Don't Underestimate Your Ability to Change the World

Last week  I met a group of heroes. They did not wear capes or tights and they didn't use false identities. What amazed me was that they don't consider their duties heroic. To them it is all in a day's work. These are the men and women who work for the Henry Street Settlement in New York City. After hurricane Sandy hit New York City blacking out most of lower Manhattan, these people fanned out to check on the seniors they knew and cared for. Sometimes walking up 30 to 40 floors they brought food, medicine and comfort. They painstakingly escorted or carried some of the seniors out of these buildings and relocated them in housing that had electricity and running water. From the time Sandy hit until all their seniors were safe and cared for they worked ridiculously long hours even though many of them had no electricity or running water in their own homes. Yet, none of them thought what they did was heroic.

In keynotes, conferences and workshops we consistently find that people easily identify individuals they believe are great: noting everyone from Mother Theresa of Calcutta, to their parents, or an aunt or uncle. They identify the characteristics they believe these individuals possess and easily list characteristics of greatness. Research on heroes, as noted by Scott Allison and George Goethals in Heroes: What they do and why we need them, list "hero" characteristics as being "smart, strong, selfless, caring, charismatic, resilient, reliable and inspiring."

Here is where it gets interesting. When we have people look at the characteristics of greatness or heroes and ask them if they've displayed any of the characteristics, they respond with silence. We could attribute this lack of response to humility, or it could speak to a larger challenge: we can't see ourselves as heroes or great individuals. That is beyond us.

Why is this a challenge? Because our actions depend on how we think of ourselves and our abilities so if we believe we cannot make any difference in the world we won't make any. However, if we realize that we have shown some of the characteristics of greatness or heroics, then that behavior and those characteristics can be repeated and we can ultimately help a lot of people we might otherwise have ignored.

None of us need a cape or tights (I've heard they're hard to keep clean) but we need to realize that we have powers and abilities that can positively affect others around us. By at least acknowledging them in ourselves we can develop and grow those abilities so that everyone benefits.