“I Don’t Want To Be Stronger…”
How Small Shifts Can Change... Everything
Transitions
Life transitions are brutal.
Child birth
Moving
Empty nest
Losing your parents
Divorce …
As you are going through these challenging times, people try to console you and tell you, “everything will be alright. This will make you stronger. You will be a better person for it…”
And you just want to scream, “I don’t WANT to be stronger… I want this to STOP.”
Hormesis
There’s a concept called hormesis — small stresses build resilience.
Cold exposure. Fasting. Resistance training.
Stress the system… it adapts.
But life doesn’t always give us small stress.
Child Birth
Childbirth is, of course, not a small stressor. It is overwhelming… All-consuming… It pushes you WAY beyond what you ever thought you could handle.
And yet… you find your way through it.
Not because it isn’t painful.
But because something in us knows how to stay with it.
That is building our capacity, not just our strength.
Divorce
Divorce doesn’t just change your life.
It dismantles it.
The routines. The identity. The assumptions of what your life was supposed to be like.
And suddenly… you’re standing in the middle of something you don’t recognize.
Including yourself.
Finding the Strength
What do you do in the moment when it’s too much?
Not philosophical.
Not someday.
Right then.
I breathe.
Not because breathing fixes anything.
But because it gives me something to hold on to.
Inhale.
Long Exhale.
Again.
And again.
Until my body settles…
even if my life hasn’t.
What’s Actually Happening
Most of what we do isn’t conscious.
Our bodies are constantly regulating us — through breath, through shifts we barely notice.
The difference is… we can choose to participate in that.
A deep sigh
A deep sigh isn’t just a reaction.
It’s a release.
Your body already knows how to do this.
The question is: will you let it?
Where’s the control?
We don’t control what life brings.
But in the middle of it — in the exact moment when everything feels like too much —
we have this.
Our breath.
Not to escape what’s happening…
But to stay with it…
long enough
to get through.
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Tarot Pull
When I pulled a tarot card for this piece, The Hierophant came up — the teacher, the keeper of tradition, the voice of “this is how it’s supposed to be done.”
And it made me think about all the things we’ve been told about pain… about strength… about how we’re supposed to handle life’s hardest moments.
But in the middle of it — when it’s actually happening — none of those words help.
What helps is something much simpler.
Something older.
The breath.
The Hierophant says: this will make you stronger.
My body says: just breathe.
And right now, I trust my body more.