Recently I had a conversation with a friend about legacy. We were
talking about what you would leave behind after your life and what kind of
lasting impact you would have. I posited that given enough time, no one would
be remembered. A bleak outlook, I know, but think about it. Here's a
thought experiment. Come up with a list of the top 100 most influential
people of ALL TIME. Good people, and bad people alike can fill this list.
You've obviously got your religious icons (Jesus, Buddha, etc.), your great thinkers
(Aristotle, Plato etc.), some great warriors, dictators, and politicians
(Hitler, Lincoln, whomever), people in other categories... whatever. Try to
come up with 100.
Got it..?
How long did that take
you? Honestly, I even had a hard time coming up with categories and
people to put in them. Could you even finish? How many people were alive
within the last 100 years? How many people lived over 1000 years ago? Do you
really think there was no one who is as influential to human history more than
2000 years ago? What about the caveman who invented fire? What was his or her
name? Even if you were able to come up with a list of 100, a quick google
search says that there have been 108,470,690,115 to have ever lived (website).
Your list is .00000009% of our species' population.
Granted, I'm not a historian
and don't think about things like this much. Also, you could argue that it's
not the person's name that is important-- it's their work/idea/invention/
whatever... but I think given enough time, EVERYONE will be forgotten on an
individual level. No one knows WHO invented the wheel, just that it was invented
(around 3500 BCE according to google).
So personal legacy is
bogus. It's a pipe dream. You will eventually be forgotten.
:) And that's
okay. :)
But then, what is there to
strive for? Why bother getting out of bed every day? Well...I would imagine
there are some people who strive to be in that .00000009%. That's great.
There needs to be. But I am not one of those individuals.
What I want in my life is to
make a difference to individuals. I want to help someone NOW. When I die, I want
people to say, "Jesse affected me in [this way]." After that, it
doesn't matter. If I can make a significant difference in one person's life, I
will have been successful.
I like to think that I have
made peoples' lives better in small ways. And that's why I get up every
morning.
j
