“You can’t spell “message” without “mess” at the beginning.”
– West Virginia Batman
Fast Change Lube and Oil held its quarterly manager meeting on Wednesday, April 24, 2019, at Fast Change Lube and Oil’s corporate office in Inez, KY. The Fast Change team welcomed guest speaker John Buckland, better known as “The West Virginia Batman.”
Buckland is the creator of Heroes 4 Higher (H4H). A foundation dedicated to bringing hope and healing to families and communities in crises. Buckland is the only full-time Batman in the United States. Portraying Batman is his leading role, but he always removes his mask while delivering his message of hope to children, whom he says are the real heroes. As a child and young adult, Buckland faced many obstacles and fell victim to all sorts of abuse, drug addiction, bullying, suicide attempts, and even found himself locked up in jail after trying to commit an armed robbery. After a radical encounter with God inside a jail cell, Buckland turned his life over to his Heavenly Father and has never looked back since. His armed robbery offenses were eventually pardoned in 2003 and fully expunged in 2008. This allowed Buckland to become a career firefighter with two years of fire service for the U.S. Department of Defense in Iraq.
Buckland turned his pain into personal empowerment, and he uses that to help others overcome their pain with these four principles of hope:
1. Never give up
2. Always do the right thing
3. Help other people
4. Never be a bully
Buckland says he wakes up every morning ready to live a Legacy First Life or L1L.
“You will discover your true purpose when you wake up every day and ask, what I can do to help other people?”
The West Virginia Batman stands on the principle that when you build up the people around you, you will build up your own life as well. He does this by taking the difficult situations in his life, repurposing his pain, and turning it into something positive for the benefit of others.
Fast Change Lube and Oil is a proud supporter of the H4H Foundation. Fast Change donates to Buckland’s message of hope and has the privilege of servicing the H4H-Hope-Mobile! The Hope-Mobile is one of a kind, fully street legal Batmobile. It is driven over 10,000 miles per year. Buckland’s ride is a rolling memorial for children who H4H have been pall-bearers for at funerals. These children have passed away from illness or tragedy. Under the hood of the Hope-Mobile, there are individual plaques to honor the children and keep their memories alive.
The foundation also works with at risk youth, communities that experience tragedy as well as families experiencing illness of all types.
“Fast Change Lube and Oil came along at the right time”, says Buckland.
“They are the first corporate entity that stepped up to back what we do and keep our message of hope alive. That says a lot about the company that they are willing to take the risk.”
To learn more information about Heroes-4-Higher, visit https://h4hcharity.org
To get John Buckland’s full story and inspiration visit h4hdvd.com