All right, now, we're going to hear a story of resilience from somebody that I so deeply respect. Her name is Jennifer Loredo. Jennifer Loredo is an Army veteran. She served for 21 years. And now she's retired and she's a certified CrossFit trainer. She does a lot of speaking at conferences on the topic of resilience. And I got to know her through our work training resilience to the US Army. Jennifer Loredo became one of the lead trainers of the Army, and I'm just really excited for you to get to hear one of her stories of resilience. She's going to talk to us about a deeply personal time in her life in which she needed to martial her resilience to make it through this difficult chapter. What I'd like you to do as you're listening to this story, is to note down each of the variables that you hear in Jennifer's story that enabled her to handle this difficult experience. Now just as a reminder, we've talked about the key variables of resilience being biology, self-awareness, of tuning in to what you're thinking and feeling and your physiology. Self-regulation, being able to sort of control all that stuff. Mental agility, looking at things from multiple perspectives. Self-efficacy and mastery, sort of feeling attached to something larger than yourself. And also feeling a sense of mastery and purpose, optimism and other positive emotions. Connection, so feeling deeply connected to the people in your life and also connected to organizations and missions. And the last one was positive institutions. So as Jennifer tells her story, take a moment to listen for those variables. Which ones do you hear showing up in Jennifer's story? >> My story of resilience. It's really kind of hard for me to know exactly where to begin. But I think the most natural place would be in late 2010, when the army told me that they were going to send me to the University of Pennsylvania to learn how to become a master resilience trainer. Five months prior to going to Philadelphia, my life was a little bit different. I was actually a first sergeant stationed in Afghanistan, or deployed to Afghanistan. With the first company of dental soldiers to deploy in support of the war. So it was our job to deploy and provide dental services to all the beneficiaries in Afghanistan. During that time my husband was also stationed in Afghanistan. He had been there for almost a year and was actually getting ready to finish up his tour and head back to take care of our two children. About six weeks after I arrived in Afghanistan, I was informed that Eddie had been in an accident. And that I was going to be sent to the hospital that he was at immediately. So, basically be by his side. Eddie was in infantryman and he was fighting the war, which we both knew good and well what the possibilities of that job would entail. But we just never really thought that we would find ourselves in the position that we were on that day which was June 24, 2010. I was sent down south in Afghanistan where he was, to the hospital that he was at having surgery. Basically, Eddie was on a patrol and an IED exploded. And he immediately lost his left leg, but was still alive and was able to be brought to the hospital to be taken care of. So the whole time that I was travelling to where he was at, I was just really thinking, I knew our lives were going to change dramatically. But I knew he would still be alive when I got there and he would be still happy to see me. So I got to the hospital and I ran into the room where he was, and I quickly realized for myself that Eddy had passed away. Like I said, it was June 24th, 2010. It was literally minutes before his 35th birthday. And as you can probably imagine, my life took a drastic turn that I just really wasn't expecting. So, the next several days are fairly blurry, but I do remember escorting his body back to the United States. And once I arrived, there were many family and friends that were there just ready to wrap their arms around me and be there for whatever I needed. Which, at that point, I wasn't really sure what I needed. But I just remember having those people there meant the world to me. And so I had to figure out what life was going to be like now without Eddie and still a soldier. And raising my two children now on my own. So I took a little bit of time off to try to figure out what that looked like. And when I did decide to go back to work, the senior leadership of the installation I was assigned to told me that the Army was standing up this somewhat new program called Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness. And it was a resilience program that would be teaching our soldiers and families how to be more resilient. And the leadership believed that I was a good candidate to help stand that program up for our installation. And I remember thinking, you've got to be kidding me. I've just experienced this horrific loss a few months ago, and you're going to give me this huge project to undertake. But I don't know, I had those thoughts for a short period of time. But very quickly found myself thinking that this is all happening for some reason that is a little fuzzy but eventually is going to make sense to me. And so fast forward to late 2010 where I began. I was sent to Philadelphia to learn how to become a master resilience trainer. And really didn't know what I was getting myself into. But I remember thinking that there's no way the army could teach me, or the University of Pennsylvania could teach me, how to be resilient. Because I'm already resilient. And maybe I can teach them a thing or two about this resilience. And boy was I wrong. I learned so much in those two weeks about myself and how to teach others. Maybe share my story sometimes when it was appropriate. But how to teach others, people that are very near and dear to my heart, soldiers and their families, how to be resilient. >> All right, I'm guessing, like me, you heard many many different variables or aspects that Jennifer tapped into as she described her experiences to us. She talked about the support that she got from her family and from her friends. She talked about her commitment to raising her two children as a single mom. There's lots of elements of resilience in that. And certainly a key aspect is that deep sense of connection that she felt. She also talked about her work at Fort Bragg, when she was identified by the leadership there to become one of the key resilience trainers. And that was at a difficult time in her life, and I heard optimism in the way she was describing that. That she saw this as an opportunity to take on something meaningful. I also heard connection, you probably did as well. That she was connected to something larger than herself, a sense of purpose. I also heard self-efficacy, right? Her feeling a sense of mastery that comes through that new challenge. So you heard in Jennifer's story different aspects of resilience that helped her kind of make it through that very difficult phase and time in her life, that really deep loss. What I'd like you to do now is to reflect on an experience from your life where you can explore your own resilience. It doesn't have to be a major loss like Jennifer experienced, it can be getting through sort of the daily grinds of life. But what I'd like you to do is to think about an experience that you feel like you tapped into your own resilience. And I want you to take the time to write that story out, free form, just however that story comes tumbling out of you is fine. Tell your story. After you've taken the time to write your story of resilience, I'd like you to go back and look at your own story. And identify the variables that you believed contributed to your ability to navigate your experience. Optimism, connection, self-regulation, whatever those variables were. So that your learning from your own life history, of what you tap into when you need resilience.
