Do we "Burn the Boats" ?



There is much speculation on whether or not Hernando Cortes actually burned his ships when he landed in Mexico. Many believe as Hugh Thomas does in his book Conquest: Montezuma, Cortes, and the Fall of Old Mexico. He states in his book that the “action was, as all who observed the thing agree, and as Cortés himself wrote, a grounding, not a burning”. Despite which is the true account of what transpired on that day we still have to give Cortes the credit for the present day expression "burn the boats" or any variation of it. The fact remains that either way there was no quick get-a-way plan for his conquistadors. His plan to motivate was to simply fight or die. We can see through historical accounts of the conquering of the Aztecs that this definitely motivated his men. Some say this is a very foolish way of motivation while others view it as brilliant. I doubt he knew how much impact this action would have hundreds of years later on society whether it be true or a misinterpretation of his account. There are countless ways it is used today as motivation.  Author and  motivational speaker Andy Andrews does an excellent job of telling the story of what Cortes might have said to his men to get them to travel across the ocean and do the unthinkable of burning the boats. He then goes on to make a personal application about how we use different things in our lives to "float" our excuses that hold us back instead of  "burning" our excuses and moving forward. I have posted his video and really encourage you to watch it. He does an excellent job of verbalizing what and how Cortes might have said, and the application is one we can all relate to. He even throws a little humor in to keep it interesting.

 

 

 I found another application that I believe hits home in our present day culture. On the website, www.burningships.com , I found some thoughts that I believe we all should consider. An unknown author states that, " Ladies and Gentlemen, we must Burn Our Ships for Marriage. What ship do we have to burn? The option of divorce!" This is a christian based website for using God and the Bible to deal with obstacles in our lives. Despite the fact that you may or may not be a religious person, I think this is applicable to all people today. Just look at the high divorce rates and we can see the lack of commitment and effort in marriages today. A favorite use of mine is the motivational use in sports. Coach of the New York Jets, Rex Ryan, has used this story with his team emphasizing "no turning back". After telling the story he told his team, “They burned their boats!” he shouted. “I’m only asking you to give me seven weeks!”  In 2011, the UCLA football team had shirts printed for the players to wear that said "BTB" (Burn the Boats).  Coach Rick Neuheisel had the entire story of Cortes read to the team and used this as a motto. Even after they had won he reminds his team, "the boats are still burned." The full story of UCLA's use is at http://www.bruinsnation.com/2011/10/30/2525763/about-burning-down-those-boats and http://espn.go.com/blog/los-angeles/ucla/post/_/id/8363/upon-further-review-neuheisel-on-cal.

There are countless examples in our business and political world today of the positive and negative effects of this mentality. If you do not believe me there are many examples just by turning on the T.V. or surfing the Internet. I am sure someone or some party will be verbally praising or bashing a decision made by another without any remorse. On the positive side, our forefathers had this mentality when they wrote the Declaration of Independence but it was also an act of defiance to England. We have to make decisions and move forward with them like we have no other choice. As I stated earlier, I doubt Cortes knew the impact of his actions on the world throughout the decades. We clearly use this in our lives today whether we realize it or not. Maybe we do not use it enough in our society but on the other hand there are other times it has caused chaos and despair. It will lead to good for some and bad for others. If we do not have the courage to use this we could be left with a lot of "what-ifs" in life.  In the end we have Cortes to thank for a wonderful example of motivation, or was it?
 

The Creation

Good Mind and Bad Mind
 

 The Iroquois and Navajo creation stories were very interesting to me in how they were similar to each other but most of all how they had many parallels to the Biblical account. The first observation I made was the Good Mind and the Bad Mind in the Iroquois account. This could be compared to God (good) and Satan(evil). Another is the creation of man. I found this quite interesting as the wording used was much the same. Man was made by the dust of the earth, made in image of the the creator, given souls, life was breathed in his nostrils and were given dominion over the land. In the Navajo account the Nilchi'i Dine'e were forced to leave the world they were living in because they commited adultery. This was unacceptable because the land they lived in was considered holy. This is very similar to Adam and Eve being cast out of Eden for sinning. The fact that we have no account of any the Native Americans having any access to the Bible or teachings of any Christians when these stories were told makes this remarkable.This makes me wonder how people who had no contact with each other on opposite sides of the ocean could have such similar beliefs. These parallels are not unique only to these two stories. As in the Navajo story, there are a plethora of flood stories and accounts from around the world and all cultures. One of the Eskimo stories even mentions Noah inviting animals aboard his ark. For North America alone I was able to find over 50 creation stories. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/flood-myths.html. It seems that anywhere you go in the world people have a natural desire to know where they came from and search for a divine power. Personally, I am a Christian and believe the Bible to be the true creation account. I also believe there is a natural God given instinct to know that we were created. This is further confirmed by people believing that we have souls and that there is an afterlife. The Iroquois story is once again similar in this way. The Good and Bad Minds wanted equal power over souls after death. The biblical account tells us that we will go to either Heaven or Hell after death where we will either be with God or Satan. Some cultures believe that we can be reborn in the future such as the Aborigines in Australia. http://library.thinkquest.org/16665/afterlifeframe.htm There are some other beliefs of where we go after death, but there are very few that believe that there is no afterlife. Thinking about all of this makes me wonder again how there could be so many similarities not just from North America but from around the world. We will probably never know how they all had so many similar ideas. As for myself, I like to believe that we are born with something God given for us to know we were created by a higher power just by looking around at the world we live in and not by accident.