Dialectics: Courage and Progression

Progression is inevitable in our world; we are constantly pushing towards change and this trend will really never stop. There are many ways to define progress: in arts, sciences, human relations, economics, education, athletics, and just about anything else. Because we are studying Jane Eyre in English and things like World War II and Gandhi in History, I found it an appropriate time to speak on human progression.

The other side of this dialectic is courage. If we look back at history, we see that certain people had an immeasurable amount of it. These people, like Martin Luther King Jr. or Abraham Lincoln, were extremely brave and typically faced huge odds against them. They were able to persevere with some kind of burning passion for what they were doing.

The dialectic is interesting because all progression is courageous, but not all truly courageous people push for progression. Any time something progresses or changes, there must be a sort of courage involved. This stands true even for something small, like a family progressing by getting new jobs or a new house-- if courage isn't there, the move won't be made.

On the other hand, some people who are courageous unfortunately do not wish to progress. Some of history's biggest figures, like Adolf Hitler or Napoleon, had courage but did not use it to push for beneficial change. Instead, they turned around and searched for regression. In Hitler's case, he was brave enough to stand in front of a hurting nation and promise that he would make it all better. Then he acted terribly, with a disgusting measure of racial discrimination and a complete lack of humanity.

Courage is essentially a catalyst for our world's occurrences. It can lend itself to progression or regression, but in the hands of the right people it will certainly do good for our world. Progression itself is the key to how our world works; as soon as we stop changing everything will fall apart. This is why brave people like Charlotte Brontë have stories that still resonate now: they were able to change the world in great ways, and their influence was profound.

We can learn from this dialectic in many ways. It's important to know that true courage isn't unreachable, as long as you believe wholeheartedly in something. Martin Luther and Gandhi had a passion for their beliefs, to the point where it became a life's quest to achieve what they wanted. If we can find this passion, and a true sense of courage, then progression is bound to happen and we can change the world.