If there is anything that I have learned in my life it is how to have inner strength even when my external world is falling apart. At a young age I learned what inner strength was and how to tap into it to help me get through challenging times in my life. Born and raised in the Amish culture I always wondered if there was more to life and what would it feel like to fit in somewhere? At the age of seventeen I made the decision to leave the culture and I left in the middle of the night, jumping out of a two story house. As I got to jump I remember hesitating and doubting myself until I tapped into the inner strength and take the jump. This was the first of many jumps in my life that I had to find the inner strength to take.
At eighteen I became pregnant and married at nineteen. A year and half into the abusive marriage I realized I needed to get out but I found out I was pregnant and I stayed because I was scared that I couldn’t make it on my own as a single mom. Two years later I tapped into my inner strength and left the marriage. I had no idea how to be a single mom since I was raised divorce was wrong and there were no single moms. I made the decision to improve my life even though I was scared.
I decided to join a gym since I needed to lose weight. I started working out, running Spartan races and then started powerlifting. Powerlifting opened my eyes up to how strong I actually was. As I started training for my competition I was not only gaining physical strength but also mental strength. This empowered me in all aspects of my life. I lost sixty five pounds and started to see myself shift mentally and have strength that I never knew I had.
Meanwhile I had started college as a single mom working full-time determined to graduate in four years with my Bachelor’s degree. Coming from only an eighth grade education (Amish school’s only go to eight grade) I had no idea how I was going to do this in four years and I had a lot of doubt but the one thing I did know was that I had the inner strength to keep going regardless of what happened. Four years later I walked across the stage with my degree.
As I finished my degree and climbed the corporate world I got remarried to what I thought was the love of my life and two years later he asked for a divorce. I was devastated! How was I going through this again? I went through a dark phase in my life where I had to make the choice to keep going and keep tapping into my inner strength. I wanted to give up on everything in my life but I knew I couldn’t, I had two boys that needed me.
As I pulled it together I told myself I was I going make myself happy and chase after my dreams regardless of what happened. I started the journey of self discovery and figured out what it was that I wanted in life. I made the decision to leave the corporate world in February 2020 to become an entrepreneur, to write, speak and coach. Then Covid hit and everything changed. I didn’t allow the fear to overcome me and I kept tapping into my inner strength to get through the unknown.
During Covid I found meditation and it changed my life. I slowed down enough to start to listen to myself and this took even more inner strength and courage that I had ever known in my life. I faced all my fears, all the things I had numbed out for years and it was uncomfortable and painful. I continued to show up and do the work and then one day I realized that my entire life I had no idea what love was and I wasn’t loving myself at all. As scary and unknown as it was I decided to fully commit to loving myself which changed my life. It takes strength to choose love and fully love ourselves!
Through each phase in my life there were times where I thought I wasn’t going to survive, I wasn’t going to make it, I wasn’t going to overcome the obstacle but yet each time I did and when I did I became even stronger. Years later I can now see the inner strength that I have keeps growing and for anyone out there going through challenging times you have the same inner strength. You can tap into the same inner strength and keep going, you are so much stronger than you think you are! I believe in you and your abilities to overcome anything and go after your biggest dreams because you are STRONG!
Stay Strong! I am rooting for you!
Emily Adams
~
Photo credit: Images courtesy of the storyteller.
