You're the Hero of This Story - You Just Don't Know It Yet
he·ro
/ˈhirō,ˈhērō/
noun
a person who is admired or idealized for courage, outstanding achievements, or noble qualities.
The word ‘hero’ makes me cringe.
It was tossed around a lot at the beginning of the Covid pandemic.
We called healthcare professionals heroes for working under some of the most stressful and hazardous conditions of their lives. We called teachers heroes for their quick pivot to remote teaching and their creativity in addressing all the challenges it entailed. We called each other heroes for masking in public. We called celebrities heroes for their stirring at-home remake of ‘Imagine’ by John Lennon.
Just kidding on that last one. That was fucking awful.
Never again, celebrities, never again.
But you get the idea. At the start of all this, we dubbed everyone a hero for doing their part to fight our common enemy: a disabling and deadly novel virus. Then we found out that this brand of heroism had a very short shelf life. As soon as doing the right thing was no longer mandated, a lot of our heroes bailed on us. The word seemed to lose its meaning.
I’ll never forget a conversation I had with a senior leader where I was working at the time, right when the push to get back to the office and unmask began. At the time, the halls of our office were still filled with posters about masking up to protect our loved ones, the vulnerable, and healthcare workers.
“For the past year, we’ve been calling everyone heroes for doing things we all agreed were heroic,” I’d said to him. “Now we’re supposed to forget about all that and just let the virus spread?”
“We’ve all been vaccinated and the virus is now mild,” he’d said without any evidence to support his claims. “We’re all going to get it eventually, so there’s no point in delaying the inevitable. The heroic thing to do now is just get Covid and get back to normal.”
It was a gruesome foreshadowing of just how far that ideological divide would grow over the next few years.
He saw himself, and everyone else who willingly came back to the office maskless, as heroes. Even as my colleagues would fall sick, entire departments at a time, and even after a few of our coworkers died from severe acute illnesses (which surely couldn’t have been Covid because Covid was over), folks were praised for showing up and fulfilling their duty by participating in the back-to-normal experiment. Even when it became clear it wasn’t working out so well, everyone was praised and rewarded with pizza parties and company swag and all kinds of other meaningless shit.
Heroes!
I have a gut reaction to that word now. I wish there were a better term to describe a person who does something heroic, but have yet to find one. Rather than dwell on my feelings with it, I decided to write about it in a way that reclaims what it used to mean to me.
I know my audience. I don’t write for the back-to-normal crowd. I have no desire to waste my time and energy trying to change their minds. I write for the Covid-Conscious/Cautious, or Anti-Covid, or Airborne Aware, whichever term you prefer. I write to validate your commitment to science, morality, and truth. I write to remind you you’re not alone, and you’re not wrong.
If you’re reading this, you’re the hero in this story.
I know the rest of the world has made you feel differently. I know many of you have been punished for consistently doing the right thing in the face of overwhelming adversity. I’ve seen some of you describe ‘hitting a wall’ as of late, and you’re struggling to see the light at the end of the tunnel. You’re asking what the end game is. You’re feeling more isolated and alone than you’ve ever felt in your life.
I can’t tell you that everything will be okay, and that everyone will live happily ever after at the end of this story. I can only assure you the mainstream acceptance of living with Covid without mitigations is unsustainable. This pandemic will end eventually. It may very well end once it runs out of hosts, and/or the planet has warmed to the point it can no longer sustain life.
Or, we may begin to contain Covid once enough people decide they’re sick of letting a biohazard destroy their lives and they’re willing to take precautions again. As cynical as many of us feel right now, it isn’t outside of the realm of possibility.
Or, in what I feel is the most likely scenario, a new pandemic or some other existential crisis will force everyone to quickly adapt, and whatever measures we must take to survive in that scenario will serve to limit the spread of airborne infectious diseases as well. Just skim your news feed for headlines and you’ll see there are plenty of candidates for what that next big event could be.
It’s pretty much a given that things will get worse before they get better. There likely won’t be any helpful guidance or support from governments and health authorities when that next big thing happens. We’ll be left to fend for ourselves. If we were in a movie or a graphic novel, we’d be looking to the skies for Superman or Wonder Woman or Batman to fly in and save us since we’d have no other hope without them.
Only this story is real-life, and you don’t need to look to the skies for the hero to show up.
Look in the mirror instead.
In the essay It’s Not Cool To Overreact, Jessica Wildfire (one of my writer heroes) does an amazing job of explaining how normalcy bias drives counterproductive behavior among the vast majority of people in a crisis. Some panic, some minimize, but most simply do nothing. “Psychologists have observed this pattern over and over again in everything from earthquakes to traffic accidents,” Wildfire writes. “It’s practically baked in that 60-70% of people will respond counter-productively to a crisis. Research on normalcy bias has revolved around short-term emergencies, but we’re seeing the same dynamics play out in the long term.”
Human beings are nothing, if not predictable.
And predictably, consistently, only 30% of people respond productively to a crisis, while others panic, minimize, or stand around waiting for others to tell them what to do.
Think about what that means.
Throughout history, any time human beings have faced a crisis, only 3 out of 10 people have done the right thing. Not just for themselves, but for the collective. They’re largely the reason why people survive crises, why societies emerge from tragedies to rebuild and recover.
They’re the sentinels who recognize threats before others do. They’re the guardrails keeping everyone from throwing themselves off a cliff. They're the reason why the human race has not yet gone extinct.
They’re… (pardon me while I cringe at this word, but not its meaning)… heroes.
You know what else is predictable about humanity?
The stories we tell. At our core, we human beings are not that creative. We change the details, but we keep telling the same basic myth across cultures, throughout time, and around the globe. It’s the tale of the hero's journey, studied and popularized by author Joseph Campbell.
At its essence, the hero’s journey consists of three stages.
1) Separation: The hero experiences a departure from normal.
2) Initiation: The hero faces challenges and conflicts, which trigger growth.
3) Return: Transformed by their journey, the hero returns to normal with new wisdom or gifts that in turn transform others.
Collectively, human beings don’t do transformation without heroes. That’s where the 30% of people who react productively to crises come in. They step up and become the visionaries, strategists, navigators, and role models needed to steer everyone to safety. They bring confidence to calm those who panic, competence to discredit the minimizers, and courage to rally all nothing-doers to meaningful action.
You’d think people would be more appreciative, but sadly, the world is not kind to heroes at first. That initial phase of the journey – the separation – often begins as rejection or an ousting, simply because heroes never fit in with everyone else. They’re punished just for being different.
But in the second stage, it’s those very differences which enable the hero to overcome challenges and achieve victory. And it’s only at the end of the journey that people see the value in those differences and recognize the heroes for who they are – the ones who saved them.
The hero’s journey is written in our collective consciousness. We all know the story. You don’t have to look too hard at fictional superhero stories to see it.
In the X-Men, people with genetic mutations for supernatural powers are ostracized from society. Their leader and mentor is paralyzed from the neck down, but has a telepathic mind so powerful he’s considered a threat to society. With their powers, the X-Men have the means to save the world, but the world calls them mutants and kicks them out of every place they rightfully belong. They keep coming to the rescue anyway.
Shy, quiet, socially awkward Peter Parker is believed by many to be autistic. His hyperfocus, attention to detail, and defiance of authority figures all supercharge the abilities he receives from a radioactive spider bite. Even as he begins his heroic career as Spider Man, he’s often blamed for causing the very crises he steps in to resolve, but keeps saving peoples' ignorant asses anyway.
Maya Lopez is a Deaf, Indigenous woman who is also an amputee. As she evolves into her alternate superhero identity, Echo, her disabilities enable her to develop a unique fighting style, while her Native American roots ground her with the wisdom of her ancestors and the community of her tribe. Although she begins her journey as a villain, she transforms into a hero. The world still sees her as the bad guy for a while, in spite of her heroic deeds.
I dare you to find a fictional superhero who wasn’t imagined as different from the majority due to factors beyond their control, and whose life wasn’t further shaped by pain and exclusion because of their differences.
For that matter, I dare you to find a real-life hero who doesn’t fit those criteria.
Harriet Tubman was an enslaved African woman who suffered a traumatic brain injury at the hands of an overseer. It led to a lifetime of seizures, headaches, and hallucinations, which she interpreted as religious visions. Believing she was guided by God, she became one of the most influential figures of the Underground Railroad and led countless people out of slavery.
Albert Einstein was an immigrant who displayed traits associated with both autism and ADHD. His scientific achievements shaped the world’s understanding of physics. The celebrity and respect he gained for his intellect gave him a voice, which he used to decry authoritarianism, racism, and anti-Semitism. He was a powerful influence in the civil rights movement in the United States.
Harvey Milk was the first openly gay person elected to a public office in California during the 1970s, when homophobia was pervasive and legalized discrimination kept gay people from accessing housing and employment. Milk had received an ‘other than honorable discharge’ from the U.S. Navy over his sexuality. As a Jew he was no stranger to anti-Semitism, and often invoked the Holocaust as a cautionary tale of the dangers of prejudice and discrimination. The traumas and losses he’d experienced throughout his life led him to a career of public service, fighting for the rights of marginalized people.
And in more recent times, heroes have emerged among our Covid-Conscious community. Last year I had the privilege of working with a group of folks in North Carolina who came together to put up a fight against the nation’s first mask ban bill. Through this group I met the amazing @dizzycatdesign, a double lung transplant recipient who has used her voice to help decisionmakers understand the burden that anti-mask legislation places on people with disabilities and chronic illnesses. Although the mask ban bill passed, the impact of her personal story helped justify an exception for health reasons. Now everyone in North Carolina can mask to protect themselves and others without fear of breaking the law.
I’m grateful for the contributions of @o_bel_, an associate marriage and family therapist. “As a late identified Neurodivergent individual, I understand the struggle of trying to fit into a world that wasn't built for those who differ from the norm,” she shares on her website. As she recognized the struggles of the Covid-Conscious in their quests to safely access healthcare and manage the stress of living in a society that wasn’t built for them, she developed a series of materials to help. My own family has made use of them. You can find her guides to help communicate your needs to your healthcare providers, as well as affirmations and tips for setting boundaries here. The materials are priceless in value, but she’s made them free of charge to all.
And I’m forever impressed by @joaquinlife, the son of immigrants who grew up in a working class family in East Los Angeles. As a community organizer, he rallied neighbors together to write and call county officials, as well as hold peaceful protests outside of hospitals when universal masking was dropped. As a result of his leadership, masking in healthcare was brought back in late 2023. Even more recently, he worked with local mask blocs to distribute respirators and CR box fans to families endangered by wildfire smoke, just as local government was attempting to ban masks. The attention he and other advocates brought to the necessity of masking helped to halt the bill from moving forward.
These individuals in our own community don’t have supernatural powers. They don’t wear spandex tights. They can’t stop trains with their bare hands or manipulate objects telepathically or sling webs that capture bad guys.
Yet in humble, meaningful ways, they’re out there saving lives every day.
This is what heroism looks like in the real world.
People who solve society’s biggest problems, who disrupt normalcy, and who save others from threats typically don’t come from backgrounds of privilege and comfort. They come from the fringes of society. They’re the disabled and chronically ill, the neurodivergent, the people of color, the LGBTQ community, the immigrants and refugees, the orphaned, the poor, the lonely, the abused, the misunderstood. They’re the intersectionally marginalized. They’re the voices that are minimized.
They’re the first to be targeted and oppressed by authoritarian rulers, since tyrants know they're the ones who disrupt power dynamics and drive social change.
They’re heavily represented among the 30% of people who save the remaining 70% from threats.
They’re the ones who keep saving their fellow human beings from themselves.
They’re the disruptors. The leaders.
The heroes.
If you wake up feeling like you can’t take it another day, like you’ve hit a wall, like you can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, and yet you cannot cease in doing what you know is right, now you know why.
Those who want to survive what’s coming won’t be able to do it on their own. They’ll need a hero to lead the way.
This is why you were born. This is why you’ve felt different all your life. This is what your struggles and pain and trauma were preparing you for.
You never had a choice. The journey chose you. This is what you were made for.
You know who you are now. Someday the rest of the world will too.
And now you know what you have to do.
Keep going.
“With great power comes great responsibility.” - Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben
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