The Quiet Strength to Heal

The way I see it…

Medication can be a lifeline: a way to rest through the night, breathe through the storm, stay afloat when your soul feels heavy. But it doesn’t heal the pain. Medication quiets the alarm, but it doesn’t put out the fire. And if we forget that, the quick fix becomes a quiet trap. Because one day, the pain will rise again — and now, with side effects.

One of them is this: the belief that you are not strong enough. That you can’t heal on your own. But you are. And you can. Strength is not something we either have or don’t. It’s something we must nurture. Daily. And there is no greater strength than the one that dares to heal: aware that it can take time and effort, but knowing the reward is worth it. Doing the work will always make you stronger. Especially when you begin to see the results.

Medication can help your body, but you have to be careful so it doesn’t weaken your mind, your soul.

Medication quiets the alarm, but it doesn’t put out the fire.

The path I chose to walk to heal was this: no medication, no therapists. All of that can help, of course. But for me, I chose to create a vision — see it as a painting — of who I wanted to become. How I wanted to live, love, be. And then give myself time, even decades, to become that man.

That vision is still my painting. I return to it again and again. It’s my compass. In moments and days when I drift, I go back to the painting. I study it. Remind myself why I created it. What I want to become. What I want to live. And I continue the work.

The painting changes over time, but the promise stays the same.Because the work continues... until the final breath.

– Daniel Mendoza, 2025