Mental Toughness

I like to think that I have a tough character. In fact, I’ve always kind of prided myself on the fact that I don’t have feelings at all, or at least that’s what I like to tell people. Having the typical traits of someone with a type A personality, I’ve always related exposing my feelings as a weakness. In some ways I still do, but I know deep down most of that is just in my mind.

Now, I’m not going to sit here and divulge a bunch of personal information to you or suggest you do the same. However, I would like to communicate that I think there is a difference between having mental toughness and actually being tough enough to share some of that bottled up stuff that we all tend to carry around.

I got to thinking about my own ‘mental toughness’ after a conversation I was having with my husband today. We’re fortunate enough that we have one another to lean on when the going gets tough, but not all of us do and not all of us will open up to others. WHY?

Many of you reading this were either in the military, are currently in the military, and/or are a spouse/child/parent or friend of someone who was, or still is, on active duty. With that in mind, there is a kind of ‘tough guy’ persona that most of us adopt throughout time in service for a variety of reasons. I mean, how many true military leader (teams) do you know who show any emotion besides maybe a little anger here and there? Not many!  And why? Because we are supposed to be the strength for everyone else around us. Let’s face it, we also get protective of our own lives because we don’t want others knowing our personal business. I think we all know how convoluted it can get with our military affiliations and wanting to keep our private lives private.

Circling back to my comment about us tough guys not reaching out to others… we all know ourselves well enough to know that eventually we have a breaking point no matter how tough we think we really are. The reality is though, that not all of us are going to actually reach out to someone with our own stuff, but we can try to somewhat break that cycle by reaching out to someone with a similar mindset/personality to check in with them and see how they are.

I think about a good friend in particular who has had one hell of a rough go at it for the last couple of months. Because her personality is exactly like mine, I know she’s not going to candidly reach out to others to discuss her personal business. Is she mentally tough and can she handle what she’s been through? Yes! But is it handled better when you can confide in someone, besides your spouse, who checks in with you to see how you are? I know it personally makes me feel better when someone checks in on my status from time to time.

To wrap this up, we all know these ‘mentally tough’ people. In fact, it describes most of us here that are reading this article. Imagine though, with all you are enduring in your own life right now that someone else you know is probably going through something similar, but also not talking about it. With how stressful the holiday season can be, lost loved ones, and professional and/or personal struggles, it’s important that we check in with a buddy and make sure they know they have your support. Nothing is worse than trying to be tough on the outside but feeling like you must keep it all together for everyone else. So, offer that olive branch to someone like you. It may be just the thing you both need to get through a difficult time.

~Sarah