The Legend of the Spider

I always enjoy reading about leaders throughout history, particularly those who led their team, organization, or nation through difficult and challenging times.  Robert the Bruce is a national hero in Scotland.  He was famously portrayed by the actor Angus McFadyen in Mel Gipson's epic 1995 movie Braveheart (which told the story of William Wallace, another national hero of Scotland) and Chris Pine in the 2018 movie The Outlaw King.  Bruce led Scotland during the First War of Scottish Independence against England, becoming the King of Scotland from 1306 until his death in 1329.  

It's hard to separate fact from fiction and history from legend, for as the narrator (actually, Robert the Bruce) in Braveheart says, "History is written by those who have hanged heroes."  However, Robert the Bruce was the fourth-great-grandson of King David I and therefore a legitimate claimant to the Scottish throne.  Unfortunately, there were others who could (and did) legitimately claim to be the rightful heir.  Apparently, in 1306, Bruce murdered one of these claimants, John Comyn in front of a church altar in Dumfries, Scotland.  As a result, he was excommunicated by Pope Clement V but was later absolved by the Bishop of Glasgow and quickly crowned himself King.  Of course, the English King Edward I disagreed with Bruce and defeated him at the Battle of Methven.  Bruce would suffer a series of defeats, his army was virtually annihilated, and he was driven into exile.  Three of his brothers were executed and his sister was later captured by the English.  Bruce fell into despair, and he wasn't sure what to do next.  He was ready to give up.

Legend has it that while Robert the Bruce was hiding from the English in a cave, he watched a spider struggling to build a web.  Whenever the spider would make progress, it would fall, only to climb back up again and start over building the web.  He would fall and start over, again and again.  Finally, the spider completed its web.  Bruce realized quickly the old adage, "If at first you don't succeed, try and try again."  Bruce would go on to defeat the English in a series of battles, beginning with the Battle of Loudon Hill in 1307 (shown in the movie The Outlaw King)and the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 (shown in the movie, Braveheart).  Robert would go on to rule an independent Scotland as King until his death in 1329.

The lesson here is as least as old as Robert the Bruce (and probably even much older than him).  "If at first you don't succeed, try and try again."  It is the same lesson in Aesop's Fable The Oak and the Reeds or Sam Ryder's song "Fought and Lost".  We hear the same lesson in an ancient Japanese proverb, "Fall seven times, rise eight times" (translated from the Japanese phrase, "Nana korobi ya oki") or most recently in Ted Lasso's goldfish rule.  Ultimately, it's about the High Reliability Organization principle of "Commitment to Resilience".  "Never, ever give up."