Following on from my post about non-conformity, I’ve
been thinking more about bravery, and what it looks like. The reason for this: recently
in my part of the world there was a news story about the survivors of the
December 2014 Sydney Siege possibly receiving bravery medals as recognition of
their ordeal. This sparked some public debate, with a prominent politician
suggesting simply being a victim of crime, as horrific as this event was,
didn’t come under the banner of bravery, and that medals should be reserved for
extraordinary acts of heroism. I’ve no intention of wading into that particular
debate, but I would like to riff on what the word ‘bravery’ actually describes,
and whether I need to reframe my understanding of this powerful word.
To me, bravery is in the everyday choices we make to
overcome Fear. The unfit woman who chooses to go to that gym class even though
her inner-saboteur is telling her it won’t make any difference. The journalist
who conducts interviews every day despite a stutter occasionally sneaking in
and testing his composure. My sister, who is disabled, and dyes her hair blood
red – because, she reasons, people are staring at her anyway.
I’ll never forget a conversation I once had with a
friend who had thrown in her six-figure-salary job in IT to go to medical school for six years,
which made her a poor student until she was well into her 30s. I told her I
thought she was incredibly courageous, and her response floored me. She
remarked that it wasn’t an act of bravado but of desperation. She had been
miserable and felt she simply could not continue to live the way she had been
living. I thought she had made a brave choice; she felt she had had no choice
at all. As I pointed out to her, plenty of people feel disappointed with their
lives but do nothing about it. They decide to accept the status quo rather than
take the gamble of changing it. Deciding to make a change is brave, and worthy
of applause.