Building resilience through mind-body practices

Resilience is often described as the ability to recover from adversity, but clinically it’s better understood as a dynamic capacity rather than a fixed personality trait.

A resilient person can experience stress, uncertainty or emotional difficulty without necessarily becoming overwhelmed by it. That capacity can change over time and may be influenced by attention, behavior, social circumstances and the way a person responds to internal experiences.

Mind-body practices have attracted increasing interest because they may strengthen some of these capacities. Mindfulness, in particular, encourages a person to notice thoughts, emotions and bodily sensations without immediately reacting to them. This seemingly simple shift can have important implications for stress regulation and psychological wellbeing.