What is Resilience?
According to the American Psychological Association (APA), "Resilience is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or significant sources of stress — such as family and relationship problems, serious health problems, or workplace and financial stressors. It means 'bouncing back' from difficult experiences.
Being resilient does not mean that a person hasn't experienced difficulty or distress. Emotional pain and sadness are common in people who have suffered major adversity or trauma in their lives. In fact, the road to resilience is likely to involve considerable emotional distress.
Resilience is not a trait that people either have or do not have. It involves behaviors, thoughts and actions that can be learned and developed in anyone."
The Resilience Project is a collaborative project between the Berkeley International Office and Second Impressions at Berkeley, aiming to showcase the UC Berkeley international community's narratives about setbacks or challenges, and how these obstacles were overcome.
The project aims to foster opportunities for discussion regarding the ideas of success and failure, and to prompt a greater understanding of the struggles that a international student faces at Berkeley. We hope that these stories will help empower our international community and give support to those who are facing their own struggles.
This project is inspired by the Stanford Resilience Project.
Special thanks to our volunteers, Seth Lu and Erica Ouyang, for the project logos.