Kay:
Hey, there, Questers happy hump day. It’s December 2nd and this is episode 238. Today, we have such a fun quote for you from one of Shila’s very favorite TV shows, Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Shi:
Yep! And this is from Captain Jean-Luc Picard (played by Sir Patrick Stewart), and Captain Jean-Luc Picard tells us, “It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not weakness. That is life.”
Kay:
Now, before we pop into talking about this quote, we just need to take a moment to pause and discuss the Morris family household obsession with Mr. Captain Picard.
Shi:
Hello, obsession, confessions time! I don’t know what it is about him. Well, Patrick Stewart, we just love him in general, but in this role, he is like… If we could pick a leader, any leader, I would want him to be our leader.
Kay:
Can you run for president?
Shi:
In the show, he’s fair. He is ethical. He goes by a moral code. He’s so many different things. So, over the years, we have really grown to love Patrick Stewart in this role so much so that we have a couple of interesting Jean-Luc Picard things. We have matching Christmas shirts that say, “make it snow” – (of course, his famous line from the show is “make it so”)…We also have a room divider that is a six-foot folding wall that is all his face, like from, from the neck up. It is a giant gentleman Jean-Luc Picard.
Kay:
That is actually not a joke. That is real. That’s a real thing that lives in her house.
Shi:
Sometimes I put it behind me on Zooms and Kay is like…seriously?! But probably the very best is that my husband, Chad, has Captain Jean-Luc Picard tattooed on his arm. So, he is always looking at me benevolently from my husband’s bicep and I love that. Then this quote kind of perfectly encapsulates, I think some of the reasons why we love him in this role.
Kay:
You know, as you’re talking about all the reasons you love Captain Jean-Luc Picard, he is just fair and he’s ethical. I’m like, “God, that’s so Shila and Chad!” I think about the characters that Dan and I love together and they’re always like the Renegade or the like super dork Renegade dorks and fair, but we digress. This quote is too good to not lean into a little bit here. Now, “it is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose.” Okay, gang, let’s just take a little pause moment here. Time out because you might be in the space where you’ve done everything right and still find yourself with an L…
Shi:
If you are in this space, you’re probably like us where you beat yourself up. Because if I could’ve just worked hard enough…If I just would’ve said something different…If I just, would’ve tried a little bit more…If I had done something differently. I should have done this or shouldn’t have done that. It can be so, SO hard, but if you really did try your best, if you put your best foot forward, if you had integrity and you’re proud of what you put forward, it’s STILL possible to lose. You’ve got to be proud of the effort that you put in and the person you became along the way because the loss is going to happen sometimes and it can be out of your control. You can make no mistakes and still lose, and he reminds us, that’s life!
Kay:
Right. I always go back to the airplane guys, and the Wright brothers. The Wright brothers were actually in competition with a very well-funded airplane program that was doing their best to find flight and when the Wright brothers made it happen in their rinky-dink Oklahoma bike shop, and when they didn’t really have the funding that the other scientists did, that it was kind of a similar situation. The scientist was like, “I did everything right. I had all of the money. I had all of the funding. I had all the calculations. We did it all right. But we just weren’t able to figure it out before the other people did.” So, they did it all right, but they still lost and it’s not that that’s bad and it’s not a weakness. It doesn’t mean that they were terrible people. That’s just LIFE sometimes.
Shi:
It is and we have to remember that our lives are our symphony and our masterpiece. That can mean that sometimes that low moment just means there’s more to come. So, a mistake or a loss just means it’s not done yet. Like it’s still building and certainly, in retrospect, you will be able to see some silver linings, some lessons, and some reasons why you’re grateful that loss happened. It’s kind of like if you went up to a cake mix and you put your finger in when it was just flour and you say, “that’s disgusting.” But all the ingredients aren’t in yet, and it hasn’t been baked yet. So, we have to remember that that’s the same with our lives as well. So, to remind you what our dear best captain ever in the whole entire world says, Captain Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation, (which is definitely the best Star Trek!), he says, “It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not weakness. That is life.”
Kay:
All right, Trekkies, we have a two-part Quest for you today. Part 1. – We want you to go out of orbit on a past loss and accept that it is not your weakness. Just get back in it, look at that loss, and look it in the eyes and say, “We didn’t lose here,” okay? That’s not a weakness. And (Part 2.) for you gang is, “Live Long and Prosper.”
Shi:
We had to bring at least the OG Star Trek, so your second part of your quest today is to “Live Long and Prosper.” Are you ready?
Kay & Shi:
Let’s quest!
