Courage was the topic of discussion in a gathering among friends. I felt surprised that I had not given this word much thought. Not a single illustration given that night resonated with me. I felt there was something common and ever-present about courage to merely belong to a superhero caricatures in the given examples. They were expressed as too rare of a quality to be recognized as a human attribute. It didn’t sit right to think of courage as an innate response to exceptional moments of crisis that purely belonged to a selected few.
I went home that night and while getting ready for bed the word courage kept coming back into my head. I felt it asking me to hear it out. It refused to leave until I listened. So once I got into bed, I closed my eyes and let it speak to me. This is how courage expressed its shape and form in my thoughts.
I am always present; so much so that I am taken for granted. I am so subtle that I go unnoticed. I am there, beside you in your weakest and most fragile moments. I am there at every attempt, failure and defeat. I have been near you in every teardrop you’ve shed, every goodbye you have had to accept, every heart-break you had to endure, every sacrifice you had to make and every loss you have suffered through. I am always standing behind you in every terrifying and paralyzing circumstance. I’ve been the hand that reaches for you every time you have fallen.
You have looked me in the eye a thousand times. You know me. I am that gaze you see in your eyes when you look into the mirror. I am that relentless stare you fear in your own gaze, that unbending strength that makes you look away from your own reflection. When you look deep into your own eyes, I am the one demanding honesty and the nakedness of truth. Look and you will see…
I am honesty and the building blocks of wisdom.
I am the protector of integrity and dignity.
I am wisdom that overcomes unfounded fears for growth and change.
I am power that forces its way through difficulty and hardship.
I am perseverance that pushes through obstacles and oppositions for progress.
I am diligence following through life’s ventures in spite of continues setbacks.
I am the tenacity that reaches for envisioned ideals and resists the substandard.
I am the reach for elevation in environment of lowered expectations.
I am endurance that keeps the forward movement through trying moments.
I am love and care in moments of recognized failure and defeat.
I am guts and nerves when you decide to take unfamiliar paths.
I am the guide telling you to place one foot in front of the other, marching through the darkness and the unknown territories of life. I am the prerequisite quality for living life. I am the one who take you from being merely alive to a state of living in full realizations of your potential. I am courage in you.
Now rest your eyes and go to sleep, I will see you through with the next sunrise.
