Ego Is the Enemy

Ego Is the Enemy — Ryan Holiday

In the winter of 1864, William Tecumseh Sherman was one of the most celebrated men in America. The Civil War was winding down, and Sherman had carved a path through the heart of the Confederacy using tactics he had spent two quiet, largely forgotten decades studying at obscure postings across the country. A grateful nation waited. The press celebrated him. Politicians sought his company.

Then the pressure started. Several powerful men urged him to run for president. The offer was serious; serious people discussed it seriously. Most generals who reached where Sherman stood would have said yes. You grab the wave when it comes. This is what a whole life builds toward.

Sherman refused. Not deflected. Refused absolutely. His biographer records the public statement he issued: "If nominated, I will not accept. If elected, I will not serve." This was not diplomacy. It was not false modesty. Sherman knew precisely where his abilities ended. He had no appetite for politics and no talent for the game of the White House. It was a different contest from the one he had spent his life mastering.

Ulysses Grant, the other great war hero, chose differently. He sought the presidency, won it, and his administration became one of the most corrupt and personally miserable chapters in American history. Grant was an exceptional general partly because he was not suited to politics, because he thought straight in a slippery world. But the faint murmur of success, the one that whispers you can do anything now, pushed him somewhere else. He ended his life battling financial ruin, personal scandal, and cancer, racing the clock to finish his memoirs so his daughters would not be left without money.