Who's to say if I will be remembered by anyone or not? I've helped a couple thousand Japanese kids take their first steps in speaking English by now. If I've inspired some of them enough to build it up and eventually do something great with that knowledge, like become a Japanese diplomat to an English-speaking country and help broker some peace deal preventing a war, well, great. I will have indirectly played a part in preventing that war. That's something great. But that doesn't mean I will be remembered, if that person doesn't really remember me as an inspiration to learn English at that point. On the other hand, if that same kid simply becomes a tour guide for English-speaking tourists, or a Japanese English teacher at some small local school, but remembers me fondly as an inspiration in their chosen career path, I will then be remembered more than if I had played a part in preventing a war. So for the great majority of us, including myself, who have an extremely slim chance at best of being remembered by name 10 years past our death for anything we've done, we should simply do our best with what we have to contribute to history in our own way. History is a vast subject full of big stories and small, and even if we are only remembered in the small stories rather than the big ones, we are still remembered. It's really up to each of us to make the memories people will have of us in the future. If we don't put any effort into making those memories, we probably won't be remembered even in the smallest stories in history.
