Becoming Resilient

In her new memoir, “A Life in Light,” popular author Mary Pipher offers life lessons on becoming resilient by moving into the light.

For Pipher, light isn’t just a metaphor but a literal expression of how light restores her.

Ever since she was a small child Pipher was drawn to the light. Her first memory is as an infant, lying on a blanket under a tree, bathed in dappled sunlight. At 74, Pipher continues to surround herself with natural light as much as possible, hiking on a sunny day or writing in a room where the sun streams in.

Pipher grew up in a rural Nebraska family with an alcoholic, raging father and a loving, but unavailable mother, whose small-town medical practice kept her out of the home for long hours.  Mary was a resourceful child, seeking out adults, like her maternal grandmother, who affirmed her. She fondly recalls washing dishes with her grandmother, who bestowed love and affection during this mundane chore.

Beaver City, Nebraska, where Mary Pipher grew up

Throughout her adult life, Pipher has learned to transcend trying times by focusing on what’s hopeful in her life.   

She appears to have internalized the positive attitude and fortitude of her female relatives, who worked from dawn to dusk on their Nebraska family farms, and from her mother who attended medical school while caring for three young children. Mary showed the same determination when she attended graduate school as a single parent, and when she decided to be a writer, which meant getting up at 4 AM to write before her children rose.

As Mary aged, her adult children and their families, once nearby, moved out of state. Her days filled with grandchildren and large family dinners disappeared. She became despondent, turning to her meditation practice when a light-filled awareness struck: “Our great challenge is coming to grips with impermanence.”  This is easier said than done. 

Pipher writes that accepting impermanence is aided by a practice of giving love, noting that “receiving love is impermanent but giving love is permanent.”

Mary, morell hunting with her husband and son, 2020

A significant way Pipher gives love is through her commitment to environmental activism, fueled by a childhood in nature, when she rescued injured small animals, nursing them back to life. Studies on building resilience have found that dedication to a worthy cause has a resilience-enhancing effect. The resilient elders I know, those who have endured great losses and disappointments, are engaged in social causes, like combatting global warming and advocating for peace over war.

Being in the moment is a central component in Mary’s light-filled path, where she basks in the beauty and awe of what she is experiencing, savoring the serenity of a walk in nature, or a spirited facetime conversation with a grandchild.  She recommends storing these precious memories as a reminder of  life’s fullness. Good advice for when a depressed mood hits.

Time in nature restores Pipher, savoring being in the moment

Pipher’s sunny nature contributes to her resilience.  In an interview with the Washington, DC bookstore, Politics and Prose, she commented, “I love to be happy,” Towards this end she practices gratitude and finds joy in helping others. This concept was ingrained in her as a child with her mother’s daily reminder to “Be kind to others.”

Karen Shoemaker interviewing Mary Pipher via Zoom for Politics and Prose, 2022

A writing practice has proved invaluable for Pipher in deepening the self-understanding that promotes resilience: “Writing helps me to see things more clearly than I would have before.”  One doesn’t have to be a published writer to make this connection.  Keeping a journal can produce the same results.

Pipher ends her memoir with this sentence: “Dear reader, you too can write your own story as a life in light.”  There’s no time like the present to move into the light.