Title:Pick your self up, fast!
Resilience, that ineffable quality that allows one to be knocked down by life and come back stronger than ever. Rather than letting failure overcome them and drain their resolve, such a one finds a way to rise from the ashes and soldier on.
2008 saw one of history's unforgettable races, and to all spectators a new inspirational fact was engraved on the sands of time. A sprinter, Heather Dorniden was sprinting in the big ten Indoor events in Minneapolis generally known as the 2008 women's 600 meters final. Like how all races are started Heather was running too, things were going smoothly for her, she had a good start, just like many of us in life...
Never had she expected that life plays tricks on us at important moments. There was about 200 meters of the race to go when Dorniden tripped, and she fell,landing hard on her face. Now this is where history was made. First instinct would leave her with just two simple choices: to stop running and go back and possibly cry or she can pick her self up fast and carry on. A normal mind would have moved to take the former, knowing fully well that: it is short distance left for the race to come to its close, that her colleagues did not stop to sympathize with her, and most importantly that they were ahead of her already. No! She got up, picked her self up immediately and continued, she ran and she did not just run, she eventually won the race, because she choose to Carry on. And when she was asked, she said: "that last 50meters, I hit a gear that I never knew I had... Not t because of anything extra ordinary but because the goal in front of me was bigger than the obstacle I faced"
Nothing could do that except for resilience, that determining force that cuts so finely making bare the dichotomy between ordinary and extra ordinary.
Success and failure are not measured by how you fall, but how fast you pick your self up. This is the story of one and all, Like Dorniden life happens, life can knock us off our feet, at one point or the other jobs are lost, relationship broken, hearts are soiled, breaken and damaged, people betray us, serious illness, even death of a loved one just to mention but a few are examples of very challenging life experiences. Now, more like Dorniden we also have two simply choices to stay down or pick our selves up immediately.
To pick up one's self is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or significant sources of stress say family and relationship problems, work place or financial stressors. In plain terms means to bounce back. No one does it for us, no one can pick you up unless u decide to pick your self up, when Dorniden fell, her spouse didn't come to pick her up, her friends didn't, neither her coach, not even those she was running with. It was when she did her self the favour of getting up that people saw the need to cheer her up to the finish line, if she stayed back there she would have only remained an object of the world's sympathy but resilience made her the inspirational factor that she is today. That ugly life experience is giving you two simply options today, stay down and become the world's object of sympathy of pick your self fast and stamp your name and your story in the sands of time.
Certain things need to be in place for one to lead a resilient life. Some of them include: A positive attitude towards failure of self and that of others, optimism, the ability to regulate emotions, and most importantly the ability to see failure as a form of helpful feed back.
In the end, let it continue to resound in our minds that even after misfortune, resilient people are blessed with such an outlook that they are able to change course and soldier on.