Courage – The Great Differentiator

Courage is the great differentiator. It separates Leaders from wannabes, Managers from almost-winners. Yet we each have the opportunity to be courageous regardless of our title, our role, our history, our circumstances. This blog muses on some different kinds of courage you may experience, and invites you to accept and celebrate each opportunity to display courage.

1. Blind Courage is the unthinking courage exhibited in emergency situations, particularly when a loved one is in danger. Generally, it’s an immediate, unthinking and urgent response to circumstances.
2. Faith is the kind of courage which helps people persevere and have hope despite the circumstances. Having faith gives us the hope to get trying, to keep getting better, to look to a brighter future, a bigger and better outcome.
3. Responsive Courage to an Imminent Threat involves understanding current and future circumstances and bravely taking action to address an inevitable, predictable threat.
4. Responsive Courage to a Perceived Threat is also about preparing for a difficult event, but it’s an event which may or may not happen, but there’s dread that it *might* happen.
5. Responsive Courage to a Future Threat is about taking courageous measures for an event which would take place in the future.
6. Conditional Courage means that you could be courageous under specific circumstances -maybe it’s when you’re engaging in a specific sport, or maybe you’re more brave when you are working with specific others or working on specific types of projects.
7. Qualified Courage is the type of courage you feel when you’ve earned or learned or done something which makes you feel confident enough to or qualified enough to perform a risky task which takes skill, education and talent.
8. Authoritative Courage is the courage assigned to someone who has adopted a specific role. Sometimes there’s training involved, as for soldiers or policemen and firemen, and sometimes there isn’t much training involved, when you’re a parent for example.
9. Situational Courage is when someone tends to be more courageous under specific circumstances. For example, as I’m both a weak skier and a weak diver, I would never volunteer to rescue anyone on the slopes or in deep waters.
10. Integrated Courage is a blend of the types of courage listed above, and other types not mentioned. Having a courageous mindset makes you more likely to choose courage and stand out in a good way. Understanding that there are many different kinds of courage will help you be more open to accepting the courage of others, and displaying some courage yourself.

Be Bold. Be Different. Be Courageous.

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