Never Finished

That’s from the introduction.

In fact, that’s from the second page of the book.

On the preceding page, Goggins tells us that this is NOT a self-help book. He tells us that most self-help books are written to make you feel warm and fuzzy and never really work.

Then he says: “Self-help is a fancy term for self-improvement, and while we should always strive to be better, improvement is often not enough. There are times in life when we become so disconnected from ourselves that we must drill down and rewire those cut connections in our hearts, minds, and souls. Because that is the only way to rediscover and reignite belief—that flicker in the darkness with the power to spark your evolution.”

Then he drops that story about the swimming rats to make his point about the power of BELIEF.

We talked about this same study in our Notes on Isaiah Hankel’s Black Hole Focus.

Here’s how he puts it: “Dr. Richter found that, under normal conditions, a rat could swim for an average of 15 minutes before giving up and sinking. However, if he rescued the rats just before drowning, dried them off and let them rest briefly, and then put them back into the same buckets of circulating water, the rats could swim an average of 60 hours. Yes, 60 hours. If a rat was temporarily saved, it would survive 240 times longer than if it was not temporarily saved. This makes no sense. How could these rats swim so much longer during the second session, especially just after swimming as long as possible to stay alive during the first session? Dr. Richter concluded that the rats were able to swim longer because they were given hope. A better conclusion is that the rats were able to swim longer because they were given energy through hope. The rats had a clear picture of what being saved looked like, so they kept swimming.”

We’ve also talked about the power of BELIEF many times before.

Remember the science of self-efficacy? Albert Bandura tells us that one of the best ways to cultivate your confidence/BELIEF in yourself is to remember your PRIOR successes.

The rats who had a “prior success”? They swam 60 (!) hours—which is, I repeat, 240 (!) times longer than the 15 minutes the rats without that hope-belief created by a prior success.

Let’s move from Theory to Practice to Mastery Together...

Think about ONE time in your past when you were up against the wall and you didn’t think you had what it took to make it through that challenge.

Yet... Somehow... You mustered the courage to take one more step. And then another. And another... Until you got through it and made it to the other side—stronger than you were before the ordeal.

FEAST ON THAT HERO BAR.

Let that prior success be the fuel for your next success.

KNOW that you can create a better future. Then do the hard work to get clarity on what that better future might look like and how you might bring it to life and how you will navigate the inevitable obstacles that will arise. Then keep on swimming. Give us all you’ve got. TODAY.

That’s from a chapter called “A Savage Reborn” in which we meet David’s FEROCIOUSLY ambitious “inner dog” and the power of his SAVAGE alter-ego he calls “Goggins.”

As I read that passage, I thought of Matthew Kelly, Bob Rotella and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.

Matthew Kelly wrote a whole book on the subject. It’s called “Off Balance.” Sub-title: “Getting Beyond the Work-Life Balance Myth to Personal and Professional Satisfaction.”

He tells us that, ultimately, we don’t want BALANCE per se. We want SATISFACTION.

And... Very importantly...

Sometimes creating a life of deep meaning and satisfaction requires the willingness to be off balance.

He tells us: “So the bad news is that you cannot have it all. The good news is that you don’t really want it all. The even better news is that you can experience incredible levels of satisfaction both personally and professionally if you take the time to work out what matters most to you.”

In How Champions Think, Bob Rotella tells us: “I don’t see a lot of exceptional people whom I’d characterize as well-rounded. I see a lot more people who are very single-minded. They have a passion for one thing, and they pursue it zealously. They generally reserve time for family when they’re not pursuing their passion. But that’s about all the spare time they have.”

Csikszentmihalyi says this in Creativity: “Another consequence of limited attention is that creative individuals are often considered odd—or even arrogant, selfish, and ruthless. It is important to keep in mind that these are not traits of creative people, but traits that the rest of us attribute to them on the basis of our perceptions. When we meet a person who focuses all of his attention on physics or music and ignores us and forgets our names, we call that person ‘arrogant’ even though he may be extremely humble and friendly if he could only spare attention from his pursuit. If that person is so taken with his domain that he fails to take our wishes into account we call him ‘insensitive’ or ‘selfish’ even though such attitudes are far from his mind. Similarly, if he pursues his work regardless of other people’s plans we call him ‘ruthless.’ Yet, it is practically impossible to learn a domain deeply enough to make a change in it without dedicating all of one’s attention to it and thereby appearing to be arrogant, selfish, and ruthless to those who believe they have a right to the creative person’s attention.”

P.S. Longer chat, but one of the consistent themes of my chats with Phil Stutz is the importance of embracing what he would call your “Evil Shadow.” It’s basically a synonym for Goggins' Savage.

Pause and reflect on the fact that we have classes on sex education, we put kids through fire and active-shooter drills (gah!!) and teach kids about the dangers of drugs and alcohol.

BUT... Somehow...

We don’t have a single class on how to deal with life’s inevitable challenges. That. Is. Crazy. (Right?)

Note: As we’ve discussed... We also know that self-mastery (/discipline/self-regulation/willpower/whatever you want to call it) outpredicts IQ for academic performance by a FACTOR OF TWO yet, again, we don’t teach kids how to cultivate this essential skill.

Heroic Education coming soon... For now, how do YOU respond when life gives you an unexpected challenge?

Do you quadruple down on your protocol and remember the fact that antifragile confidence is forged when the Heroic gods bless us with a challenge?

Or...

Do you forget everything we’ve been talking about and stop doing all the things you do when you’re at your best RIGHT when you MOST needed that level of Wisdom and Self-Mastery? Seriously. WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN LIFE GETS HARD?

While I personally like to say “PERFECT” when things don’t go as planned and I am constantly encouraging you to remember the algorithm: “The worse I feel, the MORE committed I am to my protocol,” Goggins tells us that HE SAYS, “Roger that.”

Imagine saying THAT the next time the Heroic gods bless you with a test: “ROGER that, Heroic gods. Received, order given, expect results.”

Of course, Jocko Willink, another ferociously iconoclastic Navy SEAL, echoes this wisdom. As we discuss in our Notes on his brilliant book Discipline Equals Freedom, when life gives Jocko a challenge, he says. “Good.”

Jocko tells us: “When things are going bad: Don’t get all bummed out, don’t get startled, don’t get frustrated. No. Just look at the issue and say: ‘Good.’ Now, I don’t mean to say something trite; I’m not trying to sound like Mr. Smiley Positive Guy. That guy ignores the hard truth. That guy thinks a positive attitude will solve problems. It won’t. But neither will dwelling on the problem. No. Accept reality, but focus on the solution. Take that issue, take that setback, take that problem, and turn it into something good. Go forward. And, if you are part of a team, that attitude will spread throughout.

Finally: If you can say the word ‘good,’ then guess what? It means you’re still alive. It means you’re still breathing, that means you’ve still got some fight left in you. So get up, dust off, reload, recalibrate, re-engage—and go out on the attack.”

Then we have Phil Stutz in The Tools, Kelly McGonigal in The Upside of Stress and Elizabeth Blackburn in The Telomere Effect reminding us that we want to APPROACH rather than AVOID our challenges.

Their simple mantra for the moments we want to avoid life’s inevitable (!) challenges?

“BRING IT ON.”

P.S. Earlier in that chapter, Goggins tells us: “When you’re climbing a mountain or involved in any other difficult task, the only way to free yourself from the struggle is to finish it. So why bitch about it when it gets hard? Why hope it will end soon when you know it will end eventually? When you complain and your mind starts groping for the eject button, you are not bringing your best self to the task, which means you are actually prolonging the pain.”

Reminds me of Churchill. He told us: “If you’re going through hell, keep going.”

As I typed that passage out, I was struck by the fact that the guy who is so FEROCIOUSLY committed to being THE (!) hardest motherf*cker EVER (!) says, and I quote, “I am afraid a lot.”

Note: He didn’t say, “I used to be afraid a lot.”

Nope. The verb Goggins used is in the present, active tense—NOT the past tense.

Think about that for a second as you remind yourself that COURAGE is not the ABSENCE of fear. Courage is the WILLINGNESS TO ACT IN THE PRESENCE of fear.

There’s so much we can discuss with this but I’ll leave it at. Remember: Your INFINITE potential exists on the OTHER side of your comfort zone. How’s that feel? By DEFINITION, you will (and should!) feel UNCOMFORTABLE when you are in the process of catalyzing your growth.

PERFECT. Flip the switch. Bring it on. Use that fear as the cue/trigger/prompt to practice your philosophy. That fear is the absolute best fuel for your growth.

In Buddhism Day by Day, we talked about the fact that a VOW is considerably more powerful than a kinda-sorta commitment. In Future Visions, we talked about the fact that Maslow made a vow to HIMSELF to make a contribution to the world at the same level of his greatest heroes.

We also talked about the fact that Maslow once asked his class, “‘Which of you believe you will achieve greatness?’ When they stared at him blankly, he asked, ‘If not you, who then?’”

Goggins says this about greatness in the last words of the book: “I never needed to be the hardest motherf*cker in the world. That became a goal because I knew it would bring out my best self. Which is what this f*cked-up world needs from all of us: to evolve into the very best versions of ourselves. That’s a moving target, and it isn’t a one-time task. It is a lifelong quest for more knowledge, more courage, more humility, and more belief. Because when you summon the strength and discipline to live like that, the only thing limiting your horizons is you.”

And... Here’s the oath Goggins took: “I live with a Day One, Week One mentality. This mentality is rooted in self-discipline, personal accountability, and humility. While most people stop when they’re tired, I stop when I’m done. In a world where mediocrity is often the standard, my life’s mission is to become uncommon amongst the uncommon.”

What’s your oath?

It’s time to answer the call to our Heroic greatness and give the world all we’ve got. Not someday. TODAY.