Practices in Courage

This week I had the privilege of completing two important cycles of healing.

One of the most pivotal books I received in the hospital was Mark Nepo’s  The Book of Awakening from my friend Becky.

Described as a spiritual daybook, it contains daily passages that bring presence and awareness of individual meaning to each day’s journey. I highly recommend it as an encyclopedia for heart-guided living.

Read to me by my sister or Ryan, the book offered pieces of courage that allowed me greet the days in the hospital as a path, rather than an end.

On Saturday, Becky and I joined a workshop with Mark Nepo, completing a cycle of healing that was once only a dream. The entire event felt like an out-of-body experience. Becky and I cried together, laughed together, and realized enlightening moments together. Mark read from his poetry, engaged the audience, and spoke about courage.

Courage, he explained, is made up of telling one’s mind by speaking through the heart. Cor – the word root – is Latin for heart. Which relates to the second cycle of healing. This week in nursing school I learned how to give blood transfusions. It was a special time as I thought of all the steps and careful practices it took to provide me the blood I needed. To now have the ability to do the same for others, well that is simply miraculous.

Our hearts are vehicles for blood, so every time your heart pumps is an exercise in courage. This means that life itself is courageous. And just like your heart sets an individual rhythm to providing your body life-sustaining blood, everyone finds courage in their own ways.

• Speaking and living your truth
• Entering the hospital unit again after losing a child
• Offering a meal to someone overwhelmed with life
• Standing up to an authority figure with inappropriate behaviors
• Returning to a class that challenges you
• Walking away from a bad situation
• Calling on government to support its people
• Mindfully breathing through nature
• Expressing emotion and vulnerability
• Loving a partner, friend, or family member
• Loving yourself
• Saying yes
• Saying no
• Picking up a pen, paintbrush, or musical instrument
• Trusting in your body to grow and adapt to change
• Trusting others to care for your body or the bodies of loved ones if need be
• Falling asleep at night, and
• Rooting and rising with the next day.

These actions are big or small, and happen once a day or ten times a day. They are what make us human. Courage is the reciprocal action of jumping into a relationship with our hearts.

How do you practice courage?