Just for one day

alenngk (25)in #hero • 6 years ago

Okay, let's talk about what makes a hero. Now, the best heroes, the ones we love and cherish, they follow an arc. Odysseus, Dorothy, Rick and Morty.

They've all walked the same path. They've answered the call, met the mentor and battled the threshold guardians. They've come out of it stronger than they've ever been. But towards the end of that arc, when the rubber meets the road - the tire blows. Something knocks him down, hard. And that hero regresses. They lose everything. Become less than they were when we met them. Because, well, if a hero is going to be an actual hero - he has to be born again, from nothing.

Now as the audience, naturally we wanna see our heroes at their best. We root for them to save us all. To pull themselves out of their downward spiral. But sometimes the allure of the downward spiral is too strong. Sometimes our heroes are too weak. When that goes down, one of two things can happen: We either witness the death of our hero, or we realize we've been front row to the origin of something else.
The birth of a villain.

♪ | Feel the fear! It's your only guide to your own freedom.

By now, you may be wondering,
what is the point of regression? Why watch our hero go through any of this? Because the story isn't about them. It's about us. Heroes make mistakes because we do. They do things they regret because we do. And like most any story told, myth is a mirror. One we hold up to see ourselves more clearly.

♪ | As soon as you commit absolutely to a single model or belief system in a given domain, you’re unable to see that domain with fresh eyes or through other lenses.

But that is the catch-22 of the human condition.
The inability to see ourselves for who we are. We can often only do it through someone else's eyes. And when we do, we may not like what they see. So as we watch the rise and fall of our heroes, the question we ask should not be, will they be greater? Can they ascend? No. When that rubber hits the road, and that tire blows, the question we should ask is, will we be greater? Can we ascend?