How do You Face Fear?

Feeling a lack of courage is frustrating.  All you want to do is get out there and show people what you are made of, then the anxiety kicks in and you start to wonder if you really should.  It could all go wrong, you could get laughed at, or you could even fail in general.

When all we want to do is have courage, what makes us stop?

Back in ancient Greece when philosophers such as Socrates were making it big, they had a debate on what courage is.  Some said it was standing at a post when you could die, others said it was an endurance of the soul.  None of them decided on what the meaning of courage was.

Basing this post on Psychology Today I want to share an experience about I time I had to have courage.

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I once directed a one-act play during my senior year of high school.  I have to be honest, when my teacher first declared that we would have a chance at directing I felt nervous.  I wasn’t the best actor and I knew that directing takes hard work.  I was scared out of my mind, but even though I was feeling fear I chose to take the opportunity.  Like in the story arch I had to let go of what was familiar to me and step outside of my comfort zone.  My teacher later told me she didn’t think I would have done something as big as directing.  I simply told her I didn’t want to miss out on something I knew I would be proud of.

Once I got started I had to find a script and cast actors to be in it.  I suddenly had a whole team I was in charge of between costumes, building a set, and directing.  I remember our teacher telling us to let our set, costume, and lighting people have some creative control and I knew that I wouldn’t know every answer to what they would ask, so when they came to me and asked me what I wanted, I had no idea what to tell them.  I wanted to stand up for what was right and do as the teacher told us, but here they were asking me what I wanted.

Directing my cast was another problem.  I remember typing into google ‘how to direct a cast’.  I didn’t know what I was doing and I wanted the play to go well.  Through every practice I asked my cast what I could improve.  After a couple of days, they told me to stop asking them how we could improve and just have confidence in my ability to direct.  I had to persevere in my adversities.

The next two weeks I tried my hardest to make the play go as well as I could.  I had fun with my cast, and had them learn more about the characters they were playing.  We tried on wigs and ate way too much candy.  In the end, I was excited to see how people would react to it being performed on stage.  I followed my heart into an adventure and learned more than I could have hoped for.  I learned how to gain courage, confidence, and preserve to victory.

Feeling fear and yet choosing to act, following your heart, persevering in the face of adversity, standing up for what is right, and expanding our horizons are a few ways we have courage. Feeling scared is normal but sometimes it can stand in our way and make us have regret over things we should have done.

I hope that as you live your life to the fullest you can have courage in the simplest of times and I ask that you push yourself, with courage, to go beyond your horizons and become the best you can be.

 

 

 

Thanks so much for reading.  Please comment below as I would love to hear your thoughts about this post.  You can also follow me on Instagram: Penned by Rose, and Twitter: @pennedbyrose.