Resilience Essays

Resilience refers to an individual’s remarkable ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change, as mental health refers to an individual’s condition with regard to their psychological and emotional well-being. Encountering stresses, building resilience, and avoiding mental illness amid the COVID-19 pandemic has become a central topic in today’s society. Some citizens believe that resilience is a significant attribute that can be developed through different skills and attitudes, while others do not. The public may often hear the saying that resilience can help protect people from various mental health conditions, such as depression and anxiety. Moreover, resilience can also help offset factors that increase the risk of mental health conditions, such as being bullied or previous trauma. Therefore, if someone has an existing mental health condition, being resilient can improve their coping ability. There are three articles that describe resilience and mental health from different angles. Wu et al. (2020) describe the status quo and the relationship between them in Chinese college students. However, Robinson (2020) explains why resilience has a powerful impact on mental health among the American people. Besides, Apfelberg (2021) states the ways to develop resilience while encountering COVID-19. This paper will synthesize the concepts and ideas of these three articles by presenting their themes while providing a critical response.

Researchers’ studies provide preliminary evidence of a mutually reducing relationship between resilience and mental ill-being (Wu et al., 2020). According to Wu et al. (2020), “The present study is the first study to examine the bidirectional relationship between resilience and mental health status in three phases over 4 years using cross-lagged panel analysis in a college student sample,” which means that this study is innovative in several ways. Firstly, previous studies only verified that resilience could predict mental health status. Secondly, this study verifies the significant influence of mental health levels on resilience. Thirdly, this study includes both mental ill-being and positive indicators of mental health, which is based on the double-factor model of mental health. Wu et al. (2020) further reveal “a significant reciprocal relationship between resilience and mental health status,” which indicates that there is a mutually enhancing relationship between resilience and positive mental health in the short term of 1 year. In addition, Wu et al. (2020) examine “the significant influence of mental health level on resilience in the long term of 2 years,” which shows that mental health can be used to predict resilience levels. In terms of positive mental health, Wu et al. (2020) find “freshmen have a relatively lower level of positive mental health”. For instance, as college students grow older, they appear to meet the challenges of their studies and life more confidently and steadfastly than before. By examining a sample of 314 college students in China in three phases over four years, Wu et al. (2020) gain “insight into the reciprocal relationship of higher levels of resilience predicting lower levels of mental ill-being, and higher levels of positive mental health, and vice versa”.

Scholars’ passages also assert the key to unlocking resilience and the need for mental health in 2021 (Robinson, 2020). After the explanation of the word “resilience” with the tremendous power it carries, Robinson (2020) proposes “Given the challenges of 2020, it is not hard to see the urgent need this year for resilience”. First of all, everyone needs resilience to move beyond the mental health challenges the pandemic brought. Secondly, many words reflect the limits of human compassion, whereas, resilience has the ring of hope, optimism, and rebirth. Thirdly, resilience holds more openness to future growth and possibilities than other closed-ended words. Robinson (2020) suggests that people need hope and optimism for their mental health and proposes that the more people strengthen their resilience, the more they can bounce forward into a better year. According to Robinson (2020), “The power to build resilience is within us; just as we can learn other skills through practice, we can teach ourselves to be more resilient,” which implicitly expresses that the long-term impact on both our individual and collective lives as a society is not predetermined or fixed. For example, some people are born with pit-bull determination, less affected by stressful situations, and more resilient to change; others are more vulnerable to the arrows of everyday pressures. “But regardless of where you fall, it is possible to cultivate resilience,” Robinson (2020) addresses this sentence as an encouragement to the American people. By clarifying a fork in the road as a moment of choice, Robinson (2020) declares “It brings us hope and faith that we always have the power to choose, regardless of how dire the circumstances”.

Researchers’ writings indicate the proposal to avoid implicit bias when facing resilience and positive mental health (Apfelberg, 2021). After the clarification of the phrase “implicit bias” with the rational relations between resilience and mental health, Apfelberg (2021) introduces “my final set of unrelated, yet interconnected, thoughts: Resilience, the Safety Net, and COVID Vaccination”. Therefore, it is necessary for each of us to think seriously about how implicit bias affects our actions and decision-making. According to Apfelberg (2021), “It is important that we allow resilience to form rationale when making decisions, but it is also important that we are aware that our preconceived notions, however deeply buried, can also change the way we view and interact with each other and the world,” which describes that resilience is also important in making decisions. In addition, Apfelberg (2021) notes “resilience will developed when people live united to encounter COVID-19”. For instance, resilience can be developed over the life course through simple self-initiated activities, which often involve discipline, willpower, and hard work; but the results will be generous, such as greater autonomy, mastery, and confidence. “It makes it much easier for us to make sure that we are all moving together in a positive direction, because great things happen when we live united,” Apfelberg (2021) applies this sentence as a suggestion for all Americans. By introducing several words and phrases as a guide to developing resilience, Apfelberg (2021) examines the interconnection between resilience and mental health.

After reading these three articles and writing about them, my general understanding of resilience and mental health has evolved. Firstly, I thought that there is only a few relations between resilience and mental health before. Now I realized that there is a bidirectional relationship and reciprocal interconnection between them. For example, there is a mutually enhancing relationship between resilience and positive mental health in the short term of 1 year. Secondly, I thought that there is no way to develop resilience in order to improve mental health before. Now I understood that there are several ways to cultivate resilience and enhance mental health. For instance, hope, optimism, and faith are needed for mental health and resilience building. However, I always believe that resilience and mental health are important, which is the only thing that coincides with my previous beliefs about resilience and mental health. Besides, I am surprised by the fact that resilience and mental health are consistently critical and sophisticated throughout the COVID-19 period. After synthesizing these three articles, my knowledge about resilience and mental health not only just expanded, but I can confidently say that I can sit and talk in a room with professionals, such as Wu and Robinson, about the relationship between resilience and mental health with the methods to establish and develop them. Lastly, I have a question the scholars that whether resilience should count as a talent that someone can bear with it.

Overall, it is essential for me to get to know resilience and mental health because I have experienced them in high school and I may face them in college in the future. Moreover, resilience is always demanded not only during this COVID-19 period but also for the time of future global events. In addition, resilience and mental health appear everywhere and every day, so it is critical because it gives me the chance to recognize them and develop them. Also, this topic is relatively new, as a significant topic needs to be discussed, which means that it has many unknown answers that need further investigation. For example, future intervention research is warranted further to verify the reciprocal relationship between resilience and mental health. Finally, in my opinion, experts could try to conduct more research on sociology and psychology to make a better view of the relationship between resilience and mental health with the methods to solve the problems.