The last reason we hold ourselves back from being heroic? It’s because we don’t engage our brains. That’s not surprising because we’re trained from the time we’re very small to listen.
Listening = obedience = good
Not listening = bad
Especially for those who attend church, listening becomes a lifestyle and we practice every Sunday. We listen to our pastors, to our Sunday School teachers. But we’re rarely taught to think – we let others do all the processing, the interpreting, and the connecting of dots for us. Oftentimes there’s not even a format in place where we can raise our hands and say ‘But wait a second. How does that fit with abc? Or, What about xyz?’
Heroes, on the other hand, aren’t afraid to think for themselves. Heroes don’t go along with the crowd; they fight the crowd. They sidestep group-think. They’re not afraid to speak up and say, ‘I don’t think so!’ As Voltaire once said, “Think for yourself and allow others the privilege of doing so too.”