Being Brave Actually Kind Of Sucks

We tend to talk about being brave as this positive, empowering thing, but... is it?

Dear Creators,

It’s been a rough year so far.

I was texting my friend Kate the other day — she was recently diagnosed with MS and a damaged vagus nerve and has spent more time in the hospital this year than out of it — and she said something that stuck with me:

“I’m so tired and defeated.”

Now, this isn’t something I hear a whole lot — in U.S. culture, at least, admitting defeat isn’t in vogue, and we tend to put a positive spin on things, no matter how bad they get.

“I’ll get through it,” we say as the doctor explains a medical diagnosis.

“He’s in a better place now,” we say at the funeral of a friend gone too soon.

“That’s life,” we say as the tax bill comes due for more money than we have in our bank account.

“This is fine,” we say as the house burns down around us. “My toes were cold anyway.”

What are we doing, when we say these things? Are we being brave? Are we dismissing the pain? Are we trying to convince ourselves? Are we saying what we feel is expected of us? Are we looking on the bright side? Are we resisting being labeled as a “Debbie Downer” or a “Negative Nancy” — or worse, a “drama queen”? Are we trying to manage the fears or quell the worries of others around us?

All of the above?

Our childhood lessons are full of encouragement — believe in yourself, stay strong, never give up. And these aren’t bad lessons to learn. There is a power in positive thinking, as they say, and it’s true that we’ll never do anything important or meaningful in life if we’re too afraid to try.

When Kate told me that she was feeling defeated, my initial reaction was to convince her otherwise, to encourage her, to say something like, “No, you’re not defeated! You are strong and brave and resilient and you will get through this!”

But telling someone else that they’re “not defeated” won’t magically take away their feelings of defeat, just like telling a clinically depressed person to “just cheer up/be grateful” won’t magically whisk away their clinical depression.

Life is real and often difficult and, as I learned from watching Pixar’s Inside Out, it’s okay — healthy, even — to experience a full range of human emotion.

Even fear. Even defeat.

“Ugh, I can’t even imagine what you must be going through,” I texted Kate back. “Please know that I’m here with you.” And despite knowing better, I couldn’t help but add, “I know you feel defeated, but you are still kicking and fighting and that’s amazing. And I hope that you continue to do so.”

(I apparently can’t give up telling people to not give up.)

A few moments later, Kate responded: “They say courage isn’t not feeling fear/weakness, but feeling those things and doing it anyway. If that’s the case, I’m brave, I guess. Too many people matter to me to just give up.”

I’d heard something like that before, and maybe you have, too — that bravery is “feeling the fear and doing it anyway”. It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.

This time, I did go with my instinctual response to Kate — “From what I’ve experienced, everyone talks about bravery like it’s this great thing, but when you’re actually being brave, it really sucks.”

Kate wholeheartedly agreed.

Being brave is enormously valued here in the U.S., almost as much as admitting defeat is anathema. Depictions of bravery are in many, if not most, of our favorite stories — Aragorn takes a deep breath before leading the charge into battle, Ripley runs to the shuttle and puts on her spacesuit, Luke Skywalker grits his teeth and tightens his grip on his lightsaber.

It’s awe-inspiring to watch our heroes act bravely, to “do it anyway” despite the fear (and often terrible odds). This is the power of story, and it can inspire us to do the same.

But what if you’re not in an immediate life-or-death situation? What if you didn’t just behead the Mouth of Sauron and end negotiations? What if you don’t have a bloodthirsty nightmare alien chasing after you? What if you’re not facing down a 6’7” tall embodiment of your destiny wearing a super-iconic helmet and cape?

What if you’re like me, and the hard part isn’t the “doing it anyway”, but the “feeling the fear”?

I feel like I have been brave exactly once in my entire life — and by “brave”, I mean actually “feeling the fear and doing it anyway”, while I was still smack-dab in the midst of the fear and had no way to mitigate it beforehand.

I remember how much I hated it — what an awful feeling it was, to have to do something so uncomfortable and terrifying yet necessary.

I remember, at the time, that Tim told me what I was doing was brave.

“WELL, BEING BRAVE SUCKS,” I remember telling him as I burst into tears. “I hate this. I don’t want to have to be brave!”

I remember this instance specifically because I didn’t feel brave — at least, I didn’t feel what I thought bravery should feel like. I didn’t feel like Aragorn, charging confidently into battle, sunlight gleaming off my armor.

I felt like a scared little kid on a conveyor belt, churning steadily toward their doom.

I felt the fear.

I think that we glorify bravery as this empowering moment when we are able to overcome our fears and, alight with newfound confidence, win the day.

But wow does it not feel like that. In my experience, at least, overcoming feels less like overcoming and more like just getting through the worst of something without giving up, just surviving something horrible. I feel a lot less like Luke Skywalker than I do Laurie Strode at the end of Halloween.

But given an option between doing the thing and not doing the thing… I do the thing.

I haven’t always done this. I spent a lot of time feeling the fear and not doing the thing. I thought that, at the “right time” (whenever that was), bravery would simply strike, much like inspiration or lightning, and I would suddenly be capable of doing the thing.

Unfortunately, this is not how it works.

Bravery is not some mystical external force that graces us with the confidence and courage we need to triumph over our fears. Bravery is a choice we make and an action we take.

In order to do the thing, we have to… do the thing. We have to burrow deep inside of that fear and do it anyway AND IT REALLY SUCKS.

But it’s worth it.

Something I was never taught in all my years of schooling is that creativity requires us to be brave. Maybe it shouldn’t be a lesson we have to learn — maybe we should just be able to make cool stuff without any fear. But in my experience, that’s not how it works.

No one’s just going to magically show up at your house someday and say, “Hey, I heard through the grapevine that you’re a writer, and I’m here to present you with this publishing contract and a check for a million dollars.” (There’s a difference between publishers and Publishers Clearing House, you know.)

Instead, you have to take action, even though it’s really freakin’ scary.

Submit that short story to the anthology, despite the (very likely) chance that you will be rejected.

Write the end of your novel, despite the fact that it is super hard and you feel like you are the worst so-called “writer” who has ever lived.

Send out that query letter, even if it represents a step forward that you feel you’re not ready for.

Write that poem or that memoir segment exploring your relationship with [insert difficult/problematic person here], even if it threatens to re-open old wounds.

Press your pen to the paper and write even one word in spite of your writer’s block.

Your life might not be on the line. But that’s why it’s even harder to make the choice to be brave. To feel the fear and do it anyway. To feel the defeat and keep on going.

Just like bravery won’t strike like lightning, your fear isn’t going to just magically dissolve one day. You’re not going to wake up tomorrow and suddenly not be afraid to do the think you’re afraid to do today.

The fear is always going to be there between you and the thing, especially if the thing is worth doing. And that really sucks.

But it also means that what you’re doing is important.

For me, it helps to acknowledge the fear outright. “I AM DOING THIS THING EVEN THOUGH IT IS REALLY SCARY,” I shout into the void.

Acknowledging the fear (instead of tamping it down or pretending it doesn’t exist) helps me to take the action. Because I’ve learned that, for me, at least, bravery isn’t an act that I’m putting on for someone else’s benefit, or to look cool/tough. It’s a very real movement through fear — an action — that I am taking for myself.

I know that Aragorn had to perform his bravery so that his troops would follow him into battle — he couldn’t just say, “YOU GUYS, I AM REALLY SCARED RIGHT NOW! HA HA OKAY, READY? CHAAAARGE!”

But we can. (I mean, we can if we want. I’m not here to tell you what to do.)

This has been a really long and rambling letter, and even after multiple rewrites I’m not sure it says exactly what I want it to say. Which is… that doing hard things is hard. But it’s also extremely worth it.

Just like Aragorn and Ripley and Luke Skywalker, and even Laurie Strode, you are capable of doing great things.

Their stories are immortal for a reason.

Words & warmth,

Sarah

P.S. You may have noticed it’s been a while since I last emailed you. That’s because this is my fourth rewrite of this week’s letter (I couldn’t get it quite right for a long time), and I’ve been dealing with some rough life stuff myself. But thank you for sticking with me, and thank you (as always) for reading. :) I think you’re great.

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