Life Journal Workshop – Writing Prompts about Courage

Promise me you ™ll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” Christopher Robin to Pooh by A.A. Milne

  Happy Thanksgiving to each of you! I know this week can be busy and stressful, but I hope that you will still find time to write in your life journal. This month we have focused on gratitude and a safe place to get mad. Maybe you need that safe journal page to express your feelings during the stressful holidays. Sometimes it takes a great deal of courage to face our fear, our anger and even our own dreams and hopes for our lives. This week I want to share some writing prompts about courage. Knowing you are going to be busy, I hope you will carve out a few moments to take care of you this week. Your journal writing could be your saving grace. Rather than snapping at your mother-in-law, write! You can’t change her (sadly) but you can change your reaction to her. Face this week with courage my friends!

When I needed courage

There have been a few times in my life that courage got me through. In college I spent a summer in Spain, traveling and studying with a group of students from my university. A friend and I were returning to our hotel when a man tried to yank her backpack off of her back and run away with it. Some swell of courage rose in me that I did not know that I had. I grabbed one side of the backpack and refused to let go. It had her passport in it, not to mention money and other important things. The man kept yelling, cigarillo, cigarillo over and over which is Spanish for cigarette. We finally managed to grab a pack of cigarettes out of her backpack, toss it to the man and pull away from him. I felt so strong in the moment, it wasn't until we got back to the hotel, which was less than a block away, that I started to shake and realize what had happened. Many of us have stories of being courageous in the face of imminent danger. There are so many stories of moms lifting cars off their children and other amazing feats of inhuman strength. That well of courage lives within us and we can learn to tap into it when we need it.

Courage builds relationships

It takes courage of a different kind to build a strong, open relationship with a loved one or with our children. We have to be willing to be vulnerable, to share our thoughts and feelings. Sometimes it feels simpler to rescue our child from a burning building than to have a difficult conversation with our spouse, a friend, or our boss. Courage comes in all forms, we have to be willing to embrace it, step through fear and face change. I am not saying this is easy. There have been times in my life when I should have made changes much sooner than I did and I let apathy and fear stop me. I recently made a dramatic change in my business that I probably should have made a year ago but I just wasn't ready. Once I made the change, so many other things have fallen into place. Hindsight is 20/20, right? Why didn't I do this sooner? Because it was hard, it was potentially embarrassing and shameful. Yet in the end, it was successfully resolved and freed me to move forward.

Writing prompts about courage

As you contemplate today on where you are in your life or look at the artwork on the Courage card above, take a few minutes to ask yourself the following questions and write the answers in your life journal. 1. When in my life have I shown courage? Make a list and celebrate your success. When you need to tap into courage, revisit this list to remind you that you can be courageous. 2. When in my life have I failed to show courage and regretted it? 3. In what areas of my life would I like to have more courage right now? 4. For one or more of those areas, what one action could you take that would move you forward? 5. What's stopping you from taking that action? 6. What will happen if you don't make a decision or if you do? 7. Who can you ask for help and moral support? I think one of the most courageous acts any of us undertake is learning to ask for help. We do not have to go through life, challenges, fear and change alone. Sometimes it takes courage just to ask. True courage is accepting responsibility for the state in which we find ourselves and changing it when we realize that we don't like who we are or where we are at any given moment. If you are ready to make a change in your life and would like some support, check out my HeartWise Sister Circle that starts December 1. This is a 90 day program designed to help you manage the holidays with grace and ease while launching into 2013 with a vibrant vision of what’s possible.