Looking at superhero movies these days, among other franchises with ongoing characters, life has been a bit uninspiring. Famous personas are getting rebooted left and right, yet even though many of these movies are good, very few of these movies dare to create the definitive versions of their characters. I'm disappointed to see what Zack Snyder seems to be aiming at with the upcoming Man of Steel movie, which seems content to make it good but not great. I keep on imagining what the definitive version of him would look like and how I would direct the films, and I fear that his definitive incarnation will never come in my lifetime, or worse that his bright light will be snuffed out of society decides to take the route of Der Übermensch and consider timeless morals obsolete. This is a great concern of mine. Yet, I speak to the public today not about comics and movies, but of life. I look at my own, at the way that I live, and wonder what the definitive version of my life will be. Unlike movies, I only have one shot at this.

There is a prevailing philosophy today in society, one that is inherently selfish and yet unquestioned. The conventional wisdom follows that when they graduate from high school, people should go to college and follow their dream job, because nothing is more important than following your dreams. The truly important things in life are doing the things that you love with the people you love. This is not only happiness, but the meaning of life.

From the standpoint of older morals, this is a frightening development in society's development. It means that the self is the most important aspect of life, that our happiness is our primary concern. This idea is a sacred cow, and found no one else speak contrary to the attitude so my perception of life wasn't balanced, and unfortunately it took me until the age of nineteen to gain independence from this contemporary worldview.

I know what I want to be with my life. I want to be an altruist, someone who lives for others, regardless of whether or not gain any satisfaction during my lifetime. My model and inspiration is George Bailey, who dreamed of becoming a great builder and had his own vision of how he could make the world better, but resigned reluctantly to banking when his father died because it was the right thing to do. Had it not been for the famous "never been born" act, the route George's life took would seem preposterous to modern viewers, who would have considered it a tragedy that he never got his dream job. Yet by showing how he made the world a better place by living for others, by showing his true impact, Frank Capra showed that George Bailey's life was a bright light, and that he was blessed to know that he found his own definitive story. His life was indeed a wonderful life.

In my life there are many desires. My passion is for writing. I want to create many definitive stories and beautiful bodies of work. I wouldn't mind becoming a director and inventing amazing moving pictures that reinvent cinema. I would also like to have a healthy family and start it early on in life so that I can live to see my grand-children have children. Yet, those are selfish and unlikely desires, and they can wait. Maybe I'm meant to dedicate my life to my ideals. If I live for my family, then I live for my sister, and my sister's birth represents to me the hopes of the entire nation, so therefore my duties lie solely to God and country. There are things bigger than me to live for. This land needs heroes, and I'm willing to sacrifice myself through my work to be like those heroes from the greatest generation. My life is about service, and for me I think the best place for this might very well be in the organization called "the service". There are other things I could be, but maybe this is my calling.

Life isn't about personal happiness. True happiness is what Aristotle called the good life, eudaimonia. Happiness isn't pleasure, a worldly sensation subject to time. It's an ultimate end. A person can't be happy at any one point; it's really a matter of whether their life was fulfilling or not. Life isn't about getting old doing a job you enjoy; it's about growing up and sacrificing everything in faith of what you believe in.

It would be nice if everyone else could have wonderful lives, but people's concept of wonderful has changed. Yet there is and always will be potential for a more wonderful world, in the sense that George Bailey would be proud. Children and young adults just need that one mentor, that one voice somewhere telling them that they can answer to a higher calling, something higher than what they can make up for themselves. So long as that voice is somewhere, there's hope. Even if it's only a whisper, even if it fails to produce another Greatest Generation, if someone somewhere is inspired to discover the meaning to his life, then the whispers were worth it.