More than 30 years ago, I received an award for excellence in service, and in the words shared about me, one word stood out: tenacious. At the time, I was young enough that I did not fully understand the weight of it. I appreciated it, but I do not think I yet understood what it meant to truly live inside that word.

Now I do.

At 50, tenacity means something different than it did when I was younger. Back then, I might have associated it mostly with drive, determination, and the ability to keep pushing. Those things still matter, but life has a way of refining a word until it becomes less about performance and more about character.

These days, tenacity is not just about pushing through.

It is about remaining yourself when life, relationships, disappointment, and misunderstanding try to make you smaller.

This week reminded me of that.

It was the kind of week that began with one hard conversation and somehow left a bruise on everything that followed. Not because every moment was terrible, but because something in it landed deep. It touched old wounds, old patterns, and familiar tensions—those spaces where being honest, thoughtful, and fully yourself can still make other people uncomfortable.

I have spent a lot of my life trying to navigate that discomfort carefully. Trying to explain myself clearly enough. Trying to make my heart easier to understand. Trying to be truthful without being “too much.”

But tenacity, I have learned, is not just endurance in the obvious sense.

Sometimes it looks like holding your ground in a painful moment.
Sometimes it looks like refusing to let someone else define your intelligence, your insight, or the value of your voice.
Sometimes it looks like honoring your boundaries without apologizing for having them.
Sometimes it looks like choosing not to go backward, even when backward would make other people more comfortable.

There is a difference between privacy and dishonesty. Not everything unshared is untrue. We are allowed to have an inner world. We are allowed to keep parts of ourselves sacred. We are allowed to speak honestly without turning our whole being inside out for inspection.

I know who I am.

I know I am honest.
I know I am thoughtful.
I know I have done my own work.
And I know that being misunderstood does not make me false.

That knowing did not arrive all at once. It was earned.

Earned through heartbreak.
Earned through survival.
Earned through struggle, healing, and growth.
Earned through the long and painful work of becoming more whole without becoming hard.

So no, tenacity does not mean I am untouched by pain. It does not mean words do not sting. It does not mean disappointment leaves no mark.

It means pain does not get to define me.

It means I can take a hit and still remain standing.
It means I can be hurt without abandoning myself.
It means I can be challenged without surrendering my center.
It means I can keep moving forward without needing everyone around me to approve of the direction.

That is a hard-earned kind of strength.

I have lived enough now to know that not everyone will understand the path I have taken. Not everyone will understand the person I have become. Not everyone will understand the work I do, the way I think, or the truths I have had to live my way into.

But understanding is not the requirement.

Integrity is.

And I have that.

This week may have opened with a sucker punch, but it also left behind a reminder: I am still here. Still thinking. Still writing. Still building. Still becoming. Still unwilling to betray myself just to make someone else more comfortable.

So yes, if I had to choose one word again, I would still choose the same one.

Tenacious.

Not because life has been easy.
Not because I have never bent.
Not because I have never doubted.

But because after everything, I am still willing to rise as myself.

If you’d like to read an earlier reflection on this same word, you can find it here: Embracing Tenacity: The Heartbeat of Holistic Wellness.
And if you’d like a more personal companion piece born from this week’s harder reflections, you can read: Dear 100-Year-Old Me.