Today I was reminded about something I heard about the end of the cold war from Tony Robbins many years ago that, considering Bill’s current project, I thought you guys might find interesting.
It was more than 20 years ago, so some of the details may be slightly off, but I believe the overall account of what I he said is accurate. I realize this is me recounting what I remember hearing someone tell me about what he was told happened, and we’ve all played telephone before. It’d be interesting if anyone here had access to Mr. Robbins or someone else that might be able to verify or refute the events described, because It’s a hell of a story.
In the mid 90’s, my wife and I were at a sales convention in FL where the keynote was motivational speaker Tony Robbins. Robbins recalled a time a few years earlier when he – and many of the most powerful people in the world – were heading to an important meeting in Texas. If I had to guess, it was a CFR meeting, but Robbins never said so.
Apparently, a mix up left Mikhail Gorbachev stranded in NY and his people called and asked if he could hitch a ride on Robbins’s private jet to the conference. As Robbins put it, his life’s work is analyzing and promoting what makes people successful, and here he had the opportunity to be alone for hours with one of the most influential and powerful people of the 20th Century, so his answer was a resounding, “Of Course!”
While traveling cross country, after making small talk, (through an interpreter), Robbins pressed Gorbachev about one of the most important events in recent world history – the end of the the Cold War. At first Gorbachev talked about their economy, Star Wars, keeping up with the US, the rising freedom movement, etc. All the standard stuff you read about in the history books. But that wasn’t what Robbins was after.
He kept asking, “But there must have been A MOMENT WHEN THINGS CHANGED. The US & USSR had been bitter adversaries for 40 years. We were on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Then, almost by a miracle, seemingly overnight, everything changed. What happened?”
After Robbins repeated/rephrased the question several times, he said all of a sudden a smile came across Gorbachev’s face and he let out a little laugh. Robbins asked about it and Gorbachev told him this story:
Reagan and Gorbachev and their respective staffs held a summit in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 86 to talk about arms control. Discussions were very heated with both sides essentially screaming at each other, accomplishing nothing. This went on for hours before, in the middle of a session, a frustrated Reagan stood up quickly and slammed his hands loudly on the negotiating table and the whole room went dead silent. Reagan then calmly and silently walked to the door and left the room as everyone watched, not saying a word. A few moments later, Reagan re-entered the room with the biggest sh!t-eating-grin on his face anyone had ever seen, and in an a disarming voice said: “We seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot here. I think we should start over. Hi. My name is Ron!”
Gorbachev said at that moment, all the tension in the room was gone, and both sides relaxed a bit and started negotiating with each other in earnest. Although the summit did eventually break down, a framework was established that eventually led to a significant Arms reduction treaty that was signed in Washington the next year. And from that moment on, tensions between the two Superpowers were much less and respect and communication between the 2 men was much greater, which eventually led to the end of the cold war. That was THE MOMENT when everything changed.
Robbins told the story in the context of how to overcome resistance in a sales situation – which is what we were there for. But it shows a side of Reagan that most of us never knew existed. He had a respectful, good natured way of relating to people and a gut instinct on how to deal with strong opposition and persuade people to get past themselves and do what was really in their own best interests.
Some story, huh? I’d like to think things really went that way and it wasn’t just Robbins Bullsh!tting to make a point about sales techniques. If true, it’d be pretty cool to think something as simple as this could have changed the course of world history.
