STTS 147: What Strength Through The Struggle Actually Means

Today’s episode is about the two different but powerful meanings for Strength Through the Struggle that you can use in your life. Let’s get right to it.

Hello everybody! Thanks for taking the time to tune in and listen to this episode. I really appreciate your time and energy. While this episode isn’t specifically about martial arts I’m going to use them as an example.

When I came up with the name for this podcast it was the result of wanting to be truthful about life. At least my experience with life. And what I’ve learned about it from my childhood, into the military and as a career martial artist and student of life.

I wanted people who were looking for solutions to life’s challenges to be able to find honest answers, inspiration, and motivation.

The first thing that STTS means to me is that we all actually do have the Strength to get through any Struggle that crosses our path in life. Those can be struggles that were thrust upon us through no doing of our own as well as the challenges we create with our choices. You know what I mean, problems of our own creation.

There have been a few times in my life that I didn’t know if I had the strength to do what needed to be done when confronted with a problem in my life. One of those times was when I found out I was going to be a father.

My own internal dialogue was very negative concerning how I saw myself. I couldn’t imagine anything good could come from me. More specifically, my seed. I grew up with so many experiences in childhood that I wasn’t worthy of anything good or that anything good could come from me that I spent my adult life trying not to become a father.

That wasn’t the truth but it was what I believed. And we tend to behave in alignment with what we believe regardless of whether the belief is true or not.

I ended up trying to be the best father I could and overall, I’ve done a fair job of it. Not perfect by any means but pretty good most days. And that is with the added challenges of raising a child with multiple disabilities.

Even though I didn’t believe it the start, I had the strength to do it. The truth was, I had the Strength to get Through the Struggle the whole time.

I bet you can think of times in your own life where this has been true for you. It could be anything. The ending of a relationship. Getting through school or going on and getting a degree in college. What about sickness or injury? The death of a loved one in your life? A financial crisis. The loss of a job. What about that choice that you made that brought on the difficulty in your life that you didn’t think you could overcome or get through.

You see. You had it in you the whole time. You made it through. You did have the strength to get through that struggle.

The second meaning and one that lines up with the martial arts is, we get Stronger because we go through Struggles. As a matter of fact, we CAN’T get stronger without resistance, without something to struggle against.

If I want to make my body stronger, I must find something to push against. For instance, a floor to do a push up against. If I’m standing in the middle of a room pushing against the air, my body is not getting stronger. There isn’t anything in opposition to my arms. There isn’t anything for me to struggle against.

I have to get down on the floor and push against it. The floor and my bodyweight work together to give me something to struggle against which in turn creates more strength in my body.

The same is true for events in our life that are a struggle to get through. Those events are what give us an opportunity to get stronger on the inside.

When my son Josh was hurt in the hit-and-run with two semi-trucks, it created all kinds of opportunities for me to get stronger.

The struggle of dealing with both a life-threatening and ultimately life-altering event made it possible for me to have to dig deeper than I ever had to in my life. I had to develop a stronger Faith in order to keep going with everything that was required of me and Joshua. I developed more patience and new perspectives of understanding that have made me a stronger person.

I had to come to terms with the idea that I can’t control everything in my life which made me stronger. A new level of compassion was required for my son but also for myself and others in this world has ultimately made stronger as well.

I have a deeper level of perseverance now and can endure (which is another type of strength) difficult things if I must. All of this is as a result of the struggle, that ended up in my life.

It wasn’t easy and I’m not going to pretend that it was. I didn’t enjoy going through it. It was hard. But I do enjoy the strength that I gained from it. Without the struggle, I couldn’t have gotten stronger.

What about your own life? What have you gone through that has made you a stronger person? A better student, employee or boss. What are the challenges in your life, the struggles you have gone through that have made you stronger as a husband, wife, father or mother? That’s right. You have all kinds of examples of how much stronger you are because of the struggles you had to figure out.

So let me tie it all together.

1 – We all have the strength to get through any struggle in our life even if we don’t believe it.

2 – We all can gain new levels of strength because of the struggles we go through in life.

Pretty impressed with yourself now? You should be! You’ve been getting stronger and showing strength your whole life.

I hope that helps. Thanks again for listening and remember, if you want any coaching to reach out at markgoblowsky.com. Let’s get you unstuck and moving again.