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Life Advice from Barack Obama (Part I)
What the forty-fourth president has to say about reading novels, making fewer decisions, and finding time to think.
Reading about Barack Obama on the internet can take you to some strange and unsettling places. But it’s just as likely to take you to an amazing place. Digging into the online archives of Obama-related content can bring joy and inspiration. It can make you wistful and nostalgic. You’ll find videos that make you smile, videos that make you cry, and videos that make you smile even as you’re crying.
At a time when it’s easy to feel cynical and hopeless, I find it both comforting and useful to take the occasional tour into the depths of the Obama era, if only to remind myself that the way things are right now is not the way they have to be. You can engage in politics in good faith and without sacrificing your values. You can be caring, empathetic, and thoughtful, and you can still win elections. You can conduct yourself with decency and integrity, while also getting things done. Politicians can be a force for good. Politics itself can be a force for good.
Scanning the electronic universe of Obama content also offers some more practical lessons. One of the many consequences of the celebritization of the American presidency and our collective fascination with the lives of individual presidents is that we know an enormous amount about Barack Obama, and not just his views on health care, foreign policy, or marginal tax rates.
We also know what he likes to read, how he makes decisions, and how he structures his days. We’ve learned how he gets things done, how he consumes the news, and how he prioritizes the activities that are most important to him. These insights might not be particularly profound, but they’re still meaningful, particularly in the context of the demanding job of the presidency.
“Being president doesn’t change who you are,” Michelle Obama said in her speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention. “It reveals who you are.” The First Lady was referring to character, temperament, and moral leadership, but she would’ve been just as accurate (if somewhat less inspirational) had she been speaking about time management and personal development. Here are three…
