Creative Director: Bravery

I Create: Creative Director of my Life

Bravery: the act of being brave – to meet or face courageously.

It is said that Bravery is feeling fear, doubt and insecurity, but deciding that something else is more important.

Does bravery alter the course of your life? I would say wholeheartedly, that yes, it does. looking back, my ‘biggest bravery’ was when I participated in a Rotary Exchange for a year. I went to the Netherlands. It was just before I turned 18, that I arrived.

Being 42 now, I look back and I kind of marvel at the fact that I did that. Even though I was such a quiet person, quite sheltered and not social or outgoing, I made the decision that having an adventure like this was more important than staying in my comfort zone. It was more important that I take a risk. And it would feel like a huge risk, as I got there and felt quite homesick in the beginning. We didn’t have cell phones like we do now and internet access was limited. I was leaving all my family and friends connections and support circle behind. It felt like a big risk when the family I was staying with wanted to help me learn Dutch faster so they decided 3 weeks into my stay to no longer speak English. It felt like a big risk when I attended the school there and did not know a soul and had to make friends and be social, which is something I was also not ‘fluent’ at.

Recently, I was talking to a friend who had taken a similar adventure leaving everything she knew, to stay in Turkey for about a year as well. When she returned, she spoke of how she had changed but friends hadn’t. How her horizons had broadened but you couldn’t explain that to the friends here. You couldn’t explain what changed in you, but you also couldn’t be that person that you were before you left. The person they expected you to be, or remembered you to be. You couldn’t explain what you’d been through that slowly and surely shifted your perspective of the world, but more notably, of yourself. And that’s when you realize how different you are from the person that left home the year before. How it empowered you. How you realized how strong you are for having the guts to do what you did. How brave you’d been to do it, but how brave you’d become from having realized you could do it. Look what I can do, is something you’ve now gained the privilege to say to yourself.

I still look back and am amazed how steadfast I was that I was meant to take my journey. It was so clearly meant for me.

And when you are brave, no matter how small the matter may seem, when you can face or meet it courageously, you get to choose your life. Your life doesn’t ‘happen to you, you happen to it.’

Until next week,

Devon