255: How to Be Courageous (especially when it's hard)
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Hello and welcome to another episode of Relationship Alive. This is your host, Neil Satin. Now look, it's easy to talk about being courageous as if, like, of course, that's what you're supposed to do in life and in your relationships.

You feel vulnerable, you feel scared. Well, just be courageous and take courageous action. But what does it really mean to take courageous action? What does that look like in practice? Not just this vague idea about feeling your fear and doing the thing anyway, but

But what does it take to actually be courageous? That's what we're going to talk about in today's episode, the reality of how to take courageous action. Now, the way I see it, courage is required before you get into a relationship, while you're in a relationship, and if you decide that you're going to leave the relationship, that requires courage too. Courage is required all the way through.

When you are, let's say, meeting people, going out on dates, it may require courage for you to ask someone out. It may require courage for you to follow up with a person. It might require courage for you to ask for what you want. There was recently a conversation happening in the Relationship Alive Facebook community where someone was talking about

How it's challenging to them. They've been going out with people who are spending all their time talking about themselves instead of asking any questions. So how do you show up in a situation like that? You might need to get courageous and be vulnerable or put the other person on the spot in order to ask for what you need.

Or conversely, it might take courage for you, even though someone else seems really into you, if you're not really into them, to put an end to your dating before it gets too serious, before it gets even more challenging to extricate yourself from a difficult and not entirely fulfilling situation. Now, when you're in a relationship, there are all kinds of places where courage is required.

It might be required to set a boundary with another person or again, to ask for what you want if you're not getting it or to initiate a hard conversation with

Like, for instance, a conversation about something that you really want that you're not getting, just as an example. And then so often those challenging conversations might go a little bit off the rails or might not go exactly how you would want them to go. And it takes courage to follow up on those conversations rather than just letting things go and fostering resentment. Yeah.

It requires courage often to make a choice when the right decision isn't quite clear to you. It requires courage when you need to be honest with a person, even though it might hurt their feelings. And this kind of courage is,

is really important for having relationships that are alive and authentic and where there is continually energy being generated to keep you excited and engaged in a relationship.

It turns out that if you're not able to show up in those ways to be vulnerable, to take risks, then your relationship ends up being a big story of avoiding those things. And if you avoid the things that have lots of

energy or juice to them in one area, then it's likely that you're going to end up avoiding the energy and the juice in the areas that are more exciting, like your romance and your desire and your sex and your adventure and those kinds of things.

The thing is, though, it's easy to talk about being courageous. Yes, you have to be courageous. You have to feel your fear. You have to just move forward. But the reality is that that's super challenging. If it weren't challenging, it would be easy to do. We'd be doing it all the time. And I wouldn't be having this conversation with you. But there's more to it than simply being courageous. There's...

There are things that you can expect to happen within you and in a situation that requires your courage. And that's what we're going to talk about today. Because I want you to be able to prepare for an act of courage. I want you to have an understanding of what's going to happen. I want to set you up for the best possible outcome.

And in the end, I want you to be able to take that experience and build on it. So that's what we're going to focus on, all those things in today's episode. So why does anything require courage? What's that all about anyway? If something at its core doesn't make you on some level afraid, then it doesn't require courage.

The only reason something's going to require courage on your part is if you need to take some sort of risk. And by definition, some sort of risk contains something within it that you're not so sure about that gives your system a little bit of pause. It's cause for alarm.

And we all respond to fear in different ways. Sometimes we respond to fear by being exhilarated. I'm thinking about what it can feel like when you are feeling afraid that someone might reject you and you introduce yourself and ask them out and they say yes, like,

the response to that overwhelming fear and being in that moment could be like total elation. That's one possibility. Or on the flip side, you could have an experience that's terrifying. That's another possibility. So either way, you're dealing with the way that your body handles extreme cases of emotion. And

Generally, many of us are trained that when things start to feel a little bit extreme, it can be edgy. That's why a lot of people even avoid really good feelings because any kind of surplus of emotion and sensation in their bodies can feel like a threat, can be discombobulating.

So I came up with a little acronym for you to help you understand whatever fear you're experiencing at the core of whatever the situation is, whatever it is that's requiring your courage. And that's really the first step in how you prepare for a courageous act. It's to understand the fear that you're feeling, the thing that's holding you back or making you hesitate.

So the acronym that I came up with is ANSWER. And ANSWER is one of those funny words in the English language, right? A-N-S-W-E-R. But each one of those letters stands for something that I think is important to the core experience of how you relate to something that you're feeling fear around. So the A in ANSWER stands for ACKNOWLEDGE.

All you're doing is you're acknowledging that you feel afraid.

And that you have this feeling. And this is a way of helping validate yourself, which is going to be really important when it comes time to actually acting courageously. You have to be able to trust yourself. And so the problem that a lot of people experience when they deny that they're feeling afraid is that that can work for a time, but it creates this split within them, right?

where they actually don't learn how to trust what's happening within them.

Now, some people do learn how to live with a certain degree of fear and to take certain risks without having to be courageous over and over again. They develop a new baseline. And that could be something that you work on in your relationship. For instance, if you're someone who is nervous about vulnerable conversation about your feelings, then at first, it's

Every single conversation like that might end up feeling really scary to you. But this is an area where you can actually learn to feel whatever feelings you have around taking the risk of being vulnerable, but you do it enough and it will require less and less courage on your part. You'll be like, oh yeah, I recognize that feeling. That's the feeling of how I start to get a little nervous when I need to talk about

whatever it is. And that will be familiar to you. But we're not really talking about that. I'm talking more about kind of the hardcore things that require courage. Like for instance, if you haven't been intimate with your partner in months and you feel like you're dying inside and you need some way to communicate with your partner about it,

And every time you've tried to talk to them about it in the past, it's ended up in a huge fight or even worse, like one of you shuts down or leaves. So in a situation like that, it wouldn't surprise me if you felt a lot of fear about having it and it's going to require courage to have it, have that conversation. Or if you've been in a relationship for a while and it's really not working for you,

and you're feeling hesitation around ending the relationship, then that's another situation where you might be paralyzed by your fear, your fear of hurting the other person, your fear of being single again, and what that might mean. There are any number of ways. So we're going to get to that in a second. But the first thing is to just acknowledge that you're feeling afraid and to just acknowledge

kind of embrace that within yourself. Like, thank you for letting me see that I'm feeling fear right now.

And that's an important part in the next step, which is to name the thing that you're actually afraid of. Answer. A-N. Name. So name what you're afraid of. And it could be one thing. It could be many things. Often, for me, it helps me to list those things out with pen and paper.

take some of the power, some of the charge away from those things. And it can also help explain why it is that whatever the situation is, is so challenging for me in that particular situation. So you acknowledge you're feeling afraid. You name the fear or fears that you're experiencing. And then the next letter is S-A-N-S-E.

which stands for sensation. So I want you to get in touch with what sensations that fear actually generates in your body. I think on a, on an earlier episode, I talked about how sometimes I can tremble when I'm feeling really nervous about something and literally my body will, will start shaking. Um,

Other people might feel sick to their stomach. Other people might get a headache. Other people might get really spacey. Other people, it's going to vary depending on you. But you want to get familiar with what it is so that when it starts happening in the moment, you recognize exactly what is happening with you.

If you don't take the time to prepare before your act of courage, then you can end up being really blindsided by the things that you could have predicted were going to happen if you took this time that we're talking about right now. And not being blindsided is an important part of handling these situations more effectively.

And building a foundation for yourself so that you can act courageously in the future with even less hesitation. So we've acknowledged the fear. We've named it. We're looking at the sensations in our body so that we can recognize when we are feeling that fear, what actually happens in our bodies. And then the W in answer is,

which is kind of the funny letter. I don't even know why that W's there, right? But it's there. A-N-S-W stands for the worst. What is the worst that can happen? And I invite you to be as outrageous and ridiculous as you can be by naming the worst because

The odds are that within your subconscious mind, that is what you are responding to. The worst possible thing that you think could happen. And then along with the worst thing that might happen, you might come up with other things that wouldn't be the worst thing but would still kind of suck. And it's worth it to list those things out too.

Now, at a certain point in the future, we're going to talk about the best case scenarios. But I think in honor of our fears, we're not afraid of the best thing happening generally. We're afraid of the worst things happening. So spell them out. What is the worst possible thing that could happen? And really take that in and see what's true about that, what's ridiculous about that,

It's all about filling it out in more detail for yourself so that these things aren't happening below the surface. They're happening right there in front of you. Now, the next letter in answer is E, which stands for your expected outcome. So what are you expecting will actually happen when you do whatever this courageous thing is?

And by the way, I want to point out that sometimes the courageous thing to do is not to do anything. So I just want to put that out there that being courageous doesn't always mean you're doing something. Sometimes the courageous act is to do.

Hold your tongue when you could say something that, you know, is actually not going to be helpful in a situation. It could be an act of courage to swallow your pride and your ego to just remain silent in a moment like that. So you've outlined what the worst things are that could happen. What do you expect is going to happen? This is sort of like you're realistically, what do you think is going to happen if you

do this thing or have this conversation. And that way, you know roughly what the target zone looks like. You know what is likely.

The worst possible thing is unlikely, but it's not impossible. And that's why it's important to spell it out. You're giving yourself a little bit of reassurance by observing what is most likely to happen, your expected outcome. So you have A-N-S-W-E. And lastly, the R in answer is to respect your body's wisdom, right?

There is a good reason for you to feel the way you're feeling. And hopefully you saw on some level that the fears that have been holding you back and whatever the situation is, some of them might be ridiculous, but some of them might be grounded in something that genuinely is scary for you.

I mean, wouldn't it be great if you spelled it all out and you're like, oh, that's not too bad. And then you were just able to act. That would be awesome. And if that is what's happening for you, great. That's perfect. However, at that point, it doesn't really require courage, right? Because you're not feeling afraid anymore. And I want to stick with the things that actually...

They cause you fear and you are going to have to do them anyway, despite the fear that it's causing you. And somehow you need to learn how to show up when you're feeling fear in the most effective way possible. So that's what this whole process is all about.

So the answer process that we just outlined, acknowledge, name, find the sensations in your body, what's the worst that can happen, what's your expected most likely outcome, and respecting the wisdom of your body is all about learning to trust yourself and learning to get really clear on what it is that you're feeling and that's holding you back. But you are not going to let this fear run you

That's what the act of courage is all about. This is all about getting that essential information so that you know what to do next. Now from this place, you could just decide that you're going to just do it. You're just going to do the thing or say the thing, whatever it is. And sometimes that's all you needed was a little bit of preparation, but sometimes

Okay.

So now we're going to prepare even more thoroughly. And these steps that I'm about to talk about are really the key to being able to act courageously from a place of being well-grounded, being able to keep your foundation beneath you as you do whatever it is that's stretching you past your point of comfort. And I was going to try to come up with a

snappy little acronym for these things too, but I got impatient and decided that I wasn't going to do that. So I apologize that I don't have an acronym for these things. But the goal is for us to simplify whatever it is that we're walking into, because the more simple it is,

the easier it will be for you to take the action that you need, to feel confident in your action, and to feel grounded in yourself. So that's what these steps are all about. Perhaps the most important step at this point is to get clear on your values, on your principles. Why is this thing that's requiring your courage important?

Why is it so important to you? Is it because you believe at your core that you want more out of a relationship with another person and you're willing to do what it takes to get what you want? Or maybe it's because something's going on that involves your children and

And you want to do something that's in the best interest of your children, of supporting your children, supporting them through a hard time, supporting them with making choices about their lives, supporting them with feeling good about who they are in the world, any number of ways that you might need to show up to support your kids, right? Perhaps you have to have a conversation because you value honesty, right?

And that whatever this thing is that you need to share, you can't keep it inside. Because deep down, no matter what it is, to you, it's more important to be honest than it is to spare other people's feelings. Now, I'm not saying that you can't be honest in ways that

are gentle with people's feelings. That's, I think we've talked about that in other episodes, actually. And I do cover that in my communication course at length. However, that shouldn't stop you. The need to try and be gentle with another person shouldn't stop you completely from saying what you need to say. So whether it's taking a stand for how you want to be treated, which is maybe more of a boundary conversation,

or taking a stand for what you want, or taking a stand for your kids, or for someone else in your life, or even taking a stand for your partner, you want to get really clear on what the most important thing is to you. And the reason why is that when you are doing something courageous,

There's going to be most likely all kinds of emotion happening within you. And so it will be helpful for you to know what the thing is that anchors you, that anchors you in why you're doing this thing or having this conversation or whatever it is in the first place.

It's something for you to go back to when you start to feel confused, when a conversation goes off on a tangent. It's there to tether you to why at your core this thing is so important to you, why it requires your courage. So get clear on your principles and your values. Why is it that it's so important? And I recommend that you...

land on something that's inarguable. We've talked in the show before about inarguable truths. It's the kind of thing where like, I can tell you, I'm not very happy right now. And you can't really argue with that. Like that's sort of is what it is. Or, um,

What's another thing? There's like, I'm looking out my window, there's snow on the ground right now. Now that's not really a principle necessarily. Although maybe it is something that I would fall back on if it's a conversation with my spouse about who's going to take care of the shoveling. In the end, I might fall back on, you know what, there's snow on the ground and we need to figure out how we're going to deal with it.

Right. No matter how busy we both are, no matter how tired we both are, et cetera, et cetera, there's snow on the ground. So in a way that could be actually a, uh, inarguable truth that I rest on when I'm having a conversation about who's going to shovel or who's going to call the plow person. Right. Follow me. So as a, as a different kind of thing, you might, you wouldn't want to do something like, um,

You wouldn't want your truth to be, we really need counseling.

Right? Because we really need counseling. Well, you might think that you need counseling or help from a coach, but your partner may not agree with you. So now there's room for argument about, well, do we, you think we need coaching, but I don't think we need coaching. And now you're stuck in this conflict where you didn't even need one to be. The truth behind we need counseling might be something like,

I'm unhappy in this relationship and I need for us to do something about it, period. And contained in that might be a, well, if we don't do something about it, what's that going to mean? Right? So that's where these conversations can be really challenging for everyone because something like I'm not happy, I want help.

can sound to the other person like a threat because if they're not willing to get the help or if the help doesn't work, then what? Then you're leaving? Now everyone's afraid, right? So it's clear why these conversations can be so challenging for people and why it's important for you to be able to rest on something like, I'm not happy and it's important to me that we do something about it.

where you go from there, that might require another courageous act, right? The courageous act of deciding you're going to commit money to hiring a coach. Or if your partner is unwilling, then it might require the courageous act of saying, hey, this is no longer what I want. This isn't important to me. Or if your partner is unwilling, it might require the courageous act of saying, hey,

I've told you over and over again that I'm unhappy and how much it was important to me for us to get help and we haven't gotten help. And so I need to leave and I'm sorry. I want, I want to do it in the kindest way possible, et cetera, et cetera, but I'm out of here. That's also an act of courage. So whatever it is, you want to rest on things that are inarguable and that you can keep coming back to. Now,

A second thing that might help prepare you and propel you forward into courageous action is to get really clear on what the cost to you is of not doing or saying whatever the thing is. Dive deep into that question. What is the cost to you? What is the cost to others? What is the cost to your family? What is the cost to your dreams, to your future, to your bank account, to everything

whatever it is, to your enthusiasm for life. What is the cost of not acting? If the cost isn't high enough, you might not take that action. That might be part of what's holding you back is you might feel like, oh, well, in the end, if I don't do anything, it's not so bad. So I'm just going to not do anything. I can live with it.

That's another important reason to figure out what the cost is, because maybe you'll find out that it's not that big a deal. You just want to keep things the way they are. Or more likely, what will happen is you'll get really clear on why this is so important to you, why it keeps coming back to you, probably over and over and over again, right? If something requires courage, more often than not, it's something that we recognize over and over again.

that we need to do or say, but you hold back for some reason. So getting really clear on the cost of holding back, it can be helpful in helping you understand why you keep coming back to the situation, even if you haven't fully figured out how to deal with it yet. So you come to understand your principles and your values, your bottom line. You come to understand the cost of not taking action. Now,

I want you to think about what resources will help strengthen you for this interaction. Are there things that you need to learn how to do before you can do whatever this thing is? Are there skills that you need? Is there a book that could help you? Is there a course that could help you? Those are the kinds of things that we're talking about. How can you resource yourself? Do you need a certain amount of money in your bank account?

before you'll feel comfortable being courageous. Get really clear on what it is that you need to help you feel resourced. And the more resourced you feel, the easier it's going to be to ultimately take this action. Even if taking the action or saying the thing still makes you feel afraid,

feeling well resourced, feeling like you've prepared, that's going to go a long way to helping you do it anyway. Okay. So what are the things that will help you? And I like to spend time here in particular thinking about, um,

How I act when I'm starting to get dysregulated. So this goes back to when you were recognizing the sensations and signs of fear in your body, what happens in your body. Those are all things that are indications that you are going limbic. You're leaving the prefrontal cortex of your brain, the part of you that's able to think creatively and relax.

cooperatively and show up with solutions and kindness and compassion. That's all in your prefrontal cortex. But when you start feeling afraid, you go into fight, flight, freeze, right? Which are all dysregulated states. So I think it's worth giving special consideration to the

What are the techniques for getting regulated when you feel triggered so that one, as you anticipate whatever this courageous action is, you can feel that fear and help bring your system back into a state of regulation. And so that when you are in the middle of this courageous act, you have those resources to fall back on what you know will help you calm down.

And it may be that when you're doing the thing that all your techniques of regulation still don't help you because it's hard in the moment. But those things will be there for you afterwards to help you come back from whatever chaotic state of dysregulation you're in. So they're still there for you and they're still important even if they fail you in the moment.

Okay, so we've done lots of episodes about this, but these are things like slowing your breathing down, getting oriented in the room, looking around at just the physical reality that you're in to remind yourself that you're here in the present moment.

It could be touching your hands to various parts of your body and just naming those body parts and telling yourself that you are safe in a particular moment. Those are just a few examples. So what works well for you to help you find your state of equilibrium when you get knocked off kilter? That's what this step in the preparation is all about. And the final step in getting prepared is

is to think about who can support you. So these could be your friends, your family, a coach or a therapist, anyone who might be there for you as extra support

either as you get prepared to do the courageous thing, or maybe someone who's there with you when you're doing the courageous thing and saying the courageous thing, or someone who you can go to afterwards who can help you get clear on what happened, who can help you feel reassured about whatever happened, whatever the results were of your courageous action.

So they're there for reassurance. They're there for decompression after the fact. You know, sometimes a hand on your shoulder or a hug can do wonders. They're also often there for accountability. Maybe you need someone there who's encouraging you to do the courageous thing. And it can be helpful to have them there reminding you like, yes, you feel afraid. Yes, this is hard. And yes, you can do this. Now go do it.

So these are some important ways that having another person there can be important for you when you are going to act courageously. And it's good to have as many people as you feel comfortable drawing upon. That way you don't have to deal with feeling perhaps guilty because you're being incredibly burdensome to this one particular friend or whatever. Though that's worth a courageous conversation in and of itself, right?

But, yeah, see who are the – make a list of who the people are that you might be able to call upon and then talk to them and say, hey, I'm going through this thing. Would you be willing to be there for me as a support as I go through it? And what are some ways that you would feel comfortable supporting me as I go through this thing?

So you get them involved, get them engaged, and also get them to be thinking about how they, what their special superpowers are when it comes to showing up for you so that you know exactly how to lean on them in ways that they'll feel good about and where they will really be able to help you. Now, the last thing before you actually do the courageous thing is,

To make a plan for how it could go at its best. What is the best possible outcome that could happen from you acting courageously? And what would that look like? What would it require from you in order to get there?

When we were getting clear on our fear, we looked at what the worst possible thing that could happen and we looked at what the expected outcome was. But this is a chance for you to think about what you really want to happen and what would be required from you in order for that to happen. And this will also help you prepare in advance for things that might go wrong and how you might respond to them in order to

Get as close as possible to the best possible outcome. Now, I'm not saying that you will necessarily experience the best possible outcome, but having a clear idea of what the best possible outcome could be will help you recognize when things are going really off track and

and help you ground yourself so that you can stay as closely aligned as possible with the best possible outcome instead of feeling things veer off towards the worst possible outcome. Does that make sense? Now, you want to spend some time there, but not too much time because now that you've gotten prepared, you're getting really close to taking action.

And at a certain point, it's going to be easier to actually take action than to keep waiting. You will feel perhaps more and more anxiety at that point the longer that you wait because you're ready. You're ready to do this thing. So in the final part of today's episode, I want to talk about now what's going to happen when you actually take action and what to do after you've taken action.

So that again, you improve your chances of this having the best possible outcome and for subsequent courageous acts to also lead to the best possible course of action. Okay, part three, it is time to take action. As I was just saying, you don't want to wait too long after you've done all this preparation. And in fact, you'll probably be feeling energy within you to just do it. Just do it already.

And so I recommend that you do just do it already, that you don't spend too much time overthinking it. Trust yourself. You've done the work. Now, when you take action, there are three main goals that I want you to keep in mind. And these three things will help you take action and follow through even if it's challenging.

Because it's likely that it will be challenging still, or that when you're in the middle of it, you will start feeling fear, you will start feeling the things coming up in you. Odds are that it might be a very emotionally charged situation for you.

So getting ready for that was why we were doing all of that initial prep work and why you were getting really clear on how to get regulated when you start to feel triggered or super emotional. Okay. However, now I'm going to give you some tools when you're actually doing the courageous thing that will hopefully help you have the best chance of success. So the first of your goals is,

is to stay anchored in your bottom line. The principles or values, the reason that you are there, stay anchored in that thing.

So that if your conversation or whatever it is that you're doing, if it starts to go off track, you can remind yourself or also remind the other person why you are there. What is most important to you? And even if like if you're having a conversation and the conversation is start starting to go off the rails, you can say, wait a minute, wait a minute. I just want to remind you that the reason we're having this conversation is because

Because I'm unhappy and I really want to do something that will help our relationship. Or the reason we're having this conversation is the kids are hurting and we need to do something to help them out in this situation. Or bottom line is you told me you wanted to have more sex and I want to have this conversation with you so that we can have more sex.

Get it? So you want to remember what your bottom line is and use that as your beacon of light.

Should whatever you're doing seem really dark or like it's gone off course, don't be afraid to shine your clear beacon on the very reason why you were there. And as simple and as clear as that reason is, that helps everyone, including you, especially you, follow through and stay true to whatever it is that you're doing. So that's the first thing.

Stay anchored in your inarguable values. The second thing is to stay present as much as possible. So ask yourself, what is happening within me? If there are other people involved, what is happening with the other person? What am I seeing in them? What am I hearing in their voice? What do I think that might mean?

Bring it back to yourself. What's going on in me here in this moment? How am I breathing? Am I scared? Am I sad? Am I excited? Am I elated? Anything is possible. I just want you to pay attention. And the more you pay attention, the more you will recognize when you need to bring things back to your bottom line.

the more you'll recognize if you are really starting to shift into a state of dysregulation that's going to require some concerted effort on your part to come back to a state of balance. You might need to take a break for five minutes from whatever it is you're doing so that you can come back into a state of regulation. Or you might decide, I'm just going to plow ahead, but you want to be aware of what's happening within you so that things aren't just spiraling out of control.

So number one, stay anchored in your bottom line. Number two, stay present. And number three is to show, if this involves other people, to show care and compassion for them without losing your boundaries. If this is a courageous action like leaving a relationship, you don't want to ignore the fact that another person's heart may be breaking.

Right. You don't want to pretend that's not happening. At the same time, if that is like if that's what we're talking about here, then you knew all along that most likely it was going to be hard for the other person. So you need to stay clear to your boundaries that those are their feelings and you care about them and you love them and you don't want them to feel bad, hopefully.

And you still need to take this courageous action because of your bottom line. See how these three things put together, fit together? So you're staying clear on why you're there. You're staying present in the moment. And you're showing care for the other people who are involved without letting that derail you from the reason that you're there.

And just one helpful hint, as I was mentioning just a few moments ago, don't be afraid to pause. If you need to take a break, don't be afraid to do that. If you're having a conversation with another person, don't be afraid for there to be silence, to just let the other person kind of sit in the thing that you've brought to them. Or if they present something to you that's a game changer in some sense, then

Don't be afraid to say, I'm going to have to get back to you on that. I'm going to have to sit with that and think about it and I'll get back to you. The more that you feel like you are in control of the pacing of whatever it is that you're doing, the easier it will be for you to adjust if something unexpected happens, right? You're free to do that at any minute, at any moment. Say, okay, timeout or pause, right?

One exception might be like something like if you're going to skydive, like once you've jumped out of that plane, you're, you're out of the plane. Like you don't, you don't want to take a break at that point. At that point you want to rely on your preparation and your training and make sure you pull the rip cord. Okay. But most other things allow for you to recognize, okay, I think I need to step back and reassess. Let's come back to this. Okay. Now at that point,

I have to say that I don't know what's going to happen. Only you know, only you will experience what happens. But I can say that overall, my experience has been that taking the risks, acting courageously, saying things courageously, even when it's hard, ultimately has resulted in things getting better.

and things improving, or in the direction that I'm headed being more clear. Because the courageous action may not fix something necessarily, but it will probably bring some clarity to you around all the other factors that were involved.

Because so much of the fear that can hold us back from taking action or saying the things that need to be said, so much of that fear is us imagining things, is us being stuck in those unnamed fears, is us being worried about the worst possible thing happening. Odds are that's not what's going to happen. And in the end, you'll have way more information. Plus, you'll have some momentum carrying you in a new direction.

So there's not a lot more to say here, and I'm keeping it simple on purpose. Stay present, focus on your bottom line, and show care for other people. That's how you navigate a courageous moment. Now, after you're done, you want to take some time to assess what happened. How did it go? Were you able to stay focused on what was most important to you during the whole thing, or did you get derailed?

What did you notice about what happened to you physically? How do you feel now having gone through the whole thing? What kind of support do you actually need now? Do you need someone to hold you? Do you need to be able to talk to someone? Do you need to celebrate with someone? What do you need in this moment? What feels amazing about having acted? And what fears came true?

And which fears didn't come true? Which fears were unfounded? You want to look at what happened, what was valid within you, and what things maybe you had blown out of proportion. And perhaps more than anything, you want to ask yourself, how does the landscape look different now? Now that I've acted courageously, what's different? What worked? What didn't? What feels possible now that felt impossible before?

And that might be something specific or it might be something broad, like, well, it feels more possible to do that sort of thing again. This is all about you internalizing what you just went through and being able to learn and grow from that as you move forward in your life. You also might ask yourself the next time that you have to do something courageous,

What lessons can your current situation teach you about the future so that whatever it is that you have to show up for, you can take whatever you learned today and apply it tomorrow or the next day. Okay. I think that's it. At this point, you have everything you need to go forth and do courageous things or whatever

as I mentioned early on, to not do things, but to not do things courageously. If you think of other things that might be helpful in terms of acting courageously, I would love to know what you come up with. So feel free to email me. My email is neilius, N-E-I-L-I-U-S, at neilsatin.com. And mostly, I would love to hear from you with stories of your courageous action.

So please send me an email. Let me know. Were you able to put these steps into practice? And what did you do? What did you do that was, or what did you say that took courage? And how did it go? I want to know. As I look back over the past year,

Few years, actually over the past decade and maybe even over the course of my life, I can see that there are times that I've had to make really courageous choices that have gone well. I have seen other times that I wasn't quite prepared and that didn't go so well. And overall, what I recognize is that for me, anyway, the quality of my life has really improved significantly.

by my willingness to listen to my internal compass about what's required in a given moment, to recognize when I'm feeling afraid of doing things or saying things that I know I have to do or say, and finding ways to do them and finding ways to get better at it. And that is what I wanted to share with you and to leave you with here at the end of 2021.

I will see you next year in 2022. And I hope that this episode helps strengthen you with whatever courageous action lies ahead. In the meantime, take care, be well, and I will be with you soon. ♪

So