May’s theme is Perseverance, and I’ve got a really tactile, easy exercise for you to try this month to remind yourself of your own strength.

Here is how you create your own Envelope of Strength.

• Find a piece of paper and an envelope. It might be special paper that’s meaningful to you in some way – or it might be scrap paper and a random envelope; it’s up to what feels right to you.
• On the paper, write down a time when you went through something difficult and came out the other side.
• You can be as detailed or as brief as you like; you might want to journal about it and consider what helped you get through this moment, or you might just use one or two words to trigger the memory of this moment in time.
• Fold up the paper and seal it in the envelope.
• Now comes some element of choice. You might want to destroy your envelope. You might want to save it or tuck it away in a hiding spot or journal. You might even want to frame it! What feels right to you?
• No matter what you choose, set a calendar reminder a certain amount of time from now of your choosing to remember your Envelope of Strength. Perhaps a month from now, or a year from now – maybe you even ask a friend to mail it to you at that time.
• In your calendar reminder, include a note to yourself to try to remember the time you wrote about on your envelope. How many other moments of strengths could you now add into that envelope since that time? Considering those additional moments means you’ve built up a store of perseverance you might not have realized was possible: but there it is, and there you are.

I hope you’ll share your Envelopes of Strength with me and how you decide to save, destroy, send, or hide your Envelope – and that this exercise helps you reflect on the many ways you can find strength, and therefore perseverance, in yourself.