What does “courage” mean to you?

I’ve recently been developing my meaning of courage, through a variety of memories closely related to shame. Recently, the challenges and the life itself were getting harder on my standpoint, therefore I took it as a call to write this entry.

I’ve discovered what courage looks like to me, not through comfortable and confident times, but through times of uncertainty, shame and self doubt. I would like to share a core memory that affected every area of my life and my self-perception.

Since the age of 18, I have been a casual runner. Just as when you integrate a yoga routine to life and start seeing the effect of it in the most non-yoga parts of your life, running becomes my yoga or more of a better term: my meditation.

This led me to run on the athletics field besides the University I’ve been studying in, anytime I was available: before classes, after classes or at the weekends, before starting the library sessions.

I run a 5k, 10k or a 15k, and stretch before continuing with my day. But as I stopped for stretching, there appear this old man, who reminds me how “false” I was running, how “false” I’ve been stepping, stretching etc. then starts correcting my running form, building a running schedule without having any more information about me. 

He appeared from thin air each time I’ve stopped stretching, he was insisting that I should train in his recommended way. But one day, he made a comment, that echoed in my mind each time I ran. And this comment was:

“You look really funny, you look life you’re suffering while you run!” 

This comment affected every element of running for me from that time on, I was unwilling to step, to go to the athletics field in the first place. It felt like the flame that was burning in me to keep my body and my mind healthy through running has been exhausted.

What has been left was this terrible feeling of pointlessness, shame and doubt.

“Oh no, now everyone else at the field feels sad for me as I look like I’m suffering when I run.” 

and

“Maybe running is not for me, I should not be running on the field unless I’ve correct my ‘suffering-look’ and allow myself to run in public again only when I am able to look as running a 10k is as effortless as shopping and champagne.”

Then I hide myself, I run at nights or early in the mornings when no one else is there.

Why did I hide my efforts? Because I was ashamed of how I look doing things that are not easy for me. I was afraid of how I look. 

Now, at the age of 24, as my thinking breaks free of the tunnel vision that is led by perfectionism, I am able to see the connection between fear and hiding. I believe this connection is such an old one that, it was apparent in the story of creation, in New Testament.

“But God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’

He answered, ‘I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.’”

Here is the click for me: I was afraid so I hid.

I had the same action plan embedded in my mind to hide my efforts in running. I was afraid of how I look, so I hid my process.

Realizing that brought the light to the unconscious shame element I’ve carried with me while showing effort, while failing in public. 

After this super transforming moment of “enlightenment” do I still want to hide, when I run? Yes, I do! 

Even though I’ve passed a solid milestone on my running journey, and completed a half marathon last year, which has been on my wishlist for a long long time, I am still afraid of the “suffering-look” I carry on my face while I run. But do I hide? NO!

I do not hide and run slow on the coastline with a lot of fellow runners who look like they are born to run. I log my super-slow runs on Strava, my failures and low performances too. I still like to get better in running but I realized, this is how the journey to get better in running looks life for me. And this is how I perceive having courage to take action. I am still afraid of my look, my form and I still carry those words with me, but I still do it. Because the love this sport more than the fear I have towards being mocked. And this is brave. 

And now, I have an upcoming trail race on March 24th. The route is 28 kilometers long with a total of almost 1000m elevation gain. The longest I’ve ran so far is 22 kilometers and I am training with 10 and 20k’s. And here is a graphic to express my inner dialog during a training session:

This is the truth of running for me. I run because I love it, but especially, I love to become a better version of myself than the one that stays in a place of fear. Long-training sessions are definitely not in my comfort zone, but they are invaluable ways for me to train doing the hard thing, to train courage and self-belief.

I believe the world is full of the people that practices courage in face of fear, therefore believe we all can address ourselves with the question: “What are the things that I do, while fear is still there?”

On the left, there is a street writing that I encountered while cycling in Austria:

“Lieber brennende Herzen, als erloschene Träume!”

Translating to English, it means:

“Better burning hearts than exhausted dreams!”

For me it means, it is not a walk in the woods to carry a burning heart around but, you prefer the high maintenance of your burning heart than exhausting your dreams to avoid your inner flame!

I wholeheartedly believe in protecting your heart burning for your dreams. And I know that, I won’t let the life go by me just thinking about the amazing friendships, races and whatnot that I want to experience through running. Or cycling, or travelling, the list that life offers can go infinite, since life has infinite possibilities of creating experiences for all of us.

I also know that you too. So in case you haven’t thanked yourself for fighting your own fight against fear and self-doubt, just remember to thank yourself as I do now: Thank you Bilge, for fighting the fight against yourself, against your fears and self-doubt.

Also, I come to realize that the courage is not limited to the physical challenges. For me, it is also closely connected to managing with being away from a lot of people that I dearly love.

In February, I was incredibly fortunate to spend time with the person that I love with all my heart. But in order to spend time with him, I needed to accept that I had we had to say goodbye for a while when I leave.

After having an incredible one week, it just struck me that, I am going away, sitting on this plane alone. It struck me that I was holding his hand one hour ago and now I am holding a plane ticket, then a train ticket, then a series of tickets.

Then I thought, it takes courage for both sides of this relationship. It is not easy at all to feel this closeness of heart while saying a lot of hard goodbyes.

In the depth of uncomfortable separation, I was also sure that, I was happy with my commitment of the heart, even though it was emotionally challenging to say goodbye. I felt grateful to have this challenge, I wouldn’t prefer to have any comfort with another condition. I love to fight my own fights, carry this love close in my heart, at the end of the day!

Sitting alone at that plane, I thought, how much courage it takes to say goodbye to many of the loved ones in our lives. This is also an ongoing challenge that I am learning to get better at, since my life has been full of goodbyes that I frequently had to go through, goodbyes to my family, to my friends scattered around different cities, to our dogs, and to JP.

Ja well, coming back to the question.

What does courage mean to you?

For me it is just going after my heart while having an unlimited list of excuses created by fear.