Resilience is not how much you can take. It is not about staying "strong" in the face of challenges and adversity or standing back up after getting knocked down.
Resilience is your capacity to be present and attend to what's happening here (in yourself and the situation) and the ability to see your choices and make decisions. It’s about compassion and honoring the limits of how much you are willing to take of something or someone.
Into adulthood, I would say to myself, "you can take on more," "you can do more," and "you can hold more." I convinced myself this is how you grow; this is how you get other people to stay.
The person I wanted to be in the world was someone who could show up for anything despite the conditions and despite the consequences to myself! Holding space for other people's hurtful or abusive behavior, thinking, "If I could just take it a little bit longer, something will change!"
It's been a long journey, and four important things I learned about resilience are:
1. Your capacity is not a competition — with anyone else or even yourself.
2. How much you can "take" is not a measure of your value.
3. You grow your capacity and resilience in your own time by not forcing yourself into numbness and disconnect from staying and enduring a situation or person because you think you should or need to.
4. When you are in a state of resilience, you can ask yourself:
Is this what I want?
Is this what I need?
Is this ok? Am I ok?
What do I need?
Is the cost to stay with what is coming my way more than the resources I have to support myself?
What is my capacity for this?
What are my limits?
What are my choices?
What resources (in myself and externally) do i have to help actualize my choices?
What wants to happen next?
