ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. (December 22, 2016) -- The holiday season is officially here and the U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command's, or ATEC, Master Resiliency Trainers reminded the workforce to keep the holidays in perspective during their monthly resiliency training session at ATEC Headquarters, or HQ, Dec. 8.
ATEC's resiliency sessions are in support of the U.S. Army's Ready and Resilient Campaign Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness Program, which is designed to build resilience and enhance performance of the Army family by providing self-development tools to better perform in stressful situations in life.
For this month's resiliency session, ATEC partnered with Jennifer Eichner, chief of Army Community Service on Aberdeen Proving Ground.
Eichner started the session with a question towards the audience: "How do you feel about the holidays?" Some people responded with excitement towards the upcoming holidays while others were not as excited.
"Although the holidays are approaching, each of us might have different sentiments concerning the holidays due to events that took place in the past that trigger thoughts that create our feelings and reactions," said Eichner.
Eichner explains how the negativity bias plays a big part in someone's thinking. "We have the ability to change the way we think. So if you are thinking negatively… change it! Most of the time we forget that every day is not going to be perfect, but every day has a purpose."
Learning how to tune into your thoughts can help someone better manage their emotions and reactions, allow someone to feel in control, and create the resilience skills of self-awareness and self-regulation.
"When you don't tune into your thoughts, it creates an inability to keep things in perspective, you lose your sense of control, it becomes difficult to build positive emotion, and you may develop catastrophic thinking patterns," said Eichner.
Eichner concluded the session by encouraging the audience to highlight three good things from each day going forward. "This can include: why this good thing happened, what this good thing means to you, and what ways you or others contribute to this good thing."
Eichner stated that science tells us that it takes three positive thoughts to outweigh one negative thought.
The next resiliency session will be on Problem Solving, presented by Dr. Andree Mountain and Staff Sgt. Cornelius Penn, at 9 a.m. Jan. 12 ATEC HQ.
To learn more about the ATEC's Ready and Resilient efforts, visit www.atec.army.mil/r2c.
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