Review of Make Your Bed by Admiral William McRaven

This is my morning routine that is followed quite religiously.  I wake up, of course.  Sometimes rarin’ to go, more often not.  I have my morning prayer time.  This stems from having been an affiliate of a monastery for almost thirty years.  Even when I don’t feel like it, and there are many times I don’t, it is what I do every morning. 

There are a couple of other things that I do every morning that never excite mebut do them out of necessity.  I feed the cat at 8:00 a.m.  That is HIS routine and he is fit to be tied if it is altered the least little bit.

The third thing that is a regular part of my morning routine dates back to when I was a young lad who knew that it was in my best interests to follow the prescriptions of my mother, I make my bed.  When I heard of the book by Admiral William McRaven with the title,Make Your Bed, I could not help but hear the voice of my mother in the back of my head reminding me of this duty.  If it is not the first thing that I do, it remains in the top three that I set myself to before I take on the rest of the day.

Admiral William McRaven served thirty-seven years as a Navy SEAL.  He ended his quite distinguished military career as a four-star admiral who commanded all U.S. Special Operations Forces.  Needless-to- say he is a man to be reckoned with.  And so when he suggests that if you want to change the world the best way to start is to make your bed every morning, like my mother, I take him at his word.

Sounds like such a small and insignificant thing, making your bed each morning, but the Admiral sees this as the first step in a series of steps that lead to big accomplishments.  He sums up his simple philosophy by postulating:

“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 the little things in life matter.  If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.”

That last line is this little book, only one hundred and twenty-five pages, in a nutshell.  “If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.”   This rudimentary idea was at the heart of the commencement speech that the Admiral gave to the 2014 graduating class of the University of Texas-Austin.  That speech served as the framework for this book in which he elaborates on the ten lessons that has shaped his life, as well as relating the stories of some of the people who have inspired him “with their discipline, their perseverance, their honor, and their courage.”

His chapter titles give you a sense of the lessons containedtherein.  “Only the Size of Your Heart Matters,” “Life’s Not Fair-Drive On,”and “Never, Ever Quit,” were my favorites.  That last one reminded me of an oft repeated quip by our high school football coach, “Winners never quit, and quitters never win.”

Admiral William McRaven’s Make Your Bed is simple, straightforward, and true.  Such little things will change your life, and who knows, maybe the world!  Now if I could just get my ten-year-old to start off each day by making her bed!

Reviewed by Richard Dick, Library Assistant, O’Kelly Memorial Library