CarrollBlog

Take time to read this carefully. It was sent to me by someone I know. Been on my mind ever since I read it:

"A young lady I have been working with at the woman’s center sent me an e-mail today and asked me what the definition of courage is.

My reply:

No can do. If you want the formal definition, I suggest you find Mr. Webster and chat it up with him. If you’re looking, on the other hand, for experience with courage – or a lack thereof – I might have something for you. It seems, however, far less daunting a task to tell you what I believe courage is not, rather than what I believe it is.

Courage is not the same as conviction. It takes conviction to go against the crowd, but not necessarily courage. It takes conviction to live a moral and ethical life, though not necessarily courage. It takes conviction to stand your ground, though not necessarily courage.

And as an aside - let me tell you I’m a big supporter of going against the crowd, living a moral and ethical life, and standing your ground. All three will inevitably take you places where real courage is needed and will undoubtedly lead you to places and experiences that may well define the essence of your being.

In the same way that courage is not the same as conviction, courage is also not the same as inner strength. When I was undergoing treatment for cancer, I was told I was courageous because I was “strong” through it all. Likewise, I have been told I was courageous for having survived being raped at gunpoint when I was fifteen years old. So too, was I labeled courageous after I buried my stillborn daughter. But not one of those things truly came from courage, and I was not courageous in any of those examples.

When I went to chemotherapy every week and radiation every day, I was not courageous; I was just doing what one does when one is sick. I was merely going through the motions. When I survived being raped by two men with guns, I was not courageous; I simply survived. When I buried my daughter, I was not courageous, either; all I was during that time was present.

During my treatment for cancer, if I had ever broken down and let loose, if I had ever screamed “Why me?” and “It’s not fair,” if I had ever started crying and refused to stop, admitted I was scared, stated out loud that I was tired, if I had ever said, “Please hold me and make this go away,” if I had ever let anyone know just how human I was during that time… well, those things may sound cowardly to you, but those are the very things that would have made me courageous.

And, if, after I was brutally raped and tortured, I had not waited ten years to tell someone, if I had instead allowed myself to express the humiliation I experienced day in and day out for a decade, if I had traded my silence for a voice, if I had been willing to claw my way back from being made to feel utterly worthless, if I had somehow managed to associate touch with safety instead of always connecting it to evil, if I had done anything to lighten my world – a world that for so long I kept dark on purpose because I was convinced that dark was all I deserved… well, those things would have made me courageous.

And, if, after my baby daughter died and I buried her before she even took a first breath, if I had ever said anything to anyone other than, “Yes, I’m fine; thanks for asking,” if I had ever cursed at God, if I had ever – even once – let the man whose daughter I shared for such a brief moment in time comfort me and wipe my tears instead of spitting at him with all my useless and intense anger… well, again, those things would have made me courageous.

Because it turns out that sometimes the bravest and most courageous thing you can do is cry.

Courage, after all, is not about puffing out your chest and taking on the world. It is not about being stern or tough or invincible. And it most certainly is not about fighting difficult battles on your own.

When you disclose to other people – whether the disclosure is something embarrassing, painful, humiliating, or desperate – when you admit fear, when you share pain, and most especially when you cry in front of someone else… when you do these things, you make yourself vulnerable. You allow other people to see you at “less than” whatever society – or your family or your friends – has deemed appropriate for people in your given situation. You allow people to get close. You allow for the possibility of rejection. You put it all out there and it screams, “This is who I am right now. It is not strong. It is not pretty. It is not easy to see. But it is exactly where I am right now, and it makes me me.”

And when you do that, the person you are disclosing to has the option to walk away. And in giving people the choice to walk away from a pained and scarred and raw you, you made the bravest choice of all; you showed what I believe to be real courage."