When the Olympics were on this summer, of all the highlight reels that played to frame the upcoming action, the one that stuck out to me the most was Kerri Strug, the young girl who competed on the vault with a broken ankle. This moment is lauded in American Olympic history as a moment of great resilience and determination. It’s set up as an example of American individualism and American greatness. Fight through the pain. Be the boss of yourself. Sacrifice, pull yourself up by your bootstraps, and most importantly, win. Against all odds, win. This line of thinking has helped well-meaning but oft misguided Americans validate and encourage everything from racism to unhealthily skewed visions of both work-life balance and personal wellness. This gymnastic example is what I deem to be “unhealthy resiliency.”
 
Each time I have been in therapy, the term resilience has been tossed around as both an end and a means to an end. How do you beat depression? Resilience. How do you overcome an eating disorder? Resilience. Resilience wins gold medals and earns PhDs; resilience is seen as the way to conquer mental health struggles and institutional barriers. What a strong word we use so casually. The one thing resilience always seems to forget about is humanity.
 
Collective humanity has become so far removed from traditional American discourse that what I am talking about is individual humanity. Because the power behind the word resilience comes not from an actual tool, but a living, breathing human being. Something without sentience cannot be resilient because resilience requires action. In a positive sense, it requires individuals to think positively and fight through the daily injustices we all face in unique ways. More often than not, however, unhealthy resilience causes us to take actions that further support our projected and internalized oppression.
 
Unhealthy levels of resilience suggest that, instead of taking a day off when we’re sick, we should find a way to continue to use our mind even when our body fails us. This has only become worse in the era of Zoom where professors of all levels are expected to never miss a day and emails about wellness in the time or COVID focus more on how to get classes moved temporarily online rather than if this should be occurring in the first place or if professors feel healthy enough to be teaching on a particular day. Students are bearing the same weight, expected to keep up with four or five classes while simultaneously attending to their health. This pandemic has moved past being simply a health crisis and has branched into a tool used by those in power to further invalidate and overwork their subordinates. It has exacerbated the American problem of excellence by making it more convenient, but less available.
 
So, we send emails. Field phone calls and text messages. Show up terrified and hopeful. The so-called higher minds of America wake from their sleep (if they’re getting any) each night simply to repeat the mantras “One day at a time,” without pausing to acknowledge that maybe the forward progress that comes from taking life one day at a time is keeping us from ever pausing to rest, lest we be fired, or worse, admonished by colleagues, family, and friends.
 
When my mom and I have particularly difficult weeks, we always talk about our desire and wish that life would just stop for a day so we could get our bearings. Work and rest. Take care of the overflowing laundry, get caught up on our never-ending work requests, then just have a day to sit in silence. This is what we need right now. Not another assignment. It is not enough to simply take the noble step of calling off class to take care of ourselves, we must also cancel the next one to take genuine time to ourselves where we are not keeping everything above water, but instead taking a moment to let ourselves float unencumbered.
 
First and foremost, before the publications and the labs, the symposiums, and the colloquia, we are educators. And what we do (or do not do), how we show up (or refuse to) matters. And even still, before we are educators, we are people, just trying to make it through the day amidst each of our social, political, and civil roles. It is time we put unhealthy resilience aside and model something deeper and more meaningful, a resilience that does not shy away from difficult situations but instead acknowledges the rest and recovery that we need to fully face our challenges. This is the resilience I will be practicing this semester – and I hope you will, too.

– Delaney Couri
 
Delaney is a first-year Ph.D. student in the College of Liberal Arts.