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No man is hurt but by himself.
-- Diogenes
 

 

The MONTHLY Motivator - October 2020

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Living With Courage

Danger fills the world. Risk accompanies every activity. Fear is an ever-present companion. How do you live a good and meaningful life in such a realm? You must have courage.

The good news is, you do have courage. Your job is to find that courage within you, feel that courage, build and reinforce it, and act upon it.

Getting out of bed every morning is an act of courage. You begin each day with full knowledge that you will encounter challenges. As you proceed with living, you take actions that sometimes have uncertain outcomes. When you walk through a door, you’re not always certain what will await you on the other side. You’ve known all this for a long time, and have successfully dealt with it.

One of your primary tools in doing so is competence. You know what you are doing. You’ve learned how to handle a wide range of situations. You’ve assembled a collection of resources, physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual, social, that you’re able to call upon. Every challenge that has come your way has taught you something. More importantly, the experience of challenge has produced in you a knowing, a familiarity, and an added degree of confidence in your abilities.

Yes, doubt creeps in, or sometimes floods in. That’s not totally a bad thing. A healthy dose of humility on a regular basis can actually serve to make you stronger, and doubt can definitely humble you. So it becomes a balancing act. Your experience at getting good things done exists in balance with your realization that you cannot overcome every challenge, that there are some things over which you have no competent control. Yet there is much you can do, even in situations you have not encountered before. Being honest with yourself about that ability will actually make it more real, more accessible to you. So doubt, provided you can put it into perspective, helps to authenticate your confidence, and strengthens your connection to courage.


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--Ralph Marston

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