The Greatness Project

Great Moment or Great Individual?

May 15, 2005

When asked recently about his life, a friend replied, “moments of brilliance; decades of mediocrity.” Although he was being facetious, we were stunned by the accuracy with which he described our own life. Committing to greatness comes much more easily than sustaining it. Does the consistent achievement of greatness establish us as great? Or, can a select few events, perhaps only one, propel us into the realm of greatness?

We all know individuals who, in one life-changing moment, acquired the status of greatness. Rudy Giuliani was simply the mayor of New York City (and not that beloved) when terrorists attacked on September 11. His response and presence became legendary and now he is world-renowned. Rosa Parks was simply on her way home from work and too tired to move to the back of the bus. Her actions sparked the bus boycott that fueled the smoldering civil rights movement of the 1960s. There are many individuals throughout history who seem to have been “in the right place at the right time.”

It could be argued that these individuals became great because of a single chance they had. In one select moment they had an opportunity to do something heroic, patriotic, daring, contradictory, or controversial. Taking that opportunity, they were vaulted by some higher consciousness into greatness because what they did transcended the limitations of time and geography.

Did the specific situation make the individual great? Or did an already present spark of greatness simply catch fire at the right moment? When we conducted our initial survey, “constancy” emerged as an essential factor defining greatness. Our survey respondents identified greatness as living up to a personal value system every day; the significance of this was not lost on us. We realized that most survey respondents believed that great individuals nurture the seed of greatness within themselves. Occasionally, they have an opportunity to manifest their personal values and that moment is vaulted into legend and lore because it happened to be a transformational moment.

Key to understanding historic moments and the great individuals who live in those moments is that individuals do not just “turn on” their greatness at the right time. These moments do not so much “happen” to great individuals but great individuals, because of who they are, transform these moments. They bring to that precious time the values, beliefs, and actions they live every day. What they do and how they do it is as natural to them as breathing. Occasionally, the individual and the transformative moment intersect.

Every day, we are confronted with the reality of life. We can choose to let life victimize us and we can blame life for what we have not accomplished, or we can strive to live our greatness. Identifying our values, beliefs, and moral actions, we can live in a conscious awareness that everything we do matters. In striving to live our personal greatness every day we can be fully present to those we encounter and to every moment. When transformative moments occur or pivotal people arrive in our lives, we don’t have to worry about “turning it on” because living our greatness is something we always strive to do.

There really is, then, no “great moment.” Occasionally there are transformative moments that elude many of us by their mundane façade. However, the individual who is attempting to live greatness each and every day scrapes off the patina of the ordinary to transform even the most mundane encounters. It is not the moment that matters as much as individuals who make the ordinary event, extraordinary.