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I presented a series of four keynotes this fall for Wipfli, a CPA firm, at their annual banking forums.
Great company. Had a blast.
Each was the same presentation, so in each I told the story I often do about the movie Braveheart and an exchange between William Wallace (Mel Gibson) and Robert the Bruce (Angus Macfadyen).
The joke I always tell (because, you know I'm nothing if not hysterically funny), is that I have no idea what a "Bruce" is. (I really didn't know. Was it a royal designation or a position of some sort?) And then I go on to make my point.
When I showed up at my fourth presentation in November, one of Wipfli's partners, Tim Tedrick, a gentleman I've known and worked with on and off for many years, brought me a gift. It was the book Robert the Bruce, King of Scots, by Ronald McNair Scott, published in 1982.
Funny man that Tim Tedrick.
Of course, as I launched into my Braveheart story this time, I had to show the entire audience the book Tim bought me, and then in front of all, chastise him for giving me a used book.
Tim meant his gift as a joke, but the joke is on him. I read the book and it's really good! HA!
As it turns out this Robert the Bruce was quite a leader (Braveheart does him a great injustice).
For example...
In the spring of 1307 Robert the Bruce was at his lowest point. Early on in their revolution to set Scotland free of English tyranny, his army was decimated. His wife and daughter had been carted away by the English and all of his brothers had been captured, hanged, drawn and beheaded.
The future King of Scots, with the rag tag remains of his guerilla army was hiding out in caves in the Scottish hillside. He was outnumbered and outmaneuvered; his emotions wrecked on war's unforgiving shoals.
McNair picks up the story:
"Bruce retired to the cave in which he slept and, throwing himself upon his bed of heather, gave way to such grief at the troubles he had brought upon his family and the hopelessness of his prospects that he considered giving up the struggle for Scotland...
"But as he lay in perplexity, his eye was caught by a spider hanging from the ceiling on the slender thread spun from his body.
"With its agitated movements it was trying to swing the thread from side to side until it could create such impetus that it could reach the wall and there to affix the end to form the basis for its web.
"Six times it swung its pendulum but fell short of its objective: but on the seventh it had achieved such momentum that it reached the wall and there made fast its thread.
"And when Bruce saw that a little insect, after so many failures, could persevere to success, he vowed that the King of Scots could do no less."
Twenty years later the Scots were free under their king, Robert the Bruce.
I had never heard this little tale of perseverance until I read it in the book, but my dad had. He told me that his dad had told him the story of Robert the Bruce and the persevering spider many years ago.
Ah a teachable king...and a lesson from an insect no less.
The wisdom learned? Folks, sometimes the people that win are simply the ones who stay after it.
And every failure got the spider closer to the wall.
As for the question I had of what a "Bruce" is? It turns out, Bruce was simply Robert's last name.
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