The Strength of a Woman - that inexhaustible force that moves everything.

I’m often asked:
“Where do you get your strength?”
“How do you manage?”
“Do your eyes ever sleep?”

I just smile and let out a quiet sigh… because how do you explain a strength gathered over years - from everything I’ve lived through, loved, lost, and learned?

If I had to reduce it all to one word, it would be perspective.
Because I see everything through my inner perspective, and it’s from there that I draw my strength

Recently, at a lunch with friends, I met a woman - someone who has long been walking through the battle of her husband’s serious illness.
As she spoke, heavy tears silently streamed down her face, and with trembling fingers she kept turning her wedding ring - that vow of loyalty and belonging. I couldn’t tell whether she was turning the ring or all that love she had sung into being through tears of worry and fear.

In her tears, I saw courage and the quiet strength of a woman who carries more than she ever says.
And that moment brought me back to myself - as a reminder of how fragile life is, and how love can be both pain and light.

Later, she turned to me and asked if I was “that Bosnian woman they had told her about.”
Even though my friends were already ready to begin my “grand story,” I stopped them with a glance and answered her briefly and softly. Because that moment belonged to her, not to me

Why am I writing this?

Because other people’s stories always return me to perspective.
I’m grateful that I can feel, that I can see, and that other people’s destinies can touch me — because they remind me how many reasons I have to be thankful.
From those encounters, I draw my strength.
From gratitude, from silence, from that invisible place the soul recognizes.

And so, when someone asks me, “Where do you get your strength?” - I smile again.
Because strength doesn’t come only from wounds, but from love as well.
It doesn’t grow only in silence, but in joy too.

Everything I’ve lived fits into a small compass within me.
I call it perspective.

And it is precisely there - where sorrow and hope meet - that my strength is born.

Strength.
That feminine, quiet strength that doesn’t seek applause, but peace of soul.
That knows how to love, believe, and give thanks.

Because at the end of the day, the soul is strongest when it remains gentle and true to itself - and when, despite everything, it still chooses love and light.

Kuvet žene - ta neiscrpna snaga koja pokreće sve.
Često me pitaju:
“Otkud ti kuvet?”
“Kako ti se da?”
“Da li ti oči ikad zaspu?”

Samo se nasmiješim i pustim jedan tihi uzdah… jer kako objasniti snagu skupljanu godinama - iz svega što sam doživjela, zavoljela, izgubila i naučila?

Kad bih sve to svela na jednu riječ - bila bi to riječ “perspektiva”.
Jer sve gledam iz svoje unutrašnje perspektive, i baš odatle crpim snagu.

Nedavno, na ručku sa prijateljima, upoznala sam jednu gospođu - ženu koja već dugo hoda kroz borbu sa teškom bolešću svoga muža.
Dok je pričala, teške suze su joj tiho padale niz lice, a drhtavim prstima okretala je burmu - taj zavjet odanosti i pripadnosti. Nisam znala da li okreće prsten ili svu tu ljubav koju je suzama brige i strepnje ispjevala.

U njenim suzama vidjela sam hrabrost i tihu snagu žene koja nosi više nego što govori.
I taj trenutak me vratio sebi - kao podsjetnik koliko je život krhak i koliko ljubav može biti i bol i svjetlo.

Kasnije se okrenula prema meni i pitala “jesam li ja ta bosanka o kojoj su joj pričali”. Iako su moji prijatelji već bili spremni da započnu moju “grandioznu priču” zaustavivši ih pogledom odgovorila sam joj kratko i tiho. Jer taj trenutak je pripadao njoj, ne meni.

Zašto ovo pišem?

Zato što me tuđe priče uvijek vrate u perspektivu.
Zahvalna sam što osjetim, što vidim i što me dotaknu tuđe sudbine - jer me podsjete koliko imam razloga biti zahvalna.
Iz tih susreta crpim svoj kuvet.
Iz zahvalnosti, iz tišine, iz onog nevidljivog što duša prepozna.

I zato, kad me neko pita “odakle ti kuvet?” - ja se opet nasmiješim.
Jer kuvet ne dolazi samo iz rana, nego i iz ljubavi.
Ne raste samo u tišini, nego i u radosti.

Sve ono što sam živjela stalo je u mali kompas u meni.
Ja ga zovem perspektiva.

I upravo tamo - gdje se sretnu tuga i nada - rađa se moja snaga.

Kuvet.
Onaj ženski, tihi kuvet koji ne traži aplauz, nego mir u duši.
Koji zna voljeti, vjerovati i zahvaliti.

Jer na kraju dana, duša je najjača onda kada ostane nježna i svoja - i kada, uprkos svemu, i dalje bira ljubav i svjetlo.