Only the fragile think they no longer need to train their resilience. The rest of us know it is always ongoing — we need to keep reassembling it.
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The first page of my free book.
Both of these are true at once.
A community holds together as a whole when it organises around functions most members can carry out, want to, and benefit from.
The further we drift from the majority, the harder it is for us to function within that community. The more it accommodates difference, the less those who differ will suffer — but if the norm shifts so far that it no longer works for most people, the community fragments.
The whole can damage the individual, and the individual can fragment the whole. Holding this complex, ever-changing relationship means continually reassembling our resilience.
My book is free and can be read online.
When someone has stopped rebuilding their resilience, they tend to assume they already know enough. Under pressure, they rush and force familiar functions, without noticing what is happening around them. Every small failure becomes a major crisis, or the fault of others. The deeper need is not simply more functional training for other people, but continued training in relational awareness — so we can keep reshaping the connections between fragments into a whole, and keep rebuilding our resilience.
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Relational awareness applies beautifully across several disciplines:
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In Systems Thinking & Engineering: It’s the difference between making a single component indestructible versus building a self-healing network. Resilience comes from the connections, not the individual pieces.
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In Psychology & Relationships: When a person or a team focuses solely on "performing their function," a mistake feels like a total failure. Relational awareness allows room for grace, empathy, and collective recovery.
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In Personal Well-being: If we view ourselves merely as a collection of functions (productivity, health, intellect), a dip in one area feels like an existential crisis. Recognizing our holistic, relational nature keeps us grounded even when one "function" is struggling.
We keep rebuilding our resilience.
Relational awareness isn't taught — it's felt.
Basketball for Older adults and adult beginners. Mixed. (7)Wed 11 NovLoreto College, St Albans- Basketball. All-ability adults. Mixed. (9)Sun 15 NovWatford
Late paymentThu 31 DecAL3 5LH
Swimming. All-ability adults. Mixed.Date and time is TBDLocation is TBD
Hello, I hope you are well.
In the 1990s, while working as a business analyst, I explored how we could collaborate online by separating functional connectivity from face-to-face interaction. Later, I focused on training the relational aspects of face-to-face interaction for people who could connect only functionally. To bring greater attention to relational awareness, I wrote this book and created LifeSkills21.club.
My free book "Why Everything Feels Like an Existential Crisis" can be read @ https://jonthorne.my.canva.site/
You can learn more about me by watching this video.
Always happy to chat
St Albans, UK
SkillsofWow.org is the governing body for those who coach the skills of Wow.