What can ecology teach us about resilience?

Ecology is the study of the environment—its systems, interactions, and patterns. You don't have to dig far into the field of ecology to realize that nature has much to teach us humans!

Sometimes, studying nature can expand our creative capacity, like when engineers and designers use the principles of biomimicry to invent new technologies and solve human problems.

Other times, studying ecology can expand our emotional capacity—a sort of biomimicry for the spirit. Take, for example, a study of nature's resilience.

In ecology, resilience is the ability to adapt to or recover from a disturbance that disrupts how life usually operates. You've seen ecological resilience at work, even if you didn't realize it at the time! A flower thriving in a sidewalk crack has persisted in a less-than-ideal growing situation. A gull that leaves a flooded nest and finds a new home has recovered after a disaster. A fish that learns to avoid fishing nets has found a way to live alongside human technology. All of those are examples of ecological resilience.

That adaptive "can do" spirit that defines ecological resilience can inspire personal resilience, too. Exploring ecological resilience in story form, like in the fables that accompany this workbook, allows readers to see the mechanics of resilience: the realization of a bad situation, the decisive "I can find a way" moment, the gathering of community resources, the temporary discomfort of change, and ultimately the opportunity to thrive in a new situation. Studying ecological resilience in this way helps readers imagine how they, too, could adapt, change, persist, and thrive, no matter what life throws at them.

But resilience takes work: it's true for nature and it's true for humans. The activities in this booklet will help introduce the roots of personal resilience, so that readers practice resilience, and then are ready to do the work of resilience when life calls for it.

You can use the activities on their own or in conjunction with the fables. You'll see illustrations in this book that are pulled from the nature fables—a reminder that the roots of resilience are not just needed for human life… they're needed for all life.

Liz is an ecologist and Director of the Community Sceince Initiative at the Duke University Marine Lab.