Estimated reading time: 3 minutes, 16 seconds.
TODAY’S IDEA: Make your bed
— From Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life…And Maybe the World by Admiral William H. McRaven
Admiral William H. McRaven (U.S. Navy Ret) served for 37 years as a SEAL in the U.S. Navy with great distinction. In 2014 he gave the commencement speech at The University of Texas at Austin (his alma mater and mine too: Hook’em Horns!). The speech quickly went viral because of its moving and heartfelt nature, and the book Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life…And Maybe the World came out of that speech.
The stories that illustrate the points in the book are incredible lessons of courage, hope, and determination in the face of the worst possible adversity and difficulty—both physical and emotional—that anyone can muster. Whether you serve in uniform or not, the lessons apply to all of us, regardless of our path in life.
The first lesson is wonderful. It’s simply this: make your bed every morning. It’s the importance of starting the day with a task completed. Instead of telling you the story, I will let McRaven’s words tell it to you directly, as I’m quoting his speech verbatim.
Every morning in basic SEAL training, my instructors, who at the time were all Vietnam veterans, would show up in my barracks room and the first thing they would inspect was your bed. If you did it right, the corners would be square, the covers pulled tight, the pillow centered just under the headboard and the extra blanket folded neatly at the foot of the rack — that’s Navy talk for bed.
It was a simple task — mundane at best. But every morning we were required to make our bed to perfection. It seemed a little ridiculous at the time, particularly in light of the fact that were aspiring to be real warriors, tough battle-hardened SEALs, but the wisdom of this simple act has been proven to me many times over.
If you make your bed every morning you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride, and it will encourage you to do another task and another and another. By the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed. Making your bed will also reinforce the fact that little things in life matter. If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.
And, if by chance you have a miserable day, you will come home to a bed that is made — that you made — and a made bed gives you encouragement that tomorrow will be better.
If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed.
Here’s the video of the commencement speech. The bed-making story starts at the 4:37 minute mark, but it’s well worth watching the whole 20 min if you have the time. If you prefer to read the speech you can do so here.
ACTION
TODAY: Make your bed. Years ago I heard someone say, “How you do one thing is how you do everything,” and that has stayed with me throughout the years. It echoes what McRaven says: If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.
FUTURE: The habit and discipline of making your bed is illustrative of building a solid foundation. Only by starting with small things you get to the big things. Zig Ziglar said it well: “You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.” So start today by making your bed, and keep making it every day. And along that path, build the habits that will take you towards the greatness that you seek and the change you want to make in the world.
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