One of the concepts that stuck with me, that I found so beautiful upon learning about in my Bible classes in college was about the rule of first mention.

Essentially, when a word was first mentioned in the Bible (the originally translated word) the meaning behind it was how it was meant to be read the rest of the time in was mentioned. When we would do word studies and we’d have to sift through to find the beginning, to find the way it was all tied together.

I think it was the that I made the connection that God was a storyteller. That he wanted to leave foreshadowing and theme and bits and pieces to pick up. He wanted to leave so that we might be able to untangle story that from first glance have no bearing but when we dig deep we see the unearthed path left behind.

That the meaning of a word could be more important than just what it says on page; that it could carry story upon story.

I’ve been thinking about words in my story that grab onto the meaning of first mention that for good or bad has dragged itself through my life and made a mark.

And one of those words is one I truly can’t stand: resilient.

And I’ve been trying to go through my brain to find why I can’t stand the word as much as I do.

I think that some of it is from working with kids and the thought that children are resilient. Something about it always rubbed me the wrong way. It felt like a reaction to kids having trauma or traumatic experiences was not to work on making them better but to respond with “kids are resilient”. It never settled with me that it was the thought.

And for myself, my resilience felt like a reminder that I had gone through something.

In a book I read recently by Lacey Day, two of the characters were talking about the word resilient and this is what they said:

‘And the worst part? People kept calling me resilient. Like I was some warrior goddess in cute boots’ ‘That word,’ he murmurs, and it’s not just agreement, it’s something low and rough in his voice that makes my stomach dip, ‘I hate that word, it’s a nice way of saying you survived something terrible and we don’t know what to do with your sadness, so here’s a pat in the back and a vague compliment.’

That’s why I do not like the word resilient.

But.

I’m coming to terms with the fact that maybe I’m the one that supposed to do something with the word resilient.

Maybe I’m the one who’s supposed to be changing the word and what it’s about.

Over the last 8 months I’ve been told over and over that I am resilient. And truth be told I have to grit my teeth each time. 

Because I don’t want to have to be resilient.

But, at the end of the day, I am.

I have been built into a tough old broad like my mom and I chose to keep fixing going no matter what.

I am not positive for positives sake but I do choose to move forward even when it feels like the world wants me to stop.

And those things, those moments, those events have made me resilient.

They have refined the places that were deemed broken and strengthened the places that got lost in the muck.

I still will probably bristle at the word resilience. I still will be an advocate of doing everything in my power to not be a reason a child has to learn resilience.

But, I have to the terms that maybe, I’m supposed to change the way I see the word resilience. 

I don’t know what your word is. I don’t know what makes you bristle at the mere sound of it.

But I do know that it probably means you are meant for that word. 

Whatever it is. 

With love,

Meg