Fortune favours the bold, said the classical Roman poet, Virgil.
It is easy to live life meekly. In fact, our culture encourages meekness and self-effacement. We are told that we shouldn’t speak too much of our accomplishments, or the people we know. We are told that we should fit in and conform. What’s most surprising is that the individualistic culture of social media and the Internet, seems to have actually encouraged the opposite personality! Facebook and Twitter feel like they are having a levelling effect on many of us – presenting a normal way of thinking about politics, fashion, morals and even things like what we feel is right, or good or true. So while we feel in control as we surf the boundless ocean of information on the ‘net, we feel the weight of communal opinion, rather than the freedom to be ourselves.
This is logical, in a way. Social media has brought us into a more oral culture than before. We read less linearly, we jump from hyperlink to hyperlink. We focus less and make quicker judgements: “Is this page pleasing to me? Should I stick around?” The quick-change nature of the medium encourages us to graze information and to look at things that we might find objectionable or difficult to hold in our hands, if they were written in a magazine or a book. When we hold a magazine or a book, it feels like we take more responsibility for the contents of those communication products than when a flickering assembly of light and colour and sound dances in front of our eyes as the result of a click.
In a word, the culture of social media encourages conformism. That’s why it is so refreshing when we feel the drive to be bold. Being bold means stubbornly sticking to principle and values in a room full of people with whom we disagree. There is nothing more uncomfortable, but ultimately more satisfying than busting up a dinner or cocktail party by refusing to participate in spreading a rumour, or, stubbornly defending someone who is being gossiped about or even slandered. Sometimes being bold requires putting your neck out, and being considered a carmudgeon, black sheep or a stick in the mud.
It is reassuring when someone does this. It makes you feel more comfortable in the world, knowing that someone is standing on principle. It makes that person’s behaviours predictable and reliable. It means that you can count on that person to stand up for you if you are standing on truth or principle. Being bold means sometimes striking out on your own and walking a lonely path. Being bold about the truth means that you are shooting an arrow into the future, an arrow whose trailing filament will lead others to the bold vision that you have had. They will follow its shimmering arc, and find its landing spot. There, they will congregate around you or your idea, and you will have changed the world.
Virgil was right.