Ever learn more from a lesson you give your kids than they do? Me too.

Yesterday my son asked me to pray that he would be brave.

I told him yes of course, but also told him that bravery isn’t always something you have. I told him that bravery is often being afraid but choosing to do something anyway, even in the face of fear.

In that conversation I realized that I have been letting fear control me in ways I didn’t even know. I was so blinded and paralyzed by fear in a certain area of my life that I couldn’t even see it for what it was. I had tried putting a different name and face on it. But it was still just what it was – nothing but pure ugly, destructive, controlling fear.

I’ve heard and said the exact words that I said to my son a hundred times before. But they took on new meaning for me yesterday.

Bravery is a choice, not a feeling.

Sometimes our giants are not what we think they are. But I’m learning more and more that no matter how alone I feel, I’m not. Whatever comes my way, whatever happens in my life and my family’s, has to pass through my Heavenly Father’s hands first. He will never leave me, He will never forsake me, even if I try to turn my back on Him or even myself.

Sometimes He calls us to be brave when we least expect it, when we think He “should” provide a way OUT instead of a way THROUGH. But I have to believe that there is a greater purpose for the journey.