When strength stops feeling strong

Which sounded simple enough … until I sat down to write it.

The truth is, the idea of being resilient no longer feels like a badge of honour.

For a long time, I took it as the highest compliment.

Who doesn’t want to be seen as strong and capable?

Lately, those words land differently.

They fall straight to the pit of my stomach and I have to fight back the tears.

Strength, for me, has started to feel less like power and more like exhaustion.

I do not have anything left to fight for anything that is not worth fighting for.

Maybe that is wisdom that comes after a long season of pushing through.

Resilience shapes you, but it can wear you down too.

I have a thousand stories of picking myself up after life pulled the rug out from beneath me.

Dusting myself off and marching forward because that was the only option.

But sometimes strength looks like walking away.

Sometimes resilience is letting the universe close a door you are too stubborn to shut yourself.

I believe the universe repeats lessons until we finally learn them.

I have always felt restless the moment I am boxed in.

In every job, I picked things up fast, got moving, and was soon searching for the next challenge.

So taking on a 150-year-old run down venue and trying to turn it into a multi purpose hospitality and events destination was perfect for me.

It stretched me, consumed me, and gave me a huge dream to chew on.

I loved it, and I probably would never have been finished with it.

However, after surviving the chaos of COVID, something changed.

The challenges were no longer exciting, they were heavy.

I kept questioning, am I supposed to keep fighting for this, or is the universe telling me to drop it?

It was around that time, on my morning dog walks, I began finding blue and black feathers.

Always just one. Always directly in my path.

The first couple of times, I picked them up, feeling a strange pull to keep them.

Then came the third.

There is a particular place I always stop.

A small clearing among the trees where I stand to re energise.

It is my spot. One morning, as I approached, I saw a feather standing upright in the ground, as if someone had placed it there on purpose.

It was in the exact place where I stand, right between my feet.

To be honest, I was a little freaked out, and left it where it was.

The next morning, it was still upright, still waiting.

So I took it home.

I later learned that blue -black feathers are believed to be powerful messages from the spiritual world, suggesting a need for a significant change in your life path.

A sign that you are being guided and protected as you move in a new direction.

Those feathers now sit in a small vase in my home, a reminder that resilience is not only the act of holding on.

Sometimes real strength is knowing when to let go.