Ranjay Gulati

And you're right that the media and all of us tend to portray examples of people where courage has a good ending.

You know, the hero, the heroine wins.

It doesn't always happen that way.

But that's what courage is, that you're willing to take action, not reckless action, but with the full understanding that this is uncertain and it may or may not end in a good way, but you feel compelled to do something.

Absolutely.

There are some people who are wired that way.

But what can the rest of us learn from them?

I mean, the point I want to make is that there are ordinary people who may not be wired that way, who still choose to act boldly.

Think about the lion and wizard of Oz, right?

He finally gets to the wizard and says, give me courage, give me courage.

And the wizard says, but you already have courage.

He said, no, but I'm scared.

I'm scared all the time.

He said, but you still chose to take action.

Even though you were scared, you are courageous.

And I think what we need to understand is how can ordinary people who may not have this congenital magical quality of fearlessness can resource themselves to act with courage, meaning taking action.

Nelson Mandela talked about this too.

He said that, you know, I thought courage is the absence of fear.

I've discovered courage is conquering fear.

It's taking action in the face of fear.