Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Reverb 13: Prompt 3 - The Brave

Prompt: What was the bravest thing you did in 2013?

Bravery is a hard one for me. I recall a risk-management class I took in grad school that started by asking us to consider the riskiest thing we had ever done.

I'm not that kind of person. I don't take huge risks with wild abandon. But because I'm not in risky situations, I'm also not in a place where "bravery" is really required. I even had to look up the literal definition of bravery to help me here.

Looking at it literally, it is difficult for me to be very public with my Crohn's disease. Sure I have posted about colonoscopies, but it remains to be a great challenge for me. And in July of this year, I attended a half marathon (difficult on its own) that had the added challenge of asking me to associate with a bunch of strangers (have I mentioned only a hundred times that I'm a wild introvert?) and discuss my journey with Crohn's disease.

The fundraising was a journey itself. To ask so many people to donate so much was very challenging for me. So many heart warming stories of people in the same boat. And then to travel to California to do the same thing but in front of actual people... and then to run and SWEAT in front of them? I don't know if I would call it "Brave" persay, but it was one of the most difficult and emotionally challenging events of the year.

The SECOND bravest moment is when I encountered a scorpion in Arizona when I went down to meet a (sort-of) internet-stranger. I didn't get bit. But it was LITERALLY millimeters from my foot. I could have DIED. Obviously I didn't. And the weirdo from the internet didn't even try to chop me up!

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