The Brave Cowards
I recently finished a book called “Origin”
by author Dan Brown which stars his favorite hero the Symbologist Robert
Langdon. Langdon is not your conventional hero who goes all out swinging right
from the first page. He is far more realistic and like the majority of us
someone who survives (shivering and cursing) being thrust into situations not
of his making. He admits his lack of guts and never hesitates to use his brain
instead of brawn. And it’s refreshing to
read about a mainstream character from a bestselling author who refuses to be
brave all the time. Most literary heroes would never admit to any doubts about
their lack of guts. Offhand I can’t recall a single major character from any
bestseller who admits to fear or acts a coward, without a redemption story. If
at all a character is written like that- he becomes a side-kick or comedy
relief like Neville Longbottom of the Harry Potter series who ends up becoming
a brave heart (of course) by the end of book in a mandatory plot twist. All of which
made me wonder whether bravery is synonymous with courage? And my conclusion
was that both are as different as chalk and cheese and I will now explain why,
in a long blog post guaranteed to bore you to tears.
In my younger days (damn…those feel
like eons ago) I used to watch a cartoon series on Tv called “Courage the
cowardly dog”. It was one of my favorites along with Oggy and the cockroaches, Heidi
and Chotta Bhim. Anyway the premise of the show was that the dog Courage,
contrary to his name, was a bit of a coward and afraid of pretty much everything
under the sun. But as luck (bad luck) would have it, in every episode he would
have to face one of his worst fears and battle it to save his beloved owner.
The moral of the cartoon series was on how love (for others) makes us conquer
our worst fears and act courageously. One of my takeaways from the ‘toon was
that no matter how much of a coward you are, sometimes you just have to stand
your ground and face your fears without retreating. The reason may be
immaterial but when you have no option to run and hide you are called brave and
only you know the true extent of your knees quaking under the table. Which
brings me to the concept of bravery.
When people say so and so is brave
what I assume is that the said person is fearless and has always been fearless
and has a track record of being fearless. These must be exceptionally gifted
people who have never seen failure I suppose. Or never ever entertain the
thought of failure in their lives. Their confidence in themselves, courtesy
their upbringing or maybe their socio-economic status or their lifestyle, must
brook no option of their even losing or being humiliated in public or god
forbid getting maimed in limb or life. But unfortunately for average people
like you and I with normal middle class upbringing there is no such
over-arching self confidence in our success rates. We are the ones who have
been trained to walk on pavements, look both ways on the road before crossing
even if it’s a zebra crossing with red lights on etc. We are psychologically
trained to admit that shit happens in our lives despite our best precautions.
For us it’s never a question of being brave all the time – there is no absence
of fear from our lives where it lurks just under the surface. It’s merely a
fact of conquering fear enough to step out and do what is necessary despite
admitting that our best may not be enough and the probability is great that we are
going to fail. And that’s why I rate courageous people better than brave
people. It’s easier to accomplish things in the absence of fear, but conquering
fear? Ha… that takes a lot of courage.
To end this post, I would like to
paraphrase a quote from Tolkien “the bravest step he took was the first one
from his doorstep”. Indeed, for a hobbit the fear of leaving the safety of his
snug house must have looked more daunting than facing those orcs or beasts or
even the might of mordor. And likewise every step we take out of our houses in
the morning is a badge of courage for all of us naturally cowardly people.
Would you agree?
