Book excerpt: Live to Serve: How to Adopt the Servant Mentality and Become the Ultimate Leader

Chapter 1: Answer The Call

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” — Mahatma Gandhi

To some, the call to service might be as subtle as a whisper or a dream to help others that you’ve had your entire life. To others, it might be as loud as a 747 crashing against the twin towers on 9/11. I have many friends who knew since they were kids that they wanted to serve, and I also know many fine individuals who were witness to acts that were so horrific and despicable that it stopped them dead their tracks and made them spring into action in order to make a difference by joining the military or becoming police officers or firefighters.

The call sounds different to everyone…but when you hear it, you know. And if you’re a true servant, you’re going to answer it.

Answering the call can mean a whole lot of different things, and in order to answer the call, you need to feel the calling. Even if you don’t know what the calling is, you still might fall into a serving profession. But at the end of the day, there’s a huge difference between those who hear the call and those who are just working a job. For me, answering the call was as simple as understanding that, regardless of how messed-up a situation is, helping fix that situation is exactly what I am supposed to be doing at that moment.

If working to serve others can fuel the fire inside and truly fulfill you, then you’ve heard the call.

The Mother Of Dragons

This brings me to the story of Joann Steil. Joann is the widow of Sgt. Kenneth Steil from the Detroit Police Department. We met two years ago while I participated in the Police Unity Tour, a bicycle ride from New Jersey all the way to Washington, D.C. This event is held annually in remembrance and honor of officers killed in the line of duty, to honor their service and sacrifice.

It bears repeating: this ride is not on a motorcycle but a bicycle, and it takes four days, 350 miles in total. It is grueling and painful…but it is done that way for a reason: the tour’s motto is “we ride for those who died” to honor the officers who are no longer here, the officers who selflessly and in the name of service made the ultimate sacrifice.

On the second day of the tour, I notice this woman on her bicycle. She looks like she’s having a hard time –she’s sweating like crazy, and she’s huffing and puffing as she weaves her way in and out of traffic. She is literally giving it all that she has.

As I’m watching she misses a pothole in front of her and takes a nasty fall. It’s a bad one, too: she scrapes up her legs and arms, she’s bleeding from her knees, legs, hands, and face. But just as people start to come to her aid, she gets up on her own, holds her head up high, and in a very polite manner refuses any attention or help. And she gets back on the bike and just starts riding again.

Even as she is riding up the next hill, I see she is having the hardest time ever. But is she quitting? Not at all – in fact, she has this look in her eyes of extreme focus and determination, even while fighting sickening pain from her fall.

After a while, she and I start riding in a two-by-two formation, and so we get a chance to talk. She happens to be of Arabic descent and has two wild and energetic boys. At the time the TV show Game of Thrones is extremely popular, and somehow at some point I’m starting to call her ‘Khaleesi’ and ‘Mother of Dragons.’ The name starts to make more and more sense the more I get to know her, even before I know what she’s gone through – like the character in the TV show, Joann immediately seems to me to be a good, innocent person who was thrust from hardship into a position of leadership and rose to that opportunity in a big way.

We talk about our families, our kids, our stories. We share a ton of stories on that bike ride. Eventually, I learn that she is the widow of Sgt. Steil, and she is riding in honor of her husband. Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised there was absolutely no stopping this lady.

The ride is still grueling, but by this point, the two of us are having the time of our lives. No matter how painful or bumpy the ride gets, I reflected, you don’t stop. When you’re riding for something important, you keep going no matter how cold or windy or rainy it is. I was about to learn just how true that really was for my friend the Mother of Dragons.

Trial By Fire

After a long day of riding together, I had to ask Joann the question: when did you know that you wanted to do this for your husband?

She told me that this ride was just part of the story. She said that her calling was to be there for every single widow who has gone through what she has. She told me about when her husband Ken was killed. She was sitting in the hospital, and outside Ken’s room, she saw a line of well-dressed ladies lined up. One by one they started to come into the room. The first woman put her hand on Joann’s shoulder and told her, “I know what you’re going through. You are going to be okay. I was 30 when my husband was killed in the line of duty. We had six kids, and I raised them all to be great men and women. It didn’t feel like it would ever be okay again back then, but now we are doing okay.”

The lady left the room, and the next lady came in. She put her hand on Mrs. Steil’s shoulder and said, “I know what you’re going through. You are going to be okay. I was 25 when my husband was killed in the line of duty. We have two kids. I’m raising them to be kind and loving. We are doing okay, I am doing okay.”

Then that lady left the room and the next lady came in and said the same thing. And then the next, and the next. It just kept going. And even if it didn’t feel even close to okay for Joann at that moment, those women made a profound difference in what she was going through.

A year passed. Joann had been going through the motions of the grieving process when she heard another police officer was killed, a friend of hers. The widow of this officer asked Joann to attend the funeral for support, but Joann really struggled with whether or not to go. She didn’t know if she was ready, didn’t know if she had any idea of what to do or say, or if she was up to reliving the whole process of a policeman’s funeral. The bagpipes, the uniforms, the procession…it all was a reminder of what she had gone through herself a year earlier.

Ultimately, Joann decided to attend the funeral along with a liaison from the police department. They arrived at the funeral home, and it was packed, even a bit loud. In a simple and calm voice, the liaison announced, “I’m here with Sgt. Steil’s widow.” As soon as he spoke, the room got quiet instantly. And in what Joann described as being like an out-of-body experience, she saw everyone stepped back and created a path to the widow of the officer who had just been killed. It was almost as if Moses had parted the sea right in front of her.

Summoning all her strength, Joann went up to this widow. She embraced her and said to her: “Sister, I know what you’re going through. It’s going to be okay. I was 30 when my Ken was killed. We have two beautiful boys I’m raising to be kind and loving. We’re doing okay. I’m doing okay, it’s going to be okay.”

As reluctant as she was to attend that funeral, Joann told me, her whole life changed from that day. After a while, she started to realize that no matter how tragic the whole situation was, despite the fact that she had lost her own husband, she had ended up finding her calling, her purpose in life: to be there for the widows wracked with grief, to help them make some sense out of the tragedy that has descended upon them.

It just goes to show that sometimes people have to go through some immeasurable tragedies to find their purpose in life. Answering a calling isn’t necessarily going to be something that is sugarcoated or handed to you on a silver platter. It might be very traumatic, and may even change the trajectory of your life drastically. But it’s something you have to answer when you hear it, and answering that call will not only change your life for the better but help others as well.

Your Calling Comes In All Shapes And Forms

Though my friend Joann may have not realized it at first, she understood the value of the things she had to say to other women who end up in her position, and ultimately she knew she had to be heard by others. Her calling presented itself to her as an opportunity, and by answering it she ended up doing a whole lot of good for the world that she had never thought possible. Despite her hardship, she became an asset to the world – a true servant.

It is this servant mentality of helping others that can give you a lot more wind in your sail to keep going. Think of how Mrs. Steil kept going through the arduous task of that bike ride as if the hardships did not matter to her. If you are dedicated to being a servant then you are on the same path, doing what you are supposed to be doing with the extra motivation that comes from knowing that it is not about you at all.

This is the kind of selflessness that helps you get through anything because you’re answering the call – if you have your why. The how does not matter then because no matter what, you are going to get there.

This applies to all kinds of public service – police officers, paramedics, firefighters and more. These are the people who are put into situations that they never asked for but have to deal with day in and day out. Difficult though they may be, these situations involve being the one to solve someone else’s problems. And if you find yourself in that role, then you could be answering the call just by waking up every day.

Sometimes that call isn’t so small-scale and personal, though. In a more historical example, the famous Thomas Edison suffered a monumental setback when in 1914 his plant exploded and engulfed 10 buildings in his plant. The fire was so intense due to the kind of chemicals he had in those plants that no amount of effort from the firefighters could extinguish it. The result: the fire ate up everything and left nothing in its wake. It was a total loss and a total disaster.

But where was Edison in all of this? Right there in the middle of it. Was he devastated? Of course! He had just lost the modern-day equivalent of $23 million. But that feeling was not obvious from what he did afterward. Because despite seeing all of his life’s work goes up in flames, Edison told his son Charles to go and get everyone – his wife, his family, his whole neighborhood. Because, he said, “They’ll never see a fire like this again.”

Now if you were in the place of Charles Edison, you would likely be shocked and horrified at that suggestion. You would probably think that your old man has lost his marbles! But when Charles said just that, what Thomas Edison said next left them all speechless:

“There is great value in disaster. All our mistakes are burned up. Thank God we can start anew.”

And that is exactly what he did: he started up again. He took a loan from Henry Ford and got his plant back into commission. After all of that, after suffering through the most intense tragedy and disaster imaginable, Edison’s plant made $10 million in revenue a year later. But that was only possible because Edison recognized there was a purpose to the fire – there was a reason why it happened. It could be divine intervention or karma or whatever you want to call it, but at the critical moment, Edison realized he needed that event to happen in order for him to recognize the value in disaster and to rebuild it all better than before.

Traumatic events such as these do not define you so much as they chisel you into a stronger person. Certain things in life happen to you in order to make you into that stronger person you are supposed to be, and you never know your true purpose until these things actually happen to you.

Your Purpose Belongs To Everyone

If a person does not find their purpose sometime during their life, it is likely because they never fully embrace the servant mentality or lifestyle. They never think of themselves as the person who can assist someone else, and they don’t answer that call.

What happens if someone never answers their call?

Imagine if Michael Jordan’s father had never put a basketball in his hands. Imagine if Tiger Wood’s father had never put a golf club in his hands. What kind of lives do you think they would have led? Sure, they could have led regular lives, going to college and starting families and working normal jobs, but the world would have suffered. The world would have never witnessed their greatness. And that greatness has a ripple effect upon people.

Take Lebron James, Stephen Curry and so many others who were inspired by that movement that Jordan and the Bulls team of the 1990s created. Or how about a whole legion of African-Americans who have gotten into golf because of Tiger Woods, because they saw someone they could identify with?

You see, when you do not answer the call, you are doing the world a disservice even more than you are doing a disservice to yourself. If you don’t act to answer your calling, the world will be missing out. The world will be a lesser place without you as the great servant you can be.

Don’t let the world down. Answer the call.

We are looking at the purpose as a grand picture and not just you or me as individuals. That is what being a servant is all about.