Courage

(noun) - mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty

Besides the use of “danger” in this definition, I appreciate this version of “courage.” There are so many more nouns that could be added to this, too, either in lieu of or along with both fear and difficulty. And if we stick with “danger” to that I would add “…of doubt, overwhelm, or distractions.”

Cultivating anything takes time, just ask my farmer husband waiting on crops or my kids impatiently watching the garden grow. We understand and comprehend that these seeds need time to push through the ground, sprout little green leaves, and mature into something that can be harvested; why don’t we extend that same understanding to ourselves?

I am writing this post on my new website and I am terrified to share from here because it is not ready! I have been attempting to fine-tune these pages for a few months now and second-guessing myself in sharing from this platform, but my yearning to write and share is stronger. Finally, my courage triumphed over the dangers of doubt and shame and my fear of failure has been quieted. I want to share my hard work and my passion for dreaming up “brite” ideas.

“Do it scared”, right?

Since I started writing this, I’ve been trying to notice these “do it scared” moments. My kids are probably the best at this - when do we lose our “jump back up and try again” attitude? And I’m not just talking about falling down physically or when a kid does something reckless, fusses a little bit, gets reassurance, and then just tries again; I have some mentally brave kids, I’ve found out.

I’ve known this for a while. My oldest son had a season of nearly crippling anxiety about being sick. You can read more about it here, but to see how he still uses the way he overcame those attacks still when he’s extremely nervous or frustrated is really an amazing thing to watch. My middle son had a scary incident at a lake a few years ago, but it has not kept him from growing to love the water - have there been moments of unease for him? Absolutely, but to watch him now you wouldn’t know that it was something he had to overcome. My youngest, as you’ve possibly read before, most tempts my patience, but I watched him sincerely apologize in front of others after being carted off and having a time-out. A month ago, that never would have happened. These boys are something else to watch grow up.

The grace required to allow yourself the chance to get back up in the face of failure is something I feel we lose at some point as we grow older. Is it because we don’t have a trusted person there for reassurance? Is it because we’ve heard the phrase “It’s not worth it” too many times? Or do we hear “That’s a silly idea” and just choose to agree to avoid conflict? Whatever it is, my prayer going into my upcoming new year (aka my birthday) is that I take notes on courage from my kids. I hope that when I feel like a failure I’ll turn to my Source of Reassurance - my Creator, Savior, Counselor - and then jump back up to start again.

I have several new ideas floating around and I am having to work hard to have the courage to persevere to withstand the distractions that so easily deter me from following through - my fear of failure is truly my biggest enemy right now. But failure is just the result of trying something courageously until it comes out the way it’s meant to, even if that’s not the way we first intended. And the flip side of that is recognizing there is courage in stepping back from something that is not fit to occur in our current season. This courage is where faith comes in so importantly because if we don’t have that reassurance of where our hope lies we will not have the courage to seek guidance from the Holy Spirit. Faith and courage are similar in that way of having to let go in order to gain ground.

My first “brite” idea is following a 52-week writing challenge starting this week - my birthday week! I read somewhere once that some people do their “new year's resolutions” on their birthdays because that truly is a NEW year for that person! How fun is that?! So, here’s to 35. . .cultivating courage starting with working on talking to myself as I would talk to my kids when they are struggling to be courageous.