By Sarah Stephen

Sooner or later you will face a storm. It can be at work, at home, in your business, in life. What matters most is who you become in it. My answer is simple, you face the storm but you do not become the storm.

The pursuit of purpose needs unwavering faith and focus, and for women, this starts in the mind. The opposition is real, you meet it in the system and among your close circle, yet the first battle is not with other people but with the story you tell yourself.

The difference lies not in the external but in the internal, and when you win that battle in your mind, you train your mind to notice the joys of life, the obstacle becomes the path.

From there, your challenges take on a new role because they stop being walls and become scaffolding that holds you up. Your challenges do not define your relevance, and you are no less valuable because you are in a hard season. This challenge is about attention, and this is where reflection matters.

Many people think that staying focused means pushing harder, but I believe it means pausing with purpose. Reflection is how you take account of what has happened and clarify what fuels and anchors your vision, and we need self-reflection most in the hardest times.

In these times, self-reflection may not show us what is, but rather what we choose to see. This is cognitive framing, and the way we interpret an event decides how we experience it. If you focus on the positive, some may call it toxic positivity, but your vision and your purpose filter what confirms your worldview, and your actions and your life faithfully reflect it. Reflection examines our thoughts for better conditions, and life gives feedback on the congruency of our thoughts, because we assign meaning to our experiences in life.

Reflection does not mean your experience did not happen, but what you choose to reflect on is what you invite in, and it tints the glass of your perception and your life. So I say you must maintain your vision even without sight of it. Seeing beyond the harsh reality is part of how we endure and overcome.

Something else happens when you keep moving in difficult times, and though reflection feels still, it’s a form of motion. It asks for honesty, and most importantly, you begin to trust yourself because you see what your mirror reflects. If we view the present through pain, we can’t experience new reflections, and this becomes distortion. If you made a promise to yourself, you cannot break that promise just because the road became hard. Hard is exactly when it counts.

Adjust the vision even without sight, the landscape of your mind is ready to respond to your thoughts.

Stephen is a Luxury Real Estate Advisor advocating for women’s financial freedom.