While I’m “acoustic” I thought I’d take
another look at a theme I mulled over in the summer – “The Courage to Live”.
The original piece I wrote was inspired by -
and in response to - a part philosophical, part existential question posed by
a person very dear to me.
While this second analysis of the subject started with my own
musings on dealing with the adversities of life, I found much inspiration from
the thoughts of two men – Walter Anderson (an American magazine editor) and
Rollo May (an existential psychologist & author).
I came across both men while researching this
piece and was struck by Anderson’s very common sense logic and simplicity and
by May’s altogether more challenging thinking in his pioneering work in existential
psychology.
In particular May’s belief that apathy was
the opposite to love and that as humans our unique knowledge that we are to die,
liberates the human will to act and to be. In other words, our lives are defined
by the knowledge that one day we will die.
We either act against that continually and
live, love, act - or we accept it apathetically and let our selves deteriorate
to almost non-existence. Either we find the meaning of life inside ourselves,
or we accept that life has no meaning, and therefore we as beings are
meaningless.
The last time I tackled this subject I
focused on optimism as the driver for courage. The ability to see the possible,
the positive, the good and the upside. To be hopeful.
I think optimism – of which I am a committed
practitioner – is one half of the courage to live. But I think that there is
another part to courage that is equally important and perhaps a pre-cursor to
optimism. It’s about choosing life – and the things necessary to make that
choice . . .
“I am
responsible. Although I may not be able to prevent the worst from happening, I
am responsible for my attitude toward the inevitable misfortunes that darken
life. Bad things do happen; how I respond to them defines my character and the
quality of my life. I can choose to sit in perpetual sadness, immobilized by
the gravity of my loss, or I can choose to rise from the pain and treasure the
most precious gift I have – life itself.” - Walter Anderson
To choose life we need courage.
Courage is a big challenge for many of us.
That inner strength or confidence to take on something we have no idea will
work out, to face a difficult truth or fear, to pass through a difficult
period. Where the downside is loss, pain, expense, cost, discomfort or some
other misfortune and where the upside may be invisible, or only partially
clear. . . that’s quite a big bet for a lot of us, and it’s something we face
on an almost daily basis.
Of course most of us find the courage we
need for the little things in life through comparative experiences. If this
does not work then we turn perhaps to our friends, our families, colleagues, or
our partners – but the big things in life are much more difficult.
We need a special kind of courage to deal
with those big challenges and fears – we need courage from within.
And I believe courage is born of trust. Optimism
may sustain that courage, but for it to be born, it is born of trust.
Trust of ourselves.
“Our
lives improve only when we take chances and the first and most difficult risk
we can take is to be honest with ourselves.” Walter Anderson
It sounds simple, but it isn’t. To trust
ourselves we must make ourselves vulnerable to our very own self. We must first
expose and then accept our fears, our weaknesses, our challenges and those parts
of our selves we would rather ignore or rather run away from.
Not only must we accept them and
acknowledge them, we must embrace them. We must bring them close to us and see
that they are a part of our “self”.
This is very hard for many of us as it
often involves struggling with feelings of guilt, low self-esteem, bitterness,
sadness and frequently a feeling of being lost, confused, out of control,
consumed and detached from our good selves. These are unpleasant emotions and behaviors
at the best of times and we naturally do not want to dwell on them – but dwell
on them we must if we are to understand them and accept them.
As we spend time becoming accustomed to our
“dark sides”, our fears and our weaknesses, we can begin to contextualize them,
and then begin to accept them as part of us.
First we should accept that our fears, weaknesses
and occasional bad behaviors are human. They are natural and they are normal.
We all have them; they are part of every one of us.
None of us is “damaged goods” just because
we are afraid sometimes, just because we are weak occasionally or because we
behave badly now and again.
If we are jealous or angry, selfish or
harsh, nasty or cold it is only because we are also compassionate and patient,
generous and gentle, affectionate and warm.
I believe that to a large degree our
personalities are defined by duality - as
it is through contrast we understand what is right and good, and what is wrong
and bad. As good defines evil and vice versa, so do our happy and good
characteristics define our unhappy and bad ones (and vice versa).
Second, to accept our “selves” as “whole”
by acknowledging all of our characteristics and personality traits is not an
act of relegation or dismissal. It is an act of forgiveness.
However, forgiveness is not absolution.
To forgive our self is not license or
permission to behave without consequence – it is instead to acknowledge our
mistakes, our weaknesses and to resolve first to live with them and second to
work with them.
Think of coming to the realization that one
is overweight for example. To forgive oneself for being overweight is a healthy
thing to do. To see that forgiveness as permission to carry on being overweight
and neglect oneself is not healthy. To build on the forgiveness of oneself by
resolving to lose weight and thus take care of one self better is the healthy
response. (A personal example there!)
An alternative might be hurting someone’s
feelings. Initially on becoming conscious of this “bad” behavior, we might feel
guilty and remorseful. We might even “punish” ourselves in some way – but
instead we should forgive ourselves and then build. By which I mean,
acknowledge that hurting people happens. We don’t mean to hurt most of the time
and when we do so we need to accept it as part of life. An ugly part of life by
which we can also understand a more beautiful part like care, affection,
nurture (the opposites or contrasts of “hurting someone”). But then we must
move on to build and resolve. Why did we hurt that person? What caused it? Can
we avoid doing so in the future? Can we at least mitigate the hurt we cause?
These kinds of questions – if answered honestly and truly – can help us
understand our behavior better – and consequently avoid it (at least more
often) if we resolve to.
And there is a good reason for us to go to
this trouble of acknowledgment, forgiveness, analysis and resolution . . .
Learning to live with one’s fears,
weaknesses and negative behaviors is learning to take care of oneself. It is the
act of care for one’s “self” that enables us to grow as people and to find
balance and peace.
Taking care of ourselves is the most basic
expression of love for our “self” – and in turn the most basic way of
reassuring ourselves that we have value, that we are worthy, that we are
attractive, desirable and so on.
"To
love means to open ourselves to the negative as well as the positive - to
grief, sorrow, and disappointment as well as to joy, fulfillment, and an
intensity of consciousness we did not know was possible before." Rollo May
It will not and cannot prevent us entirely
from facing fear or weakness again – but it provides us with the means to begin
to be comfortable enough with our “self” to be able to trust and trust provides
us with the mechanism with which to deal with our fears and weaknesses – as our
trust in others allows us to deal with theirs.
We usually think of trust as something we
direct to someone else – and not to ourselves. Not something that relates to
our relationship with our “self”. But in fact, no matter how much we may want
to, we cannot trust anyone else if we cannot trust our “self”.
Think of this quotation – again from Walter
Anderson:
“We're
never so vulnerable than when we trust someone - but paradoxically, if we
cannot trust, neither can we find love or joy”.
Think of the same concepts but placing our
“self” in place of “someone”. If we
cannot trust ourselves, how can we trust anyone else?
And if we cannot trust then we cannot love.
I am slightly unusual in this regard in
that I place a lot of trust and faith in people based on either instinct or hope
or both. In my professional life it is
called “empowerment” and for me it has always been the force that motivates me
to do and be my best at work. When I have been trusted I will go the extra mile
and more. I do not want to let that person down. As a result of my own
experience I tend to trust and empower others. I trust in something I have no
reason to – in other words I have faith.
In my personal life it is less about empowerment
per se than it is about a desire for engagement, for connection. It is my
currency for connection. I empower
someone else to be in my life is perhaps another way of putting it. I have
faith in them as another human being that they will act with compassion. I have
faith in them.
Many times – both professionally and
personally - my trust has been abused, broken or otherwise misplaced, my
“currency” stolen, but I cannot help myself and remained committedly
optimistic. I believe that to give someone trust based on faith, and without particular
knowledge or “testing” is generous and kind– albeit very risky, as it makes one
vulnerable. But then that is the nature of trust!
Of course I realize it can be overwhelming
for some, but I believe that trust is such a binding connection, such a force
for good and so precious, that I cannot hide behind the fear of risk when the
return is so energizing and positive. And I hope to God my optimism in this
regard is never tainted and turned to cynicism.
Of course trust is not a switch. It’s a
slider (think of a mixing desk in a recording studio and all those lovely
sliders which slowly increase the volume, the reverb, the bass, the treble
etc).
A switch is binary, a slider is dynamic. Trust
is a dynamic emotion – not a binary one.
However, while trust can grow gradually and
relatively as well as quickly, when it is broken it can sometimes be pretty
absolute.
My experience though is that the greater
the genuine trust, the greater the capacity for forgiveness.
Trust enables us to overcome our fears. To
have courage. To find our faith again
“You
block your dream when you allow your fear to grow bigger than your faith.” Mary Manin Morrissey (Empowerment Specialist and “New Thought”
Minister)
So to recap:
Through accepting our “self” with the fears
and weaknesses we have, we can learn to love our whole self (not just our good
self) – because we forgive and resolve. We resolve to take care of our “self”
and love our “self” because we conclude that we are worthy of care and love. We
provide that love and care to our “self” and we begin to trust our “self”
because it is familiar, it no longer frightens us, and we have learned to have
faith in it.
So when we need to find the courage to live
through the really difficult parts of life, we need to look within ourselves.
If we have learned to accept our fears and
weakness, if we have learned to forgive ourselves for those things we have done
which we would rather not have done, if we have learned to trust ourselves, then
we will find the strength within to be courageous. To find our faith again.
And if we are courageous we will find not
only how to live, but also how to love.
Each of us is worth life and worth love.
Each of us deserves life and deserves love.
When we can feel and understand why we
deserve life and love, we will find the courage to live life, to love and
ultimately - to be loved.
So the courage to live is also the courage to love. For to live is to love and to love is to live.
In the words of the renowned psychologist
and psychoanalyst Erich Fromm:
“Love
means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the
hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of
faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.”
This piece is “αφιερωμένο” to my "Λέαινα" - I hope this helps you to find the "Play" button.
