Extreme Ownership

Welcome! Today we’ll be reviewing Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin.

Jocko Willink is is one fascinating specimen. If you’ve listened to Joe Rogan’s podcast for any reasonable amount of time, or if you hang around in the online circles that discuss Jordan Peterson, you’ve very likely heard his name get dropped at least once. While Jocko is most well known for sharing the principles of “Extreme Ownership” on Joe’s podcast, you might not know that Jocko was a highly ranked solider in the U.S. Navy, acting both as a Navy SEAL and lieutenant commander (most notably at the Battle of Ramadi). Additionally, Jocko is a mutli-time “New York Times Best Seller” – and “Extreme Ownership” is one of those books responsible for earning him this award; after reading this, it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone on this website that I think very highly of the man and recommend this book to almost everyone.

In contrast to the vast swath of humans that exist in the public sphere and have adopted glossy, highly fictitious personas Jocko stands resolute as a rare exception; not because he’s particularly bright, well spoken, mild mannered or clever – but because he’s genuine, and he practices what he preaches. In the title of the book, and in almost every chapter Jocko preaches one simple truth: practice Extreme Ownership in everything you do, and he takes this principal to heart – it’s the cornerstone of his personality, his business, all of his books, and his podcast. Before we even reach the first chapter Jocko takes ownership for all of his mistakes. He takes personal responsibility for the eight wounded and three dead SEALs that served with Jocko while under his command. In the first chapter, Jocko takes personal responsibility for the death of an Iraqi national who was under his command in a friendly fire incident. Jocko takes this principal seriously – and he clearly lays out all the reasons why he thinks you should too. Truthfully, it boils down to a few key principals, namely that the truth will set you free, and that only by adopting and embracing that truth can you truly excel in all areas of life.

Do you have an annoying coworker with whom you have a subpar relationship with? What about a spouse? A family member? Did you fail to get that promotion or raise you were looking forward to? Did you come short of meeting a deadline? The brutal (and often grounded-in-reality) take that Jocko offers is that most of the time, this is on you. Does life sometimes give you a truly bad dice roll – a surprise death in the family, or a terminal illness? Yes, and Jocko admits as much. The truth, Jocko argues, is that you can only life your best life if you exercise as much autonomy over your life as possible; you have to live your life by the principals of “Extreme Ownership” – and by doing so I suspect you’ll come to the same conclusion that many of his readers came to – you have a lot more influence over your life than you may suspect. Like, a lot more. And while this may be obvious to some readers, Jocko correctly predicts that a vast majority of people have adopted a mindset of fatalism, that you simply drift through life and a series of unfortunate events fall upon you. This book is the antidote to that philosophy, and I think its a great read for that reason and many more, and I suspect that if you pick up this book and give it a try you’ll think its great too.