When everything is lost is the best time to try the impossible. History
contains many examples of individuals taking bold action and turning
around desperate situations. You have more resources than you think.
There are more possibilities around than it is apparent to the eye.
When everything is lost
Take
the case of Venice in the year 1314, with interest rates at 20% that
made almost impossible for anyone to borrow money. Since the King of
France had forbidden Flemish merchants to take part in the Fairs of
Champagne, imports of cloth into Venice had stopped altogether. Without
Flemish cloth, Venetian dyers had been forced to fire hundreds of
workers, pushing the economy into a deep recession.
Pietro
Alvise, the son of a Venetian merchant, did not allow the situation to
bring him down. Instead, he made a bold proposal to his father, Luigi
Alvise."What you are proposing is impossible," replied the
old man, shaking his head. "Many have tried and no one has
succeeded. It's better if we just wait."
Pietro
Alvise looked at his father and took in a deep breath. It was
imperative that he found the right words. If he could not convince his
own family, how would he be able to convince anyone else? "That's the
point, father," he emphasized. "The market is not going to recover.
Don't you see the rising interest rates? Aren't our friends going
bankrupt one after the other?"
Undecided, the old Alvise stared
at his son. Who could deny that the economic situation was catastrophic?
"I know that it can be done, father," insisted Pietro. "We don't need
the Fairs of Champagne. We can build larger ships, galleys able to sail
around Spain and France. We will take leather, spices, and glassware to
Bruges and return with a full cargo of cloth."
An amazing turnaround
During the next
weeks, Luigi and Pietro Alvise called relentlessly on other merchants in
Venice until they managed to line up 100 investors ready to fund the
construction of a double-deck galley. The new ship had two masts and
weighed 500 tons, something unheard of at that time. Traditional
Venetian galleys possessed only one deck and rarely exceeded 200 tons.
Pietro
Alvise's double-deck galley was financed, designed, and built in the
middle of the worst economic recession that Venice had ever experienced.
In June of 1314, the ship sailed away from the Venetian lagoon,
arriving two months later in Bruges. The trade expedition was a
resounding success, turned around the economy of the area, and served as
a basis for Venetian domination of world commerce during the following
decades.
For more information about rational living and personal development, I refer you to my book The 10 Principles of Rational Living
Text: http://johnvespasian.blogspot.com
Image by Maurice under Creative Commons Attribution License. See the license terms under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us
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