Defining Strength

A lot of people have been telling me to be strong lately. It's the main response people have when they learn that I'm going through a break-up, I've lost someone I love, I hurt him, I'm hurting, my happily-ever-after has been crushed, and I am now, *gasp*, single. To be honest, it's what I've been praying for every night as well; May I be strong. So I've been curious about what exactly strength is, and here is my investigation.

According to dictionary.com, STRENGTH is:
1. the quality or state of being strong; bodily or muscular power; vigor.
2. mental power, force, or vigor.
3. moral power, firmness, or courage.

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A teacher of mine in grad school defined STRENGTH as the willingness to feel weak. She used to say, "You are only as strong as you are weak."

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Good old Shakespeare said, "Love give me STRENGTH, and STRENGTH will help me through."

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My dad would define STRENGTH as the ability to love.

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My yoga teacher defines STRENGTH as "Determination."

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My 5th grade gym teacher used to define STRENGTH as being able to run around the soccer field twenty times.

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Mother Teresa said, "Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your STRENGTH lies."

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I wonder what my definition of STRENGTH is. For the past almost-three-weeks I have felt incredibly weak, like I've been punched in my sleep and wake up without the slightest energy every day. But in the moments when I am truthful, I do feel strong. When I am creative, I feel strong. When I go to yoga and get closer to doing a head-stand, I feel borderline invincible, actually. Even when I cry as I am doing the dishes, there is a part of me that is strong enough to stay standing. Certainly this sense of loss is evidence that I loved someone deeply, and that is probably what makes me feel the strongest.

I'm in the process of defining what STRENGTH is to me. I used to think it meant being there for someone else, fully. But as it turns out, that may 1) not really be possible, 2) lead to unexpected consequences, and 3) not make me a very strong person at all. Since the only person I have to really be there for right now is me, I'm figuring out what makes me strong.

And then it hits me, maybe that's it. Maybe STRENGTH is not ever really knowing, and being in a constant place of figuring it out. Sometimes the very thing/thought/action that makes us strong can, in different circumstances, make us weak. Just like in yoga, when one day my downward facing dog feels super strong, and then two days later I am trembling through it, the empowering feeling of love is countered by a helplessness when that same love is lost.

So, for now, STRENGTH is ever-changing and undefinable in my life. It is paired up with weakness and it is full of contradictions. I am seeking it, yes, but I am also accepting its transient state. I can not control it, force it, master it, or keep it. I can be open to it, welcome it, be grateful for it- until, eventually and inevitably, I have to let it shift, let it go, let it be. It will grace me again, that much I know.

What's your definition of STRENGTH?