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The Urge to Give Up

by Debra Hillard


What do you do when you don’t want to keep going? When everything you’ve done falls flat and every effort to improve fails? How do you find your resilience when that’s the last thing you want to do?


I’m resilient, stronger than most, and have a lifetime of tools at my disposal. What if I don’t want to use them? 


I’m a fighter. I’ve proven that over and over again throughout my life. What if this feels like one battle too many? 


I have a lot to give and gifts to share. What if I can’t see that now?


What if I’ve lost my passion for my dreams?


What if I’m really a fraud?


What if the struggles have become so many and so hard that I can’t see my way through? 


What if I’m just too tired?


If you are anything like me and have met numerous challenges in your life, you’ve probably faced at least one of these questions. Maybe you feel alone and afraid to share your feelings with others for fear of what they might think. These feelings cause isolation and skew your perspective. When these questions are churning within me, I’m also aware of something else. It’s a deep inner knowing that my life, no matter how it might seem, is worth everything it takes to re-create. If I can find a shred of that awareness, then resilience is possible. If I say YES to that possibility, then resilience becomes probable. A shred is all it takes. 


Notice I said my “life”, not my work. I am referring to the distinction between who we are, the life we live and the work we choose. When we’re passionate about our work it’s easy to lose sight of that. Our creations become an extension of us, leading us to believe that they hold the same importance. 


Speaking from personal experience as a creator, I have struggled with keeping that distinction clear in my own mind. My art can easily become “me.” As a result, the pressures that accumulate in the process of building my business, creating a new piece, writing my book, feel like they are life-threatening as opposed to work related. They cause me to doubt myself at times when I confuse who I am with what I’m doing. Being resilient requires that we keep this distinction clear. It doesn’t mean we don’t care deeply about our work. It simply means that if we feel like giving up, we’re clear that it’s not ourselves we’re giving up on.


Not wanting to” is a reaction to fatigue, depression, and war weariness. The balm is not giving up on yourself, but it IS giving up the struggle to make “it” better, to fix what you think is broken. The battles of life can bring the best of us to our knees and crack us in places we didn’t know existed. But “cracked” is a scar that will heal over. It’s a place where we mend stronger than before. If you live long enough and take enough risks, you will have scars. Each one adds to the unique texture of the life you create. 


Ignoring our feelings, burying the despair, heartbreak, loss, won't work. Facing them does. Sometimes resilience requires surrender, not fighting. We just have to remember who we truly are. Then when the time is right and the tears wiped away, we pick up a thread and start weaving again.


Remember when you feel too battle-weary to go on, someone else out there knows how you feel. You are not alone, my friend. You are not alone.


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