Hello listeners, this is Valeria Rusnak and I
welcome you all to the 11th episode of the Rejected
Pre -Med Podcast. I often start episodes by saying
that rejection is often redirection and it is
not innately negative. In fact, it can lead us
to personal and professional growth and it should
be viewed as an opportunity. In today's episode,
we have a very special guest, Dr. Michael Unger.
Dr. Michael Unger is the founder and director
of the Resilience Research Centre at Dalhousie
University, where he holds the Canada Research
Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience.
In 2022, Dr. Unger was ranked the number one
social work scholar in the world in recognition
of his groundbreaking work as a family therapist
and resilience researcher. His work has transformed
the global understanding of human adaptation
in stressful environments and organizational
processes with a particular focus on the resilience
of marginalized children and families, as well
as adult populations facing mental health challenges
at home and in the workplace. Dr. Unger regularly
consults with international NGOs like the Red
Cross and Save the Children, government agencies
in over a dozen countries, and educational institutions
at all levels. He has authored over 250 peer
-reviewed articles, book chapters, and 17 books.
His blog, Nurturing Resilience, can be found
on Psychology Today's website. There's so much
more I could say about Dr. Unger's incredible
accomplishments, but in the interest of time,
I will just leave it right here. So thank you
so much, Michael, for taking the time to join
us on the podcast. I'm proud to have you here,
and I'm excited to dive into your insights on...
rejections and resilience. I know our listeners
will gain a lot from your perspective and expertise.
So first, can you please share with me, how do
you feel about doing today's episode? So when
someone invites you onto a podcast in which you're
going to talk about rejection and failure and
disasters in your life, I mean, that's just like
an uplifting day, I guess, I don't know. It's
a funny, it's a funny way of segueing into a
conversation. Yeah, resilience. And, um, it's
a, it's kind of a great hook because I kind of,
when you approached me about this, I thought,
yeah, that's, that's such a common experience
and one that we hide from. And you really don't
understand that we are more resilient because
of that four letter F word fail. Um, you know,
if we try to embrace and use that as part of
the learning, the learning and growth cycle.
Yeah. Yeah, definitely for sure. And before we,
Dive into more your expertise on resilience.
I do want to ask how you even got to be doing
what you're doing today. Tell us briefly about
your background. How are you led to become a
family therapist and a social scientist specializing
in resilience? How does that come to be? Oh boy
i'm like many folks that you know the seven career
principle i think i was moving more into journalism
and international development work and child
and youth work and bit by bit became a clinician
therapist and certified over really decades of
my. in my twenties and my thirties. And then,
um, kind of reluctantly became a university professor
when I realized I was doing some teaching and
clinical work and research already in my position.
I was working with, uh, juvenile delinquents
and, uh, custody facilities. And, you know, it's
funny how life just kind of propels you forward,
but I think my interest in resilience really
came out of this, um, partially my clinical work
that I was encountering young people who were
doing better than I would have expected given
their past traumas and everything else. But I
think maybe I was just sensitive to reading those
situations based a little bit on my own personal
experience, something I've written a little bit
about in I Still Love You, which is one of the
books I put out. And basically, I emancipated
my family very young, about 16 years old, and
left. And I was one of those, in a way, very
fortunate. I was able to put myself into university
setting universities and cost very much um and
um i was able to you know sort of get myself.
Into a really good space but i worked a lot of
hours i was often working twenty twenty five
hours a week while i was going through university
but all of that together i think maybe a little
bit sensitive to the idea that you know things
might look very difficult but there are. there
are ways that many people survive and even sometimes
thrive out of those circumstances. And that got
me sort of curious about why I was seeing that
same pattern in many of the young people with
whom I was working clinically, who are coming
out of environments far more damaging, far more
dangerous, far more risky, far more traumatizing
than my own. And that's kind of where this all
started from. Yeah, no, it's interesting how
something that started off in your childhood
led you kind of by a current in a way of what
you're doing right now. a lot of the things like
my passion for this work stems from the experiences
I went through and helping me in a way figure
out certain things. And even me starting this
podcast, I'm not saying this is directly related
or similar to your experience, but even when
I started this podcast about rejections and resilience,
I first tried to help myself figure out how do
I overcome this rejection that I've experienced
for medical school and how do I build resilience.
So that's kind of how it started. in a way I
find that it's interesting how people are led
into this kind of work. So thanks for sharing
that. You're welcome. And what intrigued me a
little bit looking, you know, when I was reflecting
back, I realized that, you know, I hadn't really
done it alone, even though it felt like maybe
at the time, like I was, but there was, there
was certainly, you know, a grade 10 teacher that
inspired me that, you know, really helped me
to get through a tough time and really inspired
me that he saw great potential and what I could
do and in fact very memorably and probably in
the theme of here I had just recently arrived
at that high school and I remember I wrote my
very first essay for him and he was quite an
inspirational character. He ran the school play
and he did all kinds of other stuff. He's very
engaged with the students. Wonderful fellow.
Steve Weinberg is his name. I remember I wrote
this wonderful paper for some assignment and
he gave me an A on it. And then he kind of leans
over my desk when he gave me back the paper and
he just said, you know, I just want to let you
know, that's the last A you're going to get in
my class. And I was like shocked. I said, and
then what an absolute compliment. He said, you
know, I'm not going to, you know, I'm not grading
you this. I don't mean this boastfully. Please
don't take that this way, but it was just the
theme of somebody seeing me and seeing that I
had some potential, more potential maybe than
I was hearing in other parts of my life. And
this fellow basically leaned over and said, look,
I'm not going to grade you the same way as any
of the other students because I know that you
can do exceptionally much better. And again,
not boastfully, but just that when someone sees
you, whether it's because you're a great skier
or a jokester or you're really good at cooking
or something about you that shines through and
the world notices it, that's something that you
can really Velcro yourself to for a lot of years.
I mean, that's just that idea that, okay, someone's
believing in me. And so he's saying, giving you
another A here because I think he eventually
gave me an A. I think eventually he... He deserved
it probably. Ah, whatever. That sense of that,
you know, I'm expecting you to step up. And isn't
that a wonderful gift to give? What a wonderful
thing to give anyone for what they're showing
the world at a particular moment of potential
vulnerability in that point in time. It was a
little bit pretty chaotic in my life. You never
know how someone's words can impact like even
similar to your story. I still have my great
12 year book and sometimes like when nostalgia
hits, I look back at it and I think a lot of
those words that teachers have said to me have
stayed in my head like since then and it's been
what like. in almost 10 years. And I think it
will stay because it's very important to have
people in your life who will support you and
who will mentor you and who will guide you without
probably them even knowing about it, but just
people who there support you and help you be
on the path that will make you happy and peace
and bring you fulfillment too. So that's wonderful.
That's great that you had a teacher like that.
What subject was the teacher teaching? It was
English, English, I guess, in grade 10 at a high
school in Montreal. And yeah, yeah, later on,
I went into, you know, do some theater. He was
the director of the school play and stayed in
touch for many, many years after I graduated
high school through my university years. And
he was always sort of a little bit of a touchstone,
not just for me, but for quite a few other other
young people. And, you know, in a really, in
a really nice, safe way of, you know, inspiring
the best in, uh, I think he, you know, he had
a real, uh, knack for seeing young people that
might just need that extra push or that extra
little bit of support that might be floundering
a little bit. So yeah. Nice. When you have those
kinds of people in your life. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
I had a chemistry AP teacher who, uh, scared
the crap out of me for the first month I had
him as a teacher. But then he became one of those
figures for me as well. So yeah, I just I resonate
with what you say a lot. Yeah. This kind of ties
into the actually the next question I was going
to ask you. In your work, you emphasize that
resilience is not just about an individual's
mindset, but it's deeply tied to the environment
and possibly the people or the systems that surround
you or the systems you're in. Can you explain
what what you mean by that and how would you
define resilience in a broader sense? I know
it's a loaded question so start where you like.
It's been an interesting journey understanding
this concept of resilience because of course
I like all of us we started back in the late
80s or early 90s reading developmental psychologists
like Michael Rudder, Norman Garmese, who had
really talked about resilience as As a process,
but still focus on the individual, it really
started from a more individual psychological
perspective. And then of course there was, you
know, potentially family, maybe school that would
somehow influence, but it was still largely about
attributions and locus of control and internal,
internal cognitive processes. And I'm a little
bit more of a social scientist than a psychological
scientists. And so as i was reading that literature
i kept sort of bumping into that question about
what about the environment what about the context
what about other factors and so as i was doing
my own doctoral work i began to sort of ponder
those questions a field of resilience was very
intriguing felt like a large umbrella under which
a lot of people doing a lot of different kind
of thinking were finding themselves. There was
also, at the same time, other folks doing work
on community resilience and mental resilience.
And there's a whole group out of Stockholm that
was thinking about social ecological resilience,
et cetera, et cetera. So it was kind of a buzz
about it. And then about 2002, when I started
at Dalhousie University in Halifax, I was very
fortunate to get some seed, some initial research
funding in which I took an idea of this resilience.
And I said, I really want to find out If culture
and context matter because this is where my thinking
was that somebody to pay more attention that
just to the primary attachments in a child's
life but there's gotta be something more about
your culture in your difference and you gotta
remember as i mentioned i wanted to be like a
foreign correspondent a journalist or something
so i was already in the sort of that social justice.
The side of things a little bit for many years
and so what i do is i was able to. talk and build
a network of folks in like 14 communities, 11
countries, five continents. And what we did was
we went and found all the children who were exceptionally
stressed, like those who were in adverse circumstances,
whether because of a physical disability in India,
incredible poverty in South Africa, or maybe,
you know, working children in Cambodia. We just
went around the world finding different groups
of children under stress and then saying, but
there's a group here that are doing well. Why?
And obviously we began to ask these kids and
through a long process of research and whatever,
there was a story being told about this interaction
between the environment and the individual. It
was about social policies and economic conditions.
meeting positive thinking and you know not catastrophizing
your thinking and it was like there was this
kind of ping -pong game going between the individual
and the environment. Now at that time i didn't
have it well theorized it was patterns and themes
that were merging processes that i was seeing
but more and more they were you know the more
i studied in the more studies we did collectively
around the world through with partners the more
these patterns emerged into. some cohesive models
that began to think about the multiple systems
that the systems around us affect us. And so
I boiled it down to a very simple thought when
I wrote a book called Change Your World, what
I used eventually settled on was this idea of
us needing to be rugged, having the rugged individual
qualities, mindfulness, self -regulation, problem
-solving, decision -making, good nutrition, a
variety of other biological and psychological.
And also the environment around us. I really
think that the reason I was sensitive to that
was because somewhat it was informed a little
bit by my own sort of earlier perspective. That's,
you know, it's one thing to have a positive attitude.
It's another thing to have a positive attitude
and a friend or a mentor or some or job. You
know, suddenly the story got a lot richer. And
then these young people all around the world
were sort of basically telling us that the protective
factors that mattered to them weren't just inside
of themselves. but were swimming around them
in the community as well. And that, you know,
these, when their community valued them. One
of the better stories I heard was when we were
doing this research with some children in Ghana,
and we were asking them, just like we were all
over the world, saying, well, what is it that
makes a child resilient, doing better than expected
here? And what we kept hearing about was children
said, oh, or adults too said, oh, a child is
more resilient when they know that they have
to contribute to their family and look after
their parents when they're elderly. This idea
of when the child is seen by their community
as competent and caring and contributing to the
welfare of the whole family, that is a sign of
resilience. That is the quality that is looked
for in a resilient child. Now, I came back to
Canada thinking, well, you never hear that definition
of resilience, right? You never hear, oh, you're
resilient because you're about to support your
parents. So I ran that by my own children at
the time who were, you know, How old would they
be? 12, 14, whatever. And I ran that by my own
kids. I said, hey, resilient kids are the ones
that support their parents into their old age.
What do you think about that? And I got the eye
roll, like that ain't going to happen, Dad. You
know? Oh, yeah, the cultural differences. Yeah.
I mean, it was kind of funny because, of course,
there is no explanation in my world that our
children do that. I mean, that's not a cultural
norm where I sit. It can be found in Canada,
but that's not a cultural norm, the space that
I sit. So it was kind of a funny little episode,
but it was that teachable moment for me of, right,
this is not going to be the same everywhere.
There's going to be a kernel. And the kernel
of the truth there was a child needs to be valued
by their community. They need to be seen. Well,
coming back to my experience with my grade 10
English teacher, you need to be seen by others
as competent and a contributing member. And that
doesn't change across cultures. But what exactly
contributing means, there's a vast range of definitions
across many different spaces. So when you say
the environment impacts our resilience, you mean
the fact that we need to be seen as valued and
competent and something we have something to
contribute to society. Is there anything else
to that? Or is that the basic definition that
you would give? I would say that that's only
one part of it actually, that sort of flows.
But what we see in our environment, our environment
also makes us feel safe. It makes us feel like
we belong. It makes us feel like we can derive
meaning from our activities. It gives us routines
and out of routine gives us an opportunity to
feel like the world's predictable. So the environment
actually plays a number of different functions,
it prevents a wide array of social connections,
not just intimacy, but also that we just feel
connected, whether it's to a bus driver or the
person who serves us our morning coffee at the
same coffee shop where we go every morning. There's,
you know, I think these environments are sort
of complex nested systems themselves that provide
us with all kinds of opportunities in you know
usually what I say is you know what you select
is going to be culturally meaningful relevant
to you and what you need so you know for some
children that's going to be you know it's great
that I have access to post -secondary education
it's going to be my path it's going to be the
way I'm going to know myself is valued and for
other children it's going to be no it's a that
is not what's going to be valued it's just going
to be employment in the paying job or you know,
whatever the situation is. So I think there's
always a, you know, I think of resilience as
a process of navigation towards resources and
negotiation to the resources that you need in
ways that you experience is meaningful. So I
know that sometimes the definition you sometimes
hear and it's one I really hate and I almost
hate repeating it, but that's the idea of you
bouncing back from adversity, but it's kind of
a repulsive idea. Because if you're bouncing
back, then you're implying that's all on your
individual shoulders. You are responsible for
your bounce. The fact that the next person over
bounces back and they have a trampoline doesn't
seem to make any difference, right? So generally
speaking, most scientists in my space are not
talking about bouncing back anymore. Now we're
talking about resources and processes of growth
and all that kind of stuff because you know there's
a i will literally sometimes have people in audiences
that i present to end up and say oh could you
please stop calling me resilient and i empathize
because of course to do that means that they
have to overcome adversity versus if i could
i could actually think about resilience as you
know changing the circumstances around them so
that they have the opportunities to become their
best selves. In other words, they don't have
to change. They don't have to be resilient anymore
because the world around them is more resilient,
is providing them for the opportunities they
need to do well. And story after story, that
seems to be what I'm hearing and learning from
the world around me. And I got a question, and
it's not in our script or guide, but just something
that came up. We did talk about how resilience,
the understanding and definition of resilience
can vary across cultures, what we mean by contributing
member to society or community. I wonder, how
does the fact that now we have the social media
distractions, how does that impact the definition?
of resilience? And does that impact our ability
to be resilient? Because sometimes we have these
comparisons, sometimes we feel more like a failure
because we start comparing ourselves to others
on social media. So there's all these factors
that weren't in at play in the 90s or the 80s.
And I was wondering what your thoughts were on
it. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Valeria, I really like
where you're going with that, because once you
enter and you add a new technology like social
media, to this these mechanisms you what we're
seeing of course is yeah people are um being
somewhat disadvantaged in terms of their resilience
or being made more vulnerable as a consequence
of their time online the the social desirability
the constant social comparisons they not you
know the fear of missing out all of these phenomena
are sort of creating psychological and social
stress social anxiety you know uh seems to be
undermining our Ability to feel good about ourselves
have self esteem feel connected and all these
other things that we know are the foundation
stones for getting through a crisis are you being
more resilient showing more resilience. That
said i'll be a little bit of my own contrary
in here for a second also hearing that when people
are more actively engaged online finding communities.
that they are with like -minded individuals that
maybe especially if you're feeling marginalized,
if you're a new to a new country and you're not
settling in or you want you know you're finding
linguistically you're isolated or socially all
of those folks are experiencing this social media
universe is potentially very um helpful um avoiding
the perils of acculturation voiding the perils
of exclusion um breaking down what is an epidemic
and in our country around loneliness and social
isolation. So it's not all bad, but there is,
of course, that distinction. And most of the
researchers on social media seem to be pointing
in this direction and saying, you have to be
active online, not just passively. So if you're
just passively watching videos, that's not great.
But if you're actively posting and creating content
and engaging in conversations, even gaming with
a small community, it seems like This is not
my research, this is other folks that the impact
of those activities is potentially benign or
even mildly positive as well. So I guess it's
like any tool. How do we use it? And are we getting
control of it to our benefit versus feeling like
we're a victim of it? And from a resilience point
of view, I think what we're trying to figure
out is how can we actually tame this many headed
beast called the internet and social media to
our psychological and social advantage? Yeah.
Yeah. And what I'm hearing is that it all depends
eventually how we use social media and how we
perceive it maybe and the narrative we build
around it can help us either contribute to it
and feel like we're building a community or we'll
either scroll through it passively, compare ourselves
to others because that's how we perceive that
it's just a tool that I can use to see people
that are better than me or it's just somewhere
where you can feel like you can find belonging
by finding people you feel comfortable with and
at home with. But yeah, thanks for that. I know
it's a bit of a put you on the spot there with
that question. But it's just something that popped
into my head as you were describing the what
how definitions of resilience can can vary across
cultures. But I thought maybe they can vary across
time, too, especially with these new technologies.
But leading up to the next question, what are
some given all that you've said? social media,
not social media, our environments, our systems,
what are some practical ways people can build
resilience, even accounting for the fact that
it's not all individual? And maybe they can adjust
their surroundings with some simple steps, or
not so simple steps, or taking individual action.
What are some ways that people can build resilience,
especially when they're feeling very vulnerable,
they may be facing repeated rejections? um, and
they're struggling to move forward. Where, where
do they start? What, what should they do? Wow.
Well, I think, I mean, I'd love to sort of switch
the table on that and ask yourself how you got
through those multiple rejections or how that
got here. So obviously something happened, but,
but if I was to just give you a cheat sheet of
some of the things that I keep hearing about,
you know, there's, there's, there's no sort of
hierarchy to this. These are just ideas. And
what, what we do see is, um, a connection between
different factors. So it doesn't really matter
what you choose as long as you start somewhere.
That's kind of the message behind things like
social prescribing, right? Doctors now are saying,
you know, rather than giving a pill for depression
or loneliness or social anxiety, they're saying
basically, look, go, go to a movie with a friend
or find someone go, you know, call up a family
member, do something that will extend your social
network and give you a real legitimate contact
with somebody else. And that's probably going
to be as impactful as taking a pill to modulate
your mood in essence. But there's other things.
I mean, you know, social relationships are really
important and it doesn't have to be, you know,
that intimate other that you found. You swipe
left or right. I know I have five kids in their
twenties are all swiping. Anyway, I know you
swipe. But, but, you know, it's like, it's like,
look, it doesn't have to be that kind of relationship,
but it can also be the networks of people that
we know. And, you know, if we, you know, if we
have a dog, and we're at the dog park, and we're
getting known as, oh, you're the owner of the
golden, you know, golden doodle sort of thing
or something, it's, it's all those informal networks
that embed us and make us feel like we belong
somewhere. So, so relationships are one sort
of part of the, you know, the chair, if you will,
it's going to be stable. But then there's others
like, you know, I always start with people and
routines. Do you have a basic routine to your
day? If you're feeling all stressed and out of
it and worried and catastrophizing and you're
thinking, start with what is my routine? And
because there's something about if I repeat the
same routine each day, my world becomes more
predictable and I become a little more optimistic
because the world is like, I got through yesterday,
I went to that coffee shop, I got to bed at night,
everything, you know, can I repeat? then I'm
more likely to finish the day. I believe I'm
going to finish the day in exactly the same space.
Gratitude jars, like having a little moment in
time where I actually say, notice, and take a
little pebble that I've gathered and put into
my little gratitude jar. But it's the act of
remembering something that happened positively
during the day. But that cognitive trick only
works if I have actually had something positive
in my day. Something about, did I do something?
There's Adam Grant's idea of being a giver and
a taker that we want to give to somebody else.
Maybe I actually cooked something and brought
it to the office or I made an effort to offer
to my neighbor to walk their dog. I see that
there's some problem that they've had or something.
So again and again, whether it's routines or
contributing. finding meaningful opportunities
to show, to use our talents, to use those skills,
maybe in our workplace, to let other people know
that we have something to contribute. There's,
you know, other things, just making sure we feel
safe. Looking after your sleep hygiene. Is the
bed comfortable? Is the room dark enough for
you? Is it, you know, is it quiet? Are you getting
enough hours of sleep so you can rejuvenate?
Are you taking your vacations if you're working?
Or are you trying to make sure you're re -energizing?
If you have young children, you're not going
to do any of this, by the way. But that's part
of, you know, that's a cycle of life. You know,
you might go on to exhaustion or let the tank
really empty for, you know, maybe because a parent
is very ill or because a child is, you know,
very young. Or you're going to school and you're
training and you're in an internship that's just
exhausting you, like many medical students experience.
So all of these things, but the point is, is
that there's an element of self -care, but there's
also an element of finding those environments
around you, whether it's through routine, housing,
community, friends, pattern to your day, that
allow you some space to re -energize and take
away the stress. So, you know, I'm always thinking,
sometimes people say, you know, Here's a very
simple example. People say, oh, I'm having trouble
with money, and I'm running out. My credit card
is all maxed out. I've got all these problems.
And part of it is, OK, let's send you off for
a cognitive therapy to focus on how you can be
more self -regulated, restrain yourself, and
all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good.
You want to do it. But the very first thing you
do is you cut up the credit card. Right. Or you
get a money card. You get a cash credit card
as opposed to a billable credit card. There's
other forms of credit cards you can get that
would avoid them. In other words, when it's maxed
out, it's done sort of thing. Or you avoid going
to places where you are likely to spend money.
The other one, of course, is we change our peer
group. This is the classic one with dieting,
not that dieting should be done or whatever,
but if you are becoming very health conscious
and stuff, I say, it's very interesting. People
do the cognitive thing. I'm going to focus. I'm
going to change my mindset. I'm going to think
of myself as healthy. I'm going to have beautiful
pictures of myself. I'm going to put up messages,
whatever. Actually, one of the tricks is think
about your peer group and who's in your peer
group. Because if you change your peer group,
sometimes it's a lot easier to stick to a different
food regime. I would say on Friday nights, the
regime was that all of us go have beer and wings
at the local pub. Nothing wrong, by the way,
with beer and wings. But if that's your routine,
it's going to be very difficult for you to go
and order a low -cal soda and a salad at the
pub. It's a disgusting place to do it, but maybe
you're gonna do it. You're not gonna do that
for more than one week, I guarantee you. But
if you change your peer group and suddenly that
group is out on Friday nights going to play pickleball,
which seems to be all the rage now, including
with my family members, if pickleball, you know,
if that's your Friday evening, then your peer
group is going to kind of lead you into a different
physical regime. and they're probably not going
to go for beer and wings after, or they maybe
they will, but probably won't have quite the
same, you know, impact or whatever. So my point
is, is that, you know, when people stop thinking
about this as a purely individual pursuit, begin
to think about this as a collective or my environment
can change and that can spur me to be my best
self. Generally speaking, the changes we try
and make are more sustainable. Yeah, well said.
No follow -up question to that. Definitely the
routine one stuck with me. I'm struggling sometimes
to find a few of routines, so I'll be personally
working on that. But thank you for all the ways
that people can build resilience. And yeah, keep
in mind, everyone, that it's not individual resilience
as much or even more about the people and the
systems and the groups that you surround yourself
with. That's definitely one of the bigger takeaways
for me from our conversation today. And since
we're kind of getting to the topic of rejections,
and I asked all of the guests to share this if
they're comfortable. So Michael, have you ever
faced rejection in your professional personal
life or personal life? How did you navigate it?
And maybe it has helped you in some way. So,
yeah. share what you feel comfortable sharing?
Yeah, well, no, no, for sure. For sure. I think
I mean, first of all, in my professional life
now, I mean, I have a university professor and
I publish a lot. Anyone's ever tried to publish
a book, you know, I think we all have a bit of
a narcissistic wound that occurs when everyone,
you know, you get your rejection, your rejection
letters, and you just have to have a really thick
skin to continue to pursue grants and publications
and books. That's just the nature of it. And
indeed, I present a lot too in front of audiences
and there's always somebody who's sort of trashing
you in the, it's just the nature of whatever
the way it is. And maybe a little bit today,
there's a little more brutality in some of the
way people talk to each other. But if you think
about it on a more personal level, then I can
even say like, there's probably I had, you know,
obviously a rejection from my parents. It wasn't
a very close relationship. They kind of drifted
away, not just from me, but from my siblings
as well and their grandchildren. So it was a
very sort of, you know, sort of there was a lot
of that kind of rejection, which I think I compensated
for by finding a very great partner in my life.
She's she's amazing. And it's kind of like, you
know, you find other people who are your family.
But you know, I do think in my life, too, I mean,
because I was quite young, I had to take a lot
of risks. I had to put myself out there. A big
part of that has been embracing failure and learning
from it and willing to go forward. In fact, you
know, I was thinking it was one episode that
really did stand out in a very funny way. I was
sort of off my game. I just. I had an experience
being out west. I came back to Montreal. I was
trying to figure out what to do next in my career
and life. I was in my early 20s. And things were
really scraping the bottom financially. I didn't
have a lot of money. I didn't have a lot of resources
and kind of out of sorts. I thought I was going
to stay west and have a job and didn't quite
work out. Whatever. I'm back. in Montreal and
I eventually applied to an organization that
had a youth shelter. It was one of the first
steps actually for me moving from more community
work into youth work and that type of thing.
So I applied for this job and I still remember
the executive director asking me questions about
how to handle certain situations and what would
be your repertoire and what would you think your
strengths are and all this kind of question.
And I blew it. Oh my gosh, it was Uh, it was
an awful interview. I mean, I muddled answers.
I obviously answered the wrong thing. I, you
know, I could just tell he's off my game. I,
you know, incoherent. I think we've all had those
interviews. I had one like that recently, I think.
So I walked out of the, oh, well, I'll try again,
do something else or figure out another path
here. Whenever it is two days later, the executive
director calls me. I say, oh, it's going to be
a rejection. He says, yeah, we'd like to offer
you the job. And my very first sentence out to
him, back to him, honestly, I'm not lying about
this. I said to him, his name is Michael. Michael,
why are you offering me this job? I knew that
interview. And he kind of chuckled a little bit.
And he said, honestly, you want the honest answer?
You were the best of the worst. I don't know.
And what an epithet, right? You were the best
of the worst or something. Anyways, but I was
just happened to be in the right place at the
wrong time. I was, I guess I was breathing and
didn't look like I was going to do any harm.
It's actually quite good at the job. And I just,
it was a moment. We have all been in the wrong
space for a particular interview and it worked
out. And it was actually for me, a catalyst to
a whole career path that really has affected
me for, you know, 35, 40 years. But, um, I still
remember, uh, Michael's, uh, telling me that
you were the best of the worst, but, um, I mean,
I know that's not quite the rejection is it was
in a sense of backhanded rejection. Um, but sometimes,
you know, we have to acknowledge that we just
aren't the right, we aren't in the right space
to succeed. Now this I did, you know, one has
to integrate those. lessons of failure and see
it as a feedback loop in terms of a learning
cycle that pushes you forward to then think,
what can I do better? What do I need in terms
of skill development, social supports or friends
or colleagues? What do I need in terms of, you
know, if I'm open to learning, I'm more likely
to succeed. And I, you know, I think when we
shut down to the learning, we were more likely
to just continue the failure. So there's definitely
an element of saying, you know, thankfully I
failed and gave me more information about what
I had to do next. Yeah, no, thank you for sharing
that and the fact that you said sometimes we're
just not in this space the headspace to succeed
I definitely Felt that with med school and the
MCAT writing and all of the path that I went
through It's just I was trying really hard and
I have a really I have a pretty good GPA It's
not the best. It's not like 4 .0, but it's good
So it's like I shouldn't have a problem with
the MCAT, but I just did I studied I wrote that
thing three times and I studied for it like crazy
I did everything I thought I could within my
financial budget. Um, and just nothing. And then
on top of it, I dislocated my kneecap, which
is fine by the way, uh, now, but I dislocated
my kneecap before my final attempt. I'm like,
what is this? Just what the odds are just not,
but you know, it gets given me so much learning
and it has led me to me starting this podcast.
And it serves me much better to think that in
a way I glad I had that experience because it
has taught me so much and it has taught me to
focus in a way it's kind of forced me to focus
on more self -care and actually pursue more peace.
Because even if I got into medical school, I
think I would have burned out by so much expectation
and I was so sensitive to it all and I was such
a perfectionist and I needed to just get away
from that. And I think all those experiences
helped me get away from that kind of thinking.
And I'm still working on it, but I'm in so much
better space than I used to be. And I don't even
want to, not that there's anything wrong with
medicine, but I don't think I want to pursue
it, at least in the near future. So it's funny
the way life just happens sometimes. But yeah,
so thank you for sharing it. And it still kind
of counts as a rejection because you thought
that you had the worst interview, maybe in a
way called self -rejection. And best of the worst
is a backhanded compliment, but you did the job
just great. And I think you were just fine. And
yeah, but thank you. So I'm just reflecting what
I was thinking as you were sharing your story.
Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, if we're sort of open
to it. What I worry about sometimes is the, and
this is the focus of the latest book, The Limits
of Resilience. What I would worry about is sometimes
we are trying to be too resilient. In fact, you
know, I gotta say, it was kind of funny being
invited onto this podcast because I had an experience
of, you know, once working with a fellow who
applied to medical school three times and each
time was rejected by multiple medical schools.
And, and his approach was, well, he's just going
to keep applying until he gets in. And there
was no real refinement of his skillset. He didn't
go back and, you know, repeat courses. He didn't
kind of like, like it was kind of like, okay,
I'm going to be resilient and I'm just going
to keep trying and trying and trying. And I kind
of wanted to explain that that is not resilience.
That is toxic positivity I think it goes by these
days because it's not that you shouldn't keep
trying, but if three times you're really flat
out rejected, then maybe it is time to, even
if you are trying a fourth or fifth time, maybe
you have to start opening other doors. And I
remember asking him, why do you want to be a
doctor? And the answer was really about money
and prestige, not about care and service. And
so if your criteria is you want money and prestige,
then why have you equated that with a medical
profession? No, versus maybe thinking about other
ways. And even if you're in them, so so you know,
if his answer was obviously pointing to any number
of different uses, he could go into business
or management, he could go in, you know, I don't
know, whatever else he could go into. But also
if he was really into the care and service side
of it and medical profession wasn't being a doctor
per se wasn't quite accessible. What's remarkable
is all the other allied professionals, whether
it's nursing, physiotherapy, OT, ophthalmology,
pharmacy, you know, I can just keep going on
and on and on. You know, that there are that
there are all these other ways of entering a
medical facility as a competent, caring contributor
to your community without it only being as a
physician. There are so many different ways that
you could be interested in science and pure or
applied science. And I do sometimes wonder if
enough people are thinking about all the other
pathways that that kind of intellect could go.
And maybe we don't want all the type A, you know,
academic and describe myself, but you know, becoming,
you know, medical docs, maybe we want some of
them to fail more. Like we don't do personality
tests on them. We don't say, are you going to
actually be happy in this rather routinized environment
of career? You know, one sometimes has to think
that maybe in the failure to get into medical
school, there's certain personalities that are
actually more likely to be quite happy with another
choice. Yeah. And speaking as a former pre -med,
I think I used to kind of idealize or romanticize
the profession. And because certain cultures
are like when parents, my parents heard that
I wanted to be a doctor, they didn't even question
it. Although it's an honorable medical profession,
but like you said, there's so many different
fields, so many different jobs out there. We
just don't bother sometimes looking at because
we're just so fixated on that. That's what happened
to me. And the recently I watched this video
of a she has the girl, I don't know her name,
but she's on Instagram. She's has a degree for
medical doctor and she started working as a doctor.
But then she quit. She quit and she pursued the
job of an actor. she's now an actress and she's
pursuing that and she's much more happy in that.
And I think what she was saying is that sometimes
when you're considering the profession of a physician,
sometimes you, like you said, some people will
be really happy with that. They have that personality
type that they'll be really happy with how the
job is, all the hours, what the routine is like.
But sometimes you're going into that, you get
accepted and you just don't fit into that mold
that they're they've built for the medical professionals
and then it's really and then you're in that
you you're like okay I wait I put so much money
into this I'm I'm now a doctor and I don't feel
fulfilled I don't feel like this is for me and
I feel like potentially I can't speak for sure
because I'm not in their shoes but I'm confident
that there are people who do have that realization
there are people who switch and then they talk
about like what you're saying is that there are
other professions and sometimes medical profession
is just not something that fits everyone's personality.
And it's worth looking into other things as well.
And I'm so happy that rejection happened for
me. So that's my story of rejection is redirection
because I started looking at entrepreneurship.
I started looking at management. I started looking,
uh, mental health startups, something I would
never consider because I was just so fixated
on this medicine bubble. Um, and finally, my
rejection forced me to look a bit outwards and
see what else is out there. And I realized, oh,
there are more things that fit more my talents,
my current talents, my strength, my values, and
maybe I should pursue those. And who knows, maybe
in the future I'll come back to medicine, but
maybe I won't. I'm not as tied to it. as that
used to be. For me, it's becoming less more obvious
as I do the research in this area, too, that
people puzzle pieces, we don't have that one,
you know, we do a puzzle has to fit into one
slot. And there's a sort of determinism in that
right that, you know, oh, well, you know, your,
your parents will sign, you're going to become
a doctor, you're gonna be an engineer, you're
gonna whatever. Yeah, but I think of us must
more like 10 grams. which was a collection of
shapes that can form variety of different shape.
So you can put them into a square, you can put
them into a rectangle and make a little bird
out of them or whatever. Like if you take the,
you know, a bunch of different types of squares,
triangles, rectangles, you know, and you can
into different, into different shapes, they sort
of snap together. And I remember in one of our
studies, there was this fellow in his late twenties
who had an interesting story. He, he had originally
wanted to be an actor. He actually wanted to
be an actor and he went to school and studied
acting and, you know, left university and was
one of those struggling actors working in a,
you know, the restaurants and stuff. And he was
trying to get a few little gigs and television
and whatever. And it was going to be pretty mediocre
for him. He, you know, he came back and he ended
up, he had a life partner and it was you know,
getting pretty serious. And they were thinking
about a child. And anyways, he ended up to earn
money. He started working with his brother in
a company that his brother had that was making
literally cement foundations for houses. And
the economy was reasonably good and there's a
lot of work. And so he's kind of doing that,
earning better money than he would at, you know,
wherever else he could work. But he was still
trying to become an actor. Anyways, eventually
his brother decided to get out of the business
and wanted to get rid of the business, sell it
off or whatever. And this, this young fella that
it was just in his late twenties at the time,
he said, he looked at the situation and kind
of made a very strategic decision. He said, you
know, this acting thing, I don't think it's working.
It's kind of a bit of a failure, but, um, I kind
of would like a steady paycheck. I don't think
I'm built for this, you know, endless insecurity.
I would like a steady paycheck. I'd like to just
have a routine to my day to do something outdoors,
whatever. And so what he did was he actually
took over the foundation building company, this
cement foundations, I put in new houses and it
gave him financial stability. It gave him, you
know, his management skills, a little bit, whatever.
And this is the best part. He is now part of
a community theater troupe. still goes away to
workshops on theater and his hobby his passion
his his uh his his persona is still kind of an
actor but but he realized that he had more dimensions
to himself than that one job would necessarily
fulfill and i'm always amazed when people you
know if you think about our resilience is a collection
of factors we are not just i want to be on stage
though for some people that is the only thing
that they want. But for others, it's also about
connections and friends and being in a community
or feeling you love to read, you love to explore
ideas, you know, whatever it is about that, that
you love to do. But if it's only about being
on that stage in front of the audience and getting
those accolades and that sort of narcissistic
boost, you might become kind of a bit disappointed
unless you really are the best of the best. Sometimes
in our, you know, in our failure to achieve something,
we might actually have a more satisfying life
overall. Yeah. And this wasn't my question, but
I think we're kind of answering it right now
is that the book, the limits of resilience. And
like you said, like, how do you know when to,
when to quit? Are we being too resilient? And
is it too much when you just put Your whole identity
around like you said being on stage maybe like
unless you're the best of the best Which let's
face it. There's so many there's eight more than
eight billion people on the planet We can't all
be the best of the best so we have to have not
we have to but depending on Your personality
and what maybe there's more aspects to your life
than just a career or your relationship So it's
nice to not put you all your eggs in one basket
pretty much And I was wondering, do you have
other points to say about how resilience is not
just about bouncing back, but it's also about
our ability to self -destruct and embrace occasional
much needed failure? I really like that point.
And it really aligns with the mission of this
podcast because it is actually just about showing
how failure can help us become better in a way
we can personally grow, professionally grow.
If you like, you can add more things that can
you please like elaborate on this in more detail?
Or how do you think this idea even just applies
to rejection per se? Although we did already
talk about it. But I was wondering what else
you can you can say about this? Yeah, I do find
it's an interesting perspective on resilience.
Once one gets out of the idea that, you know,
endless striving is necessarily resilience, because
sometimes, you know, as the title of the book
suggests, it's, you know, in the limits of resilience,
it's sometimes better. better to persevere, sometimes
better to change, and sometimes to quit. And
all of those strategies are aspects of resilience.
In fact, there are these famous stories of when
a business like Kodak just didn't know they were
persevering with film, even though they had the
technology for digital long before anyone else,
but they just didn't know when to change. because
they were so economically successful with film.
And of course they were just wiped out within
a couple of years. They went from, you know,
you know, major fortune 500 to basically obliterated
out of the market because of the technology that
came along. So you, you know, there is, and there's
lots of examples like that when we, you know,
we just need to sometimes know when to, when
to change, when to self disrupt. I mean, you
know, sometimes it's, it's, it's just amazing
that sometimes we just need to know when, you
know, when enough is enough. And that's also
a sign of resilience, even though from the outside
it can look like failure. And I'm, you know,
obviously anyone's gone through a divorce. You
know, there are, there are divorces that happen
to you. And then sometimes divorces that you
do or breaking up in any relationship for that
matter. And, you know, I think, you know, often
even in, in my work with families and stuff,
you know, sometimes you say that this is really,
you can save this, but Do you want to? Like,
is it really worth it? I mean, it's never going
to really be great. It's going to be sustainable,
but it's not going to be great. And then sometimes
when people are still, you know, maybe young
enough or they have the resources to do it, the
advice might be that, you know, failure at this
marriage or this relationship is actually a better
strategy right now to move on. And that's not,
that's a resilient strategy because it allows
you then to access the next to the, to be open
to what's about to happen. and come up in the
future, which can be really wonderful for you.
So I think sometimes we're like, we misunderstand
resilience as endless persistence of never letting
go of tenacity. And while that is, those are
good traits in many cases, there's also cases
where letting go would be better and that, you
know, just acknowledging that maybe this is a
bad fit where we are. and this relationship isn't
working or whatever, or this career, this town
isn't working. And that resilience to know when
to let go and to admit defeat and to move on
is a really good skill set and ultimately sets
us up for future success. How does one have that
skill? Does it come from self -awareness or is
there more to it? How do they know when to accept
defeat or either way it's resilience or keep
going? Well, yeah, it's, you know, like any sort
of strategic withdrawal, even in conflict situations.
I think you're partly in self -awareness. It's
also experience. Sometimes it's willingness to
listen to friends and others who are telling
us or giving us clues that this is not really
the best place for you. But often it is, unfortunately,
a cognitive strategy that starts with us being
brave enough to question that and say, yeah,
this is the time for a change. I think that usually
the cue is there, we're uncomfortable. We're
psychosomatically, we're not sleeping, we're
not eating, or we're overeating, we're disrupted,
or we're oversleeping. We're dysregulated in
some respects, and often those are clues that
something isn't quite right and is where we are.
Now, I'm assuming the person has the power to
leave. If you're in an abusive relationship,
please don't heed this advice. You could put
yourself in a very dangerous situation. Same
way as, you know, financially, you might not
be able to divorce. It'd be a tremendous drain
on your, you're starting a new business and suddenly
you're going through a divorce and now you're
bankrupt or something. So there's a reasonableness
to this, what I'm saying. But when you have the
opportunities to move on, retrain, reboot, this
is not necessarily a bad resilience strategy.
for that sort of strategic rolling back and then
starting again. I think entrepreneurs are really
good at that. They'll know that it's time to
declare bankruptcy and move on to the next big
idea. People who invent things are really good
at that too. They know when this experiment is
going nowhere, it's a failure. And they'll move
on to the next idea. If you... You know, I like,
I like watching those shows, those dragon dens,
or, you know, shark tank in the US, dragon den
in Canada, there's variations on it when entrepreneurs
pitch ideas. And the, the entrepreneurs who are
going to, you know, make the money that are going
to give them money are often like, you've, you've
done this for how many years? And you still have
an idea. And you know, yeah, sure. There's always
that one case in a hundred that, you know, they
show them five years later. Look at me. Great
success. I never took your advice, which is great.
But the other 99 did go home and wasted more
money. Right. So sometimes, I mean, you know,
you still have, you know, if you're happy with
what if you're happy with pursuing this, then
you keep going. Keep going. Enjoy it. Why not?
Who cares? You're you're in it. You love it.
And more power to you. I won't judge. Right.
But if you're not happy. then maybe that's a
clue to begin to think about option B, like the
second choices, or maybe third or fifth choices.
And when you look at people who are resilient,
who show resilience, these patterns appear in
their lives. They know when to self disrupt or
they have experiences of self disruption that
have often led them into something better, or
at least gotten them out of a bad situation.
I relate this to my experience as well. And this
is such great advice because it relates to like
so much, like it's not just personal, like it's
not just academic or professional, it can relate
to personal situations. In my case, I think it
was until now, I didn't realize like the way
you framed it that resilience is also just about
letting go sometimes. And for me, I felt this
immense pressure when I realized I don't wanna
write the MCAT anymore. Again, I don't want to
pursue medical school. I knew I felt that almost
as soon as I and I even felt that even before
I got rejection from medical school I felt that
I don't even know if there's something that's
for me but after I didn't get like after I decided
and I told my parents I told my friends so many
of them but you work so hard for this so why
are you giving up come on look like I've I've
heard of people who applied so many times and
they got in. I'm like, and I heard all these
stories and I'm like, I hear you. But and I remember
after all these conversations, I was in my car
after that and I was crying like, what am I doing?
Am I doing something wrong? Like, my heart tells
me one thing, my friends and my family are telling
me another thing. Right now, everyone's kind
of already adjusted to the fact that I'm not
going to medicine. But in the first few months
when that just happened, it hit me hard. And
I think journaling Well, for me personally, journaling
helped me get through that because journaling
is when I was almost interrogating myself at
some points, where it's like, do I want to go?
Do I want to do this again? Everyone's telling
you to go. It's logical to probably go because
you put so many years into like of your life
into this. But then I started writing to myself,
like almost angrily at myself, like you obviously
don't want to do this. Just let go. And I think
eventually I started letting go of that. But
it felt like a very jarring. Experience and now
that you're saying all this it's all making sense
now i had to have a certain amount of. determination
to kind of go through with what I wanted to,
what it felt right at the moment, other than
that, like the pressure that was from the outside.
And some people were supporting me in my decision,
but others were not understanding why am I just
after one time of not getting accepted, why am
I not applying again? I think I made the right
decision. And hearing you say these things about
resilience, just now I'm even more sure that
I made the right decision. I have another question
for you. It seems like we do have the time. So
one of your books titled Multisystemic Resilience,
and you've touched on this briefly already, integrates
different knowledge systems. It's including research
that taps into local knowledge, Indigenous ways
of knowing, as well as some Western science.
How can this interdisciplinary approach be used
to help people from diverse backgrounds navigate
rejection? and other personal or professional
setbacks. What did you learn by really combining
all of this knowledge that maybe you wouldn't
otherwise have learned in your other works that
you've done before that? Good question. What
I'm finding is if once you enter the space of
more thinking about systems and multiple systems,
you know, colliding and creating the conditions
for our experience of resilience, then you kind
of open yourself to different ways of understanding
the world. So what's success or failure in one
context. I've traveled to, I think, over 80 countries
in the world. I travel a lot. I have colleagues
all over the globe. And I think the humility
that that brings to say there is no one right
way of doing things. And as a consequence of
that, you're also, I think, saying to what failure
means. and how people think about it. Is it a
spiritual thing? Am I ill -fated because of something
I've done and I need to exercise, not exercise,
but exercise something out of me? Is it a spiritual
problem that I'm experiencing versus a capacity
problem, which I might think about in my world
space, but other people might think of it as
something very different? Is my you know other
people are very fatalistic based on their ancestors
or their karma or otherwise different concepts
around the world appear so failure can be renamed.
Many things depending on your religious views
your spiritual views your cultural views and
you know to just assume that. Failure means something
always the same to me my space doesn't. I've
learned that that's not always the case. I mean,
we've had this conversation because we're occupying
a certain relatively similar cultural space that
you and I are occupying. But if this was on a
global scale, and we have people from 80 different
countries, then this conversation about both
resilience but also about failure and embracing
failure might take on a more spiritual tone or
a more cultural tone or more something about
our ancestors or something about the cosmos,
something about nature, more of a historic lessons
brought in. We might think in terms of seven
generations, in terms of just myself and my parents.
So all of those things would change how we approach
which systems we are gonna bring in, which cultural
systems, which family systems. which social systems,
which cosmos, which ecological systems we're
gonna engage with and think about are all going
to contribute to our personal, very personal
experience and the meaning we attribute to failure.
So I often encourage people to think, remind
yourself, what does this mean inside your family?
And let's face it, for many newcomers, their
first generation, it's been a common thread that,
the child is expected to reach a certain level
of success and that often means certain professionalism.
That you know that that's not always great to
to doesn't always serve the child but it's it's
embedded in that particular cultural space and
that's because the family system and the historic
system and the history and you sitting down looking
in the mirror and saying oh I'm a failure or
I'm a success or what that exactly means it's
like literally there are other people standing
behind you in that mirror there are other cultures
lined up around you. You were bubble wrapped
inside other systems. Even the financial systems,
even what, you know, the economic, social, political
systems. And, you know, if you're in a war, do
you, you don't necessarily, we're working on
a big project right now with Ukrainian newcomers
to Canada who are in Canada under a temporary
visa program. And their understanding, young
people's understandings of those experiences.
And, you know, you just, you know, you think
about school performance in a very different
way if you're working in your third or fourth
language and you've just come out of a traumatic
past. So all of these systems, all these different
experiences collide to define our experience
of failure and what it means to, in a sense,
come through that and be more resilient. And
so I do think sometimes we just forget that we
presented it all as if it's going to be the same
for everybody. Maybe for your, you know, you
should interview somebody from a culture that's
very spirit driven to think what might failure
mean from an indigenous perspective, what it
might mean from a Hindu perspective. I just made
that one. I don't know if there's any difference
at all. I don't know much about the Hindu failure.
Muslim. uh based on uh islamic texts um based
on judaic texts uh whatever uh you know i i kind
of romp around the world uh talk to a buddhist
they might have a very different perspective
on what this all means or indeed and they even
that's implying the similarity a buddhist from
napalm a buddhist from you know thailand might
have a very very different story to tell uh,
depending on what branch of Buddhism they, um,
they adhere to. So, you know, again and again
and again, I guess I look at all this complexity
and celebrate it as opposed to challenge it,
because I think what it does is it explains why
people get through very difficult situations.
Yeah. Thank you for the ideas. I should definitely
look at different cultures, perspectives and
how they define failure, what the rejection meant
for them. Uh, we are soon nearing to the end
and I just have two questions for you. The first
one, what would you say are the key takeaways
for our listeners on building resilience and
handling rejection? And then the other one is
about how do people connect with you learn more
about your work? So I think the key takeaway
here is just think about, you know, when you're
experiencing rejection or failure, I think one,
it's a should be a learning experience. And that,
you know, your success is likely to depend on
far more than just your own individual positive
thinking. And that actually may be positive thinking
as a trap that sometimes blinds us to the time
that we need to change. So I'm really about our
individual rugged qualities, meeting the resources
around us to make us our best selves. And finding
a space to explore that. And sometimes failure
just points us in a new direction where we can
be even a better self than we would be. And where
can the people connect with you and learn more
about your work they wanted to? Sure. Uh, well,
they can always find me, uh, on line at, um,
my website. Uh, yeah, they can always find me
at Michael Ungar .com. It's easy there. I have
a research website too, that some folks might
be interested in, which is, uh, resilience research,
all one word, uh, dot org or G. So that's a.
We get lots and lots of traffic across that platform.
And then my books and YouTube channel and all
that kind of other stuff, you just type in Michael
and Unger, that's U -N -G -A -R. Often people
misspell it. But yeah, then a lot of these materials
are open source. A lot of stuff and a lot of
the books are there. But it's really, for me,
it's being a voyage of trying to share these
ideas as much as possible to shift the conversation
of resilience into a more ecological sensitive,
environmentally -sensitive idea. And I appreciate
very, very much, Valeria, this opportunity to
share some of these ideas, especially around
this fun theme of, I say that fun, of knowing
sometimes rejection is necessary for growth.
It definitely is. I attest to that. But yeah,
thank you so much, Michael, for joining me on
the podcast today. been an incredible privilege
to dive into your expertise on the important,
but often undiscussed themes of rejection and
resilience. And as Michael has shared, rejection
isn't just about bouncing back, but it also lies
in our ability to self -destruct and embrace
occasional but much needed failure. By understanding
how we can reframe challenges, we open ourselves
to new opportunities, like you were saying, and
paths that may have once maybe even seemed out
of reach. So I encourage everyone to reflect
on the practical tools Michael has shared today
and remember that our struggles don't define
us, they're merely stepping stones towards greater
strength and personal or even professional growth.
Resilience is not just a trait we're born with,
it is skill we can all develop. Listeners, I'd
love to hear your thoughts on today's episode,
what resonated most with you and how do you cultivate
resilience in your own life? Feel free to reach
out on social media or suggest topics for future
episodes. And if you'd like to support the podcast,
you can donate at buymeacoffee .com. The link
will be for that in the show notes and also for
Michael's social media and all the website and
all of that will also be in the show notes. This
has been Valeria Rusnak, the host of the Rejected
Pre -Med podcast. I thank you for tuning in and
I'll see you next time.