Courage Comes First
I’m terrified of heights.
Not uncomfortable with heights. Not cautious around heights.
Terrified.
Which is interesting because over the years I’ve graduated from the U.S. Army’s Air Assault School, completed multiple SWAT schools that involved rappelling and working from heights, and spent more time than I’d like to admit standing in places I would have preferred not to be.
People sometimes assume that confidence is what made those experiences possible.
They’re wrong.
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned is this:
Confidence rarely comes first. Courage does.
Most people think confidence leads to action.
My experience has been the opposite.
Action creates confidence.
Every time I’ve done something that scared me, confidence showed up later. Not before.
The same principle applies far beyond military training, tactical operations, or physical challenges.
- Think about the first workout after months or years away from exercise.
- The difficult conversation you’ve been avoiding.
- The presentation that makes your stomach turn.
- The business idea you’ve been considering.
- The promotion you aren’t sure you’re qualified for.
- The phone call you need to make.
- The opportunity you’ve been putting off.
Most of us spend a surprising amount of time waiting to feel ready.
We tell ourselves that we’ll act when we have more confidence, more certainty, more knowledge, or better timing.
But readiness often doesn’t arrive before action.
It arrives because of action.
Looking back on my own life, many of the experiences that shaped me began with uncertainty. I wasn’t confident when I started. I wasn’t sure how things would turn out. I simply took the next step. That’s why I’ve become a believer in a simple question:
What would a person like the one I’m trying to become do next?
Not someday.
Not when conditions are perfect.
Not when fear disappears.
What would that person do next?
Then do that.
Not perfectly.
Just once.
One step.
One conversation.
One workout.
One application.
One decision.
One act of courage.
Over time, those small acts begin to accumulate. They become experience. Experience becomes competence. Competence becomes confidence. The confidence we admire in others is often the result of hundreds of courageous moments that nobody ever saw.
If you’re facing something difficult right now, don’t wait for confidence to arrive first.
Take the next step anyway.
There’s a good chance the confidence you’re looking for is waiting on the other side of it.
Because courage isn’t the absence of fear.
It’s moving forward despite it.
And more often than not, confidence catches up somewhere along the way.
A Question to Consider
Think back to a time when you were afraid.
A difficult conversation.
A career change.
A first day.
A new relationship.
A major decision.
A challenge that felt bigger than you were prepared for.
What were you afraid of?
What happened when you took the first step?
There’s a good chance the confidence you’re enjoying today was built through an act of courage yesterday.
