Average Hero

Ask anyone about the present state of our society and he’ll come up with a lot of interesting things that you, yourself already know about. It would not be much of a surprise if he could not come up with anything positive to say. Hearing the negative things, however, is not something out of the ordinary. For as disturbing as it is, violence, crime, injustice, corruption, and many more make up the headlines of our daily news.

When was the last time you picked up the newspaper or the last time you watched the news and not get disappointed? Isn’t it saddening that the conspicuousness of the negative things happening around us tend to overshadow the positive ones? And isn’t it frustrating that as much as we want to say that these things are not true, we just can’t, because we cannot deny the truth to ourselves.

Has it ever occurred to you that there is more to life than this? There is much more to life than seeing famished street children resorting to drastic measures like stealing just to sate their hunger. There is much more to life than hearing a grieving mother who has lost her child in a violent occurrence that would not have happened if the other person has counted ’til ten. There is much more to life than walking home late at night, forcing our feet to move faster as we walk along dark alleys fearing for our safety. There is no need for further expounding. We all know that we deserve better than what is being offered to us by our society.

Can anything get any worse that it could not be altered? Is a mistake ever too complicated to not be resolved? On that note, is peace ever that impossible to not be attained? And the more important question, is peace ever that impossible to not be attained by an average human being?

We could wait for the leaders of our country to use all their power and influence to promote peace. We could also wait for someone who would be willing to come out into the open and bring peace to each of us. Or we can go on living the way we have always lived. Maybe with a sudden stroke of chance or fate, the world would change by itself. Those mentioned above are exactly the same things we’ve been doing all our lives- waiting for someone to do the work for us. Now look where it got us.

Let us not think that we can exclude ourselves from doing our part and expect that tomorrow, we will wake up in a better society. As the old saying goes, “If you want something done right, do it yourself.” Are we still waiting for a hero who will facilitate the change for us? When will we realize that the hero we are expecting- the one who has the power and influence is not going to come? When will we realize that the person courageous enough to take the dare for change doesn’t need to be a highly powerful and influential person? And when will we realize that it only takes a glance in the mirror to find out who that average hero is? Yes we are just average individuals, and yes we lead simple lives; but we can be heroes if we believe so.

Let us prove not to anyone but to ourselves that our national hero was not mistaken when he said that “the youth is the hope of our nation.” We can make a difference in our own little ways. We just have to remember that we cannot lead anything to its betterment without subjecting ourselves to our own betterment. We should start the change within ourselves. Let us turn from our selfish ways and consider the importance of others. If we avoid cynicism and start seeing other people as allies instead of rivals, then we could all work together towards one goal. Lend a helping hand. What good would too many resources be without charity? Let us be good examples. Let us set the norm for helping each other. Most importantly, let us not trade humanity for progress because we can live with both.

Attaining peace may not be easy but it is definitely not impossible. It’s no easy task but our joint efforts will gradually lead us there. Consider a whisper, a very soft sound. It may be nothing but a soft breeze tickling your cheek, but a million whispers done simultaneously can be a deafening noise. Just imagine what it would be like if all of us would be willing to cooperate and do our part. We may not eliminate the forces of evil completely but we can outnumber them. Let us be the average heroes that we are, as Gandhi had so wittily said: “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”