Mental strength:

What is it?
Do you have it?
How do you get it?
Here’s why you need it……

This article will highlight why developing your mental strength will impact your life positively and greatly.

Ready for it? Let’s get into this topic.

Recently I’ve met two specific women with some major mental strength, grit & deep confidence in their capabilities.

Needless to say; It inspired me.

Neither of them had to convince me of their capability; their way of life & being simply embodies strength & grit.

Confidence is apparent beneath their words, within their choices and from the way they live their lives (on their own terms, following their passions.)

The most impressive aspect of these women is that their strength and confidence is obvious; yet quiet. Quiet; meaning; It’s not forced. It’s not coming from a “look at me” place.

Rather, it’s graceful. It just is.

First off, when you don’t believe that you can handle a situation; you’re right.

Developing mental strength allows you to witness that you can do really hard things, (yes you can) which provides you with proof of what you’re made of. This helps you to feel capable and confident in your abilities. This helps you to take healthy risk, put yourself “out there” more in life and, ultimately, can lead you toward living a life beyond a comfort zone.

This is invaluable, for whatever you believe to be true; will be true. True about yourself. True about the world and true about your life and your capabilities.

In short your mental strength is your grit, your capacity to endure and push through the discomfort, the unknown and obstacles, that life throws at you.

Building your mental strength will require you to look at your relationship with fear. Let’s get something right; nobody is without fear.

The fearless ones of us out there have learned how to be with fear by feeling it and proceeding forward regardless of it’s presence.

The trick with facing fear is gaining a healthier relationship with fear. Gaining a positive relationship with fear involves practicing being in the same room as fear without allowing it to take over all of your actions and choices. It’s learning how to stay calm and clear when fear is present in order to navigate the emotion with a centered & balanced mind instead of a panicked one. It’s learning how to respond healthfully to fear rather than react to it.

The good news is that mental strength can be developed. (and sometimes needs to be if your life circumstances didn’t naturally push you to build and condition it.)

Let’s get into how you can strengthen your grit (your mental strength muscle) in order for you to get on with reaching the goals that you have in store for your life.

what is mental strength exactly?

Mental strength is our ability to manage the stress, unpredictability, pressure, chaos, unexpected and difficult situations that come in life. Mental strength encompasses our ability to embrace and navigate change and life transitions in a positive way.

What do i need to do to show myself proof of my mental strength?

The truth is that you first may have to workout and build your mental strength muscle, depending on where you’re at. This article will help you with that.

Remember that, ultimately, the only person you have to prove your grit to is yourself. You have to believe in you first. Believing in yourself will help you hone your ability to endure. Knowing you have mental strength allows you to endure even if and when someone doubts your mental and emotional capacity.

Most importantly, your level of mental strength is what’s going to help you get through things you didn’t even realize that you were capable of.

Having true grit involves healthy inner knowing of what you can handle and leading with that. True grit allows us to get through things that feel unmanageable and too big without crumbling to pieces.

*This doesn’t mean that we can bypass healthy processing and acceptance of difficult things; everyone has to feel their feelings in order to remain emotionally & physically healthy and well.

why increase your mental strength? (here’s some stats)

In a TED talk on the topic of mental toughness with Penny Mallory it was reported that:

"30 percent of what you achieve comes down to your skill, talent and intelligence. While the other 70 percent of what you achieve comes down to your ability to be mentally tough. This entails your confidence, your drive, your grit, commitment, aim, ability to focus, resilience and determination.”

With all that said; just as a diet is not a lifestyle; your relationship with your mental strength is a life long journey, not a diet (a short term thing.)

A rushed pace to the finish line rarely will help you cultivate good things when it comes to your health, your happiness and your well being.

Cultivating and maintaining your mental strength is a long term solution that will help you stay more inwardly steady through the dips of life. Your mental strength needs to be cultivated and maintained.

4 Tips to Build, Hone and Maintain your Sense of Mental Strength (4 tips toward becoming more mentally strong)

TIP #1: Regain a sense of personal control

What this means: Having a stable sense of feeling in control of your feelings and reactions is what personal control is all about.

action: Getting clear on what you can control while practicing acceptance for what you can’t do much about, can help you to cultivate a better sense of personal control. Taking healthy action toward feeling that you’re doing everything you can to participate and make shifts where needed will allow you to be able to stomach the things that you don’t have control over with more calm & clarity.

Tools to get you to a more neutral feeling state:

emotional regulation: Emotional regulation is your ability to healthfully control and process your emotions. Being able to emotionally regulate helps you to respond to people and circumstances that are challenging with a proactive and balanced approach. Your ability to emotionally regulate helps you to stay cool & calm amongst the chaos of life so you don’t overcomplicate and destruct when times are tough.

observe your relationship with control: a healthy relationship with control allows you to know what to put effort toward and, conversely, to know when you’ve done everything there is “to do” regarding a situation. Ultimately, we’re talking about the art of knowing when to let go.

It can be beneficial for you to take some reflective time to self evaluate what your current relationship is with control.

Food for thought: High control usually results in high anxiety.

TIP #2: Find a way to challenge yourself

what this does for you: Getting better at something that you enjoy doing and that’s a positive outlet for you does wonders and can build your mental capacity. Finding a past time, hobby or interest to challenge yourself with helps you to prove your capability to yourself.

action- brainstorm all the challenges (big or small) that are of interest to you. Pick just one to commit to and see through. If you’re lacking any ideas, focusing on challenging yourself with actions that enhance your well being is a great place to start. Examples of this can be committing to going to sleep earlier, getting more exercise, drinking more water, working out more, starting a new sport to expand & grow within, limiting drinking, etc. (everyone is different here; the point is for you to challenge yourself based on where you’re starting at.)

Challenging the MIND / BODY

How movement & physical challenge work to increase mental strength and why it’s important:

Pursuing movement and physical challenge teaches us how to endure discomfort.

Acquiring mental strength through movement and physical challenge is a major avenue toward building grit and seeing what you’re made of.

why?

Because……learning how to challenge ourselves and push through our physical discomfort helps us build our capacity to be mentally tough.

Facing challenging physical situations and pushing through helps us to connect with our mind & body. This is valuable for mental strength because our physical grit can benefit and impact our emotional grit. The inner strength that we have to address, cope with & work toward healing our difficult emotions comes from the same grit that it takes to endure physical discomfort. To say it simply; If you build one aspect of yourself (body); you can simultaneously build the other (mind).

how the mind / body connection comes into play….

The mind / body connection plays into our ability to be mentally strong. The mind-body connection is the idea that thoughts, emotions, and beliefs can have a significant impact on our physical health. A healthy body allows for a strong mind.

Our emotions not only live in our mind via our thoughts; they also can live in the body and impact how our body functions.

I mention the mind/ body connection because by recognizing and nurturing it we can access our innate healing abilities and improve our overall health and well-being.

TIP #3: Focus on commitment and consistency

What this does for you: Focusing on commitment and consistency by following through with what you say, allows you to regain your sense of self trust. When you don’t trust your own word, overtime, your level of self trust becomes compromised; this is a gateway toward huge problems.

action: Whatever action you came up with for Tip #2 can be the aim and external focus for you to practice commitment and consistency. Again, start small if you need to in order to work on regaining or rebuilding your level of self trust. The point here is to start making strides toward improving your level of self trust and self commitment through consistent words and actions.

TIP #4- find ways to build & sustain your confidence

What it does for you: engaging your time and energy in things that challenge you, while accepting the challenge and working through the difficulties, helps you to build self confidence. Learning new things challenges us in so many ways, which can really help with cultivating mental strength. Learning new things requires us to be uncomfortable, which is the gateway to a stronger amount of mental grit.

action: Ask what actions, pastimes, people or general ways of spending your time & energy make you feel good or interest you? Tap into and find awareness around what these specific things are and take note. These are the things that are going to help you build your self confidence (and along the way your mental strength.)

*Note: Yes, confidence comes from within, however, engaging in life and pursuing things that help demonstrate your capability, capacity, strengths and talents is necessary to have a healthy self concept. This is especially true if you’ve convinced ourself that you don’t have anything to offer. Everyone has something special to offer; that’s just the truth. Whether you’ve allowed yourself to tap into that special essence of yours or not is another conversation.

For this tip, consider long term practices that you can invest in that will provide structure for the way you spend your energy and challenge you. Structure will give you the necessary framework to build your confidence over time.

You know that saying “if you don’t use it; you loose it?’ Well, it’s true; Meaning when you let aspects of your life or yourself go; they weaken, they dissipate.

When we begin to loose our capacity to believe in ourselves, this creates a pathway to much suffering. Without self belief, we turn our heads away from the kinds of opportunities, relationships & challenges that support our mental strength.

Final Points to Help You Harness Optimum Mental Strength

1. Choose Your Hard

It’s common that life can bring us to many “forks in the road” where we’re required to make hard decisions.

example: to stay in an unfulfilling relationship or to take the steps to leave?

example: to leave the job you hate and face the unknown or to stay and be miserable?

Both choices are hard; both choices require tolerance of discomfort in their own ways. Both choices present there own challenges. The power that we hold is our ability to choose. Choice can be hard; yet choice is our gateway to freedom.

No choice, is a choice. It’s a choice to give your power away to something else or somebody else to decide for you. This is a passive way to live.

The power of choice can help us stay away and release ourselves from any victimhood mindset.

2. The Power of I AM

You are what you declare yourself to be.

Whatever you believe to be true about who you are will match up in due time. You will become who you speak yourself into being; for better or for worse.

Your self narrative is powerful. Unless the story of who you are gets interrupted and rewritten; it will pan out exactly how you’re scripting it.

This is why I bring to your attention the power of I AM statements. In this moment, I’m asking you to reflect on what you declare to yourself and to others about who you are. Become more intentional and mindful of this and you can create a lot of change.

What do you declare on the daily about yourself to be true?

Who are you painting yourself to be to yourself and others?

Thanks for being here with me. I encourage and support your journey toward mental strength and healthy grit. I wish you to feel strong, capable and confident in who you are. I hope this post helps you cultivate ideas on how to maintain and build your true grit.

*Freedive images by my dear friend, talented free diver & photographer Allie Reilly of SAMUDRA FLOW.

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