Bouncing Back

When I was a child in elementary school, I was a fanatic for Hardy Boys books.  In fact, I read every single “Choose Your Own Adventure” book in the library.  I loved getting to the bottom of that pivotal page where you had to choose whether to take one course of action or the other.  If you chose poorly, I would simply go back to the page of decision and go the other way.  I would often read both paths, just to see if I had initially chosen wisely.

Life, however, is not a Hardy Boys book.  For the most part, a man must live with the consequences of his actions.  He can’t flip around, rewriting history, making better decisions at different points in his life.  In this life, things are going to suck sometimes, and sometimes, they are going to suck worse than other times.  There’s no escaping that.  Sure, a man can try to avoid the suck, but what kind of life is that?  The unsucky part about life is that the sucky parts, while they suck when you are going through them, make your life better in the end.

How can that be?  Well, after going through the bad parts of life, a man is more prepared for the bad when it returns because 1) he’s stronger and more resilient to it and 2) he’s more prepared for a similar situation and can avoid unnecessary pain associated with the situation.  The bad parts in life prepare us to bounce back.  Finding the willingness to do so is the challenge.

General George S. Patton once said something to the effects of, “A man’s success is not measured by how high he climbs, but how high he bounces back when he hits bottom.”  There are plenty of great quotes like this attributed to Patton; check it out.  Essentially, Patton is reminding us that in the face of adversity, it would be easier to lay down and wallow in defeat.  It takes a lot more strength to get back up and try again.

Another person with a plethora of great quotes on the importance of perseverance is Sir Winston S. Churchill.  Among his popular “Never give in” quote, and, “If you’re going through hell, keep going” quote, I found this pearl of wisdom:  ”Success is not final, failure is not fatal:  it is the courage to continue that counts.”

If you listen closely to Churchill, you can hear the echoes of another great leader, Theodore Roosevelt, who in his ”Man in the Arena” speech to a graduating class in Paris, France, in 1910, said the following words some of us know all too well:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.  The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

While words like these from great historical figures can provide inspiration during trying times, ultimately, the challenge is personal, and victory over the challenges come from within.  The first step towards victory is accepting your past as having passed, and setting your mind towards the future.

As for me, I’m not President Roosevelt, Sir Winston, or General Patton; not even remotely close.  These gentlemen certainly lived by these words, but for me, it’s easier to say these things than it is to follow them.  Life has its unexpected twists and turns, and subsequently, its regrets.  Sometimes I want to flip back and choose a different path at those points in my life which I, knowingly or unknowingly, made bad decisions that resulted in wasted time, money, or brain cells…. but I can’t. 

And I won’t.  I don’t want to.  I’m looking forward. 
So now, it’s official:  I am a Patriot.