Quote of the Week...from Bruce Lee

Everyone wants to learn how to win, but no one wants to learn how to accept defeat.

                                                                                     ---Bruce Lee

The other day I encountered a quote by the late Bruce Lee, who achieved worldwide renown for his martial arts skills and movies, in which he exhorted people not to put themselves down before others.  So I checked out some more of his quotes...the dude had a treasure trove of very wise sayings! The above quote is an example of how I can take something that's true and either apply it to others or...more helpfully and with greater difficulty...apply it to myself.  It's very easy to look at the sorest loser I've ever known...Donald Trump...and see the repercussions when someone with this extreme character flaw amasses power as United States President. I've known a number of people personally over the years...especially in my old school days...with the same glaring problem.  Yet if I'm honest with myself I have to admit that I also have had difficulty at times reconciling myself to defeat.  When you refuse to acknowledge that you lost, you can neither put closure to the experience nor properly analyze the causes of your reversal and move onward to tackle the next challenge armed with more wisdom gained from that experience.  Recently Liz Cheney, daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney and an articulate, strong conservative voice, lost a leadership position within her Republican caucus in the U.S. House of Representative because she would not bow before Trump and support his lie of not having lost last November's election to Biden.  It's been said that Republicans at-large by a 70-30% margin support Trump's contention that he actually won that election...much of that sentiment I believe arises from their very disturbing, cult-like idolatry of this individual, believing and hungering for every foul word coming from him.  But that also means that a sizeable minority accept the truth of the election and want to move on as a legitimate opposition party based on principles and stances on various issues...this is the mature, politically responsible path on which to proceed after a defeat and it has traditionally been followed throughout our history. Even though we've had some controversial elections in our history (1876, 2000 and 2016 stand out), the last time mass refusal to accept an election's results happened on this scale, in 1860 when Abraham Lincoln was elected, several states seceded from the Union and the Civil War followed.  But enough of Trump and his idolatrous, unquestioning worshipers: Bruce Lee's quote has made me look back at different events of my own life in which I've experienced defeat: wow, what an eye-opener, with a lot of stuff to learn from, based on my poor reactions to those past setbacks...