rebuilding pod | resilient or tenacious?

// As we make our way through life, we come across a lot of decision-making. The more we venture through our minds or especially if we take the philosophical route - we tend to get stuck a lot more. But there comes a point where you gotta get out of your head and just do things.

What I’ve written here might not make any sense from an external view point with reference to the episode itself, but it’s a huge dilemma that just got solved for me by going a bit easier on myself. I don’t know if everybody has principles they live their life by, but I’m somebody who couldn’t betray myself on things like that. I still haven’t changed, it’s just that maybe my mind’s been callussed a bit in some specific ways. //

For a very, very long time, I took great pride in being resilient. Until one day I watched this interview with Elon Musk. He talked about being tenacious. This hit a very different neuron in my brain. Had this been a few years earlier it wouldn’t have registered very differently to me. But this was after my struggles with being able to function and just doing the bare minimum to survive.

So why did it hit me so differently and so hard and what exactly is the difference between these two words: resilient and tenacious? Well, I think resilience is best described as being able to get back up after being knocked down and face down the barrel all over again. And to me, that meant, as many times as needed. But when I heard that word - “tenacious” in that moment, I realised, there’s no doubt in my resilience, but what I need is to be tenacious. And I know I’m trying, but I’ve just been trying to get back up. To find some land, just to stand on.

Meanwhile, tenacious to me means, you get knocked down but you keep moving forward, even if you’re stuck to the ground. Even if we’re just crawling. And you’re also trying as hard as hell to get back up, but you’re also trying to push forward. There’s that motion in two dimensions. Yes, it requires more force, but you persevere, you’re not stopping. And sometimes, being stuck is the worst feeling.

I remember there were times I tried to push forward and only forward. There were times I tried to get up off the ground and stand up straight. But there weren’t moments where I tried to do both. I had people tell me to stop pushing and take in everything I’d made for myself. All the good stuff, and learn from it. ‘Cause, there’s so much even good things can teach you. So just stop pushing.

I did try to do that. It worked out maybe, a bit. But not a whole lot. I couldn’t stay still and carry that momentum. I felt like I needed to push for a bit and keep pushing at least a tiny bit.

Don’t get me wrong here. I don’t mean you need to just keep pushing always. The most important thing is that you need to listen to what your body and mind are trying to tell you. Listen to know what you’re ready for. And realize the strength to accept the facts for what they are.

And when I talk about being Tenacious and pushing yourself, what I’ve learned from my own mistakes is that pushing yourself does not mean stressing yourself out or over-exerting yourself or applying so much force onto yourself that you’re not able to bear it. Just a little every day, and adding a bit more as you get better the same as you do with workouts and weights. Don’t go and pull or even tear a muscle.

Something I remind myself of is what I read in Eliezer the Person; Yudkowsky talks about how he has very little energy and can only do so much despite having had a pretty normal life. And how he’s accepted that fact and continues to do his work with that in mind.

And coming back to “pushing yourself”, I don’t think pushing in just one direction is ever going to really help. In my case, I suffered with my health in return for constantly pushing forward as I ran away from the bad stuff and struggled to do even the basic things. Again, I’m not saying facing the bad stuff is great either. In fact, it can make shit a whole lot worse. Especially, if you’re not ready to do it. And when you’re ready, you’ll KNOW it. You just gotta trust yourself then. And whatever happens, again - have the strength to accept everything for what it is. Because if you do, being tenacious is something that’ll come naturally to you.

Honestly, though, I still believe that it’s probably much better to turn your back to it all and take your time. To keep trying. And trying to heal. Until you’re ready to turn back and face it all.

But in my case, I was kinda forced to face it all. All of a sudden. No warning. I did have a one-day notice period though. And thankfully, every time I fall sick something changes in my brain. I guess because when you’re sick you don’t have the energy to pretend with yourself or to put a face on and debate with yourself or have an argument or fight with yourself. It all is just what it is. And this last time being sick, it helped me get ready.

(It’s always a Thursday.)

So what exactly happened? I was forced to face the people responsible for the trauma. I had the bus ride to prep for it and contemplate. Which was a huge help. I had people to support me, people to lean on, to hold hands with.

(A quote I often think about when it comes to this stuff has always been this one by Nietzsche: “And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you. Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.”)

But honestly, whatever happened, I’m better for it. I’m glad to see how much support I have and to see how far I’ve come. I’m glad that the encounter taught me so much, and although I’m still processing so much of it all as a whole, I’ve gotten so much more clarity.

And the clarity definitely helped. I’ve been sleeping better, better than I have in years. When I look back on it, it’s like whatever I did these past few years wasn’t even sleep. I understand things better and I’m able to function better and better each day - again, gentle reminder - no progress is linear - I’m learning. And I’m content with that at the moment. I’m able to be tenacious now, just a teeny tiny bit.

Despite how unimaginably painful this whole ordeal has been, it has provided me with the opportunity to discover the amount of strength that we have in ourselves. More strength than I could’ve ever imagined back then.

I remember when I decided I was gonna go do this, confront - this one thing that someone close to me said was, “Had this been a few months ago, even a week ago, I’d have asked you not to do this. But you’re better now.”

I guess I lucked out with the timing though, huh?

One thing about being human is that we’re built to last. We’re like the Wolverine without the adamantium claws and the super-cool action sequences.

It took me a while to realise this but painful things are painful and will forever be painful. You’ll never get to the point where you think about it all, look back on it all and be like yeah that was fine. Unless you’re a psychopath. We’re SUPPOSED to feel things and bad things SHOULD feel bad. We gotta preserve our human.

And there are a lot of things in this world that bring us tremendous amounts of pain. But there are also things that grab a hold of us with a similar intensity, like joy.

(Like Nassim Taleb says in a totally different but applicable context, “I’m not capable of avoiding being the fool of randomness; what I can do is confine it to where it brings some aesthetic gratification.”)

We’re all being tenacious on some level. Despite it all, and unknowingly a lot of the time.

I guess what I’m saying is… the goal now, is to be Tenacious.