On my flight home from Israel, I listened to a generous helping of music. During one of my many searches through Delta’s selection of albums, I stumbled across Sara Bareilles’ song “Brave.” It caught me from the start:

You can be amazing
You can turn a phrase into a weapon or a drug
You can be the outcast
Or be the backlash of somebody’s lack of love
Or you can start speaking up

Words are truly powerful. Forget the old adage, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” It’s a lie.

Nothing’s gonna hurt you the way that words do
When they settle ‘neath your skin
Kept on the inside and no sunlight
Sometimes a shadow wins
But I wonder what would happen if you:

Say what you wanna say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

Bravery. That’s what I needed in my writing endeavors–the bravery to say what I wanted to say, instead of struggling with words and thoughts and phrases and fears. I needed to simply let the words fall out and watch them fill up the blank pages.

But the song wasn’t over yet:

And since your history of silence
Won’t do you any good,
Did you think it would?
Let your words be anything but empty
Why don’t you tell them the truth?

Empty words. Those are the worst. 

Anybody who has anything to share (which is everyone) has to tap into that bravery of being honest with their words. It takes bravery to let the words fall out–the honest ones, not the empty ones–but it’s worth it. 

So my prayer is for bravery.

The will to create comes from the Creator Himself.

And even though I still get scared and my words don’t always fall out easily, He helps me to rise above the fears.

He gives me my brave.

Now it’s your turn. What’s a song that has inspired you?