"If"

About three years ago, I came across a poem by Rudyard Kipling, a famous British author and Nobel Laureate (he won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1907 at the age of 42) who is perhaps best known for writing the collection of children's stories published as The Jungle Book.  The poem was written for his son, John, and offers paternal advice for how one should live a life:

 If you can keep your head when all about you
 Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
  But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
  Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
  And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
  If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
  And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
  Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
  And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
  And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
  And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
  To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
  Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
  Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
  If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
  With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
 Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
  And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son.

If you are a baseball fan, and most certainly if you are a Boston Red Sox fan, you will recognize the text of this poem.  Kevin Spacey recited the poem in a video tribute to David Ortiz ("Big Papi").  The video was played at Fenway Park during Ortiz's retirement ceremony. 

There are a few lines that I particularly find inspirational.  First, the line "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you" speaks directly to leadership during a crisis.  During a crisis, the most effective leaders stay calm, cool, and collected.  There is enough going on around the leader and his or her team, and the last thing that the team needs is to see their leader stressed out or panicked.

Second, "if you can dream - and not make dreams your master" also resonates.  Dreams are good - they provide a vision or objective for an individual to achieve.  However, individuals should not focus so much on their dreams that they lose sight of their reality.

Third, "if you can meet with Triumph and Disaster, and treat those two imposters just the same" refers back to the first line.  You can't tell whether things are going well or poorly by the look on a good crisis leader's face.  These leaders respond to success or failure in a similar way.

Finally, "if you can fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds' worth of distance run, yours is the Earth and everything that's in it" means (to me) that if you push hard, work hard, and set stretch goals for yourself and for your team, success will come.  I enjoyed this poem the first time I read it, and I keep a copy handy to quickly read from time to time.