It’s that time of year again, so I’m going to try and grumble my way through another month of totally unnecessary and entirely self-inflicted mental torture by participating in the annual WordPress Bloganuary challenge.

So, how am I brave? Well, putting myself through this again could be described as brave, I suppose. Brave or stupid.

I don’t consider myself as being particularly brave. I’ve been fortunate enough to live my life largely free of uncomfortable challenges: at least physical ones. No running into burning buildings or engaging in hand-to-hand mortal combat, thankfully.

One of my biggest physical challenges was making it to the top of the pyramid of Chichen Itza, in Mexico. I’ve never been good with heights (not very brave of me) and it’s very high and the steps are very steep. I just kept my head down and kept climbing. In all honesty, I was on the verge of giving up when I suddenly found that I’d actually reached the top.

There was certainly also a mental aspect to being brave enough to conquer that particular challenge and I suppose I’ve faced up to some other mental challenges in my time.

Dealing with being made redundant – twice – without collapsing into self-pitying surrender could maybe be described as brave in some sense. More recently, caring for my bed-ridden mother in her last, very difficult, days was bravery of a sort. Lesson learned at Chichen Itza, I just kept my head down and got on with it.

But I’m quite sure what the bravest thing I’ve ever done in my life is: screwing up the courage to ask out a girl who was – and is – over-the-horizon out of my league.

Reader, I married her.