Steve Israel: Learning how to survive in our turbulent world

From the time I was first elected to Congress in 2000, I regularly heard my constituents’ opinions about various policies, from contentious debates about health care to the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. As our politics turned angrier in 2010, the focus of my constituents seemed to shift from policies to people, as they raged about particular Democrats and Republicans they perceived to be villains. Now, I’m once again hearing something different from Long Islanders: deep angst on both sides of the aisle.

Democrats worry that Donald Trump will pursue his worst impulses and destroy democracy. Republicans wonder whether Democrats will pursue a partisan agenda to block Donald Trump and also destroy democracy. Welcome to the United States of Anxiety.

Years ago, I learned that the U.S. military devised an acronym to define our turbulent times — and when the military develops an acronym, it’s time to take things seriously. It’s called VUCA: volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. VUCA is an environment where the fabric of society changes with each passing day. Old rules are consumed by new rules. Long-established norms fall by the wayside, with some cheering their downfall, and others terrified of what might come next. It’s a pervasive sense that the future is growing harder to predict. Even more worrying, there’s less to bring us together in the present.

VUCA complicates not only our global security, but Long Island’s own local governments, businesses, even family relationships. Uncertainty drips down from the very top of government — accentuating our anxieties and deepening our divisions. VUCA requires decision-makers in local town halls, corporations, and small businesses like my bookshop in Oyster Bay to rethink how they lead. If you can’t navigate this rapidly changing terrain, you won’t thrive.

As a member of the Armed Services and Appropriations Defense committees, I learned about the pressures VUCA placed on our military planners and fighters. In the process, I found my own leadership priorities evolving. I learned how to lead not by moving further left or right, but by learning how to go deeper.

For example, I learned that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, Gen. Joseph Dunford, was encouraging his subordinates to practice various forms of meditation and mindfulness. He told me that the practice wasn’t some new-age pablum, but a research-backed way for leaders in high-pressure environments to achieve clarity and mental discipline.

I also learned that VUCA may have been a new acronym, but its conditions had confronted leaders like Roman emperors, Napoleon, Washington, Lincoln, Churchill, Truman, Eisenhower. To cope, some of Dunford's colleagues advised me to read stoic philosophy, which also had been studied and executed in various ways by John D. Rockefeller, Steve Jobs, and Michael Jordan. What each of these visionaries had in common was an understanding that they were in a VUCA environment and an ability to draw on their stoic leadership tools to successfully navigate the uncertainty.

Stoicism is based on developing the discipline to stop worrying about what’s out of your control, manage your raging ego, and shift your perceptions so you treat obstacles as opportunities. Whether you’re a voter doomscrolling on social media or a member of Congress preparing to deliver a floor speech, these three fundamental tenets can transform anger and fear into focus and productivity.

As we wade deeper into a VUCA world, the key test of this political era will be a personal one: Can each of us develop the resilience to lead?

This guest essay reflects the views of Steve Israel, who represented the 3rd Congressional District from 2001 to 2017.