WHAT COURAGE BRINGS

While walking through the ancient city of Ephesus, I got lost in thought. "Know yourself," said the Spartan Chilon in the 6th century BC. This sentence is so important that every step starts with knowing oneself. In modern literature, it is referred to as awareness. The key to awareness is courage. When I think of the people of that era, a smile comes to my face, wondering if their lives, legends, epics, wars, and stories were also filled with courage. As I walk through the stony paths of Ephesus, I think to myself, who knows what happened here. The feeling of history is indescribable, a perfect visual in my eyes, with thoughtful details and aesthetics. What kind of legacy had they inherited to have such a visual? Every part of it was wisely and courageously crafted, a masterpiece. I deeply inhale, wishing that the courage of those people would pass on to me too.

In this dilemma, I question courage. I feel a huge difference between the courage of the past and today's courage. When I ask myself what has changed, could it be the developments we define as technology? Has technology distanced us first from nature and then from our own nature? Of course, a person who has moved away from nature will experience courage in a different way. But how should we perceive this? What should we do to understand that all the paths and doors that will open begin with courage? I then arrive at the amphitheater, wondering how many victories were celebrated here, how many plays were performed, and how many concerts were held. What kind of courage was it to go to unknown places, explore, and create history? Every step they took to survive was an act of great courage.

Now, perhaps a person should first have the courage to look deeply into their own body, the key to which is knowing oneself. How many people find courage in the light of the knowledge they are enslaved by? More importantly, how many people survive this knowledge? We are surrounded by information. Whether it's social media or Google, you can easily access information, but what about after that? Where were the courageous steps that needed to be taken, and why were they missing? When we analyze something better, when we understand something better, we still can't seem to apply it. However, if we take action and overcome our clumsiness in doing so, we can integrate knowledge into our lives.

Ultimately, could the level of courage you reach in life also determine the level of satisfaction you attain? Maybe it even allows us to accomplish all the great miracles of our lives. And my observation is that those who are masters of self-control possess great courage. Courage and captivity are intertwined; if you take the "c" from cesaret (Courage in Turkish), all that remains is esaret (Captivity in Turkish).

Arzu SEZGİN