My mother-in-law Patricia gave me his new book Born to Run as a winter-vacation escape — just to feed my love of music. Turns out, the 500+ page tome fed my soul too — a perfect start to 2017. It’s fun reading — a learn-by-metaphor apprenticeship from The Boss!

Execution

Springsteen was absolutely livid upon arriving London to see his brightly lit concert marquis “FINALLY!! LONDON IS READY FOR BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN.” He viewed that proclamation as the presumptuous kiss of death. It violated the way he knew things worked.

I know how it works. I’ve done it. Play and shut up. My business is SHOW business and that is the business of SHOWING… not TELLING. You don’t TELL people anything, you SHOW them, and let them decide. That’s how I got here, by SHOWING people.

Heart

He knew the big difference between talented mercenaries and a committed team. Bruce bets on those that play with all their heart.

There is a lot of love and respect at the center of everything we do together. It’s not just business, it’s personal. When you came to work with me, I had to be assured you’d bring your heart. Heart sealed the deal.

Tribe

Springsteen dreamed big while finding his niche — survive to thrive! He endured slim pickings while building a following among people-in-the-know.

Now I sent my men home with three dollars. The following week, we did it again. We played to thirty music lovers and made $30. Six bucks a man. Then next week, we played to eighty, then a hundred, then one twenty-five, then we started playing Fridays and Saturdays, then Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, drawing from one hundred to one hundred fifty people, the club maximum, at a shot. We were making a living. We’d found a small core of fans who gravitated to the only independent music in town.

Will

Grit. Digging deep. Determination. Trite-but-true discipline to win the audience over in bumpy times.

I resort to my will. In performance, when called upon, oh doubting audience member, when you think it’s over, when the vultures are circling and our blood is being smelled, tasted, my will, my band’s concerted will, our insistent commitment to do-or-die, will come back hard to kick your ass and try to resurrect the day.

Empathy

His songwriting consistently aims to understand, see another point of view, walk in another person’s shoes. He applies the same to his business partnerships — up to a point!

I later told my children, compassion is a wonderful virtue but don’t waste it on those undeserving. If someone has their boot on your neck, kick them in the balls, then discuss.

Fight

Springsteen is fueled by a drive for independence — the freedom to create things without bowing to power. He’s still pragmatic. He knows it’s about selling records. But as his record company abandoned him and his manager squeezed him, he knew when to fight.

I’d bowed to power in ways significant and trivial throughout my life. We all have. I’d been bullied. It had often shamed me and made me angry, but okay, in any other field, on any other day, I’d eat it, make my peace, do my best and move on… Mike’s mistake was he fundamentally misunderstood me. He’d voiced what he believed my options to be in the language of power. Now, one of the negotiation’s dance partners is always power, but civility and compromise must have their place on the dance floor also. At that moment, Mike’s words went beyond negotiation and became a not-too-thinly-veiled threat. Amongst friends, that’s not nice. We would fight, hard.

Focus

The Boss describes recorded sound tracks in perfect analogy to product features. Everything is relative. As he struggled to moderate the drums to leave room for guitar and to keep the guitar lean so that drums could fill the house, he reveals a universal Product (and Marketing) truth.

But you can’t feature everything, for in effect you’re featuring nothing. I wanted everything, so I was getting nothing.

Onward!

Next-right-action. No do-overs. Lots of examples in his story of launching into the darkness with the confidence that missteps will be transformed into a “righteous sword”.

… I’d been around long enough to know history is sealed and unchangeable. You can move on, with a heart stronger in the places it’s been broken, create new love. You can hammer pain and trauma into a righteous sword and use it in defense of life, love, human grace and God’s blessings. But nobody gets a do-over. Nobody gets to go back and there’s only one road out. Ahead, into the dark.

Authenticity

Your story. His commitment is not only to hard work but to authenticity. Even in the way he writes his autobiography, Springsteen digs to find his precise and personal truth. His “magic trick” comes from recognizing that personal truths reveal universal truths.

This, I presented as my long and noisy prayer, my magic trick. Hoping it would rock your very soul and then pass on, its spirit rendered, to be read, heard, sung and altered by you and your blood, that it might strengthen and help make sense of your story. Go tell it.

If it hadn’t been a gift, I’d have never picked up this 500+ page book. But what a gift. It’s perfect for startup founders, because it’s pure pleasure reading that still feels profoundly productive.