How emotionally resilient are you? Did you know it can be improved?

Dr. Harry Barry is a highly experienced cognitive behavioural therapist whose latest book, Emotional Resilience: How To Safeguard Your Mental Health, is out now.

The book teaches a range of exercises designed to recognise and manage stress in your life.

"There's an image out there that some people handle stress really well and others don't, and I've always believed that this concept was completely wrong," he says.

"Emotional resilience is something we can learn, something that can transform and even save our lives."

Dr. Barry says we can't avoid the everyday realities of life which are often stressful, but we can learn how to cope with them and improve our resilience.

He was prompted to write the book partly by the 70% increase in anxiety and depression among young people in the last 20 years, and believes the reason for this is that young people lack the basic skills they need to become more emotionally resilient.

Mindfulness is one such technique, but Dr. Barry says that short, simple exercises are more beneficial than longer ones.

More importantly, "all these skills have to be practised before they become automatic."

To catch the full chat press the play button on the image on the top of the screen