Welcome to 2022! My hope is that you have had a refreshing break over the summer period. My year started brilliantly with a 3-week family holiday in Tasmania – food, art, mountains, beaches… Wonderful…

Closely followed by the whole family getting COVID (despite all being double vaxxed) and all that entails – less wonderful.

Then in late January in the space of an afternoon, my healthy and gorgeous horse had stomach complications and had to be put down. (No flavour of wonderful at all!) Spirit’s death hit me hard – he was a beautiful horse and a fun and loyal friend.

We had hoped that 2022 would be easier. In many ways it is. And yet 2022 has already demonstrated that it will be another year in which we live with the uncertainty and reduced choice of COVID.

Like so many of you, as we continue to live with the wide reaching personal, professional and community implications of Coronavirus, I have been actively managing my state. I have been drawing on stores of resilience and creating every opportunity to replenish those stores.

Our role as leaders is to set the tone. Yes, our people want to see we are human – it’s not all roses… And the more positive and resilient we are, the more we enable others to be the same.

Here are seven strategies that help me maintain resilience.

1. 1. Manage inputs. Food, beverage, sleep, exercise, news feeds, ideas. What we take in influences our state.
   2. People. Hang out with inspiring people. I had a day last week with Thought Leaders Business School – what an energetic boost to be in a virtual room with 150+ other inspired and inspiring humans doing great work.
   3. Learn something. Since moving to the country two years ago, I have loved the physical and mental challenge of horse-riding lessons. I am always learning new things in relation to human behaviour.
   4. Do something for others. Help a colleague, friend or community member. Or perhaps a random act of kindness for someone you don’t know.
   5. Laugh. Needs no explanation. My favourite person to laugh with is my sister Fleur.
   6. Nature. Being outdoors always brings me peace and calm. Paddocks, bush, beach… Fresh air and space heals my soul.
   7. Gratitude. In the short term, expressing gratitude releases dopamine and serotonin, the neurotransmitters that make us feel good. In the longer term, consciously acknowledging what we are grateful for signals to the brain what’s important. The more consciously grateful we are, the more we will find to be grateful for.

   What are your go to strategies for maintaining resilience? How can you apply individual strategies to building team resilience?

2. Go fearlessly