Colum McCann Quotes

Ordinary life is pretty complex stuff.

It is only necessary to have courage, for strength without self-confidence is useless.

Love and peace of mind do protect us. They allow us to overcome the problems that life hands us. They teach us to survive... to live now... to have the courage to confront each day.

You always have nerves. And it's important to respect your nerves and your doubts. And then you have to ultimately overcome them.

Having a superpower has nothing to do with the ability to fly or jump, or superhuman strength. The truest superpowers are the ones we all possess: willpower, integrity, and most importantly, courage.

A brave man thinks no one his superior who does him an injury, for he has it then in his power to make himself superior to the other by forgiving it.

I have often been afraid, but I would not give in to it. I made myself act as though I was not afraid and gradually my fear disappeared.

I think you're the sort of person who finds money on the ground and waves it in the air and asks if anyone has lost it. I think you cry in movies that aren't even sad because you have a soft heart, though you don't let it show. I think you do things that scare you, and that makes you braver than those adrenaline junkies who bungee-jump off bridges.

The next time you encounter fear, consider yourself lucky. This is where the courage comes in. Usually we think that brave people have no fear. The truth is that they are intimate with fear. When I was first married, my husband said I was one of the bravest people he knew. When I asked him why, he said because I was a complete coward but went ahead and did things anyhow.

Acts of bravery don't always take place on battlefields. They can take place in your heart, when you have the courage to honor your character, your intellect, your inclinations, and yes, your soul by listening to its clean, clear voice of direction instead of following the muddied messages of a timid world.

I find my greatest strength in wanting to be strong. I find my greatest bravery in deciding to be brave. I don't know if I've ever realized it before,[...] I think we both realize it now. If there's no feeling of fear, then there's no need for courage.

God abandons only those who abandon themselves, and whoever has the courage to shut up his sorrow within his own heart is stronger to fight against it than he who complains.

Overcoming fear doesn't have to be skydiving, if you're afraid of heights. Overcoming fear is an everyday thing. We do it all day long.

We are built for the valley, for the ordinary stuff we are in, and that is where we have to prove our mettle.

I say you are a coward and you are; I think you hunt only to reassure yourself that you are not what you are: the weakest thing to ever walk the Earth. He will come for me and then we will be gone, and you will be helpless for all your hunting, because Westley and I are joined by the bond of love and you cannot track that, not with a thousand bloodhounds, and you cannot break it, not with a thousand swords.

Victory over fear is the first spiritual duty of man.

Courage is the enabling virtue for any philosopher - for any human being, I think, in the end. Courage to think, courage to love, courage to hope.

The guts carry the feet, not the feet the guts.

The courage to be is the most difficult thing for any human being.

It is naive to think that self-assertiveness is easy. To live self-assertively--which means to live authentically--is an act of high courage. That is why so many people spend the better part of their lives in hiding--from others and also from themselves.

Courage is not limited to the battlefield or the Indianapolis 500 or bravely catching a thief in your house. The real tests of courage are much quieter. They are the inner tests, like remaining faithful when nobody's looking, like enduring pain when the room is empty, like standing alone when you're misunderstood.

Usually we think that brave people have no fear. The truth is that they are intimate with fear.

What you feel doesn’t matter in the end; it’s what you do that makes you brave.

Ultimately, that is the definition of bravery: not being afraid of yourself.

Every day has its own challenges, and every day those challenges make us stronger.