Heroes Among Us

Despite the prophets, the 'holy' people, and the actual patriots who died sacrificing themselves to their beloved nation, I have never believed in any form of heroes nor heroines. People who claim themselves to be one must be really desperate or even worse: lacking some self-esteem. Moreover, if heroes actually did exist among us, there should've never been any kind of violence, robbery, or even racism. If they actually did exist, people would've had safe sleeps without being insecure of having nightmares.

turns out I was wrong.

I was reading the former president's feature when I finally realized this. He said,

Every society needs heroes. And every society has them. The reason we don't often see them is because we don;t bother to look.

Damn.

It hit me so hard that I could'nt help myself but to keep reading the following sentences, speechless and astonished. I always thought we, stupid yet wanton people of the world, do not deserve heroes. And real heroes never existed.
But if we (I) did bother to look around, we would've acknowledged a lot of hero live just in the midst of us. Those teachers who teach their student patiently, those bureaucrats who help people making I.D Cards sincerely, even those sweepers who clean the street every morning and finish their jobs before we even wake up, all of them are heroes. Real heroes.

There are two kinds of heroes. Heroes who shine in the face of great adversity, who perform an amazing feat in a difficult situation. And heroes who live among us, who do their work unceremoniously, unnoticed by many of us, but who make a difference in the lives of others.

So now I made a big smile, realizing that I've regained great optimism about life and restored faith in humanity. I gasped some fresh air and thought, maybe I could make a good person out of myself so that later I can be somebody's hero. We all can. There's no doubt we can do this. Because I know now, being a hero is not a hard thing to do. It needs only sincerity, kindness, and perseverance. It's not much to take if we really have strong determinations.

Because being a hero is simply putting others needs before ours.
Being a hero is simply reminding people about how much they mean to you.
Being a hero is simply caring, loving and giving a little empathy to people who deserve.

And being a hero is not about forcing ourselves to starvation so that poor can eat our meal and live longer while we're straining ourselves to death. It is not about giving everything we have and not keeping any remainder. It is not about total sacrifice. It never was.

And we can be a hero without having superpowers. Yes, we can. I can. You can.