Author names resilience as lesson for military and families

What lessons do military service members and their families learn over the years? Resilience, for one thing, according to Harris Faulkner, author of "The 9 Rules of Engagement, A Military Brat’s Guide to Life and Success."

“We have the kind of resilience required to design luggage,” she said at a June 14 National Press Club Headliners’ book event.

Club President Andrea Edny interviewed the Emmy award-winning news anchor of Outnumbered Overtime.

Faulkner’s book details the military ideals she learned from her father, a decorated career officer who served three tours of duty in Vietnam. Such wisdom, she said, is universal, and can benefit people from all walks of life.

Faulkner’s Rule #1 is “Recruit Your Special Forces.”

“Those in the military have a core team of people they trust," she said. "And the fact is that we all become like the people we spend the most time with. Look closely at the five or six people closest to you. Do they tell you the truth? Do you tell them the truth? Do they lift you up or bring you down?”

If your life isn’t going in the direction you want, Faulker advised, it might mean you need to change out your “special forces.”

Growing up as a military BRAT (which Faulker said stood for “Born, Raised, and Transferred”), she developed a strong sense of patriotism, optimism, and integrity.

“I have a sense of optimism and love of country that keeps me going in ways that I wonder how others do without it,” she said. “When you grow up the daughter of a combat pilot, you quickly learn that patriotism is not political. It is love.”

Truth, kindness, and necessity are essential to happiness, Faulkner said. “Ask yourself, am I willing to live a life that is true, kind, and necessary?”

Faulkner called on her nine rules of engagement during the sexual harassment scandals at Fox.

“Sometimes I am asked as a black woman why I stayed,” she said. “The military taught my father not to give up. And that’s how I feel about life.”

When a member of the audience asked Faulkner her opinion about the current state of broadcast news, she said, “It is easier to watch two people arguing than to understand facts. Spirited, heated analysis can win in the ratings, which is true for both Fox and Rachel Maddow, but it’s not news. Sometimes what we have today is a casserole of news, facts, and opinions. Covering the news is always personal, but still, it shouldn’t be visceral. We have let civility become a suggestion, and we have to do better than that.”