Is it possible to acquire courage if you don’t have it? I was moved by the recent story of the Australian boy who swam to land for several hours in rough waters to raise the alarm that his mother and siblings had been swept out to sea. Despite his exhaustion, he then ran several kilometres to find a phone.
But I’m also thinking of the lesser demands for courage – such as standing up to a friend, or family member, or tackling a company that’s ignoring your polite requests when you’re suffering from its actions. Or I also wonder how people do certain jobs that, to me, require buckets of courage: starting a business or any other sort of professional risk-taking; reporting from a war zone like Lyse Doucet or Jeremy Bowen. Or just being a police officer knocking on the door of a suspect and not knowing what is on the other side.
Austin Appelbee, right, with his brother, Beau, left, his mother, Joanne, and sister Grace, in Gidgegannup, Australia, after Austin swam to raise the alarm for his family earlier this year. Photograph: Briana Shepherd/AP
What brings courage in all these situations, and if you don’t have it, can you get it? Sam, Exeter, Devon
Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com.
Readers reply
Courage is more a decision than anything else, especially the first time. That old saying, “Feel the fear and do it anyway” is important. You don’t need courage if you’re not afraid, so don’t wait for the fear to go before you try. The first time is the hardest, then you start to realise the sky doesn’t fall in, and it gets easier and easier.
I started out really shy. Essentially, I still am. But I learned to refuse to be pushed around, to challenge people, to write really good, logical letters to companies who tried to mess me around. You can do all these things quite gently. There’s no need to be loud or angry. Just realising that quietly stating your case can move mountains is liberating. LorLala
Ask the Dutch … MarkHainge
I believe it’s available in liquid form. eibhear
It comes from realising, and focusing on, the fact that another person or the moral value of something is bigger than yourself. In that moment you don’t matter. Jane123
Marcus Aurelius: “You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength.” “If it’s humanly possible, know that you can do it.”
Fear as a necessity … scaffolders at work. Photograph: Ceri Breeze/Alamy
When I was scaffolder, the boss asked if I was afraid. I said: “Yes.” He said: “Good man, I don’t want to work up there with someone who’s not afraid since they are very dangerous to be around but, rather, someone who can temper the fear with courage.” FreddyStEadygow
That’s the sort of bold question I’d be afraid to ask. sparklesthewonderhen
Hopefully I can. Will keep you posted. Nextsteps
I’m not sure courage is the appropriate word for the examples in the article. Preparation and practice are important. There are still nerves, obviously, but training lets you deal with them. For example, making a public music performance (especially a solo one) is scary. And it never stops being that. However, I look through my practice notes, and my post-event write-up and I see that every time I am ready to piss in my pants beforehand. But I rely on my training. Windyday
Nothing physically happens for one to “gain” courage; you relinquish the egoic structure that requires protection. The distinction between courage and grit is the difference between wisdom and willpower. shakercoola
I once knew a guy who wouldn’t get on a rollercoaster, citing the very few times they have resulted in deaths. Yet he experimented wildly with drugs, which is more risky. He could not assess the risks of each activity accurately because one did not give him pleasure and the other did. lmllr1
Can you acquire courage? Yes, I think we can see that happening all around us as people age and mature and begin to question their own worlds. It takes courage to fire the boss, toss toxic friends, dump the spouse, trade in the car for a bicycle, let the hair go grey, ignore the spurious claims of “health” and “beauty” marketeers and advertising in general and, “to thine own self, be true”. Oikaze
A mother who’s son was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross was once asked to define courage. She simply said that courage was about caring more for others than one did for oneself. Jima19
Never underestimate “challenge” in forming those who run towards trouble, who take on things bigger than themselves. If you survive the worst that can happen – caregiver abuse, trauma of all kinds – some survivors go on to “extend their hand” and take risks on behalf of others, on behalf of the underdog. Being a trauma survivor often results in “courage” which is really a refusal to give in to outside pressure. foxinwinter
My ancient Greek philosophy lecturer told us she’d once set an exam where one of the questions (alluding to one of Plato’s plays) was: “What is courage?” One of her students wrote nothing except “PTO” on the bottom of every page of his answer booklet, and on the final line of the final page, wrote: “This is.”
Courage is something you practise and hone. That creates a reaction in you that it will feel better to act than to stand by. Do something small that takes courage every week and you will start to learn that action generates good feelings. That way, when you are faced with danger you are more likely to act than freeze. As the saying goes: shit your pants and do it anyway. Most people we view as brave don’t necessarily feel that way about themselves. 1mikegardner7
Mstyslav Chernov, Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and director of 20 Days in Mariupol on an assignment for Associated Press in Sloviansk, Donetsk, Ukraine, in 2023. Photograph: Anastasia Vlasova/The Guardian
Yes, especially under fire. Adrenaline is a very powerful hormone and plays an essential role in the fight-or-flight response by increasing blood flow to muscles and assisting our cognitive processing and decision-making. Sagarmatha1953
Courage in the battlefield comes from accepting that you are already dead. Courage in the face of the true reality of the human condition and our inevitable animal death is the greatest, most elusive prize of all, a lifelong practice to get anywhere near acquiring, and carries the real risk of descending into open psychosis. The best method I know of is contemplation and reading: Kierkegaard, Freud and the post-Freudians, the poets, Péguy, Tolstoy, et al. tinears
Courage v resilience v innate personal nature? Courage is evocative. Resilience is experiential. Innate personal nature is routine. snazpizaz2
True courage often comes from having no other choice. Sink or swim. Our first baby died in 2018. Someone said to me: “I couldn’t live if that happened to me. I don’t know how you find the courage to go on.”
But, the truth is, if you choose to live (as I did, thankfully) you have to find the courage. I’m now a funeral celebrant and the skill set required presents externally as courage, but it’s simply solidarity and support for those who are now the ones with no choice but to be courageous. Lucy_Biggs_
Necessity, as they say, is the mother of invention. Dorkalicious
Having had no other choice but to keep going in the face of tremendous difficulty, courage has always shown up. What else am I going to do? Collapse in a heap and wait for a nonexistent saviour? It’s about keeping going, despite everything. GrasmereGardens
On the path to courage with yoga … Photograph: Sergei Chaiko/Alamy
If you think that you cannot do something, eg hold a handstand, then find that you can, this can help to develop courage, so that maybe you’ll try a headstand. Always with an experienced and highly trained yoga teacher by your side, of course. yogainspain
It’s a pity that only a tiny handful of politicians managed to, in standing up to the general benign acceptance of current world events. woodworm20
Yes. I’d gathered in military training a sort of controlled “courage” in the form of “courage within boundaries”. I found myself being courageous beyond my expectations and training when someone was trying to off me. DrJWCC
You can put yourself in situations out of your comfort zone. They turn out not to be as bad as you think most of the time, and you can go a bit further the next time. Till you reach a point where somebody remarks how brave you were. Moving to a foreign country, for example. PeteTheBeat
There is a story of a student sitting a final English exam. The essay title was Courage. The student thought about it and wrote this: “Courage, is this …” then left the exam hall. Can that courage be learned? Kieran, by email
A very timely question in a world of climate disasters, pandemics and oligarchs who can afford underground shelters where they can hide their gold, freeze their bodies after death for future revival, and don’t give a damn for the rest of us who daily and courageously want to survive and help others who help us. As Marcus Aurelius once wrote, “A good disposition is invincible.” RP Orlando, by email
