My wife Julie came across this amazing story and said, “This would make a great blog.”
She was right.
Sometimes the greatest lessons in resilience come from the most unlikely places.
This one comes from a pigeon.
His name was Cher Ami.
AN UNLIKELY WARTIME HERO
During the First World War, the US Army Signal Corps used around 600 carrier pigeons to deliver vital messages.
Despite advances in technology, battlefield communications were unreliable. Telephone wires could be destroyed by artillery, radios were cumbersome and laying new communication lines under enemy fire was extremely dangerous.
A homing pigeon, however, could fly at around 50 miles per hour.
But the Germans knew how important these pigeons were and tried to shoot them down.
Every time one of these little birds took to the sky, it could be flying straight into enemy gunfire.
THE LOST BATTALION
In October 1918, during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, around 550 American soldiers from the 77th Division advanced into the Argonne Forest.
Suddenly, they found themselves isolated, surrounded by German forces and cut off from food, supplies and reinforcements.
They became known as the Lost Battalion.
Then, on 4 October, their situation worsened.
American artillery mistakenly began firing on their own position.
Major Charles Whittlesey desperately needed to get a message back to headquarters telling them to stop the bombardment.
Pigeons were sent up.
They were shot down.
Eventually, according to the famous account, only one remained.
Cher Ami.
THEIR LAST HOPE
A message explaining the battalion’s position and pleading for the artillery fire to stop was attached to him.
Cher Ami took off.
German soldiers opened fire.
Then Cher Ami was hit.
The soldiers reportedly watched their last hope fall from the sky.
It could have ended there.
But somehow, Cher Ami got back up.
And started flying again.
Despite his terrible injuries, he continued towards his destination, covering around 25 miles in approximately half an hour.
When he arrived, he had been shot through the chest, was blind in one eye, and one of his legs was almost completely severed.
But the message was still there.
The artillery fire was redirected away from their position, and days later the surviving soldiers were able to return to American lines.
Cher Ami survived his injuries and became a hero. He was awarded France’s Croix de Guerre for his service.
Today, his preserved body remains at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.
SOMETIMES YOU HAVE TO KEEP FLYING
More than a century later, I think Cher Ami’s story still carries a powerful message for all of us.
We will all experience times when life knocks us down.
A business problem.
A lost client.
A difficult relationship.
A disappointment.
A health problem.
A knock to our confidence.
Something we didn’t see coming.
When that happens, it is easy to focus on everything that has gone wrong.
But perhaps there is a better question:
What can I do next?
You don’t have to solve everything today.
You don’t need to know exactly how things will turn out.
You just need to take the next step.
And then another.
IT’S HOW YOU RESPOND
I have experienced plenty of setbacks during my own life and career. At the time, some of them seemed enormous.
Looking back, many eventually led me somewhere I could never have predicted.
It is why I have always believed:
It’s not what happens to you; it’s how you respond.
We can’t control every setback or everything that happens around us.
But we can control our response.
Cher Ami was wounded.
He fell.
And then he got back up.
Perhaps something in your life feels difficult right now.
Don’t assume that because today is hard, tomorrow will be the same.
Take the next step.
Keep believing.
And above all…
KEEP FLYING.
3 KEY LEARNINGS
1. Resilience is about getting back up
Being resilient doesn’t mean we never get knocked down. It means we don’t allow a setback to define what happens next.
2. Concentrate on what you can control
Don’t waste energy worrying about things outside your control. Put that energy into your next action instead.
3. Never underestimate yourself
We often discover what we are truly capable of only when circumstances test us.
THOUGHTS FOR THE DAY
Well, that’s it for this week.
Have a great weekend, keep believing in yourself, and whatever challenges come your way…
KEEP FLYING.
Warm regards
John
Off the Wall https://tinyurl.com/3tvr892z
100 Days https://tinyurl.com/4vsejtur
