This week we’re talking about resilience and your discomfort zone.

Topics Discussed In This Episode:

A little about Evy Poumpouras and her book “Becoming Bulletproof.”

How a bulletproof vest is made and why malleability is its strength.

The types of events that may test our resilience.

Why people are becoming increasingly interested in extreme events and activities.

Who Leanne interviewed recently and why.

Why it’s important to test ourselves physically and mentally.

The types of activity Leanne will do to build resilience daily, monthly, and yearly.

Leanne’s survival experience in the Scottish Highlands and the important skills those types of experiences teach you.

Why low moments are normal when you’re challenging yourself and getting outside your comfort zone.

What challenging yourself could look like outside of physical activity or sports.

How building resilience is a constant evolution.

Key Takeaways:

Leanne heard Evy Poumpouras (author, writer, speaker, and former Secret Service agent) talk about how being bulletproof relates to resilience.

Our experiences layer on us much the same way that the fibres of a bulletproof vest are layered to make it impenetrable.

There has been an increased interest in extreme, strenuous activities. Next year Leanne will be going to do an SAS simulated selection weekend.

One some level, we as humans want to go back to a time when things were more difficult because we aren’t testing ourselves physically as much anymore.

Leanne likes to plan things daily, weekly, and monthly to help build her own resilience.

When you put yourself in difficult situations, you get used to doing hard things, and this is an important skill to have.

One thing Leanne learned in her survival trip in the Scottish Highlands is whether things or edible or “deadible,” meaning if you should eat them or not.

Challenging yourself isn’t always about pushing your physical limits. It may look like learning something new, or simply putting yourself out there if you’re single.

Building resilience helps us lift the watermark for what we can withstand and endure. Once we’ve gone through a great challenge, our other struggles become easier.

Action Steps:

These are the ways in which you could consider challenging yourself to build resilience:

1.   Engaging in difficult physical activities or events.

2.   Learning a new language or instrument.

3.   Getting out of your comfort zone and meeting new people or potential partners.

Leanne said:

“We desperately want to go back to when times were harder, physically and mentally harder. I think some of us want to really test ourselves. We don’t get tested in the ways that we used to in ancestral times.”

“What do you do on a daily basis to get into a hard place, and practice being there, and getting slightly comfortable being there? What do you do on a monthly basis, and what do you do on an annual basis? Something really big. And it doesn’t necessarily need to be a physical challenge, although sport and exercise are often the first things that we look for. It might be about learning a new instrument, learning a new language.”



Links To Things Mentioned In The Podcast:

More on the Highlands Flagship Course experience: https://www.bodyshotperformance.com/survival-in-the-highlands-an-epic-adventure-with-leanne-spencer/

Becoming Bulletproof by Evy Poumpouras:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0813LT94M/

Leanne’s TEDx talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SLP1BF7KBQ

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