Written by Drew Brush, Founding Partner at PBJ People Consulting and Coaching
At PBJ, Learning is a part of our core identity as an organization, as well as individually. We often engage in self-reflection and are experimenting with learning “out in the open” by sharing these self-reflections with each other and in different mediums. Here is a post from Drew, which he also shared earlier on LinkedIn.
Bravery requires fear, and I am afraid. My biggest fear is failure, my biggest motivator is trying difficult things.
Difficult things are relative to who you are and the context in which you find yourself. For me, it was walking away from the security of a job found PBJ, making a commitment to complete my first ultra-marathon (A 100 mile trail race), and to spend more time becoming a better father and husband. I’d venture to guess, society applauds the bravery of these goals (especially when they are achieved) but does not shine a light on the fear or struggle that go into trying difficult things.
If any of these things seem difficult for you, you might find yourself imagining things about me. I am curious if the first of these thoughts are of someone who is afraid? My intuition and general experience is that we struggle to talk about these real feelings and acknowledge the true depth of potential that underlies what motivates us has humans navigating this very interesting, scary, and complex world.
The point to this reflection? To be real and acknowledge fear, to acknowledge all of you reading this who are trying something hard, and to validate it’s possible to be afraid and brave at the same time.