Riding for the Brand

I prepared this essay for Naval Special Warfare’s Ethos Magazine. Though it didn’t make it into their published magazine, I thought I would share it, for those interested in the challenges Navy SEALs face in managing their ‘brand.’
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A couple of years ago, I picked up the book Cowboy Ethics – What Wall Street Can Learn from the Code of the West, by James Owen. The book offers 10 simple rules for life and service in any organization, one of which, “Ride for the Brand,” which Owen uses as a lead-in to a discussion of loyalty. The ethical cowboy is always riding for, and representing the brand of the ranch who hires him.

Such concepts as ‘brand management,’ ‘personal branding,’ and ‘brand recognition,’ have become standard in the marketing vocabulary of businesses or any enterprise which depends to any degree on public exposure. Managing your ‘brand’ is managing your reputation, and managing the ‘brand’ of the Navy SEALs has recently become a hot topic in the Naval Special Warfare community. This essay will primarily address the SEAL brand. But SWCCs, pay attention; there are lessons in here for you as well.

SEALs on active duty generally get clear guidance from their leaders on how to best enhance the brand of ‘the community’ in the eyes of the various stakeholder groups who impact the future of the NSW brand. If and when active duty SEALs are tempted to ride for themselves and not for their brand, their leaders have the carrot-and-stick leverage of fitness reports/evaluations, duty assignments, and the UCMJ to help lead them away from temptation, and toward the values of the NSW culture. The Navy SEAL Ethos itself provides the values and focus for the SEAL brand. The recent and public chastising of SEALs for violating rules regarding those on active duty working for private businesses sent “a clear message throughout our force that we are and will be held to a high standard of accountability,” (Radm Gary Bonelli quoted in NBCnews.com). Riding for the Brand means following the written and unwritten rules of the community. Active duty SEALs know this, and if they have any questions regarding the impact of life or career choices on ‘the brand,’ they can simply ask their commanding officer, CMC or the JAG.

‘Riding for the Brand’ after leaving active duty is not quite so simple. There is no clear guidance, and no ‘chain of command’ to guide us in deciding how (not whether, but how) to use our status as former Navy SEALs to help us in our post-Navy lives. Active duty SEALs may make a clear distinction between those still ‘inside-the-wire,’ and those outside, and may consider those who have either retired or simply gotten out, to be on their own. And yet, as we’ve recently seen, the SEAL brand is affected not just by the actions of active duty SEALs, but by former SEALs as well. In the eyes of the public and our national leaders, active and former SEALs blend together – and all share in the credit and blame when active or former SEALs succeed, or screw up. While some SEALs leave active duty but stay in the community in GS or contractor positions, many choose to take the challenge of entering the private sector, where rules are often unclear, risk and opportunity are in constant tension, and trust and loyalty seem to have different meanings than in the military. In finding a niche in the private sector, most former SEALs soon learn that their status as ‘former Navy SEAL’ is a key advantage in a very competitive world. After spending the best years of our youth in the Teams, it is the main credential we carry into our next career.

While seeking a follow-on career, most of us also still want to continue to ‘Ride for the Brand,’ so that we can continue to feel part of the brand. But what does that mean and how do we do that?

It is not always easy. I believe it is perfectly legitimate to sell one’s resume, heavily laden with SEAL experience in the open market place, and to be paid for the special skills, experience, and credibility acquired during a career in the Teams. And indeed that is what most of us do. But that doesn’t mean anything goes. There are many opportunities for former SEALs to make a living in ways that wander into the gray area of whether they are indeed still ‘Riding for the Brand,’ or possibly hurting the brand for personal advantage. Former SEALs are offered opportunities to use their status to endorse specific products, political candidates, positions, causes, create company names with clear associations to the Teams, use their credibility as former SEALs to develop and sell products and services, to do media interviews, and of course, for book deals. Whether these activities help or hurt the Navy SEAL brand depends on a wide variety of factors and nuances. It is often unclear whether an opportunity might be a legitimate post-SEAL-career activity, consistent with Riding for the Brand to which they are still loyal, or whether the money they are making may be violating an unwritten or unclear code and might indeed hurt the brand. For most SEALs entering the private sector, this is a new world and many are not well prepared for it.

Obviously it is not an either/or proposition – Ride for the Brand, or Ride for Yourself. Even the best of us are doing some of both. But finding the right balance after leaving active duty and entering the private sector is a challenge that many face. There is need for better understanding on both sides of the active/former SEAL divide: Former SEALs need to better understand the impact that the current media-intensive environment has on the Teams – the spotlight is on active and former SEALs alike, and what former SEALs do impacts those still in the fight. Active SEALs need to better understand the perspectives and challenges faced by of those competing in the private sector. Former SEALs and those getting ready to get out, need some guidance on how to best use their association with the SEAL brand to help create a successful follow-on career that not only serves the former SEAL and his family, but also continues to serve the active NSW community. It may be time to create a SEAL Ethos for those who have left active duty.

Where Rattlesnakes Wear Sombreros

“It’s so hot out there, the rattlesnakes wear sombreros and carry canteens.” This is how one of the U.S. Forest Service wildland firefighter described a firefighting environment into which he was being sent.

I recently returned from helping to lead a National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) leadership course designed to be part of the curriculum at the Wildland Apprentice Firefighting Program – or ‘the Academy’ as the firefighters call it, at the old McClelland Air Force Base in Sacramento. In the aftermath of the South Canyon Fire in Colorado in 1994, in which 14 firefighters died, the National Wildfire Coordinating Group created a leadership curriculum for firefighters, and NOLS had been asked to help teach their advanced leadership course. There were 52 firefighters and eight mentors participating in this week long, field-based leadership course. We were broken down into 6 different groups that went into the field separately. Each group was led by two NOLS instructors and one or two mid-to-senior grade firefighting mentor, and included between 9 and 11 wildland firefighters who were assigned as students to the Academy.

“Where rattlesnakes wear sombreros and carry canteens” is a colorful phrase to be sure, but it tells me that the guys and gals who fight our wildland fires spend days, and sometimes weeks working in really hot places. Fighting forest and other wildland fires is serious and dangerous business – and not only the firefighters, but also our country takes their work very seriously. Since the South Canyon fire in 1994, more than 300 wildland firefighters have died in the line of duty.

Wildland firefighters are federal employees, working for the Forest Service and are called upon to respond, often on very short notice, to fight fires all over the country. Not surprisingly, in recent years most wildland fires have been in the West and other drought-stricken areas. The fire season normally begins in May, and has usually run its course by November, at which time full-time firefighters are able to slow down, spend some time with their families, take care of their gear and, and when appropriate, get further professional training (which is what we were doing with them). Between May and November, most wildland firefighters are away from home fighting fires or responding to other emergencies from 50% to 70% of the time.

It shouldn’t be surprising that the wildland firefighter and military cultures have a lot in common, given that both require coordinating significant resources to respond to threats to our communities and ways of life, putting fighters at great risk, often far away from where they live. Indeed firefighting has been a popular destination for military veterans who are looking for the camaraderie, structure, discipline, and sense of purpose that brings a group of men and women together in the face of danger. As in the military, there are elite firefighters – the ‘hotshots’ and the ‘smoke jumpers’ who are the first ones sent in to assess and hopefully contain a fire in its early stages – and there are the essential, but not quite as ‘elite’ support and logistics personnel on whom those on the line depend. And as in the military, there is an ongoing tension between those on the ground who do the (fire)fighting, and those in the rear, who decide when and how to deploy them, and make resource and policy decisions when, as always, everyone can’t get all they want. Both the military and firefighting cultures share an ethos which demands that personal and other concerns be set aside to accomplish a mission that serves the larger community.

For our expedition, I was the #2 NOLS instructor – our course leader was an impressive young man who several years ago had left the Coast Guard to become a full time NOLS instructor and spend nearly 25 weeks a year in the field instructing NOLS courses. Our team of nine ‘hotshot’ firefighters, all men, average age around 30, were still completing other classes at the Academy when we first met them. A couple of days later, early on a Sunday morning, they joined us with their gear ready to go. We packed our packs, loaded the vehicles and departed on a 4 hour drive to a remote road-head in the Lassen National forest, northeast of Chico, California.

We had 7 days and 6 nights to hike from the south to the north end of the Ishi Wilderness, and to teach a very full plate of leadership curriculum, in addition to all the hiking, cooking, and camping skills we had to teach. Though wildland firefighters spend days and weeks in the outdoors fighting fires, they normally have a support infrastructure not too far from the firefighting line, where they go to eat and sleep at the end of their shift, before they are sent back onto the line for 12 more hours. Backpacking, cooking meals over a whisper-lite stove, and off trail navigation, are not normally part of the wildland firefighters training and skill set, which is partly why this course was to be a test of their resilience and leadership.

As on every NOLS course I’ve been on, ‘kaka’ just seems to happen in the field to make things challenging and interesting, and which tests our resilience and leadership. When the trails on the map did not match the trails on the ground (we purposefully don’t use GPS) we got lost, and had to deal with different reactions to uncertainty, fatigue, and discomfort in our hiking group. When my hiking group was unable to make the end-of-day rendezvous with the other group, we realized that the leaders-of-the-day had not divided up the gear properly – the other group had three tents, we had one – so we jammed 5 large men into a tent made for, at most, 4. The next day, a cold front moved in, and in 10 short minutes, the temperatures dropped from a comfortable high fifties to low thirties, with almost gale force winds, snow and sleet blowing sideways. That night, we camped cold and ‘dry’ (there was no water source nearby,) so while we learned about hypothermia prevention, we also learned about melting snow for water, keeping our boots from freezing, and other important cold weather skills.

‘Tolerance for uncertainty and adversity’ is one of the NOLS leadership skills, and indeed these ‘adversities’ were the highlights of the week. In the retelling, I enjoyed listening to how 30 degrees became 20, then 10 degrees, and how we had trudged, head down through a white-out snow blizzard, facing all but certain death! Yep, these are the same kind of guys I spent my career with in the military!

We were in the field over 7 and 8 November – national Election Day. We were carrying a satphone and discussed the option of calling in to learn the results, but our firefighters opted NOT to find out who won the national election until after we returned. They preferred to keep our wilderness experience ‘pure,’ unadulterated by the chaos we knew was going on in the ‘front country.’ We often remarked to ourselves how, in our simple lives of hiking, cooking, eating, sleeping – the election seemed so remote and irrelevant. At the end of the week, sitting at the road-head waiting for our pick up vehicle, many had all but forgotten about the election. But I stopped a passing hunter in his pick-up truck, and learned the news.

In our group, just like in the rest of America, there were some who were elated, some who were disappointed, others who were indifferent. But the results had no impact on our expedition, or what we had learned, or how we felt about each other. We had just spent a week sleeping, cooking, eating, and hiking together, taking care of each other, in good times and bad, and in the process, we became better men together. And as a result, I believe they also became better firefighters, more resilient and effective leaders, better able to protect the rest of us and our wildlands from the scourge of uncontrolled fires. To us, in that time and place, that is what was most important, most immediate, most relevant. And, we didn’t see any rattlesnakes, with or without sombreros!

  

Wildland Firefighters on our week-long expedition

Note: The Ishi Wilderness where we hiked is named after the last primitive Native American to come into civilization. During the late 1800’s the Yana and Yahi Indians were all but wiped out by white settlers and vigilantes. The few survivors stayed hidden in the mountains, scrupulously avoiding any contact with whites, hunting, fishing, and living the way they had for millennia. In 1911, all the rest of his tribe having died, a nearly 50 year old man, ‘Ishi,’ came out of the same mountains that we had hiked in, into white man’s civilization, expecting to be killed. Instead, he was brought to San Francisco, and there began a fascinating meeting of Neolithic and 20^th century man. Ishi learned our ways, as he taught us his. He died 4 years later of tuberculosis, one of the white man’s diseases that killed a large proportion of all Native Americans. Those who got to know Ishi during his short time in Western Civilization, said that in many ways, he was more ‘civilized’- in his manners, morals, and character – than most of us. A good summary of the story is in Wikipedia under ‘Ishi,’ and I’d recommend the book “Ishi in Two Worlds” by Theodora Kroeber.

Reading about War

This post appears in Issue 18 of Naval Special Warfare Ethos Magazine, and hopes to inspire some of the SEALs and SWCCs (Special Warfare Combatantcraft Crewman – part of the Naval Special Warfare community wtih the SEALs) to dive a little deeper into the profession they’ve chosen, and read the experience and perspectives of others curently serving or who have gone before.  This recommendation would apply to anyone in any profession.

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SEALs and SWCCs are practical men.  And war is one of the most ‘practical’ of human activities.  In war, that which works saves lives and civilizations; that which doesn’t costs lives (often thousands of them, sometimes millions) and risks national independence.  Results of decisions, good and bad, are dramatic and often immediate.  Warriors, therefore, are conditioned to be very practical, and the closer one gets to the actual killing and dying in war, the more ‘practical’ war becomes.

That is why warriors are men of action – training is never over, you can always train harder, you can always be more ready.  In the stress of combat, when the bullets are flying, muscle memory and well-trained automatic response is what wins fights and saves lives.  There is little wonder that warriors often have an aversion to military theory and academic study.  Indeed most of our warriors are too busy honing their practical skills to have much time for books.  They are men of action, and reading is…well….passive.

And yet, there is a well-known quote from the ancient Greek historian Thucydides, one of the first great writers about war:  “The nation that makes a great distinction between its scholars and its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools.”

No doubt, many of our thinkers are cowards, and some of our fighters may be fools, but his point is that the best warriors are also thinkers, and the best thinkers are also courageous.  The early years of a warrior’s time in the military MUST be spent intensely focused on mastering the practical and tactical skills necessary to fight, survive, and win in combat.   But sooner or later, our best Naval Special Warriors realize that in order to truly excel as leaders and warriors, they need to tap into the breadth of experiences and ideas that others have written about, and include in their professional repertoire perspectives that come from the literature of their profession.

I realized after several years in the Teams that I had unconsciously decided to make the military my profession and career.  With that realization came the commitment to understand my profession and learn as much about it as possible.  I began by reading accounts of special operators in combat, either first person or in biography, and was surprised to find a great body of literature in this area.   Great stories of special operations-like combat, with lessons learned very relevant to today’s conflicts, are available from nearly all wars, from the US Civil War and before, to a tremendous body of literature from WW2 and Vietnam, and increasingly from more recent conflicts.   I learned how others struggled and rose to meet enormous challenges, how they dealt with their own uncertainties and mistakes, how they managed leadership issues with difficult people up and down the chain of command, under the stress of combat or the struggle to survive.  Though I had never been to war, I began to get a better understanding of fighting in war, of the scope of warfare itself.  I also learned about myself, as I tried to put myself into some of the situations I read about, and questioned whether I would have been ready to do what needed to be done.  The training moment in “book learning” happens when we ask ourselves, “what would I have done?” and then answer that question with BRUTAL honesty.

The idea that SEALs should read, and study their profession had never been emphasized to me or my colleagues during our professional development.  Our leaders didn’t stress it with us, because it had never been stressed with them.   The NSW community has made progress in this area.   But I suspect more can be done.

During my final command tour, I had an offsite that began with each leader – CO, XO, CMC – sharing with the entire group a brief summary and lessons learned from a book they had read.  Some resisted; professional reading had not been part of their lives.  But most were pleased to be ‘forced’ to read a book they’d heard about from their colleagues. Other CO’s have created professional reading groups within their commands, leading by example, with monthly or bi-monthly meetings to discuss a book all had read, or to share different books that each had read.  I am aware of innovative and intellectually curious JOs creating their own reading groups, and once the initiative had been taken, others – officers and NCOs – requested to be included.

There is no shortage of well written and easily accessible books very relevant to the Naval Special Warfare profession.  But don’t forget, being a Naval Special Warrior is a subset of being a military professional, and professional reading about the experiences, challenges and cultures of the conventional forces not only expands a special operator’s perspective, it opens doors.  Every career Marine has read Rifleman Dodd, With the Old Breed, and First to Fight – great books for every Naval Special Warrior to read.  Every career Army officer I know has read We Were Soldiers Once…and Young, and Killer Angels.  For more current literature, consider Bing West’s The Wrong War, or Into the Fire, or Sebastian Junger’s War.  For the more thoughtful among you, I’d recommend Karl Marlantes’ What It Is Like to Go to War or J. Glenn Gray’s The Warriors. 

The mind is like a muscle – when you exercise it, it gets stronger. Exercising the mind, just like exercising the body, is best done with others.  So I’d suggest that you get some of your buddies to agree to read a particular book (I say ‘some,’ because I’ve found that most who say they will, don’t) and then set a date to meet, drink a beer or two, talk about the book and how it applies to you and your profession. It may be an important step toward making you a well-rounded military professional, as well as a better all-round warrior.

Quiet Professionals Part 2 “No Easy Day”

This is part 2 because I have already written on this topic for Naval Special Warfare’s Ethos magazine, and posted it in this blog in January of this year – just scroll down.   I think it was a pretty good essay, but it didn’t get much attention when I wrote it – but it was certainly timely.   I’ve been thinking about ‘Mark Owen’s’ recently published book about his experiences during the preparations and conduct of the mission which killed Osama bin Laden, and thought I would add my two cents into what has now become a national discussion – not that my input will be included in that discussion, but I continue to be asked my thoughts on it, and so I share them here.

I’ll begin by referring to my first essay, “Quiet Professionals in Naval Special Warfare” (Part 1).  I wrote then, and continue to believe that we need SEALs to share their experiences – but not just SEALs;  ship-drivers, aviators, submariners, Marines, Airmen, Soldiers, politicians, diplomats, businessmen.    We learn by hearing, reading, and discussing the stories of others.  Those who have participated in and learned from important events, and then who share their perspectives with us, do us all a great service.   Without these first person accounts of eye-witnesses to history, our civilization would be much poorer.

The contentious issue for me in the case of ‘Mark Owen,’ is how it was done, when, and to what purpose.  In Part 1, I offered three criteria by which I suggested we judge whether former SEALs sharing their perspectives and story in public deserves our praise or our condemnation.  Let’s consider these in judging No Easy Day:

1. Is it fair and honest, and does it constructively contribute to the public understanding of NSW? Or does it primarily promote self-interest or a personal agenda?
2. Is the warrior exhibiting ‘a strong dose of humility,’ to include respect toward those with whom he might disagree?
3. Does the perspective or story serve the interests of those still in the arena, or does it make their lives and work more difficult, more complicated, or even more dangerous?

I have not yet read No Easy Day, but I’ve read reviews by people who have.  It appears that the book may arguably meet criterion one regarding the factual content – perhaps not regarding the personal agenda.  I am led to understand that it meets part of criterion two, in that it appears that ‘Mark Owen’ is a straightforward guy telling his story as he experienced it, and it appears that he is not grandstanding to exaggerate his role.  And from the reviews I’ve read, it doesn’t appear that he has any axes to grind, though he apparently is not a fan of President Obama. And several who have read it say that it does not appear to reveal tactics, techniques or procedures not already well known in the public sector.

However, publishing this book clearly does not meet criterion three.  I believe that getting his story out into the press at this time, will significantly hurt the guys still in the fight.

The timing could hardly be worse.   While some will disagree with me, I believe this story needs to be told, and I expect and hope that we’ll eventually see additional books by participants in this classic and history-changing raid.  But now is not the time.  Not yet.  It is too soon.  Not during the heat of a presidential election, not right in the wake of Act of Valor, at a time when you can hardly turn on the television or read the newspaper without finding former SEALs pontificating on matters of politics, strategy, or national security.  Former SEALs have recently not been ‘quiet’ professionals, and it seems that many are drawing attention to themselves, for purposes that are not consistent with the Professional Military, or the SEAL, Ethos.  The fact that  ‘Owen’ and his advisors chose to rush to press and ignore established protocols designed to give proper attention to matters of national security, suggest that he was in a big hurry – perhaps to beat his team mates into the market.  Had he waited until a more appropriate time, the political issues would have diminished, and we still would have gotten his story.

My sense – and fear – is that the timing and manner of the release of this book will do damage to the credibility and reputation of the Navy SEALs that may take a long time to mend.  Senior political and military leaders may think twice about having SEALs included in sensitive missions, wondering how soon they will see a recently separated Navy SEAL, seeking celebrity status,  discussing it on Good Morning America, or Imus, or 60 minutes.    You can almost hear senior leaders thinking: “Which one of these guys will go to the press, or write a book?  We’re not sure we can trust the SEALs.”

I recall General Wayne Downing telling me when he was Commander of US Special Operations Command, “You have no idea how much damage Dick Marcinko has done to the reputation of your community.”  I thought we had finally weathered that storm, and restored our reputation as ‘military professionals,’ but a friend of mine, who is very senior in the military establishment, recently told me regarding the impact of this book, essentially that we have no idea how much damage No Easy Day has done to the SEAL community’s reputation within the Department of Defense.

What also makes the untimely release of this book particularly painful, is that it appears ‘Mark Owen’ violated the trust of his team mates, caused damage to the reputation of the Naval Special Warfare community in which he’d honorably served, and made himself a pariah….for money.   It appears that in order to be first-to-market with the first-person account of the raid, and to garner the fame, notoriety, and the biggest pay check, ‘Mark Owen’ readily violated the ethos of his SEAL tribe, and the military ethos that places ship and shipmate before self.

‘Owen’ says he just wanted to tell his story and the story needed to be told. And others (among whom, the President, Vice President, the SECDEF, and others) may have already revealed what previously would not have been revealed, and perhaps for self-serving purposes. But they were not part of the Tribe – they were not sworn to be ‘quiet professionals,’ sworn to live up to an ethos of service before self, of honor, courage, and commitment, where service to the nation, team, and team mates always trumps opportunities for personal glory or gain. It appears that he has gone his own way, doing damage to his brothers who are still in the fight, for a healthy paycheck. We in the military, we in the Special Operations community, we in the SEALs, claim to be better than that. And because ‘Owen’ was a SEAL, the values and honor of the entire SEAL community are now called into question.

Am I going to read the book? Yes. It is now part of the national discussion, and unfortunately, just like Dick Marcinko’s Rogue Warrior a generation ago, it is now part of the identity, culture, and heritage of the Navy SEALs. Hopefully, those still in the fight can make adjustments to reduce the chances that this will happen again, and hopefully, senior military and political leaders will come to forgive us this one. I’m told that the SEAL community has an unpublished list of former SEALs who are persona non grata, and now ‘Owen’ is at the top. Though they may be toasted at celebrity cocktail parties, people on this list are no longer welcomed at Naval Special Warfare functions. Their names are no longer spoken with reverence and respect by those in the SEAL community. Their professional reputations are forever damaged. And though they may be laughing all the way to the bank, in the end, I continue to believe that the most important thing we have, is our honor and reputation within our community. You can’t buy those with a big bank account.

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After writing the above, I did view the 60 minutes interview with ‘Mark Owen’ and as I expected, I found him likable, credible and he told his story in what seemed to be an honest and straightforward manner.  He said he has the support of his former team mates in getting the true, inside story of the raid into the public arena, countering some of the various inaccurate versions that are out there.  Perhaps some of his team mates may support him, but certainly not the senior ones.  My experience in the Naval Special Warfare community is that many of the operators have little appreciation for the political nature of their work, and how credibility at senior levels is what provides resources, funding, and gives important missions to units.  As I stated above, no matter how credible and straightforward Mark Owen may appear on 60 minutes, bringing this story out now, in this manner, violates the rules of the tribe, and hurts the credibility of SEALs in the arena where key decisions are made.

The Fighter, the Family, the Fleet – a Fragile “Ménage a Trois”

The below is an essay recently published in the Naval Special Warfare Magazine Ethos, available on-line.  They had asked me to write something about ‘The Family’ and this is what I came up with.   I heard Radm Dixon Smith, Commander Naval Region Southwest, use the “Fighter, Family, Fleet” alliteration in a speech, and he tells me it is being used in broader contexts in the Navy.   I had independantly come up with the “Warrior, Family, Navy,” but changed the title to fit what the Navy is already using – and yes, sailors are pretty good with ‘F’ words.  I stayed with “Warrior, Family, Navy” however, in most of the text.   Ménage a trois as a reference to a wine is somewhat tongue in cheek. 

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Call it what you will – a ménage a trois, a three legged stool, a harmonic trio, a powerful triumvirate.  The point of this essay is that success for the Fighter, the Family, and the Fleet/ Navy demands that they collaborate as a team, and each must make sacrifices to make the team work.  I have found it useful to think of this three-way relationship as a ‘ménage a trois.’   ‘Ménage’ is French for household and ‘trois’ is three – you may know ‘Ménage a Trois’ as the popular wine that is a wonderful blend of Cabernet, Merlot, and Shiraz.  For our purposes, the Fighter , the Family (particularly the spouse) and the Fleet (meaning the Navy) must work together for the benefit of each and the whole.  If they work at cross purposes or compete with each other, each for their own advantage at the expense of the others, everyone loses.

Increasing Naval Special Warfare (NSW) commitments around the world has increased the stress on our warriors and their families, resulting in less effective warriors, retention shortfalls, broken marriages, and children who have to endure not only having their warrior parent away, but also tension and stress in the family when the warrior is home.

In some ways, not only our enemies but also our families have become victims of our operational successes.

Managing that stress requires communication, teamwork, and collaboration.  We’ve all seen the ménage crack and break up –it is painful to watch.    But we also know colleagues who make it work.  They excel in the field or in the Team, while at home their families thrive. How do they do it? For this ménage a trois to work, each member has an important role to play – it is truly a three-way relationship.

The role of the ‘Fighter’ – the warrior.  I recall as a Commanding Officer calling an outstanding young SEAL into my office to talk about the 60-70 hours he was working every week, and the 75 days of leave he had on the books.  I tried to encourage him to back off a bit, and to take some leave with his family. He politely and professionally told me to mind my own business.   Not many years later, I was saddened but not surprised to learn that he was divorced and his kids were struggling and in trouble.  Our warriors get important psychic rewards from the respect of their peers, and they are driven by the desire to excel as special operators.  And yet, while holding on to that ideal, most choose to get married and have families. They aspire to be good husbands and fathers, but soon realize (or are reminded by their spouses) that this new role as husband and father has responsibilities that frequently require compromising some of their focus on their professional ideal.   The family man/warrior eventually has to turn down or postpone great professional opportunities, in order to put essential time and energy into their marriage, taking care of the kids or doing work around the house.    Every senior NSW leader I know has had to bite his tongue when accosted by an angry spouse for making her husband go on yet another exercise, training event, or deployment, when the leader knows that her husband literally begged to go on that trip.  The warrior is a player in this ménage – he is not merely a passive victim, responding to demands made by the other two players.

The role of the Family and spouse.  We have to assume that the spouse knew that she was marrying someone who either was, or aspired to be, a SEAL or SWCC warrior.  It is no secret that the Navy makes heavy demands on its sailors and their families, and spouses by and large are reconciled to that.  On the other hand, many of us have known spouses who have bitterly resented the Navy, and/or the Teams for the demands that they have made on their families, and (sometimes) for the seemingly adolescent, fun-with-the-boys behavior that ‘the brotherhood’ may bring out in their husbands.     When the spouse is not reconciled to the culture of the Navy or the Teams, it puts significant stress on the marriage, and on the life and professional work of the warrior.  For this ménage to work, the spouse must willingly accept and become friends with that other key player in the warrior’s life – the Navy and the Teams.  Though it may sometimes be difficult, the spouse must try to appreciate the positive sides of the Navy/Teams culture, and accept that there will be sacrifices, as well as rewards.  As one NSW spouse put it to me, “When the spouses feel embraced and respected by the community, they are more likely to make the necessary sacrifices with more pride, and LESS resentment.”

The role of the ‘Fleet’ – the Navy.   The Navy is the 900 pound gorilla in this ménage.  It has been struggling for decades to find the proper balance between using its authority to meet ‘the needs of the Navy,’ and letting some of its objectives slide to support the needs of the family.  Navy and NSW leaders know that they can only draw so much on the good will of the warrior and the family – until the good will and dedication ‘account’ gets dangerously low.    Warriors and their families see their Commanding Officer and Command Master Chief, and Platoon Commander and Platoon Chief, as Navy representatives, since it is they who communicate larger Navy and NSW leadership policy to warriors and families.   These leaders are also closest to the warrior-family connection in the ménage, and must communicate warrior and family concerns to the Navy and NSW leadership.   Navy/NSW leaders must pay attention to these concerns, while continuing to fight for the manning and resources to permit a sustainable optempo.

Obviously, it is important to have a loving, trusting, and compassionate relationship between the warrior and his spouse and family, but addressing that is beyond the scope of this essay.  However, the other key player in the ménage a trois, the Navy, clearly has a role to play in how well that warrior-family relationship functions and evolves.  When the team works well, and all three players are doing their part and collaborating toward the success of each and all, we have three strong players and a whole that is more than the sum of its parts.

Heroism – Its Entitlements and Responsibilities

This essay appears in the current edition of Naval Special Warfare’s Ethos magazine.  The essay was inspired by discussions I’ve had with colleagues about the challenges SEALs now face, being in the spotlight as the new American heroes and media darlings.  This can be pretty heady stuff with some new and unfamiliar challenges for young men who have been trained primarily for intense combat in remote regions.  The picture to the left is of Tommy Norris, a  SEAL Medal of Honor recipient from the Vietnam war.  Ethos magazine  is available to the public at http://www.public.navy.mil/nsw/Publications/Issue%2016%20final.pdf

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Heroism comes in many flavors, colors, and contexts, as does courage, from which it springs.  The ‘heroism’ I address in this short essay is the heroism borne of courage and exceptional performance in combat.

A friend recently shared with me that he had overheard a couple of SEAL combat veterans belittling other military members who had not ‘been there, done that’ in the war, implying that they were somehow not worthy.   My friend had the distinct sense that these young SEALS felt that as combat veterans and ‘war heroes,’ they had earned certain ‘entitlements.’  A decorated Vietnam veteran himself, my friend was disturbed by what he heard.

So I began to think about the ‘entitlements’ of heroism. While we can never condone arrogance or ‘hubris’ (excessive pride,) I can understand to a certain degree where these young men were coming from.  They came into the Teams with dreams of becoming war heroes, and after enduring a stringent selection process, years of hard training and sacrifice, followed by multiple deployments into god-forsaken places, and conducting operations in which they risked death or significant injury, it is certainly understandable that they believe they have earned certain entitlements.   And they have.

They have earned, and fully deserve, the respect, appreciation and admiration of the American people, who owe their American way of life to the willingness of men and women to go into harm’s way to protect it. And they have earned the pay, medical and other veteran’s entitlements that are within the contractual agreement that the American people have made to them through our nations laws. And they have earned the right to be proud of having served and sacrificed for a greater good, for their family, community, and nation.

But their entitlements do not extend beyond that. Arrogance is never justified, nor is a sense of superiority over others who may not have had the desire, courage, or opportunity to go into harm’s way in battle.   While the accomplishments of our community may have earned public admiration, we must never demand it. When it does come – as it has in abundance of late – we should accept it with humility and grace.

I’ve found that what real war heroes aspire to most, is not an entitlement, but something that must be earned every day – the respect and admiration of their fellow warriors.  We can’t fool our fellow warriors – they smell a phony in a heart-beat – and they give their admiration only grudgingly.  Whatever we may have done in the past, fellow warriors want to know what we’re doing today, for our shipmates, our team, our country.  Warriors hold each other accountable for continuing to serve, and serve well.  “<Wearing my trident> is a privilege I must earn every day.” (SEAL Ethos).

The public, on the other hand, can be easy to impress – at least in the short term.  The media eagerly gives celebrity status to anyone who happens to catch the public’s attention, for good or for ill, but today’s media darling is frequently tomorrow’s goat.  Like it or not, the media and the public have recently put the spotlinght on us, and want to make Naval Special Warriors into today’s celebrities – war heroes to look up to – and they want to make every guy who has gone through our training a steely-eyed war-hero, epitomizing all that is good in the American male.

This spotlight is uncomfortable, not only for security considerations, but also due to the increased scrutiny and accountability it brings.  “We as a community are not used to operating under such a spotlight,” RADM Pybus recently told the Armed Forces Communications Electronics Association- West conference. A few days later, Admiral William McRaven, told the National Defense Industrial Association  Special Operations Low Intensity Conflict convention that sometimes “the spotlight on us actually makes us better,” by making us more accountable.

This ‘spotlight’ holds us accountable for what I call ‘the responsibilities of heroism.’  These responsibilities are simple, but they are not easy.   Honor, courage, quiet professionalism, humility, and exemplary citizenship – essentially, the ideals outlined in the SEAL Ethos.  Once you become a hero, you are always held to account, and expectations are high.

It can be instructive to look at the character of our greatest war heroes.  You will rarely meet people more humble than those who have been awarded the Medal of Honor.  All with whom I’ve spoken are very humble when explaining why they did what they did, how they survived, how many of their friends they lost.  None will claim to be a hero – “I was just doing my job, and somehow was lucky,” they will nearly all say.  They know firsthand the ‘responsibilities of heroism,’ for having borne them for so long.  Army Sgt Sammy Davis, Medal of Honor recipient, speaking about soldiering and life, told me, ”Heroes are those who do their duty, for their brothers-in-arms and God and country first, and then take care of themselves second.”

Becoming a hero isn’t easy; but neither is living in the spotlight as American heroes. For more than 50 years, we have excelled as warriors;  now we must also excel as ‘heroes.’  The respect and admiration that comes with heroism brings with it more responsibilities than entitlements.  True heroes understand this.

In Praise of Mediocrity

Mediocre Marathon Runners

I use this title partly in jest.   ‘Mediocrity’ is, almost by definition, that which is not ‘praiseworthy.’  And yet in my comments that follow, I hope to point out that what appears to us as mediocre does not automatically warrant derision or embarrassment.  There is an important place for mediocrity in this world, and often there is much to be celebrated in the mediocre. And I’m proud of my contributions to that great sea of mediocrity that sustains us all!I recently presented myself to my Toastmasters club as ‘the Prince of Mediocrity,’ declaring that I am mediocre at more activities that anyone else I know.  My comments were partly in jest – one evaluator accused me of false modesty, and described my presentation as an example of ‘overstated understatement.’  And yet it is true – I have chosen the path of being just OK, or at best, ‘pretty good’ at a number of activities, and not truly excellent at any.

Mediocre is in contrast to the truly excellent – a level of achievement attained by great talent, combined with great effort. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book  Outliers and Geoff Colvin in his book Talent is Overrated, claim that 10,000 hours of focussed hard work and practice are necessary to achieve true excellence in any field.  We admire on television and on youtube those who perform at the highest levels in sports, movies, the arts.  In newspapers, magazines, and books we are inspired by the persistence, greatness of spirit, and the achievements of the great in politics, science and ideas, exploration, and even, everyday life.   We are not particularly interested in the modest achievements of those with common talent, or limited drive and persistence (though  the popularitiy of The Jersey Shore may argue this point.)  We are surrounded by mediocrity in our day-to-day lives, we might say.  It is uninspiring and uninteresting.  So what is there to praise about it?

Mediocrity is so very human.  All of us, even the great, are mediocre at much of what we do – whether it be cooking, automobile repair or maintenance, housekeeping, computer skills, even personal hygiene and diet.  And we have to accept that about ourselves, or be burdened with guilt and stress.   Though mediocrity is not the pinnacle of achievement,  it is not necessarily to be mocked, except perhaps in those who promise and claim excellence, and deliver much less.

Or when we are laughing at ourselves and our own mediocre efforts, talents,  and achievements – a healthy sense of humor and humility are essential to appreciating the mediocrity in our lives.

Those who will accept nothing less than excellence, for whom mediocrity is simply unacceptable, are often loath to enter into any activity at which they may not excel.  “If it’s worth doing at all,” they say,  “it’s worth doing well.”  But how many things can we truly do well?   My counter to that aphorism might be:  “Not everything that is worth doing, is worth doing well.”  Many over-achievers will not take up golf, fitness, music, art, kayaking, whatever, because they are afraid to be associated with the almost inevitable mediocre performance that comes with entry into any of these activities.  Accepting mediocrity opens the door to trying new activities.

I also pity those who spend their lives regretting excellence not achieved. Remember Terry Malloy, the former boxer played by Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront.  Who can forget his anguished cry, “I coulda been a contender”?  We all know people who have lived their whole lives disappointed at the excellence they never achieved, rather than enjoying what (mediocre) achievements they may have had, and what good fortune did come their way.  Accepting mediocrity helps us to accept ourselves, and appreciate our lives, even when we may not have been at our best.

Achieving true excellence demands sacrifice and can come at great cost.  Life, literature, and history are full of examples of heroes who attained a very high level of excellence - indeed ‘GREATNESS’ – in one field, while the rest of their lives were a shambles.  Think of Hemingway. Or Ernest Shackleton. Or Mickey Mantle.  Or perhaps Mike Tyson, Tiger Woods, or Charlie Sheen.  In Hollywood, great actors whose lives are NOT a mess seem to be an exception.   While we may praise their ‘excellence,’  it is with reservation and caveat.  A willingness to accept and even appreciate something less than excellence might open these heroes’ eyes to the value of the rest of life, outside their field of excellence.

And then there are those who sit on the sidelines and criticize, only respecting ‘excellence,’ while they ridicule those who may not be excelling.    We are reminded of Teddy Roosevelt’s “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.”

Those of us who have learned to accept mediocrity, can enjoy a mediocre round of golf, without it ruining our whole day. Or a mediocre workout, or even a mediocre performance in a competition.  We will take on a new challenge, even when we are unlikely to excel.  We have learned to laugh at and accept less than stellar performance, learn from it, and move on.  Again we return to Teddy Roosevelt “The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds.”

“Who strives valiantly…”  may be a clue.  Mediocre results are much easier to accept, and even praise, in those who have striven valiantly.  Maybe it’s because I’m well into middle age – but there are only a few things for which I’ll ‘strive valiantly’ – and I pick those battles carefully.  In the remainder of my endeavors, I may strive…but depending on how I feel and what’s at stake, often not valiantly.    Mediocre effort is NOT acceptable however, if one has promised a valiant effort, or committed to a specific result, or when the lives, and well-being of others are at stake.  Those cases demand a valiant effort, and anything less deserves our contempt.

We mediocritites (don’t bother to look it up) play an important role in this world:  It is we who help inspire and motivate others to doggedly pursue excellence.  It is we who make the truly excellent look good.  Without the rest of us, there would be no one against whom the great could be judged as ‘truly excellent.’  As Walter Stack, an old long distance runner of the 70’s once said, “My role here is to help the rest of you guys to look good.”

We mediocritites make the world go round, supporting, inspiring, and cheering on those who are truly excellent.  When the strivers say that we are not fulfilling our potential by setting our bar too low, we just laugh and go have another drink, and wish them well – and remind them that there isn’t a lot of room at the top – somebody has to hold up the bottom of the pyramid.

The reality is that, as we get older, everything we do seems to slide toward mediocrity – except hopefully, our attitude and our wisdom.  The happiest people in middle age and beyond have come to terms with mediocre performance as part of life – not to be lamented, but to give depth to those rare occasions when we do something truly exceptional. As a golfer, I enjoy watching the Champions Tour, watching former greats humbled, but with a smile on their face, as they roll with a bad round and congratulate whomever may be having a good, or even a great day. In fact I suppose that is one of the things I like about golf – if you can’t live with mediocrity, you have no business playing golf.

In praising mediocrity, we are enjoying the glass half-full – which is so much of what life offers us, rather than cursing that same half-empty glass.  If we can’t enjoy mediocrity, and laugh along with our own foibles and those of others, then there isn’t much joy to be had.  The truly excellent is, by its nature, rare and unusual.

We mediocritites are life’s decathletes…we play at a number of different activities, and though we may not excel at any of them, we enjoy playing.  We set our bar where WE want to set it, and cheer ourselves on when we get over our low bar.   Somehow I believe taking on a variety of activities creates a whole (person) who is more than the sum of his mediocre parts.  Our place “shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” We are in the arena, and to those who may mock us for not having striven valiantly or achieved excellence, I respond, ‘Living well is the best revenge.’

So, how’s that for a mediocre essay? 

Quiet Professionals in Naval Special Warfare

I was asked by NSW Ethos magazine to write an essay on “Quiet Professionalism,” after a spate of books, interviews, articles and the like by SEALS, mostly retired, have appeared in the wake of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.  SEALs are appearing on O’Reilley, Imus, in a new movie (Act of Valor,) and on, and on.   I am also a retired SEAL sharing his opinion about what is happening in the NSW community in the public forum.  I hope that this falls into the ‘helpful’ category.

For the uninitiated, SWCC is Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewman – the specially and highly trained ‘Boat Guys’ who are also a key part of NSW.   The Ethos entire magazine is at: http://www.public.navy.mil/nsw/Publications/ETHOS%20ISSUE%2015.pdf  My essay in that issue follows:

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For years, Naval Special Warfare (NSW) leaders have sought to instill a low-profile, stay-under-the-radar, “quiet professional” ethos within the NSW community.  And yet, from time to time, SEALs and former SEALs have inadvertently or intentionally brought unwelcomed media coverage to the community, through impromptu interviews, emotional articles or controversial books. In response, NSW Leaders have had to expend political capital in damage control, to shore up the ‘brand,’ of Naval Special Warfare. “Quiet professionals” they say, stay out of the news, except to be acknowledged for their outstanding service.

Military leaders expect our operators – SEALs and SWCCs – to be highly capable and aggressive warriors in combat, and discrete, humble and ‘quiet professionals’ in garrison. The challenge is that most of the men we recruit for SEAL or SWCC training are young, gregarious, aggressive, Alpha males, eager to take on the world. When they finish training, they know they will be sent almost immediately to the far corners of the world, often directly into combat. These men are not by nature, ‘quiet professionals,’ yet most do mature into that role, and come to exemplify the SEAL Ethos: “The execution of my duties will be swift and violent when required…We train for war, and fight to win” and yet, “I do not advertise the nature of my work, nor seek recognition for my actions.”

They know that decisions regarding what the public knows about who we are and what we do, are made by those in positions of authority, up the chain of command, all the way to the President. This includes the authority to release classified and other information to the public, for reasons that those in the trenches may not always understand or agree with. This can, and often does, cause frustration. Occasionally, we’ll have active duty warriors go ‘off the reservation’ and voice opinions, frustrations or even classified information in the public or in bars, for which they are appropriately sanctioned.  Alcohol, it seems, is often associated with violations of the SEAL Ethos and the quiet professional demeanor it demands.  For the most part, however, our active duty force understands that compliance with the decisions of superiors is fundamental to good order and discipline in the military. They have come to understand that the confidence military leaders have in NSW depends not only on how well operators carry out their missions in combat, but also on their discipline and ‘quiet professionalism’ at home and in-garrison. Once again, our warriors are guided by the SEAL Ethos: “I serve with honor on and off the battlefield. The ability to control my emotions and my actions, regardless of circumstance, sets me apart from other men. Uncompromising integrity is my standard. My character and honor are steadfast.”

The issue of retirees and former warriors is a bit more complicated. These are men who generally served as “quiet professionals” while on active duty, but after leaving the service, may feel compelled to share their perspectives and stories in the public forum. Sometimes these perspectives are helpful, sometimes they are not. Short of egregious violations of security, the only sanction the NSW community has against former warriors bringing inappropriate or negative attention to NSW, is against that individual’s personal reputation and status, which ‘the tribe’ always holds as collateral.

I do believe we need former SEALs and SWCCs to contribute to our national conversation by sharing stories and perspectives from their time in service, to help our citizens better understand the NSW community, which exists to serve them. Many of our former warriors have honorably and constructively contributed to the general understanding of who we are and what we do. Some have not been quite so honorable in their contribution. What might distinguish the honorable from the less than honorable?

In determining whether a book, article, interview or other public pronouncement adds to or diminishes the credibility, reputation, and honor of the individual and our community, I suggest three criteria:

1. Is it fair and honest, and does it constructively contribute to the public understanding of NSW? Or does it primarily promote self-interest or a personal agenda?

2. Is the warrior exhibiting ‘a strong dose of humility,’ to include respect toward those with whom he might disagree?

3. Does the perspective or story serve the interests of those still in the arena, or does it make their lives and work more difficult, more complicated, or even more dangerous?

‘Quiet professionals’ in Naval Special Warfare need not always be ‘quiet’ – there are times when it is important and appropriate to tell our story. I don’t believe that the real issue is being ‘quiet,’ but rather having the maturity to be humble and the good judgment to be discrete. Anyone “going public” should be careful of their motives, not hurt those still in the arena, and avoid publicly airing personal agendas. When in doubt, former warriors are well-advised to review what they plan to share with a leader still serving, to get a perspective on how the active-duty community will react and whether their intentions meet the above criteria.

How each of us presents ourselves to the public reflects our personal and professional honor, and reflects on all of us. None of us wants to be ‘voted off the island’ for an emotional or ill-considered sharing of privileged information that comes from being a trusted member of our exclusive ‘tribe.’

Life-Balance – Is it over-rated?

I’m not sure, but life- balance may be over-rated.

Think about it. Who are the people who have achieved great things in life?  Did they have balance in their lives?  Do you get to be President of the United States by having balance in your life?  Do Bill Gates or Warren Buffet have balance in their lives?   Did Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Marie Curie, or Leonardo da Vinci have balance in their lives?  Or our military leaders – McArthur, Eisenhower, Patton, Nimitz, Halsey, or today Patreaus or McChrystal?   Do they talk about the balance in their lives?  No.  These are passionate and focused people.

Where does ‘balance’ fit in with Great Responsibility and Great Achievement?    Do we refuse responsibility for the lives of others, the responsibility for the security of the nation, or to bring great talent to bear to move humanity forward in order to maintain balance in our lives?  Do we abrogate great responsibility for life-balance?  Sounds somewhat selfish, doesn’t it?

“Well, you may have a point, but …”

It seems that the only people who talk about ‘life-balance’ are people who have already achieved what they were going to achieve in life. They are ready to slow down, rest on their laurels, and then we have to listen to them sanctimoniously preach to the rest of us how important it is to have life balance.  Are we to take them seriously? Sounds somewhat hypocritical doesn’t it?

“Well, yes but…”

Or we hear about ‘life-balance’ from people who have never really achieved anything of note, and chose ‘balance’ instead.  They may even use balance as an excuse for never having made a real difference.  They don’t acknowledge that their balanced lives were made possible by people who didn’t have balance in theirs. Sound somewhat short sighted, doesn’t it?

“Perhaps, but…”

Isn’t life really about passion, commitment, and enthusiasm?  People who achieve great things and move humanity forward do so by pursuing their passion with a single-minded focus.   Remember that memorable quote from the movie The Highlander, “I’d rather burn out than fade away.”  A  German Philosopher (Hegel) once said that ‘the great are seldom good,’ meaning that those who dare to be great follow a different set of rules than conventional society demands of the rest of us.   Balance works well for those who can’t stand the heat, who want to lope along in the outside lane, and cede the prize to those with the ambition, drive and energy to run hard on the inside.  Slow down to smell the roses, and you better move to the outside lane or you’ll get run over.  He who hesitates is lost.  Balance is the consolation prize for those who don’t have the gumption to reach for the golden ring….

“Come on now.  Aren’t we being a little harsh?”

Balance is boring.   Who wants to watch a movie about someone who has his or her life in balance?  Where is the story, the drama, excitement, passion, the thrills, the yucks?     Isn’t the impulse to balance the impulse to be well-balanced ‘sheep?’    Wouldn’t you rather be one of the sheepdogs, committed and  focused on protecting  the sheep,  or one of the wolves who go after our enemies and bring home the bacon?  Let the well-balanced sheep hide in their pens, and/or be led to the slaughter….balance is for prey and herbivores.   Choose instead to be a predator and a carnivore!

 Ok! OK! We get your point…and yet…something just doesn’t feel completely right about all this fist pumping, testosterone-driven posturing….

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The problem with the above pseudo-conversation is that one doesn’t choose between passion and balance.  The good life has both – and how much of each will be different for each of us, at different times, in different contexts.

Yes, balance may be stasis, and yes, there are many who will seek and stay in the safe harbor.  There are those who are afraid of the risk of putting one’s beliefs, one’s passions, oneself on the line.  It is true that those who drive and lead society are risk takers, heroic, passionate, and driven.  And we respect and admire them.  And perhaps we are them.  But is that all we want?  All the time?

Balance DOES have its place, even for the ambitious and the driven.    Imbalance  (stress) can be a source of creative tension, and provide us motivation and energy to rise to a challenge and perform at our best.  And when we feel that passion, or when we are fulfilling an important commitment, or serving a need for the greater good, passion, commitment, focus will certainly weigh more, and the fulcrum of the life-balance  scale will shift dramatically toward meeting that need.  There may be periods when the only weight on the other side of the scale may be sleep and infrequent, quiet periods with a friend or loved one. 

And then we need to recover – consolidate our gains, assess our wins and losses, heal, and gird our loins for whatever comes next.  For the heroic, and even for the more humble of us, I contend that life-balance is a temporary state that some of us are lucky enough to experience with some regularity in our lives.   But it is a temporary state, when all is in synch…an interlude between periods of challenge, commitment and focus….even for those who choose to run in the slow lane.   It is temporary….until the next challenge.

Marshall Goldsmith, one of the world’s most famous executive coaches, relates how many very successful CEO’s  he coaches struggle to find balance and meaning in their lives after having achieved all the prestige, power, and money they want.  It’s almost a caricature – overweight, high blood pressure, 2^nd, 3^rd,  or 4th marriage, tons of money, homes and yachts around the country, and now what? Another yacht?

A well balanced life needs passion, commitment, and focus, as well as periods of quiet joy, a meaningful avocation, and relaxed time with friends and loved ones.  The balance between passion and quiet or distracted relaxation is different for each of us, in different contexts and different times in our lives. Staying out of balance for too long has its price.

I see ‘life balance’ as an account into which we make deposits over a lifetime.  There are (slower) periods when we can deposit more, and crazy periods when we struggle just to keep our heads above water, and have little left to put into our ‘life balance account.’  We all know, and know of, people who have needed to draw on a life balance account, and found it empty.  It is sad to see.  Whatever we are able to deposit into our life-balance account accrues interest over a lifetime, providing dividends that we can draw on when we need them – especially when we get older and seek to balance the energy and passion of our youth with the perspective and wisdom of experience. 

And in the end, we all break even anyway.

Resilience

“Resilience” is a new buzzword I’m seeing these days in a many different contexts.   We need to develop “systems resilience” to deal with potential cyber attacks.  We need more “resilient communities” to prepare for tragedy and the unexpected.  The government is creating programs to help develop “family resilience” to better cope with the stresses of military life. And the military seeks to develop “resilient soldiers,” less susceptible to traumatic stress disorder, better prepared to positively respond to stress and change. 

Resilience is clearly a good thing. So what exactly is it, and how do we get some?

Like many things, resilience is both simple and complex.  In essence, it seems to come down to an ability to cope, and to respond well to adversity and stress.  The opposite of resilient  might be ‘fragile,’ ‘rigid,’ ‘delicate,’ or even ‘sensitive.’   Persistence is usually, but not always, associated with resilience.

When we talk about people being resilient, we really have to define the context, since resilience manifests itself differently in different contexts.   Different contexts may demand physical, mental, emotional, intellectual, spiritual or other types of resilience – or some of each –  to respond to different types of adversity.    Being resilient in one context does not assume resilience in another.  We’ve all seen people who may be mentally and physically very resilient in combat or high-stress environments (physical/mental resilience), but who emotionally over-react or are unbending with their families and friends (emotional/social resilience).   My graduate students are very successful in their personal and professional lives, but sometimes have views of the world that are quite rigid.  Graduate school seeks to develop ‘intellectual resilience’ by forcing students out of comfortable mental models, to try on different viewpoints and different ways of thinking.

So how does one become more ‘resilient?’

Aristotle said that if you want to become courageous, you need to do things that require courage.  He would say the same thing about resilience.  One must be willing to get out of one’s comfort-zone, and stretch one’s ability to adapt to a different environment, if one wants to develop greater resilience under stress or adversity.  In other words, one must subject oneself to the stress of not being comfortable.  In today’s culture, there is a temptation to find a comfortable niche, settle into a ‘comfort-zone’ and fight never to leave it.   We commit to career, marriage, family, community, mortgage – what one young friend of mine called  ‘the whole catastrophe.’    We seek stability, predictability, and… we get comfortable.

To stay nimble and resilient, we must occassionally force ourselves into endeavors and environments where we are not in complete control – and force ourselves to adapt.  We must be willing to at least consider, and accept with some equanimity,  the possibility that the things we count on can be taken away – our job, our money, lifestyle, health, friends, loved ones, our title and our reputation.   And we must be willing to ask ourselves that ‘existential’ question:  What is left, and who are we without those things?

To step out of our comfort-zone, we risk failure. Only by trying and failing, and trying again, do we develop the resilience to deal with things happening in a way that does not suit us.  Without learning to deal with failure, there can be no resilience.  Not getting what we want means to suffer, and, as the Greeks believed, wisdom only comes through suffering. 

In dealing with difficulties and discomfort, we frequently use something called ‘self talk’ as a psychological tool to help ourselves deal with  difficult circumstances.  Self-talk has been shown to actually change the way we think, behave, and perceive our environment. “I can do this.”  “This too shall pass.”  “This is my opportunity.” “This is God’s will (or this is my fate).  I must deal with this as best I can.” “I am strong.”   ”I am confident.”  Prayer is a form of self talk.  A wise person once warned against asking God to give us the result we want, recommending instead that we pray for the strength (resilience) to deal with what He gives us.

My old friend Master Chief Will Guild suggested two essentials to resilience:  a sense of humor and love.  A sense of humor gets us outside of ourselves and our own ego-driven self absorption.  It can deflate the pressures of fear, anger, panic and resentment.  Love likewise gets us outside of the immediacy of our personal anxiety– loving others, in spite of their failings, and loving ourselves, in spite of our failings. Indeed, Aristotle saw self-love, or ‘proper pride’ as a fundamental virtue.   Maintaining our self-respect and personal sense of dignity, when all is going wrong, is essential to a resilient response to challenge and adversity.  Without self respect and ‘proper pride,’ collapse in the face of adversity is predictable.

SEAL training is very much about developing physical and mental resilience to respond to adversity in battle or special operations.  SEAL basic training creates a somewhat artificial adversity in a controlled training environment that serves as a crucible to develop the resilience needed to respond well to the real fear and adversity of combat.  Master Chief Guild used to teach SEAL trainees four key techniques for developing the resilience necessary to succeed at their baic training, and by extension, in combat. These are variations on what sports psychologists teach to professional athletes to help them perform their best under stress and pressure.

First, maintain a positive attitude – believe in yourself, keep your sense of humor, and use self talk to stay positive. 

Second, learn positive visualization. Visualize and believe in your own success, whatever that looks like. Positive visualization prepares us mentally for the challenge at hand, and for what it feels like to succeed. 

Third, practice segmentation.  Break the challenge you are facing into bite-size goals -– this event, this day. Set simple, achievable, short term goals. Don’t look beyond getting through the challenge of the moment, the event, or the day.

Fourth, learn arousal control.  Learn techniques to calm yourself when fear, panic and anxiety seem ready to overwhelm you.  These techniques include meditation, deep breathing, heart-rate management.  And again, self talk.

The best literature I’ve read on resilience is from the Roman Stoics and from Viktor Frankl in his classic short book, Man’s Search for Meaning.  Vadm Stockdale wrote extensively about how Stoicism helped him survive seven years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam.  Stoicism divides the world into two spheres – things we can control, and things we can’t.  The Stoic believes that we develop psychic resilience (and serenity) by learning to accept fate’s dictates, assuming full responsibility for our actions and attitudes, and developing the “wisdom to know the difference” between what we have to accept and what we can affect.  Viktor Frankl’s book is about the resilience that comes from having a purpose for living – a goal for one’s life.  This greater sense of purpose provides the strength and motivation to overcome life’s challenges.  Man’s Search for Meaning is about how Frankl found meaning in his suffering in a German concentration camp, and how his belief in his own life’s purpose was key to his survival.  Both Stockdale and Frankl would argue that a strong will to adapt, survive, and prevail is essential.

In conclusion, there is much that can be said and written about resilience.   It is key to success and survival in dynamic, stressful, and rapidly changing environments.  As with leadership and character, resilience seems to be at least partly innate – some people are naturally more resilient and adaptable than others, and some people seem to be born with a stronger will to succeed.  But as with character and leadership, resilience and strength of will can be improved through experience, training and education.   We can intentionally develop more flexible mental models, a broader perspective, and we can learn to imagine things as different than they are.     It can help a lot to have a resilient and inspiring teacher, leader, or mentor who believes in us. 

It is useful to remember that Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection put a very high premium on resilience.