with the you know , their hair up and unwashed and greasy . But there's that same feeling like when you're wearing your pajamas at home and you're sitting and then you get dressed up .

You feel different when you put on a smile , when you put that one foot forward and I think resilience starts with a smile and then just putting in that effort to change how you feel Doesn't mean the situation changed , but you have to put in some effort and again all of resilience comes back to you because only you can make these choices .

Right , right oh thank you .

starts with you and only you , and we do have personal responsibility to take care of ourselves and kind of take some of those steps to build our resiliency and run our own lives .

But I also do think that our systems and our institutions have a role in building our resiliency and helping people heal as well , and I guess is that something you agree with and if so , what do you think is the role of our systems and institutions ?

Oh , you're having like a difficult time . Each grade has a counsellor , the school has a psychologist , the parents have resources to go to and , as a result , there's a lot of options to be given help to help people build resilience . But I feel that what starts happening is people land up outsourcing resilience to everyone else except for themselves .

And I'll give you an example . So we get called into the school and they want to both me and my husband to come in and it's a school that's a very open , fan alternative type of school .

And we arrive and there's like everyone sitting around the table and the speech , like the only place that was closed was like the principal's office with like a glass window , those huge glass , but like corner office , but other than that , the rest of the school's an open plan so anyone can see you sitting there and we're sitting around the table and they're like

Dr and Mrs Samuels , your daughter is really struggling with math . So at the time she was like 10 years old , okay , and we're like okay , and they're like we see she gets really upset and really frustrated and really stressed when she has to deal with math and we're like uh-huh , we're like uh-huh .

So we grew up in like South Africa and we went to like British styles state school systems with like 35 kids in a class and no one cared and you just did , and if you didn't , you got some form of punishment the opposite of resilience and helping you . You got punished for everything and like somehow we just got through and we all came out fine .

So I guess our like instincts , going back to our like what we grew up with , so we're like okay . So she finds math hard . So they go . We've really had to speak to the guidance counselor and we really feel that she needs to like unpack her emotions and my husband like leans forward and he goes listen , she has to do math . It's an essential subject .

Math is hard . She'll figure it out . She might cry , it might be difficult , but you'll figure it out . Like it's not the end of the world .

It's a good thing for her to have some stress in life and , like everybody , leaned forward in this meeting and , like you , just felt like the room closed in on you , even though it's just like big , open plan , and they were like doctor and Mrs Daniels , we really think your daughter needs to go for some counseling to unpack her emotions .

Anyway , needless to say , we landed up moving to Israel because right at the end of the school , yeah , and we moved to Israel and then you go to Israel .

My kids went from this like private school system to small classes and lots of resources to a public school system with like 35 kids , new culture , new language , one teacher in a class , absolute big , disruptive mess basically . And math was still hard .

But you know what , when no one said to my daughter like , how can we help you in this and this , she got on with it Like , and she did what . She struggled the whole way through , but she finished last year her matriculation . She did very well . She killed herself , she cried a lot , but she did it .

And I use that as an example because at the end of the day , we do have inner resilience in us and sometimes we not everything is given to us so much in a platter and so many resources to help us that we actually never discover inner resilience .

And I think that's part of what I think is like now , having lived in two societies one society which is all about resilience and the other society which is not , which is about helping people and outsourcing it .

So , yes , in crisis situations , absolutely , institutions do play a role and there are people who've fallen up clear for have real psychiatric issues or mental health issues or whatever the case is , and they need professionals to help them to rebuild their resilience .

I think where the challenge comes in is we live in a society in many , many modern , certainly higher socioeconomic societies , and I'm not saying you have to be higher socioeconomic , I think by virtue of living in America and living in Europe , and that first world countries these days are very high socioeconomic . We don't know what it means to be challenged .

We don't know what it means to be stressed . We don't know what it means to think and I'm not saying someone who's lower socioeconomic has more stress , less stress . I'm not making that comparison .

I'm just saying that we live in a society where , for the most part , we can open a fridge and find food , we can go to an organization that will help us with food if we can't . People aren't walking around hungry and when you haven't had challenges , you don't know how to have resilience .

And I think a lot of what's happened in society at least in my opinion and it's not everybody agrees with me . I am willing to debate them .

Yeah , I know they don't agree with me , but I feel like we've created a society where we outsource our problems to the therapist , to the counselor , to the math tutor it doesn't matter who it is Instead of using our own resources to solve problems and to grow from that .

And resilience is a muscle and when you use any muscle that's used repeatedly , get stronger and we don't use our resilience muscle enough and , at the end of the day , life needs resilience because they just say they have a saying in Israel and they say life is not a picnic , and that is correct . Life is just not a picnic .

It doesn't matter what , it doesn't matter who you are . Everyone has their challenges and you need that resilience muscle .

I mean , I know , when you talked about trauma in particular , that's a different kind of situation , but I think , walking through life , we don't always think about whether or not we are resilient , and I guess I'm wondering how that thought fits into your model of resilience .

I mean , it would be fantastic if schools actually educated kids how to be resilient and teach them the basic tools of resilience , rather than teaching them that any problems in life can be outsourced . That's number one .

But I think when you're an adult and you were someone listening to this podcast or you were someone thinking , how can I build my resilience , I think some of the basic steps are before I outsource my challenges , before I go for help , have I looked within my own toolbox ? Have I pushed myself out of my own comfort zone ?

I think resilience is leaving your comfort zone and I think the first thing you have to ask yourself is have I left my own comfort zone ? I guess you're in an uncomfortable position .

I agree You're not feeling good , you're feeling stressed , you're having financial challenges , your kids are driving you crazy , but how people actually stopped and looked at their own challenge like their own toolbox . And then are they like willing to go a little bit uncomfortable .

And sometimes sometimes we have to go , like , if you can either garden by hiring a gardening service or you can put on gloves and you can get down there , or you might not even have gloves and you dig with your bare hands and you have to wash your nails out afterwards .

But at the end of the day , I think the first thing people have to say is can I push myself a little bit more to take on this challenge ? And then there's some very practical tools like the ones I spoke about . Like before you start , recognize that as bad as this is , you do have blessings in your life .

So one of the reasons the title of my book is called A Hootspah , wisdom and Wine . I really believe that Hootspah is an excellent resilience tool and I'm happy to talk about wine .

bold or gracious out there . So , like a lot of people think of , is really is this Hootspah Like ? If you know Israeli culture , they like very Hootspah-based . They , you know , not scared to take on anything . So one some of the things about Hootspah to me , hootspah is not being afraid of the word . No .

We live in a society that we are so scared of someone . So what ? So they said no , you could ask , and they could say no , okay . Hootspah is just never being afraid of the word no . Hootspah is about understanding that rules are suggestions and they starting points of a negotiation .

That doesn't mean you're an anarchist and you're going to burn the house down , right . But if something doesn't make sense or you put in a box or you told X about your kid or Y about your health treatment , that you have to just accept it , okay . No , it doesn't mean no , you can challenge that , okay .

I think that Hootspah is about understanding that it's the journey and not the destination . And we live in a world that we so busy focused on like I need to live in the size house , I need this job , I need my kitchen read done , I need , I want , I have to have that we forget about the journey . Okay , so Hootspah is about appreciating the journey .

Hootspah is about when we go . Then everybody always says , oh , you should reach for the stars . Hootspah is about why should I reach for the stars ? Why ? Why the stars should be the starting point , why only reach for the stars ? Yeah , hootspah is about people say , well , think outside of the box . Well , why does there have to be a box in the first place ?

Mm-hmm , okay , why do you need a box ? And I think some of the things about Hootspah to me is about truly and I think this is so fundamental truly believing that tomorrow will be better .

And when people have resilience , they're able to understand that right now there's difficulties , but I can make a change in this , yeah , and I think all those I say like you need to have the Hootspah , you need to have Hootspah in your toolbox to be able to , because when you feel empowered , it's that same thing that I say you have to go out , you have to

do things , you have to be the first one . Sometimes we get into a rut and we think that every barrier , box , no rule , everything is constraining us . But maybe if you had a little bit of Hootspah , you would see the world with a different set of lenses .

So for me , my wisdom is Jewish Torah wisdom . But everybody needs to know what their wisdom is . We have a proverb in Judaism that says you should find yourself a rabbi and a friend . So the word rabbi translates into a teacher . Okay and a friend . So you need someone who can guide you through Situations .

It doesn't necessarily mean they have to be a Psychiatrist or psychologist , but it needs to be someone who truly shares your view of the world's wisdom and Can be your friend .

Not of you know , and sometimes people mistaken friends for someone who might be like you know , I deal with a lot of singles so they think , like a friend is , oh , my friend , and she says , well , the guy isn't , the guy isn't cute , so therefore he isn't cute , because your friends that he isn't cute , no , that a friend .

And that's why it says a rabbi and a friend , a teacher , someone who's imbued with their own wisdom Before they become your friend .

Like you can have your other friends , but you need someone who's in view with wisdom , and I think that we saw over COVID , the elections around the world , whether they like left or right everything's so polarized and Vaccinations , and it doesn't matter what . The issue is Everything .

If you don't know what your wisdom is , you can get just so caught up in every little conversation in the world what's right , wrong , who am I ? What do I do ? I really believe we all need to have some guide of our wisdom that's guiding us , because the world is a complicated place .

Yes , and then I would say my last tool in the building resilience is wine .

But also , we all spend so much of our lives being in our role . We're like mom , we breadwinner , we student , we employee , we boss , we Over COVID . We were all these , like you know . We were like housekeeper and Psychologist and food maker and homework do and zoom connector , but we always in a role , like we always always in a role .

And wine represents that ability to stop and get out of being in that role . Sometimes you are not the podcast host and you're not the entrepreneur Like who are you ? And I think third part about wine is and I think so many people make this mistake in life is , yes , we should work hard , but you also need to play hard . That's true balance in life .

And when you you know , when they say I'm an error fan , they say , like in the case of an Emergency , parents should put their mask on themselves first before they put in their child , because it doesn't help if mommy hasn't got a mask and she's out of oxygen and she's unconscious , she's not going to be able to help her play .

It's the same thing with you taking time out and having a balance . So the new wine is an allergy for balancing and taking that time out and giving yourself that self-care , the enjoyment in life pleasures , so that you can work hard in whatever that role that you're playing in life is .

Yeah , and when you have all those three things , you have a very much more powerful two kids . They manage being a resilient human being and therefore , when you're resilient , you can be unstoppable . Wow .

Not because there's a lot of things that can go wrong , but you know , when I look at the world and you can say , like I remember a politician tweeted out and she's like this is ostensibly the worst time to ever be an American , and she got thousands of that , like I think it was like 200,000 likes on her post and everything , and I'm like , really , is it

really the worst time ? Like I'm not saying things are all perfect and hanky dory , but there was like food stamps , food insecurity , great recession , wars . I mean I can think of a lot of times in American life when things were a little bit tougher than they are now , for all the challenges .

It doesn't mean we don't have challenges , right , and if you have a mindset , we understand that tomorrow will be better , then you have that ability to have perspective and look at the big picture and appreciate that in fact , yes , things aren't as bad as what the headlines make them seem .

I've got to be able to have this big picture and look with a bird's eye view and look at something in context , and I think what gives me hope is knowing that actually just because the headlines say or social media says it looks bad , that tomorrow can be better .

Aren't the things that , ultimately , are really the things that happen or that really challenge us or that really hold us back ? And you spend so much energy Like worrying is like putting your car in park , putting your foot on the accelerator and just spinning the wheels . Yes , and that's what worry is .

And I would just say take all that energy , take your car out of park , put it in drive , put your foot on the accelerator and move forward .

Yes , I'm waiting for that moment , but I don't believe I would have . I mean , I don't believe I would have heard that wisdom then and I do speak to a lot of , like graduating high school kids and I don't believe that those 18-year-olds they hear the wisdom but they don't appreciate it .

But I really want people to believe that each one of us has the power to make a difference in the world in our own way , and you can also find my book on Amazon as an e-book , as a print book . It's called Hootspur , wisdom and Wine the Journey of an Unstoppable Woman .

I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I did . So if you'd like to learn more about me , Manja Chilinski , I work with organizations to help understand how to create environments where people can thrive after difficult life experiences , and I do this through talks and consulting .

I'm a survivor of mass violence and I use my experience to help leaders learn about resiliency , compassion and trauma-sensitive leadership to build strategies to enable teams to thrive and be engaged amidst difficulty and turmoil .

If this is something you want to learn more about , visit my website , wwwmanjachilinskicom , or email me at manja at Manja Chilinski , or stop by my social media on LinkedIn and Twitter . Thanks so much .