How To Practice Ordinary Courage

Summer Reading Series - Article #3

Dear Worthy Woman,

Welcome to the third installment of the Woke Up Worthy summer reading series, a curated retrospective of some of my most meaningful blog posts.

While the first two posts of this series sat with the weight of oppression. This one is about a practice I use to find freedom in spite of it: ordinary courage.

Brené Brown said it best when she described courage as “Choos[ing] the great adventure of being brave and afraid at the exact same time.”

Ordinary courage isn’t the movie moment. The mic doesn’t drop. The local news doesn’t feature you in today’s top stories. Ordinary courage means taking the next right step toward your goals, even when you can’t clearly see the end of the path, even when you know what those actions might cost you.

It looks like sending the email you’ve drafted four times. Setting the boundary with the relative who’s used to you folding. Saying “I don’t know” in a meeting where you’re supposed to have all the answers.

For those of us who grew up believing we have to work twice as hard to get half as much and drip Black Girl Magic at all times, ordinary courage asks us to be human instead of superhuman, to achieve without the cape.

When we practice courage, we practice the willingness to keep choosing ourselves in a world that keeps asking us to choose everyone else first. I hope you enjoy this post.

In power and solidarity,
Toya

Dear Worthy Woman,

I’m back.

My family and I moved and are settling into a routine in our new city. About 80% of our boxes are unpacked, which feels good enough. Buying all the gear necessary to handle the ice and cold of an East Coast winter? The jury is still out on that.

As we ease into this new space, I’ve been thinking about how I want this year to unfold.

I considered vision boarding or choosing a word for the year to anchor my goal-setting. But every time I sit down to make headway, my mind circles back to the songs from Frozen (both I and II) that have been on repeat in my house for weeks.

One of Baby Girl’s favorites is “Show Yourself,” and the pertinent lyrics are:

Show yourself. I’m dying to meet you. Show yourself. It’s your turn. You are the one you’ve been waiting for all of your life.

I wish someone had told me that when I was younger. That I am the one I’ve been waiting for. That no one else will build the life I want. No one is coming to save me.

Finding the right partner won’t do it. Getting the right job or putting the right politician in office won’t do it either. For the life I wanted, the community I craved, the family dynamics I envisioned, I was going to have to show myself the way.

And I did.

I envisioned a future that didn’t exist, moved toward it, even when others couldn’t see it, and made my way here to this life—the one I envisioned almost a decade ago.

Living this life is so much better than I imagined, and I’m grateful every day. So now, as I turn the page to a new year, I’m left questioning: What will my next vision be? Where do I want my life to go in the next decade? And how will it happen in the context of our current political, environmental, economic, and global realities?

Those are big questions I don’t have answers to. I’m not sure I ever will. What I do have is advice from another Frozen song:

I won’t look too far ahead. It’s too much for me to take. But break it down to this next breath. This next step. This next choice is one that I can make…and do the next right thing.

Over the holidays, I caught up with friends I hadn’t seen in a while. With two different groups, the same theme emerged. One friend said, “What I admire about you is that you’ll just try it. You’ll give it a go and see what happens.” Another said, “You believe you can do anything you set your mind to, even if it won’t be perfect.”

My ability to receive compliments aside, I had to sit with what they were saying. Because my willingness to go for things, even when I’m not the best or don’t know where to start, isn’t something that came naturally. I had to cultivate a spirit of being brave enough to take the next right step, even when I didn’t know how I would get to the ultimate goal.

I had to learn to just do the next right thing to move forward. And I had to be intentional about showing myself compassion so that even when I get it wrong, when I disappoint myself or others, I still believe I am deserving. I still know I am worthy.

The person who gets the life they want isn’t the one who has the best strategy or gets it right every time. It’s the one who keeps moving forward even when they only know the next step.

So, in this moment as I start to set my goals for this new year, the next right thing is to write about Disney songs, even though it feels a bit embarrassing and cringey to do so. Those songs have been circling in my head for a reason. And as I write this, the step that comes after this one has already come into focus.

No one said the next right thing would be easy or unembarrassing. You just have to be willing to do it.

So here is my question for you:

If you were going to show yourself to yourself this year and really go for it, what is the next right step for you? (Could this be it btw?)

Let me know in the comments. Let’s support one another there.

In power and solidarity,

Toya

Do you know what your gut is even telling you? In The Decision Hour, I will help you make choices about what you want instead of who you think you should be. Book your private session here.