Towards a new paradigm of Courage - tapping into the energy of knowing
I had an interesting experience around the theme of courage recently which I’d like to share here.
I was faced with a certain situation that required some courage from me. It was an everyday sort of thing around putting myself out there in the public eye, which is something I have often avoided.
Now, I have always been a fan of the saying ‘feel the fear and do it anyway’ when it comes to taking that leap of faith that moves us forward in a positive direction in our life. But in this instant, I was feeling the fear and not doing anything. I was stuck in it. No fight, no flight, just freeze.
The situation would keep coming up again and again in my mind and every time it circled around again, I found yet another good excuse to go and do something else. Classic avoidance. My inner demon clearly had the upper hand at that stage.
And then one morning, whilst in that beautiful liminal space of the early morning hours, immersed in inner stillness, I had a clear insight that what I had been avoiding was a very natural and necessary next step on my path. In that moment it was a very clear knowing, that it was necessary and that it was actually not nearly as scary as I had been making out. I knew I had to do it and I knew that everything would be ok. The fear I had been feeling was, in fact, completely unfounded.
Later that day I went ahead and did it. And I did it relatively easily. I was still feeling a nervous excitement around the situation but out of that deep place of peace that I experienced that morning, and along with that sense of knowing that this was the right thing to do, the necessary courage had arisen. It was just there, ready for me to tap into. And so that’s what I did.
This for me was courage as the energy of knowing, arisen out of a deep sense of peace, truth and light.
On reflection, what struck me most about the experience was how different it was from the conventional - and combative - paradigm of courage and fear as polar opposites. All too often we are told to be courageous in the face of fear or uncertainty; to muster up some courage in order to conquer our fears. The inner conflict of willing ourselves to do something that another part of ourselves doesn’t want to, is one way of approaching these kinds of situations. But there is another way. One that is much more peaceful and compassionate.
I did not have to fight any inner battle to overcome fear.
I moved into peace and the light of truth arose.
I did not have to conquer my fear.
It dissipated and transmuted into nervous excitement.
I did not have to ‘muster’ courage.
It arose and was there for the taking.
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