Lesson Learned from Men of Honor movie

Lesson Learned from Men of Honor

Lips blue and hands shaking beyond control, Carl Brashear struggled to find the next step up the metal ladder on the side of the pier. Finally, he made it to the top and staggered toward a bench. But beneath the weight of a 200-pound brass diving suit, his legs were no longer strong enough to hold him. He collapsed, barely conscious.

No one had survived this long. No one had ever faced such opposition and made it out alive. For the past nine hours, Carl had searched the ocean floor for the couplings, brackets and screws he needed to complete his task – arduous, underwater test required to make it in the U.S. Navy’s deep-diving corps.

But no one wanted him to pass. It was 1954 and he was a black man fighting to join an all-white, special-forces team. Nothing about the test he faced was fair. While other drivers had their parts and tools lowered to them underwater in sealed canvas bag. Carl’s bag was empty. His parts and tools were tossed into the water where they quickly scattered over the ocean floor. To find all the parts and then finish the task was impossible. At least that’s what others thought.

Hours after the other drivers returned to the surface, Carl fought on. Against supernatural odds and direct opposition from the harsh, underwater world around him, he found deep within himself the power to continue.

Years later, when asked why he fought so hard, he simply stated, “I wasn’t going to let nobody steal my dream."

Carl Brashear was the first African American to become a U.S. Navy Master Diver despite having an amputated left leg.


The simple truth that Carl understood all to unfairly:

EFFORT is the great equalizer.

EFFORT is simply taking the next step.  Again and again.

Eric Wadschmidt, a popular speaker and business strategist said it well that:

When you look closely at how ordinary people archive amazing things, you begin to see it for what it is: one foot in front of the other. That’s all.

A step is infinitely easier than a journey.


One step at a time.

Image Source and copyright by:  20th Century Fox Studios

Story Source:

EDGY Conversations: How Ordinary People Can Achieve Outrageous Success by Dan Waldschmidt

Success/Role Model
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