Courage

It’s fairly easy to get a thrill these days.  With air travel, communication and more opportunities opening doors, it doesn’t take much to get on a zipline, go parasailing, bungee jumping or skydiving. Plus, there’s this mantra of being asked to go out of our comfort zones every once in a while because it will help us grow. There’s truth to it of course. Truth – and a danger of believing that adventurism has replaced courage.

The need for speed, the desire for the adrenaline rush, the constant lookout for one’s next big experience does indeed have their place in our lives. Without them, we’d be stuck in our little bubble, forever cowering in fear of the new and the unusual. But the situations that often call for us to be courageous do not always present themselves in the most dramatic way. Sometimes, the most courageous among us aren’t always the first persons to run into battle. Sometimes, the most courageous aren’t always the loudest. The most courageous aren’t always perceived as courageous.

There are many situations in life that call for us to respond in courage although we do not think of them as such. Or maybe, we’re so used to seeing them in others and in ourselves that we no longer see them as extraordinary. But if we allow ourselves to take a closer look, we might just find that there are many heroic and courageous people around us, and might even find that we’re a lot more courageous than we give ourselves credit for.

It takes courage to care for a sick loved one, especially one who is terminally ill. The weariness and the prospect of losing him or her can be paralyzing. Yet I’ve seen many people go through it gracefully and even cheerfully because their love is stronger than fear.

It takes courage to forgive. First. In many ways, we can get stuck on our own notion of justice and see only the hurt that others have caused us. But to forgive others is to face the fear of our own inadequacies and to realize that we too are in need of forgiveness. For the same reason, it takes courage to ask forgiveness first. But in the end, the desire for healing and mercy trumps the desire for retribution.

It takes courage to commit oneself to another person. To choose one over another is to negate all other choices. To choose to go through one door is to understand that we have forever closed five (or ten or a million) others. And the fear of making the wrong choice or losing all the other choices can be daunting, but the hope of having made the right one gives us courage greater than our fears.

It takes courage to love others and to allow ourselves to be loved. We often build walls to protect ourselves from getting hurt or from being judged unjustly. For as C.S. Lewis so aptly writes, “To love at all is to be vulnerable.” And it is precisely this fear of vulnerability that causes us to shut others out and ourselves in. But the possibility of the joy of true love (whether for family, friends or significant others) helps us overcome the fear of vulnerability.

It takes courage to be faithful. Especially to God. For to have any kind of relationship with God is to deal with uncertainties. It is to understand that the person we pray to and have faith in is completely other, completely beyond our control. That there are no set formulas to ensure that He will act exactly as we wish him to act. That all our prayers will be answered in the exact manner that we wish or that we will be answered at all. Still, we continue to pray. Because the memory of His kindness in the past is stronger than our fear. And the hope of eternal life with Him is stronger than our fear.

There are far more experiences that demand our courage than I can name. Primarily because to be fully alive and fully human is to accept the reality of fear – because we are finite and imperfect and wounded. But it is only when we understand our fears that we can begin to make choices freely and wisely. And when the hope of what we gain is greater then the fear of what we can lose, then we can act courageously.