Stronger in the Broken Places

Resilience is defined as "the ability to become strong, healthy or successful again after something bad happens." In the counseling session, we hear from our clients story after story about all the bad things that can happen in life. Our nightly news shows and daily papers highlight the horrors, tragedies and frightening circumstances that humans can't escape. And yet, go on we do. In the face of great uncertainty (will our government shut down due to budget disagreements?), nstural disasters (the flooding in Colorado) and human loss (the rising desth tollmfrom gun violence), we find ways to put one foot in front of the other. As a species, we've endured through cataclysmic events like the Holocaust and the World Wars in the past century, and plagues and bloody revolutions throughout known history. What allows us to survive, even thrive, amidst horror, devastating losses and mind-numbing pain? Some would say survival is a testament to the strength of the human spirit. Others would argue that our biological instinct is to survive and procreate at any cost. Hemingway wrote, "The world breaks everyone, and afterward many are strong in the broken places." We cannot avoid the pain that comes with living, with loving. But we CAN choose to mend ourselves, and each other, so that we are stronger where we were once broken, strong enough to reach out to each other, hold each other up, and keep moving.