Humans can be amazing! We are capable of more than we think we are.
But we tend to spend most of our lives in self doubt; until certain moments roll around and we are suddenly vindicated to ourselves.
You hear the stories all the time of mothers lifting cars off of their children, or fighting off vandals with a single punch. Anything is possible, if we try hard enough.
That's why we need to take our moments to relish in the "Damn! I'm good!" We are!
Redditor u/pikachu2_opwanted to hear about the times people surprised themselves by asking:
What's your "damn I'm a bad@ss" moment?
I often find myself surprised by... me. And after each and every time I deem myself worthy again I immediately fall back into self doubt. It's my life cycle. I could cure cancer and I'd still be like "meh." I need to start recording my "greatness" moments.
Savior
Choking Sign Language GIF by Sign with RobertGiphy"I saved my husband's life using the Heimlich maneuver, on the first try, never having done it before."
Ramped Up
"Not as cool as some of the others here, but I was running through a building, down a ramp with polished cement floors, and I somehow ended up falling down on one knee. With my high momentum I managed to slide all the way down the ramp (it was very long) and then kick myself back up into running again. It all happened completely smoothly and it felt like an action scene."
In Kauai...
"I went on a snorkeling trip off the coast of Kauai. There was a newlywed couple there that I could tell weren't good in the water. We're out in the water and they're off by themselves and I can see that the wife is crying and the husband has a panicked look on his face. Turns out they didn't realize that skin contracts in water and he lost his wedding ring off his finger. I scan around for a while and find it 30 feet down or so. I run down and get it and give it back to them. They were thrilled."
The Champion Chucker!
"Chucked a piece of cardboard at a recycling bin at work, it was about 30 feet from me. A draft caught it and took it 40 feet up and it did a double loop before slamming directly into the bin. One old lady saw and went "wooow!" Felt like a freaking champion all day."
Leaks
shower GIFGiphy"I just relocated and extended the outdoor water tap for my 70 year old widowed neighbor, and when I turned the water back on nothing leaked. Felt kind bada**."
See there, now that is cool realness being served. We need to appreciate our own actions, big or small. That feeling of bada**ery is like none other. Why not try to emulate it instead of taking a pill to fake it?
Back Up
fun video GIFGiphy"I went to a shop to buy a new bike... and I went there on my old bike. I came back home riding my new bike and by holding the old one with one hand."
"Everything was going fine, until the bikes abruptly turned sideway and sent me flying over the handle bars. I ducked forward, landed on my shoulder and in a continuous roll, I got back on my feet and did a thumb up to appease a startled passer by."
Survivor
"I didn't think how cool/good it was at the moment, but when I was like 5 or 6, a woman covered in blood crawled to my childhood house door and started banging on it, I woke up from the noise and went to open it. When I opened it, I just saw her in cuts, scratches, bruises, etc... Apparently her boyfriend was trying to actually kill her and she managed to escape."
"She asked to be let in for safety and I let her in and went to go wake up my mom. When she came out she was shocked to see her and went to clean her wounds a bit and later called the police and ambulance, I didn't fix her wounds or anything but I'd like to think that I saved her life that day."
Lockdown
"Start of UK lockdown my dishwasher broke down and since shops were closed, I was looking at minimum three months of doing the dishes by hand. Forget that. Went to YouTube, watched a bunch of videos, took the pump apart and found a piece of broken glass which was messing it up. Put it back together, worked perfect, forget you entropy and washing dishes."
Things That Are Normal Where You Live But Crazy Anywhere Else | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
In Yellowstone...
"I got lost alone in Yellowstone, after sunset. But I'd come prepared with a headlamp, kept my cool & found my way back to my car alive. My detour added several miles to the route, and it was & still is the most I've hiked in a single day, probably just under 14 miles."
"I could barely move when I got back to my car. I had to just sit for about 20 minutes before I was able to drive. But I got the most amazing view of the Milky Way of my entire life along the way. Totally worth it for that alone. Any mishap you survive becomes an adventure."
A New Shape
Working Out Richard Simmons GIFGiphy"Obese most of my life. Worked really hard, lost 100lbs. Took up running, and decided to run a marathon."
"I've never felt more like a bada** than when I crossed that finish line. The training and the race itself were the hardest things I've done in my life, and there were many times throughout where I really wasn't sure I was going to make it."
"Crap. That guy is an IDIOT!"
"I share mine with my dog. Did the adrenaline pumping, car lift thing. My idiot neighbor was trying to change his own oil, and didn't have the jack in the proper place. Whatever metal it was on, bent, and the car lowered onto him. Him which had his body positioned perfectly so the front tire would crush his dumb butt."
"My dog was out back and started going insane barking, so I bolted outside, wondering what could be wrong (he only barks when something's wrong, like my kid left the yard or something) I see my neighbor's legs sticking out from his freaking tire, race inside screaming for my brother, then bolt back out and try to lift the car. My brother comes out and as I somehow manage to lift the car just enough, he pulls the neighbor out. I was expecting him to be dead, but he stood up, coughed a few times, and said thanks."
"We called EMS to get him checked and they took him to the hospital. He had some internal injuries, but survived and recovered fully. What I remember most is flopping to my butt in the driveway, thinking, "Crap. That guy is an IDIOT!" It was my brother that said I'm a bada**. And as the real hero, yes, doggo got all the pats and scratches and treats."
"I was at a party and apparently some guy had a problem with me (I didn't even know him). I was sitting with friends and from across the room he yelled something to me, but with the music I couldn't hear what he was saying. So I said "What??" And he yelled it again. But again, I couldn't hear him."
"So I stood up and said (more forcefully) "WHAT?!" His face dropped, he shrunk back a little, said "never mind" and sat down. My friends laughed their BUTTS off. I genuinely thought this dude had a question. But I had inadvertently backed him down. My bad@ss moment was an accident."
High Five
High Five Teamwork GIF by SpongeBob SquarePantsGiphy"When I was like 9 years old, I choke-slammed the neighborhood bully, full WWE style."
"It was directly under a streetlight, and there were people all around to witness it, because I think someone was having a party. I ran away because I thought I would get in trouble, but the adults (actually teenagers, but being 9 I thought of them as "adults") just wanted to give me high-fives. And don't worry, the kid was totally fine other than being shaken up."
The Perseverance Award
"I signed up for an archery merit badge at my boy scout camp a few years back and I sucked terribly at if with the lowest average for the whole damn week, but toward the end of the trip I crunched it and spent my entire free day with the bow at the archery area and sank them center left and right. When it came time to announce awards at the end of the week, the counsellor in charge of the range stepped up in front of the bonfire and gave a speech about the scouts he worked with that week."
"He gets through most of the names and I'm feeling pretty down on myself because I figured I was overlooked but I can still recall what he said."
"...And the last award is something very special, the camp barely hands it out because only a few kids here are cut from this cloth. The Perseverance award goes to a scout I watched tirelessly fire down the range until his hands were red and covered in blisters. He started off with the lowest average of this summers group, but ended with the highest I've seen while working in the ranger. The award goes to (my name), congratulations, you earned it."
"I was beaming for like 4 months after hearing it."
- Hazeunix
Middle School Days
"Middle School. I stood after school to play basketball with some other kids. I was just sitting on a bench taking a break when a younger kid — I think it was one of the other kid's little brother — comes up to me and tries to start something for no reason. Little kid throws a punch at my face, and without missing a beat, I move my arm from resting on the table to catching his fist inches away from my face."
"Idon't say a word and I just let the kid think about what just happened. It takes him a moment to process and then he just walks away like nothing happened. Felt really cool in the moment but none of the other kids saw it."
- Dijirii
Save the Girl
"Leaving work at a big box store a little after 1am and I'm next to my car in the parking lot and changing out of my work shirt into a t-shirt. There's a couple benches outside a few random people around. I see a car swerve toward one woman and then brake hard and knowing a couple people out there I figured it was just a very bad joke."
"But then I see the car lurch forward and brake hard again and can see a woman in the headlights with a terrified look on her face so I start running as fast as I can toward them. A ridiculously muscled guy gets out of the car and starts moving toward her. I wasn't the first person there."
"The first was a 14-year old kid who was very short and skinny. The kid shoves the guy and then the guy knocks him down and gets right on top of him. The guy hits him three times before I get there and hit him in the back of the head. This dude was hella drunk and got off the kid to take a couple swings at me that I was able to avoid."
"One of the others in the crowd yells that the cops have been called and he books it out of there. Thankfully the cops got him before any more damage happened. He pled guilty and went to jail for a bunch of charges. I don't think I was the most bad@ss because the kid took those hits like a champ and saved the girl, but I still felt pretty awesome."
A Critical 2 Minutes...
"Possibly saving a life. I saw a motorcycle crash in a parking lot late at night. No one but me went to check on the guy, everyone else was just standing around looking. Dude had a compound fracture on his leg and blood was pouring through his jeans onto the ground. I used my belt to tourniquet the leg. The ambulance didn't arrive for another 2 minutes so I might have saved him from bleeding out."
"I can do this, I was in the girl guides."
amazon fly GIFGiphy"Once, at a party, a friend of mine got trapped in the bathroom accidentally when the doorknob fell off."
"Despite being plastered, I got her out with a pair of scissors. The quote, still remembered a decade later among our friends was "I can do this, I was in the girl guides." Took perhaps five minutes."
I Am Woman!
water bottle woman GIFGiphy"I'm a relatively petite woman and I changed my flat tire without any help in a snowstorm. It was a struggle, and my hands were scraped and bleeding by the end, but I felt really proud of myself."
Bravo and Cheers to all! None of that was easy to pull off, and more times than not it's even more difficult to share. Go forth y'all and lean into your inner BADA**!! Let the inspiration lead you.
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Redditor r3tr0gam3r83 wanted to hear about which realizations in life have left people SHOOK, so they asked:
"What is something that blew your mind once you realized it?"
Avocados are not vegetables.
They're fruits, berries to be exact.
Like what?!?!
Colleagues
GIF by Bud LightGiphy"Sometimes it is more important to like your colleagues than the actual job."
"I had shi**y jobs with the most amazing colleagues and had shi**y colleagues and the most amazing job. I'd pick the first every time."
chr989
Star Trekking
"That you could legitimately travel at warp speed through the center of galaxies and never run any real risk of hitting a star. That’s how spread out space really is."
justanotherguyhere16
"Also, galaxies, stars, and even the Universe is constantly moving. I think time travel has been invented, but they can’t figure out the 'space' part of it.
"Yes, they can travel back in time, but relatively speaking, they can’t figure out how to navigate to the part of the planet they want to reach. So when they travel back in time, it’s relative to where they currently are, and end up not moving through space, thus ending up in the middle of an empty vacuum."
theknights-whosay-Ni
Jaws is Old
"That sharks predated the rings of Saturn."
BeardedDominant
"Sharks also developed the immune system that ended up in both dinosaurs/birds and mammals."
csiz
"We don’t know that. We can’t say for certain that the rings are only 100 million years old. It’s still debated."
The_Kek_5000
"I'm pretty sure that sharks are older than trees."
Cayderent
From the Trees
"One day I sat on a tram, passing a river. There was a duck in a tree. I realized I'd never seen ducks in trees. No one else seemed to notice, but I was puzzled. Now whenever I come across something that seems intuitive but I have never considered I call it a duck in a tree."
Ol_Pasta
"This realization happened to me this past year. We apparently have a family of wood ducks in one of the big trees in our yard. Our neighbor said she has seen a duck walking around on a branch. I made it 37 years without knowing some ducks can roost in trees. My wife caught a video of the mama leading like eight ducks into the field next to our house. We aren't even near water."
jwbourne
Artistic Timeline
Confused Eminem GIFGiphy"Pablo Picasso and Eminem were both alive at the same time."
leebon427
"I’d bet a lot of people think Picasso is a Renaissance artist."
editormatt
I admit it. I'm one of those people. Pablo and Marshall, in one lifetime.
New facts are fun.
The New World
Design Loop GIF by xponentialdesignGiphy"They were colonizing the Wild West at the same time as they were building skyscrapers in Manhattan. I always think of them taking place eighty to a hundred years apart. It's wild."
Emilayday
Oh the Power
"Nuclear power plants are just steam power plants that use nuclear reactions to heat the water. There's no fancy magic extracting energy directly from nuclear material. They just boil water and spin a turbine."
RenaKunisaki
"Most electrical generation is spinning a turbine. Photovoltaic solar power is pretty much the only exception, and it's not the only form of solar power. There's solar thermal power, which uses mirrors or lenses to concentrate the heat of the sun to make steam and turn a turbine."
Brawndo91
The Empire
"The Roman Empire fully fell less than 50 years before the discovery of the new world."
South-by-north
"The Romans also had copper wire, magnets, and battery acid. They could have invented electricity hundreds of years before it was actually discovered. But they didn't. The wire was used for jewelry, the magnets as lodestones, and the battery acid was used to clean the rust off of swords."
Kahzgul
"RIP Byzantine Empire. 1453 never forget."
crossbowman44
The Witness
"Owl‘s silent flight. I mean I always knew that but a while ago was the first time I actually witnessed it. Owl came flying towards me and landed only a few feet away and you couldn‘t hear anything. Crazy."
Zealousideal-You-324
"I saw a barn owl swoop down and catch a mouse while hiking at night, and the whole thing happened in complete silence. It gave me a deep sense of unease because it was literally like someone hit the mute button on life."
VulcanVisions
Bad Kermit
Kermit The Frog Meme GIF by IdentityGiphy"Poison dart frogs aren't poisonous in captivity."
"I own 5 of them and anytime I tell someone I own some I always get 'Do you ever lick them' or 'Can you go kill someone with them.' But yeah they get their poison from what they eat, and all I give them is fruit flies."
JMfury
Poison frogs?
That sounds like something Rose would have a story about on 'The Golden Girls.'
Redditor rentinghappiness wanted to hear about the things everyone really didn't know anything about until it happened to them, so they asked:
"What is something you used to think people were over-exaggerating about until you experienced it yourself?"
We never really know anything about anything until we try it for ourselves.
Mouth Issues
Dentist GIFGiphy"Dentist chiming in… tooth pain. I knew academically how painful they could be until it happened to me."
juneburger
"You know the pain is serious when you start looking forward to the inevitable root canal."
HailMari248
Wonders of Nature
"Giant sequoia trees. When I finally saw them in person, they looked fake. I could not comprehend a tree of that size."
schaefer001
"And we may have lost 15-20% of the remaining trees during some big fires in 2020 and 2021. A 2011 estimate puts it that there were only 80,000 remainings. They truly are wondrous organisms that I feel like everyone should have the chance to experience if they can."
"I'm a big believer in doing everything we can to protect and preserve these silent giants. It's really sad that so many were cut down by loggers when the wood is such poor quality for human purposes, to begin with. Such an utter and sad waste."
this_is_poorly_done
Just Me
"Loneliness."
Fried__SoapI
"I'm with you. Put all my cards into a girl who went suddenly cold and dark on me. Now I'm alone at rock bottom figuring out my next moves. You know, the smartest people in the world and also the happiest people in the world can be the loneliest?"
"I was only recently informed it's okay to talk to myself and hype myself. Enjoy my own company. I'm absolutely going to learn to do that. I'm thinking of painting, walking, and weekend trips out on a bus. Would be nice if you could have joined me even if we sat in silence."
Roofdragon
The Years Gone By...
"The physical pain of getting older. Damn."
marklikeadawg
"The emotional pain too. I get so nostalgic and teary over the past and how much has changed. It's a weird grieving process over losing your youth and the way things were."
heethersmeether
"On my 35th birthday, my wife woke me up with a cupcake and a candle, sang me 'Happy Birthday' and then congratulated me on being '15 from 50'... that really hit me hard. The other day I turned 45 and she said '5 from 50' and that hit me so hard, I just wanted to stay in bed all day. I still feel like an irresponsible teen but I'm pushing 50. Insane."
Opa_Kalaka
It's Hazy
Confused Always Sunny GIF by It's Always Sunny in PhiladelphiaGiphy"Brain fog. I had an alcohol withdrawal seizure in March. My short-term memory and sense of time are absolutely sh*t right now. On the plus side, I haven't had a drink in over 90 days and I don't want one."
Sideshow_Bob_Ross
Oh the wonders of the brain.
What a mess.
Scorched
Menopause Hot Flashes GIF by Kino LorberGiphy"Hot Flashes. I didn’t think they were this bad. I’m a 31-year-old man who took Wellbutrin for the past month and hot flashes are a side effect."
"I thought you just thought you were hot. No motherf**ker you are. You’re super hot legitimately, and you have to do something about it or you’ll go insane. It’s not in your head. It’s your brain raising your temps until you can’t focus on anything else."
_PswayZ_
Everlasting
"Chronic illness, there is absolutely no way you can truly understand the impact unless you experience it."
Disastrous-Phase-979
"Just that idea of always being sick and you will NEVER not be sick again."
"AND you're expected to participate in society just the same as everyone else. It's deeply f**ked up."
Farisr9k
"I like the part where I've been in pain for 25 years so I can kind of still function even when it's really bad."
"And then I try to get an ambulance guy or an admin assistant in a hospital to believe that I'm having an emergency and they're like 'You seem fine, take some Tylenol and go home' until I finally get a blood test, and then the doctor goes 'Holy crap, you're about to die, why didn't you come to the ER sooner.'"
"Like, listen up MF, I had to take a go**amn Uber to get here and then argue with reception for an hour."
BlahBlahILoveToast
Stoned
"How much a kidney stone hurts."
SpiritusSanctu
"Most people expect it to hurt the most when passing a stone through the urethra. Nothing prepared me for the pain as it passed through my kidney/ureter."
"One second I would be fine, carrying on conversations, prancing around nimbly-nimbly. The next second I would be keeled over, crying in agony, losing my lunch due to the sudden onset of crippling pain. 0/10 ... Would not recommend it."
King_of_Lunch223
Close Your Eyes
"Insomnia."
Successful_Fall7801
"Oh, what I would give to not have insomnia! I go through periods of sleeping more or less normal, and then for seemingly no reason, I’ll have weeks on end where a good night of sleep is IMPOSSIBLE. I’ll get 2-4 hours of sleep despite pills, tea, baths, white noise, meditation - everything."
"I’ll spend my days so deeply, utterly exhausted that I can barely think, and my whole body feels heavy, lifeless. It’s hard to feel any kind of emotion, let alone happiness or contentedness. Just existing as a human-shaped puddle until the time when I can go to bed and hope to god that tonight will be different for some unknown reason."
"Insomnia is a real bi*ch. It will tank your mental health and send you spiraling really fast."
thesmallshadows
Beep
Meme Reaction GIF by TravisGiphy"Tinnitus. It’s torture."
DissidentBliss
"I don't mind it much 'cause I've had it since I was born. That means I don't know what proper silence is."
77x5ghost
"Me too, they thought I had hearing issues when I was young because I couldn’t really hear some of the beeps well because they matched the pitch of the ringing."
ehter13
Don't judge another until you lace up their shoes and walk a mile in them!
Do you have anything else to share? Let us know in the comments.
