I have always paid attention to the people who inspire me. Some are well known and have reached thousands or millions of people. Someone who can change how many people think about themselves, their lives or the world has done something genuinely valuable.
Others on my list are people almost nobody has heard of. They may have inspired one person, a handful of people or a team of twelve. Their influence operates on a much smaller scale, but that does not make the effect on the people they reach any less significant.
What interested me was what these very different people had in common. The scale of their influence might be completely different, but what reaches us seems remarkably similar.
Famous People Who Inspired Me
Some of the people on my list will be familiar. Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi, Viktor Frankl, Carl Jung, Abraham Lincoln and Nelson Mandela are all there. They inspired me for different reasons. In some, I saw extraordinary commitment to something beyond themselves. In others, it was the courage to hold to a conviction when doing so came at enormous personal cost. Others changed how I understood myself or what human beings are capable of.
Philippe Petit came onto my list differently. His walk between the towers of the World Trade Center took place in 1974, but I only came across the story many years later. What struck me was the sheer confidence it must have taken to step out onto that wire. It was certainly courageous, though part of me thought it was completely reckless.
Later, when I watched him talk about what he had done, I found myself thinking about it again. It wasn’t the stunt itself that stayed with me so much as the belief he must have had in his ability to carry it through.
Responding to Purpose and Beliefs, Not Achievements
Simon Sinek, in Start with Why, describes a similar idea: that we often respond not to what people or organisations do, but to the purpose and beliefs behind their actions. I find this useful for understanding my own list, even though inspiration is clearly more complex than any single model.
I was not inspired by a desire to reproduce their achievements. I was not going to walk between two skyscrapers, lead a country or follow any of their paths. What I recognised were beliefs, values and ways of approaching life that I already held or wanted to live more fully.
When I looked across all of them, the same seven qualities kept appearing. Not everyone displayed all of them in the same way, and some brought particular ones into much sharper focus than others.
Seven Qualities I Found in the People Who Inspired Me
1. They Can See Something Different
The people who inspire me often recognise that something could be different. They have a clear idea of what they want to achieve or change, and they are prepared to work towards it even when others do not yet see it.
2. It Isn’t Only About Them
I am also inspired when what someone does matters beyond their own success. They may still have personal ambitions, but they also want to contribute, change or improve something for other people.
3. They Keep Going When It Is Difficult
Having an idea is the easy part. The people who inspire me tend to keep going when things are difficult, progress is slow or other people doubt their work.
4. They Think for Themselves
I am drawn to people prepared to think independently rather than accept the prevailing view. That does not mean they are always right. Gandhi, Lincoln, King, Jung and Mandela were human beings with their own flaws and decisions we might question. I do not need someone to be perfect to find them inspiring. What interests me is their willingness to reach their own conclusions and stand by them when it mattered.
5. They Act Despite Fear
I used to think inspiring people were fearless. I no longer believe that. What I find more inspiring is someone who is frightened or uncertain yet acts anyway. They do not need to know how everything will turn out before taking the next step.
6. They Trust Their Own Judgement
The people who inspire me listen to others, but they also make their own decisions. They can take advice, change their minds and admit when they are wrong without needing everyone else to agree with them.
This is where I see a connection with the Higher Self. We can listen to others without automatically adopting their opinions as our own. At some point, we have to decide what we believe is right for us.
7. They Are Willing to Try
Philippe Petit made me think particularly about this. He looked at the space between the Twin Towers and decided to walk between them on a wire.
Most of us will never attempt anything like that. But on a much smaller scale, there are times when we have to be willing to try something without knowing whether we can do it. Sometimes we only find out what is possible by having a go.
Inspiring Ordinary Lives
I drew those seven qualities from people whose names are widely known, but there is nothing about them that requires fame or a large audience. Once I looked closer to home, I could see several of the same qualities in the people around me. I also began to notice three more that had not appeared on the first list at all, because they tend to be lived quietly rather than publicly: kindness, courage and love.
Kindness
When my marriage ended, I had nowhere to go, and a friend took me in with my small children. We stayed for three months. She was single and independent, and having a family suddenly land in the middle of her life must have disrupted it enormously. She never asked how long it would go on or mentioned any inconvenience to her, then or later. We have been firm friends ever since. What inspired me was her kindness and generosity in making room for us when we needed it, without making us feel like a burden.
Courage
Another friend was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. Faced with something most of us can barely imagine, he went on to build a remarkable support network for other people living with cancer and for those around them. I saw courage in him, certainly, but I also saw several of those seven qualities. He took what was happening in his own life and turned some of it outwards. There was vision, commitment and something aimed beyond himself. There was daring, too, because starting something on that scale while he was ill was not the obvious thing to do. The scale may have been different from that of the people on my original list, but some of what inspired me was remarkably similar.
Love
And then there is a relative of mine who has spent her life caring for her daughter, who has severe learning disabilities. There has been no single dramatic act to point to, just years of loving, advocating, adapting and being there. What inspires me about her is love, but when I look again, I can see commitment and dedication too. Perhaps we notice those qualities differently when they are lived quietly over a lifetime rather than attached to a public achievement.
These people have not inspired millions, but that is not the point. They have inspired the people whose lives they have touched. Sometimes it is through the same qualities we recognise in people whose influence reaches much further. Sometimes it is expressed through kindness, compassion, courage or love at exactly the moment another person needs it.
The scale is completely different, but the capacity is not. What reached me in my friend’s spare room was the same quality I recognise in lives I have only ever read about, and none of it requires a platform or an audience. It is available to any of us on an ordinary day.
Why We Are Inspired
So why do these people affect us? It is not only because we admire what they have done. Something about how they live strikes a chord with something already in us.
When we see someone act courageously, stay with what matters or be kind even when it costs them something, perhaps we recognise our own capacity to do the same.
This is why inspiration can feel different from admiration. We can admire someone without wanting to change anything about our own lives. Inspiration makes something feel possible for us too.
Don’t Change the World, Change Your World
As I was reading about inspirational people, I asked a mentor how any of it was supposed to help someone like me. Most of the people who inspired me had changed the world, and next to them my own patch looked far too small to matter.
He told me not to focus on the world. “Apply your beliefs, principles and values to your world,” he said, “and the rest will take care of itself.”
I understand that differently now. We do not need to set out to inspire anyone. We need to live what we believe in the part of the world that is ours, and we don’t get to decide how much influence or inspiration that creates. That is a relief rather than a limitation, because it leaves us with the only part we can actually do anything about.
“We need to live what we believe, in the part of the world that is ours.”
Try This: Name the Quality, and Say It
Think of two people who have inspired you: one well-known and one you have actually met.
Which of the seven qualities did you see in each of them? Add your own if something important is missing. My list came from my life; yours may be different.
Then, if you can, tell the person you know. One sentence is enough. Tell them what they did and why it mattered to you.
They may not realise they affected you. Telling them may not change anything, but it gives them the chance to know that something they did mattered.
Once we understand what inspires us, it is tempting to try to create the same effect in other people. But the harder we try to be inspiring, the more easily inspiration turns into performance. What we can do is create the conditions in which inspiration becomes possible, and that is what we turn to next.
Articles on Inspiring Self and Others
Inspiring Self and Others: Living in a Way That Calls Forth the Best in Everyone
- The Difference Between Motivation and Inspiration
- What You Are Really Chasing Is a Feeling
- Characteristics of Inspirational People
- Why Trying to Inspire Never Works
- What Happens When Nobody Needs To Win
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