Personal development requires being courageous; are you up to the challenge?
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"To stay truly alive, we need to choose courage over comfort." - Susan David, author of Emotional Agility.
Photo by Muzammil Soorma on Unsplash
What does someone who has courage look like to you?
Are they fearless? Brave? Act first, think later?
When I started reflecting on what having courage means, I thought of a movie character from Star Trek. You may know him as Captain Kirk. That man had some cajones! He didn't shrink in fear when he was fighting against a group of men at the club, even though his odds of winning were slim to none.
He impressed me with his relentless “give-it-a-go" energy, taking the Ultimate test repeatedly and looking at the problem differently each time. Eventually, he outsmarted the test maker, Spock, and beat it! This led to some consequences because the way he won didn't align with what the institution deemed acceptable. Nevertheless, he showed that where there is a will, there is a way!
We all need that mindset when we go out into the world, fighting to stay optimistic despite the world's ongoing issues (climate change, pandemic, financial crisis) and still having the courage to show up for ourselves, our goals, and our loved ones.
I'll be sharing some highlights today from the Star Trek movie and Life and Beyond about why courage matters and how having it in your life may benefit you:
Thinking outside of the box takes COURAGE!
In the movie, Kirk caught on to the actual attack on Vulcan by the Romulan ship that signaled them to come as a trap. His peers weren't convinced and wanted to do things as they had always been.
He had to speak up against the federation protocol and fight for his beliefs. If he hadn't followed his intuition and dared to push for what he believed in, the ending/ outcome of the movie would have been VERY different!
Sometimes in life, you will have moments where you will find yourself in the middle of like-minded people and facing the choice to speak up with your dissenting opinion and break out of the groupthink.
For example, if you are at a brainstorming session at a work function or community-based group, and people are thinking of concepts to enhance the work processes or about the next group volunteer event. What do you do when your opinion may change the outcome of the solution? Do you keep your head down and agree with the group? Then kick yourself on your way home about not speaking up.
No!
You having courage looks like you are willing to be the outcast momentarily so that your thoughts and opinions are said and heard by others. This doesn't mean your idea will be automatically accepted and implemented, but you never know; your idea may lead to lighting a lightbulb in someone else's mind on how your idea can be enhanced more efficiently for the group's prerogative.
Each time you do this, you will feel more confident in yourself, your mind, and your problem-solving ability, which will inevitably spill over into other areas of your life, such as goal setting and relationships with others.
Being assertive of your needs regardless of others' pushback… takes COURAGE!
To implement boundaries for yourself, courage is needed! It would help if you adopted a no-fear mindset when speaking up for yourself because when introducing change to the relationship dynamic, you can bet there will be pushback to keep the status quo going. This is going for ANY relationship between boss-employee, family, and friends. Once you do the work, write out your values and nonnegotiables for yourself and how you want to operate in these dynamics. The pushback may be in the form of consequences.
Having courage looks like standing up for yourself in the face of these possible consequences
Such as at work that could be a job loss or project loss,
with family that may mean being subject to gossip and fewer family invites(sounds like more time for you, so this may be a *win-win for you)
within friendships and relationships, it can mean being willing to lose the person you are interacting with on a temporary or permanent basis if they are unwilling to accept the new courageous you!
For Kirk, he lost his going out into space privileges after defeating the test… (even though we all know he found a way to get out of it..).
Self-reflection and Accountability… takes self COURAGE!
Taking the time to reflect on yourself can help you identify areas where you could improve to see personal growth.
Facing yourself and taking the time to see where you may be not acting in alignment with your values is very BOLD and DARING!
It's much easier to keep on doing what you always have done without any intervention on your behalf. It's easier to pretend, deny, and blame others than to face that you could have handled a situation differently. But nothing worth having comes easy. Developing the emotional intelligence to listen to others when they bring up issues with you, taking action, being accountable for your goals, and being corrected when necessary takes courage!
Let me give you a visualization of what courage looks like and doesn't.
What courage looks like :
Photo by Artem Beliaikin on Unsplash
You want to be a fearless go-getter running towards your best life with scenic routes showing sunset and rain. Rainbows after the rain, listening to a playlist with various music blasting different beats. These other bases of different drums and instruments illustrate your zigzags of opportunities in life that you take advantage of, and you can barely recognize who you were five years ago because you have done the work and grown SO much!
What courage doesn't look like:
Photo by Arani Mukherjee on Unsplash
You choose to stay in the comfort lane you're in, brisk walking at the pace you're going and have always gone, with no colorful trees, no end of the rainbow, with earplugs in, the same song playing, the same melody over and over again just the same day in and day out, with no growth from who you were as a teen...
Your life, your choice.
I choose to be courageous and take on life's challenges with my head held up high, earplugs blasting some salsa music, tuning out others' opinions about where I should be running and how fast I should be moving, and instead focused on working towards what my version/vision of my best life is!
Who's coming with me?!
Reminder:
The more you take the chance to embrace courage, the more trust and belief you have in yourself. This helps future you…think of it like every time you are courageous, you are putting it in the bucket, and it will become full of brave moments that you can reflect on when you are feeling scared or fearful of making a new decision or going on a new pathway.
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