The courage that matters today may have no resemblance to the courage people applaud in stories.

Stories teach us to look for courage in dramatic shapes, so the real version often passes unrecognized. Most of it is undramatic and slightly dull from the outside: making the phone call, sitting through the appointment, telling the truth in a small room, getting up on a day that offers no reason to. Nobody applauds that, and it costs more than the versions that get retold.

When you look back on this week, count the thing you dreaded and did anyway. Whatever it looked like, give it the name it deserves rather than the one it would have earned in public.