Episode #17: Collective resilience and culturally competent flourishing with Drs. Lucy Hone and Denise Quinlan

In this episode, we talked to Dr Lucy Hone and Dr Denise Quinlan about their work on building well-being and resilience among different populations, and how to develop the most important skills associated with resilience.

Dr Lucy Hone is author of the 2017 book Resilient Grieving: How to Find Your Way Through a Devastating Loss and gave the TED talk ‘3 Secrets of Resilient People’, which was among the Top 20 TED talks of 2020. She is co-author (with Denise Quinlan) of the Educators’ Guide to Whole-school Wellbeing, co-convenor of Wellbeing in Education New Zealand, presenter on many of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing and Resilience’s online courses, and has featured in the Guardian, Washington Post, and on the BBC, ABC, Channel News Asia, Swedish Television, The Bolt Report Australia and Television New Zealand.

Dr Denise Quinlan is acknowledged internationally as an outstanding facilitator and trainer, helping people explore wellbeing and resilience. Participants have described training with her as ‘life-changing’. She has worked alongside leading resilience researchers Martin Seligman and Karen Reivich, delivering the Penn Resilience Program in Australia and the UK. Her podcast, ‘Bringing Wellbeing to Life’, was recommended by TED in their culture list for 2020. Denise’s academic research is published internationally, and her publications include the Educators’ Guide to Whole-school Wellbeing, which she co-authored with Lucy Hone. She is co-convenor of Wellbeing in Education New Zealand. 

Key conversation points:

• What resilience is and the difference between individual and collective resilience. Individual resilience can be thought of as “learning to swim” and collective resilience thought of as “building the pool.” We need both to be truly resilient.
• Ways to build resilience, individually and collectively: healthy relationships; having a “mission” in life; cultivating self-awareness, self-regulation and self-compassion; and developing flexible and accurate thinking.
• What trauma is and what post-traumatic growth (PTSG) is, and Lucy & Denise’s argument for why PTSG requires struggle after trauma. 
• Our “explanatory style”: how we explain what has happened to us, and why this is important for well-being and resilience.