What It Means to Be Brave: Recovery Lessons for Hard Times, Healing, and Doing it Afraid

Episode 25 When was the last time you were brave? 

What about the last time you saw a bada** woman being brave AF?

In today’s episode, I’m diving deep into the real meaning of bravery—not the highlight-reel kind, but the messy, spirit-shaking, deeply personal kind that recovery demands from us.

I share a powerful story from this past weekend when my daughter suffered a traumatic fall that landed us in the ER for over 10 hours… and what I witnessed in her, in myself, and in every person who showed up in that moment taught me something new about what it means to be truly brave.

I open up about my own experiences of bravery in recovery, from launching my business to saving my marriage, speaking up in friendships, standing up for my children, and choosing the uncomfortable, unpopular truth over silence or people-pleasing.

You’ll also hear:

• What spiritual traditions like the Bible, A Course in Miracles, and Brené Brown teach us about true courage
• Why bravery is essential in healing from addiction, codependency, eating disorders, and perfectionism
• What it looks like to choose bravery in motherhood, marriage, friendship, and self-leadership
• And how we can trust that our bravery is always divinely supported—even when we’re terrified
  
  

Recovery Reflection Prompts:

1. Where are you being invited to be brave right now?
2. How have you already shown courage in your healing + recovery—without even realizing it?

If this episode speaks to you, share it with a friend in recovery, leave a review, or DM + let me know what resonated.

Let's Connect

If you're a woman in recovery and ready to finally do the thing you’ve always wanted to do, I’d love to support you. Book your free 1:1 Breakthrough Call, where I’ll help you get clear on what you’d love to do (or have, or be), identify what’s really holding you back, and take the first best steps to take the leap.

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Hey gorgeous.

I love you.

I'm so proud of you.

And I believe in your ability to create a life you absolutely love.

Transcript

0:00

Welcome to the Girls Who Recover podcast with Dana Hunter F, where incredible women just like you, go to transform life's biggest setbacks into your most powerful comebacks so that you can live a life you. Love. I'm your host, Dana Hunter Ella, transformational coach and founder of Girls Who Recover, and my mission is to pull back the curtain on our mistakes, failures, shame and personal disasters, and light the way for how to use those to create your biggest and most gorgeous comebacks. Follow the show now. Grab your iced coffee and turn up the volume for girls who recover. Let's light it up. When was the last time you did something brave? Or maybe you saw a woman doing something brave. Being brave, embodying bravery. In today's episode, we're gonna go deep into this theme that shaped every single. Sell of my life, my recovery, my motherhood, my kids, my business, my marriage, and my friendships. And I'm wondering if I were to ask you to write a definition of bravery or brave, what would you write? And today we're gonna talk about all of it. Brave. Bravery. I'm thinking about the Disney movie. Brave Anybody out there? Also obsessed with Disney movies and have small kids and know them all and just me. Okay, but back to brave. The kind of bravery we are talking about is not the kind that you're gonna see on headlines. It's not the kind of bravery that screams and shouts and roars, but it's the kind of bravery that might whisper to you, get up and try again, or Let's try again, do to better tomorrow. That kind of bravery that chooses to say the truth when it would be easier to say nothing. That kind of bravery that shows up even though every part of you is like, don't do it. Or the kind of bravery that holds the line or a boundary when all you wanna do is cave or run. Anybody else a runner? Just me. Okay. I like to run in my Brooks shoes, and I also like to run from hard situations sometimes, but this form of bravery is about the quiet daily, sometimes totally invisible courage that it takes to be a girl who's. Girl who recovers that kind of bravery, that heals and transforms and allows us to come home to ourselves. So we're gonna talk about what it really means to be brave, which might be my new favorite B word. Let's be honest. After doing some research and pre pre prepping for this episode, I'm pretty sure be as brave is my new favorite B word. We'll talk about why it matters so much, especially to women, and especially to women in recovery this weekend. You know, I like to do these things in real time. So this weekend, something. Kind of big happened. My oldest daughter, Ava, she's 10, was with my mom. All my kids are with my mom and they're on off on Adventure for the weekend, and they stopped for Starbucks, which I mean, who doesn't love Starbucks? Well, my daughter Ava does. So she's running inside. Before she makes it to the door, she trips over one of the parking stoppers going a hundred miles an hour and land smash on her face. So in the concrete, I'm so grateful that I was not there because my mom, who's very brave and my sister we're, we're there. Um, and I also was making my gratitude list around. The bright spots of the situation, but they were right there. They're both doctors, also very courageous. But my eight, 10-year-old daughter smashed her face in the concrete. And, um, so I'm, I'm actually working out of a Starbucks in another town where we're staying for the summer. And I get this call, I finally figured out on my phone how to put myself on do not disturb, but also let my husband through, like, I've only had this phone for like 10 years. Finally figured out how to do it. So normally I'm used to nothing coming through. I love do not disturb. It gives me my peace, helps me stay focused. But uh, I saw his message come through and he was like, call me And I don't know about you, but like my husband never says, call me. It's never good when somebody texts you call me. Um, and then I also saw that I had missed some calls from my mom and I. So, you know, it's just like, oh my gosh, something terrible has happened. But long story short. It was not worst case scenario. I breathed through that and called him back and they shared with me what had happened. And so I got on the FaceTime with my daughter. I've never seen her look so devastated in my whole life. I'm talking about brave, talking about courageous, talking about the strong one. She is all of those things, and we're actually working with her to express more of her emotions and to feel more of her feelings. But her face, even though it was covered by an ice pack, they had made it to the. Urgent care, which is right next door, was just devastated. Like, I had never seen it. I had never seen her that upset. Oh, I'm just getting upset just thinking about it. And so I just, I, you know, I talked with her and I talked to my mom and I asked her, I was like, Ava, do you want me to come, come there?'cause they were, they were away out of town. She said yes. And so, I mean, I couldn't have gotten out of that Starbucks fast enough. So I said, I'll be there in, I'll be there in 90 minutes. And we raced there. And in the middle of, of all that, um, this experience that seemed like it went on and on and on, this message came up for me. And it wasn't from my. Mind. It was from my soul, my spirit, and it was like, watch all this brave, look at all this brave. It wasn't a direction, like you have to be brave, right? We've already had an episode on that about, oh, you have to be strong in the midst of like, no, no, no, no. This is different. So. Before I tell you about what that looked like, we raced up together. They recommended that we take her to the state, the the pediatric emergency room at University of Kentucky, which again is like two hours from where we were staying. We put her in the car and drove as fast as we could. And got her there and she know she has blood all over her, uh, shirt and she has this ice pack and it does not look like friends. I'm just gonna tell you, uh, there's a reason why I did not go into healthcare.'cause I cannot even stomach those things. It was so bad and I was like, please God, help me be present for my daughter in the middle of this. Do not make me, let me make it about me. Let me hold presence and be brave. Which was looking like presence, calm presence in that moment for her. So we got to the ER and we were there for what seemed like ever, I think it was like 10 hours, but we experienced the most beautiful care given by the most compassionate, loving physicians and nurses and techs, and everybody was very alarmed as we were about. The situation and the consequences of it. Um, and she ended up getting, she had the facial surgery team come in, and so her lip and her little part of her face, and then the, the dental surgery team came in and pushed her teeth, her two front permanent teeth, pushed em back in place and gave her a spit stint and, you know, the nurse's job, she took one look at me and she's like, okay, I know who my actual job is. It's to take care of this mom. Just trying to keep it together and, uh, I won't, I won't tell you all of the details, but it came up that this, this direction to stay present and look for the brave, because it was a lot. And in the middle of that chaos, I got that sweet, quiet whisper. Look for the brave. Look for the brave. And here's what I saw. So Ava let herself feel her feelings, something that we have been working on and praying for. She cried and she howled. And she whined and she felt her feelings. And then she let herself experience what needed to be experienced and let herself be helped. I think that's pretty brave. And it wasn't, there wasn't anybody saying to her like, you're being so strong, like you're being so strong.'cause listen. Again, listen to one of my most recent episodes. That's not what we wanted her to be. We wanted her to be present in the middle of it, and we wanted her to welcome in everything that was not suffocate it, not stifle it, not pretend that it wasn't there, not trying to be strong, that we didn't have to be. So just the i, the fact that she was able to feel her feelings and say That hurts. I, I, that's an example of what brave looks like at 10 years old. Oh, also at 43. Okay. And her doctors and nurses and care team, they were also so grounded and calm, and clear and brave in a situation that, you know, I know they signed up for it. I know they're working at an emergency room, but if you. Even if you're practicing for a long time, to see a situation like this where a sweet little girl has essentially a very injured mangled phase like it is, can be upsetting and the doctors, nurses, and staff work calm and clear and compassionate. The other ways I saw bravery were her dad and Brent was with me. He's essentially just like taking deep breaths and checking on her. And when he needed a break, he went for a walk and when he needed to get re-grounded, he took that time for himself and. That was bravery for him. He did. He too didn't come in the room and say, everything's gonna be okay. You know, everything's gonna be okay. Because although we know everything ultimately is gonna turn out for our good,'cause everything's always working out for us in that moment. It was a lot and I wasn't, neither of us were able to. Authentically. Genuinely say like, oh, it's gonna be fine. It's gonna be fine.'cause that felt like a lie. I didn't wanna project into the future, even though my heart and mind both knew all as well in that moment. I wanted to be with the feelings that we were experiencing and be with the experience itself, and it didn't feel fine. It felt really scary. And we were able to be brave and present so and synonym for what brave looked like for me, wasn't me trying to convince myself that it was gonna be fine and hold it together. It was me being super present and in the moment with what is so I remember. Hearing the direction be really present because if you're in the middle of presence, there is nothing else except for the wholeness and the fullness of presence. So I remember noticing like the arm hair on the doctor's arm. And the, the faded color of the nurses' top and the glistening of the syringe and the smell of the hospital. And I remember being really present. There were, there was a picture of monkeys on the ceiling, which I, you know, it was a kids, kids, hos kids emergency room. So it was a lot of kid stuff. But just noticing and breathing and being really present with what, what was. Um, and then another example of bravery is, you know, Ava has two small, two little sisters, Audrey's eight and Alyssa's five, and they were very brave, although they weren't with us. We separated them and they went with my mom and Brenda and I took Ava. But they were brave in the experience in that they held space for her when she was in the urgent care. And they asked about her and they sent her love and they drew her pictures from where they were. And then when she got back with them. The next day. They were very curious and compassionate and loving and all of that is brave. And it wasn't about not being afraid. In fact, I'm not gonna lie to you, I was terrifi, like literally terrified. I feel choked up about how afraid, afraid I was. But I teach this so it's, I kept saying like, it's okay to feel afraid. It is natural to feel afraid. It's okay. And I kept praying and I kept inviting God to show me, what would you have me do here? What would you have me be? And the answer was present. Be present with what is. And it was about choosing to be love, choosing to be loving, even when also feeling a lot of fear and concern about my daughter. So let's talk about bravery, right? Like, what is it? Did you write down your definition? Did, could you, because, um, I have a few forests. So I looked at brave and I looked at bravery, and the definition of brave is ready to face danger or pain, or showing courage. That's one definition. Another is facing unpleasant conditions without showing fear, which me, I don't necessarily agree with that one, but when I looked up the word bravery, some things hit a little closer. So being courageous, um, being willing to face, oh, where did it go? Being willing to face something even in the middle of feeling fear, so fundamentally. At its core, bravery has nothing to do with fear. It doesn't mean you don't have any fear. It means you have fear and you have the courage to act anyway. So it's almost like, yeah, I'm feeling afraid and I'm gonna show up and answer this doctor's question, these doctor's questions. Anyway, yes, I am afraid and I'm gonna hold space and presence for my daughter and her feelings anyway. And it's about showing. A quiet presence, strength, quiet, present strength, and continuing to go to go forward, even in the face of, in, in Ava's case, pain, like extreme pain. So bravery can manifest in a few different ways, and I want you to think about how it shows up in your life, and especially in the women's lives that you know. Um, it can show up like, okay, I'm afraid and I'm gonna face this fear.'cause it has nothing to do with fearless. It's not the same thing as being fear, fearless, fearless. Means you're a sociopath. Okay, so we're gonna be done with being fearless. I think that we aren't doing our fear a service by trying to be fearless or running from it or fighting it. Fear is really just a signal that it's something to be acknowledged and welcomed in and asked, Hey, what do you need? But bravery is about acknowledging that fear, seeing it, and choosing to, to move forward anyway. Bravery can also mean making really hard choices, even when you're not gonna be popular because you make them. Or you might have to take a risk to make a brave choice to do what the right thing is. Um, I'm gonna tell you the silliest story. Okay? So after the, um. After the emergency room, my sister and mom graciously got us a hotel room nearby and it was like 1:00 AM by the time we got there, we're exhausted, we're basically traumatized. And I go to my suitcase, which, which I packed in haste and of course I forgot like the bag that has everything in it. So we had no toothbrushes and I sent my husband out to get the toothbrushes and he came back. He's like, nobody was at the desk. I don't know if we should have paid for these, but here they are. I'm like, oh my God, you stole the toothbrushes. Listen, in our new way of living, in the middle of recovery, we are not, we do not steal. We are not thieves. We pay for what we, we pay for what we get. So anyway, we just went to bed and the next day I very bravely, right, because I'm embarrassed, maybe humiliated, went to the front desk and I was like, Hey, we took some toothbrushes last night in the depths of night and. Can I pay for them? And then of course she was like, no, you cannot pay for them. We're gonna give you these toothbrushes in the toothbrush. And I was like, but we took three of them. She's like, they're all yours. But this bravery is, you know, that was the right thing. I. What I did is a small example, and this is not to laud me, let me tell you. Everything in me was like, don't worry about it, it's no big deal. And the old me would've just kept on walking. But I can't live like that anymore. I have to do the right thing. It's, I'm compelled by it as often as I possibly can. So that move, I'm gonna call myself out as being brave.'cause I was terrified even though I was like, I'm just gonna give him the money and pay for the toothbrushes. So brave can be in little small situations and it can also be uncomfortable, I guess is the, is the pull of that one. Bravery can be bigger and it can be the ability like Ava was demonstrating to persevere through hard things. And I love Glennon Doyle, she coined it. I know she's not the first one to ever say it, but in her book, I think it's untamed actually. She just, she and her sister and her wife, Abby just published a book called We Can Do Hard Things, but she coined it. We Can Do Hard Things and that in itself is bravery. I. And bravery doesn't have to be physical. It can also be emotional and it can be spiritual as well. So bravery not about fearlessness. It's not about being super loud. It's not about having it all having the answers. It's not a performance, it's presence. It's being honest and it's being aligned with who you are in that moment. And maybe it sounds like I'm scared, but I'm here. That's what I said. I'm scared, but I'm here in the emergency room. It could also be saying, I don't know what's gonna happen next, but I know the next right thing will come and in the end all will be well. I know that it might for you or for me, be you saying, I'm not gonna gaslight myself. I'm not gonna abandon myself. Not this time I'm gonna be true to what I know is right, because bravery is choosing to lead with your whole. Soul, your spirit and not from your fear, and especially being a woman in recovery. It requires being in recovery, whether it's you're recovering from substance abuse or alcoholism like me, or codependency or disordered eating or trauma or burnout or people pleasing or perfectionism or anything else that has separated you from your whole truest self. All of those qualify you to be a member and the girls you recover. Community bravery is required. In this sacred ground of recovery and we embody and demonstrate and practice bravery every step of the way because let's be real, my friend's, in recovery, it takes immense courage and bravery to admit the truth about whatever it is that you've been struggling with. Immense. I mean, I remember when I finally admitted that, like that I had tried every single thing to drink normally. That's the long and short of it, and I couldn't, and there was bravery, also humiliation, not required, but was for me to admit the truth both to myself and then when I went into my first. A meeting to admit it to others as well. Um, it takes a immense bravery to sit in hard feelings instead of numbing out with whatever it is that we used to numb out on. Maybe it was alcohol, maybe it was eating, maybe it's gamble. Like whatever it is. Um, maybe it's trying to people please your way into something, being with the hard things instead of numbing them out. Uh, the women that I work with too show immense courage and bravery to sometimes they leave what is fine and good and they go for what's fully aligned and makes them feel fully alive. So just what I did right? Like I left my, uh, corporate job, my career at education, which was fine. It was my zone of. Excellence. I was good at it, but it was not my assignment and it didn't match with what I was evolving and expanding to be, which is, you're listening to it, this podcast and my coaching practice and speaking opportunities and all of these beautiful steps towards this journey that I don't know what the end of it looks like. That takes bravery and it's an honor to be able to. Support women in recovery to go for the thing that they feel makes them feel most fully alive and aligned. It also takes bravery to let go of roles that have kept us safe, but kept us small. And the roles can be in a relationship, it can be in a group, it can be, uh, in a job. You're staying because it's safe, but you know it's keeping you small and it's even brave to just believe, to change your mind about your belief, about your own worthiness. I was just on a client, um, call client coaching call, and we were coaching on this idea of worthiness and. I think bravery comes from this idea that, listen, I'm worthy, I'm worthy to say the thing. I'm worthy to take the action. I'm worthy to leave the job. And let me tell you if, if you, if you haven't heard me, say it a million times, hear me. Say it again. You were born. Worthy a hundred percent. And no percent of that has ever shifted. Not up, not down. You were born worthy and you stay that way. And so the believing of your expanded 100% worthiness allows you to be even. Braver because my girls who aren't brave enough to take big risks or to leave the job or to leave the relationship or go, finally go for the thing. The thing you always wanted to do, the women have the most difficult time doing that are the ones that just aren't grounded in their deep feelings of worthiness. And if you're in recovery, I mean so much bravery is required of you. You make a thousand million brave choices. The first one is to show up and say, I need help. The second one is to get yourself in a community of people who are embodying the solution and who know the way out. The next one is reaching out for help. Over and over and over again. I was on the phone with a woman who mentors me this, or, yes, yesterday morning, just crying, crying, crying, and saying, please help me. Please share your experience with me. That takes bravery. I know the old me and sometimes the current me is like, I don't need to ask for help. It's not like I'll figure it out. It's not a big deal. But we have got to be done with that. Humans were born into to be in community with each other, to be partners, to be lovers, to be friends, and we want to help each other. And when we deprive ourselves and our friends and our C connect our communities of their ability to help. Us we're taking that opportunity, that chance away from them. It takes bravery to stop apologizing for what you want. What you'd love, and that's a question that I ask my coaching clients right off the bat. And then over and over, what would you love? Not what do you think you can do? Not what do your parents think you should do? Not what does your community or your husband or your wife say you can do, but what would you love? It takes immense bravery to listen to your heart, to be available for the speak. Speaking of your soul, the whisper of the divine, A message from God. To receive what it is that you actually would love, which is your assignment. And it takes a lot of bravery to tell a new story about who and whose you are. And bravery oftentimes is not flashy. It's often super quiet. It's very sacred. And, uh, if you are. Relating to any of this. If you're a woman taking a breath right now, I have a little secret for you. You are already brave. You probably could get a PhD in bravery. Am I right? Think about the last 24 hours. Think about the last 30 days. Think about the last year of your life and I guarantee you can identify. Actions you've taken in spite of being afraid, truths that you told when it was, it would be easier to lie or withhold brave moves forward even when you didn't feel like doing it. I know you have all of those. So here's me handing you your metal or cookie or whatever it is that you need. That's a brave ass bitch. BI, B baby. Sorry, that came out of nowhere, but I'm gonna embrace it. I love it. So here's some other ways that bravery has shown up for me, and maybe it's showing up for you in similar ways. Remembering that being brave is not just for the big moments, it's showing up in our life every single day if we're paying attention. So in my life as a mom. Brave shows up all the time. The invitation to be brave. And what that means is letting my kids see me have feelings and take action anyway. So when I'm angry, I say I'm feeling angry, and then I go for a walk or I go yell outside or I go, my kids think I know kung fu.'cause um, I like to go outside and like kick something, just, you know, safely. They're like mom's out practicing kung fu. But I'm letting that emotion be expressed in a healthy way. And then also when I'm sad, I cry and I will cry in front of my kids and I will say things like, I'm feeling sad because I'm feeling upset because. And then they see me cry in the car and then keep moving, right? I'm not laid out. I'm not staying in it, and I'm also not suffocating my own feelings. And you better believe that. I never tell my kids don't cry. I do not tell them to stop crying. I think that's toxic. I think that's suffocating. And, um, I'm not gonna do that to them because I, I don't know that anyone ever said that to me, but I definitely was raised in this culture that was like, it is not good to show your feelings. And I didn't see a lot of people show their feelings and so quietly I absorbed this norm that it's not okay to share your feelings. And I'm not doing that with my kids. Show your feelings, express them in a healthy way. I was on a call with my coach earlier, and one of the guest speakers said Whatever emotions you're feeling typically can be metabolized in 90 seconds if you are present with them, which means you're not shutting them down, you're not trying to move them away, you're not running from them, you're not fighting them. You're just feeling whatever the somatic response is. Generally, it takes you 90 seconds if you're super present with it, for you to move. To and through it. And so generally when my kids are sad, I know they're probably just gonna be screaming and crying for about 90 seconds, as long as I'm holding space and presence for them, which candidly I'm not always able to do, I'm not always able to do. Sometimes I'm like, Ugh, tag, you're it to my husband. And he is actually really, really skilled in holding presence. But we welcome all their feelings in and we welcome, I welcome my own feelings in as well, which is kind of a new practice for me. Also being brave as a mom means do doing what I say. And if I say you can or you cannot have that, uh, you cannot have it or you cannot have it. And I'm not going to switch. I'm not gonna say things that I can't generally. Fulfill my end of, if I say I'm gonna be somewhere, I'm gonna be there. If I say we're gonna do something, we're gonna do something. And also, if I say, you can't watch YouTube, you ain't gonna watch YouTube. I don't know if y'all are like this, but my kids love to sneak the TV and then watch YouTube. We don't let'em have a lot of screen time at all. But when we do, their favorite thing to like watch on the low is YouTube. And there's so much gross stuff on there. It just like makes me feel sick. Okay. Where was I? Oh, yeah. Being brave as a mom means trusting my instincts, even when other people don't get it. Even when I'm like, no, you cannot smoke around my kids, or, no, we're not gonna go be around that person, or, no, we're not gonna be doing that. Thank you very much. Even though other people are like, well, why that's weird? I'm like, yeah, well gimme a t-shirt that says hashtag weird mom, and I'll wear it. But I know what my instincts are and I stick to them and I honor them. Even when it means like, I'm not popular, I'm not, it's not a popular opinion, or it's gonna make people mad. I'm not worried about making you mad, okay? Because I don't make anybody mad anyway. You make yourself mad. I was just talking to somebody about that, about the only person in charge of your feelings is you. The only person that can give you permission to do the thing that you've always wanted to do is you, nobody's coming to give you permission. It's all you. It always has been. You are co-creating your experience with the creator of the universe. That doesn't mean it's only you because you're guided by divine flow and divide force and divine purpose and divine intention, but it's you and the divine. Okay? It's not some man that's coming to save you or some job that's gonna make you feel whole or some amount of money that's gonna make you finally feel okay. It's none of that. It's you. It's always been you. And sometimes being brave is just saying you like, you know what? I don't know. I don't have it figured out. I don't know what the plan is, but I'm gonna keep going and I'm doing my best in my marriage. If anybody's married or in long-term partnership with somebody, you know, there is a lot of bravery required. So for me, it's being brave around what I need, what I want in the relationship, and what I need to feel safe and affirmed and encouraged. My love language, I am not ashamed to say is words of affirmation. I love me meia. Good. You're looking fine today, honey. And it took a lot of bravery for me to say that's what I need. I know you keep thinking acts of services, my jam, but it's not. So, although you don't have to stop that, please say something like, your ass looks fine today, honey. It takes bravery to say what you need to name what you need now. Whether or not they're actually gonna do it is a different podcast episode. Okay. But you are me being brave and saying what I need is the thing that I can do. The other thing that I've been practicing recently but also forever basically, is staying present when it would be easier to run or shut down or get on my phone or ignore or whatever, and that epi that experience in the emergency room. Presented me with the invitation to do that. Be present. Be present. Be present. Be present. Back to the present moment, back to the smells in the room, back to the monkeys on the wall, back to the, the doctor's arm. Hair like whatever it was. Back to back to the present. Be present. It would've been so much easier for me to freak out, be on my phone and text people and tell social media blah, blah, blah, but I wasn't willing to do that. Because what was brave and required in that moment was mom being super present. And then also in my marriage, and I'll be candid with you, I have a much easier time being present with my kids. I have a little bit of a hard time being more present with my husband, but being present with him, receiving his, um, what he needs and what he's expressing and his concerns, when it would be a lot easier to go to my default, which is to just write you off or dismiss you. And frankly, uh, you know, we've been married, you may not know this, but we've been married 11 years, we've been together 15. And sometimes bravery means staying in the marriage when it would be a lot easier to leave. It would be a lot easier to leave. So the other thing about being in relationship is like owning what's coming up and not blaming. So being, having agency and not. Putting blame on him or a situation or outside circumstances, really grounding into this deep belief that it's all me and God. It's all me and God. Nobody can make me do anything. Um, and I, I get to be responsible for my own feelings and my own words and my own behaviors, and then also in partnership in my marriage. Being brave means telling the truth even when it risks. Conflict. Uh, I don't love conflict, uh, at all, but being brave in my marriage means me telling the truth about what my feelings are, what my needs are, what my experiences are. And I've also had the pleasure of doing this, some similar things in friendship. Um, I will not lie to you. It is much easier. My, my traditional behaviors in friendship have been to overlook it, to ignore it, to hope it will go away to forgive it, right? And I'm saying forgive in, um, quotation marks, which is basically just bypass it and not have to deal with it. But recently I have been. Practicing bravery and friendships and saying hard things to my friends and hoping that they love me anyway, but also being okay if it's, there's a rupture. And so I got some good practice with this. I feel very brave and very proud of myself for, um, just essentially naming something that was not okay for me, what I needed. And because at the end of the day, like it's all about my perception and experience and I felt really good about it. And so. That's encouraging. Bravery generally pays off, especially when it's coupled with presence, compassion, and love. Okay. Lemme take a breath here. We've covered a lot so far, by the way. Well, I guess I'll tell you at the end how Ava's doing. I looked up, I. I said I, I went to my best friend, Chad, GBT, and I said, Chad, GBT. Tell me some spiritual foundations for bravery and what stood out to me. There's a lot by the way. Um, in the Bible for instance, there's a verse that says, do not fear. Be strong and courageous. For I'm with you. And so that brings me back to I am never brave by myself. I'm never brave by myself. I am always connected to my creator. Maybe sometimes I call it God. Sometimes I call it source. Sometimes I'll call it universe. Sometimes I call it love. But I am always connected. And so in the instance of the emergency room with Ava, I invited God to make its presence known. And it wasn't like I invited God in'cause God is always. God is everything always everywhere, all the time. But it was more of, please help me expand my awareness of your presence, of your loving presence, of your healing presence. And I love this verse because it says, be brave. Essentially. Don't fear. Be brave for I am with you. And it's a reminder that we're not doing life by ourselves. We're doing life with the creator of the universe. With the master. Remember, you are a masterpiece, a piece of the master. We're doing life with the one you are. Someone, some of the one. We're doing life with the, with the entity, with the source, with the energy that created us. We don't have to be brave on our own, and that helps me take a big, deep breath.'cause I don't have to be brave by myself now. It's always nice to have other humans helping me be brave. It was great that my husband was there. It was nice that my mom and sister were there. It's, it's been so wonderful to have people who love us reach out, say that they're with us and they're praying for us. But my bravery comes from and is enhanced by this deep knowing of who and whose I am. Do not fear, be strong and courageous. For I am with you, which means it's handled, which means it's handled. And I'm gonna let you in on a little secret. It's handled in your favor. The end is always good. We're directed by the creative force of the universe, and that force is always moving us in the direction of wellbeing. It's always working out for you. It's always working out for me, and it's always good. Even though in the moment the 3D may not reflect that courage and bravery are not self generated. That's why when you try really hard to be brave, it's exhausting. It's connected to something much, much bigger than us, much higher than us. And so we don't have to be brave alone. And of course, let me see if I can find it here. My, one of my favorite spiritual texts actually, I wanted, I wanna share with you this verse that came up also from the Bible, which is the greatest, in my opinion, metaphysical text of all time. Jesus was the greatest manifester, the greatest metaphysical teacher, but it comes from the book of Esther, chapter four, verse 14, and it says, perhaps you were born for such a time as this. I'm gonna say that again. Receive it as a call forward. Perhaps you were born for such a time as this, and if that's not an invitation of bravery to bravely step forward and be in this moment, whatever the moment is, whatever the news is saying, whatever the relationships are happening, whatever is let it be. Perhaps you were born for such a time. As this, and of course the Course in Miracles says essentially the same thing. It's very brave to choose love over fear. It's very brave to stand in the middle of your experience and say, I choose love over fear, and if there's something here that needs love, I'm going to be the one to do it. And then Brene Brown, my girl, whose work I absolutely love, says, you can choose courage or you can choose comfort, but you can't choose both. And bravery is what makes all healing possible. It's a, it's what allows your purpose to unfold. It allows you to be the biggest, most expansive version of yourself, and it's what transforms recovery into total resurrection. Right. So there's recovery when you first get sober, when you first go into recovery, and then there's real expansive transformational recovery, which is when you are grounded so deeply in your being and identity as a creation of the creator. Piece of the master masterpiece, some of the one that you can't help but go after your dreams. You can't help but take the leap to do the thing that's on your heart, that thing that you would love, that thing that you would love, that is for you. It's your assignment. And so as we close out for today, I'm gonna invite you to consider a few questions on your journey bravery, and then I will close out and tell you how Eva's doing. Now, my first question for you, my love is where have you already shown brave bravery? Where have you already been brave? If you're in recovery, where have you been brave in your recovery? Where have you been? Brave as a mom? Where have you been brave as a partner or a wife or an employee? And the next question is, where in your life right now are you being invited to be brave? Maybe it's a relationship. Maybe it's a big leap you need to take. Maybe it's a hard conversation. Where in your life are you being invited to Be brave right now, and I want you to DM me. You can find me on Instagram at Girls Who Recover, and I want you to DM me where you're being invited to be brave right now, and where you've already been brave in your life. So it's just been a couple of days. This is Tuesday and all of this happened on Friday, but. Because of the bravery of my daughter and my family, and me and the loving, healing arms of a conscious creator who has our back, paired with people who love us in overflow, all will be well for Ava. Her face will be fixed, her teeth will be fixed, um, and she will heal. As quickly as a 10-year-old can possibly heal. So I'm very grateful for all of you. You've reached out. I'm grateful for all your love, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak on a topic that I didn't even know I loved so much, and that is bravery. So I'm calling us forward to both recognize where we've been brave already. To realize that's how it's a, it's a key ingredient in our transformation and our expansion and stepping into who we were created to be. Brave is a part of that and is, if this feels like something that you'd like to do with the support of someone who has your back, who's been there, who knows the process of transformation and has coached many women. Especially women in recovery to do the thing you've always wanted to do, to take the leap to create the dream. To start the business, to go for the relationship, to make the move, to write the book, to go for the raise to make more money. Whatever it is for you, I would love to invite you into a breakthrough call with me. A breakthrough call is a really sacred, powerful experience, is a gift for me to you. If you feel like you are ready to make a big leap in your recovery and in your life to do the thing you. Always wanted to do. I'm dropping the link in the show notes. You can get a one-on-one spot with me for free, and together we'll clarify what you would love. What would you love? We'll land on the thing that's standing in your way, the biggest thing holding you back, and we'll create momentum around a path forward so that you can finally get started to do that thing you've always promised yourself you wanted to do. So as a closing love note from me to you. Remember that bravery does not always roar or yell. Sometimes it trembles, sometimes it whispers, sometimes it gets on her knees and prays, but always, every time, bravery is an invitation for you to rise, not when you feel. Ready? Not when you feel fearless, but right now, right here in the middle of the chaos, in the middle of the mess, in the tension between who you've been and who you are becoming. You do not have to be perfect. You just have to be willing. I love you. I'm so proud of you, and I believe in your ability to create a gorgeous, brave life you love. Whoa. Did you just feel what I felt? There's a whole lot of that and so much more to inspire you to create miracles in your own life on upcoming episodes of the Girls Who Recover podcast. And if you loved this episode, be sure to follow the show. Give it a five star rating and a gorgeous review, and then share it with your best friend to be a light in her life. And the fun doesn't have to stop here. Grab my latest workshop for free in the show notes. Designed to help you create a career you love and book your free breakthrough call with me one-on-one when you're ready to be supported in transforming your life. You can find and message me on Instagram at Girls Who Recover. And in case you haven't heard it today, I love you. I'm so proud of you, proud, and I believe in your ability to create a gorgeous life you love starting right now, and I'll see you in the next episode.