Strength Builds Quietly

By Jennifer Kelleher

There’s a particular kind of strength that only reveals itself over time. Not the loud kind, not the kind that announces itself with fireworks. A quieter kind that you earn by staying.

Over the past two years, I’ve learned how to keep moving forward, even when things didn’t unfold the way I imagined. There were unexpected turns and moments that asked me to slow down, to soften, and to reconsider my pace. But something in me changed.

For a long time, I thought growth meant pushing, achieving, and outrunning discomfort. Lately, it has looked different. It has looked like sitting with what’s tangled instead of stepping over it. It has looked like noticing the impulse to react and choosing, instead, to pause. It has looked like combing through the knots gently, one strand at a time.

In my early and mid-thirties, I did a great deal of inner repair. Much of it happened quietly and alone. I learned how to take responsibility for my patterns, how to sit with my own contradictions, and how to stop outsourcing my peace. The past few years have been about bringing that work into my relationships by choosing presence over protection and connection over control. That shift has changed everything.

And it shows up in unexpected places.

Recently, I set a personal record with hip thrusts at the gym. On the surface, it’s just a number, plates on a bar. But it didn’t come from forcing, and it didn’t come from ego or from trying to prove something. It came from showing up on the days I didn’t feel particularly inspired, from adjusting when something felt off instead of quitting, and from going through instead of around.

Strength builds that way.

As we move into this week’s solar eclipse in Aquarius, there’s a palpable sense of forward momentum. Eclipses tend to reveal what has been quietly forming beneath the surface. Aquarius energy nudges us toward authenticity– toward living a little more honestly, and a little less cautiously. At the same time, we enter the Year of the Fire

Horse in the Chinese zodiac– a symbol of vitality, independence, and bold motion. Fire and air. Spark and wind. There’s movement in the field.

But forward momentum doesn’t have to mean frantic energy. Sometimes it simply means being willing to outgrow an old way of bracing yourself.

I feel this in my life, and I see it in my son. Max and I both seem to be blossoming right now– each in our own way, but side by side. He’s stepping into more of who he is. I’m doing the same. There’s something deeply humbling about growing up alongside your child. We’re both learning when to push and when to soften, when to speak and when to listen, and when to try again.

The eclipse reminds me that becoming is rarely a straight line. The Fire Horse reminds me that there is power in trusting your own momentum. And the past two years remind me that real strength isn’t built in dramatic bursts, it’s built in the steady decision to stay present. To adjust, to repair and to keep going.

If you’re feeling the stirrings of change this week, you’re not alone. There is a collective sense of movement right now, but you don’t have to sprint into it. You can meet it thoughtfully. You can let it refine you rather than rush you.

And if what you need is a space to soften as we transition toward spring, we’re holding that at Ocean Bliss Yoga. On Wednesday, March 4 from 6:30–8 p.m., Sarah and Bella Arikian, a beautiful mother and daughter duo, will guide a Yin and Restorative Yoga workshop designed to help you gently release winter’s holding patterns and make space for renewal.

You’re always welcome in our light and plant-filled studio overlooking the water. Come move, breathe, soften, and build your strength the quiet way– with us at Ocean Bliss Yoga. Sign up for classes at oceanblissyoga.net. Call or text me with your questions at 917-318-1168.