Did you have someone (non family) that made a positive impact?

It's a good question. Before I talk about myself, I'd rather talk about a place where I have seen this exact scenario come up A LOT: math. Specifically, I'm subscribed to Numberphile, one of Brady Haran's 8,724,262 Youtube channels (which are all good, btw). It's his most popular channel, and many of the professors and guests have become iconic on the channel. So he started a podcast where he started interviewing them one by one. Very interesting, and I highly recommend it. Check it out here.

Nearly, to a man (or woman), every single one of them had somebody like that in their life. Someone that took extra time with them growing up and nurtured their interests above and beyond what anyone had to. And that's how they ended up on the mathematical or scientific route they ended up on and eventually spreading it to the whole world. I'd say, of all their varied backgrounds and life stories, that is the most consistent element between all of them.

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As for me, eh, not really growing up. I'd count my parents in there as well in terms of not having much impact. I really liked my high school English and economics teacher. He taught a demanding class, but the most important thing he instilled in me was the concept of "narrow the topic." The more you focus in on a topic, the more you can dig into it, push against the boundaries you thought it had, and really come to interesting conclusions. So right. A paper on "the Civil War" will be terrible. It's too broad. A paper on how the density of foliage on Little Round Top might well have played a deciding factor in the North being able to hold its position and ultimately win the battle of Gettysburg...that probably hasn't been done before. That will probably be interesting when you're done with it. Later on in life, I really came to understand the broader implication of that message which is that creativity flows from constraints.

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Recently, maybe that's changed for me. A few years ago, my church's pastor of over 25 years finally retired. I was on the committee to replace him, and we had an interim pastor for much of the year that that took. Said interim pastor and I got along really well from the get-go, and I found him to have an incredibly real and empathetic personality as someone that had experienced plenty of difficulties in life. He'd been divorced and dealt with depression and been in therapy and was now happily remarried, and I finally broke down and went in to talk to him one day about my relationship with my ex. I had hoped to gain some wisdom from someone that had experienced a painful breakup like he had, and I felt I could trust him to talk about this.

Within about ten minutes of me being in there, he asked me to instead tell him about my dad. And my childhood. And my childhood with my dad. A surprise psychoanalytical approach. Well, that's what I needed, and I spent many more weeks in his office bawling my eyes out talking about my dad. He'd also had a dad that he never felt he could love. There were some differences in our dads' vices, but the similarities were just striking. He just got it. Nobody else ever has. He understood the anger, and he didn't invalidate it.

After he left, I was incommunicado with him for a while, but I got in touch with him again about a year ago, because I was just going through some terrible times with my dad's business (where I was VP) being on the precipice of destruction. He agreed to meet with me every week to help me. As a friend. Most of what we've worked on has been trying to help me find purpose in my life. "The Courage To Be" as Paul Tillich put it in the titular book which he assigned me to read. He's retired now, and I'm the only person he does this for. He said I had a big impact on him as well, and he thought about me a lot in that year after he left. It's been a few weeks since I've seen him. More than any therapist, parent, friend my age, or anyone else I've met, he's really challenged me to rethink a lot of things. It's all in the hope that we'll find something that finally sticks with me and makes it possible for me to reliably get up and face each new day. It's hard work; I'm a fantastically hard nut to crack, and no one has ever succeeded. But if anyone has a chance, it's him.

 

yes, my fam members have made huge positives for thousands of lives around them. but i don't talk about it cus I'm the exact opposite and feel very small when i do. but my antibodies can be used to fight against blindness since despite my daily faps, i still have clear (with glasses) vision.

 

I've had a few people like that. My family is spread out and most of my life starting from my late teens I've lived away from home and have had to look for other role models other than my own family.

A few of them have been my Judo Senseis with the one having the most influence on my life. Was one of my college Senseis. He had been a great competitor and also was studying to be a Buddhist monk. He taught me a lot about understanding being in the moment and other lessons. He really showed me how success comes from training and preparation to the point that when the opportunity is there you can act on on it.

During the summers when I was in school I was working in kitchens and one of the chefs also made me appreciate the value of hard work but also the value of humor. I remember working the breakfast shift with him and it was slaving over hot grills at 6:30 in the morning but he would be cracking jokes, often crude and dirty, and keeping things light during a miserable stressful time.

An architect who I worked with and was one of my professional mentors. He taught me the practice and how to maintain a sense of professionalism and ethics. He was the type of guy who did things literally by the book and knew the building code inside and out. His knowledge and advice helped me immensely in my work.

Also my late neighbor who passed away two years ago at the age of 98. She had lived in her house for more than 50 years and when I first moved into mine we didn't get off to the best of starts as I had a wild house warming party. After that though she was always there working on her yard and even shoveling snow well into her 90's. I would often come home and find a bag of home baked treats from her hanging on my door knob. She really taught me the value of community and appreciating our elders.