With One Hand Waving Free

Lately the word “Brave” has been floating around in the recesses of my mind. It’s wafting about like a speck of dust on a sunbeam, or a balloon in an air-conditioning draft. It’s bumping about, touching on memories, last looks, final hugs, sunrises, cups of coffee, and the thumping of feet on the pavement at the park. Do I consider myself brave? Nah. Not on any given day.

I saw the movie Brave. I kind of thought the protagonist was a little rebellious and the floaty-glowy-ball-light-fairies were a tad unrealistic. In my daily life, there are absolutely no floaty-glowy-ball-light-fairies hovering about, tempting me to follow them. That would actually make things quite a bit easier than they are. Instead, I related more to the mother character in the movie, and understand feeling more bear than bonnie lass.

Is “brave” a warrior, a champion, who fights to the death in arenas when there is no other choice than to thrust  defiant fists into the air? Is being brave challenging “fate”? Is being brave a puffing out of the chest, a brandishing of the sword? Is it brave to just open your eyes in the morning and consider getting out of bed?

The dictionary first puts the word Brave in the adjective category. It is: 1) possessing or exhibiting courage or courageous endurance; 2) making a fine appearance. Then as a noun it is 1) a brave person,  2) a warrior, especially among North American Indian tribes; and 3) a bully; a boast or challenge.  As a verb used with objects, it means 1) to meet or face courageously: to brave misfortunes; 2) to defy; challenge; dare, and 3) to make splendid.

Stick with me here.

Synonyms:
1.  bold, intrepid, daring, dauntless, heroic. Brave, courageous, valiant, fearless, gallant refer to confident bearing in the face of difficulties or dangers. ‘Brave’ is the most comprehensive: it is especially used of that confident fortitude or daring that actively faces and endures anything threatening. ‘Courageous’ implies a higher or nobler kind of bravery, especially as resulting from an inborn quality of mind or spirit that faces or endures perils or difficulties without fear and even with enthusiasm. ‘Valiant’ implies a correspondence between an inner courageousness and external deeds, particularly of physical strength or endurance. ‘Fearless’ implies unflinching spirit and coolness in the face of danger. ‘Gallant’ implies a chivalrous, impetuous, or dashing bravery.

Antonyms:
1.  cowardly.


Is picking up my husband’s socks and underwear from the closet floor considered brave? I venture to say yes. Is killing a spider, when there’s no one else around to kill it, brave? Again, it is a two-armed mortal against an eight-limbed demon, and hence therefore deserves the label of dauntless.

What if there’s a fear of something greater, of a severe earth shift, of loss? What if there is an ongoing season of goodbyes and what's left is rather sadness than gumption? What if the heavy is also dark?

“It is awfully hard to be brave, when you're only a Very Small Animal.”
- A. A. Milne (Winnie-The-Pooh)

In these shifting sands, I often feel like a Very Small Animal, just one pinpoint among the many, many stars. The reality is that I am not invincible, dreams shift and shatter, and yellow-brick roads sometimes lead to dead ends. Sometimes life is a quick drop, a sudden stop. And what do we do? We can look up into the blue sky and wonder who is watching. We can glance over our shoulders to see if anybody saw when we fell down and skinned our knees. We can wipe away that glimmer of a tear because there just isn’t time right now.

I have always liked the movie Elizabethtown. It is the story of a man whose great invention at a shoe company craters and he is fired; while he rigs a contraption to commit suicide, his sister calls to inform him that his father had a heart attack and died. Yeah yeah, it sounds sad, whatever. This is the platform from which he falls, however, and the audience takes the journey with him, facing failure and its wretched aftermath, burial, crazy extended family, intense sorrow, regret, new love, and fresh beginnings.

“You have five minutes to wallow in the delicious misery,” Claire Colburn says in a note to Drew Baylor. “Enjoy it, embrace it, discard ...and proceed.”

“Sadness is easier because it's surrender. I say, make time to dance alone with one hand waving free.”

I think the writers of this story understood sadness and its toll. We see Drew dancing under a grove of shade trees after scattering some of his dad’s ashes along the road. He cries; sometimes you can dance and cry at the same time, and it’s more about being in the moment than searching for triumph.

And one quote Claire gives to Drew, which sits on a back shelf of my mind for those difficult days when I really don’t want to do the laundry but the closet is stinky so it’s either my nose or my sanity, and sometimes my nose wins…..

Claire says, “We are intrepid. We carry on.”

When I first heard that word in the film, and taking the context of that moment, for some reason I assumed the word ‘intrepid,’ meant something like ‘long-suffering’ or some glorious, persevering, walking word. You know -- a word that has to do with walking long distances. I know; my vocabulary should be better. Sometimes it is. But today as I looked up synonyms with ‘brave,’ there appeared the word, ‘intrepid.’ Ah, then. Intrepid means ‘fearless and bold.’ Plucky. Dauntless. Resolute.

We are intrepid. We carry on.

Is a person just brave when he needs to be? How does bravery – courage – makes itself present and perfect? Does it count to be brave if you really don’t want to be? What if you have the opportunity to walk away and live, when walking toward the object of fear could mean death or intense loneliness? What if you have to make the decision on your own?

“David also said to Solomon his son, ‘Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the LORD God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you.’”
 1 Chronicles 28:20

That one sums about all of it up. It works for any problem, any situation. God will not fail or leave. Be strong, be courageous, do the work.

How do I know if it’s supposed to be my work? What if I’m just putting that pressure on myself?


I don’t know.


“Even cowards can endure hardship; only the brave can endure suspense.”
~ Mignon McLaughlin

“Living by faith includes the call to something greater than cowardly self-preservation.”
~ J.R.R. Tolkien

“We have to be braver than we think we can be, because God is constantly calling us to be more than we are.”
~ Madeleine L'Engle

“Our fate lives in us. You only have to be brave enough to see it.”
~ Pixar’s “Brave”

I don’t know or attribute much to ‘fate’ and its friends. But there is a journey, a path, a web, a plotline, through which we travel while on this earth. What I’m starting to see is that the more difficult the landscape, the more I see of my true self. I see the selfish flippancy, the materialistic cravings, the immature belief. I see the shaking flesh, the whimpering muscles. Through the emptying out there is an instigation of firmness within me; as the complaining sifts out like powdery flour, a more solid hand forms a tangible faith. You see, I am petty, I am weak. I am late, I am clumsy, I am dubious. But the God who made me has me here to learn more about his security. He is secure, he is Always. He is intrepid.

But I don’t always know his plan, and that kind of makes my heart four-cups-of-coffee jittery.  

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
~ Winston Churchill

“Bran thought about it. 'Can a man still be brave if he's afraid?'
'That is the only time a man can be brave,' his father told him.”
~ George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones

“Before I knew you, I thought brave was not being afraid. You've taught me that bravery is being terrified and doing it anyway.”
~ Laurell K. Hamilton, Blood Noir

So, maybe, sticking around counts as bravery. Not everyone sticks around.

“I think laughter may be a form of courage. As humans we sometimes stand tall and look into the sun and laugh, and I think we are never more brave than when we do that.”
- Linda Ellerbee

Let’s refer back to the synonyms of brave: “‘Courageous’ implies a higher or nobler kind of bravery, especially as resulting from an inborn quality of mind or spirit that faces or endures perils or difficulties without fear and even with enthusiasm.”

Facing the changes in life, just by walking through them, counts as bravery. Humans are flawed, containing an inborn quality of mind and spirit that will endure peril and difficulty. Can we face our flaws without fear? Can we face the cold winter, the bare tree branches and hardened earth? Can we face this with enthusiasm? What if our biggest challenge lies within us?

“It is easy to be brave from a safe distance.”
~ Aesop

Claire: “You want to be really great? Then have the courage to fail big and stick around. Make them wonder why you're still smiling. That's true greatness to me.”

“Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.”
Psalm 43:5

He is the Everlasting, the hope and the healer. If our God is for us, then who can stop us?

As a child of the King, there is no logical, physical, or mental reason not to be brave. His spirit is in me.  He rescues me every morning, every sunset, every spider, every sprained ankle, every bruised ego. He makes me courageous, if only I will let him make me fearless. It’s my choice to give in to the sadness or ask him for a little more strength.

“And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” ~ Philippians 4:19

His riches are more than just padded bank accounts, stacks of gold bars, and stock market dividends. His riches are strength for the weary, comfort, fullness of heart, mercy, seeing Him, peace, and inheriting the kingdom of heaven. His gifts are close hugs, warm beds, gut-clutching laughter, cloudless skies, and the soft whispering of the stars.

His reward is his presence.

I think I can be brave so long as he’s holding my hand. Then I can make time to dance along with my other hand waving free.


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<http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/brave?s=t> (3 Sept 2012)

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