The Thing About Being Brave

The thing about being brave is, you can never go back. you can look back, but never retry or repeat.
the roller coaster ride that never loops back around.

Tonight it's raining, dark, thunder and lightning.

"I don't wonder, when it thunders, if I'm safe in Daddy's arms." *

But I do wonder, when I take risks, if I've made a huge mistake

But that's the thing about being brave, you can't hit "Redo".

We use the sound of thunder that follows a flash of lightning to measure how far away the lightning is.

And maybe, in some strange way, I use the magnitude of my heart's quaking to measure the height from which I jump each time I take a risk.

"You are so brave!" my friend said to me this week, "You talk about stuff, and then you actually do it! You take the risk, and it is such an encouragement to me, to see you stepping out in love and risking it all."

I sometimes feel brave, and mostly I feel foolish. Sometimes, I even feel a slight pang of regret.

But if thunder reminds me of how close I am in my Daddy's arms. Perhaps I can learn to feel the same with each new cliff I jump, and step I take, toward a braver and more risky me.

Because, I would much rather live life doing all the things that fear tries to hold me back from, and feel the fragility of my heartbeats, then reach the end of my days and realize, I have yet to live.

*lyrics from When It Thunders by Jason Upton