7 practices to strengthen your daily resilience

How Positran's Positive Action Cards help to strengthen everyone's resilience

We have brought together in a set of 64 cards the most solid interventions in positive psychology, all validated by scientific research. These 64 activities are grouped under the acronym ACTIONS, which represents 7 types of simple and concrete exercises to integrate into your daily life: Physical Activity, Understanding, Tranquility, Identity, Optimism, Us, Satisfaction.

7 actions to strengthen your resilience to daily

These 7 categories of activities are used by many professionals to help everyone:

• improve their well-being,
• experience more positive emotions,
• strengthen their connections,
• develop their confidence and resilience.

Research shows that these exercises are more effective when they are chosen freely. Only test the ones that resonate with you.

Here's a look at each one and what the science says about them.

1. Physical Activity: moving to take care of the body and mind

Physical activity is one of the most powerful interventions for improving mood. Some studies show that a sports program of 3 × 30 minutes per week may be as effective as antidepressant treatment (Babyak et al., 2000).
The practice of yoga, in particular, is associated with increased gratitude and greater meaning in life (Ben Shahar, 2010).

👉 How to go about it?

Yoga can be practiced almost anywhere, without expensive equipment. Many platforms offer accessible sessions, including for beginners (such as chair yoga). Everyone can adapt the practice to their level.

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases psychological well-being
• Reduces depressive symptoms

2. Understanding: writing to clarify and soothe

Psychology has shown that expressive writing allows you to put negative or traumatic emotions at bay, facilitating their emotional and cognitive digestion.

👉 How to go about it?

Take a few moments to identify a current experience.

• What emotions are you feeling ?
• What are the positive dimensions or possible learning?

Write freely, without worrying about the form. The objective is to clarify what this experience changes in you, what it teaches you and how it can help you face the future.

The ideal: 20 minutes per day for 3 consecutive days.

🔬 Scientific results

• Improves mental health
• Strengthens physical health

3. Tranquility: creating bubbles of calm through mindfulness

The mindfulness meditation has many demonstrated benefits:

• better stress management,
• greater self-awareness,
• more empathy and quality relationship,
• better decision-making and more creativity.

👉 How to go about it?

One of the most effective practices is love and compassion meditation.
Try this short protocol:

1. Visualize a person you love deeply.
2. Pay attention to the sensations in your heart (warmth, openness, etc.).
3. As you exhale, imagine that you are sending these feelings towards this person.
4. Repeat mentally:
   “I wish you to be happy. I wish you not to suffer. I wish you to feel joy and ease. » (3 minutes is enough.)

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases positive emotions, positive relationships, health
• Decreases depression and anxiety

4. Identity: know yourself better to move forward with your strengths

Our character strengths play a major role in confidence, motivation and resilience. Identifying them allows us to better understand what truly drives us and how we function in the face of challenges.

👉 How to go about it?

Write a positive presentation of yourself of approximately 300 words, including concrete examples that illustrate your strengths.
Then:

• Identify your signature strengths, those that define you more.
• Tell someone how these strengths have already helped you in life.

This process is usually done over a week.

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases well-being
• Decreases depression

5. Optimism: opening the field of possibilities

Optimism is both a personality trait and a skill that can be trained. Imagining a positive future stimulates motivation and opens the door to new solutions.

👉 How to go about it? The “Miracle” Technique

Imagine a miracle happened overnight and solved your current difficulties.
Ask yourself:

• What would be different tomorrow morning?
• How would I know the miracle had happened?
• Have I ever experienced something similar ?
• What would need to be put in place to create these changes?

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases positive emotions
• Improves vision of the future
• Strengthens well-being
• Develops psychological capital

6. Us: strengthening connections and gratitude

Gratitude is one of the most powerful emotions in positive psychology. Sharing it strengthens relationships, trust and collective resilience.

👉 How to go about it?

Think of someone you feel grateful towards.
Write them a letter expressing:

• what they did,
• how it affected you,
• the impact it had on your life.

Then set a time to read this letter out loud to the person.

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases well-being and positive emotions
• Decreases depression

7. Satisfaction: savoring to make the positive last

Savoring is amplifying the intensity and duration of positive emotions by paying deliberate attention to them. It's not just feeling: it's prolonging, enriching, intensifying.

👉 How to go about it?

• Identify 3 positive events from the past week.
• List what you could have done to savor these moments even better.
• For 1 to 2 weeks, take 2–3 minutes a day to relive three positive experiences and try to make them last pleasure.

Possible strategies:
share with someone, fully immerse yourself in the moment, keep a vivid mental image, physically express your joy, congratulate yourself, marvel...

🔬 Scientific results

• Increases positive emotions
• Reduces depressive symptoms

🎁 Bonus: recover sleep during stressful times

Difficult periods can disrupt sleep. Here is a protocol from the American army allowing you to quickly recover up to 1h30 of sleep:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFAoSAylTdQ