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To give our children the best chance for being strong and resilient you need to be an encourager and teach them to self-encourage. All human beings need encouragement. Encouraging your child not only keeps them feeling more positive and motivated, it also gives them an inner voice that will help them to encourage themselves for the rest of their life.

With the hope of the vaccine ending the pandemic, it is important for us to acknowledge that we are dealing with losses experienced at the hands of the virus. For some, it is the loss of a loved one. For others, it is the loss of life experience, work, and finances. It is important to acknowledge your losses and your feelings of grief. I encourage you to talk to your friends or close family. Grief can happen in response to loss of daily routines and ways-of- life that usually bring us comfort and a feeling of stability. Acknowledge your feelings and process them with friends. Consider what you have learned from all of the experiences you've had during COVID-19 and how you can take this knowledge and build informed changes into your life going forward.

According to the National Human Trafficking Hotline, Human Trafficking can happen to anyone, but some people are more vulnerable than others. Become aware of the warning signs and determine to be an advocate for those experiencing this horrible crime by visiting https://humantraffickinghotline.org/what-human-trafficking

Today, we appropriately set aside time to remember the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. His Letter from a Birmingham Jail is one of the most moving reads I have encountered.  Many things he said over the course of his life can help us all live more fulfilling and resilient lives.  He said related to the power of love and forgiveness, We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.”. Let us all remember the life, legacy, and enduring wisdom of Dr. King. 

COVID-19 has changed how we celebrate this year. I encourage you to think of ways to use the technology available to make these holidays special. Use a social media app to get family together and make a craft. Send out the list of needed supplies and let everyone get what they need before the meeting. Read stories to your grandchildren over the phone or computer. Use the same to Share stories of Christmases past. Use the Netflix party app to remotely watch a holiday movie together and chat. There are still ways to celebrate this season. Find creative ways to adapt. It will help manage the loneliness you may be dealing with this year.

This week is a week where many of us are celebrating holidays or holy days, Hanukkah, Christmas, and Kwanza are on many of our minds. Rather than allowing these special days to become stressful by focusing on planning and getting tasks done, focus on the relationships and deeper the meaning of each celebration. The deeper message in all of these holidays can give us hope and strengthen our resilience. Allow them to enrich your faith while you treasure the people in your life whom you love. 

With COVID-19 affecting our holidays, schools going more and more remote, and the lingering post-election stress it is important to ask ourselves questions that help us manage our stress response.   The Greater Good Science Center poses a few questions to help us think about how we are managing and reacting got what is going on around us (Smith & Suttie 10.2020).

This is Thanksgiving week. Gratitude is the quality of being thankful and the readiness to show appreciation and return kindness. Harvard Medical School writes that “The word gratitude is derived from the Latin word gratia, which means grace, graciousness, or gratefulness. Gratitude encompasses all of these. Gratitude is a thankful appreciation for what you receive, tangible or intangible. With gratitude, people acknowledge the goodness in their lives. In the process, people usually recognize that the source of that goodness lies ...at least partially... outside themselves. Gratitude also helps people connect to something larger than themselves.

This week is Homelessness and Hunger Awareness Week. Mental health is an essential component of your overall life experience. It impacts all domains of life including physical, spiritual, vocational, and relational.  One area of life where a person’s mental health has a big impact is in housing. Surveys indicate that close to half of people who are homeless have a mental health diagnosis. Often depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress can underlie the series of life occurrences that lead a person to homelessness. I would encourage all of us to think of the ways in which we can help those experiencing housing insecurity.

One international study published just this month reports that people who had a strong sense of meaning and purpose in their life were more resilient, especially in relation to Covid-specific stress. What are some things that give us a sense of purpose? Caring for someone who needs your help, an activity or hobby that is meaningful such as gardening or cooking, or being part of a group that connects you with others such as a service club or a church. So if you find yourself stressed don't do less, do more of what gives you a sense of purpose.

If you are in a circumstance in which you are being abused in anyway physically, emotionally, or sexually reach out for help. You deserve to be treated well and in a safe, caring relationship. Help is available by calling Appleseed’s Safe Haven program 24-hour crisis hotline at 419-289-8085. Visit www.safehavenofashland.org for more information.

Appleseed earned the 2020 Platinum Seal of Transparency, the highest level of recognition offered by GuideStar, a service of Candid. By sharing metrics that highlight the progress that Appleseed is making toward its mission, the organization is helping donors move beyond simplistic ways of nonprofit evaluation such as overhead ratios.