I had good care going. I had Meredith and the family. And I didn't want to become the object of some kind of pity, most of all. I didn't want to show up on the Internet, 'Tom Brokaw has cancer.'
Interpretation
The speaker emphasizes the importance of resilience and dignity in facing personal challenges without seeking pity.
In this quote, Tom Brokaw expresses his determination to cope with his cancer diagnosis while maintaining his dignity and focusing on the support from loved ones. He underscores the desire to remain strong and private about his struggles, illustrating a common human inclination to avoid becoming a subject of pity, especially in a public sphere dominated by media narratives. This reflects broader themes of courage in the face of adversity and the importance of privacy in personal battles.
In practice
During a motivational speech about handling difficult times.
The WWII generation shares so many common values: duty, honor, country, personal responsibility and the marriage vow " For better or for worse--it was the last generation in which, broadly speaking, marriage was a commitment and divorce was not an option
Your grandparents came of age in the Great Depression, when everyday life was about deprivation and sacrifice, when the economic conditions of the time were so grave and so unrelenting it would have been easy enough for the American dream to fade away.
While Pickstown may not be what it once was, it still is framed by the natural beauty of the ancient river, the sweep of the Great Plains, and the long, unbroken shoreline of the lake behind the dam. It gave me a 19th-century childhood in a modern mid-20th-century town, and for that I will always be grateful.
I am simply the most conspicuous part of a large, thoroughly dedicated and professional staff that extends from just behind these cameras, across this country and around the world, in too many instances, in places of grave danger and personal hardship. They're family to me.
Heroes are people who rise to the occasion and slip quietly away.
It is, I believe, the greatest generation any society has ever produced.
When the Nobel Committee chose to honor me, the road I had chosen of my own free will became a less lonely path to follow.
Fear isn't so difficult to understand. After all, weren't we all frightened as children? Nothing has changed since Little Red Riding Hood faced the big bad wolf. What frightens us today is exactly the same sort of thing that frightened us yesterday. It's just a different wolf. This fright complex is rooted in every individual.
If there is a fear of falling, the only safety consists in deliberately jumping.
As long as gay people don't have their rights all across America, there's no reason for celebration.
The power of resistance is to set an example: not necessarily to change the person with whom you disagree, but to empower the one who is watching and whose growth is not yet completed, whose path is not at all clear, whose direction is still very much up in the proverbial air.
you say you have no courage, but i see it in you. what you did, the burden you agreed to shoulder, took courage. for that, i honor you.
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