Resilience In Unbroken

Resilience is the ability to recover quickly from difficulties. In the book Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie and his dad did not have the best relationship in the beginning, but at the end of their very long journey they were inseparable. In the book Boy In the Boat by Daniel James Brown Joe did not really have a family until he made the rowing team, and until he met Joyce who would later become his wife and they would start a family. Human resilience is affected by family in both of these books.

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand provides a detailed description of how Louie Zamperini survives being a prisoner of war. The author uses several ways to develop the central idea of resilience and perseverance. One way the author develops this main idea is by giving vivid descriptions. During the bombings of Wake Atoll, the author uses graphic and vivid phrases like “The islands were now a blaze of garish light.” This quote is just one instance where the author highlights how much resilience was needed to survive this dangerous situation. Secondly, the author develops the main idea by using problem and solution to show the resilience, grit, and perseverance needed for this difficult situation. The text states ““Phil was fighting to get out” and

Persistence means to not give up and keep trying, and both Louie the main character and other characters demonstrate this. “Unbroken” is about Louis Zamperini an olympic runner who joins the military and is shot down and stranded along with two other crewmates. The first reason as to how this theme is shown is that Louie survived forty seven days on a raft in the middle of the ocean. After Louis was shot down, he was stranded in the middle of the Pacific ocean on a raft. Instead of freaking out like one of his crewmates he stayed calm. One quote that proves this is when Mac, one of Louis’s stranded crewmate says “We are going to die!” (Hillenbrand 128). After Mac says this Louis calmed him down and assured that they would stay alive. To add on to this, instead of giving up like other may have done Louie resorts to whatever means possible to live. Even if this includes eating albatross and raw shark (Hillenbrand 149). This portrays that Louie was so persevered to live that he resorted to eating disgusting things so he would remain

Resilience, when asked to define and explain the act of being resilient, can be a hard thing to describe. It is something everyone must be at one point in their lives, and what some people must be every day. There are different levels to it, depending on what the person is going through at the time. However, resilience is commonly described as just staying strong in a tough situation or time in a person’s life. When something goes wrong, or something bad happens, the person affected doesn’t let it break them. They stand strong against whatever is being thrown at them, but they bend when they need to. Someone who is resilient is flexible, making sure they don’t crack under pressure. As Robert Jordan said in The Fires of Heaven, “The oak fought the wind and was broken, the willow bent when it must and survived.”

Enduring and persevering through the snares of life is not always easy. Perseverance is not giving up despite difficulty or delay in achieving success. In the novel Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, the characters face troubles and difficult situations. Louie in particular does not give up although all hope seems lost. Louie exemplifies perseverance through his experience in Olympic running, in the army, and in the ocean.

Louie and Phil used all of their strength to overcome the obstacles they went through, both physically and mentally. Their physical strength was tested throughout their entire journey. Being stranded on the ocean took the initial toll on Louie and Phil’s bodies by diminishing them down to 67-87 and 80 pounds, respectively. Both of them had weighed around 150 pounds when they had crashed. Louie’s mental strength was tested as well. He started to have hallucinations of people singing in the clouds, most likely due to dehydration. The two retained their strength though, by focusing on their survival and trying to remain sane. Their optimism also had a great influence on how strong they were. In Ruth Robertson’s (2016) article “The Strength of Optimism” she states, “There are many benefits to having a more optimistic mindset. Research tells us that it can lengthen your life, determine how you overcome life’s obstacles, build resilience and manage the risks of developing depressive disorders and other mental health issues” (para. 3). Robertson is saying that optimism can help you through the hard times that life throws at us. A positive mindset can transform a life or death situation. Louie even retained a lot of physical strength while he was in the prisoner of war camps. Near the end of his imprisonment he would have to carry literal tons back and forth for hours. The Bird, one of the Japanese guards and Louie’s worst

People have learned to be resilient in order to overcome serious hardships. A person’s resilience can be seen through how they handle bad experiences; to be resilient in the face of adversity. People who never give up and always fight back even when it gets hard are resilient. Some believe that resilience is a trait that can be learned.

Resilience is defined as the ability to bounce back when faced with a trying situation. In the memoir First They Killed My Father by Loung Ung, Loung narrates to us the story of her childhood under the violent reign of the Khmer Rouge. Throughout the memoir, there are many circumstances in which Lound demonstrates incredible resilience through her unwavering determination and persistence. These traits are also evident in my best friend and fellow teammate, Kerry. Every night at swim practice, without fail, Kerry demonstrates remarkable resilience, pushing herself to the limit to complete every set.

Imagine having everything taken away from you, your food, your rights, your family, and your life. That is what happened to Louie Zamperini and other other POWs at japanese prison camps. Louis Zamperini grew up in Torrance being a bad kid that everyone in his town disliked. Later in his life in high school he took on running, being trained by his brother pete. This turned his life around and everyone loved him. He started breaking records and adventally he went to the olympics. He was drafted into the air corp and was a bomber. He got stranded in the ocean and later was taken captive by the japanese, who tortured him. During his life Louie never gave up, he was unbroken. Even through the hardest things he had resiliency and showed redemption.

Everyone encounters obstacles in life that they feel like they can't overcome. People that have 'resilience' can take these challenges head on, stay calm in any situation, and use their problem-solving skills to take advantage of the situation and get themselves out of it. In a section of "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand, a biography of war hero Louie Zamperini, Zamperini is adrift at sea after his bomber crashed in the ocean. He is left with just the remains of the plane and two others, Phil and Mac. Louie Zamperini's key characteristics of resilience and the differences between all three men allow them to overcome adversity, and Louie and Phil make it out alive.

Even when the weight of the world is coming down and doubt is setting in, there still are powers to help carry on. Louie Zamperini, a famous Olympic athlete, was dragged down to a low level when he was captured by Japanese forces and suffered under horrendous conditions in the many POW camps he stayed at. Throughout all of life’s trials, he survived, due to his strong resilience and agency. He wanted to live, and even though he may have wanted to give up, he had plenty of things to live for. In Unbroken, Laura Hillenbrand uses both internal and external conflict to show the theme that people can stand up against enemies even when the odds seem stacked up against them.

Resilience is the ability to overcome struggles. In the book Night, Elie Wiesel is put into a concentration camp during the Holocaust. During his time there, Elie would not have been able to be so resilient without his father by his side. In Boys in The Boat, Joe Rantz would also have struggled to overcome his struggles without his dad. However, without Joe’s father treating him so badly throughout his childhood Joe might not have been so motivated to prove to his father that he was strong. In both books, Joe and Elie both demonstrate resilience by using their family to overcome their struggles.

Robert H. Schuller once stated, “Tough times don’t last, but tough people do.” In the novel Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, Louie struggles with fitting in anywhere and staying out of trouble. He was constantly doing things to cause trouble and making mistakes. Pete, Louie’s brother pushes him to run to escape his troubles. Throughout Zamperini’s life, he gains perseverance which gave him the ability to survive through life.

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in a moment of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. What this quote means is that it is easy to be strong when everything around is intact, but it becomes much harder to remain strong when everything around you starts to fall apart. This quote can relate to many characters of Laura Hillenbrand’s biography Unbroken in many different events throughout the book.

When you read "Unbroken", you can't do anything but feel bless and be thankful for life, like he did. When you read his story you can't do anything but trying to start to forgive those who hurt you or just try to be a better person by being positive and be thankful and try to make others feel that way. The Victory Boys Camp was a way to do it. Make a person better by making them realised that they are worth it. And that the biggest value of this book, "YOU ARE WORTH IT AND YOU ARE BETTER THEN YOU