Band of Brothers is based on the events during WWII following "Easy" Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division.
Whether you're a military enthusiast or not, this book is highly engaging and contains life lessons in life and death situations. The journey is one also of remembrance of a time and a generation that saved the world and changed the course of history.
Key takeaways from Band of Brothers
Leadership
Everyone is in a position to lead even if it is just themselves.
Leading isn’t about ordering people around. If you’re in charge of people, don’t just give orders. Nobody respects that or responds to it. It’s much more effective to lead from the front and by example and those under you will know what to do.
Even leaders have to gain respect. Respect is earned even by a leader. Just because people do what you say doesn’t mean they respect you. It’s another case of leading by example and giving respect to others in order to gain it.
Leadership isn’t about inflicting pain or punishment. Just because you can make someone do something doesn’t mean you should. If there is no point to the punishment, don’t give it. When you do have to give a punishment, it should match the offense.
Training
Training, training, training. Do it. Do it often. And do it for everything you value. Do you enjoy your health? Train your body. Do you like having a creative, intelligent mind? Train your brain. Do you want to be better at your job? Train! There are only two directions in life: forward and backward and the only way to keep going forward is by working on what you want to improve.
Training should be hard. It should put you in a state of discomfort. There are a lot of “cute” ways to train that don’t really do much but they’re fun or easy so you just do that instead of really working for improvement. Ever see a pro athlete go through a workout or a dedicated student study? THAT’S what brings on improvement. Blood, sweat and tears is a common saying for a reason- those are what it takes to get better and another big one is time.
If you want to succeed in life, you have to push yourself. It’s not just about doing something hard, it’s about what it does when you put yourself in that tough situation. You learn how you feel when you’re in discomfort and that can translate when you’re in discomfort in a business situation, school situation, or anything else. You also learn how to react in a tough situation which is both a mental and physiological response.
Brotherhood
Whether you call this brotherhood, comradeship, friendship or anything else, the power of this is extreme. When you have a group surrounding you that is pushing you, supporting you, and building you, your life will be on a different level. Weather it’s in the military, a school group, a business group, a gym group, etc, when you surround yourself with good people and good relationships, you get better.
Sacrifice
Quote from Webster “those things that are precious, are saved only by sacrifice.”
Sacrifice is the foundation of having what you want. In a world where temptation and distraction are big business, if we can say no, we will achieve great things. Sacrificing social media, drinking, fast food, streaming, video games, money wasting products, etc will give you back the attention span, focus, time, and money to be able to accomplish your goals. Comparing these things to sacrificing life during war is hard to do, but the major theme is the same. If you want something, you must give up something else. You can still enjoy life, but the short term gratification will put you in a predicament.
No one lives forever, no one is a hero forever. However, those heroes do make an impact on the world that inspires others to be the heroes of their generation. We owe it to those heroes in the past who sacrificed and gave us this opportunity to do the same today and pave the way for those tomorrow.
This book (and the show series) is a great representation of so many lessons we can learn and apply to our life and any venture that we partake in.
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