In this episode, I talk to George Bonanno about trauma and resiliency. We start off by discussing what people get wrong about trauma and how this led to the invention of the PTSD diagnosis. George defines what resilience is, how it’s different from growth, and its paradoxical correlation to individual differences. Finally, he elaborates on how the flexibility mindset and sequence help us get through personal traumatic events or global tragedies like 9/11 or the COVID-19 pandemic. Bio Dr. George Bonanno is a professor of psychology, chair of the department of counseling in clinical psychology, and director of the Loss, Trauma, and Emotion Lab at Teachers College Columbia University. He’s the author of The Other Side of Sadness and The End of Trauma. Website: www.tc.columbia.edu/LTElab/ Twitter: @giorgiobee Topics 00:01:41 Jerome L. Singer’s influence on George 00:05:42 Society’s skewed view of trauma 00:08:15 Explaining the PTSD diagnosis 00:10:38 People are more resilient than you think 00:14:23 Resilience VS growth 00:19:50 The resilience paradox 00:24:44 The flexibility mindset 00:29:58 The flexibility sequence 00:34:50 How to be more flexible 00:38:11 Goal-directed self-talk 00:47:50 The resilience blind spot 00:50:06 What 9/11 teaches us about resilience 00:53:10 We’ll overcome the COVID-19 pandemic