Where Do You Find Your Strength?

I get my strength from my belief that everything has a purpose...every moment a reason for happening. The path is not always clear, but it is a direction.

Thank you, Jalyce. I believe this too, and it does help....

I'm just envious of people who do get strength from somewhere, regardless of where or what it may be.

Have a relationship with God that is between me and Him - unique for me. I do not believe in church as such...but have an inner faith and inner spirituality that helps me through. I've learned to "Let Go & Let God" I too believe that everything happens for a reason. Also, the older I get, and the more experienced I am...I can see that all the better and it helps me get through the toughest of situations. I also have inspirational books that have timely sayings that perfectly fit my day, and also help me through.

I believe everything happens for a reason...that we are to learn from what happens here on earth to make us better in this life, as well as in the afterlife (whatever that is). I guess you could call it blind faith, but it really seems to work. I was once told by a friend that "we are the sum total of our experiences and how we perceived them to be." Our experiences, whether good or bad, mold us into the people we are. If we perceive them to be lessons to make us better people, then I think we will use the experiences to become better people. I hope this makes sense.

I agree with everyones comments above. I do believe everything happens for a reason. I too was raised in a Christian background. My father was actually a non denominational preacher for awhile. Church was kind of forced down my throat when I was growing up so once I moved out and got married it went to the waste side.

I agree with David's statement. I am also envious. I am a horrible pessimist. I try to think "God never gives me more than I can handle" but when times get really tough and I'm struggling I find myself asking God "What have I done?!?! I cannot possibly handle anymore."

I was raised to have faith but sometimes when everything looks so dark and you have a dark cloud over your head...it's hard to have faith. Faith in what? Then I say to God "What's next? and Why in the heck am I here only to live with a dark cloud?" So, I have no idea...maybe that's my problem I'm not closer to God. Heck, I don't know.

I do believe everyone you meet, everything good or bad you go through is for a reason. Some of the horrible things have made me stronger...some of the things still linger.

Everytime something goes wrong in my life and I'm upset about it, my mother says 'You should be in church'. But I'm really not a church go'r. I believe you can go in your back yard and find God.

I just don't know. I'll say it again...I'm envious of people who have strength. Today is one of those days I don't have any.

Time to pray?

Cheryl, I think you are a very special person, and I admire not only your devotion to your religion, but your willingness to hear other sides. And that is what you are doing here - asking others to share.

I do not belive in "God" as such. I believe we all have within us the ability to choose a path. We cannot choose the circumstances of our lives. No one would choose to be born poor, or a slave, or in a culture that did not tolerate their kind. But each day, when we wake up, we have choices. I have always chosen to be what I consider a "good" person. I have not always done the right thing. But I have learned from my mistakes, and I have grown. My strength comes from knowing that I have made the best choice I could, and that I am true to what I feel is right.

After my divorce, when I was at my lowest, and filled with anger at the ex-husband and his new, much younger girlfriend, I tried to find comfort in being the best mother I could be to my three children (all teenagers at the time). I tried to act with integrity and honor, words that are not commonly used today. I never lied to my children. I tried not to lie to myself. The word "integrity" became my mantra.

I feel that I am a good person, and I believe in the concept of "Do no harm". I find comfort in being true to that goal.

For me, i hop in my truck or 4x4 and i drive about 10 minutes out of the city (town), go to my private fishing spot, also same place the eagles nest and I get in touch with mother nature, this is where I make my peace. When we lost our child my now ex, well lets just say I still carry it with me, my wife at the time didnt even acknowledge the loss, and this was 4 yrs ago April, I just recently spoke with her and its as if it never happened. So how I handle this is I got a second job working in a Body shop, also I talked to friends and got help, but what I have found is time may heal all wounds, but the pain is always there. Once again mother nature has been a saving grace.
Thanks for letting me rant
Philly

I have had a basically strong inner core that came into full bloom as a result of birthing my daughter at home with a midwife. Then, I spent the first 7 years of my daughter's life as a single Mom (that will test your strength). There are many things I have pulled myself up by the bootstraps and just handled because I was the only one there to handle it. I also write in my journal for strength. I talk with family, my therapist, my women friends and my gay men friends for strength. And I get out in nature. I have a deep relationship with my higher power, but it does not include church or any organized religion. I do pray, after a fashion, but it is more of a meditation.
For me, when everything is falling apart, it's all about letting out all the emotions that have come up as a result of everything falling apart...thereby uncovering the strength that always rests underneath.

Sometimes the greatest strength that we have is already inside us..... and we dont even know it. It is only when we look directly into the face of our sorrow and reassure ourselves that we are not going to let overcome our lives that that strength will begin to surface.

The strength comes from faith and from concerned friends and families.

Dear Cheryl- This is an important question. I envy you and all others who are true believers. It would be comforting to believe that everything has a purpose {assumed, of course to be a salutary one,} but that is, pray tell, not my belief. I can only rely on my experience which is decidedly mixed. Until I was 12 when my mother died of breast cancer, followed by a series of traumatic blows that I appreciated the experience of suffering. The traumas sent me psychologically reeling. I became increasingly panicky, depressed, obsessive, detached, split, although maintaining a good facade.

Following my intuition I became aware that I needed to find essential answers to ultimate questions including who am I and what do I really want? Is there a purpose and meaning for my life and if so what is it and where can I find it? The pursuit of these answers motivated me to value human knowledge from what ever place I could find it: teachers, authors, the movies, radio shows, friends and the like.

I got turned onto speculative philosophy reading a seminal book by Will Durant called The Story of Philosophy -. I became aware that certain books were of enormous value as they seemed to be talking directly to me. They provided good guidance when I felt lost.

Some excellent teachers showed special interest in me which helped in multiple ways to at least begin to feel that I was not alone with my suffering but that knowledge could potentially be converted into personal power.

I started a journal at age 19 which I continued for the next 35 years. This was invaluable for making my unconscious conscious. I could see where I began and where I was and where I wanted to go at anyone time.

The writing offered me a pathway to personal awareness – an important tool for organizing my own chaos.

When I hit a dead end in my process of self analysis I sought out professional help. Although my first two psychotherapy attempts failed in their aim of making me feel whole and integrated I persisted in amassing degrees, becoming a psychotherapist now psychoanalyst, got excellent training in my field, paid extra for a master apprentice supervisor – read all I could stuff into me – began to practice what I had learned – and when I felt confident enough I dared open up a private practice.

Along the way I continued to take piano lessons and became a proficient piano player. I formed a small combo in HS, later in college.

I worked in the summers as a musician, waiter/bus boy. I dared to go 7000 miles on a Lambretta scooter around Europe and England in the summer of my senior year at Columbia mainly by myself – joined later on by an Australian girl I met in Rome.

When I got good and depressed mainly connected with a failed first marriage I sought out what was to become my psychoanalysis – 11 years, three times a week – no insurance. That experience with a trusting, wise, and challenging good person – enabled me to face my authentic self – identifying and working with my assets and my limitations.

When ever I felt lost and abandoned perhaps because of my nature (a combination of genes, habits, propaganda, identifications, and character) I relied on my intuition to guide me. It was at such quintessential stuck points that I often had meaningful coincidences (synchronicities) which marked the opening of pathways I never previously knew existed.

One such pathway was meeting a psychiatric nurse at a summer resort where I worked as the house photographer. Having a masters degree in psychology but feeling trapped in a dead end job as an employment counselor at New York State Employment service I had decided to go back to school and get a Ph.D.

Although it was a great idea I did poorly in the math part of the Graduate Record Exam. It was on the day I received the tenth of ten rejections to go to graduate school that I met Carolyn. We had an instantaneous simpatico. She said she was working with a brilliant psychiatrist in a unique therapeutic community treating heroin addicts and thought that Dr. Judi might be interested in me.

As was the case at many such pivotal points in my life I was hired and became an assistant director working on the front lines on the war of addiction.

Odyssey House – over the course of the next 17 months – turned out to be a life defining experience. Shocked, in the fifth month, by my idealized perception of Odyssey as the perfect rehabilitation center blown to smithereens by a series of highly unprofessional treatment events – I became the self appointed scribe of Odyssey. This material became the core of my memoir – some thirty seven years later which is in the hands of 6 publishers.

I relate all of this detail to indicate that meaning for me arises out on my daily encounters to sustain my being and to harness my available libido and direct it to those activities that seem to be of value for me as meaningful connections.

Life for me is like being on a mysterious scavenger hunt in which the prize is the journey itself. Life is a struggle in which many random acts occur along with those that are intentional. In this connection I am respectful of the important role played by such forces as luck, chance, destiny, karma?, serendipity, fate, and synchronicity.

Whereas I do not believe in the intercession of a personal God I very much think there is something which is referred to as spiritual. When I am attuned to myself and feel most natural I believe I am attuned to that realm of experience I think of as spiritual.

I am also aware that at any one moment in time I can and will die, have little control over such real possible events such as war, prejudice, accidents, the tyranny of the mob, terrible acts derived from man's inhumanity to man, sickness, economic reversals and the likes.
Finally I like best my psychoanalysts' assertion. That in the final analysis there is your experience and your experience of your experience. Then there are the conscious and unconscious meanings you assign to your experience, and the derived conclusions from your interpretations of your experience that determine your attitudes leading to specific behaviors.

Above all I am profoundly aware of the great power of love to heal, to cement relations, to motivate, to endure, to make what often feels to be a random kaleidoscopic fragmented mixed up jug saw puzzle assume some purposeful meaningful connectedness.

Cheryl, what a great article. I grew up in a primitive baptist church, the kind that yell and scream and it used to scare me to death. I never understood what the preacher was saying and it turned me away from churches in general for years. Things changed when I attended a southern baptist church. My current pastor has lived a very full life and has experiences that he shares with us that almost everyone can relate to. I feel as though finding this church has brought a totally new meaning in my life and I can now understand the Bible so much more. I think most of us seek a higher understanding, it takes time for us to find what it is that we seek.

when faced with the trauma of dealing with deep personal issues I find that when people say "everything happens for a reason" I want to punch them in the face and ask them if they believe that it happened for a reason or just because they are insensitive assholes.

I believe the strength comes from those things that are important to us. For me, I have always found strength and healing in nature. Through nature, I came to understand that there is a God. That has been my path, and I think everyone will have a different answer.

Cheryl, I think strength comes from many places. I have a very strong faith but I do not attend church. It's something very personal to me. I have found strength in faith, friends and when I get completely overwhelmed, I look at things one day at a time. There were times where my heart was aching so badly that I didn't think I'd make it another day and I just cried and cried and cried. You have to be good to yourself and believe that with time, things will get better. Once you've gotten through it, you are all the more stronger.

Wow...what wonderful answers from everyone. This was great. I believe I learned something from everyone here and everyone also said something to which I could relate. I hope some more people will comment. I find this topic so interesting. Thanks for sharing!

I don't believe everything happens for a reason, nor do I believe that God is behind it all – tragedy such as accidental death, death by illness or natural disaster, these events are happenstance, chance and a long causal chain of events many of which are not intended or the intentional direction of divine will.

I don't believe the divine has a hand in such things.

I do believe that how we handle tragedy is up to us and there we can get some help from the divine. We can call upon our connection with the divine to summon forth a guiding way to find a path through the dark times. Or, we can just make our way on our own.

Tragedies test us, this is true, but I do not believe it is the intended will of the divine to put us through such a test. I do not believe in a cruel God or an unjust one. But that is only my human belief trying to put a human understandable face on the truly unknowable reality of the divine that is beyond comprehension.

My main source of strength has always been my family. We've had our problems, but they've always been there for me at the end of the day, offering tremendous support throughout.

Lately, I've also found strength and comfort in my newfound Gnostic Christian faith.

Gary, I don't believe in a cruel, unjust God either. Nor do I believe He is the cause of the horrible things that happen to us. I do believe, though....that if we look to Him, He is able to make whatever happens to us work toward something good in some way. He sees the big picture whereas we only see the little one.

Hi Cheryl. I too went through difficult times as I believe all people experience. As a believer I believe God loves me and as Jesus said he sent his Spirit to walk with us. I imagine he walks beside me and literally holds me up. I also know I do not always feel it. It is only later that I look back and see that alone I would have failed and Jesus was present even though I did not know it. Jesus can be present also in friends, doctors, medicine, pastors, in aloneness, in a good sunrise, in catching a beautiful trout in a clear bubbling stream. I am Dutch. And any country that has carved out land from the sea has to be stubborn. Sometimes even though my heads knows about Jesus and his "angels" I still feel alone. Then I do as the poster says, "Tie a knot inthe rope and hold on. Faith is believing that even though I do not feel it a loving God is with me. I also believe God doesnot wish harm and hurt for me. I also believe God is in the midst of our pain and will bring us good. In the end we are all different and we each have different personalities and resources so we each find our own path. But God is there to shine a light on that path. For me the secret is do not quit and BELIEVE. And do not feel guilty if you feel you are alone and you have failed as a believer. God understands. Finally spoil yourself a little. You are sick and you need to care for yourself. Well that is my formula. Hope it helps you. From one who understands what you write about. Bert

Cheryl,

When I read your reading you could of been writing about me! When sorrow, despair, loss, and a feeling there is no hope. I do as you do, I pray to God! When we seek and ask God for direction, believe me there will be a path for us to follow. We need to find that path that He wants us to follow. We only need to ask Him. Jeremiah 29: 13 'You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart'.

Christine

Thank you all for your comments. Jan...how sad to lose your child and your husband of 36 years. I'm glad that you were able to find comfort in your belief.

Bert...thank you for you comment. I agree that even if we do not feel God's presence during the dark times, just knowing and having faith that He is there is a tremendous comfort. Thank you..

Through myself,and loved ones,i follow on a spiritual path,I am not connected to my own religion,i try to keep open in my beliefs,they are senders, and recievers of messages,or angels above,beyond,or on the earth plane.Shelly

I am still searching for something to really believe in. I grew up with a Catholic father and a Jewish mother. It was hard sometimes so I kind of drew from the best of both faiths and still get bits of wisdom from all the religions I read about. I do not think you have to have a set faith to be spiritual. I find a lot of support during difficult times by reaching out to the people most important to me. Over the years that has been mostly my best friend and my brother. Now I get a lot of strenth from being a mother. The love of my son is spiritual and healing. I find peace when I am out in nature, especially near any kind of water. When I get really down I listen to music and eat chocolate. Having pets has always helped also. My dog is a great listener and is always there when I need her. I really do not pray much or turn to god because I am still searching for that connection. I have struggled through and have always found the way with help from the people and things that make me happy.

Cheryl, I appreciate your article. This is an important question. It's changed for me throught my life a bit.
Raised Baptist, and then in a Southern Baptist reform school, I was taught things I do not believe now.

So my strength comes from a beautiful sunrise, or the heat of the sun on my skin. A walk in the woods, or by the reservoir. Stopping to look at something beautiful.
It also comes from a friend.
Writing helps immensely.

Thanks for this, Cheryl. You are a special woman.

Cat, I can relate. Nature always helps me too. It helps me see that my problems are not that huge in the scheme of things. Writing and friends help as well. Thank you for your comments.

Actually, that's the joy of all of my adventures in the backcountry, and having a friend's private ghosttown to escape to. Helps me gain strength when I have to come back to the real world.

of course i've always experienced things which sometimes i do not know where to find strength...and He is always there for me in times i need help. God is so wonderful!

Hi Cheryl,
Nice to hear you don't beleive in an unjust God either.

As for how I've dealt with tragic events - I searched within and found the strength to deal with it all. To heal myself and to learn how to cope and move forward.

Family, friends all offered support but ultimately what I had to do was tapped my own inner strength and wisdom which was lying dormant till the need arose.