Book Excerpt: 'RISE: The ‘Deep Resilience’ Way' By Neena Verma

In RISE: The 'Deep Resilience' Way, author Neena Verma presents a reimagined understanding of resilience that goes far beyond the notion of simply recovering from adversity. It frames resilience as a profound, renewing, and creative force that sustains meaningful living. Drawing together professional expertise, applied research, and lived experience, the book offers an integrated model for emotional well-being and personal development. 

The book introduces two frameworks, Resilience Mindset and Deep Resilience, developed by Verma herself, through extensive academic and coaching work. 

RISE speaks to those facing grief, loss, change, or major life transitions, offering a pathway toward renewed purpose and hope.

Through practical insights, reflective practices, and accessible guidance, it supports readers in cultivating resilience as an ongoing practice and a way of being.

Book Excerpt | RISE: The 'Deep Resilience' Way

POST-TRAUMATIC GROWTH AND MANY WAYS WE GROW

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for
a large intelligence and a deep heart.
—Fyodor Dostoevsky

Each of us gets visited by something mildly or majorly trying at some point in life. It is certainly not a welcome guest. But the good news is that there is more to adversity, hardship and challenging circumstances than just pain, misery or turmoil. Contrary to the common misconception that stress, adversity, setbacks and trauma only have adverse effects, they often provide just the right spur we need for existential growth. While traumatic experiences do shake us, they also inspire reflection, deeper awareness, meaning and transformation. There is enough research evidence and anecdotal wisdom to suggest that setbacks, failures, obstacles, challenges, trauma, pain and suffering uncover our innate will and capacity to adapt, transform and envision new possibilities and potential for growth. Of course, there is no set formula to influence or predict people’s responses to adverse or traumatic events. Nonetheless, they are often found to catalyse deep transformation and growth.

Although the human capacity to grow from trauma and adversity is as old as civilization itself, it is in the recent decades that eminent trauma researchers Richard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun named the phenomenon as post-traumatic growth (PTG). They describe PTG as the ‘positive psychological change experienced as a result of the struggle with highly challenging life circumstances.’2 In their view, crisis, loss and trauma do not just inspire an existential need to review and reconstruct one’s core beliefs—shaken in the aftermath thereof—but also kindle
meaningful growth. Their research confirms that a wide range of people, from those showing mild symptoms to those with full-blown post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), seek and foster PTG, whether by themselves or with help. The idea of PTG offers a brave and much needed paradigm beyond post-traumatic stress. It affirms the human will and capacity to choose our attitude and response to stressful and tumultuous experiences. Jayati’s story is a heart-warming testimony to this. Post-traumatic growth and resilience, dear reader, are co-travelling friends that enable and support each other. George Bonanno—whose work on resilience we discussed in Chapter 3—also contends that resilience is about ‘the capacity for generative experiences and positive emotions’.3 That said, let
me clarify that PTG does not mean forcing ourselves to ‘see the positive’. Nor does it mean that we should ignore, deny or suppress post-traumatic stress (PTS). Both post-traumatic growth and post-traumatic stress are natural human responses.

Neither precludes the other. And PTG is not a fix or cure for PTS. In fact, sometimes trauma is so engulfing that even minimal restoration seems too hard. Survivors of conflict, abuse, crime, violence, complex bereavement and other such events may find it hard to come out of their trauma. The enormity of their suffering notwithstanding, many of us not only manage to survive despair and make a resilient comeback, but also find a way towards deeper transformation and growth. I personally know some stories of horrifying trauma. Despite their tragic experiences, many survivors choose the narrative of hope, resilience and meaning in suffering. That is what lies at the heart of post-traumatic growth—our choice of narrative, will for meaning, and the will and capacity to grow from adversity.

Clouds come floating into my life,
no longer to carry rain or usher storm,
but to add colour to my sunset sky.
—Rabindranath Tagore

The great literary maestro and first Indian Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore’s life is a profound testimony of post-traumatic growth. Choosing to sublimate his grief from multiple losses through arts and literature, Tagore made revolutionary contributions as a litterateur, artist, musician and social reformer. He founded the Visva-Bharati University—the first university of integral learning in India—that continues to inspire over a century later. Gurudev,
as he was fondly called, penned and painted his pain. He mourned through his music and sang his sorrow. He inspired the people of the land to rise above communal and religious differences and join hands to fight against the brutalities of the colonial regime. This is what PTG co-creators Prof(s) Calhoun and Tedeschi refer to as life-transformative existential growth. Here are the five major ways PTG manifests.

First is the possibility of uncovering, cultivating or enhancing greater personal strength. Tedeschi contends, ‘trauma may be the mother of strength.’4 Circling back to Jayati’s story, her loss made her realize—and consciously deepen—her psychological strength. The second way PTG shows up is in improved relationships. Jayati’s keenness to value and nurture her relationships grew even stronger in the aftermath of her loss. What she got from her
mother, she liberally shares forward, and deepens her relationships in the process. Another way PTG manifests is by fostering a greater appreciation for life. John Muir’s evocative words, ‘And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul,’ capture the essence of Jayati’s journey, which began with healing and grew stronger with her realization of human mortality. The fourth way of post-traumatic growth leads to envisioning new possibilities—something that ensued for Jayati as an expanded ability to imagine possibilities beyond her pain. Finally, trauma
often proves to be a harbinger of existential (re)awakenings and a new understanding of the meaning and purpose of life. Jayati’s life took a transformative leap when she decided to take her mother’s legacy forward, unfurling a meaningful motivation to live life for something larger than her own suffering or joy. Her pain became the chrysalis that metamorphosed into Dilli Meri Jaan endeavour.

Let me pause for a moment to underline that PTG is an evolutionary process, often quietly and subtly unfolding over an entire lifetime. It would be unwise to expect quick effects in the immediate aftermath of adversity and trauma. In fact, it would create an unkind pressure on oneself or others, and even backfire. The journey of PTG starts with a healthy acknowledgment of our struggles and vulnerabilities. As we affirm our fears and pain, things begin to shift. We become able to modify our narrative or form a helpful new one, mobilize a state of resourcefulness, and take the path of adaptation and growth. Please note that not everyone may seek or experience growth from adversity, loss or trauma. Some of us most of the time—and many of us sometimes—settle for restorative adaptation, not wanting to or able to take the journey forward into greater growth. That is fine. But that should not deter you from pursuing this generative phase of deep resilience.

Extracted from RISE: The 'Deep Resilience' Way by Neena Verma, with permission from Rupa Publications.