The first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic generated a significant number of stressors
that the Swiss population had to deal with. In order to cope with and adapt to
such adversity, it is essential to have protective factors that allow for resilience. The
objective of this study was to investigate the effects of mindfulness and physical
activity on depression and resilience during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.
A quantitative method was adopted asking participants who were engaged in physical
activity or mindfulness to fill a battery of measures of depression and resilience and some
demographic questions. The results showed that mindfulness practice strengthened
the initial level of resilience of practitioners, suggesting that mindfulness meditation is a
tool for coping with adversity during a potentially traumatic event. Conversely, physical
activity practitioners maintained a stable resilience score over time, suggesting that
exposure to adversity did not disrupt their state of biopsychospiritual homeostasis.
Moreover, being physically active decreased the depression score over time. Regarding
demographic variables, gender differences were observed in the average scores in the
resilience scale and in the Depression Inventory.