Keep Moving Forward
By Bruce Callis February 7,2017
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The first stop on the FLW, The FLW Tour at Lake Guntersville presented by Lowrance is in the books. Mark Rose didn’t fall apart on the last day and pulled out a 15 ounce victory over Bryan Thrift. While it is a great beginning for Mark, it is short lived as the next stop is at Lake Travis in Jonestown, Texas on February 16-19.
Mark relied on one creek, Brown’s Creek, for all the fish he caught, making moves within that area to secure his victory. On the last day, Mark caught 18 pounds 3 ounces to hold off a hard charging Bryan Thrift who caught an impressive 22 pound bag. If it had not been the final move that Rose made that netted him an impressive 5 pound bass, the results could have easily changed. That we will never know.
There is no time to bask in the glory, for it has to be put out of Mark’s mind and preparation started for the next stop. For some, like Scott Martin, James Watson, Brad Knight, John Cox, and Clark Wendlandt, there isn’t time to think about what went wrong, but to get back to work and figure it out. But the 15 hour drive can be murder if they let it get to them.
The question is, how long does it take to get a disappointing tournament out of your head? Do we sit and sulk about the what ifs or do we automatically put it behind us? Do we shove it away and the first moment something goes wrong, does it flair it’s ugly head and pop back into our mind driving us further away from finding the answer? Now, I’m not perfect, as a matter of fact, I’m far from it, but I try my best to just chalk it up to experience and move forward. You never really forget about it, but it’s what you do with the memory that counts.
A huge bass coming unbuttoned, there is nothing we can really do about it, it just happens. Do we just get back up and search for the next big bass? The decision to not move or to move, what does it teach us? What should we have looked for that would have made the decision better? Every failure is a lesson, a tough lesson, but its a lesson we have to learn from. If we never face failure, what happens when it happens? When we are struggling to catch fish, our failures can either help us make the right decision or drive us deeper into failure.
Bass fishing, like life, is a learning experience. We face many trials, glories, and failures. It is how we handle each that defines who we are. Do we go Ike when something goes wrong, smashing our gear and showing the next generation that is how you handle failure? Or do we do like most, shake our head and move on? Do we let failure define us, or do we keep moving forward? I think Walt Disney had the best plan, ever forward!!