Brave in action is a running series I want to start here. A highlight of real events and people, working out their brave in both extraordinary as well as very ordinary ways.
A while back I was listening to an interesting podcast with Michael Hyatt and Stu McClaren where they were discussing the concept of exercising your “brave” muscle. An idea I was tossing around recently, as well. More on that here.
Anyway, in the podcast they discuss the importance of putting yourself in situations that require you to be brave. The idea here is that the mental fortitude and courage that gets you through this helps you develop a track record and builds confidence to do it again. In essence, you’re working out your brave muscle.
I get this. It makes sense to me. And the very next day I got the opportunity to “work out” with my ten year old.
Recently, my son had a little wart form on the top of his foot. I remember having a wart show up on my arm when I was a kid and my mom threw some Neosporin-looking cream on it along with a band-aid and boom, it was gone. End of story.
So, armed with that memory I stopped by the pharmacy hoping to find the same cure for my son and instead found only an aerated freeze it off solution. Which I bought. And it didn’t go over very well. I’ll spare you those details.
Anyhow, we resorted to plan B; let the doc take care of it.
A couple weeks later, the day of the appointment, I casually mentioned to my son that we’d be leaving for the doctor’s office in an hour or two. And he was less than thrilled. More like, he was angry. And he stormed off to his bedroom.
Apparently, “Surprise! We get to go to the doctor and freeze off (dig out?) that extra little piece of you” was not his idea of a good time.
So I gave him some time to process and then I went and sat on his bed to talk through it with him. The Hyatt and McClaren podcast still fresh in my mind, I talked about exercising our brave muscles. I tried to answer his questions honestly. I told him it’s okay to be a little scared but he had a choice as to what he wanted to do with his fear. And we talked about punching fear in the face. And we prayed.
I wish I could say when I left his room he was throwing punches and ready to fight, but this is real life. He was still sulking.
Eventually he came out of his room though. And when we were loading up to head to the clinic he said, “I’m not worried about it anymore, mom. Sorry I was acting like that”. This sweet boy, caught between big kid and little, melts my heart. Of course there was no reason to be sorry. We’re working this out, together.
There are always two choices as to how we are going to deal with the stuff that scares us, fear or faith. This boy? He made his choice.
So we go see the doc. And it turns out, to our surprise, that freezing a wart off isn’t the only option. The lesser option (a topical medication derived from the “blister beetle”, which is pretty fascinating when you are 10. Who am I kidding, I was fascinated and I’m…not ten!) is pretty much painless.
Here’s my favorite part of the entire story. After the doc gave us our options and my son promptly opted for the painless one, the doc left the room to grab what he needed. And as soon as he did my son let out a huge sigh and said, “well, that was a waste!”
“What?” I asked, “What was a waste?”
“Fretting. Fretting was a waste.” Light bulb moment for that kid!
And then, trying to wring all the truth I could out of this teaching moment, I told him that fretting is always, always a waste. It produces nothing, fixes nothing.
But brave? That choice is pure brilliance. That choice matters for today and for tomorrow. That choice begins the precedent in his mind for every decision he will make in the future. One small step. One good workout.
And then when he got home he told his younger siblings about it. Walking about an inch taller than he was a few hours earlier, he had gained confidence in choosing brave. And his brave was bleeding out to the little people around him.
See how that works? People are watching. Brave is contagious.
It’s funny the life lessons you can learn from a wart. And a 10 year old who chooses brave.
