Success Requires Both Courage and Humility
Kenneth Mwale
Inspiring people and organizations to live out their PURPOSE is what drives me.
"Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go". Joshua 1:9
Scripture emphasizes the need for courage for everyone who wants to achieve anything in life. The reason courage is required to achieve success is because coping out is easy. Giving excuses is our number one deterrent to success. Fear of what others may think of us for doing things differently is the biggest of our fears. Sometimes the fear of what other people will think of you when you feel stops us from trying. Courage helps us to overcome the fear of “what will people think of me?” Courage says, let’s do this! If it works, well and good. If it fails, well, at least I tried.
Courage is not the absence of fear but going ahead despite it. Courageous people are just as afraid as everyone else, but they despite their fear. There is no need for courage if fear is not present. The fact that we need courage means that fear does not go away, we have to act despite its presence. Everyone wants to be successful but it takes courage to be successful.
Courage is one thing. But there is also one other ingredient just as important to success. Humility. Humility makes us admit that what we are doing isn’t working. Humility is what causes us to unmount a dead horse. It takes a lot of humility to admit we are on the wrong road. A humble man or woman admits when they are wrong and stop what they are doing.
Therefore, to succeed we need to be both humble and courageous. This combination is not easy to find in people. They are either all courage or all humble. Courage makes us do the things that scare others but are necessary to do. Humility helps us stop doing what isn’t working to concentrate on what needs to be done. It takes humility to accept failure and start again. These two concepts work hand in hand.
The world is in need of people that have this combination. It takes courage to be humble, and courage is a form of humility sometimes.