Once I acquired an e mail from the Life Administration Science Labs, a part of the KPI Institute, primarily based in Melbourne asking me to hitch their podcast to speak about life as a wheelchair person, it appeared like an excellent alternative to speak about the advantages of wheelchair expertise.
Their authentic concept was a bit completely different from mine. They wished to speak about what the bodily arrange of residence life seems to be like for a wheelchair person and the way this may be made extra accessible. Don’t get me improper, accessibility is absolutely necessary and never sufficient is being accomplished for my part to make sure that folks can totally get pleasure from and utilise the areas they occupy.
Though it’s necessary to speak about accessibility (see my earlier weblog on accessible housing right here), I wouldn’t say that’s my most important space of experience or curiosity. I prompt that we discuss wheelchair expertise and the way it may match with one other one in every of their themes of private resilience. I’ll say that they have been very accommodating of the options I made about the way to discuss wheelchair expertise and the specifics to concentrate on.
So the subsequent factor to rearrange was a time to talk. As they’re primarily based in Melbourne we have been a ten hour time distinction so squeezing a two hour recording window into their working day was going to be tough. A little bit of flexibility with them staying after 5pm their time and me being able to go at 7am my time made it work.
Logistics have been all sorted and questions have been agreed on. However then I needed to begin fascinated about the resilience that I get from wheelchair expertise. I do know it’s there. I do know that the abilities permit me to take action a lot. However how does that translate into resilience?
One factor that I actually like about alternatives of chatting with individuals who don’t totally perceive wheelchair expertise or are coming at issues from a barely completely different angle is that I get the possibility to consider what it’s that I do and attempt to image what this might appear like from their perspective.
What resilience means to me
Firstly I wanted to consider what the phrase resilience meant to me and why it’s so necessary. The most important a part of resilience for me is about defending psychological well-being. “Stressors”, issues that have an effect on our psychological well being negatively, can are available all sizes and shapes. A few of them will probably be anticipated and a few sudden. A few of them will probably be massive and others will probably be small.
Constructing in practices that defend our well-being in day by day life could be a massive a part of bettering our resilience. Issues like placing down our telephone and getting a while away from screens or going to the park for some contemporary air.
1. Placing issues into perspective
One factor that I discover helpful in constructing resilience is placing issues into perspective, which admittedly is less complicated stated than accomplished. Trying on the larger image can expose the smaller issues for what they’re – small issues.
The thought of issues passing could be a method to remind ourselves that issues in life are principally transient and nothing goes to final eternally. This too shall move is an concept that’s shared excellently by Tom Hanks within the clip under.
