The acorn becomes an oak by means of automatic growth; no commitment is necessary. The kitten similarly becomes a cat on the basis of instinct. Nature and being are identical in creatures like them. But a man or woman becomes fully human only by his or her choices and his or her commitment to them. People attain worth and dignity by the multitude of decisions they make from day by day. These decisions require courage.

Indeed, compulsive and rigid moralism arises in given persons precisely as the result of a lack of sense of being. Rigid moralism is a compensatory mechanism by which the individual persuades himself to take over the external sanctions because he has no fundamental assurance that his own choices have any sanction of their own

Courage is the basic virtue for everyone so long as he continues to grow, to move ahead.

Whatever sphere we may be in, there is a profound joy in the realization that we are helping to form the structure of the new world. This is creative courage, however minor or fortuitous our creations may be.

We must be fully committed, but we must also be aware at the same time that we might possibly be wrong. People who claim to be absolutely convinced that their stand is the only right one...is a dead giveaway of unconscious doubt. Commitment is healthiest when it is not without doubt, but in spite of doubt.

Every human being must have a point at which he stands against the culture, where he says, this is me and the damned world can go to hell.

Courage is necessary to make being and becoming possible.