On Strength

My Friend, Rebecca, is living in China being a linguist with the Peace Corp. Some parts of her life are miserable and some are amazing. I love to read her blog because her stories are always interesting and she can make the mundane sound exotic.

The thing about Rebecca is that she is very insightful. She said something on her blog that really got me thinking today and I wish pieces of my soul had as much depth as hers.

She said that some Chinese survivors “have more strength than I hope I ever have to find out I have.” And that got me wondering if I’ve been through the worst that I’m ever going to see. God, I hope not, because if the hardest thing I ever have to go through is a really nasty crash, I’m in a pitiful state and not prepared at all for the netherworld. And I’m pretty sure that I’m not automatically going to the happy place where all is wonderful and bright.

So, how does one strengthen their strength? Because if the amount of trauma is showered upon you based on how strong your character is, then I better be dealing with some really shitty things in the near future because I’m feeling puny compared to, say, a malnourished Chinese child or someone with AIDS or someone that has to watch a family member die of cancer. (Losing $21,000 in the market doesn’t count.)

So, as I reflect on strengthening my strength for the next round of trauma, I’ve come to a conclusion (and it’s shallow at best) that building empathy and compassion might be a good way to build strength. And that leads me to another question, is building strength a good, sensible, and meaningful endeavor? I might be strong, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that my character is stellar, it could mean that I’m just a bad ass who can put with more than the next guy.

My next conclusion is that strength doesn’t come without practice. Blah, blah – comparison of lifting weights to build body strength – well, there might be only one way to build character strength, and that’s to go through trauma.

Which makes me wonder if just simply not caring can be mistaken for strength? Because if someone has apathy, it could appear that they are strong because they don’t fall apart as they climb through an obstacle.

And uninformed people often say that I must have incredible strength to survive an airplane crash and the death of a husband. To them I say, have you ever been a project manager trying to tame the wild beast of open enrollment? Because my final conclusion is that that’s the ultimate test of one’s character.