The pandemic, wars, instability, fluctuation, and uncertainties of our time have tried and tested us as a global society. Not to mention the day-to-day stressors that demand our energy and sometimes our sanity.

It’s more important now than ever before to understand how to not get crushed under the weight of our current situation. How to not only “make it through”, but use it to our advantage.

To become anti-fragile.

What does being anti-fragile mean? How does it differ from resilience?

Resilience has been the name of the game lately.

But we can do things even better, right?

Let’s kick it up a notch and become anti-fragile.

Resilience is the ability to bounce back or overcome a hardship, strain or challenge. When something is resilient it is able to face its challenge, recover, and return back to its original state.

Anti-fragile is the ability to become stronger when faced with a challenge. The challenge itself is the catalyst for the growth, strength, or improvement of the anti-fragile subject.

So basically, the challenges and stressors that would break someone who is fragile actually make you stronger and better. They actually help you grow.

What are Stressors?

A stressor is anything that creates a stress response in the body. Whether that be a physical stressor, a psychological stressor.

They can be personal stressors such as a job loss or a relationship change, an illness, or the death of someone close to you. It can also be a macro stressor such as economic turmoil, political unrest, pandemic, or a natural disaster.

According to Dr. Karl Albrecht, a management consultant and conference speaker and a pioneer in the development of stress-reduction training, there are four common types of stress:

• Time stress – Doing things at the wrong time, or running out of time.
• Anticipatory stress – Stress about things that may occur in the future.
• Situational stress – Emergency situations or situations beyond your control.
• Encounter stress – Stress around the dynamic with other people.

Why Become Anti-fragile?

Yeah, I think it’s pretty clear given the times. (It’s 2022 as I write btw), but hey, let’s make it explicit.

It’s safe to say that pretty much all of us won’t have a perfect track record of good fortune, perfect circumstance, and all positive events in our lives. Almost all of us know what it feels like when something “brings us to our knees” or makes us feel “broken” or “unrepairable”.

Some of those challenging experiences may even classify as “traumatic” and make us trepidacious, afraid, and paralyzed to move forward.

You’ve probably heard of PTSD – post-traumatic stress disorder, and you’re probably thinking, “Yeah, I have felt that” or “I definitely have felt that.” But have you heard of PTG – Post-traumatic growth?

Developed by psychologists Richard Tedeschi, Ph.D., and Lawrence Calhoun, Ph.D., in the mid-1990s, post-traumatic growth is a theory that explains that people who endure psychological struggle following adversity can often see positive growth afterward. How’s that for, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”?

No, you’re not broken. You’re here. You’ve made it this far. And you’re about to use all that shit as fuel for your betterment.

Most of us have found a way to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and pick up the pieces as best we can. We have found some inner strength or resilience.

If you’re feeling like you’re constantly getting kicked down, you’re not alone. And it’s exhausting.

And it’s time. Time to design the chaos, challenge, and disorder as the fuel for your growth, your success, and your thriving.

You with me?

Let’s become anti-fragile together 😎✨

Designing for Anti-Fragility

Once you understand what anti-fragile is, it’s important to know how to design for it. The body naturally designs for this in various ways. Muscles grow bigger and stronger due to stress, not without it. Bones become denser and stronger due to stress, and the release of certain helpful hormones occurs due to stress.

In order to become anti-fragile, there are tangible and intangible elements and systems we need to put into place. Keep in mind that when you decide to become anti-fragile there will be a restructuring that happens both in your mind and in your life.

Now, let’s design your life so that you thrive under stress.

Identify Your Fragilities and Priorities

Start with asking yourself, “Where in my life am I fragile?” “Where am I anti-fragile?”

Here’s a simple structure for you as you consider the various areas of your life. It’s an adaptation taken from the SPIRE technique, shared by Tal Ben-Shahar forerunner, pioneer, and advocate for happiness and Founder at Happiness Studies Academy & Potentialife.

I call my version, SPITFIRE.

The SPITFIRE Technique

• S – Spiritual – Relationship with yourself, your higher self, God, source, the universe, etc.
• P- Physical – Related to your body vitality and health.
• I – Intellectual – Releated to your mind and knowledge capacities. IQ.
• T – Traumatic – Traumas that occurred that may be a source of weakness, or strength.
• F – Financial – Stability or preferences in the area of money and finances.
• I – Independent – How well are you able to keep yourself alive without depending on others. This could be people close to you, or private and government services. This is also related to how well you can sustain your mental and emotional stability without the need for others to play a role.
• R – Relational – The health and size of your social structure. Friends, family, and loved ones who are there for you and share time and caring with you.
• E – Emotional – Your emotional wellbeing and EQ.

Identify your level of anti-fragility in each area by rating it a 1-10. 1 being completely fragile and 10 being completely anti-fragile.

Once you’ve rated yourself, begin with the area that you think requires the most attention and design for anti-fragility. Once you’ve improved that area you can move on to another section. Or you can choose to work on complimentary sections.

Here’s how.

Eliminate points of Fragility and Non-Serving Elements

Do your best to start with a clean slate by getting rid of anything that you’ve now found is non-serving, holding you down or creating fragility in your life. Create simplicity and an agile, flexible, mobile approach.

This means releasing non-serving thoughts, traumas, people who do not add value to your life, non-serving beliefs and fears, non-serving habits, and non-serving foods & drinks.

On another 1-10 scale, some of these will be pretty easy, while some of these will be hard as hell. If you want support, reach out to me at, Jacqueline@consciousnessliberty.com.

Add Redundancies

This one makes see cringe because I’m such a fan of efficiency and optimization. Although, when I look at nature, I can see the way redundancy is designed into it. Into our own design as humans. Some of our organs are duplicates, such as two kidneys, two lungs, etc.

What steps can you take here? Add a cushion to your finances, start storing extra food, stock up essential supplies, back up your files, buy a generator, create multiple streams of income, keep your money in various places and give yourself extra time. Basically, have a backup or a surplus of things that are important to you, thus eliminating single points of failure.

Diversify Strategies

Dare I say diversification as much as opposite strategies. For example, when investing, keep part of your portfolio conservative and take bigger risks with the other portion of your investments. Have a steady job, (or part-time job) and a side-hustle (more risk, bigger payoff). One side is conservative while the other is risk-taking. You get the benefits of both because they both have their pros and cons. Add diversity of income, and diversity of skills, create new opportunities and give yourself new options.

“Stop optimizing for today or tomorrow and start playing the long game.”

-Parrish

Allow for Chaos

Don’t expend energy trying to control every detail. Allow some room for chaos, obstacles, and things not going as planned. Design this into your plan so that you can expect it and accommodate it. Resist the urge to suppress randomness. So much energy is wasted trying to control everything into “your idea of what it should be”. Rather expect the chaos and move flexibly with it. As Bruce Lee said, “Be like water, my friend.” And bonus points if you use this chaotic energy, and your saved energy, to propel you.

Insert Stress Under Controlled Situations

Haha, after we talk about releasing control, it’s time to take back some of this control. Opposing strategies anyone?

Introducing stressors allows you to take advantage of the natural anti-fragility designed into your body.

Here are some examples:

• Lift weights – strengthen your muscles
• Do cardio (running, HIIT, etc.) to expand your stamina, heart and lung strength
• Meditate – strengthen your mental control and awareness (taming the monkey mind)
• Face your fears – Strengthen your mind and expand your abilities and capacities while befriending being outside your comfort zone
• Insert discipline & Intentional habits – Strengthen your discipline while making challenging tasks easier over time due to the body’s natural ability to incorporate habits into effortless actions
• Learn new things- learning can be painful for the brain, but it’s obvious why this is good. Besides gathering new useful knowledge, working the mind can strengthen and create new neural connections, keeping the learning centers of the brain active.

Start with Resilience

Before you can move from fragile to anti-fragile, it’s important to understand that unshakable state of resilience. Then you can build from there into anti-fragility. Lean into coping mechanisms such as journaling, exercise, meditation, self-care rituals, routines, cathartic release, and allowing yourself some grace. Learn about philosophies such as stoicism or Buddhism to help you cultivate an unshakable mindset. They are a helpful foundation on the road to anti-fragility.

Respect the Old

There is something to be said about the “tried and true”. Observe what has worked in the past and whether it still works. Take the path of least resistance by following what works.

And yet…

Take Small Risks

Taking small, calculated risks and stepping a little outside your comfort zone helps you grow and expand as a being. Plus with risk comes the payoff. I suggest it as one of your strategies as you diversify strategies.

Find Your Rock

Your rock is usually yourself or your faith. Don’t find your rock on anything you cannot directly control. That’s pretty much everything outside of yourself. (Unless we get metaphysical and the outside world is an extension and reflection of your inner world… ok so, anyway…. we’re carried away…) Just keep it simple for this one, lol.

Know yourself and what you value. Be very aware of where you put your self-esteem. By that I mean, don’t place it on others’ opinions of you (no not your parents, not your significant other), don’t place it on your performance, or compare yourself to others. I suggest placing your self-esteem on the simple fact that your existence is a miracle of beauty and epicness. The quickest way to recognize your inherent beauty and worth is to love yourself. Want some help with that? Check out my free 7-day course here, that helps you make a life-changing difference in your self-love.

If you have meaning or purpose (created by spiritual growth), you are more likely to overcome stressors. But what if you’re not “spiritual”? No problem, your “spirituality” is your relationship with yourself. With your own spirit and deep inner knowing.

Build Meaningful Relationships

Having a strong network of dependable, loving, good people around you creates an extra layer of support. It’s nice to know you are not alone.

And if you don’t have many close relationships, or even if you do, it’s important to start with building a meaningful relationship with yourself. Your own inner guidance and wisdom. Even if you’re alone, you’re not. Make sense?*

*(You can lean on your higher self, deep wisdom, or inner knowing).

Watch Your Mindset & Attitude

“Your mindset is how you see the world around you. And your attitude is how you interact with the world according to how you see things.”

– https://tailoringthegoodlife.com/how-to-change-your-mindset-and-attitude/

What kind of mindset do you approach chaos and disorder from? “Oh shoot, why is this happening?” “Oh poor me,” or “Bring it on!” “Let’s see what I can do.” “I can learn from this” “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.”

It is natural in pretty much everyone’s psychology to drop into the “victim mindset” when faced with an unwanted challenge.

Notice it. Honor it. Grow from it.

Speaking of which…

Reframe Your Stressors and Learn from Them

Failure, being wrong, missed deadlines, projects falling flat, losing a lot of money, not having the skills, not knowing the answer. It’s time to reframe these painful experiences not as a reflection of something you are lacking, but rather as an indicator of something to aim for. As an opportunity that shows you where you can get better. In Carol Dweck’s book, Mindset, she makes a distinction between the growth and fixed mindset. Use the one that works for you.

• The fixed mindset believes that you were born with natural skills and smarts. And what you got is just who you are. And you need to accept that. Super non-serving for challenges.

• The growth mindset believes that you have the capacity to acquire and learn the skills to achieve the goals that you would like to achieve.

Now that you know how to become anti-fragile. Take it a step at a time, to the extent that you design and what works best for you.

If you want some inspiration, check out David Goggins’ story. He’s one of the best examples of an anti-fragile man. He used the hardships and traumas he faced as a child, to become better. He then went through military and seal training to endure hardships and stressors that strengthened his mind, his body and his character. Hats off!

Resources:

• https://thisnakedmind.com/how-to-embrace-an-antifragile-mindset/
• https://fs.blog/an-antifragile-way-of-life/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B_Oz_PHShY&ab_channel=JoePolish
• https://www.artofmanliness.com/character/advice/beyond-sissy-resilience-on-becoming-antifragile/
• https://kadavy.medium.com/9-ways-to-build-an-antifragile-life-904a1e9b4294
• https://www.inc.com/dheeraj-pandey/what-it-means-to-have-an-antifragile-mindset.html
• https://www.creativehuddle.co.uk/post/how-to-become-antifragile
• https://www.screwtheninetofive.com/differences-between-growth-and-fixed-mindset/
  https://www.mindsethealth.com/matter/growth-vs-fixed-mindset
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4MhC5tcEv0&ab_channel=RSA
• https://tailoringthegoodlife.com/how-to-change-your-mindset-and-attitude/
• https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/albrecht-stress.htm
• https://www.apa.org/monitor/2016/11/growth-trauma