We’ve shared some incredible stories of resilience below that we hope will help you on your journey towards building up your resilience.
Amber Henderson
My resilience was shaped long before I ever realized I would need it. I grew up watching my mother raise four children on her own, and from a very young age I admired her strength, her work ethic, and her ability to keep showing up for us no matter how heavy life became. Read more>>
Kathryn K. Murphy
I am fortunate in that my family baked resilience into me from a young age, and it’s a good thing because I wouldn’t have gotten this far without it. I come from a family where hard work and persistence were modeled from an early age by multiple family members, many of whom did not have the same opportunities I did. Read more>>
Tiffany Davis
My resilience wasn’t built in one moment — it came from a lifetime of learning how to keep moving, even when life didn’t make it easy. Growing up, my sister and I spent a lot of time fending for ourselves while my mom worked to keep us afloat. Read more>>
Morda Kennedy
As a performance artist who creates original work inspired by dreams and fairy tales, I view the world through the lens of personal narrative. What is the story I am telling myself about myself? For me, resilience comes from telling better stories. When I was young, my story was written for me by doctors and by my parents who believed what the doctors told them. Read more>>
Milton Pitts
Growing up in detroit honestly. Being 34 you look back at your childhood and realize you had to be resilient to survive. I grew up off Fenkell and Livernoise and I went through a lot of hard times. Dealt with the wrong people at times. You start to learn how to move around the noise you know. Read more>>
Toun Olawoye
I get my resilience from the women who came before me. A strong woman birthed me, and a strong woman raised me, so I grew up understanding resilience not as an option, but as a way of life. Their strength taught me that challenges don’t define your ability to stand up again does. My faith also plays a powerful role. Read more>>
Michelle Mary Schaefer
As a Deaf woman, I have faced countless barriers from audism, ableism as well as sexism yet none of it has stopped me from pursuing my passions for storytelling in the entertainment industry. Read more>>
Zandra Gutay
I believe my resilience comes from my journey growing up in Manila, Philippines moving to the U.S., starting over, and building everything from the ground up. I’ve faced moments where life felt uncertain, but every challenge taught me how to stand stronger, trust the process, and keep moving forward. Read more>>
Monetia Smothers
First, thank you for having me on The Bold Journey! Building resilience as a single parent didn’t happen overnight—it just became part of who I am. As a single mom navigating life’s challenges, there’s no room for failure. You either make it work, or it has to work. Read more>>
Mesa Herod-Williams
I get my resilience from the water. Long before Floating In DFW existed, the lake was where I went to breathe, reset, and let life’s weight drift away. Watching sunsets melt into the water taught me that resilience isn’t loud, it’s steady. It’s choosing to keep going, even when the winds shift, and remembering you can always adjust your sail. Read more>>
Dream Hudson
I would say I definitely get my resilience from my mother, Tareka McClellan. To me, she fully embodies the title of Superwoman. As a single Black mother, life hasn’t always been kind to her, but through her deep faith and determination, she continues to overcome every obstacle thrown her way. From a young age, I’ve known that I have the best role model in her. Read more>>
Shandrea Johnson a.k.a DIYA
I’d say my resilience comes from a few years of juggling two jobs while still pursuing my dream as a singer and songwriter. Working in caregiving—especially supporting clients with dementia—demands emotional strength, patience, and adaptability. My second job coaching autistic clients teaches me presence and compassion. These roles can be draining, but they’ve shaped my ability to stay grounded under pressure. Read more>>
Vitality Rapper, Model, Poet Singer.
I honestly have to credit God for that. Under certain circumstances I found myself becoming the definition of “resilience” seeing my spirit is unbreakable. In my past I went against so much opposition. Finding myself around people who wanted to see me break For their personal pleasure, or just bc they felt inferior for some reason. Read more>>
Jeriel Sydney
My dad, 100%. He is such a fighter, a doer, a believer -the kind of person who moves forward no matter what the landscape looks like. I grew up watching him navigate challenges with this quiet determination, and that shaped me more than anything else. Read more>>
Domenica Bernetti
Being an immigrant has taught me more about resilience than anything else. When I first moved to Chile as a child, I learned what it meant to adapt, to a new culture, a new country, and even a new way of communicating. Migration pushes you to your limits; it forces you to bring out the best in yourself so you can adjust and survive. Read more>>
Hope Lutz Firsel
My resilience was not born in a single moment—it was forged over years in the quiet spaces between heartbreak and hope. I often say that resilience is not something you discover; it’s something life insists you build. Mine began, unknowingly, in the sterile hallways of fertility clinics, where I learned to sit with uncertainty. Read more>>
Millie van Kol
Where do I get my resilience from? It’s funny, I don’t think its something that you often think about, or realize you have until you take a moment to look back and reflect on all of the mountain ranges you have climbed to get to where you are at this very moment. Read more>>
Taylor Dibbert
Mainly trauma. From thinking my life was over and then slowly discovering the power of art and writing to process grief and to heal. Read more>>
Mandy Webster
I think my resilience comes from watching my grandmother overcome her struggles. She left my abusive grandfather after 35 years of marriage and 13 children. With her four youngest still living at home, she got her first job ever and went to community college to earn an associates degree. Read more>>
Westley Heine
At certain periods in my life I found myself living day to day, hour to hour. Be it in jail, or living in my car cross country, or when I was a squatter in Chicago hustling as a street musician. After those experiences normal stressors like a job interview or corporate BS at work roll off my back. Read more>>
Author Robert L Jamison, PhD, CCM, BH-C
I get my resilience from a combination of factors, including supportive relationships with my medical colleagues, a positive self-view, physical and mental health practices, and the ability to make plans and take action. It’s a set of skills that can be learned and developed over time through practice, rather than being a single innate trait. Read more>>
Sara Horiuchi
Because I want to keep a piece of my mind in the future. I believe the people who had to keep trying hard, have tough times, busy times and hungry times, those people are able to find happiness in life, and learn maturity and kindness through their experiences. Read more>>
Michael Desposito
Resilience is one of the most important strengths because it acknowledges the human condition and story of why I got into my field. While I have been in the mental health field for many years, I initially had plans to go into cardiac medicine. Read more>>
Markus Reinhardt
Where do I get my resilience from? I built my resilience the same way I built my body: under load, under pressure, and under situations most people would’ve quit on long before I did. Read more>>
Sika Lawson
There are really two sources that I would say I get my resilience from. Firstly, I come from a very rich Togolese & Nigerian culture, which innately harbors extremely strong and resilient people, due to the pressures we overcome daily whether that be from socio-economic, governmental, developing infrastructure, and the like, yet we are some of the most joyous and optimistic people. Read more>>
Michel’le Burns
My resilience comes from surviving one of the darkest moments of my life. In July 2024, I slipped into a coma and had to be airlifted to Duke Hospital in North Carolina. I was placed on life support and even considered brain dead — a three on the coma scale. By every medical standard, I wasn’t supposed to come back. Read more>>
Joan Livingston
I believe I inherited my resilience from my grandmother, Angela. Vovó, as I called her, grew up the youngest of a poor family on the Portuguese island of Madeira. Her parents gave her up to be the live-in companion for the child of a wealthy family, where her older sister, Maria, was a servant. Read more>>
Joshua Tourdot
When I really think about it, my resilience probably comes directly from my mother. She’s fiercely competitive, she absolutely hates losing, and while I didn’t inherit that same aversion to loss, I did absorb the love of competition she modeled. For me, the fun in life has always come from the possibility of failure rather than the possibility of success. Read more>>
Lashon Byrd
My resilience comes from a very unique, expansive journey that I embarked on very young. Here it is in brutal honesty, with no part left out in the slightest: The road was far from smooth. Especially younger, I was naive, ambitious and that’s in good faith, but had no idea what I was doing. Read more>>
Michelle Gines
I’d say resilience is something I’ve learned to see as a quiet, steady flame rather than a loud battle cry. It’s not about never bending; it’s about knowing where your roots lie. For me, resilience has always come from a place of faith and alignment. It’s that sense that when life gets turbulent, I can pause, reflect, and realign with what truly matters. Read more>>
Jocelyn Nath
There’s a beautiful Buddhist teaching that says, “No Mud, No Lotus.” It reminds us that suffering (the mud) is a necessary part of life, allowing happiness and growth (the lotus) to bloom, a concept shared by Thich Nhat Hanh that deeply resonates with me. Read more>>
Halima Muhammad
I get my resilience from surviving the moments that were supposed to break me. Becoming a single mom, going through a divorce, and even being laid off pushed me into places where I had to rebuild myself from the ground up. Read more>>
Helen Ogochukwu Nwiba
After graduating from the university and struggling to find a job, I saw how many underprivileged women and youth were facing the same challenge not because they lacked potential, but because they lacked skills and opportunities. That pain became my purpose. I decided to create something that could open doors, build confidence, and turn creativity into income. Read more>>
Charles Matthews
I believe I learned resilience from my mother who I was very close with growing up. I watched my mom face a number of challenges and setbacks along the way but she always seemed to find a way to manage and overcome them. Read more>>
BRYAN D. SMITH AKA PAINTER BRY
I learned resilience slowly, the way most meaningful things manifest; through life trials, repetition, and showing up on the days I didn’t feel like showing up. I was raised by tenacious examples of determined go-getters, and that grit must’ve rubbed off. Read more>>
Amy Frost
have always been an overachiever, that is part of being a Nielsen especially the oldest Nielsen girl. Being the oldest of five sisters, I was the one who assumed the role of taking care of them. My life was always about taking care of someone else. I was honored to care for my sisters, and it started a pattern I lived for many years. At 18, I started working full time for the Air Force while attending school at night. I never had a spare minute, as I was always taking care of my sisters, my close friends and now my co-workers. I was always a model student and worker. Read more>>
Tricia Battani
There’s always been a force outside of myself quite literally <i>pushing</i> me towards music. I’ve never felt I had a choice in the matter. Even as a child, I knew I was to get to Los Angeles as soon as possible. The way I felt singing, dancing, and performing was unbelievable. I wasn’t in control of this pull. Plus, I don’t think it hurt that I constantly witnessed my entire family performing for big crowds- Dad was a drummer, my sister on TV by the time i was 5, Mom sang televised National Anthems every year for professional basketball games, so I became fearless in my pursuits, as well. Read more>>
Maya Kellman
My resilience comes first and foremost from God. Followed by my parents, mentors, loved ones and myself. I have been blessed by God with supportive family who have instilled humility, respect and positivity in the face of life challenges. Seeing them as opportunities for growth and change. My resilience is deeply rooted in my appreciation for knowing there is someone higher than me and ensuring all things are working towards His plans and purpose for me. Read more>>
Alejandra Cordero
I attribute my resilience directly to my ancestors. I’m a first-generation Mexican-American, and the legacy I carry is one of overcoming immense adversity. While their struggles are part of our story, what I choose to focus on and draw strength from is their enduring spirit, their rich stories, and their incredible cultural beauty. That legacy is my inheritance. It’s a reminder that resilience is more than just enduring. It’s about creating, contributing, and ensuring that our spirit not only remains but flourishes. That belief is in my blood, and it’s the fuel for everything I do. Read more>>
Niya Butler
I am an only child to a single mother from Southern Louisiana. My whole life, I’ve seen nothing, but resilience from my mother. Without my mother’s resilience while raising me, I may not have even began this career. Read more>>
Lesley-Anne Stone
I learned from the best – my Mom and Dad – to fight for what you believe in. I take it as a compliment that people have nicknamed me a bulldozer. I face challenges head-on and push through until the job gets done. Every challenge, trauma, or loss I’ve faced has pushed me forward, teaching me to learn and grow from it. That’s where I learned to plow through. I like to think I’m always moving forward, not just moving on. Life is a journey, and we’re all meant to keep learning, evolving, and moving forward along the way. Read more>>
