Maintaining Resiliency

Learn how to manage heightened stress and anxiety while managing your property.

By MOLLIE WITT, CAM, CAPS, Venterra Realty

“Resilience is based on compassion for ourselves and compassion for others,” is a famous quote by the New York Times bestselling author Sharon Salzberg. During the current climate that we are all experiencing, this quote really resonates and reminds me of our industry. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, our industry has experienced one change after another. All of our normal day-today functions have been disrupted, and once we get used to one disruption, another change follows right behind it. With each change, there has been an adjustment required on our part, but our original goal to operate our apartment communities to the best of our abilities has never changed.

Resiliency is required to navigate the ever-changing environment successfully. Breaking down the quote from Salzberg, resilience is having compassion for ourselves and for others. So, how do we do this? In order to exercise resilience, we must understand and address how we are feeling while remembering to care for ourselves. Then, we must do that again for our residents by understanding and addressing how they are feeling, while remembering to care for them.

Without a doubt, this year been an emotional roller coaster for many people. To say we have been experiencing heightened stress and anxiety may seem like an understatement to many. Taking a step back and acknowledging the heightened stress levels and the increased anxiety is the first step to working with the stress and anxiety and using it to support your resiliency.

In the moment that the stress and anxiety start to rear their heads, mentally take a step back and acknowledge what you are feeling. Put a name to the feeling or sensation. This will allow you to remain in control while still recognizing what is happening. Naming your feelings can make the difference between you controlling the emotion and the emotion controlling you. Taking this a step further by trying to connect the emotion to the source really helps you to be stronger than the emotion you are feeling in that moment. Finally, tell yourself what your future self can do to try to prevent this.

Here is an example: You just had a difficult phone call, and your heart is beating faster than normal. Once the realization happens, acknowledge the faster heart beat and name it. “I feel my heart beating faster than normal, and I know that this is a sign of anxiety. I am anxious because a resident just yelled at me on the phone because they stepped in dog mess. I acknowledge that I can take an additional five minutes tomorrow to walk the property when I open so I can try to prevent this from happening again.” Doing these few things allow you to control your emotions and remain resilient, versus being at the mercy of that emotion.

In times of increased stress and anxiety, selfcare is one of the most impactful things that we can do, but it is also usually the first thing we forget to do. Taking a moment for yourself is actually something that allows you to be able to get through the stress and be there for others.

Imagine yourself as a jug that is empty. Not only is there no water available for anyone who is thirsty, but you as the jug are not even holding water. Holding water is the one job that the jug has. In order to do your job, or to even be assistance to others, we have to make sure that we are filling our jug. Filling a jug is not hard, it just takes a moment to do!

What is something that will figuratively fill your jug? Maybe a walk around the block? Maybe getting in your car and having lunch in your car at a park or lake? Maybe just listening to that one song that pumps you up. These are all things that we can do each day that help us keep our jug full so that we can pour out to our jobs and our residents. And when our jug is full from the start, it allows us to be able to pour into another when they need it the most. Keeping your jug full is a surefire way to build some resilience.

Now that you are able to recognize how you are feeling and understand the increased anxiety within yourself, acknowledge that your resident is probably going through a very similar experience with COVID-19. They may not work in our industry, but that does not mean COVID-19 is not affecting their work life. That same emotional roller coaster that we have been on for the last five months, they have been on it as well, just sitting in another roller coaster car.

Many of us have encountered that resident who just does not want to adhere to the guidelines and recommendations and are not afraid to protest their dislike of masks to us. We are not in a position to overrule the medical expert recommendations, and we need to understand that their reaction in a stressful time may not be a true reflection of who they are as a person. Remembering that your resident is human will help you remember to not define them by their momentary reaction to their environment. Their heightened stress and anxiety may manifest as behaviors they would not normally display. As long as we remember that we are all in this together, it will allow you get to the root of what your resident wants and expects from you in the moment. Remembering to see your resident as another human who is under extreme amounts of stress will allow you to breathe and get through the potentially uncomfortable moment with more resilience.

Our job is to help our residents. They have a need and we have a solution. We would not be anywhere without our residents. So, we need to work to make sure that they feel taken care of and as comfortable as possible in all of our interactions. Your resident may be at the end of their rope by the time they get to you, but that should not change the fact that we are able to offer genuine care and concern while working to find a solution to what is bothering them. If they are not acting as the best version of themselves, that does not mean that we cannot act with our best versions of ourselves. Acknowledging the things in the world that they have been through and meeting them with genuine compassion and care will not only allow them to leave with satisfaction, but it will also make you that much more resilient through this current normal that we are operating within. Instance by instance, you will build confidence in your abilities to get through this current normal with your residents.

Caring for your residents and understanding how they are feeling but also offering yourself the same are how you will maintain the resilience needed to weather the continuous changing environment and the current normal. Acknowledging the emotions that you feel, and doing the same for your residents, will allow you to step back and get through the stress. When we are able to get through the stress time and time again, while simultaneously meeting and exceeding the expectations at work, is when we can truly call ourselves resilient. But in order to consistently get through those moments of happiness and moments of stress that make our day, we must remember to acknowledge what is happening within ourselves and realize that our residents are going through a very similar experience.

Mollie Witt, CAM, CAPS is a regional trainer at Venterra Realty with almost 11 years of experience in the multifamily housing industry. Witt has a passion for learning and spreading knowledge and has shown this through volunteering to facilitate NALP certifications through the Houston Apartment Association. She also has a passion for serving the community and holds two regular volunteer positions with Ronald McDonald House at the Texas Children’s Hospital in the Medical Center and as a Sunday school teacher at her church.