What is strength?
“Strength, strength is what I want. Strength not to endure, I have that and it has made me weak – but strength to act – ” Susan Sontag, from Reborn: Journals & Notebooks 1947-1963
I saved that quote because it resonated with me, while realizing how physically weak I had become after months of using my strength to endure an emotionally overwhelming and exhausting family matter. I had the strength to endure, but the physical strength I knew was gone. And, now I needed strength to act. From a place of exhaustion. It was time to rebuild, and for me movement was (again) medicine.
Rebecca Fishburne (her busy life includes training clients at Dauntless) wrote a piece about her version of strength – and why she pursues it – after participating in the 2017 Charm City Strongwoman event in Baltimore. It’s a great story about a personal Why, dedication, and community. It’s not about just lifting heavy stuff.
With all this thinking about strength, I remembered the photo above. I took it a few years ago somewhere along the course of the Baltimore 1/2 Marathon. It was a perfect sign for the client I was running with at the time. And now for anyone, really, because I believe we all have more untapped strength than we believe we do. Strength in many forms.
“You don’t know how strong you are until strong is what you need.”
Where strength shows up: Physical. Emotional. Spiritual. Intellectual. Character…
Strength also looks like: Dedication. Persistence. Resiliency. Tolerance. Perseverance…
How are you strong? Where do you want to be stronger? What are you doing about that?