A friend recently wrote about leadership and used being a captain
and the pressures they are under to make high speed decisions. Although my
father was a sailor in his youth we spent little time on a boat, so that
analogy was understood but did not sink in. When I reflected on what my father
did for a living being a fighter pilot I understood his analogy more. Also,
since I have flown private planes before I can understand his references more.
The first thing he told me about flying is it is hours of
sheer boredom, interspersed with seconds of sheer terror. I understood this
because of my first solo cross country. My instructor had me fly into
Sacramento Metropolitan which had two runways with some separation between
them. Well I contacted the airport and the directed me to land 34L, so I lined up
on what I though was 34L and started my final. Within seconds I was being
yelled at by traffic control to bank left. When I did I noticed out of my right
window a large jet climbing towards me.
I had lined up on 34R’s taxiway and not 34L. Once I got the
runways straight I lined up for my approach, now I did mention the jet was
climbing towards me. This meant the wind was opposite of my landing direction.
So terror two happened, I was doing a downwind landing. I had never done this
before and was glad it was a commercial strip since my air speed was correct, I
did not understand what a ground speed of 30 or so MPH faster would be like. I
bounced the plane on the runway and powered out of it, doing my touch and go as
required by my instructor.
So in a very short time I almost met my maker twice. If I
had frozen, who knows what would have happened. Instead I had to make a quick
decision and act upon it to save me and my aircraft. Now there are two lessons
to learn here, one is not to panic and deal with problems as they come. Panic
locks up one’s ability to respond and will result in disaster.
The other lesson is experience! Unfortunately experience
comes from surviving mistakes and learning from them. I always used to joke
that I would rather learn from your mistakes than mine. That is actually quite
true, we need to listen to the “salty dog’s” stories and learn from them.
Another saying “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
from George Santayana links this to life and the Bible.
You see we have a history book in the Bible, just
about every story known to man can be linked to this book in one way or
another. As I have read though it I could see many of Shakespeare’s works with
different names and realize that we need to learn history because it repeats
otherwise!! Just look at fidelity in marriages to see this, not one man in an
adulterous relationship held the Bible’s stories to heart. If they had, they
would not have wandered no matter how awful they felt their marriage was.
Instead they would have learned how to mend and serve through all strife. So
read your Bible and LEARN!