Crash! Smash! Bash! You’re Engine Hash
I remember the day we found Shel Silversein’s children’s book, “Where the Side Walk Ends.” We were Christmas shopping in downtown Bangor, Maine. We laughed like children.
Years later, we read all his poems to our one girl and two boys. Here’s part of “The Little Blue Engine.” It shocked us.
The Little Blue Engine
Shel Silverstein
The little blue engine looked up at the hill.
His light was weak, his whistle was shrill.
He was tired and small, and the hill was tall,
And his face blushed red as he softly said,
“I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.”
So he started up with a chug and a strain,
And he puffed and pulled with might and main.
And slowly he climbed, a foot at a time, …
… He would not stop — now he neared the top —
And strong and proud he cried out loud,
“I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!”
He was almost there, when — CRASH! SMASH! BASH!
He slid down and mashed into engine hash
On the rocks below… which goes to show
If the track is tough and the hill is rough,
THINKING you can just ain’t enough!
Independence feels good. We start expressing, “I’ll do it myself,” with our toddler-body-language before we can talk.
There’s a place for independence – being your own toddler-person.
On the other hand, it takes many years
to remember you can’t do it yourself.
I love Shel Silvestein! That poem is a great reminder that we need to move past independence to interdependence. It involves a little give and take, but it’s the only way to do things we can’t do by ourselves.
Hey Greg, Looks like we have something else in common! Have a great day. Best, Dan
PS…I’ll get your bio info up soon. Thanks for all you do and share.
My takeaway is that confidence only takes you so far. Hard work in the form of preparation is another ingredient, along with interdependence, that must be present in order to succeed. Love Shel Silverstein, too, and have shared his work with my three kids.
Army saying: Not much difference between blind confidence and suicide.
Huh! And all I ever heard of that story was the “I think I can! I think I can!” part. Now, all these years later… and lots of crash smash bash… 🙂
Thanks, Dan
Hi Robin,
Silverstein actually did his own version of the Children’s story, “The Little Engine that Could.” In the original version the engine succeeded. In Silvertein’s poem the engine failed. I think both stories have their place. The one that hits me hardest today is the engine that failed.
Cheers,
Dan
Dear Dan,
An inspiring poem with a great lesson! It’s credible of using the same for leadership guidance. The inner faith, strong will power and determination to succeed can take one to the heights not singularly but collectively. Hence, always work on building strong teams and achieve the desired goals by joining hands together.
Cudos for making us rememeber our chidhood and relevance of good poems in our professional career.
Dear Dr. Mrunal Asher,
I appreciate that inner faith, strong will power and determination are great things to succeed. I would like to add that our intention decides our path and means. So, right intention is utmost needed to become truly successful otherwise our success is vacuous.
Regards
Ajay
I agree that our intention can decide on our path and means. However, right intention only will enhance the inner faith of moving towards the journey to success.
.
Don’t overlook the fact that a positive attitude goes a long way towards achieving the summit.
Its true that no battle can be won alone but it is also true that positive attitude & conviction of one person only brings the big difference whether its in once life or society or world…….. I don’t feel I require to quote any example for this as our history has many. The story mentioned in this article is not pointing towards those who are having lack of self belief & lack of idea about own strength but it is about those who have lost all positivity in their life & they need mere a “White Hope” to rebuild self belief.
I think I can …..I think I can…. are the miraculous words to inspire one not to make fool.
Dear Richa,
Yes, agree. I think, I can is the great example of being optimistic and hopeful. We ought to stretch our ability to remain positive. So, when we include ” I can” to our ability, it becomes capability and that is needed to remain hopeful, optimistic, real and authentic.
Being hopeful without action is deceiving self but using our capability and still remaining neutral is great sign of power.
Hi Dan, great little poem. I will have to look this author up. Sounds like great poems to share with my grandchildren. As I read the poem and tried to interpret it with leadership in mind two messages were loud and clear, at least to me. Never think you can, Know you can and you are more likely to succeed and secondly never wait until the end to enlist more help. Lastly, Climbing Mt. Everest alone would never be as gratifying as arriving accompanied by your team.
Shel had awesome poetry and loved his cartoons too! Definitely on on the edge and ability to crossover his message to generations.
Great take-aways, Al. I especially agree that knowing what you can do is valuable, just thinking you can may be dangerous. Hoping is probably a bigger risk still. And, as always, I’m completely with you on the gratification of teamwork.
With apologies to Yoda…
“Do or do not. There is no think.”
It is not the intent, but the actions that drive a culture. People see the action and the results, not the thinking/planning/intent.
Well said Doc. Yoda is one of my favorite guys! I could not agree with you more regarding intent and execution. The only time intent becomes relevant is when an action on the surface is pejorative and we judge harshly before visiting intent. We had a recent “crash” that when all the parties understood the rationale behind the behavior tempers cooled and solidarity and collegiality reigned once more.
Great point Al….way to weave some more shades of grey! Perhaps it is if the action is unclear/foggy that we need to dig deeper and understand the intent. Of course, if the action is foggy, that is another issue too…
Dan, this might be one of my favorite posts from you! Thanks.
I have read this post several times and am torn between the concept of “it’s not enough to think you can” and the question you asked more overtly about knowing when you need others to help.
I suppose the two ideas can be married in the idea that you may know what you “think” you want to happen but other people help flesh out AND IMPLEMENT the ideas – there’s a lot more productivity likely once you’re not by yourself trying to accomplish a goal.
Reading everyone’s posts, it occured to me that in the poem the engine’s failure was physical — the work was more demanding than he could get done. His ability to see the vision, understand what would be needed, and execute the tasks were all sufficient. So maybe he did all the leadership functions, and failed to enlist help with the execution. In that context, Al pulled out the right lesson: enlisting help early on.
Everyone talks vision. But without implementation, you’re smash, bash, engine hash. Here’s to the technocrats who make vision a reality.