““The oak fought the wind and was broken, the willow bent when it must and survived.” (Robert Jordan, “The Fires of Heaven”)

The name J.D. Vance, the Republican nominee for Vice President of the United States in the 2024 presidential election and a presiding senator from Ohio, has become high on the analytics of search engines over the past few weeks.  If you’re unfamiliar with his background, he rose from the quintessence of the lower working class in the heartland of America raised by a single mother who fought addiction, to graduate Yale with a law degree before influencing his way onto the political stage.  His best-selling memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy” has been adapted into a movie. If there’s one word to describe him that stands among the many it’s this:  Resilient.  

To be resilient is often coupled with other expressions such as strong, tough, and flexible but at its core is a character of someone who knows how to overcome.  It’s not an attribute that is given to all, but one that I believe is bestowed upon birth.  I envision celestial beings who shine their light upon an embryo soul before it transitions to its earthly womb and say, “Give that one an extra dose of resiliency, they’re gonna need it for the lifetime they chose…”   We’ve all known those people who appear to go through one trial after another and emerge, seemingly unscathed and with their hair in place, while others are so emotionally fragile that an unkind word from a stranger sends them diving for the covers. 

I’ve always been the former, often to my chagrin.  I don’t refer to myself as being resilient, instead I’m flush with “Buffalo Blood,” the alias for the DNA inherited from my paternal grandfather.  My grandfather, who was fittingly nicknamed “Buffalo,” was not only a physically imposing man, but one who had a temperament that allowed few things to unnerve him as he faced challenges head on.  In him I saw a fearless character, not one of a mythical proportion, but one who represented a formidable force who knew how to cut through the brush of life.  My parents didn’t possess buffalo blood, so I yield in gratitude to the science behind recessive and dominant genes that appear to make character traits skip a generation.

The problem with becoming comfortable with resiliency is it can make one appear too self-reliant. When others view you as self-reliant, they tend to withhold any help that would ease your circumstance, either as a chastisement for remaining upright as they watch, with curiosity, to see when you’ll fall much like the last block in a game of Jenga, or a misinterpretation as something that’s revered, worn as a badge of courage.

Resiliency is an invaluable trait to have, for this life is not designed for the faint of heart.  To be resilient means you believe in something greater beyond the storm clouds, that the power within you champions for your life, and that hope is a noun come to life.  It does not mean that help from others is not desired or insulting, but the required humility to accept it only strengthens the resolve to help others.  It’s the domino effect of being of service. 

In the end, the greatest act of kindness is to give a fellow traveler a hand up, even those who appear not to need one.