President Teddy Roosevelt once said that “The longer I live the more I think of the quality of fortitude… men who fall, pick themselves up and stumble on, fall again, and are trying to get back up when they die.”
Fortitude is the virtue of strength and courage in the face of adversity. It is not concerned with success or failure, but rather with the courage to try in the face of daunting odds. A general who prevails against a stronger enemy in battle may be remembered as a hero, but the general who fights bravely to the end, yet is captured or killed, still has great honor. He at least had the fortitude to fight. Only the soldier who lays down his arms or runs for the hills is known to be a coward.
Are you facing a challenge that you fear could end in failure? Great! Let it be a test of your fortitude. And if you fail, don’t let it be the conclusion of the matter. Get up, and fight on to the end, so that you can count yourself, in Roosevelt’s words, among those “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.”
Fortitude is about trying, not about winning.
Have a wonderful day.
