My daughter, Michelle, found this video of Erik the other day and posted it on her Facebook page. I wanted to see it because I knew it would be funny, but at the same time, I was scared to see him so happy and silly and not yet knowing how miserable his life would become and what he would do to end it. I mustered up the courage, though, and I’m glad I did. Just as I expected, though, I felt a mix of joy and pain. I hope you enjoy it! Click HERE to download the mp4 to your desktop.

Don’t forget to join me live on Conversations with Suzanna today at 10:00 PT/11:00 MT/12:00 CT/1:00 ET. Click HERE to listen.

At 3 pm ET/2 pm CT/12 pm PS, listen to the The Halli Casser–Jayne Show. Eben Alexander, MD, Jamie Butler, Erik and I will be the guests, and we’ll explore life after death. Check it out HERE.

Along the same lines of courage, enjoy today’s post:

Me: What is courage, and how do we find it?

Erik: You schwallow a pill.

Jamie and I laugh.

Erik: Wouldn’t it be awesome if we just kept that sentence and put a period. Ping.

Me: The pharmaceutical companies would love you.

Erik: Courage is confidence with an engine.

Me: Mm!

Erik: Right? Because you can have confidence and not choose to do anything with it. Courage comes with action.

Me: Oh! I like that.

Jamie: I do too. It came with a great visual. Kind of reminds me of that steam punk movement they have. That’s how he’s showing it.

I have no idea what she’s talking about.

Erik: And how that’s created or earned is by trusting yourself, knowing what your goals are—logical goals, emotional goals and knowing what your needs are.

Me: And spiritual goals?

Erik: Oh, definitely. Most of the time, people are reckless. It’s not courage. They’re big and they’re bold, and they go out there and do the first thing that comes to them, and it creates destruction. That’s not what courage is. Courage is thought of. It’s felt. It—

(Pause)

Jamie (To Erik): Wait. Involves? Let’s use involves.

Erik: —it involves community; it involves the environment. Everything is one. To have that, you need to have trust in yourself, and that means knowing what your goals are.

(Long pause)

Jamie: Hold on. It’s a great visual, Erik, but I want it explained more. When he shows me the confidence—

(Pause)

Jamie: Erik, you’re just going to have to find a way to talk about it. It’s hard to believe you might be at a loss for words!

Me: That never happens!

Erik: A loss for human words.

Me: Yeah, that’s what I was going to say. Probably a loss of words that we can understand.

Erik: Yep. Because there’s a level you reach that you truly understand you’re doing your best at any given moment. You don’t ask yourself, “How can I be better? What can I do to better myself?” That’s when you know, without a doubt, that you’re being the best version of yourself. Then that becomes your automatic pilot. That’s what I’m talking about. Courage happens there because you know yourself so well that you know there are no mistakes, that mistakes are defined by other people. So if they’re defined by other people as mistakes, it’s actually a learning experience. You’re not afraid of looking at something that didn’t work out and embrace it and go, “Oh god. I did that with all great intent, and it didn’t work? Let’s do it again.”

Me (a little lost): Anything else?

Erik: Well, we could go down a rabbit hole if you want.

Me: No, we’ll go on.

Enjoy your Wednesday, my sweets!