New Delhi, April 26 -- "Heroes may not be braver than anyone else. They're just braver five minutes longer." - Ronald Reagan

This comes from a man who understood courage at close range. Reagan was shot outside the Washington Hilton in 1981. He walked into the hospital under his own power. He joked with surgeons while bleeding internally on the operating table. He knew something personal about holding on for five more minutes.

The quote has two sentences. The first dismantles a myth we have all believed. The second replaces it with something far more useful. Together, they redefine heroism in a way that puts it within anyone's reach.

The first sentence is quietly radical. Reagan is not celebrating heroes as superhuman beings. He is pull...