COURAGE

Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.
- Dale Carnegie


What is Courage?

Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is doing the things you need to despite the fear. Even living is an act of courage,anyone can die. Courage is the willingness to accept criticism and to walk on the path people never have trodden.Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.Necessity does the work of courage.Courage is never to let your actions be influenced by your fears.


No doubt there exist real dangers in life you must avoid. But there's a huge difference between recklessness and courage. Courage is the ability to face down those imaginary fears and reclaim the far more powerful life that you've denied yourself. Fear of failure. Fear of rejection. Fear of going broke. Fear of being alone. Fear of humiliation. Fear of public speaking. Fear of l dancing. Fear of regret. Fear of success.How many of these fears are holding you back? How would you live if you had no fear at all?If you have courage you will love what you do(please the picture above, it is supposed to be broken-glass walk but i preferred it be broken-glass dance). There will be a flow in what you do.


Courage is the ability to get yourself to take action in spite of fear.Courageous people are still afraid, but they don't let the fear paralyze them. Courageous people proactively go after their goals than reacting to their life out of fear.Real courage is a mental skill, not an emotional one.In other words, you use your intelligence, logic, and independent will to overcome the limitations/fear you've inherited as an emotional person.


Courage, however, doesn't require that you take drastic action in difficult/fearful situations. Courage is a learned mental skill that you must condition, just as weight training strengthens your muscles. You wouldn't go into a gym for the first time and try to lift 100 kilograms, so don't think that to be courageous you must tackle your most paralyzing fear right away.So tackle your smallest fears first, and progressively train up to bigger and bigger fears.The other approach to building courage is to acquire additional knowledge and skill within the domain of your fear.Just as your muscles will atrophy if you don't regularly stress them, your courage will atrophy if you don't consistently challenge yourself to face down your fears.If you aren't regularly exercising your courage, then you are strengthening your fear by default; there is no middle ground.


Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent.Courage is not something that can be handed over to you through lessons either.Courage is a way of life. It is as much a habit as anything else. 


What is the difference between the achievers and non-achievers? Both have their fears; Both have their respective talents & weaknesses. Achievers have courage to act despite their fears and non-achievers succumb to their fears. What you do with your life is 100% up to you -whether to be courageous or fearful.The courage to stand up for what we believe in. The courage to follow public rules and laws and insist that other people follow them too. The courage to resist those who take easy ways out, which only leads to more corruption and red tape in our social systems.


Here the following quotes are worth mentioning:
1.Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear - Ambrose Redmoon.

2.Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear - Mark Twain.

3.Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen-Winston Churchill.

4.Courage is... the knowledge of how to fear what ought to be feared and how not to fear what ought not to be feared.  ~David Ben-Gurion


References for this post(courtesy) :
1.http://www.indianchild.com/character/courage.htm
2.http://www.stevepavlina.com/articles/courage-to-live-consciously.htm