One Year Later: What I've Relearned about Resilience and Feeling Whole Again

<p> Hey there, it's Michael. Welcome to Whole Again, the show that's here in support of the person you're becoming and your desire to live a meaningful life. And today, as I record this, I'm celebrating an anniversary. Now, at first blush, you might not think this is a happy anniversary, but I do, because I'm still here.</p>
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<p>After all, none of us are guaranteed tomorrow You see, one year ago this morning, I was waiting for EMS, emergency support, to come rescue me. I was lying on the asphalt. Here I am. Here's a little photo of me. I got clotheslined by an unmarked low-hanging utility cable that was hanging across the road. And the only words, if a picture, that picture could be worth a thousand words, as they say, the only thing I kept on muttering was, "I can't believe this is happening.</p>
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<p>I can't believe this is happening." And then the language got a little bit spicier as my pain got more intense. My plan that morning was to take a pretty typical midweek bike ride, a little training, nothing too intense because it was July 30th after all, and we had a heat index predicted for, say, a hundred and five degrees.</p>
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<p>So I was being a little chill, just again, a nice easy bike ride. Get outside, welcome a new day, get some movement in, beat the heat. And about a mile before I turned around to go home or a mile before I was supposed to turn around to go home, I rode right into that cable, and it caught me right here, right around my shoulder and my collarbone, and it snarled me up like I was a fighter jet trying to land on an aircraft carrier, and it stopped me almost immediately, and it threw me down like I was a rag doll, and I broke my femur in five places.</p>
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<p>Today, one year and one week later, because this will be released one week after I record it, I wanna share what actually helps us get through these challenging life moments. It's not the highlight reel stuff. It's the quiet part that very few people do share. And before we get into that, I wanna share something with you that might surprise you.</p>
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<p>Some studies suggest that ninety percent of us, yes, nine zero, will face some type of traumatic event in our lives. Things happen. Life is bumpy as we know it. And this is not being pessimistic because I'm not pessimistic. It's really about what it means to be human, that we're gonna go through something, nine out of ten of us.</p>
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<p>And this is why I believe so much in building a strong foundation. Like you're building a house or a building, we need a strong foundation before the bumpy moments arrive. Your foundation is what helps you meet these moments. If your foundation isn't strong and then the moment happens, it's gonna be much more difficult to get through it in the way that you wish to.</p>
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<p>So as things are going easy-peasy, lemon squeezy, and we feel like, ah, we don't need to work on it, this is exactly the time to work on strengthening or building a solid foundation. So you might ask, what is a foundation when it comes to us as people? Everyone knows what a foundation looks like for a home or a building.</p>
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<p>It's laying down cornerstones. It's laying down cement. You gotta make sure that structure is built, again, from the ground up. And same could be said about our own personal foundations. When I was recovering from my last bad day and now this accident, the one that happened a year ago, I started with my foundation again, making sure that that was as strong as possible.</p>
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<p>And from a physical health perspective, I work from my feet up, right? Because our feet serve as our foundation as we make contact with the ground. But when we look at our own personal, like, inner work foundation, it starts with our first principles, our values, making sure that we show up in alignment to them.</p>
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<p>It's also about the quality of your peloton. Basically, who's in your community? Who's part of your support network? Another cornerstone in our personal foundation all has to deal with our mental, physical, and nutritional health. All that feeds us. Of course, having a good contemplative practice like a practice of gratitude or mindfulness surely can help.</p>
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<p>And one of the most important cornerstones to a solid foundation is the conversation that we have with ourselves. And there are also two qualities that people don't talk enough about, at least in my opinion. That is hope and grace. Hope is simple, even if it doesn't feel simple in the moment. It's that belief that taking one step will lead to another, which leads to another With hope, there's action.</p>
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<p>You don't need to see the whole pathway, you just need to have faith that you can take the next step. Now, grace is a little different. Grace is what we extend to ourselves. We can also extend it to others. It lets us off the hook for expecting our recovery to be a straight line up and to the right, because it's never that way.</p>
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<p>Some days you're gonna gain a whole bunch, and other days you'll plateau, and some days you might even take a step back and you have to start all over again. Grace is what allows us to not call those days where we're not making progress, at least how we might define it, as days of failure. And for my 50-plus peeps out there listening, I probably don't have to tell you this part, but when you get to a certain age, you also need a whole bunch of patience because the older we get, yep, the longer it takes.</p>
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<p>And that's not a knock against us, that's just part of our biology, and I've learned that the hard way over the last year. People have shared with me that they believe my superpowers are showing up and making sure that habits stick, that habits stick in a way where we can get traction. Basically, the application of all the wisdom that's out there.</p>
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<p>How do we apply it? How do we incorporate it, not in a transactional way, but in a way that becomes a way of living? Those superpowers helped me recover from my last bad day, my big, huge accident that changed everything for me. And I've had to tap into them once again over the last year to get me through this ordeal.</p>
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<p>It's funny in a way, I shared that photo I just shared here on the video and a few others with folks online, and as you would imagine, people are like, "Oh my God, are you all right?" Like, "What's going on?" And there was a flurry of activity. There was a whole bunch of concern and compassion that was extended.</p>
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<p>But once the algorithm moves on to the next thing, the next thing that might be edgy or an oh-my-God moment, then it gets really quiet. People don't reach out. They don't check in to see how you're doing. And that's the exact moment that the real work begins. Not when people are watching. It's after they stop watching.</p>
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<p>That's when we need to show up. And I'm happy to share with you that yesterday, less than one year, three hundred and sixty-four days since the accident, I signed up for my first two events post my accident. I'm gonna be pinning a number on, first in August, and then to end the season in October, and I'm so pumped that I'm in the position to do so.</p>
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<p>And it all starts with having a solid foundation. And if you're not going through something right now, this is a perfect opportunity to make sure your foundation is as strong as possible. And if you're going through something right now, you can still take steps to care for your foundation through a contemplative practice by making sure you have the right type of support, AKA knowing who should be in your peloton.</p>
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<p>And it also means you can show up in alignment to your values while having that type of healthy conversation that I know you can have with yourself. So today, take a step towards making sure your foundation is as strong as possible because with that strong foundation, we are better prepared to weather whatever life throws our way.</p>
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<p>And as always, thanks for being here. And thank you for being part of our community. And I hope you're checking out my new series, A Perfectly Imperfect Union. It's all about reflections of America as she turns 250 this year, and I'll have a new episode in that series for you tomorrow. And I hope you'll also check out all the different episodes I have for you on Whole Again.</p>
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<p>They're all designed to help you step into that person you're becoming and live a meaningful life. But until then, let's remember to celebrate our scars as golden symbols of our strength and resilience. And don't forget to have fun storming the castle.</p>
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<p>And if you wish to learn more about creating beautiful ripples and how to prevent a bad moment from turning into a bad day, please visit my website, michaelobrienshift.com and sign up for my newsletter called The Ripple Effect. And join us each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday here at Whole Again and discover how you can heal, grow, and become more resilient and celebrate our scars as golden symbols of strength and resilience.</p>
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<p>Until then, remember, you can always come back to your breath. You've got this and we've got you.</p>