FABULOUS Framework for Growth and Resilience
Over two decades ago, Barbara Rubel—a renowned thanatologist and keynote speaker known for her work on vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue—developed the FABULOUS Transformation™ Framework. She created it with one goal in mind: to support the helpers, healers, and caregivers—the people who give so much of themselves and often carry the emotional weight of others’ pain. If you’ve ever felt drained, worn down, or emotionally heavy from the work you do, you’re not alone—and this framework is here for you.
In her keynote, The FABULOUS Framework to Build Resilience and Growth, Barbara goes beyond the idea of simply bouncing back from compassion fatigue or vicarious trauma—it’s about moving through those challenges and emerging with greater strength, clarity, and a renewed sense of purpose.
And yes—FABULOUS is an acronym, too. It stands for:
- Flexibility
- Attitude
- Boundaries
- Understanding job satisfaction
- Laughter
- Optimism
- United (connection with others)
- Self-compassion
How the FABULOUS Transformation™ Framework Helps You Thrive
Each element offers a meaningful piece of the puzzle to help you survive the emotional toll of your work and reconnect with what makes it fulfilling. The FABULOUS framework helps you reconnect with meaning, build resilience, become more mindful, and find deeper purpose in the work you do. It weaves together wisdom from grief and trauma research, especially from thanatology (the study of loss and death), to show how it’s possible to experience things like:
- Vicarious resilience – learning strength from the people you help
- Post-traumatic growth – finding personal growth through struggle
- Trauma transformation – making sense of what you’ve witnessed
- Compassion satisfaction – rediscovering joy and fulfillment in your role
- Empowerment and Advocacy – share experiences and create change
The FABULOUS Framework helps people who care deeply—often absorbing others’ pain—find strength in the courage they witness, grow through the challenges they face, turn difficult experiences into insight, and reconnect with the satisfaction that comes from making a meaningful difference. And finding a way through the pain with more clarity and strength.
More Than Survival: A Path of Meaning and Growth
At the heart of the FABULOUS Framework is the idea that when we go through loss or big changes at work—whether it’s losing a role, shifting careers, or facing unexpected challenges, we need space to make meaning out of it all. Inspired by meaning reconstruction theory, the framework helps us get through the hard stuff and understand it in a way that helps us grow.
It’s also rooted in the idea of post-traumatic growth—the belief that even in the aftermath of tough experiences, we can emerge with more clarity, strength, and purpose. It encourages you to reconnect with what makes life feel full and alive, deepen your relationships, both at work and beyond, and stay open to new paths and possibilities. It’s about turning disruption into transformation, and helping you find yourself again when work shakes the ground beneath you.
Drawing from nonfinite loss theory, it acknowledges the deep, lingering sadness that can come with losing a part of your identity, like when you leave a job you loved, or realize a career dream you worked so hard for may never come to life. It also recognizes disenfranchised grief—the kind of sorrow that doesn’t get named or supported. Maybe you were passed over for a promotion, walked away from a toxic workplace, or let go of a long-held goal.
Your pain might be invisible to others, but that doesn’t make it any less real. The FABULOUS Framework helps you tend to those invisible wounds. It offers a path back—not just to feeling “okay” again, but to feeling whole, aware, and more deeply connected to who you are and what truly matters to you. It’s about finding solid ground again when work shakes you, and growing stronger in the process.
