The courage you have is very much like a muscle.  You can’t build up one of your muscles without lifting some weight.  Your muscles won’t grow without you increasing your weight.  No weight, no muscle – Some weight, some muscle – Heavy weight, more muscle.  Challenging your current level of courage means you need to be challenged.

You won’t know pain unless you fall to the ground.  You won’t know sadness unless you lose something dear to you.  You won’t know courage without experiencing failures.  It’s within your failures and the recovery process that helps you build and develop stronger courage.  During the recovery process, keep an open mind about your faults.  Faults can be the reason you failed.  Know that each fault is a diamond waiting to be shaped.

In shaping diamonds, there are 2 methods used: 

1. Cleaving. Cleaving involves splitting a diamond along its natural known lines of weakness.  In each of us exists lines of weakness and undervalued strengths.
   
2. Sawing involves using a blade that cuts into a diamond forcefully across any imperfections and perfections without prejudice.

How will your diamond or your courage be shaped?

What are some of the elements that keep us from successful courage?  What circumstances interfere with us building courage?  How about the fear of failure?  The fear of falling short or failing can keep us from trying risky opportunities.  When we are overly cautious and do not take on risky opportunities, we are not confronting hard and challenging growth.  When we grow our confidence grows as well.

How about self-doubt or lack of self-trust?  When you don’t believe in your own abilities, you have no pathway to success and that relates to no confidence and your inability to be a risk-taker.  When you take on risks and are either successful or you fail, and you keep taking risks.  Your courage to take on adversity grows.  Quitting is not an option, I didn’t say failing is not an option, quitting is not an option.

People pleasing is one of the hardest.  In order for us to be popular and liked by everyone.  Instead of doing what is right and respectful, we end up doing what others want and need.  We set aside our moral values for the privilege of being liked by others.  We lose ourselves, our own identity, and the very nature of the person we were meant to be.  This means we have set aside our courage and end up following anyone who will mandate who we are and what we do.  No need for courage.

"Courage is feeling fear, not getting rid of fear, and taking action in the face of fear".

A daily adventure that is part of battling with courage we seek every day, is the uncertainty of life and where we are being taken. Uncertainty about what is going to happen is a constant problem.  We can’t see the future so we are uneasy and unsettled about what is going to happen.  We have no control over certain things in the future.  Maybe it’s financial instability or maybe it pertains to our health.  Do you fear not having money to retire, or money to pay for repairs on your car, buying food, or paying rent?  Are you afraid that your health will deteriorate so badly that you need care beyond anything you know?  All of what I said is built around the uncertainty of ‘what if’ situations.  Challenges we think might happen, but haven’t.  We are torturing ourselves with things that we have projected as problems, and that kills our courage.  I have talked about how 90% of what we worry about never comes to fruition.  It only exists in our minds.
             
Determine those things we have current control over.  We can control our current health position by continuing to work out and eating healthier.  Work through or around our aches and pains.  Pain in our lives is meant to help you to decide what is important and what isn’t.  Your courage is built on your perseverance and determination.
             
​A person is not finished when they are defeated.  You are finished when you quit.

Do you ask yourself, what does it take to have courage when I have so many fears?  It is not the courage piece that you focus on, it is facing your fears and challenging them until they are no longer fears or you have minimized - what the fear was all about.  Maybe it was a childhood fear you’ve carried for years, and you are just now facing it and realizing it was small, insignificant, and in the past. Suppose you stop wanting to be courageous and only concentrate on facing what scares you.  That path is the one that sets you apart from truly learning what it means to have courage.  Others will see you are fearless and full of courage.  Remember that courage is not the absence of fear, but the confrontation of each fear until it is put in its place.  Webster defines courage as: the mental or moral strength to venture, proceed, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty.

• You are courageous when you are facing self-doubt
• You are courageous when you are facing anxieties
• You are courageous when you are facing discomfort and panic

Courage isn’t having the strength to carry on, it's going on when you don’t have the strength. – Napoleon Bonaparte

Courage can mean different things to different people.  Some of the basic definitions are: to have no fear, to be able to stand up to anyone who opposes us, and to smile with a defiant grin.  Some would say, “It is an ability to be loud, and aggressive”—someone who is a leader of people, who shows no weakness.

Maybe the words you think would never be in the vocabulary of someone who has courage would be: fear, hesitation, indecisiveness, afraid, and nervousness.  Just the opposite.  People who are courageous, feel all of the characteristics mentioned.  The only difference is that someone who is courageous pushes forward through it all, as those negative emotions follow along.  Courage is not the absence of fear, it is the inclusion of fear, and your determination to still move forward.  Forward with some type of action or any type of action that moves you from your present position to a new position.  That new position could be successful or unsuccessful.  But your efforts and determination to move forward are far greater than your fear of doing nothing.

​There is a level of security that comes from not doing anything, not taking chances, not exposing yourself to anything unknown or new.  It is the devil's way of making sure that you don’t help others, nor do you know how to help yourself.
Fear MUST be present in order for you to know your level of courage!

Facing fear on our path to courage is both rewarding and challenging. The benefits are undeniable—each time we confront our fears, we build resilience, confidence, and a stronger sense of self. We grow, learn, and prove to ourselves that fear does not have to control our choices. However, failure is also part of the journey. We may stumble, hesitate, or even retreat at times, but these moments are not signs of weakness—they are opportunities to refine our approach and strengthen our resolve. True courage is not about never feeling fear; it’s about learning to move forward despite it, knowing that every step, whether successful or not, brings us closer to the person we aspire to be.

​Day 1:  Courage, Inclusion of Fear
 
Day 2: Courage, What does it Take
 
Day 3: Courage, What About the Future
             
Day 4: Courage,  Fear of Failure and Self-Doubt
             
Day 5: Courage, Flex your Courage