“The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity.”
This quote is by Rollo May, who was an American existential psychologist who lived from 1909 to 1994.
What often comes to mind when people think about courage are those heroic acts done by women and men that we learn about through the media: people helping others at great risk to themselves, such as rescuing someone who is in a life-threatening situation. I’m very thankful for and impressed by people who have the courage to help others in this way.
It also takes courage to face challenges that life presents to us in our personal lives, such as addressing relationship issues, making major decisions that impact our life and others’ lives, being assertive when it’s uncomfortable but necessary, getting help and making the effort to overcome an addiction, and dealing with many other types of difficulties.
And courage is also needed to endeavor to be the unique person each of us was created to be. Among other things, this requires us to resist conforming to societal pressures because of fears that we won’t be accepted unless we do. This is the conformity to which Rollo May refers, and he emphasizes that conformity is a common problem in our society.
Although May wasn’t a Jungian psychologist, his words reflect an essential aspect of Jungian psychological theory called individuation. Individuation is the opposite of conformity. Individuation is the inner process where we grow in consciousness and become more whole and unique persons. We do this by endeavoring to discern and then to integrate contents from our unconscious into our consciousness. And this type of personal growth also happens as we face difficulties and do our best to deal with them rather than fearing and running from them. The process of individuation requires us to be brave, but as we become more individuated, we also grow in courage that helps us to deal with future challenges. In addition, it enables us to be more generous, more helpful to others, more humble, and to acquire other positive qualities.
I encourage all of us to be watchful of our tendency toward conformity and instead to be our unique selves.