Finding Our Resilience

In a Chaotic World, Nov 6.

I woke up this morning to an America I do not recognize. To an America I feared. To an America I despised. How, how could we — yes, collectively, we — have done this to ourselves and to the world? There needs to be time for grief and to face the swirling mass of difficult emotions that follow. But that is NOT what I want to focus on right now.

Just breathe, the first friends to write me this morning told me. I have been breathing. It’s good advice. Deep breaths. This brings me out of my emotional of distress and back into my body.

Now, I want to focus on resilience. I don’t feel it right now. Now, I feel naked and afraid. I feel like I want to hide. I want to blame, and want to shame — shame my fellow citizens for the chaos they have wrought. The feelings are all valid. But they won’t help me now.

Now, I need to find my core of strength. I need to live out of my resilience and live out of my courage.

A few years ago, I co-authored a book with a brilliant philosopher-psychologist named Shai Tubai that we called Indestructible You: Building a Self that Cannot Be Broken. At the core of the book are some fundamental truths about power and the will to power we each possess — a will that both drives and motivates us. And when we feel powerless — as we all do…