Message of the Day - Accepting How Our Goals Change

Good Morning,

 

Sunday evening, our family watched a short documentary on Sir Ernest Shackleton's 1914 Antarctic expedition. This was Shackleton's third trip to the last continent. In his previous two attempts, other explorers had achieved his goal's first. On this trip, he was to lead the first overland expedition across Antarctica.

 

He had two ships, one going south from New Zealand and the other from south of Argentina. The first ship would land and lay supplies halfway across Antarctica, and the second ship, the one Shackleton was on, the Endurance, would come across from the other side, and then use those supplies to get the rest of the way across.

 

The mission was doomed from the start. His ship, the Endurance, was mired in ice early on and ultimately was locked in the ice for months. Then the ice crushed and destroyed the Endurance, leaving the crew stuck on ice flows. Once the ship was gone, the goals of making the first Antarctic crossing were gone. Shackleton now focused on saving his entire crew.

 

It would have been easy for Shackleton to find ways to keep his dream alive and salvage something of the mission, since he had been wanting something like this for decades. But, Shackleton was a great leader and knew that he had to change his goal.

 

He continued to make course corrections and goal changes when he needed to, to make sure his crew survived. In the end, everyone of the Endurance crew lived and were all rescued. It was an ordeal lasting over 2 years in some of the most inhospitable environments on Earth.

 

The success in surviving was a willingness to not cling to goals which fed only pride. It was a willingness to focus on what was important, and go after those goals.

 

How many times in our lives do we cling to goals which no longer hold the value they once did. That we are only pushing forward because of the pride or fuel for our ego?

 

We should look to Shackleton's example for knowing what is important and change our goals when it is the best thing to do. Even if we don't win the prize we originally wanted.

 

Enjoy!

 

Sanford Berenberg
Sanford@berenberg.net
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