Resilience……

What is Resilience?  And who determines whether you are resilient or not – is there a guideline, a sliding scale?? 

The official definition is ‘the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness’

More simply put a Band Aid.

I once prided myself on being resilient – I actually considered it to be my superpower.

Now don’t get me wrong, being resilient is important but without understanding and healing it really is meaningless.  

Right about now, you will probably be asking yourself – what would this chic know?

Well, let me tell you a little about myself…..

I am the middle Child, and if you know anything about being a middle child then you would know that we invented the word Resilience!  With two older Brothers and a younger Sister, I was neither here nor there, not the oldest but not the youngest and to add to it, I was very different to them all.   From the outside, we were your average Family but appearances generally don’t tell an accurate story so I had to learn Resilience from an early age. 

Fast forward to life as an Adult, throw in a divorce, a chronically sick child, multiple major surgeries, grief, sadness, desperation, a failed business and you guessed it I am officially referred to as one hell of a Resilient Woman!  Or Am I……..

Sure, each and every time I was knocked down I got back up, I dusted myself off, I searched for the learnings and I declared it to be a growth moment.    And whilst I will agree that I walked away from each event with a fresh perspective and feeling stronger than ever, I forgot to do one very important thing………

You see having Resilience was great, it was the courage and determination that kept me moving forward but I never stopped to heal the wounds left from each blow – Resilience was my Band Aid.   

Being Resilient meant that I was able to cover my deep wounds, my bruised ego and just keep going until one day I simply couldn’t. 

Years of being resilient and never dealing with my wounds caught up with me and I became a version of myself that I didn’t recognise.    

I have found out the hard way that Resilience doesn’t suddenly fix you, it doesn’t stop your body from holding onto the hurt, it isn’t a superpower that makes everything ok, without healing, it is nothing more than a Band Aid.

So, the next time someone talks to you about Resilience, listen carefully, are they giving you what you need to heal or simply helping you whack on a Band Aid and keep going.

I have devoted the last few years of my life to healing the wounds covered up by Resilience and working with others to do the same.    I hope you will stick around and join us as we removed the Band Aids, uncover our wounds and finally heal to make way for the life we have always wanted.