“Navy Seal. Rhodes Scholar. Eric Greitens is truly a modern-day renaissance man. This is a remarkable story of a brilliant young man who deeply cares about human suffering…and does something about it. Whether as a civilian or in uniform, Eric’s strength, fortitude, and integrity enabled him to effect positive change in Iraq and Afghanistan. And now he’s using his extraordinary talent to help our wounded veterans serve others again. In these challenging times, his vision is an inspiration to all.”

— General Richard Myers, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

If you’re looking for an exciting book from the perspective of a humanitarian and a warrior you will want to read The Heart and the Fist.  The author, Eric Greitens, graduated from Duke University, won a Rhodes scholarship to Oxford, and earned a Ph.D. writing a dissertation on humanitarian movements and relief work.  As he was writing his dissertation he realized that humanitarian efforts alone were not sufficient to stem the tide of evil in the world.  He writes, “The world needs many more humanitarians than it needs warriors, but there can be none of the former without enough of the latter” (p. 125).

He decided to join what the New York Times describes as America’s Jedi knights: the elite of the elite, an all-star team of commandos – the Navy Seals, even while turning down offers to stay on at Oxford and a lucrative consulting job.

The book is philosophical in its approach as Greitens brings together the seemingly paradoxical roles of humanitarian and warrior.  This quotation from John Stuart Mill is such an example,

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself” (p. 127).

He also has some inspirational principles from his arduous Seal training as one of his instructors briefed the trainees before hell week,

“Each one of you is like an earthen vessel – a beautiful piece of pottery – prettied up by your fathers and mothers and teachers with tender loving care. In a few days, Hell Week is going to begin and we’re going to take every one of you out onto the grinder and we’re going to smash you on the ground, break you open and we’re going to see what’s inside each one of you. With many of you, we’ll find nothing. There’s just air. You are empty men without substance . . . For others when you break we’re going to have to turn away from the smell, because you live in a weak culture that has allowed you to get by on charm and pretty talk and backslapping and you have practiced dishing manure for so long that it almost seeps out of your every pore, and now, that is what you are.  For others, when we smash you, we’ll find inside a sword made of pure Damascus steel. And you are going to become Navy SEALs.” (p. 163)

His personal insights of his Seal training provide a host of leadership lessons, he writes, “This was not really physical training at all; it was spiritual training by physical means” (p. 177).  During hell week he was having a difficult time after 72 hours without sleep he couldn’t fall asleep when given a chance. As his anxiety built, it gradually came to him that as a leader this “isn’t about me.”  He writes, “when I began to think that things were unfair I started to feel sorry for myself” (p. 194).  When he realized as a leader his responsibility was about his ability “to lead and be of service” to his colleagues, he stopped feeling sorry for himself and was able to endure.

Today Eric Greitens has a nonprofit organization that is devoted to giving wounded and disabled veterans the means to build new lives at home and become leaders in their communities.   In summary, “Greitens offers each of us a new way of thinking about living a meaningful life. We learn that to win any war, even those we wage against ourselves; to create and obtain lasting peace; to save a life; and even, simply to live with purpose requires us—every one of us—to be both good and strong”  http://www.ericgreitens.com/books)