Something to Chew On is a newsletter I’ve cooked up to share some of my ruminations and marinations with family, friends, and colleagues. More importantly, though, it’s meant as an invitation to (re)connect, reflect, and be in conversation, at a pace that works with all the goings-on in everyone’s lives. New issues will go out about once every month or two. Happy reading!
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Courage Amid the Chaos
Published 6 months ago • 4 min read
Main Course
Courage Amid the Chaos
“Without courage we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. We can’t be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest.” -Maya Angelou
I’m not a pundit, the aim of this newsletter isn’t political per se, and certainly wiser folks than I have plenty of insights to offer about the current political state of the US (and honestly, anyone who’s talked to me for more than 20 minutes probably has a good sense of my politics anyway). Whatever your political leanings, I hope we can agree that the start to 2025 has been chaotic to say the least.
Amid the chaos of the last few weeks, my mind has returned again and again to a scene of extraordinary courage. In our collective imaginations, we know where we are supposed to look for courage: in sweeping battlefields, atop sheer cliffs, on colossal oceans, or opposite burning buildings. But this particular example of courage was delivered from the Canterbury Pulpit of Washington National Cathedral. Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde, in soft but imploring tones, made an entreaty during the closing of the inaugural prayer service. If you haven’t yet seen the last two minutes of the sermon, it is absolutely worth watching:
Interviewed the day after the service, Bishop Budde said she felt moved when preparing her sermon to add a plea for mercy, knowing that many people felt fearful of the actions threatened by the new administration. “I had a feeling that there were people watching what was happening and wondering, Was anyone going to say anything? Was anyone going to say anything about the turn the country’s taking?”
Few among us will find ourselves with the sort of platform that Bishop Budde had during the prayer service. And yet, I can certainly recall finding myself in situations where I have wondered the same thing: “Is anyone going to say anything?” And, directly on the heels of that thought, the intimidating question, “Should I be the one to say something?”
Bishop Budde’s choice to appeal for mercy and compassion says a great deal about her character, and her moral convictions. It speaks volumes, too, about the current political climate that this appeal was both fodder for fierce debate along party lines, and viewed as an extraordinary risk for the Bishop to take.
Courage is sometimes seen as synonymous with risk-taking, but the two aren’t quite the same. Courage has been described as “confronting fear in a task that is linked with a higher-order goal or that has meaning to the individual.” When framed in this way, mustering courage seems within reach. Each of us has principles that are deeply meaningful to us personally, values that we hold dear regardless of the audience at hand or others in the proverbial room. Clarity on these values makes confronting our fears an easier proposition.
Now seems like a good time for us to remind ourselves, courage doesn’t require an audience. We are each encountering opportunities to be courageous in our day-to-day lives, through our actions and our decisions. In our workplaces and within our families, in our houses of worship and professional organizations, as coaches to our children’s teams and as community members in public spaces, we have the choice to exercise courage when we know our values are violated.
Certainly, this may look like speaking up when you feel like the lone voice of dissent. But courage can also be hiding in plain sight, in quiet decisions. It can look like stepping in when you see someone mistreated. It can be holding boundaries, or initiating that difficult conversation you’ve been putting off. It can look like talking face-to-face rather than texting. Courage can be sharing your fears with someone close to you. It can be admitting you don't have the answers, or simply asking for help. It can look like showing up when it’s hard just to get out of bed.
I’m finding it helpful in this moment to remember that courage is not an innate trait but a skill, and like many skills, it improves with practice. What is more, courage benefits from being practiced in community with others–it can be contagious. And, as the quotation above from writer and activist Maya Angelou indicates, courage can serve as the key that opens the doors to our kindness, honesty, generosity, and mercy. In this current social and political moment, throwing the doors open wide for such virtues feels urgent and necessary.
Quick Bites
We can grow our courage by seeing ourselves as courageous, and by recognizing that we can act on our values in community with others. A few questions to reflect on: *Do you recall a time you demonstrated courage, however big or small an action?
*Can you describe a situation you were part of where courage was as much a social action as an individual decision?
I welcome your responses to either question, as a way of growing our collective courage. I hope to share some of your stories in my next newsletter. Looking forward to what you send!
Screen shot from "A Trump Supporter Finds a Surprising Ally at an Anti-Trump Rally," StoryCorps
A Surprising Ally
Defending our ideological adversaries is its own kind of risk. In this StoryCorps conversation, two people from opposite ends of the political spectrum describe a moment in 2016 that brought them together.
Screen grab from "How to Start a Movement" TedTalk
"How to Start a Movement"
It can take courage to be a leader, and sometimes, it takes courage to be a follower, too. In this brief and humorous TedTalk, Derek Sivers demonstrates the point.
It’s not just other people, but also other living creatures, that can bring out our courageous best. In case you missed it, here’s a heartwarming video of a Vermont man who recently rescued a dog from a freezing river. Said the dog's owner of the stranger who waded into the frigid waters to save her pet, "It's brave, it's selfless, it's commendable... It's just everything."
Screen grab from "Raw Video: Vermont man rescues dog from freezing river in Barre," via MyNBC5-WPTZ
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Something to Chew On
Hi there! I’m Joyce Lee-Ibarra, and I’m a social sector consultant specializing in learning & evaluation, community research, and facilitation. I’m also a wife, mom, and human doing my best to navigate my journey on this giant blue marble.
Something to Chew On is a newsletter I’ve cooked up to share some of my ruminations and marinations with family, friends, and colleagues. More importantly, though, it’s meant as an invitation to (re)connect, reflect, and be in conversation, at a pace that works with all the goings-on in everyone’s lives. New issues will go out about once every month or two. Happy reading!
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