The adjective resilient means (among other things) “tending to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change”. That’s an excellent capability to have in though times like these, isn’t it?

You may think that resiliency means roughing it like Rambo or the Amish, or that it is a lifestyle that only very rich people who can buy their own ranch can afford. That’s not true. Resilience, especially in the current economical situation, may be both a smarter way to live and a necessity for everybody, especially people with very, very normal lifes and jobs (or lack thereof…). A great way to discover and prove this point is to visit the Resilient Community Wiki: “a collection of all the resources and places that make personal, family, and community resilience possible. Resilience isn’t only about surviving global failures, it’s about building a better life for you and everyone around you."

Click for a while on their “random page” link and you’ll see how and why resilience isn’t about survival, but about living as close to how you already live, just smarter. As an exaxmple, here is what I found on that wiki with a little “random page” clicking:

• “bug out bag”: a portable container of items that you and your family can quickly take with you in the event that an emergency forces you to leave your home (potentially permanently).

• Black & Decker Complete Photo Guide to Home Repair

• Abington Bank - Huntingdon Valley locally owned bank

• Dayton Community Vegetable Garden

• Bricks made of PET plastic bottles and cement

Do you see what I meant? Vegetable gardens, fair banking, home repair, safety… this is all stuff we rightly associate with ordinary, very bourgeois life, not survival, isn’t it? Resilience is good for everybody. Resilience is “business as usual, as far as things that really matter are concerned”. We should all try resilience a bit. Before we’re forced to, that is.