“You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have.”

– Bob Marley

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These days the workplace can surely test your strengths, and so it’s important to understand your strengths, so that you can tap into them if, when and how needed.

However, the word “strength” means different things in different contexts: as examples, physical strength, moral conviction, political prowess, emotional agility, creative resourcefulness, perhaps persistent courage. The measure of each of your “strengths” depends on both the depth of your determination, and the circumstances you confront.

As Bob Marley rightly observed, it is often the case that you don’t know the limits of your strengths until they are challenged, tested, doubted or threatened, and you have no choice but to “reach deep.” That’s where, how and when you truly get to know the limits of your strength, be it physical, moral, emotional, intellectual or otherwise.

Just as the English proverb says “Necessity is the mother of invention,” so, too, is it the case that “Desperation is the father of strength.” Or as Plato wrote, “Need will be our real creator.” Indeed, there have been verified instances in which a mother has lifted up one side of an automobile herself, in order to save her child beneath it. Daily challenges promote growth of your strength, and rare, once-in-a-lifetime crises show you its real “upper limits.”

Know and bear in mind the most important lesson at the heart of these insights is that, in all probability, you are much stronger, much more courageous and far more resourceful and resilient than you might suspect, as you have likely not yet had the blessed opportunity to demonstrate to yourself the true limits of your strength.

Over time, as we live, learn, work and face crises, while our physical strength may subside, our inner strengths – the ones most needed at work – tend to flourish. They really do.

This quote was transmitted to us last week by Wanda T. of River Ridge, Louisiana, a self-described “Bob Marley Super-Fan.” Wanda asked us to remind our readers that Bob Marley passed on May 11, 1981, and that it would be a fitting tribute to his memory to do a “dedicated good deed” in his blessed memory on May 11 (this Thursday). As she wrote, “The strength of his soul was the sweet spice of his music.”

If you’d like to submit a saying, proverb or quote, we’d love to consider sharing it with our worldwide Blog Family. To do so, just send it to “The Boss,” also known as Vanessa@ExecutiveLaw.com.

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