Thursday, September 14, 2006
Courage
it has been said, is managed fear. I agree. At every corner, there is something that could potentially be life threatening or injurious. The speed of day to day life tends to blur the lines between mindfulness and expediency, and this certainly does not help matters any. Childhood experiences, adolescent carelessness, youthful indulgences, and now on to more mature realizations, all point to the fact that life is fraught with danger. One can only repress the daily dangers one encounters for so long until finally the fear is made manifest in a palpable, bitter tasting sensation at the back of the throat. There is fear present in the world at large, if not the living under a possible atomic holocaust, then now the terrorist threat that dogs us. There is fear socially in hopes that your family will not come to harm and that friends and extended families will not encounter evil, on down to the personal, where health and wellbeing both physically and mentally are not to be taken for granted.
So while fear can be found at every turn, you also find Courage in it's space and in those ordinary people you see from day to day living out ordinary lives.
After 9/11, this to me is the extraordinary Courage of Americans, in that they continue to lead their ordinary lives.
Soccer games, Boy Scout meetings, Church socials, Knitting Circles, all quietly attest to something one greater even then Courage. I think and I hope it's called Resolve.
it has been said, is managed fear. I agree. At every corner, there is something that could potentially be life threatening or injurious. The speed of day to day life tends to blur the lines between mindfulness and expediency, and this certainly does not help matters any. Childhood experiences, adolescent carelessness, youthful indulgences, and now on to more mature realizations, all point to the fact that life is fraught with danger. One can only repress the daily dangers one encounters for so long until finally the fear is made manifest in a palpable, bitter tasting sensation at the back of the throat. There is fear present in the world at large, if not the living under a possible atomic holocaust, then now the terrorist threat that dogs us. There is fear socially in hopes that your family will not come to harm and that friends and extended families will not encounter evil, on down to the personal, where health and wellbeing both physically and mentally are not to be taken for granted.
So while fear can be found at every turn, you also find Courage in it's space and in those ordinary people you see from day to day living out ordinary lives.
After 9/11, this to me is the extraordinary Courage of Americans, in that they continue to lead their ordinary lives.
Soccer games, Boy Scout meetings, Church socials, Knitting Circles, all quietly attest to something one greater even then Courage. I think and I hope it's called Resolve.
