Practicing courage unlocks worlds ☄️

The most common regret

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The most common regret of the dying:

I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

Let’s just stay with this for a moment.

Notice how it feels to read this unifying regret before moving on.

I feel the longing

the role of shame

the human need to embody one’s wholeness

and feeling at odds with an inner directive and outer expectations

What is striking about this regret is that it is based on an internal metric, not attainment. I wish I'd had the courage.

If you are reading this and feel like you don’t ‘have’ the courage, hear me out: maybe courage only ever exists in practice. Maybe we locate our courage through practice in the smallest choices we make, not the biggest leaps (Regarding Dew’s signature course is about this very conviction put into practice: pivotal shifts are found in our daily pivoting toward wholeness).

I think about what Maya Angelou shared about the centralness of courage:

Courage is the most important of the virtues, because without it, no other virtue can be practiced consistently.

Courage is at the center of my work for good reason, and realize that I haven’t shared many stories of why… I’m working up the courage.

But today, I’m curious:

In what ways are you being called to practice courage?

What words of encouragement do you want to remind yourself as you practice courage?

(think small!)
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.
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On behalf of the human need for fulfillment
On behalf of benefitting everyone who is impacted by you living into your wholeness
On behalf of those who carried the burden of regret in their last moments
May we each practice courage as an offering to life itself

Three things to support you to center courage in your life:

1. If you are ready to practice deeper courage to live a life that is true to YOU, and if some private support (encourage, accountability, and practices), would help you through the process, I am giving away two gifted sessions to two subscribers. That’s two sessions per person! Head to the last letter to apply. This opportunity closes next week.

2. Our creative ritual—aka the New Moon Writing Gathering—is happening this Saturday at 11am-11:30am EST. That’s 30 minutes of courageously meeting the page with the help of some journal prompts and feeling a sense of renewal by the end of it.

   You are automatically granted access as a paid-supporter of the Regarding Dew letters (that’s $5!).

3. The archives of the Regarding Dew Letters are chock full of writings on courage. If you haven’t taken a stroll through the archives, I suggest starting with these courage-based musings…

Gentle Musings: Derailment and Joy as a Practice (Audio)

You can be so much more than you think you can be.

Confidence is overrated ~ the what, why, and how of creative gumption ~

That’s all for today!

Thank you for being here. If you enjoyed this letter, please consider giving it a ♥️ at the top, forwarding it to a friend, or becoming a paid-supporter.

To the paid-supporters: I hope to see you tomorrow at 11:00am EST for the New Moon Writing Gathering! You’ll all receive Zoom details soon.

With love,
Maggy