I was asking myself this question recently. And I realised that there were two perspectives to this – outside and within.

To the outside world, courage is seeing someone standing up for herself and her beliefs in the face of opposition; doing the right thing even if it means taking the hard road.

But the person standing up doesn’t see courage, only feels it. It is not a singular emotion but a tug of war between conflicting ones. And it never feels right at the beginning. How can it when all you see is disbelief, disappointment, anger and blame in the eyes of the people you love and respect? But amidst all that negativity, you will hear a feeble voice from within telling you that this feels right. It is important to listen and hold on to it because that will eventually become your rock against the deluge of negativity that will come raining down on you.

The world only sees courage after the fledgling sapling has grown into a strong tree with deep-seated roots. During that interim time, what you will feel is not courage, but rather the lack of enough of it. You will feel doubt, guilt, shame, self-loathing and hopelessness. But listening to that inner voice will also give you a sense of peace and rightness. You need to nurture it so it can put out its roots. And if you are lucky, you will have the support of a few to deepen those roots.

Standing up doesn’t look like courage at the start. It feels more wrong than right. The only thing that feels worse is not standing up.