Prose of a Wanderer's Spirit

What is it that defines a man?

There are as many answers to this simple question as there are grains of sand on every beach, every atom in the universe, and every man, woman and child. Some answers are complex as the thousands of theories of every science known to man, while others are as simplistic and whimsical as a child's wish. Many believe that there is only a single factor that defines a man. Some think that there are many qualities. Still others reason that the characteristics that decide a man's worth are as vast and infinite as the stars themselves. No one answers or answers are truly correct. We as a species are opinionated and for every two individuals there are eight opinions.

Some say that a man is defined by the company he keeps, that those that surround him are the prime feature of his existence. After all, are not those that one associates with a sign of what the man himself is? They reflect his biases, his values, and thousands of other small factors that add up to the individual in question. Others say that he is defined by what he achieves with his life and the monuments he builds to proclaim the victories, no matter how small, that he achieves. These are the people that would say the map of a man's victories will be for what he is remembered. Hundreds of men strive their entire lives to leave some lasting impact on the world at large. Some are remembered as great heroes of the world. The conqueror that built an empire, the politician that led his nation to prosperity, the scientist that made the breakthrough that revolutionized the world. Then, there are those that are remembered as as villains. These are the monsters who brought low nations, who committed genocide, who brought suffering on an unimaginable scale. They are two sides of the same coin, but they are only an infinitesimally small part of it. The rest are those that fell short and failed to climb to the heights achieved by the juggernauts that paved the way forward and set the bar so high. We forget these men so often and their names are lost to the annuls of history.

Those are but two ways by which one might measure a man's merit.

Personally, I believe in a much . . . simpler alternative.

I suppose that what defines a man isn't the great works he achieves or the company he keeps. I think that his measure is found in the way his life impacted others. It is the small acts he shows to his fellow man that defines him. He might've been the soldier that saved the conquer from a crushing defeat. He may have been the secretary that handled the menial tasks the politician couldn't bother with. He may have the assistant that held the beaker while the scientist poured the elixir that created the breakthrough. He may have been the friend that simply sat and listened to the great man as he expounded on his dreams of grandeur or the one that gave that final push when his friend found himself trapped in his darkest moments when the world seemed against him. These simple acts are the ones that are remembered by the truly great men whom realized that they stood upon the backs of others. The same principle applies to the those that fall short of greatness. For though they may never be remembered by every human to ever walk the earth, they are still the fathers that support and love their children and pass on the values and experiences that guide them. Their children in turn pass the lessons learned on to their children and them to theirs. It is in this way that a man is remembered, by the people whose lives he's touched.