The Art of Resilience
This article is based on my life story, from troubling times to good ones. My story is a testament to the Will to Survive life with its ups and downs. This is why I decided to write about this topic: as a form of motivation to anyone who is going through a tough time in their life and feels like there is no coming out of it. Hopefully, by sharing my journey towards resilience, others can learn from my experiences.
In 2021, I remember reading an article that was issued in the Wilderness Paper. The article posed a question stating ‘if you were unexpectedly forced into a wilderness situation could you survive?’ When I read the question I thought ‘no ways!’ and chuckled to myself. After diving in, I realised that the article was not merely writing about a literal survival in the wilderness. It leaned more on using the mind as a positive attitude when faced with adversities, which is what I have applied in my life to combat the challenging situations I’ve found myself in.
Growing up
I grew up as an extremely brilliant and spontaneous child. I was that child that soared through everything. I had a very strong personality but was also very fearful of displaying my full potential in everything that I was good at because I went through a slightly emotional and traumatic childhood. I lived with my mom’s parents (grandparents) for the first stages of my life. At the age of 8, I unexpectedly had to leave my grandparents and go live with my dad, for whatever reasons my parents had agreed upon together. As mentioned above, I was still a child, I did not have much knowledge nor a say in the decision that was made on my behalf.
I was a little enthusiastic about the move, as it seemed more of a step ahead for me. I was moving to a different setting than the one I was used to. “I am going to live in a suburb,” I thought — with white people (abelungu). Tell me which child would not be excited about this endeavour? I thought deeply about the future, forgetting how severely I would be affected by the withdrawal symptoms that came from not living with my grandparents who I had known and grown to love for years. I had not given much thought to the idea that I will be starting a whole new life with total strangers, people that I was not used to at all. The move happened swiftly and I had to quickly adapt to it — despite the anxiety. Life was not the same at all but it was not the worst either. I grew to miss my grandparents so much, I was allowed to call them once or twice a week, but that communication did not last long. I remember visiting my mom and gran for two holidays and that too was cut short. I was kind of forced to forget that I have a mother and grandparents that yearned for my presence every June and December.
Years later my grandparents died, I sadly did not go to the funerals. It was then that I made a conscious decision to grow and start forgiving the fact that I never saw them again, and might never see my mom. I was forced to survive that trauma without even having anyone to share it with. I worried that by the time I finished university, my mom would have passed on. But I’m grateful that she lived until we met again after 13 years apart.
Learning resilience for the first time
From a very young age, I realised that I have the power to control how I feel and also what I do going forward. So, I decided then that my life was now in my own hands. The psychological and dictionary meaning of resilience “is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or significant sources of stress such as a family and relationship problems, serious health issues, workplace and financial stressors”. Having made this decision I realised this power of resilience within myself.
I have had too many opportunities to practice in all those years. I matriculated with flying colours, went to university and soared in my studies. I worked 5 jobs in university and I was part of a German scholarship that took me to Mozambique and Zimbabwe. I graduated and started working. In 2016, I decided to find my mom and moved to live with her.
Life changed for me again and I had to adapt to living in a township after so many years of being a suburb girl, but I adjusted. I went through my fair share of challenges and also gave my mom hell too, as I was going through depression because of the move and everything I went through. I started drinking, partying and being a loose cannon. I lost my car because I could not find a job in Port Elizabeth. My life was shattered. My dreams, goals, visions and aspirations did not matter to me at this stage I had given up on myself.
Practising my resilience
I remember praying to God in August 2017 and asking him for my life back, and I started building my own guide to help me be resilient. My life changed and everything started to fall into place. I got married in 2018, fell pregnant and gave birth to a beautiful baby boy. But then again in 2020, I went through extreme challenges as my husband lost his job at a company we both worked in. I was fortunate to be employed in a new company as a call centre agent the month before he was retrenched. We went through a huge financial strain, marital issues, and in-law challenges that almost brought us to our breaking point in the marriage. I worked tirelessly to be the breadwinner at home and also to tend to my household expenses.
The load became extremely unbearable, to a point where I had mild depression. I could not cope any longer, and I did not feel like I could share my situation with anyone. Until I decided to choose myself and separate from the marriage.
So when I preach resilience I know. I know how heavy life can be, I have been through it all but that never stopped me from trying, and working towards my goals. I have an LLB degree with a wealth of experience and a resume that takes up more than two pages because of my experience and exposure to countries abroad. But my title never mattered to me when I was unemployed and willing to take up any job that presented itself to me — I worked as a promo girl, a radio DJ, a newspaper girl and at one point when I struggled to get employment I opted to work as a maid.
My experiences have made me realise that ‘resilience’ and the ‘will to survive’ is a holistic approach. And with that shared, I have come up with my own survival guide to being resilient and ensuring that I always have the will to survive:
- Start with my mind, sometimes a mental shift is needed: Daily, I make use of daily affirmations, meditation and manifestations to help maintain a healthy mind.
- Exercise my mind into thinking positively: My former trainer used to always say “mind over matter”. I decided to guard my mind to only think positively whenever a negative thought came up. Whenever I am feeling down or depressed, I go through old pictures that make me happy.
- Document my thoughts (both good and bad): This really helped monitor how many times I had good thoughts and how many times I had bad thoughts. I would then analyse to see if I mostly had bad days or mostly had good days. A plan of action always arose from this exercise.
- Remind myself that every situation is temporary: There’s a quote that I love so much that says “things fall apart to come together”. This quote keeps me going and reminds me that everything is temporary. Nothing lasts forever.
- Have a divine intervention (mine was God, The Universe and my ancestors): Prayer helped me get through each day. Manifestation also helped me speak things into existence for my life. Finally, I communicated with my ancestors on a daily basis using sage which is an incense that is used as a form of communication with past spirits.
I survived death while giving birth to my son. I survived emotional turmoil while going through a major depression which led me to resign from one of the most prominent legal jobs at a very prestigious law firm. I survived financial constraints, I survived the loss of family and loved ones. I survived the most traumatic strain in my life where I was forbidden to be with my mother for 13 years, but I survived. I survived being the only breadwinner at home, as my then-husband lost his job due to COVID, it has not been easy. I survived a separation in my marriage and having to adjust to now being a single parent. But I soared through and I am still soaring. I can safely say now that being resilient has shaped me and made me the person I am today. After working tirelessly as a call centre agent through the pandemic, I was promoted as a Junior Legal Advisor from the 1st of March 2021. I can’t imagine what could have happened to me if I had given up!
I hope my journey has inspired you to keep going and never believe that a situation is too big for you to overcome. Nothing is permanent. Nothing is too hard for us. Seek guidance, practise self-care and meditate. Manifest greatness upon your life and speak to the Universe, it is listening. And always remember — “mind over matter”.
If you want to get in touch with me, you can reach out and follow me on Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter or through my blog, Holistic Serendipity.
