What is Courage?

[deeek]

Excerpts Reprinted with Permission of Blurtit.com

Courage

Courage is an admirable quality in a person and it takes mental and physical
strength against all odds.

A person who is courageous is spiritually strong. He has faith in his
convictions. A person who is courageous is driven by the power to rise
against injustice.

It means doing what YOU think is right- no matter what anyone else says
and no matter how scared you are of getting hurt or in trouble for doing it.

It is who you are with your whole heart.

Courage is letting go of who you thought you were supposed to be and embracing
who you are!

Accepting and loving yourself with all your imperfections.

Ask yourself what courage means to you. Where you have demonstrated
courage in your life? Where you could use a little courage?

For you yukonm

[MajestyJo]

Thanks for sharing. Love the cat!

[yukonm]

Oh....thank you deeek!! I love the cat!!

[yukonm]

deeek, there was a time in my life where although I was sober, i wasn't practicing the principles of the AA program. I still had a lot of material stuff BUT I was also living way beyond my means.
Before I got into the trouble which led me to recovery, I had a WHOLE LOT of money. the courts froze all my assets and I literally went from riches to rags overnight. I had enough cash on hand to pay a good attorney and my expenses for a few months but soon I found myself in deep financial trouble.
I was too proud to let everyone know. Instead pretending that I was on top of things. After all, I still had my big house, big fancy car and dressed like a movie star every single day. I looked real good on the outside. Inside I was full of fear, lost and sinking spiritually. Then came the day when I could longer live the lie..........I lost my home.
It took a lot of courage to admit to everyone that I had been living a lie and even more courage to ask for help. BUT I did and people embraced me and I did find help.
It was also at this point that I surrendered my will over to the care of God. Since that time my spiritual life has grown and my relationship with God is a personal and intimate one.
Just thought I would share this experience with you.

[Lady1021]

Hi Deeek,

For me, beaten down by grief and loss and more than two decades of alcoholism, courage seemed to come from sheer desperation. In AA people have told me time and again how strong they think I am and how much courage I have shown since coming to the program. All I could see is how desperately I wanted things to be different. AA gave me courage through the hope I developed in listening to others tell their stories. For the first time in my life I no longer felt alone in my misery and that was a powerful thing.

[MajestyJo]

COURAGE

"We need the courage to start and continue what we should do and courage to stop what we shouldn't do." - Richard L. Evans

What is courage? Many of us think it involves surviving against all odds. Some of us believe courage is personified by an individual like Helen Keller, who coped with many physical defects to vastly change her life and the lives of those around her. Others of us believe courage is personified by people like astronaut John Glenn, who took risks trying something new knowing he could fail.

Are we courageous? Compared to those people we would probably say no. Yet we are because we have taken risks to change our lives. Being willing to change is an act of courage. Believing in change and forging ahead on the new, uncharted path is an act of courage.

We are the only ones who can change ourselves. Just as Helen Keller and John Glenn made decisions to alter their lives, so do we make decisions to risk changes. Whether we started on our new way of life years ago, days ago, or even hours ago, we are filled with courage because of the decisions we made.

I can say the Serenity Prayer and remember my courage.

open-mind.org/Daily/

Courage comes from within when I surrender to my Higher Power and ask for help, of myself, I can not make the changes. In order to find the courage, I need to find acceptance. Acceptance of what is in the moment starts the process, it doesn't happen all at once, for me it was in very small increments.

Something I posted on another site in 2006.

I found out that you can`t wear out the Serenity Prayer.