It’s just a spark, but it’s enough to keep me going.

Last Hope – Paramore

I just watched Tony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru on Netflix. It had some incredible stories of resilience, especially that of Dawn (or “Sol”, as she is called in her native country of Brazil). If you haven’t watched the Tony Robbins program then I’d highly recommend it. It’s been out since 2016 and something, probably all the shouting, has put me off watching it for all that time but it’s an amazing watch, if you’re in the right frame of mind. Dawn was a 26-year-old survivor of the Children of God cult. Tony said something to her, something that I found very poignant: “You’re strong. And you’re tired of having to be strong. But you are strong. That’s why you’re still here.” After all she’s been through, Dawn got a break, and now works to help others heal – Dawn Watson Website .

I then went for a walk. I’m in Hull at moment. There appeared to be a lot of “down and outs” on the street and I wondered what their stories were. As I went into the shops, someone asked me, from afar, if I had any spare change. Once in the shops, I found that I did indeed have some spare change, and put it in my pocket, to give to them. By the time I left the shops, the man had left. I walked back home (anywhere I stay for a night is automatically home!) and along the way, a man with a sleeping bag round his shoulders, a man who I think I recognised from the previous day, was walking towards me down the road and as we passed one another he asked me, very politely, if I had any spare change. I said “Yes I do actually. I was going to give it to someone else but he left.” And I scooped up the change from my pocket, around £3, and placed it into his hand.
“Thank you very much, Miss! It’s my lucky day that he left, isn’t it? Thank you, you have a good day now.” In one instant, this man was more polite than almost of the farmers (and dive shop owners) I’ve worked for in the past 12 months. If I’d have said “No, sorry, I don’t have any change”, in my experience, he is likely to have been just as polite with “Thank you, you have a good day now.”

We judge by appearances. He didn’t have a flash car, or a clean shirt, or anything clean at all in fact. Maybe he only had what he was wearing, including carrying around his sleeping bag bed with him. But for the sake of £3, he was more grateful to me than the months of labour I’d given to other people.

It made me think, what can you get for £3, really, these days? Barely anything. How can this man afford to eat? Where can you even get free water from these days? How resilient is he? He’s more resilient than I am. Can I imagine surviving in his position, walking around being polite to people? Of course not. I’ve struggled through some struggles recently, some days have been really struggly, but whilst I appreciate my own struggles, that’s hardly anything compared to the experience of sleeping rough and needing to ask strangers in the street for change.

Humans, not just as a species, but as individuals, are incredibly resilient. We often forget how much so, when we’re living through something that feels like it will never end. I think people experiencing homelessness often get a bad rap. Are we really “scared” of them, or are we scared of finding ourselves in that situation, and people treating us the way we may currently treat those people? I went along with my Mum and Dad when they volunteered at a soup kitchen on Christmas Day in 2018. I chatted to a guy who had recently found himself homeless. He had been living paycheck to paycheck anyway, which a lot of people do, it turns out, and which I have never had to do. He and his girlfriend split up and he had to move out. He didn’t have anywhere else he could live. Because he didn’t have a stable home, he then lost his job. Because he lost his job, he lost his income. He used the last of his money to buy a tent. He hadn’t been homeless “long enough” to get help from the council, he said. He had also pitched his tent away from the known “rough sleepers” camping area, which made him ineligible for help from another organisation, as his tent was not within a certain radius. Not being within the “camp” also meant that he didn’t then get the support and camaraderie from those who were in the camp. He was practically all alone. Perhaps absolutely all alone. I feel privileged to have met this guy. I hope he’s OK.

How resilient are you? “You’ve got through everything you’ve been through.” – I love that quote. You’re probably more resilient than you realise. Even if we feel like we’ve given up, we still drag ourselves up and try again. That’s why we’re here. Pat yourself on the back every once in a while. Look how far you’ve come and use that to see, not where you’re going, but where you want to go.

Sometimes all we need is a break, or a helping hand. A little bit of hope. How can you help someone else who may be struggling, even if they’re a stranger? We don’t have to be resilient in isolation. In fact, unsurprisingly, it has been found that “Resilience in the individual is dependent on multiple layers of society”, i.e. social support enhances human resilience (see journal article here). Are the people around you supporting you? Resilience and struggling isn’t a competition. I think if we can accept that we all have things to deal with, we all need a bit of help, then we can all become more resilient and grow from difficult experiences. Tony Robbins takes growing from difficult experiences to a whole new level, but the concept is probably the same for us all. Unfortunately, I can’t end homelessness, but I can give a bit of help to someone who’s struggling and frankly, someone whose evident resilience I admire. And I know that people will be there for me if I need a bit of help, and I’ll be there for them. And hopefully, we can get through the things we have to go through with a little bit more hope, and a little bit more ease.

Thank you for your time.