BodyLogos Blog
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Redefining Strength
I want to change our perception of strength. Strength is the ability to meet resistance and influence an outcome without compromising ourselves. And we already have it.
Strength is not an attribute; it’s a state of being. Gladiators, bodybuilders, and football players demonstrate strength through brute force, sheer willpower, muscle mass, and relentless pursuit. But we’re also quick to identify dancers and martial artists as strong. Their medium taps into a sense of vulnerability, balance, alignment, controlled power, and grace—but no one can deny their strength. Strength may look different on each of us, but it is an inherent part of who we are.
You are not weak by nature; you are stronger than you think. Your strength is not something you need to kill yourself to gain—it is already within you, waiting to be excavated. The key is to stop chasing something you already have and tap into it, so you can manifest that strength in your everyday life.
Because we don’t think we’re strong, we approach resistance with the idea that we’re not enough. We throw everything we have at it and push past our physical, mental, and emotional limitations. We see strength as domination, but it’s not.
When you learn to listen to your body’s divine wisdom, you cultivate a sense of where your body is developing tension instead of standing in its strength. You end the vicious cycle of unrealistic expectations, injury, and self-criticism and learn how to consciously embrace responsible growth. You stop compartmentalizing your strength into emotional, physical, and mental pieces and operate from the strength of your being at all times.
You learn how to align yourself with gravity—instead of working against it—so you can channel your strength to meet life’s resistance. As you meet resistance with equal parts power and alignment, you transform tension into strength
As in the sword dance above, the power lies in bringing just the right amount of force—not too little and not too much. By meeting the sword’s weight, I meet gravity. I am tapped into a larger source of energy, free of tension, and discover a strength that is wholly and uniquely mine.
About Tammy Wise
I’ve Mistaken Myself As My Book
by Tammy WiseWhy a difference of opinion feels like conflict
My book’s purpose is to share tools that have helped me to take responsibility for the quality of my own life. It uses physical posture to relax emotional triggers so that the comfort of underlying truths are realized.
The effectiveness of these tools is unquestionable to me. But for someone else, these tools may be viewed as contrary to their existing beliefs.
At face value, opposition is a wonderful foundation for a growth provoking and intimate discussion!
Why then do I (and maybe you) hear opposition as criticism?
Criticism that touches on that which I hold sacred feels like having my sense of self uprooted. Not only is my work in question, but so is my personal integrity by association.
A difference of opinion doesn’t shake my belief in the work, it shakes my belief in myself. What morphs opinion into conflict is the internal criticism I interject toward myself that measures my value by how safe and content someone feels around me.
From this stance, any opposition feels like a personal failure rather than a comparison of experiences, information or understandings. (Not to mention it being a bit narcissistic!)
I’ve come to realize that sharing one’s wisdom challenges someone else’s. To push back is to consider, not deny, what’s being presented. (No matter what tone of voice they’re using.) They would simply disregard it otherwise.
Sharing deeply is an intimate exchange that asks us to be fully seen, and where we must allow our rightness to be in question.
I experience intimacy as a gentle probing into the mysteries of our inner guiding beliefs. As a verb it’s an act of vulnerability; as an adverb it’s a demonstration of strength. The art of strength is the grace of allowing strength to be vulnerable.
The tools shared in my book, The Art of Strength, have always questioned my emotion’s rightness. Now the book itself continues to do the same on an even greater scale.