What doesn't kill you...

I heard that Kelly Clarkson song "Stronger" on the radio today. And while I'm not really a big Kelly Clarkson fan, I do like this song. It's a good empowerment song. But today, I was really thinking about what this song was saying:

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

Stand a little taller

Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

What doesn't kill you makes a fighter

Footsteps even lighter

Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

Now obviously this song is talking about a guy leaving her, but I was thinking about the other things in life that don't kill you. I know there are definitely things in my life that haven't killed me but have made me stronger. But that wasn't a given. If something's going to make you stronger, you have to fight for it to make you stronger.

There are things that may not kill you literally, but can kill you in other ways. Crohn's obviously hasn't actually killed me, but if I let it, it could run my life. It'd be so easy to sit around and feel sorry for myself all the time. I've tried to tap into the social media Crohn's community and I've definitely found people out there who seem to have given up and resigned themselves to a certain kind of life. But I'm not going to do that. And that's what has made me a stronger person. Without the things I've dealt with over the years, who knows where I'd be now.

I'm not saying this to try to sound impressive or prideful. I want to bring encouragement to anyone who may be dealing with a potentially "deadly" issue. It doesn't have to be health related, it could be anything. You can't just sit back and say, "Well, this will make me a stronger person someday." You have to want to be a stronger person. You have to fight to be a stronger person. Learn from your mistakes and from your trials. While they may seem too big to beat now, you keep fighting and you'll win every time.

You think you got the best of me

Think you had the last laugh

Bet you think that everything good is gone.

Think you left me broken down

Think that I'd come running back

Baby, you don't know me cause you're dead wrong.