“Fear creates
the gap between who you are and who you can be. Courage closes it,” explains Margie
Warrell, PhD, author of the new book, The Courage Gap: 5 Steps To
Braver Action.
“To clarify,
closing your courage gap is not about ‘de-risking‘ your life or sheltering from
problems—natural and human created. Rather, it is about bringing the bravest
version of yourself to every situation,” adds Dr. Warrell.
That includes actively
taking on rough problems, doing what is unpopular, facing storms head-on, and
maybe even reshaping the broader landscape in the process.
Dr. Warrell
empowers us to recognize that courage is a learnable skill accessible to
everyone, regardless of how risk-averse, timid, or defensive we may be.
Additionally, for
leaders, The Courage Gap provides a guide to operationalize and scale
the courage mindset across your team and organization to deepen trust,
dismantle silos, foster innovation, accelerate learning, and unleash collective
courage toward a more secure and rewarding future.
This is not
another book on why courage is important; it is a
research-backed, step-by-step guide to teach us how to close the
gap between thinking and doing, hesitation and action–the courage gap.
“Closing your
courage gap is not a short course but a life-long endeavor. It will stretch you
in ways and humble you in others,” shares Dr. Warrell.
Drawing on
cutting-edge research woven together with stories that compel head and heart, The
Courage Gap will help you bridge the think/do gap between what you’ve been
doing and what you can do; between where you are and where you want to be—in
your career, relationships, leadership, and life.
More specifically,
Dr. Warrell will help you develop your mastery in the two essential
dimensions of courage:
- Management
of fear. - Willingness
to act in its presence, amid real or perceived risks.
Further, as you
read the book you will learn about the powerful 5-step roadmap to
reprogram the self-protective patterns of thought and behavior that sabotage
success to bring your bravest self to your biggest challenges and boldest
vision.
Intention: Focus
on what you want, not what you fear: Your desire for a positive outcome
must exceed your fear of a negative outcome.
Belief: Rescript
what’s keeping you stuck, stressed, or living too safely: Rewrite the
self-protective stories magnifying the perception of risk and siphoning courage
to act.
Connection: Embody
and breath in courage: Transform the psychology of fear to the physiology
of courage, connecting to the power of your presence and to people who help you “walk taller.”
Action: Step
into discomfort: Practice the
“one-brave-minute” rule, embracing “growing pains” to override your “inner wimp”
(even the most heroic have one).
Learning: Find
the treasure when you trip: Forgive your fallibility and mine the lessons
in every miss-step, struggle, and setback.
Applying these five steps will:
- Ignite passion
and unlock the potential fear holds dormant. - Rewrite the
scripts that have kept you stuck, stressed, and living too safely. - Reset your “nervous”
system and embody courage in critical moments. - Transform
discomfort as a cue to step forward and expand your bandwidth for bold action. - Reset your
relationship to failure and make peace with the part of you that wimps out.
An additional piece
of advice from Dr. Warrell is, “Be led by your values, not your emotions. When
your values are clear, courage becomes easier.”
Dr. Margie
Warrell, Leadership Coach and Author
Dr. Warrell shares
these additional insights with us:
Question: In
leadership or entrepreneurship, what are effective ways to demonstrate courage
among those around you so that everyone on your team is more open to change?
Dr. Margie
Warrell:
Be real
about what challenges you.
Courage takes
vulnerability. One of the most powerful ways of demonstrating courage is to
lower the “got it all together” masks we often wear as a leader or business
owner. Lowering this mask is being real about what challenges us, where we’ve
fallen down, and what sometimes keeps us from getting back up.
People on our
teams will play it safe unless they feel safe to do otherwise. By showing that
you sometimes mess up, that you don’t always get it right, you make it safer
for them to try things that may otherwise not.
Learn
something new and share your fumbling up the learning curve.
The reason that
we often resist taking on learning new skills is that we have to go through the
phases of the learning curve that can be socially embarrassing and
uncomfortable. It’s why people who haven’t learned to swim as kids don’t try to
learn as adults—they have to flap around in the water like a 3-year-old. So,
take on learning a new skill and share your experience of moving from conscious
incompetence to conscious competence.
Say Sorry.
We all mess up.
We all fall short of being as patient, organized, or calm as we’d like to be.
When you do, own it and apologize to those around you. Not only do you win
trust by being real and humble, but also you demonstrate a willingness to
embrace your fallibility which, in turn, creates an opening for braver action.
Share your discomfort.
You cannot lead
from your comfort zone. Share how you treat discomfort as a cue to move
forward, not to retreat. It will help others follow suit.
Question:
What is one specific action that anyone can take to start closing the
courage gap – between who they are and who they want to be – today?
Dr. Margie
Warrell:
Start where you
are. With the next decision you face.
Ask yourself,
“What would the bravest part of me do right now? “Then do that. It doesn’t
matter how small or insignificant it is or how uncomfortable you feel. Just
take action. Courage is a muscle. You have to put in the reps. When we practice
courage in small ways it expands our capacity to take action amid our fears and
the risks in larger ways.
___
Dr. Margie
Warrell (pronounced Mar-gee), is a five-time best-selling author, keynote
speaker, leadership coach, and Forbes columnist. With twenty-five years
of experience living and working around the world, she has dedicated her life
to helping others overcome fear and unlock their potential.
She is Senior
Partner at Korn Ferry and Advisory Board member for the Forbes School of
Business & Technology.
Thank you to
the book’s publisher for sending me an advance copy of the book.
