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Finding Your Brave

Writer's picture: Sue & Claire Sue & Claire

We are delighted to bring you our first guest blog of 2025 written by the very inspiring Catherine Irwin, author of Switching Lanes - Slow Parenting in a Fast World.


Catherine is a mother of six, an author and passionate slow living advocate. Following her busy and hectic lifestyle in Australia, Catherine and her family relocated to the beautiful Norfolk countryside to embrace a calmer approach to daily living, and shares how her family of eight navigated their way back to a more simple and sustainable way of life. You can follow her and her lovely family on social media @along_the_country_lane


In this blog Catherine talks about the challenges and joys of finding your brave - we love this idea so much and it seems especially relevant for January - the month we traditionally associate with planning ahead, setting goals and intentions for the rest of the year. We hope you enjoy it and we'd love to know what resonates with you - as we move forward in 2025, how brave are you willing to be?

 

Finding your Brave by Catherine Irwin


Finding your brave
Finding your brave

Being brave isn’t easy. Often the very thought of trying something new is enough to paralyse us before we even consider the possibility that we can succeed.


Braveness looks completely different from one person to another.


For some, it might be introducing yourself to new neighbours, or leaving a job you aren’t happy in. For others it could be starting a hobby you aren’t familiar with, joining a sports team or organising your home life which feels busy and chaotic. No matter the circumstances, being brave takes courage and courage is often silenced by that unwelcome intruder in our heads - fear.


We don’t care to try new things because of fear. Fear of failure, of looking silly; worrying what others will think or say about us. Fear of being uncomfortable and out of depth. Fear bites; it stings and paralyses us, cementing our feet in the same place, unable to move forward. And the big kicker of fear is that we give it power to trap us into a deceitful web of lies that we all too easily believe.


Courage is the very opposite of fear, and yet why is it so easy to believe we can’t do something instead of believing we can?


We all want to be happy and experience joy in our lives.


Not just the sort of fleeting highs of joy that accompany big life changing moments such as marriage, having a baby or falling in love but the sort of inner joy that we can experience every day.


I’m going to let you in on a little secret.


Did you know that the very things that light us up in life are often the ones that lie beyond the edge of our comfort zone?


In order to own joy, we have to step into that vulnerable space of insecurity and the unfamiliar. And if you are like me, I don’t particularly enjoy that scenario.


So what do we do about it?


  • We take baby steps. Teeny tiny beginnings with slow intentional purpose.

  • We keep our eyes on the goal. Allow it to marinate in our minds.

  • Write it down and visually see our objectives.

  • We celebrate the small wins. Even one minute of bravery is a reason to celebrate.

  • We don’t look at the whole mountain of fear looming before us but rather the possibility of achieving our brave. Whatever it is. Big or small, bravery is in us all. We just need to tap into it.


Here’s where I let you in on another secret. Those small, tentative acts will begin to silence the fear and the more you practice bravery, the quieter those voices become.


When we begin to be brave it kick starts our motivation. We become energised instead of exhausted; a little bit of self pride begins to creep in (in a wholly good way) and we find ourselves in a place of empowering strength.


My brave these past few months has been to face my fear of cold water. Being an Australian, I am not naturally accustomed to the cold and certainly not icy water.


I was raised in the dusty wheat belt countryside of Western Australia; one of the hottest places on the planet, where the earth is dry and cracked, bitumen roads melt under foot like molten lava and the sun is an incessant furnace.


Yet here I am living in England, and when the days draw in and it begins to get dark at 3.30pm, I struggle, which makes me want to hibernate like a winter bear, eat warm sticky puddings and sleep.


I most certainly don’t want to throw myself into a freezing river and be embraced by its glacial fingers.


But throw myself in I did. I was truly terrified that first day, of the pain that awaited me and the fear that threatened to overwhelm me. It didn’t break me though. I wouldn’t let it hold me prisoner and instead calmed my tight chest and racing mind by telling myself I only had to stay in for one minute. Just one minute. I could do anything for one minute. You can do anything for one minute.


That first plunge was the hardest but it wasn’t the cold that I had to overcome.

Yes, the freezing water took my breath away as hundreds of sharp glacial needles assaulted my body and I found myself biting at the air in short desperate bursts. In those first 20 seconds I thought I must be mad and maybe I was. But then something miraculous happened. I felt warm all over; it radiated from the inside and travelled through all of my limbs . A blanket of calm serenity engulfed me and I felt happy; flooded with gratitude at what my body had accomplished, alongside a hefty portion of feel good endorphins

I faced my fear and found my brave but I had to tackle the incapacitating fear first. It wasn’t the actual sensation of being cold, it was the thought of it; teetering at the rivers edge and imagining how ghastly I would feel. My mind was imagining pain and the reality was the opposite.


Finding your brave is really about finding yourself. Let the fear wash over you and do it anyway, just one minute at a time.


Your brave is already there. You just don’t know it yet.


Catherine


 @along_the_country_lane


 

About New Leaves


We are Sue and Claire and we are professional oranisers and home stagers based in the Cotswolds. We've been helping people across the Cotswolds organise, declutter, and style their homes since 2015.

 

If you're moving house, downsizing, renovating, or going through a life changing event such as having a baby, retiring, or relocating, we can help bring order to the chaos!

 

Do reach out to us to find out more.


Best wishes


Sue & Claire

www.newleaves.info Facebook/Insta @newleavesinteriors

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