An OFC (opportunity for courage) occurs as one of three different types

 

Let’s consider an example with Jane. Jane works in a sales office as an administrative manager for 43 salespeople.

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1) Forced opportunities for choosing courage

 

The first type of OFC is a forced opportunity for courage.

 

Jane’s boss says to her “Jane, our sales manager will be out sick for our important sales meeting on Monday, and I’m tied up with another obligation. You’re the only one available who really knows the new data that we need to present to our salespeople. I want you to prepare a 20-minute talk and inspire them to take action on this new data.”

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Jane is really scared about how she will look if she doesn’t give a good presentation. Jane does have a choice. She could quit her job. She could refuse the assignment and deal with her boss’ response to that.

She might come up with a third alternative.

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But most of us would see this as a forced OFC. In preparing for and giving the presentation,

Jane is stepping into an opportunity for courage.

 

Typically, forced OFCs don’t present themselves that often. Some people have been inspired into a whole new life by responding to a forced OFC. Nevertheless, I consider forced OFCs to be the least important type of OFC.

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2) Optional opportunities for choosing courage

 

The second type of OFC is an optional opportunity for courage. These occur much more often than forced OFCs, especially as you begin to look for them and learn to recognize them as they occur.

 

Jane’s boss just gave her another task to finish before the end of the day. Jane knows that she will have to stay overtime to finish the task and she will resent her boss if she accepts this task without speaking up.

 

She has two basic options to choose from: She can choose to stay overtime and resent her boss. Or she can choose to speak to her boss (with a partnership attitude) to work out something where both of them feel good about the outcome. For Jane, choosing to speak to her boss is frightening for her.

 

The second choice is the choice of courage.

 

Once you begin to recognize them, optional OFCs will present themselves to you many times each day. I consider optional OFCs to be everyday opportunities to keep your life  exciting, stress free, and with good relationships.

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3) Created opportunities choosing courage

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The third type of OFC is a created opportunity for courage.

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These occur only when you decide to invent them and take advantage of them. Of the three types of OFCs,

they are potentially the most powerful to help you fully realize the life that you want.

 

Jane is fairly satisfied, well-respected, and well-paid as an administrative manager. Nothing is really pushing her to consider anything else. Yet, if she examines more closely what might turn her on the most,

what could give her even more day-to-day pleasure in her life, she’ll probably realize that she would love to be a saleswoman.

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But what a risk! She feels safe and respected in her current position. She knows her job well.

She has a guaranteed income, not subject to the ups-and-downs of an income based, at least partially, on her sales performance. People appreciate and respect her for what she does.

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She automatically thinks to herself, “If I move into selling, I might not be good at it, I will risk my guaranteed salary, people will think I am crazy, and I will give up the comfort I’m feeling now.”

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For Jane, to even consider stepping into selling, she must step out of her everyday life and create a new opportunity for courage that would never present itself to her in the normal course of events.

 

This is a created opportunity for courage.

 

Created OFCs will never obviously present themselves to you. You must look for them. You must invent them. The person who consistently looks for created OFCs, in all domains of their life, is the person who has fully embraced the risk that life is and declared themselves a full participant in their own life.

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And now for the call to action...

 

Identify and isolate three past examples of OFCs in your life:

 

1. One that was a forced OFC

2. One that was an optional OFC

3. One that was a created OFC.

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"Opportunity is often difficult to recognize; we usually expect it to beckon us with beepers and billboards."

–William Arthur Ward

 

"I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference."

–Robert Frost (1874-1963, poet)