There’s a lot of bravery going on right now. The young kids that must adjust from the sudden loss of limbs from shark bites this past week at Oak Island, North Carolina, and the families of the slain in Charleston, South Carolina, are all having to put one foot in front of the other and keep going. Maybe South Carolina will take a brave look at a sometimes sad heritage, as well as the rest of America, face our violence, and actually do something to change this awful path.

But here I want to applaud the people that are brave every single day. I’m talking about those who spend day in and day out taking care of frail elderly parents (mostly women) or those who raise children with disabilities. It takes a lot of courage to hold your temper in check and a lot of patience to continue with gentle behavior along with appropriate responses.

And it takes enormous courage every day for individuals to battle extreme depression, severe anxiety, or other exhausting mental illnesses for themselves and their families. This requires bravery every single day, every single hour and every single minute. For it is the minutes that can sometimes bring us to our knees.

We have to remember that there will be another minute to be grateful for, and look for the moments that have gone well, because those moments add up to lives well lived, even though they are difficult.

Those who have received a scary diagnosis have to fight back against the loss of control that slams them, and figure out how to move forward every day. Overcoming this terrible sense of loss of control is a momentous battle in and of itself, never mind the condition that caused it.

I am heartened when I run across young adults in their twenties who already have so much insight, and are questioning how they can better themselves and their marriages, asking the right questions before their relationships are irreparably damaged.

And I meet business women who are bravely working in what is, in many corporate cultures, a man’s world, to make it better for the other women that will come. Many volunteer in nonprofit organizations to boot, giving precious time and money to causes they believe in so that the world is a better place.

And finally, I want to thank all of the fathers out there who are present and have allowed their children to be who they want to be.  Kudos for making sure their families are cared for, setting examples for their sons and daughters of what a good spouse, parent and provider looks like, for those children are surely watching and learning. It is for all parents a very brave act to get up and go to a job each day you may not like to put food on the table and pay the rent.

I celebrate each and every one of you for your every day bravery.

Save