Do You Relate to the Lion in the Wizard of Oz?

Do you remember Bert Lahr? He was the actor who appeared in the original version of The Wizard of Oz and played the character of the cowardly lion. All he needed was Ccccc-courage!

So many of us need the courage to get by sometimes, or so it seems. If only we had the nerve and willingness to take risks, we could be in a better place. A strong lion/lioness never sinks into the mindset of “If only.” They act with confidence when they act. The key is knowing when to take action and then taking it with bravado.

I know about courage because thousands of people who have read my memoir, Under My Skin — Drama, Trauma & Rock n Roll, have told me that I’ve got it! They say it took courage to do the things I did, like leaving a dysfunctional family as a teenager, taking a job in Japan at 20 years old without knowing the language, traveling alone since forever, or calling out and standing up to misogynists and machismo men in business, quitting certain habits cold turkey like smoking cigarettes and marijuana (back in the day mind you), starting businesses overseas and raising venture capital when all the odds were against my ideas, going bankrupt, facing slanderous and false charges against my person, being ousted from a company I was a significant shareholder in because I was a whistleblower, standing up and brushing myself off and starting all over again. And again, and again.

Those things are not the half of it. But I’m not writing this story to be a braggadocio; I’m trying to understand…