Can you see why resiliency is so tough to grasp? It is made slippery by myriad traits and processes. Within this general description of resiliency are cognitive, emotional and social strengths, embedded within interpersonal and intra-personal processes, all of which exist in the first place due to a complex combination of genes, environment, and personality.

But there is one resiliency process highlighted toward the end of the film that bears further highlighting by this blog. This highlighted element of resiliency has been attracting increasing attention in psychological research circles. It is the "thing" that seems to help many trauma survivors fend off PTSD, and even instill growth in others. It likely underlies success in other domains like academics, sports, relationships, etc.

It is the ability to make meaning out of adversity. Not an easy task.

Let's be frank. The middle ages were a difficult time for all concerned, especially those like Robin who found themselves born into the shackles of a brutal social caste system.

In such a life context, he could have done the common thing - do nothing and hope for an uneventful life and a quick death.

He could have done the predictable thing - accept the seemingly inevitable fate of being a pawn in the King's self-serving Army.

He could have even done the empowering thing - roam the countryside as a bandit with a flexible moral code.

But no, Robin Hood does the resilient thing - he makes meaning. Specifically, he steps onto the public stage and pushes political and social reform (a constitution of sorts where "man is given liberty by law").

This is clearly an example of meaning-making, and yet meaning-making is not at all a clear process. What is happening here? Research has yet to shed much light on what the inner mechanisms are and how they are developed. So what follows is pure but hopefully logical speculation.

The first step (though hardly a necessary and sufficient criteria) to meaning-making, a sub-component of resiliency, is completely counter-intuitive and bizarre. It is trauma. The experience of trauma scrambles the brain out of auto-pilot mode and into the kind of soul-searching mode that can arrive at meaning-making questions and convictions.

For instance, Robin the Meaning-Maker refuses to succumb to the larger forces of doom and destruction. Although everyday in the 12th century might constitute a traumatic experience by today's standards, Robin has endured the horrors of battle, and the loneliness of broken familial ties. It is his acute awareness of how unfair and horrific the world can be that propels him into trying to make the world more of what it should be. By the halfway mark of the film Robin is busy envisioning a life for all of equality and justice, a kind of new-and-improved living that has seemed hopelessly out of reach.

The next step in this meaning-making process might be to establish the "correct" goal. Bite off more then he could chew (aspirations to take over the throne) and Robin would have arrowed himself in the foot. Think too small and too selfishly (I am going to sell this gold for a sweet patch of land) and too little meaning would have been derived. The "correct" goal is a balance of these extremes, something that is long-term, in-line with values, and connected to the greater good. Fittingly, Robin set his sights on a manifesto for which he and his countrymen could happily defend and die. Few empirical studies have sought to construct and examine a hierarchy of meaning-making tasks, but meaning is likely correlated with the number of lives "touched," the gravity of the act. The warmth and compassion inherent in his affability, the charisma and articulateness inherent in his leadership, the seriousness and depth inherent in his thought process were all resilient qualities evident within Robin from the outset and likely served as building blocks during the construction of his "correct" goal.

The final step might be to effectively buffer the impending forces of adversity. To strive for meaning-making on such a large and public scale put Robin at risk. Large socioeconomic forces (being declared an outlaw can't be good) came crashing down on him in response to his efforts.

It's worth mentioning that the modern day equivalent of such meaning-making could be, for instance, a gay individual coming out of the closet and entering into the larger LGBT movement. Such publicity might not lead to death as it did in 12th century Britain, but being branded with "outlaw" status and its attached consequences would perhaps arise.

In any event, to ward off the psychologically destructive impact of such societal obstacles, Robin needed buffers. Buffers can be cognitive, emotional or social, and Robin, quite predictably, possesses high degrees of lots of them. A cognitive buffer is something like an optimistic explanatory style, where the cause of a bad event is explained in a particularly resilient way. When Robin deems his indentured servitude to be the result of an unjust world, he is exhibiting such a propensity. An example of an emotional buffer is emotional intelligence or knowing how to accurately identify, effectively modulate and appropriately channel emotions. When Robin corrals the rage associated with his father's death (killed for pushing a similar social-political agenda) into a focused attack on the French invasion, he is exercising superior emotional intelligence. An example of a social buffer is developing tight, loyal friendships, which Robin does rather effortlessly. He's particularly friendly with Maid Marion.

To conclude, Robin Hood is not merely the story of a skilled archer who lives deep in the woods of Nottingham and takes from the rich so as to give to the poor. It is the story of resiliency, and how such a phenomenon is made-up of learned psychological skills (akin to archery), which can clarify values (akin to democratic ideals), to then facilitate life stories worthy of folklore.

Please email with real-life stories of Robin Hood-type resilience.