Everyone who has reached deep down to find the will to run one more mile or press one more set knows the feeling. You never forget that moment: the moment when you kept going even when you thought you couldn’t; the moment when you didn’t give up even though every nerve ending in your body was screaming for you to stop. That moment stays with you forever and it changes you. It literally redefines the possible for you. You become more for having experienced it. Maybe you don’t go on to win the race, but you have a much more important victory: a victory over self-doubt and self-imposed limitations. A victory for the possible.
I come from a family of runners. Running is something you don’t have to be particularly talented or coordinated to do—which is why I do it! You just put on your shoes and go. And the road, I’ve found, holds some important life lessons. It may sound odd, but I’ve discovered that one of the main sources I can draw on to teach my son Trig to overcome the challenges he faces are the lessons I’ve gleaned from a life-long love of athletics.
Over the years, I’ve learned that the real benefit of sports isn’t the glory of victory or the glow of physical fitness, although these are great things. The real benefit comes from that moment when you find in yourself the strength to do something you never thought you could. More than most, Trig will encounter challenges in his life. He will need to find that strength. For my entire life, running and playing sports have helped me find it for myself. Now it’s helping me help Trig push beyond the limits society will inevitably set for him.
The first of the life lessons I’ve learned on the road, and that Todd and I will work hard to teach Trig, is to take things one step, and one day, at a time.
Take the moment when you start training for a marathon. You can think only about the first mile. It’s impossible to look all the way down the endless road and find the will to finish. You have to pick a point—a fence post, a mailbox, or, in my case, a snowdrift—and stay focused. If you don’t, the challenge will feel too big. You’ll lose your determination in the face of the sheer magnitude of your ultimate goal.
I learned this the summer Track got his driver’s license. I was training for a marathon that year. On lucky days, he drove the route ahead of me, placing water bottles and notes of encouragement at points along the way.
Mile 1: “Run, Mom! Love ya!”
Mile 2: “Don’t give up!”
Mile 3: “You’re OLD—but you can do it!”
Ah, the love of a sixteen-year-old.
That summer, I ran note to note, water bottle to water bottle. I’d get tired or thirsty and I’d think, Just make it to the next one. Track taught me the trick of tackling the big things: Take it one mile, one note, one step at a time.
There’s another thing about the road: Most of the time, you’re alone. It’s just you out there. But it’s in those times—when no one’s looking, when no one’s cheering you on—that your character is revealed. When you think you’re at the breaking point—when you think, I can’t run another step. I can’t do it, and there’s no one but yourself to turn to for strength—that’s when you show what you’re made of. That’s when you discover the hidden reservoir of strength you can draw upon to endure and finish well. Some call it spirituality. Others call it personal resolve. Whatever you call it, I believe it resides in all of us. And when we need it most, it will be there.
Digging deep is a defining characteristic of people of accomplishment and nations of accomplishment. It’s really just the common sense that our parents and grandparents taught us: Nothing worthwhile comes without effort. And big things come with big effort. That’s what’s made America great. When you read the accounts of the women and men who tamed the western frontier, built our great cities, and ventured north to Alaska, you’re struck not just by the almost superhuman effort they expended, but by their rock-solid determination to push boundaries, to reach the better life that awaited them over the next mountain range or with the next mining claim. From our comfortable, safe existences in the wilderness they conquered and the communities they built, these Americans seem more like aliens from another planet than our national forebears. But their grit and their optimism are a part of us; they live on in our restless culture of striving and effort and idealism. They didn’t just build a great country, they built a great culture.
Few American leaders captured this spirit of greatness and grit like Teddy Roosevelt. Not only did he love the beauty and the wildlife of the American West, but he exemplified, in his life and his words, that large, ambitious spirit. He delivered one of his most famous speeches in Chicago in 1899, when he was governor of New York. He wanted, in his words, to talk about “what is most American about the American character.”
I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life, the life of toil and effort, of labor and strife; to preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph.
A life of slothful ease, a life of that peace which springs merely from lack either of desire or of power to strive after great things, is as little worthy of a nation as of an individual. I ask only that what every self-respecting American demands from himself and from his sons shall be demanded of the American nation as a whole. Who among you would teach your boys that ease, that peace, is to be the first consideration in their eyes—to be the ultimate goal after which they strive? . . . It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.
How far our leaders have come in the past 110 years—and not always in a good way. When I was growing up, nothing demonstrated the American ethic of innovation, enterprise, and striving—the “strenuous life”—more than the American space program. I wasn’t yet born when John F. Kennedy pledged in 1961 to land a man on the moon within the decade. But I have early memories of when that ambitious goal was accomplished in 1969. Like so many Americans, my family and I watched the moon landing on an old black-and-white TV set. As with Theodore Roosevelt, JFK’s ambition to put a man on the moon perfectly captured a nation that feared neither hard work nor failure. “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy,” he said, “but because they are hard.”
I grew up in an America that strives to achieve noble goals, “not because they are easy . . . but because they are hard.” But fast-forward almost fifty years, and our national leaders seem to have lost all of Kennedy’s confidence and brio (for the greatness of America, in any case; they don’t seem to lack any faith in their own greatness). Instead of announcing ambitious new goals for the space program, we have the head of NASA telling Arab television that his agency’s “foremost” goal, according to President Obama’s instruction, is “to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science and math and engineering.”
Hearing this new rationale for our space program had us scratching our heads. What? Holding hands and singing “Kumbaya” with Muslim countries? What does that have to do with our once proud and pioneering space program? One of my kids heard the NASA change in direction and shook her head. “It’s like that Sesame Street song, Mom,” she said. “‘One of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn’t belong. Can you guess which thing doesn’t go with the others . . .?’”
How condescending to Muslims. How sad for America. And how unsurprising coming from a man who is himself one of the leading exemplars of the new culture of self-esteem. From “paying any price” and “bearing any burden” to trying to boost other countries’ sense of self-worth by downplaying our own—all in less than five decades. Is this really supposed to convince our enemies that they shouldn’t attack us and our way of life? Is it really supposed to inspire my kids and other American kids to work hard and dream big?
When I finally reached my goal of running a decent marathon, I made it with only a few seconds to spare. It was hellish and brutal, and I consider it one of my greatest accomplishments, I suppose because it just hurt so bad. But it made me stronger, not just as a runner but as a mom, a leader, a citizen. It strengthened me because I learned more about perseverance, self-discipline, and focus—all things needed to progress in every area of life.
Todd and I know that, however much we try to protect him, Trig will confront real challenges in his life. Hard as it is to believe, some people will make life harder for him. It’s at these moments that he will need to find his inner strength—he’ll need to know it’s there, not because someone told him, but because he’s felt it and he’s experienced it.
Sometimes I think we try too hard with kids these days to substitute this inner strength with empty praise. Everyone’s into building their kids’ self-esteem by telling them they’re all “winners,” assuring them that every scribbled picture is a work of art and every chaotic soccer game is a triumph. I understand the good intentions behind this, but I also worry that we’re not giving our kids the chance to discover what they’re made of. Kids know the difference between real praise and empty praise. When we don’t let them fail, when we tell them every average effort is superlative, we’re keeping them from discovering that hidden strength. We may think we’re helping them, but really we’re holding them back.
In fact, we may be creating a generation of entitled little whiners. I came across an article recently that reported how growing numbers of employers today complain that many young job applicants exhibit all the signs of having been—there’s no other word for it—spoiled. These young people feel entitled to jobs and salaries they haven’t earned. They have unrealistic views of their own capabilities. They don’t take criticism well, and they demand lots of attention and guidance from their employers. They “were raised with so much affirmation and positive reinforcement that they come into the workplace needy for more,” said one manager. Another workplace manager describes seeing young employees break down in tears after a negative performance review and even quit their jobs. “They like the constant positive reinforcement, but don’t always take suggestions for improvement well,” he said. And lest you think this is the typical insecurity that comes with youth, the culture of undeserved self-esteem is getting worse. We are experiencing what columnist David Brooks calls “national self-esteem inflation.” He points to the result of a study in which American teenagers were asked if they considered themselves an “important person.” In 1950, 12 percent said yes. In the 1980s, 80 percent of girls and 77 percent of boys said yes.
As parents, it’s natural for us to want to protect our kids from the dog-eat-dog competition of life. But do we really have their best interests at heart when we shield their little egos, finish their science projects, and sell all their Girl Scout cookies for them? One of the things that has made America great, after all, is our work ethic. Americans have never been afraid to work hard, in the belief that even if we don’t necessarily see the fruits of our labors, our children will. But the ability to work hard and succeed assumes a lot of things; it requires a lot of life lessons that the family and our culture used to teach. One of the most important is the ability to defer gratification, to be able to wait to enjoy the rewards of your work.
Our basic understanding of self-discipline and our ability to work hard for an often distant reward are formed early, in strong families and communities that don’t confuse hard-earned self-esteem with unearned self-regard. For me and my siblings, these lessons began early with the performance of household chores and other duties assigned by our parents. We weren’t bribed with an allowance; we simply did as we were expected to do as part of the mutual effort required to keep our little family afloat, such as picking berries, hauling wood, and cleaning up after ourselves. Later on this attitude served me well when I had to earn money for college, and when I worked dirty and demanding jobs on a fishing boat or processing crabs and roe on a slime line.
But above all, it was athletics and competition that taught me the value and rewards of hard work and consistent effort. Like everyone, I have to battle with my own temptations to skip a workout and eat junk food instead. But my caring, athletic family taught me to make short-term decisions for long-term gain. I always, 100 percent of the time, feel better when I make the decision to go for a run versus skipping it. And bagging the fat and carbs I don’t need instead of consuming them feels better than the guilt-ridden, sluggish feeling I get when I eat a bunch of crap that slows me down. And I know that the choices I make aren’t just affecting me; they are teaching my kids. Once I gave up chocolate for an entire year—from January 1 to January 1—just because I wasn’t sure I could do it. I’m a borderline chocoholic, so it was one of those “if I can do it, anyone can do it” things I wanted to do, just so I could show my kids. Sure, it’s a petty example, but I believe this feeling of accomplishment is what everyone is created to crave. One of my favorite quotes is from former Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz: “God didn’t put us on this earth to be ordinary.” Everyone is created to be unique, but not everyone has been blessed with the life tools to get to that “extraordinary” place. To get there we have to have self-discipline and make the right choices. You have to have discipline. No one will do it for you.
Our failure to instill the virtues of hard work and deferred gratification does a disservice to all our kids, but it is the kids from low-income and broken families who often suffer the most. Unlike more privileged young people, they have fewer resources to fall back on when they enter the job market with a shrunken work ethic and an inflated sense of entitlement. Attempts to substitute empty “self-esteem” for the hard virtues of work and accomplishment, however well intentioned, are bound to fail. Just like in the competition of athletics, the competition of business, of the arts, of leadership—of life—doesn’t make exceptions for good intentions. Greatness isn’t rewarded to individuals who “deserve” it more because they come from more difficult circumstances. Reality is harder and more demanding than that. The greatness of America has come from striving to give everyone an equal chance at reaching the American dream, and then backing up that promise by instilling the virtues of hard work, thrift, and fair play. No one ever promised that everyone would succeed; just that they would have a chance to if they worked hard enough.
Our greatest American success stories are those of the least among us taking advantage of opportunity, working hard, and beating the odds. These stories are not in fashion today, but our popular culture used to be designed to give Americans a reason to aim higher. A movie like It’s a Wonderful Life taught us that working hard and doing the right thing pays off in the end, if not in material possessions, then in the love of your family and respect of your community.
Contrast that with a more contemporary movie like American Beauty, in which a middle-class suburban father “finds himself” by quitting his job, lifting weights, seducing his teenage daughter’s friend, and smoking pot. Remember the scene at the dinner table when the father, played by Kevin Spacey, tells his daughter that he’s finally awoken from the “coma” of his middle-class American life? “Janie, today I quit my job. And then I told my boss to go f— himself, and then I blackmailed him for almost sixty thousand dollars,” he says nonchalantly. “Pass the asparagus.” Message: hard work is for suckers and brainwashed, brain-dead drones.
That’s a seductive, edgy message for a Hollywood movie, but how does it work in real life? Time and again, real-life American success stories are of people doing the opposite—of working hard instead of dropping out; of taking advantage of opportunities instead of thumbing their noses at them; of beating the odds instead of becoming a statistic.
One of these stories that particularly moves me is that of Booker T. Washington. Born a slave, Washington defied the odds to become one of the greatest men of his time. No one thought to build this self-taught young man’s self-esteem. In fact, society had nothing but the lowest expectations of him. But Washington had something that too many of the kids being taught to chant “I am somebody” today do not: a positive attitude toward demanding, physical labor instilled in him by a wise, devoted mother and a few remarkable teachers.
In his autobiography, Up from Slavery, Washington tells the story of how he gained entrance to a school established for former slaves a few years after the Emancipation Proclamation. After a harrowing journey from his native West Virginia to the school in Hampton, Virginia—a trip that included being turned away from an inn for whites only and being forced to sleep under a wooden sidewalk in Richmond while he worked to earn money to continue his trip—Washington finally reached the school.
I presented myself before the head teacher for assignment to a class. Having been so long without proper food, a bath, and change of clothing, I did not, of course, make a very favourable impression upon her, and I could see at once that there were doubts in her mind about the wisdom of admitting me as a student. I felt that I could hardly blame her if she got the idea that I was a worthless loafer or tramp. For some time she did not refuse to admit me, neither did she decide in my favour, and I continued to linger about her, and to impress her in all the ways I could with my worthiness. In the meantime I saw her admitting other students, and that added greatly to my discomfort, for I felt, deep down in my heart, that I could do as well as they, if I could only get a chance to show what was in me.
After some hours had passed, the head teacher said to me: “The adjoining recitation-room needs sweeping. Take the broom and sweep it.” It occurred to me at once that here was my chance. Never did I receive an order with more delight. I knew that I could sweep, for Mrs. Ruffner had thoroughly taught me how to do that when I lived with her.
I swept the recitation-room three times. Then I got a dusting-cloth and I dusted it four times. All the woodwork around the walls, every bench, table, and desk, I went over four times with my dusting-cloth. Besides, every piece of furniture had been moved and every closet and corner in the room had been thoroughly cleaned. I had the feeling that in a large measure my future depended upon the impression I made upon the teacher in the cleaning of that room. When I was through, I reported to the head teacher. She was a “Yankee” woman who knew just where to look for dirt. She went into the room and inspected the floor and closets; then she took her handkerchief and rubbed it on the woodwork about the walls, and over the table and benches. When she was unable to find one bit of dirt on the floor, or a particle of dust on any of the furniture, she quietly remarked, “I guess you will do to enter this institution.”
I was one of the happiest souls on earth. The sweeping of that room was my college examination, and never did any youth pass an examination for entrance into Harvard or Yale that gave him more genuine satisfaction. I have passed several examinations since then, but I have always felt that this was the best one I ever passed.
What made such a lasting impression on Booker T. Washington wasn’t just that hard work was something for him, a former slave, to do to get ahead. It was the example of others he came in contact with. In his book he tells the story of being asked to come back to school early one year to help prepare the building for the return of the students.
During these two weeks I was taught a lesson which I shall never forget. Miss Mackie [the headmistress who had asked him to help out] was a member of one of the oldest and most cultured families of the North, and yet for two weeks she worked by my side cleaning windows, dusting rooms, putting beds in order, and what not. She felt that things would not be in condition for the opening of school unless every window-pane was perfectly clean, and she took the greatest satisfaction in helping to clean them herself. The work which I have described she did every year that I was at Hampton.
It was hard for me at this time to understand how a woman of her education and social standing could take such delight in performing such service, in order to assist in the elevation of an unfortunate race. Ever since then I have had no patience with any school for my race in the South which did not teach its students the dignity of labour.
. . . at Hampton, for the first time, I learned what education was expected to do for an individual. Before going there I had a good deal of the then rather prevalent idea among our people that to secure an education meant to have a good, easy time, free from all necessity for manual labour. At Hampton I not only learned that it was not a disgrace to labour, but learned to love labour, not alone for its financial value, but for labour’s own sake and for the independence and self-reliance which the ability to do something which the world wants done brings. At that institution I got my first taste of what it meant to live a life of unselfishness, my first knowledge of the fact that the happiest individuals are those who do the most to make others useful and happy.
Washington went on to found the Tuskegee Institute to produce teachers to educate newly freed African Americans in poor, rural communities. In the face of systemic racism and official segregation, Washington had every incentive to, as the producers of American Beauty might put it, give the finger to The Man. Instead, he worked to pass on to others in need the virtues that had given him success. He didn’t take the easy path; he took the hard path. He earned his success and his self-esteem. And that, in the end, made all the difference. This is the lesson our children need: every able-bodied American should be expected to work, and your work ethic gives you wings!
It’s very easy to imagine the reaction of one of today’s pampered American teenagers at being asked to sweep a floor or do some other menial job. We have promised these young people meaningful, rewarding careers without remembering to teach them that working hard and earning an honest day’s pay is, or ought to be, rewarding in itself.
Did you ever wonder where the producers of American Idol come up with the seemingly endless supply of people who can’t sing but are deluded enough to get up in front of a national television audience and screech out a song anyway? Many of the contestants’ ability (or, more accurately, inability) to carry a tune reminds me uncomfortably of me. But they get up and sing anyway and are unaccepting and horrified when the judges’ critiques begin. Chalk some of them up as victims of the cult of self-esteem. No one they’ve encountered in their lives—from their parents to their teachers to their president—wanted them to feel bad by hearing the truth. So they grew up convinced they could become big pop stars like Michael Jackson.
On American Idol, of course, these self-esteem-enhanced but talent-deprived performers eventually learn the truth. After they’ve embarrassed themselves for the benefit of the producers, they are told in no uncertain terms that they, in fact, can’t sing, regardless of what they’ve been told by others. But in the wider world, these kinds of instances of hard-truth-telling are increasingly rare. Instead of eventually confronting the limits of their inflated egos when it comes to paying the rent and putting food on the table, Americans are increasingly being told not to worry about it. Someone else will provide for them. I think a large part of the appeal of American Idol is the spectacle of Simon Cowell pouring cold water over the heads of these young people. Cowell can be a little harsh at times, but he upholds the highest standards, and something in us recognizes and responds to that.
Unfortunately, Cowell is almost alone in his willingness to tell hard truths. Instead, a growing chorus of voices is trying to convince our kids that hard work isn’t necessary anymore, that they’re entitled to a lengthening list of benefits paid for by others, and that they don’t have to accept the consequences of their actions when those consequences are bad. These voices seem to think that the purpose of government—the purpose of America—isn’t to promise equal opportunity but to produce equal outcomes. If we all just magically had the same number of material possessions, we’d all be happy. And their preferred way to bring about this magical situation is by redistributing income. During the campaign, Obama called it “spreading the wealth.” Whatever the term, it means government taking from some and giving to others.
The problem with this plan is that Americans don’t think it’s . . . well, American. To their credit, most Americans don’t view their lives in zero-sum terms; they don’t see their neighbor’s success as their failure. In Europe, politicians have an easier time stirring up class envy to justify redistributing wealth through high taxes. Not so much here. One of the roots of our exceptionalism as a nation (as Alexis de Tocqueville pointed out 150 years ago) is that we are not obsessed with class differences; everyone wants to get to the top. That’s the reason we work so hard.
But it’s not necessarily the money we’re after; it’s the satisfaction of achievement. In his excellent new book The Battle, American Enterprise Institute president Arthur Brooks explains how, despite what Washington may think, Americans aren’t motivated by the promise of a free lunch. Citing loads of survey data, Brooks argues that what makes Americans happy isn’t just having money and status, but earning money and status.
Earned success means the ability to create value honestly—not by winning the lottery, not by inheriting a fortune, not by picking up a welfare check. It doesn’t even mean making money itself. Earned success is the creation of value in our lives or in the lives of others. Earned success is the stuff of entrepreneurs who seek explosive value through innovation, hard work, and passion. But it isn’t just related to commerce. Earned success is also what parents experience when their children do wonderful things, what social innovators feel when they change lives, and what artists feel when they create something of beauty. People who believe they have earned success—measured in whatever life currency they want—are happy. They are much happier than people who don’t believe they’ve earned their success . . .
If money without earned success does not bring happiness, then redistributing money won’t make for a happier America. Knowing as we do that earning success is the key to happiness, rather than simply getting more money, the goal of our political system should be this: to give all Americans the greatest opportunities possible to succeed based on their hard work and merit. And that’s exactly what the free enterprise system does—makes earned success possible for the most people. This is the liberty your founders wrote about, the liberty that enables the true pursuit of happiness.
Above all, what Todd and I want for Trig and all our children is happiness. We know that that means they’re going to have to work hard, and we’re trying to prepare them for lives that will consist of moments of both success and failure—and, more important, well-deserved contentment.
But in this endeavor, we are working against a significant headwind. What happened to the old-fashioned American ethic of hard work and selflessness, of trying to build a better country for your kids than the one you inherited? I think Americans still believe in this, despite all the promises of a free lunch being dangled in front of them by their government.
There is narcissism in our leaders in Washington today. There’s a quasi-religious feeling to the message coming from them. They are trying to convince us that not only are they our saviors, but that we are our saviors—not hard work, not accomplishment, just “believing in ourselves” and what we can accomplish together through government. As candidate Obama proclaimed on Super Tuesday 2008, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for, we are the change that we seek.”
I believe in a humbler, less self-involved America. I believe in that simple, commonsense wisdom that has come down to us through the ages: Everything that is worthwhile comes through effort. There is no free lunch. Anybody who tries to tell you otherwise is selling something—usually something paid for by your tax dollars.
In the Middle Ages there were hucksters called alchemists who claimed that they could take worthless metals and combine them to make gold. They were frauds. But America has an alchemy of her own, and it’s real: it’s when the liberty created by the system of our Founders combines with our work ethic. The result is Bill Gates and Warren Buffett and the most prosperous and generous nation on the face of the earth. We have to preserve in our children not just a reverence for our founding liberty, but a willingness to dig deep and work hard in order to take advantage of that liberty. They can learn these lessons on the playing field, in their classrooms, or around the family dining table, but they need to learn them. Because this is the road not just to their material well-being, but also to their happiness. If I can give Trig anything in return for the many gifts he’s given me, it is a country whose citizens still know how to dig deep and whose government still honors their efforts.