You Are Stronger Than You Think (Dedicated to my Daughter)

 

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What is the difference between inner strength and courage?

Courage is often defined as the ability to face challenges and take risks and not be afraid.  The truth however is far from that.  A person who easily goes about doing things which the rest of us finds difficult is not necessarily being courageous. Having courage means that you choose to do something of your own free will which you find difficult or are afraid to do. I’ll give you some examples.

• A courageous person is courageous because their knees shake but they still walk onto that stage.
• A courageous person is one who is afraid of change but will still say ‘Yes, I will’.
• A courageous person is the person who feels socially inept but still goes to that party.
• A courageous person is afraid of being turned down but they make that phone call anyway.

Now here’s the thing: A courageous person is able to do their courageous feat by first reaching into themselves until they have found their wherewithal to do it and that wherewithal is their inner strength.  Now when faced with something we find enormously difficult, we may be tempted to believe that we don’t have the inner strength to do it.  We may be tempted not to do it or to just give up or give in.  However, if you look back over the years when you or someone you know had faced difficulty, you may notice  what I noticed.  We always had the strength within us when we made the effort to find it.  This may be as difficult as finding the TV remote after your daughter’s ‘movie night’ with friends but not impossible because it is there.  All it takes is a bit of hope.

Take a look at the little seedling in the picture above.  It looks like it has so much going against it. I mean come on, what was it thinking? It hardly has much room to grow and it is at great risk at being trampled upon. Yet we all know that little seedlings are stronger than they appear.  They can grow and upturn concrete slabs no matter how many times it may have been stepped on. Remember those times you got stepped on and still like the little seedling you bounced back up again? Weren’t you stronger than at first you believed?