A Profile in Courage

(from Nancy LeTourneau - "2013 Most Memorable Moments")

The above picture is of Antoinette Tuff who talked down a solo gunman with an AK-47 in a Georgia school this last August. I can't embed the video Nancy links to in her blog, so here's the link to the video. If you have the time, listen to it - an extraordinary profile in courage.

What do you hear? Here's what I hear:

• Antoinette tells us she was terrified, though you can't sense this in the calm, strong-voiced way she tells her story.
• She "anchors herself" in her sense of God, using the words of her preacher as guide. In other words, she directs her attention and energy to something strong and transcendent, leaving little room in her consciousness for fear or felt helplessness.
• She also grounds herself in Love - for the 800 "babies" in the school.
• The gunman is not the "enemy"; he is a sad and wounded soul. She shares her own story of despair and then recovery, telling him repeatedly that this same hope can be his too. Her words are not from some Emergency Procedures Manual. Nor are they a lecture. They come from her place of pain, felt very recently, so they ring true to the gunman. They are her words, but because they are "real", they are also his.
• In this connection, they recognize each other as brother and sister.

Are you capable of such courage? Yes, if you -

• are fully responsible for your emotions and where you choose to place your attention
• love others and honor yourself
• can embrace your own pain and also see it in others
• can stop thinking and be present

Another "self-test", this one in poetic form, is the call to authenticity embedded in the following poem:

SELF-PORTRAIT

It doesn’t interest me if there is one God

or many gods.

I want to know if you belong or feel

abandoned.

If you know despair or can see it in others.

I want to know

if you are prepared to live in the world

with is harsh need

to change you. If you can look back

with firm eyes

saying this is where I stand. I want to know

if you know

how to melt into that fierce heat of living

falling toward

the center of your longing. I want to know

if you are willing

to live, day by day, with the consequence of love

and the bitter

unwanted passion of your sure defeat.

I have been told, in that fierce embrace, even

the gods speak of God.

By David Whyte

From Fire in the Earth

If you can live "in that fierce embrace", with true authenticity, you will always have the courage you need.