What Makes Them Gryffindor?

Among all Hogwarts houses, Gryffindor is the most exposed through Harry Potter series because Harry Potter was a Gryffindor and his life was surrounded by Gryffindors.

Gryffindor's most well known trait is bravery and Gryffindors, in my opinion, are brave to do what they think is right. And for that "right thing", they're willing to sacrifice what's important for them, sometimes to the point of doing reckless or stupid things.

I know almost too many Gryffindors that I sometimes forget they're from the same house. There are trouble-making Fred and George Weasley, smart Hermione, ambitious Percy Weasley, clumsy Neville, and flirty Lavender Brown. We also see the infamous Peter Pettigrew. The question is, "Are they brave enough to be Gryffindor?" 

Look at Percy Weasley. He's smart enough to be Ravenclaw and ambitious enough to be Slytherin. Still, he was a Gryffindor. He was a Gryffindor who left his family and chose to work for the Ministry of Magic. How can a Gryffindor do such thing? I think Percy actually considered family important. Remember, even after he left his family, he congratulated Ron when Ron was chosen as prefect. Percy, at that moment, thought that Ministry of Magic was right and his family was wrong. Simple as that. He had the nerve to go after what he thought was right. He believed in Ministry of Magic, then he work there and left his family. After a while, he realised that his family was right then he came back to his family.

Hermione stated in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix that the Sorting Hat had considered placing her in Ravenclaw but she chose Gryffindor because, as she said herself in her first year, "Books! And cleverness! There are more important things - friendship and bravery and - oh Harry - be careful!" She valued bravery more than cleverness. Also let's just remember how many times Hermione was involved in breaking the rules for the sake of "everyone's safety".

Neville Longbottom was sorted into Gryffindor for his bravery although he didn't realise it at first. I found a post that may have been reposted many times so I couldn't find the original resource. The post was written, "I had a thought: Neville's greatest fear was Snape. And for ten months of every year for seven years, he went back and faced that fear over and over and over again. It would be like tossing Ron into a nest of spiders every day. Or pitching Harry against a Dementor every day. Neville went back to Potions every time, never skipped out, never ran away. Kid was braver than anyone ever noticed from the very beginning, even before he started standing up for himself." That post explains how bravery doesn't simply mean not being afraid but it's more about how someone deals with fear. Neville, in this case, faced his fear.

What about Peter Pettigrew? I guess the Sorting Hat thought this way, "Peter wasn't loyal enough to be Hufflepuff. He wasn't smart enough to be Ravenclaw, neither ambitious enough to be Slytherin. So let's sort him into Gryffindor, muahahaha!!!" Ignore that "muahahaha". Or maybe Peter was sorted into Gryffindor because he chose it, since he wasn't brave enough to be Gryffindor. 

At the end, we can learn from Gryffindor that the act of bravery takes many different ways. Except from Peter Pettigrew. Really, I still don't understand how he was sorted into Gryffindor.

P.S. I feel satisfied that I can finish writing this post. Really, I didn't expect that writing about Gryffindor would be difficult. It was even easier to write the Slytherin post. I don't even know why.