And I follow you

Fathers’ Day gift to you.

Hearts touched with Fire, by David Gergen.

Indisputable on every page. Like a good meal for our hard head and soft heart.

Perhaps when it was rushed to print, Putin had not yet invaded Ukraine. Or else, we would have had a chapter on Zelensky.

But for now, as far as Leadership studies, this is it. A compendium of role models, check lists and advices for both old and young people: on changing reality…”for centuries, Americans kept a Bible by the side of their bed, now, we keep an iPhone”….to leadership models, Alicia Garza ” If there are many leaders, you can’t compromise a movement and you can’t kill it” as told to Charlotte Alter (pg 243)..

We have all seen Mr. Gergen on TV, heard him on PBS or CNN, often right after a Presidential debate or State of the Union address. After all, he has been just a few doors outside of the Oval Office since the Nixon administration on down.

We’re fortunate to have him where he has been (certainly not in that engine room of a ship).

But then, as he mentioned numerous times in the book, it’s crucible that made a man “strong steel are made from hot fires”. The inner journey converges with the outer journey, then have them integrated before product – us – gets to market.

He saw Nixon wave from the helicopter, Ford fumble – or choose the least-voted-on speech version, Alexander Haig’s sweat when Reagan had been shot and Clinton hold CA traffic for a $200 hair cut.

His red flag: beware of power and its lures ( “There’s always something…” to quote All the King’s Men).

Mr. Gergen exemplifies the best of Speech Communication. How words matter.

How words galvanise a nation into action: “Ask not….”

Mr. Gergen also urges readers to study History, to have a better grasp at the time frame and flow, a pre req for having better judgment (Kennedy and the Guns of August – his reference point during the Cuban Missiles Crisis).

When everything is tied into a knot, handed to you still hot like “Hearts touched with Fire”, you can’t help but saying: “Thank You”.

I will read it. Will put it next to my bed beside the iPhone. And promises kept. I finished it (partly because I bought it full price, partly because it was a Fathers’ Day gift to myself, with tomorrow deadline).

Mr. Gergen was true to form. He embodies his message, peppers it with anecdotes from Reagan televised magic marker mishap (and subsequent ad-lib) to a post-impeachment Clinton, subdued and deflated.

He touched on Speech primers i.e. Ethos, Logos and Pathos (first, get a feel for your audience before delivering your message, often times persuasion – then as often be the case, add some humor that disarms them). – which triggers my one-liner for Facebook: “to change the world, one wife at a time” (no visual aids here).

He, the author, could have taken shots at recent leadership in the WH, but he chose to accentuate only the positive instead of wasting his energy on duplicating the work of Jan 6 commission. Besides, history has a funny way to pick winners (Nelson Mandela, who was baptized by fire) and losers (Nixon, who resorts to the low arts of Leadership).

I want to close with what struck me. When Mother Teresa who started out her chosen path at age 18, was asked why Calcutta? Her reply:” Because I want to live a hard life”.

The path to Leadership often goes against headwind, through rough patches, down and through the valley of the shadow of death. But comes the other side, like in the morning of October 28th, 1962, with Northern Hemisphere still in one piece, thanks to our nation’s leader who himself was reading History and not trigger-happy.

Today’s future mass-shooters could take a lesson or two from “Hearts touched with Fire” e.g. volunteer a few years of your wasted life in the service of others, find meaning in suffering (from Lincoln to Bonhoeffer) before those inner/outer journey align with True North. The young Shultz who was the whistle blower at Theranos, said on TV right after the verdict that all he wanted was a sense of vindication.

When your inner journey and others’ all confluence into something like a Naval Echelon, chances are we find ourselves vindicated and live in a much better world than ours today.

Happy Fathers’ Day.