Image: Flickr/Bruce Berrien

“Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.” (Raymond Lindquist)

People are funny. We usually know what we need to do long before we actually do it. It takes a while to muster up our courage and talk ourselves into taking action. That’s because there’s something very scary about letting go of what we know — even if we really don’t like what it is that we know.

If you want to make positive changes in your life, you must let go of old patterns of behavior. They may be familiar and comfortable, but those patterns are what got you stuck in the first place. It will be scary at first, and you might feel like you’re in a sort of free fall. But, before you know it, you’ll see that the rope you were hanging onto wasn’t as secure as you imagined. And then you’ll be able to experience a lightness you didn’t even know existed.