Take the Leap: Cultivating Courage with Dr. Heather Penny

Written by Dr. Heather Penny

Each of us holds vast reservoirs of clarity, confidence and courage within us. We just need to learn how to access it. Increasing your Clarity, building your Confidence, and engaging your Courage is the 3C Living and Leading Coaching Model. We’ve talked about clarity and confidence, now it’s time to discuss how to engage your courage.

The Vital Role of Courage

We won’t find better traveling companions than clarity and confidence. Together, they help us see clearly and believe resolutely. But a third companion is required during the more challenging parts of the journey. Times when fear is overtaking us, and we’re tempted to quit. Or times of overwhelming pain or grief. When all seems lost and you’re sinking fast, you need another “C” at your side.

You need courage.

Let’s pretend your life-long dream is to parachute over the vineyards of Napa, California. You’ve found the perfect drop zone to land and have studied successful parachute jumps. The much-anticipated adventure is days away. Your classes with certified skydiving instructors have paid off. Your clarity on what to expect and how to respond is strong. You know where you’ll jump, when to pull the cord, and how to land. And your confidence grows only stronger as your beliefs guide the growing excitement. This is what you have dreamed of doing, and the time is right.

As the morning for the jump arrives, putting on your chute and adjusting your gear, you eagerly board the plane. The sound is mind-blowing as the engines break the silence, but it only serves to increase your excitement.

Watching the earth get smaller, you adjust your goggles and check your altimeter, waiting for the signal to jump. And then it happens. The pilot gives the signal.

It’s Go Time.

And you freeze.

You remember everything. Why are you clinging to the side of the plane?

The pilot frantically gestures for you to jump, but nothing is going to force you from that plane.

Eventually, you pass over the drop zone and watch it get smaller. The plane begins descending. And the moment has passed. Disappointed, you return to the ground without accomplishing what you’d dreamed of doing.

Now if this has actually happened to you- no judgment. I’m not sure I’d jump either. I applaud your cautiousness and trust your wisdom to wait.

But for the sake of diving into courage, I use this illustration to highlight what is missing. All the clarity and confidence in the world cannot make up for a lack of courage. Courage is about taking action. It is what we need to take the powerful leap of faith. It is about seizing the opportunity at the right time.

Without courage, we’ll never get traction in life. Just like our parachute jumper, we won’t achieve what we hope, nor will we arrive where we want to be. And here’s the hard part, the longer we fly in circles over the jump zone—knowing what we want but never jumping—the weaker we become.

But when we engage our courage, we become stronger.

You’ve got this! If you’re circling and not jumping, engage your courage and go for it!

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