it means when things are getting tough you have to get back up, dust yourself off and keep trying.

quit your bitching and be a man. when it gets tough start playing hard.

"Cowboy Up" is when you are injured or down and the prospect of doing whatever it is you're about to try is so bleak that the best you can hope for is to live through it.

When faced with a hard chore, it's a shift in attitude from "can't" to a positive "can-do" with confidence and a non-complaining spirit that becomes contageous.

Basically, another way of saying "Shut up and take it like a man" or "Quit your whining." The term is derived from the popular image of cowboys being tough, unflinching, uncomplaining, and hard-working.

Essentially another term for self-endowment of strength and moral, or to another. Essentially another term for a similar phrase like, "toughen up", or "stop your belly-aching and fight!", etc etc.

The original meaning of "Cowboy Up" was to inform the next bullrider or bucking bronco rider at a rodeo to get ready to ride or "cowboy up". Now it means to stop being a pussy liberal snowflake with your safe spaces and whiny bullshit, grow up and be a man for once in your pathetic life.