There are people in my life right now who are carrying things I would not wish on anyone. And I am writing this for them.
I think about the man being torn apart in family court over circumstances that have nothing to do with what kind of father he is. The woman who came home to find her things on the lawn and her life rearranged without her input. The single parent raising two special needs children alone, without a break, without a net, without nearly enough recognition for the sheer weight of what they carry every day. The young man who grew up absorbing the chaos of an alcoholic, mentally ill father, who now has to build a self out of the pieces that were left. The woman sitting up at night worrying about a child with a terrible disease, not knowing what tomorrow looks like. The widower who is the last of his bloodline, sitting alone in a house full of absence.
I think about the professor who hid in a bathroom during a campus shooting. The friend who woke up after surgery missing part of himself. The man who fights thoughts of ending his life every single day and still gets up and goes to work. The woman sleeping on an air mattress in an empty house, starting over in the most raw and vulnerable way. The young widow who lost her husband on what should have been a joyful trip. The woman whose husband made her quit therapy because he could not handle who she was becoming. The three brothers watching their mother die.
This Is What Endurance Looks Like
None of these people are broken, even though they might feel that way. They are in motion through some of the most brutal terrain a human being can cross. And the fact that they are still standing, still trying, still showing up, that is not small. That is remarkable.
Endurance is one of the things I believe in most. It is not glamorous. It does not trend. It does not get applause. It just keeps going when everything in you wants to quit. That quiet persistence is one of the most powerful things a human being can do.
Don't Break Character
I have thought about this a lot, and I keep coming back to the same message for every single one of these people, and honestly for myself too, because I know there will come a day when I need to hear it back.
Don't break character.
You know who you are. You know the kind of person you have been working to become. The pressure of a hard season is not the time to abandon that. It is the time to lean into it harder. The character you have built is exactly what will carry you through if you let it.
You have got a lot of heart. More than you are giving yourself credit for right now. Hold on to that. The people in your life who see you clearly already know it.