Epic Moments

In human life, there are moments which we can term ‘epic’. I will give here some examples of these moments, and will elaborate why I call these moments epic. 

Gandhi was thrown out of the train at Pietermaritzburg. The young man took a pledge that he will fight injustice. Non-violence will be his weapon.

Gautama was walking in a garden. He saw a sick man, an old man and a corpse. He took the pledge of renunciation and became Buddha. 

Archimedes jumped into a bathtub. He discovered the principle of buoyancy. 

An apple fell on the head of Newton. He discovered the law of gravitation. 

These are some of the examples of what I call epic moments. We have many such examples. 

We read about these events, giving rise to epic moments. One can argue and juxtapose whether another person, other than the persons described in the above examples, could have the same experience, same impact, with same consequences had he experienced the same event. The answer we do not know. But we ‘know’ these events, how they produced epic moments and how they changed the course of history, philosophy, science and human life. 

Let us forget for a moment these events. We are all human beings. Our life practices are almost same – we eat, sleep, we need family, friends, and comfort and so on. These elements too had a place among the lives of above individuals.

But what made them different from us? Is it time? Is it space? Is it the particular age in which they were born? Perhaps not. The epic moments I described above transcend time and space. Their consequences transcend age, transcend physical human phenomenon. All these persons lived like us. They spoke, lived and behaved like us. But, all are dead and gone. What does remain? Those epic moments remain, their impacts remain. Because of those epic moments, and their consequences, we remember these people.

So, we have the answer – what makes them different from us. The answer is – epic moments. It is these moments that separate them from us. Events occurred to them, created an epic moment for them, and we know that, and we remember them. 

How is an epic moment produced? It is difficult to answer. The events described, and which gave rise to epic moments, are very ordinary events. That can possibly happen to any individual. They are events that produced epic moments. It is not the event per se that is important, but it is the person, his/her state of mind, the exact situation, the circumstances surrounding the event, the social mores of the time, the receptivity of the individual at that time – all help constitute an epic moment. In another way, it is the combination of acts and forces happening in a particular time and place, but not in the control of that particular person, who is experiencing that particular event. Again I emphasize, the event may be ordinary, but when it gives rise to an epic moment, its significance passes beyond that particular person, time and space. 

I further argue that in every individual’s life there are epic moments. Perhaps the scales are different, but nonetheless there are epic moments in every individual’s life. An event causing a sudden moment of realization, an intimation of something deep, invoking in us something noble, or loosening the grip of mind and heart towards something wider, can give rise to an epic moment. An epic moment can emerge from any event, even from a very mundane event such as watching an animal walking, or a bird flying, or water flowing, or watching a person speaking some particular words, or watching a song or a play. Epic moments create life changing waves in us. They inspire us, change our lives, and make us a different human being than we were before. It was, I would say, a kind of reincarnation or rebirth, but in the same body.

There is another angle. A human being on average lives about 60 or 70 or 80 years, or may be more or less. The human life is very ordinary. It is indeed very ordinary. Society and law have set before us certain rules, which guide our lives. We do our daily chores, do our work for sustenance, have family, friends, and so on. And life passes away. In that sense, human life is very ordinary.

What makes life extraordinary? What brings to it meaning? Epic moments. Minus epic moments, the whole life possesses not much value. Epic moments inspire our life, shape our life. Like non-violence shaped the life of Gandhi, or renunciation shaped the life of Buddha, and so on. To add, the ordinary human life becomes extraordinary due to epic moments. If a human being is seized by an epic moment, clings to it, and follows it, his life becomes different than the others. His life becomes extraordinary. 

I will make a distinction here. Are all events epic? No. Can an event which is ordinary for an individual be epic for another individual? Yes. Who will define whether an event is epic or not? First, the individual, then the society. Rather the impact of an epic moment on an individual is so powerful, so immense, it flows out towards society. It is the society that remembers, reinvigorates the epic moment that happened to the individual, even long after the individual is dead and gone. 

In a different context, Max Weber wrote ideas come to us when they please, not when we please. It has a deeper meaning, which I can apply to the analysis of epic moments. Epic moments occur when they please, not when we please. But, again, there is a qualification here. There may be exceptions. The general rule is the individual must be receptive to the epic moment. There must be preparedness somewhere. Individual must be able to capture the energy released by the epic moment, and channelize it. It was like the apple that fell on the head of Newton, and activated his fertile brain, toward the discovery of law of gravity. 

Epic moments are ‘epic’ moments. They are not ordinary moments. Hence, it is not under the control of a particular individual to make an epic moment happen. As I mentioned earlier, there is probably scales in epic moments. An epic moment that changes human life, revolutionizes science, creates new paradigms are not the same epic moment that begins in an individual’s life and ends there. Both are, however, epic in terms of transformative power, whether small or large, individual or group or larger society. An individual may have experienced an epic moment and guided by it in his own life and is not interested to widen or to channel the transformative power to other individuals in society. But, it will still remain an epic moment as it transformed the life of that individual.

Are there negative and positive epic moments? This is very difficult to answer. I may appear biased if I say that epic moments have a positive transformative power on society. I may be wrong.