Background photo by Zdeněk Macháček on Unsplash.

Bravery is the ability to follow your bliss and make no excuses for that.

Bravery, Brilliance and RuPaul Charles | On the Spot | TED

This video dropped in my feed when I needed it the most.

I was going through a dark night of the soul, and had just done a tarot reading where I'd asked the question, "Am I delusional?" and the final card of the spread was Courage.

I had cried when that final card unfolded on my tabletop, for I had asked for it to be made clear if I should turn around now, or proceed as my heart and spirit were telling me to do—or not do, as it were.

"Be brave," I heard my higher guidance whisper. "You know what to do."

"But what does being brave even mean? What do I do?" I asked.

Silence. I wiped my tears away with a tissue and fought not to sulk or sink deeper into despair.

I suddenly remembered a video I'd discovered a few weeks earlier by an amazing creator Nneka Julia, entitled You should start again., and I hopped onto YouTube to find and rewatch it but as I opened my app, there was RuPaul's video waiting for me.

Synchronicity. I had to click it.

And then I cried some more.

Define bravery. I think bravery is the ability to follow your bliss and make no excuses for that, alright?

To follow your bliss.

What if your bliss goes against everything you are taught you need to do in order to survive in this world?
What if following your bliss is a sure ticket to being judged as insane and delusional?

I can almost hear RuPaul saying, "Make no excuses, honey ✨!"

Hence: Bravery.

The Oxford Dictionary of English defines brave as ready to face and endure danger or pain; showing courage.

One of the biggest myths I feel we have been sold is that if we play the "rules" right, we will be assured certainty and security. That is bullshit.

No great revelation here, but I have viscerally learnt that there are no guarantees either way. Follow our bliss or not, we will encounter the suffering of uncertainty.

Bliss is not immunity against uncertainty. Neither is it a guarantee for any material things: Abundance, success, reputation. Bliss guarantees only itself.

I wrote the following to a friend:

Which price do I want to pay?

Because either way, we have to pay. Suffering cannot be avoided.

We might as well pay the one we won't regret when we are on our deathbed.

Even if it goes against everything we are taught by culture as right, respectable and safe.

Hence: Bravery.