High Resiliency, or our Ability to Handle Stressors, has been frequently cited as Necessary for Leadership Success.
It makes sense.
To have the Highest Levels of Success, You Must Face High Levels of Stressors.
If you're Unable to Handle the Stressors, You Will Not Succeed.
It's not a Difficult Concept to Understand.
However, when most people think of "Resiliency", they Focus only on the Psychological Aspects.
This however Fails to Understand how Humans Work from a Psychophysiological Perspective - aka How the Brain Works "with" the Rest of the Body.
In my work, I Frequently say, "All Stress Adds".
It Does Not Matter where the Stress Originates, it "All" is Added Together and Impacts our Overall "Stress Threshold", or how much Stress we can Handle at Once, aka our Resilience.
One area where Stress Often Accumulates in Today's World?
Our Neurogastroenterology, or "Gut-Brain".
Just as our Brain has Neurons that "Think", so do other parts of the Body including our Nervous System, our Hearts, and our Guts.
Each of these Systems works Interdependently, and can Directly take over control in situations when deemed Necessary.
The common one with our Gut-Brains?
You know that Dessert that you say isn't "Good" for you, yet immediately when you see it you not only Desire it but often Grab and Eat it "Despite" You Thinking You Shouldn't?
That is your Gut-Brain's Neurons Superceding Your Brain's Neurons, pushing you to eat that Dessert.
But what does this have to do with Resilience and Leaders?
Well, some Research was recently conducted that looked at Individuals who had "High Resiliency" and "Low Resiliency" and Compared both their Brains "and" their Guts to see if there were Correlations.
What they wanted to understand was whether those with High Resilience had Specifically Different Guts than those with Low Resilience.
Now, the Common Trainings around Resilience Focus "only" on Psychology.
The Theory is that you can "Only" Focus on your Brain and Improve Resiliency.
Now, when I've looked at the Long-Term Results of these types of Initiatives, I have found them to be "Completely" Ineffective.
Why?
Well, if Brain-Focused Resilience Training "Worked" in the Long Term, we would See Leaders who could Handle Stressors Better, which they could in turn Teach their Teams.
But this is "Not" What We See in Business.
In Reality, we have Watched Burnout "Dramatically" Increase, "Despite" the Increases in the Prevalence and Use of Brain-Based Resiliency Practices.
Not only are Leaders having "Worse" Resilience, but it is getting so Bad that it has become Burnout which is the "Worst" Level of Dis-Stress Impact on our Bodies (Outside of Death).
This is a Major Reason why I Stopped Doing "Leadership Development" Practices with Clients, including solely doing Brain-Focused Resilience Training.
They Do Not Work.
The Reason is Simple.
All Stress Adds.
We as Humans have Other, Critical, Psychophysiological Problems that are happening "Preventing" these Solutions from having "Any" Long-Term Impact.
This brings us back to the Research.
Is there a Difference between the Guts of those with High and Low Resilience?
The Answer, Unsurprisingly, is Yes!
If we Dig into this Research Paper, we can begin to Understand "Why" this Impacts Leaders.
What the Researchers found is that those with High Resilience "also" had Eubiosis (Eu=Good, Biosis=Mode of Life/Way of Living, or in this context Good Living in the Gut, where Microbiota Aid Us).
They also saw that individuals with Low Resilience "also" had Dysbiosis (Dys=Ill, or Ill Living in the Gut, where Microbiota become Disruptive).
Now, before we go Deeper into the Research, there may be a question here...
Which comes First - The Low Resilience or the Dysbiosis?
The Research does not answer this question for us, but the "Likely" answer is that it doesn't matter.
The Most Probable Answer is that Dis-Stress causes problems for "Both" Simultaneously (All Stress Adds).
I'd argue further that when Stress Damage (aka Oxidative Stress) is not Fixed, both of these will Simultaneously Degenerate.
This also helps us Understand why a "Brain-Focused" Solution to Resilience Does Not Work in the Long Term.
They do "Nothing" to Fix Other Damaged Systems, Including Stress Damage Accumulation and Dysbiosis.
You may get "Temporary" Aid with a Brain-Focused Solution, but the other "Added" Problems continue to Accumulate, leading to the "Same" Result.
Burnout.
We can Also Understand this Better when we look at How Resilience and the Gut Changes between these Groups from the Research.
The High Resilience Group, "exhibits adaptive psychological features, microbiome function facilitating gut health, and neurological signatures supporting emotional regulation and cognitive-emotional connections."
In simpler terms - Mental Adaptability, Digestive Health, and Emotional Intelligence are associated with High Resilience and Eubiosis.
Then it says, "...findings suggest resilient individuals, particularly those demonstrating tenacity and perceived ability to control life outcomes, possess a microbiome that supports gut-barrier integrity and eubiosis and a cortical signature that reflects adaptive emotional and cognitive regulation."
This says that things like our Locus of Control (or Growth Mindset in this Context, associated with Flow States), Gut Health, Emotional Intelligence, and IQ appear to be Linked.
Then, we can look at the Clinical Symptoms within this research.
The High Resilience group, "... was associated with lower scores of depression, anxiety, perceived stress and neuroticism..."
Often all of these are associated with Burnout, or lead to Burnout more quickly.
High Resilience was, "... also higher in trait-like mindfulness, particularly in the abilities to express emotions in words, to be nonjudgmental and to express empath..."
All of those are more ways to say Higher Emotional Intelligence.
The High Resiliences group, "... showed better self-reported cognitive abilities, including verbal fluency, verbal memory, comprehension, visual memory and sustained attention."
These are all ways to say Improved IQ.
Though, as an important note of Scientific Honesty, these are "Self-Reported" and "May" not necessarily reflect "Significant" IQ Increases via Psychological Testing.
For a Deeper Dive into Scientific Literature on IQ Changes, you should read my Article, "Is IQ A Static Trait?"
There is another aspect of this paper worth Understanding better.
"Collectively, these findings suggest that individuals with low resilience may deplete psychological and cognitive resources when confronted with stressful events, whereas resilient individuals may instead reappraise stressful events to promote advantageous psychological outcomes and coping."
This is often called the difference between "Post Traumatic Stress" and "Post Traumatic Growth".
When you look at Human Energy, also known as Mg-ATP, we find that Energy Levels Influence the Stress vs. Growth Response being mentioned here.
When we Do Not have enough Energy (Mg-ATP) to handle a Stressor, our Typical Response is "Stress" via a Fight-or-Flight Response.
When we Do have enough Energy (Mg-ATP) to handle a Stressor, our Stress Response does not Activate and it can instead Trigger a Flow Response which correlates to Growth.
How do we Produce Energy (Mg-ATP) as Humans?
Through a Healthy Gut, aka Eubiosis.
Can you see the Connections Happening Here?
We can go further into this paper to see the Connections more clearly.
The High Resilience group, "... included adaptive response to environmental changes, genetic propagation, energy metabolism and anti-inflammatory response."
This one is packed but let's look at it.
Environmental Changes can refer to a lot of different things, but essentially all Change is a Stressor and a High Resilience with Eubiosis allows us to Adapt to our Environment more Positively.
Now, "genetic propagation" is really fascinating and would point toward High/Low Resilience and Eubiosis/Dysbiosis being tied to "Epigenetics" or Changes in our DNA.
Basically, High Resilience/Eubiosis leads to Healthier DNA Expressions and Propagation, while Low Resilience/Dysbiosis leads to Unhealthy DNA Expression and Propagation (Did someone just say Cancer?).
Energy Metabolism is pointing to how well and easily Human Energy (Mg-ATP) is created.
Finally, we have the Anti-Inflammatory Response.
Now, "Inflammation" is a highly discussed topic that is generally misunderstood.
Our body "Needs" Inflammation for Growth to Occur.
As an example, when we Work Out, it Causes Inflammation which sends signals to the body to Repair the Muscles which (when done correctly) Creates Stronger Muscles.
However, the Problem we are seeing "More" often in our World Today could be called "Over-Inflammation".
This means that our Bodies are Reacting to More Stimuli, Faster, with Inflammation, and because they are Over-Reacting it is Causing Larger Issues.
So, if you are in states of "Over-Inflammation", then things with Anti-Inflammatory Properties can be helpful.
When you look deeply into the Research around Energetics (Mg-ATP), you begin to see that Stress Damage (aka Oxidative Stress) is often the Culprit of this Over-Inflammation.
So, within what we are seeing with this Research, when we have High Resilience and Eubiosis, we tend to not become Over-Inflammatory and our bodies have a better Balance between Inflammation/Growth.
The connection most likely is that there is "Less" Stress Damage due to Higher Resilience and Eubiosis.
But the List Continues to Grow.
The High Resilience Group, "... also exhibited increased frequency of pathways facilitating genetic proliferation and pathways providing bacterial energy sources (for example, carbohydrate metabolism)."
This means Better and More Efficient Energy (Mg-ATP) Production, which creates a multitude of Regenerative Effects, including Increased Stress Threshold and Resilience.
The Research further says that the High Resilience and Eubiosis promote, "intact communication between the gut and brain to optimize psychological functioning."
This means that the "Communication" between the Gut-Brain and the Brain works better when there is High Resilience and Eubiosis.
Better Communication leads to Better Decisions and Better Results.
There is also a large section that discusses differences in specific regions of the Brain which points to more evidence proving everything stated thus far...
But there is another interesting thing to note for Leaders who seek Peak Performance.
Most of the Brain Regions Mentioned "Directly" Correlate with the Brain Regions Involved in Flow States (aka Where We Feel and Perform Our Best as Humans).
This Suggests that High Resilience and Eubiosis are "also" Directly Correlated to Flow States.
This would Explain why Flow Researchers often say that "Flow" and "Burnout" are Opposites ("Technically" it is only True in Productivity, but that is what Flow Researchers are Most Interested In).
In Burnout, you will have Lower Resiliency "and" Dysbiosis, which then Impact the Brain Function and Composition, which "literally" Blocks Flow States.
This is why I "Frequently" say that Burnout is a Leader's Greatest Problem in today's World.
So, this is Essentially what this Research is Showing.
The Brain and Gut-Brain are Directly Linked.
When there is Dysbiosis, there is also Low Resilience, causing Significant Challenges that are all Important to Solve if a Leader Hopes to Succeed.
When there is Eubiosis, there is also High Resilience, which makes Life Significantly Better for Leaders.
There are 2 Things the Research does "Not" Show.
We already discussed the First, which is that the Research (due to its Design) could not Analyze which "Comes First" - Changes in Resilience or Changes in Biosis.
However, it is Fair to say that they are likely Highly Correlated to the point where it really doesn't matter.
Either could come "First" and the Results will be Similar.
The Second thing the Research does "Not" Show (again, due to Design) is how to Fix Low Resilience and Dysbiosis.
However, we can Figure out the Answer to this Anecdotally from what we are Seeing in Business.
Brain-Based Resilience Programs are "Not" having Long-Term Effects, as seen with the Increases in Burnout.
Why?
Dysbiosis and Stress Damage Still Exist.
The Resilience "Can Not" Improve because it is being Held Back by a Gut-Brain in Dis-Stress.
As I say, "All Stress Adds".
Until the Gut-Brain Dysbiosis and Stress Damage are Fixed, the Brain becomes "Stuck" in Low Resilience.
The Gut-Brain and Brain are Tied Intricately Together - They Rise and Fall Together.
The Solution?
You must Lower "Total Stressors" enough so that your body can "Recover" from Stress Damage and Dysbiosis.
Once these Improve, you can then Apply "Eustress" to Increase Resiliency and our Stress Threshold.
The Goal with the Eustress is further to Hit Flow States to Maximize Growth.
This is why I Fight so Fiercely for "Regenerative Legacy Design".
Traditional Leadership Development completely ignores Psychophysiology, yet "All" of the Problems Leaders have are Underpinned by their Psychophysiology (and their Teams').
If Leaders "Fix" their Psychophysiological Problems, especially Burnout, then they "Fix" All of their Problems.
That is Why this is So Important to Leaders.
Success for Leaders is Absolutely Dependent on Creating a Regenerative Legacy.