Journaling Prompts
Your Inner Reserves: It’s been said that all that you need for this journey is already within you. Are you connected to an inner reserve of personal strength? What does it look like and feel like? How do you gain access to it? Do you recall a specific time in your life when you’ve been able to connect with your inner strength and use it to move forward?
Powerful and Feminine: Some think there’s a tension between strength and femininity. What do you think? Do you subscribe to traditional views of masculinity and femininity? Do women wield different sorts of power than men? Do you see yourself as powerful, and in what ways? Who are women of great strength that you can think of, and how have they influenced your life?
Physical Strength: As time goes on, we lose some of our physical strength, and perhaps gain some wisdom. Some of us start out as physically stronger than others, and some of us build our physical strength over time. Are you physically strong – do you stay healthy? Do you struggle with health issues? Do you consider yourself a hearty soul or a sluggish one? Do you do anything to improve your health or physical strength in any way, and if so, do you do it to look good or to feel good?
Weakness: At least once in a while, it’s nice to let other people be in charge and allow ourselves to be weak. Do you ask for help when you need it? Do you find that you rely more on others, or that others rely more on you? Is weakness a fault to you? Was someone in your past a weak figure, and if so, how did that impact your view of weakness today? Are there times that you become drained – and what do you do to remedy that, or do you surrender?
Music
Quotes:
Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing. Use the pain as fuel, as a reminder of your strength. August Wilson
It takes more courage to reveal insecurities than to hide them, more strength to relate to people than to dominate them, more 'manhood' to abide by thought-out principles rather than blind reflex. Toughness is in the soul and spirit, not in muscles and an immature mind. Alex Karras
Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage. Lao Tzu
I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman. Anais Nin
Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will. Mahatma Gandhi
The size of your success is measured by the strength of your desire; the size of your dream; and how you handle disappointment along the way. Robert Kiyosaki
Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength. Arnold Schwarzenegger
Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that is where I renew my springs that never dry up. Pearl S. Buck
What does not kill me makes me stronger. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Don't wish me happiness-I don't expect to be happy it's gotten beyond that, somehow. Wish me courage and strength and a sense of humor-I will need them all. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power. If you realize that you have enough, you are truly rich. Tao Te Ching
Success is achieved by developing our strengths, not by eliminating our weaknesses Marilyn vos Savant
For an impenetrable shield, stand inside yourself. Henry David Thoreau
Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance. Samuel Johnson
Solitude is strength; to depend on the presence of the crowd is weakness. The man who needs a mob to nerve him is much more alone than he imagines. Paul Brunton
Strength is born in the deep silence of long-suffering hearts; not amid joy. Arthur Helps
People do not lack strength, they lack will. Victor Hugo
What we actually learn, from any given set of circumstances, determines whether we become increasingly powerless or more powerful. Blaine Lee
Ultimately, the only power to which man should aspire is that which he exercises over himself. Elie Wiesel
Strength is a matter of the made-up mind. John Beecher
All the strength and force of man comes from his faith in things unseen. He who believes is strong; he who doubts is weak. Strong convictions precede great actions. James Freeman Clarke
Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers but to be fearless in facing them. Let me not beg for the stilling of my pain but for the heart to conquer it. Let me not look for allies in life's battlefield but to my own strength. Let me not crave in anxious fear to be saved but hope for the patience to win my freedom. Grant me that I may not be a coward, feeling your mercy in my success alone; but let me find the grasp of your hand in my failure. Rabindranath Tagore
Thus an army without flexibility never wins a battle. A tree that is unbending is easily broken. Lao Tzu
Remember, you are braver than you believe, you are stronger than you seem, and you are smarter than you think. AA Milne
Like water, be gentle and strong. Be gentle enough to follow the natural paths of the earth, and strong enough to rise up and reshape the world. Brenda Peterson
True strength lies in submission which permits one to dedicate his life, through devotion, to something beyond himself. Henry Miller
I don't believe in anything and that makes me stronger than you think. Anne Rice
Storms make trees take deeper roots. Dolly Parton
Concentration is the secret of strength. Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength. Maya Angelou
There are two ways of exerting one's strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up. Booker T. Washington
Perhaps I am stronger than I think. Thomas Merton
He possessed beauty without vanity, strength without insolence; courage without ferocity; and all the virtues of man without his vices. Lord Byron
When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid. Audre Lorde
You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, "I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along." . . . You must do the thing you think you cannot do. Eleanor Roosevelt
It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires great strength to decide on what to do. Elbert Hubbard
Although men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold which the owner knows not of. Jonathan Swift
Nothing is so strong as gentleness. Nothing is so gentle as real strength. Frances de Sales
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. Mohandas K. Gandhi
Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. Rachel Carson
All too often arrogance accompanies strength, and we must never assume that justice is on the side of the strong. The use of power must always be accompanied by moral choice. Theodore Bikel
Strength and wisdom are not opposing values. William J. Clinton
The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same. Carlos Castaneda
It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change. Charles Darwin
It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err. Mahatma Gandhi
Power over others is weakness disguised as strength. True power if within, and it is available to you now. Eckhart Tolle
Oh soul, you worry too much. You have seen your own strength. You have seen your own beauty. You have seen your golden wings. Of anything less, why do you worry? You are in truth the soul, of the soul, of the soul. Jalal al-Din Rumi
love is the voice under all silences, the hope which has no opposite in fear; the strength so strong mere force is feebleness: the truth more first than sun more last than star e.e. cummings
Concrete is heavy; iron is hard - but the grass will prevail. Edward Abbey
A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles. Christopher Reeve
I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it. Pablo Picasso
Links:
Share Our Strength – Working to end childhood hunger in America
Voices of Strength - Resources for Rape and Sexual Abuse Survivors
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