Courage
Courage comes in many forms and is as unique to us as our thumbprints.
All of us need to find courage some of the time, and some of us need to find it all the time. There’s no shame in that, in fact the qualities that a less brave person has, can often include empathy and compassion and the world needs more of that.
But I digress.
When considering courage, most of us see it as doing something that makes us feel uncomfortable, potentially embarrassing, and furthermore exposes us. This leads us to vulnerability, which goes hand in hand with courage.
Brené Brown talks about courage and vulnerability, and she is the Queen of both. What I’m talking about here is the freedom that courage can bring, even though we are feeling soooo vulnerable. For instance, some of us who have experienced trauma and childhood abuse find it difficult to speak up about what happened to us, because it takes a phenomenal amount of courage to do so. There are many reasons why, but I guess the key one is that we have been made to feel wrong, bad, and as unwelcome as our truth. To then transcend that as an adult is almost impossible. Reason? Because as a child, if you have been conditioned to silence it is then almost impossible to surpass that with a strong voice filled with confidence and self-belief. Sometimes it’s hard for those who have not experienced this to understand, no matter how hard we try to explain. The simplest analogy I can find is adults who were bitten by a dog as a small child.
If you look closely and notice those adults around dogs now, you will see they are still terrified…. And so it is for my fellow survivors, it takes years of hard work, digging deep and self-sacrifice to come to a place where we can feel safe to speak out.
Though publishing my book, I have met many survivors across the world, who are working through some of these very challenges. I am so grateful to know their stories and applaud anyone who is trying to overcome the fear to speak out. This is not just a milestone; this is the biggest step some of us can and will take in our lives.
When talking courage, it can sometimes be so simple observing from the outside and feeling confusion around why ‘You just don’t do it’. But when you’re coming from a place of betrayal, hurt and trauma, it’s like leaping off a tall building.
No one I know would willingly do that.
Some steps I have taken to help move me forward in my journey of courage include, writing a journal, talking to a friend, confronting abusers and sharing my truth whenever I could.
The biggest challenge in my ‘courage’ journey was to confront my family about my abuse, and though it didn’t end well, it freed something inside of me which I found healing.
What worked for me in finding my courage was to:
Write down what I wanted to achieve
Visualse the outcome as being successful
Feel into the visualisation, through closing my eyes and experiencing its success
Talk to a trusted friend about how I wanted it to unfold
Have a script close by when I was ready to speak out
Speak out
Celebrate that I spoke out regardless of the outcome
To those out there who are trying to find their voices, you have nothing but my love and support, and for people trying to show support, I thank you.
Please never forget that all it takes is ‘one voice’ to change someone’s world.