Romanticized Endurance: A Calming Toolkit for Change
Introduction
“Just keep going.” “Women are born to bear pain.” “This too shall pass.” Have you heard these phrases directed at you when you were struggling? In South Asian cultures especially, there’s a deeply embedded belief that a woman’s strength lies in her ability to endure—silently and without complaint. But what if this glorification of endurance is actually harming us?
When we romanticize endurance—the act of bearing hardship without seeking relief—we often normalize suffering rather than healing. This quiet acceptance can prevent us from acknowledging when we need help and create barriers to our mental wellbeing. Today, we’ll explore why this happens and how we can build healthier ways to face life’s challenges.
Table of Contents
- The Cultural Glorification of Women’s Endurance
- Understanding True Emotional Resilience vs. Harmful Endurance
- Breaking Free: Practical Steps Toward Healing
- Quick Wellness Questions
- Finding Your Path Forward
The Cultural Glorification of Women’s Endurance
From childhood, many women are taught that their strength is measured by how much pain they can bear without complaint. This messaging comes from everywhere: family stories of grandmothers who “never complained,” films portraying the ideal woman as one who sacrifices endlessly, and religious narratives that honor suffering. But this glorification has real consequences.
The Many Faces of Romanticized Endurance
Romanticized endurance appears in many forms in our daily lives. It’s the mother who never takes a sick day. The wife who stays in an unhappy marriage “for the family.” The daughter who suppresses her own dreams to fulfill family expectations. The professional who pushes through burnout because asking for help might be seen as weakness.
This narrative is particularly powerful in South Asian cultures, where a woman’s identity is often tied to her role as the family’s emotional backbone. The expectation to manage household harmony often means absorbing stress, disappointment, and even abuse without outward reaction.
The Hidden Cost of Always Being Strong
Research shows that chronic suppression of emotions and needs can lead to serious health consequences. A 2020 study in the Journal of Health Psychology found that women who consistently prioritized others’ needs over their own showed higher rates of depression, anxiety, and even physical ailments like chronic pain and digestive issues. [Source: Journal of Health Psychology, 2020]
When we internalize the message that our pain doesn’t matter, we often:
- Delay seeking medical help for physical symptoms
- Dismiss our emotional needs as “being dramatic”
- Accept toxic relationships as normal
- Push ourselves beyond healthy limits
- Develop a disconnected relationship with our bodies
How Mental Health Stigma Reinforces Endurance
In many communities, mental health struggles carry significant stigma. Women who admit to feeling overwhelmed, depressed, or anxious may be labeled as “weak” or told they’re failing in their duties. This mental health stigma creates a powerful incentive to mask struggles and “push through” at any cost.
A young professional shared with us: “When I finally told my mother about my anxiety, she said, ‘What do you have to be anxious about? When I was your age, I was raising three children while working full-time.’ It made me feel like my struggles weren’t valid because they weren’t the same as hers.”
This comparison of suffering is a common way that endurance culture perpetuates itself across generations. Each generation is expected to bear at least as much as the one before, if not more, creating a cycle that’s difficult to break.
Understanding True Emotional Resilience vs. Harmful Endurance
There’s an important distinction to make: resilience and endurance are not the same thing. While they might look similar from the outside, they operate on fundamentally different principles and lead to very different outcomes for our wellbeing.
What True Resilience Actually Looks Like
Resilience is our capacity to recover from difficulties and adapt to change. Unlike endurance (which often means suffering in silence), resilience is dynamic and responsive. Resilient people aren’t those who never struggle—they’re people who have developed healthy ways to process difficulty and emerge stronger.
Key characteristics of genuine emotional resilience include:
- Acknowledging pain rather than denying it
- Seeking support when needed
- Setting boundaries to protect wellbeing
- Processing emotions rather than suppressing them
- Learning from challenges rather than just surviving them
As Dr. Brené Brown explains in her research on vulnerability, “Resilience is not about pushing through at all costs. It’s about feeling the full range of emotions and moving through them with support and self-compassion.”
Recognizing When Endurance Becomes Harmful
How can you tell when you’ve crossed from healthy resilience into harmful endurance? Here are some warning signs:
- You frequently say “I’m fine” when you’re not
- Physical symptoms like headaches, digestive issues, or insomnia have become normal
- You feel numb or disconnected from your emotions
- Resentment builds up in your relationships
- You can’t remember the last time you prioritized your own needs
- You feel guilty when taking time for self-care
- You measure your worth by how much you can handle without breaking
Psychologist Dr. Thema Bryant notes that “Martyrdom is not a sign of emotional health. It’s often a trauma response learned in childhood when our needs weren’t met or validated.”
Trauma and Healing: How Endurance Affects Recovery
When we’ve experienced trauma, the endurance mindset can be particularly dangerous. Trauma recovery requires acknowledging pain, processing emotions, and often seeking professional support. But the cultural pressure to “be strong” can prevent women from taking these necessary healing steps.
Research from the trauma recovery field shows that suppressing traumatic experiences—rather than processing them—can lead to what therapists call “trauma freezing,” where painful experiences remain stuck in our nervous systems, affecting our health and relationships for years. [Source: The Body Keeps the Score, van der Kolk, 2014]
This is why many women who have experienced significant trauma—from domestic violence to workplace harassment to birth trauma—often minimize their experiences, saying things like, “Others have it worse” or “I should just be grateful.”
Breaking Free: Practical Steps Toward Healing
Moving from a pattern of romanticized endurance to genuine resilience isn’t about dramatic gestures—it’s about small, consistent shifts in how we relate to ourselves and others. Here’s how to begin that transformation.
Permission to Acknowledge Your Pain
The first step in healing is the simplest yet often the hardest: giving yourself permission to acknowledge that you’re hurting. This isn’t complaining or being weak—it’s being honest with yourself.
Try this simple practice:
- Find a quiet moment and place one hand on your heart
- Take three slow breaths
- Say to yourself: “My pain is real. My feelings matter.”
- Notice any resistance that arises (thoughts like “I’m being dramatic” or “others have it worse”)
- Gently remind yourself that acknowledging your experience doesn’t diminish anyone else’s
This practice might feel uncomfortable at first, especially if you’ve spent years minimizing your feelings. Start with just 60 seconds a day and gradually extend the practice as it becomes more familiar.
Building a Vocabulary for Your Needs
Many women raised in cultures that prioritize endurance lack the language to express their needs clearly. If you’ve been conditioned to ignore your needs, you might not even know what they are anymore.
Here’s a simple exercise to rebuild this vocabulary:
- Physical needs check: Once daily, scan your body from head to toe. Are you hungry, thirsty, tired, tense? What is your body asking for?
- Emotional needs check: Ask yourself, “What am I feeling right now?” Use a feelings wheel if naming emotions is difficult.
- Expression practice: Complete these sentences in a journal:
- “Today I need…”
- “It would help me if…”
- “I wish I could ask for…”
With practice, this awareness becomes more natural. You’ll begin to notice needs earlier, before they become urgent or overwhelming.
Practical Boundaries for Recovering People-Pleasers
Setting boundaries is essential for moving from endurance to resilience, but it can feel nearly impossible if you’ve built your identity around being available to others. Start with these small steps:
- Delay, don’t deny: When asked to take on something new, say “Let me check my schedule and get back to you” instead of an automatic yes
- Start with “safe” boundaries: Practice with low-risk situations (like declining a social invitation when you’re tired) before tackling more challenging boundaries
- Use “I” statements: “I need some quiet time this evening” rather than “You’re asking too much of me”
- Notice your physical reactions: Feeling tense, resentful, or exhausted are often signals that a boundary is needed
Remember that setting boundaries isn’t selfish—it’s necessary for sustainable giving and healthy relationships. As relationship therapist Nedra Tawwab explains, “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.”
Finding Support Without Shame
Breaking free from the endurance mindset often requires support, but asking for help can trigger feelings of shame or failure. Here are ways to approach this crucial step:
- Start with one trusted person: Identify someone who has shown empathy and non-judgment in the past
- Use bridging language: “I’m trying something new—being more honest about when I’m struggling. Can I practice with you?”
- Consider professional support: Therapists, especially those who understand cultural contexts around endurance, can provide a safe space to practice vulnerability
- Explore community support: Groups like Hey Mandala’s community circles provide spaces where many women are working through similar patterns
If therapy feels like too big a step, consider starting with a mental health app or online support group. Many offer culturally sensitive resources specifically designed for women from communities where mental health may be stigmatized.
Daily Practices for Cultivating True Resilience
True resilience is built through daily practices that reconnect us with our authentic needs and experiences. Here are some approaches that have helped women in our community:
- Morning check-in: Before checking your phone or email, take 2 minutes to ask, “How am I feeling today? What do I need?”
- Body scanning: Take brief pauses throughout the day to notice physical tension and consciously release it
- Emotional naming: Practice identifying and naming your emotions without judgment
- Gratitude with authenticity: Note what you’re genuinely grateful for, while also acknowledging challenges
- Permission pauses: Before automatically taking on a request, pause and check if you truly have the capacity
These practices don’t require extra time in your day—they can be integrated into existing routines, creating small moments of self-awareness that gradually shift your relationship with endurance.
Quick Wellness Questions
Q: How is “endurance” often glorified for women?
A: Women’s endurance is glorified through cultural narratives that celebrate sacrifice and silent suffering. We see it in phrases like “she never complained,” in media portraying the ideal woman as one who puts everyone else first, and in family stories that praise women who endured hardship without seeking help. This glorification appears as compliments (“you’re so strong”), expectations (“women are natural caregivers”), and cautionary tales about women who prioritized their own needs.
Q: What is the difference between healthy resilience and harmful endurance?
A: Healthy resilience involves acknowledging difficulties, processing emotions, seeking support when needed, and emerging stronger from challenges. It’s dynamic and responsive. Harmful endurance, by contrast, involves suppressing needs, ignoring pain, isolating yourself, and pushing through at any cost. Resilience replenishes your emotional resources while endurance depletes them. Resilience allows for vulnerability; endurance often demands its suppression.
Q: How does this narrative prevent women from acknowledging pain?
A: The romanticized endurance narrative prevents women from acknowledging pain by creating both internal and external barriers. Internally, women often internalize messages that their suffering isn’t “bad enough” to warrant attention or that acknowledging pain makes them weak. Externally, when women do express pain, they may face dismissal (“everyone goes through this”), comparison (“others have it worse”), or even social penalties for not maintaining the strong caregiver role. This creates a cycle where seeking help feels both personally shameful and socially risky.
Q: I know I should set boundaries, but I feel overwhelmed with guilt when I do. How can I manage these feelings?
A: Guilt when setting boundaries is extremely common, especially for women raised to prioritize others’ comfort. Start by recognizing this guilt as an expected part of the process, not a sign you’re doing something wrong. Try writing down your guilt thoughts and countering each with a compassionate truth (e.g., “I feel guilty for saying no” → “I deserve to honor my limits”). Begin with smaller boundaries where the guilt feels manageable, and notice how the intensity often decreases with practice. Remember that discomfort is part of growth—it doesn’t mean you’re making a mistake.
Q: How can I help a friend who seems stuck in the endurance mindset without making her feel judged?
A: Approach your friend with curiosity rather than correction. Instead of saying “You need to stop taking on so much,” try “I notice you’ve been handling a lot lately—how are you really doing?” Share your own experiences with moving beyond endurance, using “I” statements like “I realized I was ignoring my own needs when…” Create safe spaces where vulnerability is welcomed, not judged. Small gestures that model self-care can be powerful—like suggesting a break during a busy day or openly talking about your own need for support.
Finding Your Path Forward
The path from romanticized endurance to genuine resilience isn’t linear. There will be days when old patterns resurface, when the voice that says “just push through” feels louder than the one that honors your needs. That’s not failure—it’s part of the process.
What matters is that you’ve begun to question the narrative that your worth lies in how much you can endure. You’re recognizing that true strength isn’t found in silent suffering but in honest acknowledgment of your humanity—complete with needs, limits, and the courage to honor them.
As you move forward, be gentle with yourself. Notice the small victories: the moment you paused before automatically saying yes, the time you acknowledged your feelings without judgment, the day you asked for help and received it. These moments are powerful evidence that change is possible.
Remember that cultivating resilience instead of endurance isn’t just a gift to yourself—it creates permission for other women to do the same. When we collectively shift away from glorifying pain and toward celebrating authentic wellbeing, we create new possibilities for generations to come.
Begin today with one small step: perhaps a moment of honest reflection, a boundary gently set, or simply the quiet acknowledgment that your wellbeing matters. In that moment, you’re already changing the narrative.
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