Tap into your inner resilience

Sore muscles, a cranky back, and a happy heart. 

My regular gym has finally reopened after 15 months and my partner and I got our out-of-shape bodies back there on the very first day.

We made a big lifestyle shift a decade ago when we went from zero exercise to become regular moderate gym-goers. We’d kept up with it for all of this time other than occasional injury, illness or trips. 

So much changed during these months of the pandemic, and while we did try to keep at it, with moving and the last lockdown, we never quite got back to our old routine. 

But then our gym reopened last week and it feels like it’s finally time. 

This particular midlife body needs to ease back into it or else my muscles will scream bloody murder and my knees will revolt.

And so I ease in and am patient, knowing that eventually the muscles will grow stronger again, my cardiovascular system will be less huffy-and-puffy, and I’ll feel lighter and more flexible. 

So what is it that’s sending me back to the gym after all this time (besides knowing that it’s good for me)?

It’s all about innate resilience.

It may take longer to build back muscles than it would have in previous decades, but it is still going to happen. I don’t even need to think about it, as long as I simply get back in the routine and literally go through the motions.

Unlike getting in shape, resilience itself is not something we need to work at, train for or build. 

Resilience is the backdrop from where all those actions arise. It’s what bubbled up in me to let me know it was in fact time to return to working out. It is something within that is beyond the stories, the thoughts, the beliefs, and the memories. 

Innate resilience is what is there when we get out of our own way and get our heads out of the game.

It’s there when our minds are less focused on the constant stream of thoughts that distract us. Those thoughts that tell us things like:

     Everything is a problem to be solved or fixed

     I need to get ahead and the only way is to strive towards goals

     There is some kind of absence or lack I must somehow fill

But what if there is no void, no problem, nothing to struggle towards, other than what our heads tell us? 

What if the awesome power and awe of awareness (whether it’s settling into a state of being, or taking inspired action) is actually the space in which the answer to all of those “problems” reside? 

What if we could access our knowing, our sense of connectedness, our innate resilience at any time because it’s never not there? 

What if innate resilience is our default setting and we’ve simply not realized it?

What might be different in your life if you could realize this?

If you’d like to explore your resilience a bit further, I’ve got a tap-along video here. 

Any questions? Feel free to comment! I’ll be checking it after I get back from the gym!