Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 27 of our Wisdom-Trek and thank you for joining me. 

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom.

Today we look at the 12 Trails of Courage (Trails 1-6).

Thank you for joining us for our 7 day a week, 7 minutes of wisdom podcast.  This is Day 27 of our Trek and today and tomorrow we are going to look at 12 trails of life where we can be infused with courage.  We will cover the first 6 today and the remaining 6 tomorrow.  We cover a lot of various types of topics with many of them in a series of steps that cover multiple days. So, if you have missed any episodes please subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on iTunes, Stitcher, or listen on Wisdom-Trek.com.

We are recording our podcast from our studio at Home2 in Charlotte, North Carolina,  as we are wrapping up the week and will be heading to The Big House in Marietta, Ohio, to maintain the lawn and continue our internal renovations. We are excited to get back for a week and finish up the downstairs room off the kitchen, which we always referred to as the "eating area."  It was actually the milk porch when the house was originally built. We should also be able to move into the room directly above the "eating area," which we always referred to as the sun-porch but now is being renovated into our new office.   We converted the downstairs office to another bedroom, where Paula’s mom stays when we are in Marietta.

Let’s begin up the trails of courage, and see how we can apply them.

The Trail of Personal Responsibility

Courage gives you the strength to take personal responsibility for your actions. You can't always control your circumstances, but you can always choose how you will respond to each situation, regardless of how difficult. No matter what challenges, you face you can have the courage and power to make the ultimate choice, which is either to let the world impact you or to go out and impact the world. Resist the impulse to blame your woes on others or situations of life, but instead make the decision to own your life and be fully responsible.

The Trail of Living with Integrity

Courage gives you the strength to live with integrity at all times. Integrity is the only path in life upon which you will never get lost. Placing integrity at every step of the trail and with every decision you make requires a willingness to do what is right above what is convenient or politically expedient. At times, this means veering off the safe and comfortable trail onto one less traveled.   By taking an alternate trail, the risk of failure or disapproval may run high. At all times, living with integrity calls you to forge your trail. At its core, integrity is about wholeness and alignment between your deepest values.  It will control every decision you make and every action that you take.  Integrity calls forth courage and greatness.

 

The Trail of Seeing New Worlds

Courage gives you the opportunity to see your world in a new perspective because you are unwilling to settle for how life is today.  You usually will not see the trails of life or the world, as it is, but as you are. Too often we settle with answers to life’s questions because we do not have the courage to ask new questions. We contend with those who claim a monopoly on the truth. The fact is that none of us has a monopoly on the truth. We just have our own version of it.

While I feel that all truth ultimately was created and comes from God and can be found in His Word, I am not naïve enough to think that I have a corner on the truth market, and neither should you. We all should continue to study and to gain wisdom and truth. Have the courage to ask ourselves and others the difficult questions about life.

It does take courage to question our own assumptions and beliefs,