Practice Management

Thinking warriors

By Dan Hull

There has been no illustrious captain who did not possess the taste and a feeling for the heritage of the human mind. At the root of Alexander's victories one will always find Aristotle.

--Charles de Gaulle, Army of the Future (1934)

In truth, Alexander the Great's off-the-charts political and personal excesses greatly worried his teacher Aristotle. They also worried his fellow Macedonians. The measured and academic Aristotle was Alexander's opposite. Alexander was well-educated, persistent, confident, smart. A brilliant commander and politician (usually). He was also wild and self-destructive.

Plato, Aristotle's mentor, was mystical, poetic, and aristocratic. He was more like Alexander in background and personality. A better match. But Plato died when Alexander was 8, and when Aristotle was only 37.

But you get General de Gaulle's the idea. He's right. If you want to evaluate a politician, or leader, ask him what he or she knows about (a) world history, and about (b) the old verities that people from Plato and Aristotle to Emerson and Ken Wilbur have to offer us.

Full post as published by What About Clients? on April 26, 2009 (boomark / email).