On Heroes 21 Jan 23

I think it is important to have heroes, to have a select constellation of stars you admire and look up to. They raise you up with a model of behavior and being that inspires the best and the growth in you.  

And so it goes and you get older and the heroes get fewer.  And in the back of your mind there is the question – how do you measure up to your heroes?  In individual sports at the world ranked level, like tennis, you can progress and actually play your heroes and contest them and even beat them and so have a real measure.  A measure that says yes, you have grown and some of your heroes are now peers.

And for most of us, we do not get to be with and play with our heroes in a contest of spirit and life achievement.  And so, you must wonder – how do I measure up?  Have I become a hero too?  Have I been worthy of their example and inspiration?  

The answer lies deep inside you, your personal truth and so you take your measure and answer as best you can.  And it is an answer and it is not objective.  The objective answer would be in what you do and achieve on the world stage.  Did you produce any works that are compared with your heroes.  Has someone else outside of you said you are like your heroes?  Ahh that is the external measure that you would accept as a real answer.  

And yet the journey, the reaching towards the heroic is fulfilling and rewarding and, in the end, it must be enough of an answer for most of us.  Did I fill the world with love, truth and beauty, was I an honorable and good man?

Postface:

I am the master of my fate (with grace given)

I am the captain of my soul.

Excerpt with license taken, from the poem “Invictus”