To recognize courage, it helps to distinguish the various facets of courage. Some of us display certain types of courage well, but fall short in other areas. Try to detect which elements you exhibit and which ones need to be unleashed in your life.

• Spiritual Courage. The spiritual journey requires being in the present. It is a confidence in faith that drives you to continue growing. You become a “witness” to your attachment to results and learn to self-correct. You surrender your ego to a higher level of courage consciousness and begin to exist in a place “where courage meets grace.” While all this is going on, humility steps in to replace arrogance and uprightness. The sacred within awakens.

• Emotional courage. Similar to spiritual courage, this involves “knowing yourself.” A path committed to contemplation is required to release your false identity. Thomas Keating in Open Mind, Open Heart defines it this way: “the self-image developed to cope with early childhood emotional trauma that seeks happiness by satisfying instinctual needs for survival/security, affection/esteem, and power/control, and that bases their self-esteem on cultural or group identification.” In the Enneagram it would be related to instinctive fears around the three subtypes: social, one-on-one, and self-preservation.

• Leadership courage (individual and organizational). An organization’s courageous culture honors and uplifts the human spirit (as opposed to authoritarianism or coercion). The collective intention of a courageous organization is to unite hearts and minds to achieve inspiring results. It means that the organization (and its people) will “fall on their swords” to honor their collective personal courage. Courageous leadership knows the difference between pride and arrogance versus humility and grace.

• Courage of individual leadership. Rooted in truth, you know your own heart, speak it appropriately, and display dignity shod with humility. People would label you as brave.

• Ethical/moral value. This courage is activated by the willingness to choose differently despite personal difficulties. The goal is a higher level of integrity than is required for the easy alternative. Moral courage is like a compass. Over a long period of time, a navigational error of one degree will throw you hundreds of miles off course.

• Physical courage. Facing a physical limitation that challenges the human body, using the body to meet athletic challenges, facing physical danger, or overcoming serious health problems are the best understood forms of bravery today. Practicing a contemplative life (stop and “be”) or being centered in mind, body, and spirit are other lesser-known physical examples of courage.

• Personal courage. The way of your heart might be the easiest way to understand this form of courage. It is a combination of heart and mind combined with a commitment to take one hundred percent responsibility for your actions. You must recognize that your spirit is the author of your destiny, as well as feeling safe in times of uncertainty and being comfortable with the individuation of your spirit also contributes.

• Political courage. The unwillingness to sell your soul is the key characteristic, represented by whether you are a politician (selfish) or a statesman (serving others). In other words, is your intention to do the right thing by putting future needs before political aspirations? Political courage is characterized by humility, not ego. It is being willing to risk expressing an unpopular thought that reveals your authenticity.

• Social courage. Social courage exhibits pleasant behavior in public, regardless of the circumstances. With discipline and grace, you reveal a paradox of courage: you don’t insult others, or take offense in silence. Your image plays a key role, expressing the contradictory qualities of social grace with a rebellion against the limitations of society.

By distinguishing and inserting these aspects of courage into your daily life, you increasingly manifest true courage, setting an example in which others can look for affirmation.