After a long week I thought that today would be a good day to finish up my post on Paul Johnson's "Churchill".
The epilogue of the book leaves us with Johnson's five lessons that we can learn from Churchill that I would like to share with you.
Study of boats by Winston Churchill 1933Lesson One: Always aim high
“As a child, Churchill received no positive encouragement for his father and little from his mother. He was aware of failure at school. But he still aimed high. He conquered his aversion to math, at least enough to pass. He reinforced success in what he could do: write a good English sentence. Conscious of his ignorance, he set himself to master English history and familiarize himself with great chunks of literature… He sought to be prime minister feeling only he could achieve certain things. In 1940 he aimed not only high but at the highest – to rescue a stricken country in danger of being demoralized, to put it firmly on its feet again, and to carry it to salvation and victory. He did not always meet his elevated targets, but by aiming high he always achieved something worthwhile [emphasis mine].” [2]
Lesson Two: There is no substitute for hard work
“Churchill obscured this moral by his (for him] efficient habit of spending a working morning in bed, telephoning, dictating, and consulting. He also manifestly enjoyed his leisure activities, for him, another form of hard work, to keep himself fit and rested and to enable himself to do his job at the top of his form… But he never evaded hard work itself [emphasis mine]: taking important and dangerous decisions, the hardest form of work there is, in the course of a sixteen-hour day.” [3]
Lesson Three: Never let mistakes, disasters (personal or national), accidents, illness, unpopularity, and criticism, get you down
“[Churchill’s] power recuperation, both in physical illness and in psychological responses to abject failure, were astounding… He scrambled to his feet and worked his way back. He had courage, the most important of all virtues, and its companion, fortitude [emphasis mine]. These strengths are inborn but they can also be cultivated, and Churchill worked on them all his life. In a sense his whole career was an exercise in how courage can be displayed, reinforced, guarded and doled out carefully, heightened and concentrated, conveyed to others.” [4]
Lesson Four: Don't waste time and emotional energy on the meanness of life
“…Churchill wasted an extraordinarily small amount of his time and emotional energy on the meanness of life: recrimination, shifting blame to others, malice, revenge seeking, dirty tricks, spreading rumors, harboring grudges, waging vendettas. Having fought hard, he washed his hands and went on to the next contest. It is one reason for his success. There is nothing more draining and exhausting than hatred [emphasis mine]… Nothing gave him more pleasure than to replace enmity with friendship, not least with the Germans.” [5]
Lesson Five: The absence of hatred will leave plenty of joy in a leaders life
“[Churchill’s] face could light up in the most extraordinarily attractive way as it became suffused with pleasure at an unexpected and welcome event… Joy was a frequent visitor to Churchill’s psyche, banishing boredom, despair, discomfort, and pain [emphasis mine]. He liked to share his joy, and give joy. It be never be forgotten that Churchill was happy with people.” [6]
[1] Paul Johnson, Churchill (New York: Viking, 2009), 3. [2] Ibid, 162-163.[3] Ibid, 163.[4] Ibid, 164.[5] Ibid, 164-165.[6] Ibid,165.
