You should be tough-minded and tender-hearted.
I first heard this while reading a sermon by Martin Luther King Jr. Later, I learned that he had drawn inspiration from the political realist Reinhold Niebuhr. Niebuhr, in turn, was inspired by Matthew 10:16, in which Jesus advises his disciples to be “wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”
It was King who translated this wisdom into the necessity of being both tough-minded and tender-hearted.
This powerful balance is the fruit of true wisdom. The ability to see the world as it is, not as we wish it to be, is essential if we are going to make meaningful moves in it. But we must take care not to become cold or overly detached from others. Despite all the struggles and disappointments, we should never forget the human capacity for good.
We want to be happy. Yet it is hard for us to remain satisfied with what we have.
We would prefer to do good rather than evil, but it’s easy to excuse ourselves when our passions hijack our judgment. Often, we don’t realize how harmful our actions will be.
Our brains are incredible engines of creativity, but they are even better at self-justification and rationalization.
So, the fruit of real learning is never Pollyanna idealism or self-satisfying cynicism.
It is a tough mind, reinforced by a tender heart.
Understand our weaknesses. Understand our potential. See the gap between our ideals and the way we live. But also notice the moments in which we have moved closer to those ideals.
Remember that average people have done much harm, but equally average people have done much good.
Remember that murder and crime make the news precisely because they are not the norm. It is wise to be wary of human frailty, but never lose sight of the vast majority who simply hope to live a good life with as little conflict as possible.
People will do all kinds of things for status, fame, and what they perceive to be love, things we wish they wouldn’t. But recognize that this speaks to our longing for friendship and the love of others.
We are not good enough to allow the individual free rein to pursue whatever they desire. Yet we are not wise enough to entrust the community or the state with total control over each individual’s life and pursuit of happiness.
So we will always struggle to create societies where the individual can pursue her potential without losing a sense of mutual affection and responsibility to a community greater than herself.
We are made to live as members of a society. And no society can function without limitations on individual freedoms or without a shared understanding of what we owe to one another. Shared values and laws necessarily mean some degree of individual dissatisfaction in the interest of the whole.
This is true of friendship, family, organizations, and nations.
The answers will always depend on time and circumstance. The problem is never fully solved. The balance is never perfected.
But this is the life we are called to make an art of. What we cannot change, we must accept, without being dejected. And what we can affect, we must pursue with hope and fortitude.
Tough-minded and tender-hearted.