August 27

COURAGE MONTH: DAY 27:

“Run my dear,

From anything

That may not strengthen

Your precious budding wings.” ― Hafez

We all have to fly the nest sometime. And will do so, repeatedly, through the course of our lives. Each shift in job or career, each move to another home, each new adventure is as if we are flying from the proverbial family nest again and again.

If we are not strengthening our wings, we are stagnant. Life is about movement, about change, about progress in some areas and retreat in others.

When we sit still, on the branch, afraid to leave that safe little nest we have created, we are going to lose out on life itself.

And there are a lot of reasons for staying still…comfort, fear, approval of others who want us to remain predictable and controllable, and so many more. We make up ideas like security  and safety,  believing they are concepts we can create in our lives. There is no such thing.

Each one of us, born whenever we were, are on a collision course to only one end…death. So, how can we demand from life the thing that invalidates what life really is? There is no safety, no security, no guarantees of any of that.

So, courage (heart) is going to rule the day. Jump up and go in the direction of everything that brings you joy. Fly all the time, everywhere, explore all avenues and find the things that make your heart soar…that is what life is for.

Be a part of it, don’t sit safely on the sidelines, without the dancing, the singing, the joy of being fully alive.

Don’t let the past be the bag of cement tied to your leg that grounds you, or even worse, drowns you. It is not necessary to have an anchor. That is the purpose of life, to fly, to soar, to dream, to live!

The cement is the crap from the past that we hang onto and drag around to remind us of life gone wrong, or so we believe. It is the absolute opposite.

A reminder of when we acted badly because we were selfish and afraid. We were not living well then, why continue to drag that through our days instead of doing all these things we are here to do. Why else, then, would we be given the grace of this process, if we refuse to jump in and use it?