Be a Hero!

Scott Goodknight graciously allowed me to share this post on my blog. I read it in a post of his on Facebook and immediately wanted to know more abut him. I encourage you to read his story on his website www.FindingYourHero.com:There is an ancient Greek myth about a young boy named Icarus whose father wanted to learn to fly like the birds. He and his son spent endless hours working on inventions to enable them to fly to the heavens.All the inventions they developed wouldn’t work because they were too heavy.Finally one day they created a set of wings they fashioned together from actual bird feathers and wax to hold them in place. They were light and strong.They completed two sets of wings; one for the father and one for the boy.The father gave him his blessing and instruction with one warning: Don’t fly too high. If you do you could get too close to the Sun and it will melt the wax causing the feathers to loosen and you to fall to the Earth and perish.The boy nodded his head, strapped on the wings and began his ascent. Imagine the joy and excitement he must have felt as he soared effortlessly with the birds, higher and higher. He must have become even more encouraged when the other villagers began shouting in excitement and amazement.The story goes that in his excitement he flew higher and higher so as to impress the onlookers on the ground even more. As he flew higher his father shouted out “Remember not to fly too high!”But the boy didn’t hear him because he was already too far away. Too close to the sun…Sure enough his pride and arrogance caused him to fly higher and higher and soon he began to feel the heat. He could hear his father shouting at him and suddenly he remembered what his father told him.But it was too late.Tragically the feathers began to loosen and he started to fall. Imagine his terror and regret as he realized that he hadn’t listened to his father and now he would die. Imagine the horror of his father, the guilt and shame that he must have felt that he had not given his son better instructions.The lessons here are supposed to be about “Climbing too high, too fast” or maybe “How pride goes before a fall” or perhaps “How a teacher should not give a student wings before he is ready to fly.”But remember,….this is just a myth, a myth meant to entertain simple people 2500 years ago who had the average education and intelligence of a modern day 5 year old. For them myth and legend were a seamless part of their everyday reality. Myths and legends were how they explained things to themselves that they didn’t have the science to understand.The brain is funny like that. If it can’t understand something it will make up a story so it doesn’t have to feel ignorant. The human brain HATES the unknown.FACT: The temperature in the air around you doesn’t get hotter as you move away from the surface of the earth… it gets colder. I have skydived from helicopters over two miles high, where a football field sized “drop-zone” looks as small as a pencil eraser and from the ground the helicopter becomes invisible to the naked eye. I can tell you from direct experience and dozens and dozens of jumps that while it can be over 90 degrees on the ground, it is literally FREEZING COLD at 16,000 feet.Like I said, the story of Icarus is a “myth” or a fairy tale and like most of the myths and stories we grow up with TODAY, it is inaccurate.What are some of the myths you tell yourself about climbing the ladder of success? Or about how much money you deserve to make or are capable of making? Or about what you can do to make a living that you enjoy? Or about the body you want to have or the relationship that you deserve to be in?Myths…stories…legends…belief systems… BSPERCEPTION IS NOT REALITY!You are capable of flying as high as you can imagine… and you deserve to…and you SHOULD!Fact: What happens if you don’t use your wings?Just look at any chicken, or the extinct dodo Birds from Mauritius Island. Nature frowns on not using your wings.“Use it or lose it” is the law of the Universe.And evolution works both ways. Necessity is the mother of invention. Make flight a MUST and you will grow wings where you once had shoulders.HOW? Choose to tell yourself ONLY the myths and stories that EMPOWER YOU. If you’re going to be inaccurate, you might as well err on the side of believing that you can do anything you can imagine. Belief in human beings is an incredibly powerful evolutionary force! And it sure beats sitting on the ground like a chicken (in fear) watching the other birds fly around in the heavens.Fly high my friends!!!I will see you in the clouds, just on the other side of Mount Olympus!Be the HERO!!Scott Goodknightwww.FindingYourHero.com