I'm Gonna Be a Star! Or a Martyr! Or the AntiChrist...

Sometimes I wonder if great people had any inkling they would be great. In my book The Kings of One Color (Click Here to Buy!) Moshe is thrown into a life where he makes a difference to every person alive on the planet. But, he struggles with the idea that his destiny is any more than to spread the word of God.

What about others who have had this kind of influence on the world. Did MLK Jr. know early on that he would inspire generations of people to strive for peace? Or Ghandi? Or Mother Theresa?

I had always heard that the missing years of Jesus in the Bible were the years where he was soul searching, trying to understand what he was. I can't imagine living with this type of knowledge, which makes me think that most of these people did not know what was coming.

But, a worse existence than knowing that you would influence millions of people would be to know that you would harm mass amounts of people. I guess a greater question is what about the evil people from our world? Hitler, Vlad Dracul III, Lenin, Stalin, Manson, Pol Pot... Did these men know they were destined to infamy? Or did these men think they were destined for greatness?

I really feel the human psyche is too fragile for any of this knowledge.