GZ,
I've come to believe that real courage is hard to come by, especially the courage to stand apart from the crowd like Trump does when he talks about and acts on the hardest things we need to confront in this country. The reason why it is hard is the incredible need we all have for community and to be liked. To belong to the crowd. None of us ever outgrew that desire. Hell, this entire Silicon Investor is testament to the very human need to connect with others and to belong to some small tribe. We're all just evolved great apes, after all. Some ancestral instincts don't die with age.
I remember when my son was young and he had a school speech assignment. He was terrified. The idea of standing up and presenting on any topic in front of all those fellow students had him in an absolute panic attack. I kept telling him he needed to demonstrate courage and just get through it. Finally, he got frustrated with me and said, "Dad, I'm just not one of those courageous people who have no fear of public speaking. I can't do this and I won't do this."
I just didn't know what to say to him, because he was a straight 'A' kid and I didn't want him to get a bad grade, but he was a nervous wreck. As you know, speeches are really just a part of life, if you have a job. As an exec in the tech world, I used to give speeches to auditoriums filled with people and had a video of one of those times, where the camera was zooming in on me as I spoke. I replayed that video to him in order to make a point. He said, "Dad, you looked so calm. You weren't nervous at all. How did you do that?" I told him, "Courage, son. You may not believe me when I tell you that I was so nervous before I gave that speech, I tried to delegate that to one of my employees, but he happened to be out on PTO that day. Then right before the speech, I had to run to the restroom and I threw up. I was always a high anxiety, fairly introverted person, so I was usually a nervous wreck before speeches, but I got it done anyway, because there was no other choice but to just power through it. Real courage is the act of doing the thing you fear the most. There is no courage in doing something you do not fear."
Anyway, since I was banned, several of those folks on the other thread have recently told me that I'm long winded, they don't like my style, and others have insinuated that someone else writes my posts and that I must be some kind of mysterious plant of some sort. Really, I'm just an old guy that talks too much and likes to philosophize. I guess in this Twitter world, a guy like me that talks too much is already obsolete to folks who can't be bothered to spend more than a second reading a post. So I should cut this sucker short, before I get more of those guys coming out of the woodwork to flame me again. :) |
