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Category: Overcoming Fear

Living With Courage

Today, the Martial Arts Academy I teach at lead a group of students through their black belt and higher degree test.

At the end of the ceremony, some of the graduates were asked to share their thoughts, feelings, stories, and/or gratitude over the microphone to the audience.

One young girl shook me with her words when she said, “I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for this school because it’s where my mommy met my daddy.”

…As in, she literally wouldn’t be alive if that school hadn’t been opened because her parents would’ve likely never met and never would’ve, you know, had her.

But, they did meet. And they did have that precious little girl. And that little girl worked incredibly hard to earn her black belt and was filled with emotion at the weight of what that represented.

This, for me, is a wonderful reminder to live life with courage. To get out into the local world and try new things. Even if that means starting out at white belt when you’re already at a “black belt” level in many other areas of life. Where there aren’t screens separating us and where we’re able to meet like-minded people who are also committed to personal growth.

Because, as is illustrated so beautifully in this story… you just never know.

And what a shame it would be if it was a lack of courage that kept something beautiful like this from ever happening.

Grow Your World

Our world shrinks and grows in proportion to our courage.

How is courage built?

By feeling fear and acting anyway—relative to what’s just slightly outside of our comfort zone.

Try to go too far and we’ll fight, flight, or freeze. Not going far enough has no impact. It’s the mindful flex forward on the “just right” amount of fear that allows us to grow our worlds.

P.s. 35 Osho Quotes on Courage and Why Life Is Better Lived Dangerously

The Quiet [Poem] 

Never fear the quiet
That comes with the climb

While solitude
Might feel lonely

Elevating your mindset
Raising your vibration
Upgrading your standards
Expanding your vision
Advancing your position
Peaking your mountain

All require leaving
Most of the noise behind

Never fear the quiet
That comes with the climb

P.s. In case you missed it, you can read the best of what I posted to MoveMe Quotes last week, here.

The Direction Of Doubt

Doubt comes with the territory of doing something new.

Don’t ignore the doubt.

Don’t vilify the doubt.

Don’t run from the doubt.

Welcome it. Lean into it. Inspect it.

What you might find is that doubt is actually a signal that you’re heading in the right direction.

Fueled By Fear

…of being average, unworthy, and boring.

Fear, channeled, has kept my tank off “E” and engine running STRONG for years.

Don’t suppress fear; use it.

Realize This

Something you should know about fear:

The bigger it is, the more ignorant it is to your strength.

Fear subsides in proportion to the size of your *known* inner strength.

Something you should know about inner strength:

You have way more of it than you realize.

When Fear Gets Caught In Your Throat

When choking, a drastic and sudden thrust is required—either by cough or Heimlich maneuver.

When choking on fear, maybe what’s required is the same—a drastic and sudden thrust.

Either by temporary uncharacteristic courage or by clever maneuvers against the mind.

Some people’s most memorable moments were closely preceded by the phrase: “F*ck it.”

Why? Because it allowed them out-maneuver the belittling thoughts of their mind and thrust forward, uncharacteristically, into the fear of the presented unknown.

This isn’t always good advice. But, when it is, it’s precisely the kind of Heimlich maneuver required to free a person from the suffocation of a comfort-zone filled life.