Behaviorist, psychology researcher, and expert on the topic of resiliency, Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe, explains how to stay resilient even in the face of hardship, how to prioritize and set goals, the 5 Pillars of resilience, the importance of taking a pause, the perspective shift brought on by her podcast co-host, navigating the realms of wellness, and the role of perseverance in building your legacy.

Welcome to Let's Talk Legacy. I'm your host, Gary

Michels, and today we are joined by Dr Robyne Hanley-Dafoe. She's

behaviorist, psychology researcher, educator and

international speaker. Is one of the world's greatest experts on

the topic of resiliency, something which is critical for

all of us to establish a legacy. Doctor, welcome to the show.

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Well, thank you for having me. I'm

glad to be here.

To get started. Tell us, what is your

definition, or the scientific definition, shall I say, of

resiliency?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: I love this question. So resiliency in

my work, and what we talk about is this idea about, how do we

essentially take all the broken parts and put it together in

this mosaic of how we get to find a comeback, how we are able

to bounce back, how we're able to kind of reimagine, redefine,

rebuild once, what was like something that we thought was

going to go a particular way, for example, and then all of a

sudden there's this detour. And what do we do with those pieces?

And how do we rebuild a big, bright teacher? So to me, it's

incorporate so much on that behavioral perspective, but also

that psychological perspective, and really how we kind of work

with our variables so we can build big, bright futures. In

the research that we've done, what we were able to identify is

that people who were resilient, that they seem to be able to

kind of lean into a particular set of tools approaches, or what

we've called the Five Pillars. So how a person like develops

and learns those pillars is one thing, but I think for us to

first understand, like, what those are, and then we can

imagine all the different ways people can go about it. So the

first one was belonging. It's that you need a home team. You

have to have people that you're fighting for. You have to have

people that matter to you and also you matter to them. When

people have some person that's looking out for them in their

corner, we know it allows them to tap into this whole other

level of tools and resources and energy to be able to show up

even in the most difficult seasons in time. So having that

one caring, consistent kind of person in our world matters. The

second we talk about is perspective, this ability to,

like, see the big picture, but also, like all the little things

that contribute to that big picture and we also tie into

that area as well, this notion of like, this alignment between

our head and our heart, right for sure. Like, resiliency

requires problem solving, critical thinking, but it also

requires, like being able to feel our way through the world,

to be able to like work in those situations and process our

emotions. So we see that perspective piece was really

important. The third one, which again, was a bit of a sticking

point for so many people, was the idea of acceptance of

working within our controllables. And I think

sometimes people get stuck because they think acceptance

means approval, that we have to, like, you know, approve of

what's happening. We don't have to approve it. We need to be

able to work with it and to have, like, real, raw

conversations about what our realities are. The fourth

variable, which I personally think the world needs such a big

dose of right now is the perspective of hope. We know

that part of human resiliency, there's this through line of

hope that we have to trust that better days are ahead. And this

isn't what I think right now is getting really popular around

this kind of toxic positivity where, you know, we just need to

kind of think about rainbows and, you know, manifestation, or

perhaps, like you know, if affirmations and ponies, this is

just a genuine ability, that even in the dark seasons, we

there's like this part of us that knows that we are going to

find our way through it, that we're well resourced. And again,

things might be hard right now, and we trust we'll figure it

out. And the fifth variable, that's this wee bit of a wild

card in such an extreme way, was we learned that, like, resilient

people use humor, and it wasn't like humor, and then, like, you

know, it wasn't like they were deflecting things or not taking

things seriously, that they they understood the importance of a

pause, that understanding, you know, being able to like, like,

make light of what you can make light of, even In difficult

scenarios, that they have this amazing capacity to be able to,

like still, find moments of relief, and we saw that through

laughter. So for example, when you laugh, your body releases a

natural tranquilizer. Your pain receptors are blocked, so people

were able to use that as just a moment of reprieve. So that way,

they were able to respond versus react to what was ever in front

of them.

It sounds like people who stay resilient have a

good sense of perspective. They're realistic, but also

still very optimistic, not cynical. Is that correct?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, this idea that hope triumphs

experience. And as a behaviorist, I'm the first one

that's going to tell you your past you know past behavior is

the best predictor of your future behavior, how you

experience the world is so indicative of what you've gone

through. Yet, even when we've had a difficult outcome or

something, hasn't turned out our way, hope triumphs that

experience. It's being able to say, You know what I know this

is why this went off the rails, or why perhaps this got, you

know, this didn't work out, and I'm. To try again. It's that

ability to like, not let that negative experience or that

rejection or that hurt, like, preclude you from having a big

future, right? So it's this ability that it like, has this

awesome capacity to say, like, try again. You know, life

experience might tell us don't do that. It could hurt or it

might not be your best choice. Well, yeah, but we find a way to

persist.

For a lot of people, even if someone has a

really hard experience, if it has a positive outcome, that's

all that stands out in their mind. Do you find that's the

case?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, oh for sure. It does absolutely

like how, again, how we like process, how we kind of navigate

what we've gone through, but that requires this degree of

like self awareness, that ability to pause enough after a

mistake or a setback, or some type of, you know, event that's

requiring resiliency to actually, like, take stock,

right, do a little bit of that act after action report, almost

of like, okay, like, what you know, kind of what went off the

rails, or what was difficult, or, you know, what can I learn

from this? And there's this kind of beautiful, kind of philosophy

that speaks of, if we kind of wiped away every mistake we ever

made in our past, we would lose who we are today. And so that

notion of the importance of it, and as I say, like, I have a mom

of three teenagers, and one of my go tos with my teenagers is,

don't waste a mistake, right? Like, don't, don't, you know,

add it with blame and shame. Like, who cares? Like, that

won't serve you at all. Don't waste this mistake. How are we

going to take the lessons learned there and we're going to

be able to move forward? But on that note, one of the things

that I sometimes get concerned about is when people, for

example, process things in such a way where they'll say, like,

oh, everything happens for a reason. You know, you have to,

like, you know, go through that and, you know, to a point. Yes,

things work for a reason, but some things also just suck.

Like, some things are just horrible. And I think sometimes

when people try to be like, they try to rush recoveries, for

example, in the name of resiliency, right? They're like,

oh, I want to be a resilient person, so I'm not going to

process it. I'm just going to like, you know, you know, ignore

it, override and I'm just going to jump to the next thing,

because I want to be resilient. That's actually not really being

of service to yourself on the best kind of deepest, wisest

way. You're just going to set yourself up that you're going to

have to do that work later.

You mentioned the importance of pausing and taking

stock after an experience before moving ahead. Are there a few

key things that we want to keep in mind, as we're looking back

and reflecting?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: I really love this question. So

there's a couple different kind of ideas that jumped top of mind

for me on this one. First of all, I actually love this

practice of having what I love to call like my like, my failing

journal, I know love people, love to, you know, journal about

just kind of getting your all their thoughts and feelings out

of their head, which is a great practice. I love a fail journal

where when something doesn't work out, when I've dropped the

ball or something outside of my control has happened, I'll just

take a couple minutes and jot it down, but this is the key. I

leave a lot of space underneath that entry, because I'm going to

come back in three months. I might come back in six months,

and I'm definitely going to come back at the end of the year,

because I want to see how that failure, that setback, that

lesson, that mistake, I want to see how it actually impacted my

future. And sometimes when I go back, I realize, like, wow,

like, I'm glad that that thing happened, because that then

started this like domino effect, or this cascading of these other

things that had that not happened, I wouldn't have gotten

there. So having a failed journal and leaving space for

it. It takes the kind of the shame and the power away of that

feeling that, you know, oh, we don't want to document the bad

stuff because we don't want to bring more of that into our

lives, which is absolutely the opposite. It's like, when we

actually start to see this, like tapestry of how all this is

working together. It's pretty remarkable. So that's a one. The

other one is, is just actually having a, you know, another kind

of practice I love to use. It's a reoccurring appointment with

myself. Or once a month, I just block off an hour, and I rarely

take the full hour, but just do again, just a little bit of a

check in. Like, how did last month go? What were some of the

lessons learned? Or, you know, if there's something that I

noticed I'm stuck on right? It might be a feeling. It might be

an experience. I might notice, especially our stressors. We

like to revisit those at like, 1am in the morning, so I take

note of where I'm stuck. And what I do is just kind of that,

once a month meeting with myself for just an hour and just kind

of do that little check and notice, is there anywhere I'm

stuck, is there anything that I need to maybe haven't processed

yet? And just again, just having that little bit of

accountability check. And what's so interesting, somebody

recently said to me, they're like, you know, oh, I don't have

an hour to check in with myself once a month. And it's like,

you're going to be forced to take time down the road. I

actually have gotten the point where, like, I look forward to

it, right? Like, I look forward to just kind of slowing things

down, taking stock, taking inventory, and again, not using

it as, like, setting goals, per se, but just like, a really good

kind of awareness. Pause. Just be like, okay, am I okay? And

if, again, on that note, if I notice something that am stuck

on that, I have to do some work on that. I'm going to set some

intention to do some work on that. I'm going to revisit that.

And the other question I love to ask in that place is, like,

like, who, who's telling like, the kind of idea. Idea I have

about this. It's like, where am I getting that information from?

Like, is it being driven by my ego? Is it being driven by is it

outside appearances? You know, is it being driven by somebody

who is definitely not paying my mortgage? I'm really careful

about kind of doing a wee bit of an autopsy of some of those big

emotions to see who or where am I getting some of the

information, because that stuff left unchecked festers in our

psychology.

Our show takes a very long term view of most

topics, because it's focused on creating and leaving behind a

legacy. So first of all, what does the word legacy mean to

you?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: I love that question. What's so

interesting for me, where I kind of really resonate with the idea

of legacy. It's not like it's not remembering me, it's

remembering the work or remembering how the work was

done. So legacy, to me, is something that lives beyond the

person, and it's around impact. And to me, one of the greatest

blessings that I can hope to achieve in the work that I do

again, around human resiliency and well being, is is not that

it was, this is what she said, or this is what she talked

about, is that ripple effect, for example, of hoping a

strategy where people develop this philosophy that you know

better days are ahead, and they don't need to know who

necessarily said it, or how it came to be, it just becomes part

of the collective. So I think it's taking ourselves out of it,

but we're letting the goodness stay long after our time here.

So talk about being resilient in the short

term, maybe through a specific period of hardship, versus being

resilient long term, over years or decades. How do those

different, and are there different tools or steps to

each?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, again, another you're asking

such cool questions. So I think, on the short term is when we

lean in a lot more to some of the like the behavioral

practices. So one of the reasons, for example, and you

know, my first book that I put out was all about human

performance and resiliency, and, you know, we talked about these

pillars and but one of the things that, you know, the

reason why the second book was the second book was one of the

variables that we were able to come upon, is that the more a

person looked after their whole well being like throughout their

lives, outside or inside of a difficult season or a difficult

situation, that actually offered them this really interesting

hedge of protection from some of the negative things that would

happen with somebody when they're experiencing practices

of resiliency. So essentially, the more we look after ourselves

when things are good and calm and things are manageable, the

better we are positioned when things go off course. So that's

why the second book that came out was about human well being,

and what does it take to actually be well, especially

when the world is so unwell. So what I the reason I'm sharing

that is because when we think on the short term, it's what we do

each and every day, that's going to set us up for our capacity to

be resilient. So even, like what we said when we talked about

that person who like, said, Hey, I don't have one hour a month to

check in with myself if anything happens to them, right? They

have no spaciousness in their life because they're already

probably burned out, right? They're probably already

overextended. Their resources are probably quite drained. So

then that way when that bad thing happens, it's going to

knock them out, versus someone who keeps that little bit of

spaciousness, that little bit of awareness, that just that little

bit of ease. So then that way they're able to bend and adapt

when things go awry, and you need to have just a little bit

of ebb and flow. We can't always operate kind of in the red or at

100% because when that bad thing happens, it's going to knock us

out. So the short term stuff is, like the everyday stuff now, in

terms of, like the big picture, the kind of, you know, the

looking at that kind of 1000 view of, kind of out of it, one

of the things that we know about that is it becomes this, you

know, this tapestry, or this narrative of how we show up in

the world. And one of, to me, one of the greatest markers of

resiliency that I don't think a lot of people talk about, is

when people have gone through bad things or horrible things,

like no good, rotten things, and they've processed it and done

the work, and they can still be kind, that they can still be

like, have faith and have trust, and they still lean into like

humanity, people who have gone through just the worst of the

worst things, yet somehow still believe in the good in the

world. To me, that is like the pinnacle of resiliency, because

people can get through stuff 100% but if you can get through

stuff and still have a soft heart and still have a generous

heart, you're you are winning on every level of life. You know, I

do get concerned, though, again, as I said before, where people

are rushing in the name of resiliency, or again, shutting

themselves down or blocking things, and it's like no. The

whole idea is that we process it in such a way, and we show up in

how we're living our lives in such a way that we're not

defined by our past, that the past happened absolutely but

that doesn't preclude that big future where we trust that all

will be well and that, you know, better days are ahead and and

that living, hope filled is a really beautiful way, especially

as we age. You know the fact that if we can stay soft as

we're aging, and we can still have faith in humanity like

again, that's that's, to me, what will. Really make the

difference in how somebody approaches their recoveries or

their comebacks.

How does resiliency play into someone's

trying to achieve their legacy goals? For that matter, what are

some of the most effective and proven ways towards achieving

any goal, including lifelong goals?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Again it's one of the things that's so

interesting, is that, I think so often when we think about goals

is this, this notion that it's like a final destination, right?

Like this is what we're trying to get to, but the reality it's

like the things that we do each and every day with consistency

and with intention that's going to give us the best return on

our investments. So that notion that, like, it's not always

meant to be like, this positive, smooth upswing, that there's

going to be setbacks. That's part of learning. Like, learning

is messy. It's even just this past weekend, I had a

conversation with another group of parents, and, you know,

they're, you know, commiserating about the fact that they're, you

know, teenager was in a mood, and I just paused the

conversation because I think, for example, teenagers get such

a brutal reputation in our society where it's like, gosh,

they're, they're not adults, and they're not kids. And anyway,

and I said to the person, I'm like, do you expect your

teenager to be in a good mood every single day? Do you expect

them to be like, you know, chasing those goals and locked

in and hungry for their features every single day? And the person

was like, well, sort of, I'm like, Are you in a good mood

every single day? Like, as a grown person, like, are you

every single day locked in moving that needle forward, you

know, always in this positive, you know, Outlook and, you know,

there was just this little bit of this pause where it's like,

yeah, well, we are. It's not that human condition isn't meant

to be in this smooth, static state of always improving,

always going the right direction, so making space for

the realness of each and every day. And if we kind of embrace

that little bit of that messiness and the ebbs and flows

that is our nature, we will have a better experience working

towards that trajectory of legacy as we age, as we go, you

know, move forward when we realize it's not meant to be

smooth, and there's going to be, you know, this pause right where

you do the work and you realize, okay, so this is one experience.

And you know what mountain ranges tend to be? Have lots of

summits, and recognizing that there is an opportunity to be

able to Okay, now let's look at the next summit and, and

sometimes our legacy isn't just one thing. It's like this

mountain range. It's this foothills, it's these valleys

and, and that, in itself, is a testament to just how amazing

the lived experience can be. Well, we give ourselves

permission that we're not perfect and we don't need to be

to have a really great life.

Prioritization is a big part of setting and

achieving goals, both big and small. What are the best ways to

prioritize what matters most to you in your journey?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, so one of the things I can, I

can share with you and on a couple different notes around

like that, prioritization. I think sometimes people get a

little bit confused about time management and priority

management, about like, how do we fit time into these things?

And when things are a priority, we make the time we we can,

like, create these non negotiables around that time. So

if we have kind of too many things happening at play, time

becomes a factor. But when we have radical clarity of what

matters most, and we make it matter most, things become a lot

more kind of straight, streamlined for us. So I think

again, just kind of wrestling with that notion of time

management versus the priority. So often I'd say people say to

me, like, this is my priority, but I don't have enough time,

right? And time has such an illusion, and you know, that

notion of not having enough time, it ties into that scarcity

mindset. And I hear people all the time wake up and say, you

know, Rob and I didn't get enough sleep last night, or I

don't have a I don't have the right team that's going to help

me make this project move forward. And they're always kind

of on their back foot, versus that sufficiency mindset, that

trust, that I'm well resourced, that I can figure this stuff

out, is just one right decision after another. So again,

priority and time management is one of those stumbling blocks

that I think offers some help. And the other one that we often

talk about is, again, there's so many noise there's so much noise

and negativity and distractions, where all of a sudden we might

not even notice, because we're on autopilot, that we're making

things a priority that are not a priority. So again, it's that

noise if we're on autopilot, if we're not careful, we feel like

we just ought to do or we should do, when the reality is it's

like the stuff that matters most. It's like right in front

of us, if we give it the right attention.

Your debut book covering many of these topics is

called Calm within the Storm, a pathway to everyday resiliency.

I love it. That's a great title. Tell us a bit about the book,

and also your your second book Stress Wisely. That's a good

name, which is out now.

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: So book number one really dives into

human resiliency, like, how do people, like, build resilient

practices that are going to let them live a good life, like, how

they can bounce back, build those comebacks when they're

going through something challenging. The second book,

stress wisely. One of the things that was so cool that we learned

about in our research is usually there's this heavy emphasis on

physical well being, right, sleep, nutrition, exercise.

Absence of disease, that's what everyone was talking about. Then

I stumbled on research that talks about, for example, like

loneliness will kill you faster than a bad diet. Yet we are

talking about social connection, and we're not talking about,

like, building communities the same way what we are hype cycled

by nutrition and all of that kind of stuff, even though we

know this is more detrimental to us as a group of people. So what

stress wisely, really started to do is, like, unpack a lot of

this, like, misinformation that's out there about well

being, and really took a holistic approach that says, You

know what? Sometimes the best thing that you could do for your

well being today is actually not run to the gym and, like, try to

hate yourself healthy. The best thing you could actually do is,

like, clean out your car, like, literally, just tidy up your

environment, experience an immediate win. Be able to bask

in just a little bit of organization and accomplishment.

Because going to the gym, yes, it's important, and it has its

place. But if you're so tired, burned out and depleted, the

last thing you need to do is punch your body with all that

extra cortisol, give yourself some gentle wins being able to

just have that tidy space. And then guess what? The next day,

when you're feeling a little bit better, you take that clean car,

you drive to the gym, and you're starting to always feel like

you're having this positive momentum. So stress wisely

unpacks the eight realms of wellness. It's full of these

really practical ways of like, how to show up today for the

best return on your investment for tomorrow.

You also expand upon your work in your online

community called Anchor Labs, which focuses on resiliency for

leaders. Tell us about Anchor Labs.

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah so anchor Labs is kind of that.

Kind of was the answer to folks after I've worked with them, to

say, like, what else right? I want to dive deeper. I want to

spend more time learning about some of these, like,

undercurrents of these behaviors. So anchor Labs is a

series of courses that allows people, at a self paced kind of

way, to embrace and kind of dive deeper into some of these

concepts and really get sustained results, which,

whereas as scientists, that's what we're all about. We want to

make sure people have the tools to be able to have the outcomes

that so many people are promised, but don't actually

have a chance of having. But we actually found a way to get that

to people, which it's really exciting to be part of.

And you also co host a weekly podcast with

singer and songwriter Peter Katz, titled In Time. Peter is

from such a different background than you. How did the two of you

come together and collaborate?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, so Peter Katz is my co host, and

he is a brilliant singer songwriter. He is just a

remarkable, talented human who is also deeply creative as the

takes to be a master in that field. And so Peter and I, we've

been friends for a really long time, and this is this kind of

neat thing that ended up happening. So Peter and I,

again, we come from such different perspectives, right?

Like, he's literally a musician, I'm a scientist. And what would

happen is we would be like, just chit chatting. We'd be talking

about something, and then we noticed people would be like,

listening, right? Like we could be in like a coffee shop having

a chat, or going down for a walk on on the boardwalk, and then

people just be like, how did you guys like? What did you guys

say? Or how did you come upon that? And it's just really

enriched conversation from different world views. And I

think so often we spend a lot of our time with like minded

people, which is great. We want to surround ourselves with

people that are going to elevate us and move us forward, but they

tend to be the people who think a lot like we do. And what we

wanted to offer, what we shared with the world is this, like,

once a week, little check in where we just are. We're just

having a conversation about, you know, what, what we're seeing,

what we're going through. Both of us are also professional

speakers, so we're kind of always traveling around the

world and and we call it in time, because we just drop in

for half an hour wherever we are, and we just talk about

things that that we're seeing and patterns and trends that we

notice are happening and and really just try to offer people

like this place where, you know, we can have dialog and discourse

and just talk about something other than all that negativity,

unfortunately, that just is so prevalent right Now in our

lives, and kind of a safe space where people can land just to,

like, listen to some cool ideas that maybe could shift some ways

of seeing the world. I gave you a really quick example of a neat

little learning that happened really early on when we were on

this podcast together. I made a comment just really quickly, and

I said, you know, oh, this will allow me to kind of kill two

birds with one stone, right? It's an expression that I grew

up with, seems like, yeah, people get it. And he paused and

he said, or do you think you could try to feed like two birds

from one hand? And he's just like, Robin, your language is so

aggressive, like, you have really violent language at

times. And I'm like, what? And he's like, Yeah. He said, you

know? He said, You, you know, you Yeah, had this great

interview. You killed it. And he's like, or were you really

impactful, right? So as a creative He's so sensitive to

language, because, again, he's a master of words, and just this,

like, radical kind of interruption for me, where all

of a sudden everybody's like, wow, I use really, really

aggressive language, even though I would say, like, I really care

deeply about people, and I'm so tender hearted, wow, I didn't

even notice how. Aggressive. Sometimes my language was so

again again. It's just something so simple as how we describe

something and how when we hear it from another person's

perspective, it just, it's just a really cool learning and

anytime we can have those like, wow, I never saw it that way. I

just think that's this beautiful, like, there's just so

much possibility there to just really shift our thinking in an

elevated way.

What legacy do you hope to leave behind through

your professional work, anchor labs, the podcast and groups you

speak with and to?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: On a professional level? The legacy

that I want to offer is that hope is a strategy for all of

this, in terms of resiliency, in terms of well being like, I just

want that to be something that people carry into the future,

that we're not defined by the worst things that have happened

to us, that there's these comebacks that are available.

And I just really want that to permeate that, yeah, there's a

lot of hardship in the world, a lot of injustice, a lot of bad

parts, and there's a way through it, so that professionally, I

want to, I do want to radically shift how we think about

resiliency, to include it, to also include hope.

So how is that different from what you'd

consider to be your personal legacy?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: Yeah, so it definitely has. There's

definitely parts that break together. For me, the legacy and

she was someone that was very generous, that she forgave, and

she was very generous with forgiveness. She was very

generous with the people in her lives. And again, you don't need

to remember me. I just want you to remember how I made other

people feel, that they felt that generosity.

Where can our listeners connect with you and

pick up copies of your books, your the podcast, or learn more?

Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe: So the best starting place again at Dr,

robyne.ca, Robyne with an E and again, on social. I find social

is a great way to be able to keep these conversations going.

So Dr, Robyne, on social and again, thank you so much for

just asking such big, beautiful questions. Thank you for just

being so prepared for this. And I really appreciate your work.

I've been listening to your podcast in my morning walks, and

I just love the work that you're doing, like it's just such a

refreshing approach that you cover so many different topics,

and I love it. I just love that you're putting this into the world.