The Courage No One Claps For

Performative Courage vs. the Real Thing

In the digital age, even courage can feel like something we’re supposed to document. You took the leap. You quit the job. You moved across the country. Cue the Instagram caption, the newsletter post, the “big life update” on LinkedIn.

There’s nothing wrong with sharing. Sometimes, it is brave to be visible.

But lately, I’ve noticed a shift: the bar for what counts as courage can start to feel performative: like unless it’s public, it doesn’t count. Like unless you’re turning your pain into a post or your risk into a narrative arc, you’re doing it wrong. The spotlight ends up dictating the value, as though quiet persistence isn’t enough unless it’s staged for an audience.

Maybe it matters even more now, in a culture where visibility is currency and silence is mistaken for absence, because the courage that doesn’t get posted can be the kind that keeps us alive.

But what about the other kind?

The Unseen Kind

The courage it takes to show up to an event where you don’t know a soul. To ask for help when you’d rather seem “fine.” To send one more pitch, one more cold email, one more “just checking in.” To walk into another interview, knowing full well you might not get the job. To keep building something when the response is mostly silence. To stay kind when you’re tired. To stay hopeful when you’re hurt.

Maybe yours looks different — maybe it’s showing up to the doctor’s appointment you’ve been avoiding, or keeping a promise to yourself no one else knows about.

These moments don’t make it into highlight reels. They don’t trend. They don’t get claps or comments or neatly edited reels. But they’re real. And for some of us, they’re daily.

And maybe they matter even more, because the quiet kind of courage is what actually sustains us. It’s what keeps careers, relationships, and dreams alive when the spotlight is gone.

Living Without Applause

There’s a particular ache that comes with doing hard things… and hearing nothing back. No one sees the hours you spent psyching yourself up. The small panic before the meeting. The lump in your throat before you hit send.

We saw this on a larger scale too. In the early days of the pandemic, we banged pots and pans out our windows for medical professionals, applauding their courage to keep showing up. But after a while, the noise faded, the applause stopped and yet their work, their quiet daily bravery, had to continue.

The same could be said of teachers. We call them heroes, celebrate them in soundbites or appreciation weeks, but too often forget the courage it takes to keep showing up under pressure, with limited resources, and with futures depending on their steadiness. Their bravery is quiet, sustained, and almost always undervalued.

For me, it’s looked like walking into interview after interview when I was running on fumes, summoning energy I wasn’t sure I had. It’s also looked like sending one more proposal after three went nowhere, or agreeing to attend the networking event when all I wanted was to stay home.

No one sees how much effort it takes to keep going.

But just because it’s quiet doesn’t mean it’s not brave. In fact, maybe that’s the bravest kind: the kind done not for recognition, but out of necessity, or faith, or a thin thread of belief that things can still change.

We don’t clap for persistence the way we clap for big leaps, but maybe we should.

What Keeps Me Going (Even When It’s Quiet)

Some days, it’s structure. A to-do list with just three things on it. A walk before I open my laptop.

Some days, it’s a friend who sends a voice memo that makes me laugh. Or a stranger’s post that reminds me I’m not the only one out here trying.

| Sometimes it’s not even hope, but momentum. Motion. The simple act of doing the next right thing, whether or not it leads anywhere.

It’s not always graceful. But it’s forward. And that counts.

Final Thought

You don’t have to post about it. You don’t have to brand it. You just have to get through the next hard thing and then the one after that. And that’s enough. Even if no one’s clapping.

If you’re in a season where the applause is missing, I hope you give yourself credit anyway. Because the quiet kind of courage deserves to be honored too.