A Little More Faith, A Little More Fight

Sometimes I get happy when I think of all the situations that I've been through in my life. Not just because I overcame the situation, but for the situation itself. I've learned how to navigate through some tough stuff, push pass messiness, and come out on the other side triumphant.

A little stronger. A little wiser. A little better.

And all because of tough situations.  

I'm not talking about becoming a mother at an age when I was still growing up, figuring out adulthood, coming of age, and trying to create a career path that makes my soul happy. 

I'm not talking about when I made it through the toxic and abusive relationship with my ex and decided embrace this single mom gig.  

I'm not just talking about when I made it through graduate school as a single mother and got those two master degrees. Don't get me wrong, taking your two-year-old to class with you because you couldn't find a babysitter and didn't want to miss any of the work isn't easy.

But it's not impossible either.

Faith. 

I'm talking about tough situations and circumstances that took place in my life before I peed on a stick and found a positive oh-my-freaking-goodness-you're-pregnant sign staring back at me. 

I'm talking about laying on the couch with my birth mother as the marshal came to knock on our apartment door and evict us for not paying the rent. I'm talking about living in homeless shelters because we literally didn't have a place to stay. I'm talking about entering the foster care system and moving from one foster home to another because I was being physically abused.

The odds to succeed were against me. But I beat those odds.

Fight.

I learned how to endure and I learned how to perseverance. I learned to have a little more faith and a little more fight. I learned that if I could just make it pass certain hard times, things will be better on the other side.

I knew that something good was going to happen if I just worked hard and excelled in school. I figured out how to be self-sufficient and solve problems at a high level. I learned the importance of being proactive and re-grouping and re-strategizing when things didn't go well the first time. Or second time. Or fifth time. I learned that defeat was a time to get back up again and start back over again. 

Resilience. It's damn near half the battle, right? 

Hard times helped me to learn that I need to have a little more faith and a little more fight in me. It taught me that it's okay to feel a little frustrated and a little downtrodden. But then it's time to get back up again and push pass the struggle. 

A little more faith and a little more fight. Sometimes that's all it takes to get to your success. 

{This post was originally published here on August 14, 2013.}