Being Brave
It’s a fresh new year. Maybe you find yourself in this new year with an entirely new life. Maybe you got kicked out of your old life – divorce, death of a loved one, loss of a job or career. It feels terrible. Everything hurts and feels unfamiliar. You need recovery time for sure, but that FIRST year is a tough one. All your comforts and all your habits are up for grabs. They don’t necessarily work anymore or maybe they just don’t feel good because they remind you of what you don’t have.
My first year after my late husband died, I decided I needed a good ole dose of feeling brave. I needed to practice it. The first thing I did was figure out what would qualify. What would make me feel brave? Initially, I didn’t even know how to answer that. Practicing being brave was a new idea to me. I’d never tried before. This little game wasn’t so fun. It didn’t feel good right off, but I stuck to my quest. I didn’t realize that it might make me feel good about myself at a time when I spent so much time feeling shaky, weak, and helpless. It shifted my perspective from focusing entirely on my loss into one of (reluctant) exploration or inquiry. Maybe I could fuel myself forward in this life I didn’t want by practicing feeling brave?
It made me feel brave to opt out of our family holiday traditions. I spent Thanksgiving and Christmas on my own. I sat down and wrote 19 letters of love to friends on Christmas Eve and sent them all at midnight. It was the most Christmasy thing I’d ever done! It felt brave to choose what I needed over what everyone wanted for me or maybe wanted from me.
Being brave was also going home to an empty house. The pit in my stomach eventually cued me into the fact that I needed to change the energy in that space. I started to try and figure out what would make me feel comfort there. The old space was clearly haunted by my old life. Bringing nature inside the house felt good. Rearranging the bedroom felt good. Getting rid of some furniture and thrifting for some new pieces felt good. I painted all the walls by myself. I rented half my house to someone else. It felt brave to make those changes. It felt a little like I was erasing my old life too, but more like I was trying to find a way to live in this new life.
Painting my walls led to me taking an art class and painting canvases. I got more serious about my art which had languished for years. I was too busy before to consider painting, but once my life got blown up, painting a canvas made me feel brave in a weird and unexpected way. Facing an empty canvas and putting my marks on that surface. Self-expression felt good.
Eventually, pursuing what made me feel some sense of bravery somehow made a path to my new life. It gave me some sense of control and brought a small level of meaning to this hard season and made me feel better about myself at a time when I could hardly recognize myself. Being brave gave me what I needed to build a new life of beauty and art. Today, I still practice bravery through my painting explorations.
If this new year is forcing you into a new life or a new identity, I encourage you to think about small things you can do that will make you feel courageous. Courage to be brave will lead you to a full heart with a full life, you see. I pray courage for you, dear friend. Tell me what you’re practicing to feel brave.
