COURAGE
VIRTUE Courage
SABOTEUR Cowardice
A leap of faith always begins with a courageous heart.
Love conquers fear using courage as its weapon, words can console or be used as weapons, wounding us deeply. It takes courage to resolve differences without resorting to insults, threats and hateful words. Violence comes in many degrees, ranging from humiliating insults to nuclear explosions. It also takes courage to face illness, shame, ridicule, debt and so much more. We don’t usually think of courage like this, but it does take courage to overcome whatever you’re facing.
Courage becomes bravado when our intention comes from excessive pride or vanity. Our intentions always determine the outcome of our efforts. Sometimes people believe that courage is about killing the enemy, it can be or not. It takes courage to protect ones country, family and ideals. It takes bravado to want to exterminate one’s enemy. To want to cause harm isn’t the same thing as facing the fact that you may have to cause harm to protect living beings. Love and the desire to be violent never occupy the same space.
Courage requires the surrendering of one’s ego. Bravado requires ego. It takes courage to forgive, it takes bravado to retaliate. It takes courage to be patient, it takes bravado to show off. It takes courage to speak up and it takes courage to face your inner saboteurs, your bad habits. Without courage, we just keep hiding from our self.
How many times do you start something and don’t get past the starting line? It takes courage to press onwards, to overcome our fear of what others may think of us. I feel it’s important to note here that others will think what they want, so choose to live your life courageously, forget about living your life just so you can get good press in other people’s minds. Those minds may be too small for you.
The greatest leaders have to endure opposition and courage will always be linked with leadership. To have leadership over your self is to lead yourself out of self doubts, dread and fear. When we overcome adversity we feel more self respect, more inner strength and more compassion. These virtues are necessary for becoming peacemakers.
Cowardice is an ugly word and I don’t take it lightly. Cowardice is always a time of darkness within a life. It is a time when one’s character and human dignity is at an all time low. We all suffer from minor degrees of this word and compassion for your pain is paramount. Please, if you’re suffering from deep fear to move forward, practice helping yourself with compassion. Look for and find the courage to experience compassion for yourself and move one foot in front of the other. Believe me, you’re going to love looking back on that moment when you began to treat yourself as a dignified human being.
Peace be you, Namaste!