Courage

My three year old daughter Savannah and I were alone together this evening and I noticed that when I would walk through our house she was always one step behind me. At one point she said “Daddy, I’m scared”. When I quizzed her on the source of her fear I found out that her concern was a common one. She is scared of the dark.

I’m not in the habit of burning every light in the house so there was ample opportunity for her to be faced with the object of her fear. I sympathized with her that I too was scared of the dark when I was about her age. She’s very mature for a three year old so I proceeded to share with her some things she needed to know in order to face the fear and build her courage. Following is a grown up version of the conversation.

You see, Savannah’s fear of the dark is actually a false belief that something is waiting in the shadows that would harm her in some way. I have seen the acronym False Evidence Appearing Real used to describe fear and I think it is a good definition.

In the house I grew up in there was a looong hallway (well it doesn’t seem nearly as long to me now as it did back then). My bedroom was at the very end of the hallway and I had to pass two other rooms in order to get to my room. Every night I had to face my false beliefs that the “boogey man” was waiting in the spare bedroom waiting to get me. Each time I faced that fear and walked past those dark rooms despite my fear I built COURAGE.

I shared with Savannah the concept of courage. It was a new word to her, but by the time it was over she understood that each time she faced her fear of the dark and went in to the room anyway that it would easier because she was building courage. She didn’t express a lot of interest in participating in this activity and was quite satisfied to be classified as a “Fraidey Cat” for now!

If we want to grow personally it is important to first identify the false evidences that we tell ourselves are real on a daily basis. Fears can paralyze us and stand in the way of moving toward whatever goal we are currently pursuing. We must also create habits that cause us to be able to build our courage and push through the fear.

This personal blog is a source of fear to me for instance. To write about my own experiences and publish it to the world is kind of scary. Making myself transparent to the world (potentially anyway) is not something I am used to doing.

I have a couple of things that I want to share in the next couple of days are very important to me. The topics I have in mind should probably have been in my first post to this blog, but I let my fear of what somebody might think stop me. No more. Stay tuned. I hope this little story inspires you to share a story of your own courage building. I look forward to hearing from you!