He could not have known what the future would hold. He could not have known how he and his country would soon be tested. But in 2019, Volodymyr Zelenskyy gave a twenty-minute presidential inaugural address to the people of Ukraine that foreshadowed how he would respond.
Despite being one of his country’s greatest success stories, making a fortune in the entertainment business and then holding its highest office, Zelenskyy asked not to be celebrated or held up as a model. “I really do not want my pictures in your offices, for the president is not an icon, an idol, or a portrait,” he said. “Hang your kids’ photos instead, and look at them each time you are making a decision.”
Then, in February 2022, in an act of brutal illegality and avarice, Russia invaded Ukraine. Zelenskyy stood and fought, refusing opportunities to be rescued. What could be motivating him? His own advice. He has two children, ages eighteen and ten, whom he fights for. The Ukrainian military and its citizen-soldiers were similarly motivated—fighting valiantly alongside him against incredible odds for the chance that their children might live in freedom and live proudly, knowing that when it counted, their parents were prepared to sacrifice everything on their behalf.
Each of us should be inspired and humbled by this example. But as Zelenskyy said, we don’t need to put pictures of heroes on our wall. Instead, we can hang up pictures of our children and strive to make them proud, and this should inspire and fortify us when we have to make tough decisions for their future, for their safety, for their freedom.
It is our kids who compel us to do the right thing . . . because they are always watching.