Most of the brave things you’ll do this year will take under a minute. The fear just makes them feel longer.
RESILIENCE
WHAT THIS MEANS
The act itself is short. Asking the question takes four seconds, hitting send takes one, saying the hard sentence takes maybe ten. What stretches it is everything before: the rehearsing, the drafting, the imagining of faces. Fear bills you for all of that and then calls the total the cost of being brave, when most of the bill was the waiting.
Take the thing you have been circling for a week and actually time it. Note the seconds it took. Keep that number in mind the next time your head tells you something is going to be enormous.
A QUESTION TO SIT WITH
Which one-minute conversation have you stretched into weeks of dread?
MORE IN COURAGE & RISK
- Being first in your friend group to take something seriously can look uncool. Later it looks like a head start.
- Being the only one who disagrees is uncomfortable. Sometimes it’s the only reason the room doesn’t make a mistake.
- Courage doesn’t always mean a big moment. Sometimes it’s admitting at dinner that you got cut and you’re sad about it.
Free, with nothing to buy inside it.