Choosing right over easy

Pablo García Saldaña

Choose the right over the easy. Outcome is God’s responsibility. Obedience is yours.

In our professional and sometimes also in personal life we often face dilemma of choosing to do what is right (but might be bit hard) or easy. Taking coding for example, quite a few times I need to make a choice between a quick fix plaster work to get things done and make it live so that business is running, or choose a more difficult path of making a business case for refactoring or redesigning the system. I am pretty sure I am not alone here.

Today I am posting this real life story of ordinary men who had the courage to do the right thing over easy.

When saving even one life matters, imagine having saved hundreds of lives just because you had the courage to do the right instead of the easy.

This is the story of a ship in the middle of shipwreck and a lifeboat that reached in time.

There were three ships around this sinking ship when the distress signal was being sent. The first one, Sampson, was approx. 7 miles away from the sinking ship. Only 7 miles! They could see the sinking ship! But they turned their backs. Why? Because the crew aboard the ship had been involved in illegal hunting of seals. They turned their backs to a shipwreck because they didn’t want to get caught.

Sometimes, courage is not about insane bravery. It’s just simply about having the guts to let go of what’s important to you because someone else is in dire need. Obviously, the crew of Sampson did not possess this royal quality.

There was another ship approx. 14 miles away from our sinking ship. The Californian saw the distress signals as it was within eyeshot but they were surrounded by ice and it was night time; and it wasn’t probably comfortable for them to move. They decided to wait till the morning for the conditions to improve. You know that ’20 seconds of insane courage’ we often talk about? When it is about someone else, those 20s become even more important!

The third ship was approx. 58 miles away and was already moving in the other direction but when they heard the cries over radio, they decided to be the lifeboat. The captain of this ship just prayed to God for direction and turned his boat. They waded ice fields in the dark but kept going.

This lifeboat was Carpathia. And the shipwreck it sailed to was none other than the Titanic. They saved a whopping 705 lives that night. Those 705 lives were saved because one man chose the right over the easy, that one man had the courage to look beyond his comfort. And the man deserves to be acknowledged. He is Captain Arthur Rostron, the man who simply said, “Mr Dean. Turn the ship around.”

Read the full story of how one brave man changed 705 lives

Conclusion

Every day we all have to make coices that involve the right way or the easy way. Some may seem small and others we know could change our lives forever. This is not say that right things will always be the hardest thing to do. Either way, big or small, doing the “right” thing is always the right choice. What do you do?

When faced with a decision, look deep inside, realize the right choice and have the courage to make it.