My grandmother might’ve been 5 ft tall, if she were to wear stilettos.
I’ll never forget the look on her face as her tiny frame descended our front stairs.
She walked out and hugged me, then told me what happened:
“Your mom was in an accident.”
The rest of the details from what was said that day are harder to remember.
The End of Childhood
“…childhood ends when you learn you’re going to die.”
– The Crow (1994)
Perhaps the accident was the end of my childhood, but maybe it happened earlier.
I didn’t sleep well as a child, and in order to get a few hours to sleep, my parents had put a TV and VCR in my room.
I was obsessed with Superman. So, one night, around 4-5 years old, I was watching Superman, for the 200th time, in the middle of the night, in my room.
Krypton explodes.
It occurred to me that everyone on that planet would die, including Jor-El and Lara, Superman’s Kryptonian parents. It then occurred to me for the first time that one day my own parents might die—and that I would too.
I was overwhelmed with sadness and fear. I cried and screamed until my father—a funeral director by day—came into my room to comfort me as the caring dad by night.
Luckily, he was well equipped to talk about the subject matter with me.
My Fight Against Time
As the son of a funeral director, death would become an ambient factor in my life.
Yet it was my mother’s accident that really brought its omnipresence into focus. 26 days after my 18th birthday, I would be forced to know that it was always there, looming over each day, and each moment.
My mom survived the accident, but not without 8 hours in the operating room, 8 pints of blood, and 3 weeks in a coma. Even after that, a serious traumatic brain injury permanently reshaped her future.
A fraction of a second earlier or later, and countless lives would’ve been different. Life, as it turns out, precariously hangs in the balance, subject to randomness and luck.
This is where I began to believe that if we don’t have much time here—and we don’t know when our time is up—then we better put some points on the board before the clock runs out.
To do that, I had better make sure I have the power to make the impact I want to make.
What if we can stop bad things from happening?
The irony is that if my mother’s accident was the start of my push of becoming superhuman, it was when Lois Lane died in a car that planted the original seed of that idea.
In the very same movie that gave me an awareness of mortality, I also learned that with enough emotion, effort, and power you could quite literally turn back time to save those who’ve been harmed.
Obviously, we can’t manipulate time, but we are active participants in the construction of reality.
We are the agents of change
“What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
— Mary Oliver
Though it doesn’t always feel like it and I sometimes forget, every day I wake up is an opportunity. Every decision we make and interaction we have shapes what happens next.
Every one of us is quite literally an agent of change.
Yet, many of us are stuck in auto-pilot, moving through life without critically thinking about where we want to go or what impact we wish to make. We may even discount our own ability to affect change.
To me, Becoming Superhuman is about recognizing our own potential to be better. We do this not for anyone else’s expectations, but for our own. It is a declaration of an intent to cause change deliberately and take ownership of the journey to get there.
Becoming Superhuman is not about superiority over others, but over ourselves, to push ourselves to live the most meaningful life possible.
What that looks like is for each of us to decide.
The reason I care so much about Becoming Superhuman, is because I know that once people see it, they will not be able to unsee it, and it will change their life.
And so, I will continue to write this blog, offer resources, coaching, and workshops, deliver keynotes, and develop the idea of Becoming Superhuman.
I will do this day in and day out, because Becoming Superhuman is a process, not a destination.
“The people who are trying to make this world worse aren’t taking a day off. How can I?”
— Bob Marley
I hope you enjoyed this post!
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