COURAGE...

This week I was wondering how one conjures up courage for a new project or at least, for a first, new step.
On Monday I saw ‘Man on Wire’, a film about Philippe Petite, who in 1974 did the impossible: illegally rigging a wire and walking between the twin towers. For about an hour dancing between the towers, crossing eight times. I had read his book ‘to Reach the Clouds’ a few years ago, which had deeply moved me. To see him talk and recall his story was a feast for the eyes and heart (check out the trailer for the film with some amazing footage www.manonwire.com).

It all began with a crazy dream, a vision, sparked by an article in 1968 about the possible construction of the twin towers, which Petite saw, waiting in a French dentist’s practice. The towers themselves were still only a vision then and yet Petite’s dream was already potent and alive. It took him six years of preparation with an amazing team of people and fierce determination until that foggy morning in 1974 when he walked across the void. On his first visit to the towers and to the roof, ‘Impossible’ was all he could think of playing like a mantra in his mind. Yet, having felt the air up there he was suddenly struck; and in horror and delight he whispers his first thoughts: ‘I know it’s impossible, but I know I’ll do it!’ ;
and once back on street level: ‘Impossible, yes, so lets get to work!’

Petite did not know whether he ever would succeed, in fact everything seemed to contradict this vision. Yet staying focused, stubborn, unwavering and enlisting all the help he could get, he succeeded and gave us an amazing and beautiful gift.

Where does courage start? Did courage mean first of all to listen to the vision and not dismiss it as plain crazy? What are first acts of courage? Petite took his pen and drew a line between the outline of the towers, which weren’t even built then. A single line, a few millimeters long, recorded this gigantic dream. His amazing ‘coup of a century’ contained in this very first gesture.

Without courage and risk there is not much aliveness nor growth. Anais Nin reminds us that ’Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage’;
Jeanette Winterson believes that ‘only the Impossible is worth the effort!’
and Peter Drucker claims that ‘there is the risk you cannot afford to take and there is the risk you cannot afford not to take.’

I guess there are many kinds of courage:
Courage to just breathe and allow a vision to be there no matter how crazy or huge it might present itself to us;
Courage to allow the vision to remain close no matter what we encounter;
Courage to share the vision with others and ask for help;
Courage to commit- and commit again and again;
Courage to make uncountable small steps all leading to the single point of fulfilling the vision;
Courage to show up daily in service of the vision;
Courage to start again after failure;
Courage to remain flexible, yet focused;
Courage to acknowledge the impossible, yet get to work.



This morning I was witness to five spiders in my garden creating their delicate webs. Yesterday I had admired their determined stillness sitting motionless and waiting in the centre, this morning I saw them in action, witnessed this miraculous action unfold.
Do spiders need courage for their constructions? Courage to throw that first thread?
The most difficult part in constructing the web is the first thread: a sturdy horizontal thread on which the rest of the web is depending. The spider uses the wind and some luck: throws out one thread, hoping it will catch.
The similarities to Petite’s coup, firing a fishing line with a bow and arrow across the void between the towers is amazing! Petite describes how he can’t find the fishing line for some time that has been fired from across the other tower by an accomplice, the line on which all else hangs or fails (a thicker thread, a sturdier rope, eventually the steel rope!). In frustration he takes all his clothes off and searches the floor. Eventually he finds the arrow perching precariously on the edge; one small breath could have send it into the void.
From this thread the coup is constructed.
From the first thread thrown by the spider the whole web is created. Here is how:
The wind carries a thin adhesive thread released from her spinners while making the thread longer and longer. If she is lucky the thread sticks to a proper spot. Then she walks carefully over the thread, strengthening it with a second thread. This is repeated until the primary thread is strong enough. After this, she hangs a thread in the form of a Y below the primary thread. These are the first three radial of the web. More radials are constructed taking care that the distance between the radial is small enough to cross. Then non-sticky circular construction spirals are made. The web is completed when the adhesive spiral threads are placed. While the sticky spirals are placed the non-sticky spirals are removed.
Unless the web can be easily mended, a spider shows up every day and constructs a new web, first recycling the old one by eating it up, using this precious protein for the new construction.

Wow! I think I never will be able to thoughtlessly walk through a web again. Then again I know if I do, I know the spider will start again, rebuilding the web.

Petite is an extraordinary man. He promised to walk the towers again if they are rebuilt: ‘When the towers again twin-tickle the clouds, I offer to walk again, to be the expression of the builder’s collective voice4. I will carry my life across the wire, as your life, as all our lives, past ,present, and future- the lives lost, the lives welcomed since.’
When I don’t know how to conjure up courage for a new project, maybe I will think of the spiders and just show up every morning, creating my web in daily practice, laying out sticky threads for inspiration or whatever wants to come along. At present I cannot measure my courage with people like Petite, but spider’s courage I should be able to conjure up!