Winter 2009-2010 Q&A

Q & A

Answering our readers' questions

In our Hero School® programs with the homeless, at-risk youth, business leaders, and educators, we encourage attendees to submit questions when they arise. Below are random questions that we've received recently, conveniently paired with the first answer that popped into our heads.

Q. I was an attendee at one of your Teacher Leadership presentations- just amazing. My question: when you said you didn't drink coffee or alcohol, is this because of your religion? - Las Vegas, Nevada

A. My religion is Heroism, and we really don't have rules regarding what to eat or drink, only when to eat or drink or where to eat or drink. I do admire religions that encourage their followers to not give in to alcohol - and even too much coffee - as long as they are given a good "why."

My last cup of coffee was in June of 1991. I was an addict. Nothing wrong with drinking coffee, but I was a slave to it and I have a problem being a slave to anything - or anyone. And I'm a Pisces. Hazel Dixon-Cooper, in her book Love on a Rotten Day, claims that if you're a Pisces in Hollywood, you're probably an alcoholic. Well, I wasn't in Hollywood, so I became a coffeeholic. The only way to break free from this substance - that I was so dependent on - was to make a quality decision to never have another cup, ever. After "trying" for years, the day I finally "decided" was the last day I was tempted and I never experienced any withdrawl. Realizing that I was "The Decider" over my own life, I stared at the cup of coffee - which had become an extension of my hand - and declared,

"I will never have another cup of coffee as long as I live."

And I didn't...I mean haven't, since I'm still alive.

"There is a real difference between managing and leading...My definition of a leader is someone who helps people succeed." - Carol Bartz, Yahoo! CEO

Q. "I saw the photo on Facebook when you were run over by a drunk driver as a boy. Why don't you speak out more against drunk drivers?" - Seattle, Washington

A. First, I'm not the same person I was in 1968 when I was run over by a drunk driver and his 6000lb car, nor the same person that spent the first 6 months out of the hospital in a body cast. I'm much more bitter. O.K., I'm kidding about being bitter. My sense of humor might have been caused by the impact. Isn't this Journal about moving past the past?

"Happiness appears to him in accord with a sedative." - Friedrich Nietzsche, Superman

The first step I've taken against drunk drivers is I've chosen not to be one. This miraculous feat was accomplished in 1997 when I decided never to drink alcohol. How easy was that? Actually, I quit drinking so that I would have the right to speak about using alcohol as a "sedative," particularly when we don't know how to quiet our inner conflicts through "self-control" and "self-outwitting." Instead of judging those who drink, or those who drink and drive, or those who drink and drive and sing along to Barry Manilow hits from the '70s, I focus on the source of the behavior:

WHY do some people feel they need to drink?

HOW do they justify driving after drinking to themselves and their families? WHAT is the root of the inner conflict whose pain needs to be drown in alcohol?

For me, it would be impossible to be a role model for teens if I felt I needed to drink, but told them not to. And no, I've never tried other drugs. I like how Forrest Gump put it: "Good, one less thing."

"Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts." - Proverbs 31:6 KJV

By looking to help people find answers for their pain and lack of self control, perhaps we can offer them alternatives to drinking - and running over people like me with their cars. For those who still sing along to Barry Manilow songs, however, you're on your own. -TT

"A person hears only what they understand." - Goethe

Q. "Has there ever been a question from a teen or homeless person that has stumped you?" - Buffalo, New York

A. Yours, just now.

Actually, Yes, and no. I don’t recall ever not having an answer to question. But even if I don't immediately have an answer to a challenging question, questions often evoke answers from inside me, like something funny will evoke laughter, or like pulling the string of a See ‘n Say®...

"A Tiger says..."

There are some questions, however, that I will leave unanswered.

It took me a long time to learn that it is not always wise to answer

certain questions in the first place. Some people ask questions

not to get answers, but to test, tempt, and entrap.

"Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest he turn and end you with it." - The Proverbs of Solomon

About a month ago, a subversive young man in the shelter kept challenging the job strategies I was teaching to the other 40 men in the room. By questioning everything I said, this "devil's advocate" avoided being responsible for “doing” any of the strategies himself. He was also working to undermine what little faith the other men had in themselves to return to the workforce. Rather than answer his questions, I would instead return his words back to him, in the form of a question. When he challenged my instructions to be honest on an application, for example, I replied, “So you really think that lying on an application is the best way to get hired?” With this kind of person, whether he or she is a student in your classroom or an employee in your office, the best response is always a question, not an answer.

Tiger Todd with the homeless at Ethel Pearson Park, Las Vegas (1998)

Q. How much do you get paid for each homeless class?

A. Less than the homeless do.

The truth is, well, that is the truth. For the past 15 years, I've actually paid to perform Hero School classes for the homeless. While I volunteer my time, expenses for vehicles, supplies, insurance, and intellectual property still must be paid. The majority of these expenses I pay from my own income as a business management consultant. Recently we've been receiving donations and investments in Hero School to help with the financial load, and it has helped considerably. I am so grateful for the increasing number of heroes and heroines who are helping fund the cause.

"All I want to do is learn to think like God thinks. The rest is details." -Einstein

Q. "Can you give some examples of your best motivational strategies?" - Las Vegas, Nevada

A. Have you made a donation to Hero School lately?

Seriously, my first rule of motivation is to know who it is I want to motivate. I then reverse-engineer my words or assignments based on what they need to hear. For example, when I am working with homeless and displaced men who are predominantly raised in Christian homes, while they can be motivated to come to class for money or shelter, what motivates them to take action toward their own “Character Change” (my goal for them) might come by framing each practical topic within the context of their “calling.” When these men hear that an old guy named "Abram" was able to change into Abraham - the father of many nations and 4 religions - or that sissy-man Simon bar Jonas changed into Peter - the Rock - or that a “devil’s advocate” named Saul of Tarsus could change into the Apostle Paul – he wasn't even a disciple and he still changed into the one who inked two-thirds of the New Testament – most of them drop their excuses and get moving.

“When the heroes go off the stage, the clowns come on.” - Heinrich Heine, German Poet and Writer, 1797-1856

For you, it’s even easier to get moving. If you keep procrastinating about cleaning up your house or apartment, getting those pictures hung, and sorting your book and DVD libraries, just Invite your boss over - tonight! You will simultaneously clean like there is no tomorrow. If you don’t do it, there might not be a tomorrow. You'll also discover how much you can accomplish before you have to be at work!

Tiger Todd's COMPONENTS TO MOTIVATION:

1. Put your pride out there. Shame is a great motivator.

2. Set an uncomfortably-near deadline or a fast countdown timer.

3. Make a vow to yourself, your co-laborers, to the people you would never let down, and to God (Whom many of us have let down alot).

4. Decide to Live by Words, not feelings or circumstances.

5. DO what your written goal says do, not what you want or feel like doing.

The Teen Whisperer: Reversing Right and Wrong

Reversing Right and Wrong

by Tiger Todd

"The pendulum of the mind oscillates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong” - Carl Gustav Jung, Psychologist, 1875-1961

Sometimes, a decade or two can go by before we understand what really happened.

Every now and then, the voices in my head are replaced by videos in my head. These videos recount the moments from my former “lives” where I wish I had done something differently. One such moment was when I had been selected as the starting pitcher for our junior high softball team. This memory begins with the thrill of victory, and ends all too quickly in the agony of defeat…or at least I thought it had. It wasn’t until I observed a similar experience years later - like a deja vu - with a friend’s son at a junior high school tennis tournament that I learned that some memories can be rewritten.

Each afternoon during junior high softball practice, I would repeatedly pitch the ball right over the plate and right through the strike zone. This accuracy and consistency had earned me the job of starting pitcher for our season-opener against Boulder City, and with it, some junior high celebrity. If you’ve ever been selected as number one at anything, it is a feeling you can get used to very easily. I was walking tall from the moment I was chosen…right up to the point when the coach pulled me in the 4th inning of that fateful game. Did he pull me because I couldn’t find the strike zone and walked too many batters? On the contrary; I had pitched too perfectly. It was the same way I had pitched in practice, but now every batter was knocking my beautiful pitches all the way to the fence! How little my underdeveloped teen brain really knew about the “big picture” back then.

Dean Drummond: "Baby, high school's over. "

Prudie Drummond: "High school's never over."

- The Jane Austin Book Club, 2007

"Age merely shows what children we remain."

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

When my friend’s son Chandler was in junior high, he had no equal playing tennis for his school. Consequently, he was selected to play in a citywide tournament at the Monte Carlo Hotel in Las Vegas. Watching his first match unfold as an adult, I was immediately impressed by the boy’s composure on the court. But it was his “purpose” on the court that raised some concern. Rather than challenge his opponent with his usual winners, Chandler seemed to take pleasure in setting up his opponent with lob after beautiful lob, only to watch helplessly as his beautiful lobs were unmercifully returned to his side of the net at twice the speed of sound. His parents were mortified, having just witnessed their son’s decimation in the very first match. I, on the other hand, was beginning to see a parallel to my own junior high school failures and just maybe I could keep him from bigger failures to come.

It takes more than practice to make perfect

“The world is governed more by appearance than realities, so that it is fully as necessary to seem to know something as to know it.” - Daniel Webster

Between matches, I took Chandler to the McDonald’s in the food court and shared my softball experience with him- and my most recent revelation about his tennis strategy. “You know, you aren’t supposed to play tennis in competition the same way you do in practice,” I counseled. “Huh?” he grunted, in that very special way that teens do, their lower lip about to leak saliva. I then explained that at softball practice, my coach wanted me to pitch balls in the strike zone so the other players could practice hitting the ball, much in the same way tennis coaches encourage their players to carry on long rallies so both players get ample practice. What my coach failed to explain was that the way to pitch in competition was just the opposite from the way to pitch in practice! Maybe my coach assumed that I had watched baseball growing up - which I hadn’t - or that my teenage self had a fully developed frontal lobe - which the National Institute of Mental Health proved I didn’t (Yergulan-Todd, 2001). Whatever the reason, I still lived 20 years after junior high without knowing what I had done “wrong”! This episode perhaps explains why I am so passionate about teaching teens “what I wish I knew” about the entire Circle of Life.

Truth is what works.” – William James

But let's look at the even bigger truth here. We can agree that the “right” way to pitch in practice is without question the “wrong” way to pitch in a game. But how can the right way sometimes be the wrong way? I’m glad you asked. When it comes to our methods, “right” and “wrong” are often relative to the time and place of the event. Now don’t get too excited because I referred to right and wrong as “relative,” as if I said something heretical. We all have our trigger words but I'm going to ask that you keep from jumping to old conclusions until you've read all the way to the end. Just mentioning the philosopher Nietzsche, for example, in my weekly class of homeless men makes many of this overwhelmingly Christian group tense up - and start to hate me - as if any philosopher's rant was more powerful than God. And while were on the subject of "revaluing values", I’m not the only one who recommends a more balanced education than one from a single category. In fact, some of the most famous proponents of righteousness believe that learning what both sides know is the best form of education:

“Be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.” Jesus, Matthew 10:16b

Interestingly, while many great teachers throughout mythology, religion, and history teach a similar lesson, educational programs today are often only one-sided. Knowing just half of any story puts us at a distinct disadvantage, and not knowing when and where to employ a particular strategy is often the difference between those who get promoted in life... and those who get replaced. Is it any wonder why so many good people - whose only education came from “sheep” school - get…well… fleeced? Let's also keep in mind that when dealing with right and wrong, I am talking about methods and approaches, not ethics and moralilty. I just can't find in any literature where being a "lamb to the slaughter" is anyone's "calling."

“If a heroes are those who risk their own lives to save others, then villains are those who risk others to save themselves.” – Tiger Todd

If we truly expect to produce teens that succeed, while simultaneously protecting them from the villains of this world, we should engage and empower both sides and all the parts of their brains (front and back), as well as both parts of their inner beings, by learning from both “sheep school” and “serpent school.” At least consider combining “social services school” with “business school.” Imagine how much more effective our future educators and social workers would be at producing responsible citizens from their students and client if in addition to using their current strengths, they were also masters of organizational behavior, entrepreneurship, and business law. They could rule the world!

Do what I say, not what I do.

"We have seen the end of an either/or world. Conventional business models are built on choices between mutually exclusive options... For the foreseeable future, you must think 'and', not 'or'." - Peter Sheahan (2007), Flip

I don’t know about you, but I like being right. Not just for the sake of being right, mind you, but so that I can have confidence in my actions. Nothing is more deflating to our confidence than when we are "iffy" about our “right-ness.” It especially sucks when we know what we are doing is just plain wrong. Taking from the quote by William James, we can know that what we are doing is wrong by the fact that it’s not working. From these tennis and softball examples, however, we can see how the lives of our teenagers can suffer - sometimes for decades - because we don't teach them both sides, nor how to connect their approach with their desired result. If a tennis approach brings the desired result, only then can it be deemed the right approach. My lack of awareness of this truth stunted my growth and development for 20 years. Rather than see my future as in the control of my hands, my hands were tied to fixed definitions of right and wrong that were made obsolete by an ever-changing and very diverse world. Instead of investing my energy in mastery, I was wearing  myself out defending ideals that I could not prove nor support.

The Dilemma of Taking Sides

The master communicator, Joseph Campbell, once shared a story about the dangers of "right and wrong" thinking. As the story goes, a Monk in 1980’s Southern California, while flanked by his “constellation of beauties,” began collecting hundreds of minnows from bait shops along the Monterey peninsula to release into the Pacific Ocean. This pious act appeared to be going well until local pelicans saw the flickering feast of fish, like a disco ball advertising an all-you-can-eat buffet, and swooped in for the free-or-reduced lunch. The ensuing chaotic scene continued as the horrified priest and his faithful supporters used every item of their clothing to beat the pelicans away. Still, one unanswered question remained: is it “right” to save minnows, but somehow “wrong” to feed pelicans? Joseph Campbell states that the real error made that day was in not understanding that what is “good” for pelicans is “bad” for fish. The priest erred by having taken sides (Osbon, 2001).

There is a final aspect to this lesson for wise heroes and heroines. Moving “right” and “wrong” from the realm of outdated actions or beliefs and into the realm of time and place or motive and intent, will not only help our teens develop their own on-board judgment and reasoning skills, but it will also help develop their inner hero. Maybe that’s what “wise as serpents, and harmless as doves” really means. This is the very dividing line between heroes and villains; heroes give of - or risk - their lives to save others, while villains risk others' lives to save themselves. So while heroes could use their powers to harm others, they- you - are defined as those people who choose instead to use your powers for betterment of humankind.

"All sciences are now under the obligation to prepare the ground for the future task of the philosopher, which is to solve the problem of value, to determine the true hierarchy of values." - Friedrich Nietzsche

With our youth today, there is an essential need to share both sides of education. Not only can our teens today “handle the truth” that the right way in one situation might not be the right way in another, they will respect us more for being honest with them. By teaching teens how to reason rather than simply memorize facts or the dogma of right and wrong, they may also be able to avoid having their childhood experiences gestate into unresolved internal conflicts that war against the soul for decades.

But wait, there’s more...

“Will he finish what he begins?” Yoda

I have yet another risidual effect from the lack of awareness from my own teen years. It is one that affected me late into my adult life, and one that may offer another clue as to why more and more young people today are failing to complete what they begin. Returning mentally to that ill-fated softball game, I now remember that the trauma from being yanked for what I thought I was doing right. Soon, I began missing practices until I eventually stopped showing up for softball altogether. I never finished that softball season.


"Will he finish what he begins?" - Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back

This inner unresolved conflict did not dissuade me from starting new sports like tennis, soccer, or basketball, but by not finishing softball, I had inadvertently begun the habit of not finishing what I begin. As if some unseen force was stalking me, I couldn’t finish any of the new sports either. Each time I quit, I  continued to reinforce the pattern that was set from just one lesson I didn't understand in softball. Even today, it is a challenge for me to finish anything that I begin, from classes to books to relationships. Sure, I've started countless businesses and projects, and penned a dozen books. But seeing them through to completion takes everything I have in me, and everyone I know around me. Thanks to all of you who continue to help me finish things. Enablers:)

Brain research from Cornell University, first published by the National Institute of Mental Health in 2002, confirms the “flight” reaction from this inner conflict between right and wrong so prevalent among teens today. According to Dr. Deborah Yergulan-Todd and Dr. Jay Geidd, the undeveloped frontal lobe and nearly non-existent prefrontal cortex of the teen brain, route these conflicts directly to the amygdala(s). This "do not pass go - do not use reason, good judgment, or rational thinking" influences teens to either fight to get their way, or take flight if they feel powerless. As a teen, my lack of understanding triggered the flight response. I'm a lover, not a fighter. Not only did I run instead of learn the cause of my inner conflicts, I foolishly nurtured the habit of not finishing.

We Can Do Better

If you notice any of the teens in your life avoiding certain activities or showing difficulty in finishing what they begin, help them to interrupt this pattern now. Help them to understand that the right way in one circumstance isn't necessarily the right way in another, and that it's O.K. It's O.K to play tennis two different ways, like working on extended "rallies" with friends, and hitting winners in competition. Please, for the love of our young people, don't make the same error that the adults did in my life by telling them that there is only one right way and that way must be used for everything. Keep in mind, the adults in my generation also told me about the "Three R's." It took my a long time to discover that only the word "Reading" begins with the letter "R"! 

"Right" is relative, from practice to games, and from reading for enjoyment to reading to defend the innocent. Sometimes doing the right thing in a relationship means being the mature one and taking the blame for those things you didn't even do.

Help your teens increase awareness and rational thinking by encouraging them to list many possible choices to their behavior, including the potential consequences. And for the adults, don't forget that our goal with teens is not to be "right" or convince them of our way. Rather, our goal is to help the young people in our care change into responsible, self-sufficient adults who will go the distance in what they begin. What will the teens in your life need to hear from you to help them get there? -TT

Mini Essay: Nietzsche, A Hundred Years Ago

Superman:

A Hundred Years Ago

by Tiger Todd

“The only dance masters I could have were Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Walt Whitman and Nietzsche.” -Isadora Duncan, founder of modern dance 1877-1927

"Man is a rope fastened between animal and Superman, a rope over an abyss... What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal."

- Friedrich Nietzsche, from Superman

As a philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche penned many works and words, including the one we use often in Hero School, Hubermensch, or Superman. Some of his works were used by heroes to justify sacrificing their own lives for others, while some were used by villains to justify sacrificing others' lives for their own evil purposes. While not considered a hero or a villain, Nietzsche's words illustrate a confidence not often seen in heroes of the 21st Century.

“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.”

- Winston Churchill

Why are there so few confident heroes today? Have heroes today become too shy? Perhaps people prefer the silent, modest hero. But do we really? Sales and rentals of action hero movies don't appear to support this idea. Maybe what we want most from our heroes- and ourselves- isn't bravado or arrogance, but confidence. We don't want them to brag, but to have the courage to make guarantees. We expect guarantees on products likes televisions and vacuum cleaners, so why don't we expect the people we trust to be confident enough in their expertise to guarantee their results, too? Imagine a world where every doctor would guarantee successful outcomes after procedures, every teacher would guarantee the students in their care will make AYP, every broker would guarantee (legal) stock dividends, and every politician would guarantee that social problems will not only be addressed, but solved. These will be our 21st Century heroes.

Is this too much to ask, or should we continue to set the bar even lower when we are the very people to set it higher?

American Brad Walker clears on the way to taking gold in the

men's pole vault, ahead of Romain Mesnil and Danny Ecker

(©2007 BBC)

“For the task of a revaluation of all values, more capacities may have been needed than have ever dwelt together in a single individual"- Nietzsche, Ecce Homo II:9

An interviewer once asked Nietzsche how he felt about those critics who reviewed him unfavorably (R.J. Hollingdale, A Nietzsche Reader 1977). To this, Nietzsche calmly and confidently replied, "How can they possibly understand me- I'm the only who has this information!" Pretty confident. Not that we should agree with everything every philosopher says. And even if everything they said was valid, we've each had what we've said misinterpreted by others and used against us. But does this mean we should "cast away our confidence" and stop trying? The main reason why we still read about the people we do today is not because they were right or wrong- we read about both- but because they exhibit such great confidence in what they believe. Do you?

"In the end, even treason is just a matter of dates."

- From The Count of Monte Cristo

Still, it is Nietzsche's next sentence that struck me as the most compelling statement of confidence. Nietzsche continues,

"But a hundred years from now, there will be some who will begin to understand what I am saying."

I may not have the confidence yet to believe that the words I write today and the works I do during my lifetime will be read about for generations to come. But I can believe that the words of the the great philosophers and apostles that we are reading today were written for us today. I also believe that they were written to help us become the ones who would write for the next generation.

Don't let your modesty become mediocrity by trying to get under one another or by being less than the next guy. The world doesn't need any less. They desperately need the more. It is OK to have the confidence of a hero in your professional life since, as Nietzsche put it, you are a bridge and not a goal. You are that bridge between a person's life now and how they need it to be in the future. So put on your confidence and be the heroes you were born to be. Who knows, maybe someone will be reading "you" a hundred years from today.

Movie Message: Quantum of Solace

Movie Message:
Quantum of Solace

A Movie Hero Matures
by Tiger Todd

Night before last, I found myself watching Roger Moore as James Bond in the 1973 classic, Live and Let Die, for probably the first time in 20 years. Observing 007, the resourceful British Secret Service agent through the 20+ film series is equal parts great entertainment and a vehicle for transporting viewers through time. Not only do we get a taste of more exotic locations and cultures than House Hunters International, but we also get to witness just how much these different cultures and societies have matured. The latest installment of the Bond franchise,  Quantum of Solace, continues this trend, but there is something more. Quantum is the first film in the series whose story and action continues from where the last movie left off, and, more importantly, instead of focusing on the maturation of a culture, we experience firsthand the maturing of a hero.

Quantum delivers more than just a glimpse into the most beautiful locations and present-day cultures, from Italy, England, Haiti, Austria, Russia, and Bolivia- I lose track of where else. While Bond leaves empty shell casings and more than a few dead bodies in each of these fabulous locations, he is simultaneously being set-up as the bad guy, a common theme where the one true hero is a threat to both sides of the law, a la Spiderman. As with the inner conflict between revenge and duty experienced by Peter Parker and Spiderman, Bond himself struggles with feelings of vengeance, betrayal, sorrow, and anger for the death of Vesper, the agent-turned-lover-turned-double agent from Casino Royale. Bond must somehow manage what Nietzsche calls “the war which he is” long enough to stay alive and save the planet from a network of villains bent on global domination.

But what makes this Bond film so extraordinary is its accuracy in depicting not just the inner conflict of the hero or heroine, but the lessons that can keep us from becoming just like the villains we loathe.

What this Bond has in depth, however, he still lacks in maturity. His lessons begin through his boss, “M,” played coldly, confidently, and brilliantly by Dame Judi Dench. M only expects "duty" from her agents and so is continually surprised by 007’s “arrogance and self-awareness” which, she adds, “seldom go hand in hand.”


Orestes and Apollo, attributed to Eumenides painter; Apulian, 380-370 BCE
Paris, Louvre Museum

M is initially perplexed by Bond but soon realizes he needs some instruction to redefine his experience. While former Bonds excelled at arrogance and womanizing, Daniel Craig’s 007 in Quantum perfectly exemplifies the conflicted hero of history, like Marcus Aurelius; Mythology, like  Orestes; and religion, like King David. To deliver this lesson, M must draw on the divinely feminine role of Wisdom, or 'Sofia' in the Hebrew voice, the feminine guide to kings from David to Solomon. Wisdom is the hero’s guide into the future and into himself. In one powerful and pivotal scene, Bond has returned to his hotel suite to find M-as-boss accompanied by myriad agents poised to arrest him. In this same moment, Bond is informed that the innocent girl he charmed into bed the night before has been killed by those after him. While Bond blames the villain, M shifts deftly into the role of Wisdom, focusing on Bond’s carelessness:

“Why her, Bond? She was just supposed to send you home. She worked in an office, collecting reports. Look how well your charm works, James.”

While we Bond fans may agree that “kill-or-be-killed” appears to be Bond’s only choice in his line of work, M points out that bad guys aren’t the only casualties of the hero’s tumultuous life. Bond must learn to think first before charming people into his life- or into his bed- particularly if he can’t be there to protect them when he's out fighting evil. You and I affect so many other people’s lives, and while we cannot always protect them from evil, we can at least not endanger them further by carelessly involving them with villains hell-bent on getting to us. This is quite a lesson, and one better-learned through Wisdom - or through a movie like Quantum - rather than through experience.



“To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.” - Henri Bergson

But the real story in Quantum is how Bond chooses to judge himself while simultaneously learning to overcome the pain and suffering spawned from betrayal and love. Bond holds it together, as many of us do who have been hurt deeply by those we have loved and sacrificed for. In fact, Bond gains strength from exercising his self-awareness, as well as from the advice he offers Bond-Girl Camille in dealing with the revenge she seeks over the murder of her family. He is also beginning to realize- as some of us have- that many of those who have betrayed us were victims themselves, used by villains through their short-term thinking, blind compassion, or need to belong.

Boldy going where no 007 film- or character- has gone before, this Bond matures, not by taking solace through excessive alcohol, women, or revenge, but by preventing history from repeating itself ever again. In the dramatic final scene of the film, we see Bond-as-master, for he has mastered both his license-to-kill persona and his inner conflict. By turning his tragic experience into a sacrifice for others, he has redefined the role of “hero”, thus saving the next would-be victim from the same fate as his beloved Vesper.

"No great deed is done by falterers who ask for certainty."
- George Eliot, a.k.a. Mary Ann Evans Cross

There is probably not a hero or heroine among us who has not been hurt by someone we love or have sacrificed for. It is also likely that those who have betrayed us, like Vesper did to Bond, were merely duped themselves into their unfortunate behavior by the voices of another, some value-less villain with a selfish agenda. Hopefully, the model set by Daniel Craig’s Bond in Quantum can offer not only solace for the rest of us, but a path through - and ultimately out of - the pain of betrayal. By working through our own challenging situations and inner conflicts - perhaps by seeking to save someone else from something we’ve already gone through, as our maturing Bond did - we can create a similar heroic recovery path for ourselves. - TT 
©2009 Hero School