We’re into the AbsoluteWrite Blogchain #9 and I’m following Virginia Lee, who kicked us off with a post about quitting jobs.
It got me thinking about the nature of courage. If someone asked me to define a courageous act, I’d probably tell them about a firefighter going into a burning building to save a child’s life, or a sister who donated a kidney for her brother. I wouldn’t tell them about someone who had the courage to quit their job because it made them feel worthless, or a friend who realized she had an alcohol problem and checked herself into a clinic. But these too are acts of courage.
I believe courage isn’t just about putting your life on the line, or pushing beyond your comfort zone. Courage can sometimes just be having the strength to admit that you can’t cope, or you can’t do what’s expected.
And I wonder too if writing isn’t an act of courage. Through writing we expose ourselves in ways a non writer will never do, we give people insights into our hearts and our minds, into places our imagination takes us. These are deeply personal places, and every time we put them down on paper, we’re opening ourselves to the world.
I know there isn’t a job profile for a writer, but if there were perhaps it should include courage as an essential trait?
Andrea Peck has the lucky task of using my uncoordinated ramblings as a prompt for the next post in the chain. Don’t forget to check her out at http://www.andreapeck.blogspot.com/.
I Ain’t Dead Yet – So quit already!
writing@cathsmith.com – On Courage
hunt & peck – Comfort Zone
Life, Writing, and Other Things- Brave New Adventures
Periodically.org – Comfort
Food History – Blogging and comfort food
A View From the Waterfront – Food Security and Subsistence.
Organized Chaos – AW Blog Chain 9
Williebee – Chains that find me
The Road Less Traveled – Eat Locally or Comfortably?
Well said. Courage is often the ability to act and think on your own. It is taking an action that might be unexpected of others. Courage starts in dealing with the small things, it isn’t just the spectacular or public focus that matters.
Brio! I believe writing IS an act of courage, if it is done honestly and with an effort to find truth and to learn, about ourselves and each other.
“Courage can sometimes just be having the strength to admit that you can’t cope, or you can’t do what’s expected.”
Wow, that really hits home. I often find it much harder to admit my shortcomings to others than to act as if I can do it all. Writing can really reveal our inner turmoil to the entire world, so in that sense it’s an act of courage.
Courage to face your inner demons is the most admirable, to me, because no-one will give you a medal for it and there’s often no point where you can say “The fire is out – I can go home.” And I always think writers are lucky, because we don’t have to face those demons alone.
Yes, writing takes courage, and trying to be published. Particularly in this time when a few are trying to reinstate censorship for the many.
After my cancer diagnosis every day became a test of my courage. I’m finally getting over that. Writing is my salvation. Really, I think that writing gives me more courage than I might otherwise have.
I never thought of it that way before. Thanks, Cath.
Excellent post! I enjoy reading. Have a wonderful day!
- Michelle Knudson, Freelance Writer
http://www.michelleknudson.com
Great post! It’s interesting that courage isn’t often talked about unless, as you pointed out, it involves some sort of heroism. But, that does not credit the daily acts of courage that most of us face.
Nice post! Trying to get published may be a act of courage, but for some of us (e.g. me) it can just be a willful ignorance of how bad our work really is. Or a fetish for receiving fancy rejection letters. I mean, how often do we get real mail these days anyways?
Great post, Cath. I agree that writing is a courageous thing. Showing your work to someone takes even more guts, because you are exposing yourself. Putting yourself out there for approval or ridicule. Thanks for voicing something I hadn’t really thought about before.
Every once in a while I come back around to the realization of the courage it takes to write. Writing when what you write may be spectacularly wrong and / or trite and /or badly received — and you know that’s a possible response — takes enormous courage.