What it means to be courageous

I never identified much as the "courageous" type. When a colleague commented to me on Friday that she thought I was courageous, I was prompted to re-evaluate what I thought courage was.

The next day as I was reading Malcolm Gladwell's book, I stumbled across a portion that revealed a lot about my (incomplete) view of courage. Here is a snippet from Gladwell's book titled David & Goliath, p 149:

"The conquering of fear produces exhilaration. The contrast between the previous apprehension and the present relief and feeling of security promotes a self-confidence that is the very father and mother of courage.

Courage is not something that you already have that makes you brave when the tough times start. Courage is what you earn when you've been through the tough times and you discover they aren't so tough after all."

I don't think taking the uncommon path is easy for anyone, but there are people who are overwhelmed by the fear/apprehension and those who are willing to take the step of faith despite the realness of the challenge.

I am learning to say yes to these opportunities to grow in courage (via small steps of faith) rather than just self-selecting out as one who is just not courageous. The issue was never that I can't, it's that I won't.

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