What are the Six types of Courage?

Courage comes in many different guises. How many can you think of? How many have you used?

Here are six different types of courage.

1.  Physical Courage

Ok, this is the one that probably comes to mind first. This is the "stand up to the bully in the playground" sort of courage. You see it when people are willing to face danger - physical danger  - you know, saving someone else who might be going through their own trauma. Such as firefighters, who are willing to put themselves in dangers way despite the possiblity of getting hurt.

My own experience as a one off sky diver might also be classified as physical courage. Somehow I had to manage my body out of a plane, even though part of me was sure that I was about to fall to a certain death! So there was also an element here of mental and emotional strength needed.

More often than not though, physical courage can describe any situation where you're willing to put yourself in harm's way to help someone else.

2.  Emotional Courage

Emotional courage is something that you'll find with the best leaders and most inspiring humans.

These sort of people seem to be able to deal with their emotions in a productive and healthy way rather than a destructive one. They face their emotions head on instead of turning their head, ignoring them, or simply running away!

Maybe you can think of a time when you showed great emotional courage. 

There are no doubt plenty of times in your life, whether it be your personal life or your professional life, when you've found yourself in great hurt or sadness. Maybe it's been the devastating loss of a loved one? Or maybe a close colleague of yours has moved on to another town and you miss them in a professional capacity. Maybe you've had a major disagreement with your boss - who knows! Nevertheless it still requires some emotional courage to get up and keep going. You may well be fighting a need to isolate yourself, or even lash out agressivley - but instead you use emotional courage to front up anyway.

I remember a time when I had just given a colleague the bad news that I wouldn't be able to employ her the following year. She was devastated, and incredibly upset. She felt unwanted and pissed off. But yet, that very night she came along to our end of term assembly in front of a packed hall, head held high. That took a load of emotional courage on her behalf to turn up. And in turn she gained a truck load of respect. I'll always remember that.

3.  Intellectual Courage

Leaders need intellectual courage because it enables them to lead with confidence and conviction - even if their ideas might not intially be picked up by the people they are leading.

A leader with intellectual courage will see beyond the "this is how we've always done it" scenario and ask those tough questions that might rock the boat regardless of what others will think of them - all in the name of sticking to their convictions, or being curious of things other than the status quo.

You might find someone with intellectual courage doing some of these things:

●     Speaking up in meetings even when they're not sure everyone agrees with them.

●     Challenging ideas, even from management.

●     Sharing their opinions even if they aren't popular among their peers or superiors.

●     Asking questions that may seem ridiculous at first glance (but actually reveal some truth).

Often this this type of courage presenting itself by someone on your staff, may appear confronting to you. It takes a great leader to respond to intellectual courage with intellectual courage.

4.  Social Courage

Social courage has never been needed more. We live in a society whereby we're constantly judged by not only what we wear, but by what we listen to, by what we read, by what we eat, by what we do for a job, by what we do in our spare time with our spare time - the list goes on. We live in a time that is incredibly visible by way more people than ever before.

In the old days we were visible to our family and to our immediate friends. These days with the help of "improved' communications (such as social media) we are now visible to the world. And with that comes a social cost.

Social courage is the ability to stand up for yourself and your beliefs, even in the face of opposition from others. And these days the others is an increasingly bigger group than ever before.

It takes social courage to stand up to someone else on a social media platform if you don't agree with what they say. It takes social courage to stand up for your beliefs in a room full of colleagues at a staff meeting.

Humans are invariably a social beast. We don't like to rock the boat (yes I know I've already used that cliche'!) in case we get ourselves tipped out of the social boat. A courageous leader would and should allow people in their care to feel open to being socially courageous. 

This level of bravery isn't easy, but it can be developed over time.

5.  Moral Courage

This one is all about having the guts to stand up for your beliefs and values in the face of adversity, even when no one else does. Yes it does sound a little bit like intellectual courage in that it is about standing up for what you believe in.

But moral courage comes from more of a personal value and virtue point of view. Unsurprisingly, it comes directly from your personal morals.

If something doesn't feel right in your heart, or if you feel that an injustice has been done, or perhaps that something simply isn't fair - then it's likely you'll call upon your moral courage to step in and help you stand up for your belief.

In my years as a Principal you might be surprised to learn that it was my moral courage that seemed to be activated way more often than any of my other "courages".

Unsurprisingly it appears that it was often government or ministerial decision making, high above my pay grade, that found my moral courage being actived!

6.  Spiritual Courage

You don't have to be particularly spiritual to enact some spiritual courage in your life.

Spiritual Courage is a willingness to risk what you think you know, in order to learn more about yourself.

For example, after 28 years of Principalship I gave up my $150,000 a year job as a Principal. I had no job to go to. I had no plans in place. All I knew was that I could no longer carry on doing what I was doing. On reflection I would call this spiritual courage. And although others might call this stupid, I felt a very real need to change my path. It was, and still is, a risky proposition. But yet I felt a very real urge to let go of what I knew, and all the personal limitations that had in turn been enforced on me over a great many years, to discover a different way.

What was it that I was looking for? At the time as I made the "great leap" I had no idea. I just felt that something had to change.

And I needed to find my limitations - and in turn I found that I don't have any!

You don't either. But that takes a bit of spiritual courage to take that step of faith.