Let’s not get caught up in the self-help fluff. “Resilience” has been hijacked by inspirational quotes over beach sunsets, usually posted by someone who’s never had a bad day in their life… or a mortgage, or teenage kids, or a dodgy knee.
But resilience isn’t some magical trait reserved for yogis, elite athletes, or people who write motivational books with titles like Unbreakable: My Journey Through Mild Inconvenience. It’s not a TED Talk. It’s not even particularly sexy.
Resilience is human.
Full stop.
If you’re alive and even somewhat functioning in this chaotic mess of a world, congratulations, you’re resilient. You don’t need to meditate in a Himalayan cave to earn that title. You earned it the moment you got back up after stacking your bike as a kid, gravel in your knees, tears in your eyes, but determined to ride again.
We all start as little puddles of potential. Drooling, screaming, sh*t machines with no idea how to do anything. And from that point, it’s been nothing but one big resilience training camp.
Crawling. Walking. Falling.
Remember learning to walk? You don’t, of course, because you were like one and a half. But you fell hundreds of times. And every single time, you got back up. You didn’t overthink it. You didn’t say, “Well, clearly walking isn’t for me. I’ll just be a floor person.”
Nope. You got up. You tried again. And again. Until walking became boring and you had to go learn something else, like riding a bike, or swimming, or surviving puberty.
So, when did we forget that resilience is part of us?
Maybe around the time someone told us we had to have it all figured out. Or when failure started feeling like a report card rather than a stepping stone. Maybe when social media started rewarding polished highlights over the messy truth.
But underneath the self-doubt, the burnout, the bloody imposter syndrome… is the same scrappy little human who once tried to climb the bookshelf just to reach the biscuits.
Still there. Still trying. Still rising.
Resilience doesn’t always look heroic.
Sometimes it looks like doing the dishes when you’re depressed.
Sometimes it looks like going to work after a night of no sleep and a heart full of grief.
Sometimes it looks like apologising when your ego would rather swallow a cactus.
Sometimes it’s just getting through the day without punting your WiFi router across the room.
It’s not glamorous. It’s not always visible. But it’s there—in every person who’s ever felt like giving up but didn’t.
And here’s the kicker: You don’t need to “earn” resilience. You just need to remember it.
You were born with it. It’s wired into your DNA. It’s the same force that healed your scraped knees and broken hearts. It’s what helped you leave the wrong job, the wrong relationship, the wrong town. It’s what helps you laugh again, even after pain made you forget how.
And yes, it changes shape as you age.
As a kid, resilience was physical: jumping off things, breaking bones, bouncing back.
As a teen, it was social, navigating rejection, embarrassment, and the horror of braces.
As an adult, it’s spiritual, learning to let go, hold boundaries, stay soft in a hard world, and still find a reason to get out of bed when the alarm feels like an insult.
The truth is, resilience isn’t about being tough. It’s about being real.
It’s not pretending you’re fine when you’re not. It’s feeling it all, the fear, the fatigue, the doubt—and still showing up.
It’s sitting in the rubble of what you thought your life would look like and saying, “Alright then. Let’s build something new.”
It’s being knocked flat by life, divorce, illness, loss, and disappointment and finding a way to rise—slower maybe, but wiser.
Resilience is not a performance. It’s a practice.
It’s the little decisions you make when no one’s watching.
To keep going.
To ask for help.
To try again.
To forgive.
To rest.
To live, fully—scars, flaws, and all.
And no, you’re not broken. You’re becoming.
Every messy experience, mistake, bad haircut, awkward conversation, or night spent crying into your pillow is shaping you, moulding you, and strengthening your soul’s roots.
Growth is rarely graceful. Sometimes it feels like being pruned with a chainsaw. But beneath the chaos, something new is always taking shape. Something real. Something you.
So here’s the truth, simple and raw: You are already resilient.
You’ve survived 100% of your worst days. That’s a damn good track record.
You’ve rebuilt yourself after heartbreak.
You’ve figured stuff out, you thought you never could.
You’ve laughed in moments where crying made more sense.
You’ve loved again after pain.
You’ve kept going when everything in you screamed to stop.
That’s resilience.
Not perfection.
Not strength without softness.
Not stoicism or hustle culture or pretending nothing touches you.
Resilience is learning to bend without breaking.
To feel without drowning.
To fall without staying down.
You don’t need to find resilience.
You just need to remember who you are.
And you, my friend, are so much more capable than you’ve ever given yourself credit for.
Now go out there and be gloriously human.
Fall. Get up. Repeat.
You’ve been doing it since nappies.
