Resilience as An Antidote for Unhappiness

Authors: John Stonestreet and Dr. Jeff Myers

According to the 2025 World Happiness Report, the United States ranks way down on the list, at number 62. In fact, the happiness decline among young Americans has been greater in the last 10 years than nearly every other nation in the world. Granting that “measuring happiness” is a tricky feat to begin with, it’s clear that many of us, as U2 sang years ago, still haven’t found what we’re looking for. 

At a recent Lighthouse Voices event, Dr. Jeff Myers identified one key to overcoming unhappiness and finding meaning. Resilience. 

Resilience says I want to learn to become comfortable being uncomfortable. I want to be comfortable being uncomfortable. Some of you have been following the transgender issue in the last few years, and what we’re finding is a couple of very disturbing things.  

Number one, young women are far more susceptible, and the ones who are most susceptible are the ones who spend the most time on social media. There’s no question about this in the data any longer. This is evidentially proved at this point. The second thing that is very difficult about it is that a lot of parents submit their children to these unproven medical treatments because they’ve been told by the doctor, “Your child will be more comfortable if she undergoes puberty blockers or if she takes cross-sex hormones.” 

And these unproven medical treatments are so devastating for these young men and these young women, and they are irreversible.We’re talking about treatments that can move a child to the place where they will never be able to have children. They will destroy their body. The medical stuff on this, especially for girls, is horrifying. It’s like they’re old ladies in their bodies because they have so much osteoporosis, all kinds of different medical issues that are usually preventable.  

If a parent were just to say to the child, “You’re uncomfortable being in your body as a teenager. So is every person who has ever been a teenager, literally, in the history of the world. So, we’re going to help you, walk alongside you, to learn how to become comfortable being uncomfortable.”  

I had to learn this lesson when I was in school. I learned that I am designed by God to act in the face of risk, to bring good to my world. Then my focus is to be resilient. I don’t want to be the person who breaks when I fall. I was a very timid kid, and something changed in high school for me.

It was in a swim class. I just signed up for the gym class like everyone else and found out that my teacher was going to be Mr. Becker, who was the swim coach at our school. Mr. Becker believed that swimming was the solution to every problem that a young person faces. So, he brought us into the swimming pool area, said, “Boys, jump in there in the shallow end and swim to the other end. I want to see your skills.”  

I jumped in and managed to thrash my way to the other end of the pool. Mr. Becker met me there. He said, “Son, are you okay?”   

“Yes, sir.”  

“That’s the worst swimming I have ever seen.” (He wasn’t being mean. He was just acknowledging a fact.)   

“Yes, sir, I thought I was going to drown out there.”   

“I thought you were, too. I thought I was going to have to jump in and save you.”  

But then he said something transformational to me. He said,  

“If you pay attention to what I’m doing in this class, I will guide you every day, step by step. You will learn to swim. In fact, you will learn six different swim strokes so that you can vary your swim strokes and swim almost endlessly. You will be able to swim for an hour without getting tired. After you take this class. On top of that, if you pay attention to my instruction and do what I say, by the end of this class, you will be a Red Cross certified lifeguard.” 

Now, think about that for a minute. He wasn’t just giving me a vision of staying alive by learning to dog paddle. He was giving me a vision of moving all the way from being a person who could barely stay alive in the water, to being a person who saves people in the water. And I got that Red Cross lifeguard certificate.  

So did every young man in my class. This was in the middle of Kansas. There’s no water. But if there was water, everybody in town is a certified lifeguard who could save you.  

That was Jeff Myers, president of Summit Ministries.