#69: Strength.
May your struggles help you find your strength.
Every single woman I admire has achieved greatness not because her life was easy but because she endured struggle and through her struggles she found her strength.
Strength is defined as the capacity of an object or substance to withstand great pressure or force.
The same way a diamond is formed through massive pressure, we are made through our own moments and experiences navigating the pressures and forces of life. And I have found, both through my own experience and through working with others, that the harder or more extreme the outside pressure, the more profound the inner growth or transformation will eventually be.
Oprah once said, “Where there is no struggle there is no strength.” However in our society, struggle is rarely shared and never celebrated while strength routinely is. We have been taught to lean away from our most challenging moments rather than into them. We have somehow been convinced that only strength matters, but I happen to believe you cannot have one without the other.
It is often when we are the most uncomfortable that we find the strength to change and while our struggles rarely make sense in the moment, I believe they ultimately shape us and make us better in the end.
I do not believe that our struggles make us weak, I believe they challenge us to find our own inner strength. I have faced countless dead ends, more roadblocks and hurdles than I can even count, and endured a few heartbreaking losses that still continue to sting. I have tried and failed, and I have started over and over again. And while painful, each struggle has effectively made me stronger, more willing and able to stand back up again, and ultimately better (not worse) at navigating whatever life throws my way.
Here is how my personal struggles and challenges have shaped me:
My nearly two year struggle with postpartum depression fundamentally changed my life, stripped me of my entire sense of self, and forced me to let go of anything and everything that was making me sick (including my career, my expectations, societal narratives, the stories that were keeping me stuck, and even some relationships). It also planted a seed deep inside of me to someday use my story to help other women who might be struggling themselves.
Leaving my corporate career in an effort to simply survive left me devastated and feeling very much alone, but simultaneously unlocked a deep desire to support other mothers navigating their own career transitions.
Feeling under-fulfilled while staying home with my kids forced me to be honest with myself about which needs could be met through motherhood and which needs had to be met through the continued development of myself, which allowed me to visualize my first business and ultimately bring that dream to life.
Experiencing my own business failure in the midst of the pandemic furthered my desire to support other women in navigating career changes and personal transformations. It also unexpectedly brought me my first coaching client who just so happened to have been navigating her own business closure.
Grappling with my own identity shifts countless times over the past decade of motherhood allowed me to see how our individual ‘sense of self’ plays into our relationship with work and motherhood and just about everything else, adding an additional layer to my work. More on this soon…
Without each of these huge personal shifts I never would’ve found the strength or courage to redirect my life or reinvent myself again and again. Each of my struggles helped me to see what truly mattered, who truly mattered, where and how I wanted to spend my precious time and energy, and perhaps most importantly how I wanted to actually live my life.
With time, I began to recognize that each challenging circumstance seemed to make space for even more learning and alignment. I now view obstacles as redirection and a friendly reminder to take things into my own hands before it ever gets too bad. If I could take any of it back, if I could choose to walk an easier path, if I could erase even some of the pain, I don’t think I would. Each individual struggle ultimately helped me to open my eyes and seemingly guided me onto a different and often more beautiful path.
There were entire chunks of time when all I wanted to do was speed up my own growth. When I wished that my own challenges could be a bit easier, when I craved the clarity I now have, but I have come to see that I needed my struggles to be profound to allow for the necessary changes to take shape. A strong foundation is not formed through luck or ease, but through repeated pressure and force. There is always strength to be found in your struggle, whatever that struggle may be.
I have come to believe that the struggles we endure ultimately provide us with the strength (and clarity) we need to pave a better path forward. This does not mean that things will be easy or comfortable or quick, but with the right mindset and support, we can move through life’s difficult moments fully knowing that they will provide the right environment for us to grow. If nothing else, we can be thankful that unlike diamonds our own evolution takes far less than 1 billion years of extreme pressure to form.
May you find strength through your struggles.
What is one struggle you have faced that ultimately redirected your life and helped you be a better version of you? To challenge yourself even more, make a list of every single struggle you have endured and one subsequent positive to go with it.
Looking for support? Here are four ways I can support you right now:
Sometimes you need guidance to point you in the right direction until you can unlock it for yourself. Pick a random number between 1-69 then go read that past newsletter which can be found in my archives for some instant guidance. This week I got #22 which was written at the start of last year and is all about new beginnings.
I help women to know and understand themselves so they can mother from a place of strength. Two of my current coaching clients are on standby this month which means that I have a tiny bit of availability in my weekly schedule. If you have been dreaming about creating a more fulfilling and financially free life or you simply need a bit of support, now is your chance to work with me.
Nobody is coming to save you, you must help your self. Download the free Help Your Self workbook designed to kickstart your self-discovery journey. Research show that you are 35% more likely to achieve your goals and vision if it is written down and this is a great place to start.
Accountability is the glue that ties commitment to result. I recently opened a few spots for monthly accountability coaching, this is by far my most accessible and affordable coaching option available and accountability partners have even shown to increase your chances of success by 95%, let me be yours!
The Latest Self/ish Posts:
#68 Transformation: Change is inevitable, transformation is a choice.
#67 Incubate: All good things take time.
#66 Decide: One day or day one, you decide.
#65 Joy: Identify what brings you joy and choose that over everything else.
#64 Non-negotiables: Make time for the things that matter to (you).
#63 Help: Nobody is coming to save you, you must help your self.
#61 Visualize: Visualize your best self and start showing up as her.
#60 Clarity comes from engagement, not thought.
#59 Money: Women deserve to be paid.
Full archive here.
The Latest from the Self/Talk Podcast:
#5: Work, Motherhood, and Self.
Join the conversation here.
Inspiration for sharing the word strength came from my own experience choosing ‘strength’ as my ‘word of the year’ last year. While I am still deciding on the right word for 2024, two women I admire recently wrote about their own experiences choosing their own ‘word of the year’ and I thought I would share them here in case you are seeking even more inspiration:
said “I keep my eyes closed. Pen in hand. I am ready to write down the first word that comes to mind. I wait. And wait. And wait.” said “I like to imagine my word as a weatherworn lighthouse, shining through the fog, gently guiding me in the right direction.”
YESSSS in yoga we call this 'tapas'. It literally means heat and it's the transformation that comes on the other side of the fire. <3 excited to see you tomorrow