Life: Courage Required
When you hear the word courage, what do you think of?
I’ll give you the list of mental images that used to jump to mind for me:
Firefighters running into burning buildings.
Astronauts stepping onto the moon.
Soldiers going into battle.
Superheroes facing down bad guys.
Explorers venturing into previously uncharted areas of our world.
David stepping out against Goliath.
Rockstars or actors stepping on a stage in front of thousands of people.
Big, bold, daring, life-threatening, fear-inducing, heart-pumping acts that a few of us do while the rest of watch in awe.
Those acts are certainly courageous, but they are not the whole of what it means to have courage.
What about in my own life? I used to think that courage is what propelled my adrenaline-junky tendency. Jumping out of a plane (parachute and expert involved, obviously). Bungee jumping off of a bridge. Black flips off a cliff into the ocean or a lake.
There may be an element of courage there.
More likely a high tolerance for completely unnecessary risk.
Maybe I just have a couple screws loose or something (this is what my mother would say).
We tend to associate courage with bravery. That is not necessarily wrong.
Where we err is in thinking that courage and bravery only show up in large moments.
Author Brené Brown** says the following about courage:
Courage – Courage is a heart word. The root of the word courage is cor—the Latin word for “heart.” Courage originally meant “To speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.” Today that means:
• Talking about how we feel
• Asking for what we need
• Being ourselves
• Being kind to others who are trying to be themselves
• Learning how to be brave and afraid at the exact same time
A heart word. Not a word related solely to the daring and the outwardly, overtly brave, but to everyone who has a heart. A word that defines simple of acts of living in a wholehearted manner.
Recently, I have been working to update my understanding of courage. Two reasons behind that drive:
The more I think about it, the more I believe that a large portion of daily life requires small, though certainly not insignificant, acts of courage.
I want to be able to acknowledge and be grateful for the times when people around me do something that required them to be courageous. I want to be able to call it out, recognize it, verbalize that I saw it. Thank them for it.
With that in mind, here is how I have reshaped my definition of courage: Tenacity in the face of uncertainty; the ability to persist in the midst of the unknown.
That is courage. And it takes heart.
All of life is uncertain. We wake up in the mornings and though we may have our schedules and plans, we have no real idea what is going to happen. We feel like have a decent grip on the short term, but we all know that can be thrown totally out of whack at any moment. One phone call and the next thing on the calendar is something we had no idea we would need to face. When it comes to the long term, there are far too many unknowns to have any real sense of certainty about what is in store for us. And that means we all need to have courage.
When future looks grim, it takes courage to simply move forward.
When the future looks bright, it takes courage to enjoy the season without allowing the fear of messing it up stop us.
When hope seems lost, it takes courage trudge forward in the darkness.
What does this kind of everyday courage look like in real life?
Having that hard conversation with a friend or coworker without having any idea what the outcome will be.
Raising your hand to answer that question in class, knowing you may be wrong.
Offering your idea in a staff meeting, understanding that it may not be the one everyone gravitates toward.
Supporting a family member through an unexpected season of mental, emotional, or physical illness.
Picking up the phone in order to attempt reconciling a severed relationship.
Parenting. All of parenting.
Standing on the starting line of a race, not knowing what will happen between there and the finish line.
Leaning into difficult seasons of marriage/relationship.
Asking for or extending forgiveness.
Asking for help.
Facing the next round of chemo, counseling, or medication in hopes that this is thing that brings healing.
Stepping into a new environment — socially or professionally.
Making a career change.
Being willing to take the game winning shot, knowing you could miss.
Going back to school as an adult.
Stepping out of high school into whatever comes next — college, workforce, military, trade school.
Trying or learning something new.
Moving into a leadership role.
Being vulnerable, transparent, and open with your past or present experiences.
Some of those are way more uncertain and unknown than jumping out of the plane or off the bridge. And they show up every single day in a myriad of different ways. Some of them almost completely paralyzing.
We could come up with 100 other examples of everyday courage that have nothing to do with burning buildings, flying bullets, or a bunch of adrenaline, but instead look like a tenacity in the face of uncertainty. Persistence in the unknown. As you think about your day, I would venture a guess that everyone reading this has done something courageous at least one time.
One more thought on this topic.
“I believe that Christianity offers a deeper well of resources from which to summon courage than anything else on the planet.”
There is a scene in one of the early books of the bible that paints a poignant picture of the reason for my statement above:
Moses, who has been leading the people of Israel for years has reached the end of his life. Joshua is about to take over and lead them into the next chapter of their journey. What lays ahead of Joshua and Israelites is a boatload of uncertainty: new place, new people, difficulty, struggle, war.
Moses, in front of all the people of Israel, tells Joshua this:
Be strong and courageous, for you will go with this people into the land the Lord swore to give their fathers. You will enable them to take possession of it. The Lord is the one who will go before you. He will be with you; He will not leave or abandon you. Do not be afraid or discouraged.
[Deuteronomy 31:7-8]
The reason for Joshua to have courage? The God of the universe was going before him, would not leave him, and was most certainly with him.
That is not a promise that is only held out for the leaders of God’s people. By faith in Jesus, anyone can have God going before them. never leaving them, and most certainly with them. In that, there is reason to be courageous. In that there are resources for summoning tenacity in the face of uncertainty, persistence in the midst of the unknown. It is that reality that causes Paul to almost blurt out in Romans 8, “If God is for us, who is against us?”
It is not that life ceases to be filled with uncertainties and unknowns. Instead, in Christ, we know that the certainty of God, His goodness, and His presence is greater than the uncertainty of the circumstances before us. And with that in mind, we can step forward with courage.
So tomorrow, when the unknown is staring you in the face and the uncertainty leaves you a little off-kilter, be courageous. Have tenacity. Persist.
And do so by reminding yourself that in Christ, the God of the universe is standing before, alongside, and behind you.
** If this topic strikes a chord with you and you want to do some more reading, here are two really good books on the topic, both by Brené Brown, who I mentioned above:
Daring Greatly — about courage and vulnerability in our everyday lives.
Dare to Lead — about fostering and practicing courage and vulnerability in the workplace.
