Blood & Ink: The Year of Courage

Jesse Itzler posted his ‘word of the year’…

His is DOMINATE. For the last 5 years, it’s been SOUL.

That sounds fun! Alright, I’ll bite…

“What’s the word I want to carry with me every day this year?”

COURAGE.

At each moment, in every domain, and across my life writ large, I want to step back and ask “What is the most courageous move I could make right now?” and DO IT.

It pains me to say that I am not, at this moment, 100% confident in my ability to do that. To identify the MOST courageous move, and act on it without hesitation. Maybe I’m being too hard on myself, maybe my standards are too high, but I felt disappointed admitting that.

I did an exercise yesterday: I wrote down a bunch of domains (health, work projects, relationships, possibilities) and asked myself what the most courageous thing I could do for each of them was, and listed them out.

The results shocked me.

Simultaneously empowering and terrifying. The vision of my life if I did all of that was amazing. It was also terrifying because it showed me—clearly and without wiggle room—where I am still playing it small in life, how I’m operating out of fear or comfort instead of courage.

But that’s the nature of this exercise.

To train the muscle so it becomes second nature. So it’s not a question of which path to take, the default path becomes the path of courage.

So that’s where we are right now. The Year of Courage.

What’s your word for the year? Let me know and I’ll hold you to it. :)

Love and power,
EB