Tyler Has Words is the blog of Tyler Patrick Wood, a writer/musician from Texas. You'll get free book excerpts twice a week. On the other days, you'll get words. If you would like an original take on everything by an expert on nothing, this might be a cool place to hang out.

About Kinds of Heroes

About Kinds of Heroes

Post 219:

            I love a good real life hero story. Somebody runs into a burning building without thinking of their own safety, a bystander averts some crime despite horrible danger.       

            That’s stuff we need to hear about. It seems like the landscape is generally mired in darkness, so a little light shining through every now and then goes a long way.

            But there’s all kind of heroes. I think the least exciting and yet most admirable are what I call heroes of endurance.

            People that get up and face another day of struggle, just to maybe get a shot at something better over the horizon. It takes a whole different mindset, and one that I admittedly wish I had.

            A moment of heroism can be instinctual, a reflex, but a prolonged stretch of heroism is something that takes constant psychological upkeep. We have an evolutionary code that tells us to look out for number one above all else. It’s the denial of that programming that makes someone a real frigging trooper.

            It’s strange—a place where science and morality don’t exactly fit together.

            Here’s an example. Back around World War One, some brave souls wanted to sail down to Antarctica. The place was hardly known about, not really mapped—the entire venture was fraught with danger.

            And then they get stuck in the ice. For something like an entire year, they survive in the worst possible conditions. The captain didn’t lose one guy. Not one. Talk about a long stretch of heroism. And these dudes weren’t rocking Patagonia jackets. Just old school gear and old school heart.

            This wasn’t an acute bout of the fight mechanism. This was an all out war on giving up. Because let’s be honest, life can really suck sometimes. It’s easy to give in to despair; it even makes sense in a lot of ways.

            The war on giving up is a weird one, because fighting is its own end, and yet, it feels like you’re losing all the time.

            This stuff comes naturally to some people, I suppose, and to the naturals, I say keep kicking butt. Rock out. The rest of us will do our best to follow your example. It’s a war that could always use more soldiers. Cheers. See you after.

             

            

About The Divorcer

About The Divorcer

About The Laws of Space

About The Laws of Space

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