From Mark Twain to Winston Churchill and Maya Angelou, there is no shortage of inspirational quotes about courage.

Overcoming your fears might require individual, small acts of bravery, and lifestyle changes that can turn into lifelong habits. Regaining control over your fears might help to increase your sense of self-worth, helping you to live a fuller life.

You might start by saying “yes” more often, seeking those situations that are outside of your comfort zone, or standing up to irrational fear. 

Here are five simple ways to start small and become more courageous.

1. Find something you enjoy and work towards a meaningful goal

Winston Churchill once said that “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

One way you might show courage is to find a cause, hobby, or purpose and then pursue it to a meaningful goal. This could be learning a new language before a holiday, taking up an instrument to achieve a specific grade, or simply spending an hour more a day in nature.

Set yourself a goal so you have something to work towards. You might find that a definite focus helps to relieve any feelings of worry or stress that you have.

Remember that the moment your task becomes difficult, the time to show courage has arrived. When the honeymoon period ends and the size of your challenge becomes clear – whether you’re struggling with barre chords, French past-participles, or the British weather – it is the courage to continue that counts.

2. Overcome your fears… but don’t be afraid to start small

To paraphrase Mark Twain, being courageous doesn’t mean not experiencing fear, but rather mastering it, and acting despite it.

The fears we need to overcome will be different for everyone. A confident public speaker might have projects at home not yet started due to fear of failure. Meanwhile, the person who has succeeded in finishing a given project might be terrified of speaking about it in public.

Overcoming shyness could be as big an act of courage as the most daredevil stunt.

Starting small, taking baby steps outside of your comfort zone, is a great way to build up courage slowly, over time. The repetition of these small steps also helps to ingrain them in your lifestyle – to make them into habits.

Once your confidence grows, as you begin to see yourself as a more courageous person, you’ll be free to take the bigger leaps. As William Faulkner once said, “You cannot swim for new horizons until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.”

3. Have the courage to be yourself

Stepping away from the literary world for a moment, it was Coco Chanel who is quoted as saying “The most courageous act is still to think for yourself. Aloud.”

Courageous people are often self-confident, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have to work for it. As with overcoming fears, the key is to take small steps and form good habits. Low self-confidence might cause you to say “no” to things, or to miss out on opportunities that can begin a self-perpetuating spiral.

Overcome your fears, grow more confident, and then say “yes” to things. Experience and practice help you to acquire new knowledge that you can use to overcome the obstacles you face. As your self-confidence grows you might take on bigger and bigger challenges, becoming even more courageous.

It all starts with a can-do mentality and the courage to be yourself. 

4. Manage your emotions 

Staying on top of your emotions, especially during challenging times can be difficult. As you look to step outside of your comfort zone – setting new goals and saying “yes” more – the ability to manage your emotions will become increasingly important.

How you think about a challenge will affect the way you feel about it. If you allow fear to take over your thinking, it could make the task harder to approach. It could even cloud your judgement, making the task itself harder.

One key to managing your emotions is to separate your fears into the things you can and can’t control. 

If you have done all you can to manage those things within your control, it will hopefully relieve the stress or worry you feel about the things that you have no say over. Once your side of the bargain has been completed, you can accept whatever comes next.

5. Don’t be scared to act on impulse

While some decisions will require thinking about – weighing up options and potential pros and cons – sometimes the most courageous thing to do might be to act on impulse. If you are being yourself, and you have confidence in your own abilities in a given area, your instinctive choice may well be the right one.

Have the courage of your convictions and find out what new opportunities arrive to award that bravery.

And remember, to end with the words of Vincent Van Gogh, “What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?”