Fall Seven Times, Get Up Eight
It is often difficult to get up after a fall. Our bodies ache, we have injured ourselves and we may not find points of support to get back on our feet. However, despite the pain, it is worth resurfacing. This is the wonderful power of resilience. If you fall, stand up.
If you are strong today it is because one day you were weak and you overcame it. It is something to be proud of, because when something gets complicated we take on a great deal of learning.
The story of the two frogs, an example of resistance
Once, two frogs that fell into a bowl of cream and felt like they were sinking. It was difficult to swim or float for long in that thick mass like quicksand.
At first, the two of them kicked the cream to get to the edge of the bowl and only managed to splash in the same spot and sink. It was getting harder and harder to surface and breathe. One of them said aloud:
-I can not anymore. It is impossible to get out and, since I am going to die, I do not see why I prolong this pain. There is no point in dying exhausted by a sterile effort.
And with that said, she stopped kicking and sank quickly, being literally swallowed up by the thick white liquid. The other frog, more resistant or perhaps more stubborn, said to himself:
–It is very difficult to advance in this thing, but I will continue trying to see if I find the right way. I will not give up, I will fight until my last breath, as long as it takes and as long as I can bear.
And he kept kicking and splashing always in the same place, without advancing an inch. Hours and hours. And suddenly, from so much kicking and shaking, shaking and kicking… The cream turned into butter.
The surprised frog jumped up and skidded to the edge of the container; from there, it croaked happily back home.
What is the lesson to be learned from this story?
We must never give up. There is always a possibility of being afloat, even if it seems crazy to us or we do not contemplate it. In fact, adverse situations often surprise us by their ability to make us look at the situation from different perspectives.
Create a motto: persist, insist, and resist. Get up if you fall. Despite the lurching and the headwind, calm always comes after the storm.
If you fall, get up: Accept life with its pluses and minuses
The goal is never to reach the top of the mountain, but to be able to stop at each section and contemplate what each landscape has to tell us. We suffer precisely because we want to get up immediately when we fall. This is crazy. We need to adapt and assimilate the blow.
Isn’t it natural to be sad if our partner leaves us, if we lose our job, or if a loved one becomes ill? Let us accept that it is part of the process and that we have to give negative emotions time to do their job.
Remember that doing this does not mean giving up, but fighting a situation that you cannot change only causes you pain. Resist weaving your value and transforming yourself little by little. If you fall, get up, because you can do it.
Do not give up, even if it burns cold, even if fear bites …
Interpretation: If you fall seven times, get up eight
This is the quintessential resilience poem. There is always a way to open the door even if we do not have the key. We can keep walking even though we have lost our shoes and our feet are bleeding.
Adversity has the gift of waking us up, of propelling us even though our knees hurt from falling. Don’t forget this: giving up should never be a real option, even if it goes through our minds hundreds of times.
