blessedharlot:

“For as long as I can remember I just wanted to do what was right…”

That right there is everything. That quiet moment is the heart of Steve’s character. He has a calling that runs deeper than job or career or desires or role. It’s honestly even deeper than his own identity. Steve’s identity changes, his calling doesn’t.

No matter what other human weaknesses and flaws and insecurities he may apply to this, this is a vocation. Folks irl have followed this into all manner of dangerous and/or self-sacrificing roles. When people talk about Steve’s moral compass, it’s not one rooted in his interests or his desires, or even his limitations. It’s not rooted in fear or trauma. It’s rooted in something bigger than he is, that he is always reaching for. Part of the reason his profound change in physicality doesn’t phase him or change his commitment to being a good man is that he’s always felt this connection to something larger than his body and his identity. It’s what drives him more than anything else.

His capacity for self-sacrifice is merely and only a function of this. He never pitied himself his disabilities or superabilities. We see evidence of several people in his life loving him for exactly who he was, and role models that also devoted themselves to some bigger cause. He comes from a strong brave place, and knows how fragile and short one human life is. He’s been responsible for the loss of human life, and we see as he speaks to Wanda in CACW that he lives with that pain by understanding he can still serve something bigger than himself, even with the mistakes and limitations that he is well aware of and accepts. He knows in his heart about something bigger than his own self and his own life that is worth following and embodying, whatever the consequences may be. Death is only one consequence. Leaving his team has been another. Walking away from being Cap has been another. Losing friends, fighting authority figures, all of it. These things are not done for their own sake, or for drama or to make a point. They are the results of this drive to follow something bigger… to do what is right.

He says this quiet, reflective statement to Peggy 20 minutes into CATWS. It’s been true for two movies before this one, and it will be true for the rest of this film, and three extant movies after, and whatever comes beyond. We see him brushing up against authority figures from the beginning, and forging his own path despite them. But here in this film we do see him make a profound discovery. On one hand there is the calling, and then on the other, there is the human organizations those of us with vocations devote ourselves to, to try and fulfill that calling. But the cause that calls us and the human orgs we build to do the work are NOT the same thing. The Steve of the first act of CATWS defines an army as a group of guys who trust each other. While IW Steve would probably say the same thing, I think IW Steve realizes much more viscerally than first act CATWS Steve just how big the gulf is between the call, and most groups ostensibly trying to follow it. He’s seen what his integrity cost him, and he’s seen how many people in this world choose something else over integrity and devotion to that call. He’s disillusioned in a new way.

But he doesn’t waver. He doesn’t regret his integrity. He doesn’t regret his call. He’s not looking for forgiveness. He’s lived his life on his terms, making his choices, doing what is most important to him, which is that call bigger than he is. And there is a sort of deep mindfulness, a deep present-moment awareness to this. He isn’t doing any of this for a reward. His reward is doing the right thing, and feeling that calling sing in his heart.

This devotion is what I love about Steve. It’s what he models for me. It’s what I share with him and learn from him.