Burning the Ships

When Hernán Cortés landed in Mexico with under 700 men, the indigenous population numbered about five million, a ratio of about 7,500 to 1. Rather than keep his lines of escape open, Cortés made the radical decision to burn his ships, leaving him and his men no choice but to move forward—eventually conquering Mexico and bloodily destroying the Aztec empire. Mark Batterson points out that we often leave ourselves avenues of escape which we too readily use, rather than moving forward. Better to burn “Past Failure” and “Past Success” along with “Bad Habit,” “Regret,” and “Guilt” than return to…