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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Gleeson, Brent, author.
Title: Embrace the suck : the Navy SEAL way to an extraordinary life /
Brent Gleeson.
Description: First edition. | New York : Hachette Go, [2020] | Includes
bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020014395 | ISBN 9780306846335 (hardcover) | ISBN
9780306846328 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Resilience (Personality trait) | Success.
Classification: LCC BF698.35.R47 G54 2020 | DDC 158—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020014395

ISBNs: 978-0-306-84633-5 (hardcover), 978-0-306-84632-8 (ebook)

E3-20201125-JV-NF-ORI
 CONTENTS

COVER
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
FOREWORD by David Goggins
INTRODUCTION

PART 1 EMBRACE THE SUCK

1 Pain Is a Pathway
2 You Got Dealt a Bad Hand—Get Over It
3 Oh, and Maybe Your Values Are All Wrong
4 Taming Temptation Tiger

PART 2 GET COMFORTABLE BEING UNCOMFORTABLE

5 If You Ain’t Failin’, You Ain’t Tryin’

6 Do Something That Sucks Every Day
7 Choose Wisely What You Suffer For

PART 3 TAKE ACTION: EXECUTE, EXECUTE, EXECUTE

8 Win More Through Discipline and Accountability
 9 Modeling Mindset and Behavior for Violent Execution
10 We’re All Going to Die, So Get Off Your Ass and Execute

Epilogue: Transform Your Mind, Live Extraordinarily

Acknowledgments
Discover More
About the Author
Resources
Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more.

Tap here to learn more.

 FOREWORD
by David Goggins

The pain that you are willing to endure is measured by how bad
you want it.
—DAVID GOGGINS

Our minds are the most powerful weapon we have at our disposal. But
often, our greatest tools can be exactly what stands in the way of
overcoming adversity and achieving extraordinary accomplishments. If you
can’t learn to control your mind, you’ll forever be a slave to its evil
limitations.
I met Brent in late 2000 at the Naval Special Warfare Center in
Coronado, California, when we joined Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL
class 235. I’d already been in SEAL training at the command for ten
months, having endured two Hell Weeks and multiple injuries, but my
journey in developing resilience and mental toughness was only just
beginning.
I grew up in a physically and emotionally abusive household and battled
learning disabilities, obesity, and racism every day. That environment fueled
depression and a mindset consumed by fear and a deep need for acceptance
of any kind. I was constantly trudging through the muck so to speak, with
no end to the suffering in sight. One day, I realized that I could make the
choice to rise from the ashes and take control of my life. In 1994, I joined
the United States Air Force and served for five years as a tactical air
controller. I found happiness and fulfillment in service to our great nation.
Giving to a cause greater than myself filled a void I had struggled with for
years. But after leaving the Air Force, depression pulled me back into its
lonely lair. Down there in the darkness, what I lost in myself I regained in
weight. And at 297 pounds, I became consumed by the fear of permanency;
that was simply who I was going to be. At the time, I accepted it. Then one
day, I looked in the mirror and said, “Fuck this.” I decided to stop
wallowing in misery, get off my ass, and start training. To take back control.
Through extreme discipline and resolve, I lost 106 pounds in a very short
period of time. In 2000, I joined the Navy with the goal of becoming a
Navy SEAL.
I knew I’d have to dive headfirst into hell and battle the devil—even
become the devil—to achieve this goal. I immersed myself in this new
normal. I transformed my mind to embrace the pain, to enjoy it. I developed
the mental calluses necessary to go to war with myself each day. Brent used
to joke that I was possibly the only person in the history of the SEAL
training program who relished the torture, that this battlefield had become
my home. We completed what was my third Hell Week in March 2001.
Eight months later, after completing SEAL Qualification Training, Brent
and I earned our Tridents and joined SEAL Team Five.
But it wasn’t enough. I had become too comfortable in this new
heightened state of performance. I needed to recertify myself as a savage
and take my journey to the next level. As part of a cross-service training
program after my first deployment, I opted to attend Army Ranger School.
In 2004, I graduated from the program with the distinction of enlisted Top
Honor Man and returned to Team Five. Soon after returning from Ranger
School, I began my career as an elite ultramarathon athlete while on active
duty as a SEAL.
I’ve been on a journey of self-discovery and comfort zone crushing ever
since. Over the years, I’ve used my pain and suffering as fuel to drive me
forward. I’ve become an accomplished endurance athlete, completing more
than 60 ultramarathons, triathlons, and ultratriathlons, setting new course
records and regularly placing in the top five. I once held the Guinness
World Record for pull-ups, completing 4,030 in seventeen hours.
But all of the awards, medals, accolades, and magazine articles mean
nothing to me. That’s not why I do what I do. Sure, I have raised significant
funds and awareness for the Special Operations Warrior Foundation, but I
don’t need the recognition. I’m not trying to be number one in the world at
anything. It’s not about how many races I run or how many miles I’ve
traveled on broken feet. There’s no scoreboard. Rather, it’s about achieving
my personal best and pushing well beyond my comfort zone every chance I
get. For me, physical and mental suffering are a journey of introspection; no
other experience makes me feel more clear, focused, and alive.
We all have the ability to master our minds. But our brains are wired
with defense mechanisms for avoiding pain and hardship, for staying well
within the confines of our comfort zone. Our minds have a tendency to
force us into a sheltered existence. I call this the “forty percent rule.” When
our brains start sending signals that we can go no further, endure no more,
to retreat to the blissful embrace of denial and mediocrity, we’ve only
achieved forty percent of our mental and physical potential.
But when we find ways to harness our minds, we can defy all odds.
From overcoming depression, abuse, financial strain, or illness to
conquering the most unimaginably lofty goals, when properly vanquished,
our minds become the weapon needed for success on any battlefield. We
just have to embrace the suck.
About a year ago, Brent asked me to send a few motivational words to
one of his mentees who was about to begin SEAL training Hell Week. This
young man had lost his mother to a sudden brain aneurysm a week before
checking in at the command. This is the message I sent, which was shared
with the entire class:

Please tell him that my words will make no difference when his balls
are in his stomach from being so cold. Men don’t get many chances to
show their grit! You need to pray for bad weather! Pray for the coldest
water! Pray for a broken fucking body! You should want the worst-
case scenario for everything you do in Hell Week! Pray for it to be so
hard that only your fucking boat crew makes it all the way through!
They succeed because you lead those motherfuckers through the worst
Hell Week ever!
You have to become the devil to get through Hell! This shit is
about your fucking mindset! If you are hoping for the fucking best-
case scenario in Hell Week, you are not ready! Know that no
motherfucker can endure what you can. Not because you believe in
 yourself. But because you have trained harder than any motherfucker
alive!
You might think this is a fucking motivational speech! Well it’s
not! This is my mentality before I go into any fucking war. Hell Week
is not for the faint of heart. It’s for that motherfucker looking for the
beginning of his soul. You want to see where most people end, and you
begin. Be that guy; when everyone is in pain and miserable with their
heads hanging low, you’re the one smiling! Not a friendly smile, but
one that says, “You think this fucking shit can hurt me?!”
This is your time to start creating the person you want to be! You
can’t make that man in a soft fucking environment! You must be
willing to suffer more than anyone else! Not because you have to, but
because you want to!
I leave you with this: many people are looking for hard shit so they
can prove themselves, but once the hard shit comes, the reality is too
much to bear. Be watching for “the look”! You will know it once you
see it. It’s like their soul is leaving their body. It happens during deep
suffering, when a person can no longer handle the mental pain and
anguish of what they thought they could do. The key word is “thought”
they could do! After you see the look, quitting is very near.
So, what the fuck are you going to do when your balls are in your
stomach from the cold? What are you going to do when your body is
broke as fuck and you have fifty hours left? What are you going to do
when your boat crew starts to quit and you feel alone? What are you
going to do when it won’t stop raining and you can’t get warm? I don’t
know what you’re going to do. But you asked me for my advice, so
here’s what the fuck I did: I prayed to God to make it worse! Mindset!
Go to war with yourself!

We all have it in ourselves to step boldly onto our battlefield and take
the fight to the enemy, to willingly go to war with ourselves, defy the odds,
and live our own version of an extraordinary life. Regardless of all the
inevitable obstacles we face from the day we’re born until the day we go
over the great divide, if we simply embrace the suck and go all in, there’s
no limit to what we can accomplish.
 Pain unlocks a secret doorway in the mind, one that leads to both peak
performance and beautiful silence.
So, don your battle gear and get after it. Good luck.
 INTRODUCTION

Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a
difficult one.
—BRUCE LEE

This is a book about resilience—a valuable weapon many of us across the

globe have needed to arm ourselves with over the past year. While the
contents of this book are timeless and the tools it provides apply in any
scenario, its release was unfortunately ironic. The unprecedented pandemic
that rocked the world to its core in 2020 has reshaped the context of our
current perceptions of just about everything, including our priorities, health,
families, businesses, finances, faith, and love. Developing resilience largely
depends on our ability to change the narrative in our minds around the
inevitable challenges we face in life and find new answers to these
important questions:

What do I consider to be true adversity?

How long do I wallow in my misery?
Are emotional and physical pain realities to be avoided or
embraced?
How often do I dwell on things out of my control?
How quickly do I bounce back?
Am I willing to embrace extreme discomfort to live my
extraordinary life?
 We are the architects of our own beliefs, the decisions we make, and the
results those decisions deliver. We may not always realize it, but we have a
relatively significant impact on how our lives unfold. The most mentally
and physically tough people I know constantly practice the fine art of
building resilience—deliberately pounding away at the boundaries of their
comfort zone in pursuit of their passions and causes greater than
themselves. Simply put, they choose adversity over mediocrity and continue
pushing forward despite the odds stacked against them.

If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you
can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep
moving forward.
—MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

In early 2000, I made a decision that carried lifelong impact. I left a

relatively lucrative job as a financial analyst with a global real estate
development company to join the United States Navy. The objective? To
successfully navigate what is arguably the most challenging special
operations training and selection program in the world and become a Navy
SEAL. Little did I know that the following months and years would change
my perception of adversity forever.
In the coming pages, I will share some of my experiences from SEAL
training, combat, business, and life in general. But the fundamental
intention of this book is to uncover what really drives us to thrive in
adversity. How do we develop resilience? Do some people have larger sums
in their resilience bank accounts than others? How can we make more
deposits than withdrawals? Does it happen naturally over time or must we
train ourselves in the art of mental toughness? The overarching answer is
simple. Resilience is like any muscle. With focus and determination—and
some of the tools in this book—you can strengthen your mind to overcome
any obstacle, crush goals, dominate your battlefield, and live an
extraordinary life.
I attribute much of my success in embracing the unimaginable rigors of the
SEAL training course to my mentor. My parents both completed their
undergraduate education at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas,
where I also attended college many years later. When I finally gained the
courage to present my parents with this radical and risky strategy of
becoming a warrior (instead of a financial analyst) my dad introduced me to
one of his close friends and swim teammates from SMU. He graduated,
joined the Navy, and became a SEAL during the Vietnam War. He was
living in La Jolla, California, just thirty minutes from where I would
hopefully one day begin my transformation from tadpole to frogman at the
Naval Special Warfare Center in Coronado, California. My dad figured that
his friend might have some wisdom to share, or more accurately, the ability
to talk me out of it! Time would tell.
Now, many years later, in an effort to continue my service and give back
to the Naval Special Warfare (NSW) community, I mentor young people
through the program. When I first began mentoring these eager and
determined young men, the questions were the same ones I had when I was
in their shoes. What’s the hardest part? How did you get through it? Is it
more mental or physical? What’s the best way to train for this program?
Keep in mind, when I was in college, I placed Navy SEALs on the highest
of pedestals. They were untouchable demigods who breathed fire, ate glass,
and easily bench pressed five hundred pounds—all while carrying a
machine gun and Viking drinking horn full of ale. Their steely-eyed glare
alone could put a man six feet under.
Before investing my limited time in being a mentor and knowing most
of these young men might fail in their attempt, I needed a process for
selecting candidates. I had to uncover the answers to a few key questions:
Which of these guys have the grit to get it done? How do I determine who
has the appropriate level of resilience? Why do some spend years preparing
only to quit on day one while others crush the training with a smile on their
face? So, I asked a high-ranking SEAL commander and fellow board
member of the SEAL Family Foundation if NSW had conducted any
research to define the mental, emotional, cognitive, and physical attributes
of the candidates who are most likely to graduate the course. The pipeline is
well over a year of extremely demanding training, and it carries an attrition
rate that scares most off before they even sign up. It’s very competitive just
to be accepted into the program, much less graduate and be welcomed into
“the brotherhood.” And of those highly capable students who begin, only
about 15 percent earn their Trident pin and go to a team. Oh, and then the
training regime (and lifestyle) becomes even more taxing, but we’ll come
back to that.
His response was that NSW had in fact invested significant resources in
this research. What he then told me might not be the initial response most
would expect—a narrative about star athletes, academic excellence, and
brutes who have a penchant for kicking ass and taking names. Obviously,
athleticism and intellect play a role, but it’s far deeper than these attributes
alone: grit, resilience, and a deep passion to serve as a SEAL rank at the
top. Essentially, the consistent data and “recipe” for success is reflected in
the opening paragraph of the Navy SEAL Ethos, which ironically wasn’t
created until 2005:

In times of war or uncertainty there is a special breed of warrior

ready to answer our nation’s call. A common man with uncommon
desire to succeed. Forged by adversity, he stands alongside
America’s finest special operations forces to serve his country, the
American people, and protect their way of life. I am that man.

A common man with uncommon desire to succeed. Forged by adversity.

Upon further reflection, I boiled what the commander told me down into
what I now refer to as The Three Ps: Persistence, Purpose, and Passion.
That’s it. Sure, you won’t even be accepted into the course unless you’re
in peak physical condition and meet the academic standards. But none of
that matters in the first few weeks of Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL
(BUD/S), which kick off a long and arduous journey. Achieving any lofty
goal or overcoming life’s seemingly insurmountable challenges require
persistence, purpose, and passion. The Three Ps aid in the necessary
emotional connection for high levels of achievement, be it becoming a
Navy SEAL, getting into Harvard, or beating cancer.
 I am currently the founder and CEO of TakingPoint Leadership. We
partner with our clients on leadership and organizational development
initiatives to help them create cultures of high performance. One of the
learning modules in our leadership development program is on cultivating
resilience in ourselves and others. We break the definition of resilience into
three categories:

1. Challenge: Resilient people view difficulty as a challenge, not as

a paralyzing event. They look at their failures and mistakes as
lessons to be learned from and opportunities for growth. In our
words, they embrace the suck better than others because they
lean in.

2. Commitment: Resilient people are committed to their lives and

goals. They have a compelling reason to get out of bed in the
morning. They are not easily deterred or distracted by
“opportunities” that are unrelated to their desired outcomes.

3. Control: Resilient people spend their time and energy focusing on

situations and events that they have control over. And because
they put their efforts where they can have the most impact, they
feel empowered and confident.

We also teach Carol S. Dweck’s philosophies on growth versus fixed

mindset. Dweck is the Lewis and Virginia Eaton professor of psychology at
Stanford University, and she is known for her work on the mindset
psychological trait. She taught at Columbia University, Harvard University,
and the University of Illinois before joining the Stanford faculty in 2004.
According to Dweck, in a growth mindset, people believe that their most
basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains
and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning
and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment.
Growth and fixed mindsets can be further broken down into five
categories: Skills, Challenges, Effort, Feedback, Setbacks.
 When we become trapped by a fixed mindset, we believe our skills are
essentially defined at birth. Challenges are to be avoided at all costs.
Feedback is taken personally as opposed to viewed as useful data to learn
from. Setbacks are based on external factors and result in discouragement.
A growth mindset is the bedrock of resilience. With a growth mindset
you know that skills and success come from hard work and dedication, and
the status quo is never enough. People with this mindset are comfortable
being uncomfortable. Transparent feedback is not just accepted but craved,
and setbacks are just another bump in the road fueling the fire to push
forward.
A growth mindset is essential for embracing the pain and misery of
SEAL training and high performance in any endeavor. It’s also critical for
embracing the suck life throws at us when we least expect it, and essential
for accomplishment and dominating any battlefield. When I was at SMU, I
was a member of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity. I know what you’re
thinking, but just bear with me. We held our weekly meeting every Monday
night after dinner in a private room on the third floor of the fraternity house.
Each night, without fail, we closed the meeting by reciting a famous quote
on the value of persistence from former President Calvin Coolidge.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will
not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.
Genius will not: unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education
will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and
determination alone are omnipotent.

So, many years later, with a few impactful life lessons under my belt, I
embarked on my mentorship journey to find only the young men with the
most persistence, purpose, and passion. The ones who were not only willing
to embrace the suck, but longed for it. This isn’t easy to measure, especially
before BUD/S students are truly tested by the infamous and brutal crucible
that goes by the appropriate moniker of Hell Week. But by asking the right
questions and better understanding their purpose, I have been able to choose
mentees who have what it takes. And all of them, so far, have become
SEALs. I am in no way taking credit for their success. The grit they needed
to see it through came purely from within.
Interestingly, none of them have been college track stars or Olympic
swimmers. But they each had a personal connection to the mission and a
deep passion around the idea of military service at the most elite level. That
connection and passion has continued to drive their resilience in the worst
of times. My most recent mentee has had an oddly similar journey to mine,
with one exception. He grew up in Rancho Santa Fe, California, five
minutes from where I currently live, graduated from college, and began a
career in finance only to shift his focus to become a NSW warrior. Sound
familiar? Then, the most horrible and unforeseen event occurred. As David
mentioned in the foreword, one week before he checked in for BUD/S, his
mother died suddenly of a brain aneurysm. Undeterred, and with a new pain
to use as fuel for his journey, he dominated the training pipeline and
received orders to SEAL Team Three. He became a frogman, well-equipped
to take the fight to the enemy.
Nothing great in this world comes without a little bit of adversity.
Nothing amazing happens inside our comfort zones. Whether we are talking
about getting a promotion, nurturing a challenged marriage, mastering a
sport, building or saving a small business, navigating a pandemic, battling
disease, dealing with the loss of a loved one, raising children, or hunting
terrorists, a little bit of suffering will always be attached. That’s why the
things we love and work hard for are deeply rewarding. My hope is that this
book will provide you with the ammunition and inspiration necessary to
embrace the suck, keep fighting, and live an extraordinary life.
 PART 1

EMBRACE THE SUCK

We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey.

—KENJI MIYAZAWA
 1
PAIN IS A PATHWAY

Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.

—BUDDHIST PROVERB

Al Fallujah, Iraq
1:37 A.M.

You never forget the stench of a war zone, a place full of pain and suffering
for all involved.
Our small convoy of Humvees rolled slowly through the rural
neighborhood. Each operator was intensely alert, scanning for enemy
threats around every corner and on every rooftop. We had turned off the
headlights and were driving blacked out, using night vision goggles
(NVGs). Five minutes earlier, our assault force had met at a predetermined
set point about half a mile from where our high value target (HVT) was
apparently holed up in a two-story house in an upscale area outside the city.
We had four vehicles full of SEAL operators and a black Suburban SUV
carrying agency partners, the source who had provided the intelligence, and
an Army Ranger unit acting as our blocking force (they would cordon off
the area so no one could move in or out).
Each vehicle had two SEALs standing on both port and starboard
running boards carrying ladders, with additional assaulters in the back,
ready for a quick dismount. I was on the port side of Vehicle 2 holding on to
a nylon strap fastened to the roof with my right hand, left hand clutching the
side of a wooden ladder. My M4 rifle was strapped tight across my chest.
The green haze of my NVGs cast a surreal depiction of the surrounding
environment. We were skeptical about the intel because the source seemed
nervous and had changed his story several times. We were all on high alert.
The breaks squealed as the convoy rolled to a stop and we quickly
dismounted. “The house is fifty meters up the road on the right,” our
platoon commander said over the radio. The assault team dismounted while
our drivers and gunners trailed behind us ready to act as a quick reaction
force if the op went sideways. We silently shuffled down the dirt road, eight
of us carrying the ladders so we could scale the wall the source said
surrounded the house, while the others covered our approach. We slowed as
we came to the corner of the lot and noticed something odd. “What the hell?
There’s no wall in front of the house,” one of our point men said in a loud
whisper. “Ditch the ladders.”
We filed into a perfectly assembled assault train as he led us toward the
main entrance. The place looked like a small fortress, not a traditional
home. Side by side, two point men crept to the door as the team stacked
against the outer wall. One tried the handle. “Locked. Explosive breach,” he
said.
He pulled a bundle of C-4 explosive from his kit and prepped the charge,
while the second SEAL held his rifle pointed at the door. I waited with the
rest of the team, sweat already pouring down my back from the humidity
and heavy gear. When the charge was fixed to the door, they quickly moved
back to our position. “Charge is set. Three, two, one. Execute.”
BOOM!
The breaching charge blew the door into three pieces and sent thick
chunks of burning wood and metal flying in all directions. We surged
through the smoldering entryway. Out of the smoke, a bear of a man came
charging straight for us. The first three guys in the stack immediately
opened fire, zipping him up with several rounds from their suppressed short
barrel M4 rifles. As is the case with most enemy targets in the Middle East,
there were multiple noncombatants, women, and children in the house. Two
rounds passed through the man’s right side and hit his wife in the hip. We
can’t render medical aid until the fight is won, so we had to keep pressing
forward, each SEAL stepping over the massive body and peeling right and
left into the compound. The house looked nothing like the source had
described. Instead of being in a front living room, we found ourselves in a
large open courtyard surrounded by a two-story building with multiple
rooms on both levels. We were immediately spread thin, and with shots
fired, this was now a hot target. Two SEALs and I moved right across the
southwest corner of the courtyard toward an open door. An unarmed
military-aged male emerged and moved toward us frantically. My teammate
struck him in the chest with the muzzle of his suppressed rifle, sending him
crumbling to the floor. I pounced on him, quickly pulling thick plastic flex
cuffs from my kit and using them to secure his wrists behind his back.
Our chief was directing traffic. “Leave him. Keep clearing the south
side,” he said. I moved swiftly toward the open door, weapon pointed
directly at the entrance. I shifted to the left across the doorway, scanning as
much of the room as I could before entering. I moved to the side of the
entrance and waited for the shoulder squeeze that signaled that a teammate
was ready to move in with me. But there was no squeeze; everyone was
dealing with other threats. A man emerged from the darkness with an AK-
47 pointed right at me. From the doorway, I took immediate action, placing
two rounds in the center of his chest followed by one at the base of his nose.
His momentum carried him as he fell to the ground at my feet. I flipped my
night vision goggles up onto my helmet and looked down. His bottom jaw
was severed completely. He couldn’t have been more than nineteen. What
the fuck, you stupid son of a bitch!? I was livid. Why did he have to force
my hand?
A few minutes later, the target was secure, and we began our search for
additional intel. Our corpsman immediately began providing medical aid to
the woman, while another SEAL got on the radio to call in the medevac
helicopter. We loaded the dead combatants into body bags and placed them
in the back of one of the vehicles. The next day we received word that the
woman lived.
Back at base later that night, I buried my face in my pillow, consumed
with pain and confusion. I reflected on the early stages of my SEAL
training—how horrific it was and how much resilience I needed to navigate
the physical and emotional challenges we faced each day. At the time, we
didn’t know that the evil bitch of war was lurking just around the bend,
which would require a whole new level of fortitude.
What drives resilience in each of us is very personal. Our passions and
purpose are a culmination of varying events, experiences, beliefs, values,
and external factors. Norman Garmezy, a developmental psychologist and
clinician at the University of Minnesota, met thousands of children in his
four decades of research. But one nine-year-old, with an alcoholic,
schizophrenic mother and an absent father, particularly stood out. Each day,
he’d show up to school with the same sandwich in a brown paper bag: two
slices of bread with nothing in between. The reality was that there was no
other food available and nobody at home competent enough to provide
other options. Even so, the boy didn’t want people to pity him or know just
how grim his situation was. Every day, without fail, he would show up with
a smile on his face and a brown bag of bread tucked under one arm.
The boy with the bread sandwich was part of a special group of children.
He belonged to a cohort of kids—the first of many—whom Garmezy would
go on to identify as succeeding, even excelling, despite incredibly difficult
circumstances. These were the children who exhibited a trait Garmezy
would later identify as resilience. He is now widely credited with being the
first to study the concept in an experimental setting. Over many years,
Garmezy visited schools across the country, focusing on those in
economically depressed areas, and followed a standard protocol. He would
set up meetings with the principal, along with a school social worker or
nurse, and pose the same question: Were there any children whose
backgrounds had initially raised red flags—kids who seemed likely to
become problem children—who had instead become, surprisingly, a source
of pride for the school? Garmezy said, in a 1999 interview, “If I had said,
‘Do you have kids in this school who seem to be troubled?’ there wouldn’t
have been a moment’s delay. But to be asked about children who were
adaptive and good citizens—who excelled even though they came from
very disturbed backgrounds—that was a new sort of inquiry. That’s the way
we began.”
Resilience presents a challenge for many psychologists. Whether you
can be said to have it or not largely depends not on any particular
psychological test but on the way your life unfolds. If you are lucky (or
unlucky) enough to never experience any sort of adversity, you won’t know
how resilient you are. It’s only when you’re faced with obstacles, stress, and
other environmental threats that resilience, or the lack of it, emerges. Do
you succumb, or do you surmount?

Somewhere in Hell
March 2001, Coronado, California
12:04 A.M.

I gasped violently as my head re-emerged from the icy froth of the fifty-
five-degree surf zone. A perfect cocktail of saltwater and mucus streamed
from my nostrils and down onto my lips and chin. My sinuses and eyes
burned from being constantly purged by the Pacific Ocean. The cascading
headlights from the two white Ford F-150 pickup trucks pointed in our
direction were blinding. I looked up for a brief moment and noticed the
warm glow coming from a few of the cozy condominiums stacked in the
tall white towers looming over us. The briny smell of ocean water lingered
in the cold night air.
BUD/S class 235 was a mere four hours into Hell Week, the brutal
crucible that weeds most students out of the Navy SEAL training and
selection program. We were lying in the surf zone, arms linked, feet toward
the beach. We shivered uncontrollably in our wonderful human chain of
miserable convulsions. The instructors had ordered a round of “rocking
chairs.” The class lies down together in about a foot of water, and in unison
everyone kicks their legs back up and over their heads. Back and forth, back
and forth until the instructors have had enough. This exercise forces your
head underwater at a downward angle shooting cold seawater into your
sinus cavity.
We were clad in green, brown, and black jungle camo battle dress
uniforms (BDUs), black Bates tactical sport boots, orange life vests, and
black Pro-Tec helmets. I had a hairline fracture in my left elbow that was
causing severe swelling due to bursitis, overuse injuries to the iliotibial
bands in both legs, and a flesh-eating bacteria snacking away at my right
calve. Oh, and did I mention it was fucking raining? It rarely rains in San
Diego. It was glorious. Everything was coming together nicely. The good
Lord needs dangerous frogmen, which can only be forged in adversity.
David Goggins’s prayers had been answered. As the Navy SEAL Ethos
states, “My Nation expects me to be physically harder and mentally
stronger than my enemies.” One of the instructors standing over us said
something I’ll never forget, “Gentlemen, take all that pain, shaking, and
cold and turn it into aggression. Let it drive you.”
Four hours earlier, Hell Week breakout had commenced. Once you’ve
been through about a month of indoctrination and a few weeks of the first
phase of the BUD/S program, you arrive at Hell Week. And it is exactly
what it sounds like. At this point, about half the class has already quit. And
many more will ring the bell during the first couple days. The weeks
leading up to this period are no picnic either. Most of the class enters Hell
Week either sick or having sustained multiple injuries. Or both.
So when the agony is getting ready to start on a Sunday evening, you’re
already miserable with anticipation. The group reports to the main
classroom on Sunday morning with only a few required items. The beauty
of that first day is that you still have no idea exactly when the fun will
commence. The stress and anxiety are eating away at the core of your soul,
and then suddenly breakout starts. It’s a whirlwind of explosions,
instructors swarming around you, firing M60 machine guns—using blanks,
but still. You’re getting sprayed with fire hoses, and smoke grenades are
going off everywhere. For the residents of the high-rise condo towers just
up the beach it looks like a fierce battle has broken out.
The instructors are shouting orders. “Bear crawl to the surf zone—get
wet and sandy!” “Boat crew leaders, give me a headcount!” “One hundred
burpees! Bust ’em out!” It’s total chaos. After a couple hours of insanity,
the class heads to the beach for “surf torture.” Similar to rocking chairs, you
link arms with your classmates and walk into the ocean and lie down.
Unlike the fire and brimstone of actual hell, the instructors want to make
sure they keep you extremely cold, wet, and sandy all week. My class had
the privilege of enduring Hell Week in the winter, when water temps in
Coronado can be in the fifties. And you know what? Fantastic. The
mindfuck of being freezing cold and soaking wet twenty-four hours a day is
what drives most students to throw in the towel.
It’s not uncommon for students to quit even in the first few hours. I
enjoyed watching others drop on request (DOR) because I knew it meant
my chances of making it kept improving, statistically speaking. For six
days, you won’t have more than a couple hours of sleep. Even when you are
allowed to sleep it’s not exactly restful. Whenever you stop moving, your
muscles cramp up uncontrollably—the pain is overwhelming and you can’t
even fathom being able to move again. But you quickly learn that the mind
can be a powerful tool when harnessed properly.
Everything about Hell Week is designed to test your physical and mental
fortitude. You’re running and crawling everywhere, covered in sand, flesh
sloughing off as you go. You run the equivalent of multiple marathons.
Swim dozens of miles in the frigid ocean. Run carrying heavy logs, boats,
and backpacks. And everything is a race. If you’re not “putting out,” the
instructors hammer your ass. That is, if your boat crew doesn’t tune you up
first. It’s nonstop intense physical activity, and the instructors are
whispering in your ear every minute, trying to get you to quit.
“Gleeson, come on man. This isn’t for you. You’re not cut out for this.
Hop in the truck—we have blankets and hot coffee.” They are like the
sirens from Greek mythology luring sailors to their watery demise, and
guys fall for it all the time. But an hour later, when they’re warm and dry,
all they know is the fierce sting of regret.
You only stop moving to eat. That could mean running over to the chow
hall or eating a cold Meal, Ready-to-Eat (MRE) in the surf zone. Some of
us started putting the MRE water-activated meal heaters inside our shirts for
a brief moment of warmth. When the instructors caught wind of this, they
made us relinquish all meal heaters for the rest of the week. Naughty
BUD/S students!
What gets you through is your mindset, resolve, and the leadership of
the officers in the class. And, of course, The Three Ps. Our class leader—
the highest-ranking officer—was the ideal combination of tough, principled,
and compassionate. We all gravitated toward John. He had a positive mental
attitude and an innate ability to fire us up about the misery we would face
each day. On Sunday afternoon, as fear consumed us in the classroom, he
read us the St. Crispin’s Day speech from William Shakespeare’s Henry V.
This speech has a lot of meaning to me. I was the captain of our rugby team
my junior and senior years at SMU, and we had an excerpt from it printed
on the back of our team T-shirts.
John read aloud those famed lines: “From this day to the ending of the
world, but we in it shall be remembered. We few, we happy few, we band of
brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.”
John died four days later—he drowned in the pool after suffering from
severe pulmonary edema. He was laid to rest at Fort Rosecrans National
Cemetery and will forever be my brother. It was my first Navy funeral—I
had no idea it would be the first of so many. His Hell Week boat paddle
hangs on the wall in my office. I offered it to his family, but they politely
declined. It’s a monument to the extreme sacrifices men will make just
attempting to serve as a SEAL—a goal, when successfully achieved, that
only leads to greater sacrifice.

So, after a seemingly endless session of surf torture, our first evolution of
the night was rock portage. We paddled our black rubber boats out through
the powerful eight-foot waves turning north to head up the beach toward the
famous Hotel del Coronado. That part alone was the cause of severe injury
for a few of our classmates. If your timing is off or the crew out of synch,
the crashing waves can launch an entire boat backward, sending BUD/S
students flying in all directions like rag dolls at the mercy of the dark sea.

The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm
terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient
reason for staying ashore.
—VINCENT VAN GOGH

To the casual observer from the beach, this might look either horrifying
or hilarious depending on your psychological makeup. What one might not
see from a distance, however, is oar handles smashing in teeth, elbows
cracking cheek bones, a classmate’s helmet breaking his buddy’s nose,
muscle-bound men landing on top of each other, and boats trapping students
underwater for what seems like an eternity.
Why were we paddling up to the Hotel del Coronado? Let’s just say it
wasn’t for cocktails with pink umbrellas or spa treatments consisting of a
massage, facial, and body wrap. (Although the sand in my pants was doing
a wonderful job of exfoliation… just a couple layers of skin too deep.) If
you’ve ever been to The Del, you may recall the massive jagged rock
formation that sprawls seventy-five yards along the beach just in front of
the southernmost part of the hotel. It’s as if God Himself, in all His
mischievous glory, reached down and strategically placed each giant
boulder purely for the sake of SEAL training—nothing else but flat white
sand for miles on either side. We had spent the preceding weeks running
and swimming up past the formation and back while performing our four-
mile runs and two-mile ocean swims, which required more competitive
minimum times as you progressed through each phase of BUD/S.
During rock portage, the instructors have a sensational skill for timing
the surf just right so that the waves are at their max, crashing so violently
against the rock face you can hear it from every room in the hotel. The goal
of rock portage is to paddle through the surf, land your 250-pound boat on
the rocks, and successfully carry it up and over onto the beach—with each
boat crew member present and accounted for. To the passerby during the
day, the rocks may not look all that intimidating—with jovial youngsters
climbing around and happy couples snapping selfies for Instagram. But to
the BUD/S students in the water, with high surf at nighttime, they look like
the cliffs surrounding Kalaupapa on the Hawaiian island of Molokaʻi. Just
Google it, you’ll get the idea.
My boat crew, Boat Crew 2, floated just beyond the surf zone waiting
for what felt like the right moment. Each boat carries six enlisted students
and one officer—the crew leader. Included in my crew was David Goggins
and Drew Sheets—two of the toughest guys I’d ever met. Pistachio-size
raindrops were ricocheting off our helmets and the hard rubber frame of the
boat. The clouds had parted just enough to allow a beam of moonlight to
guide our path to potential destruction. It was like a well-lit runway—but at
the end of the runway was annihilation. The only source of moderate
warmth came from the rigors of paddling the boat and the occasional peeing
in one’s pants. Yes, you read that correctly; the warm urine provided ten
seconds of extraordinary bliss. It’s the little pleasures in life, right?
“Now! Paddle!” our boat crew leader suddenly shouted. We surged
forward at an aggressive yet somewhat cautious pace, trying to time the
waves just right. If the surf was too low, we’d land at the bottom of the
rocks and get crushed when larger waves came in on top of us as we
ascended. If it was too high, we could lose control of the boat and be flung
into the rocks at bone-crushing velocity.
We rode a medium-sized wave in, positioning the front of the boat on
the edge of one of the larger boulders. Two of us leapt out, holding the lines
so we could keep the boat steady and upright. Amid the struggle, I looked
to my right and saw one of my friends get tossed from his boat as it hit the
rocks. He landed head and shoulders down in a crevice between two rocks,
only his waist and legs above water. I later found out he almost drowned
and ended up with a broken arm and fractured collarbone. But there was
nothing I could do for him. I had my own crew to worry about. We hauled
our boat up and over the rocks to the safe embrace of SEAL instructors
ready to dole out some more pain.
The hotel guests with a lust for late-night socializing often come out to
watch the fun unfold. The instructors, injured students (also known as “roll
backs”), and Navy corpsmen had the area blocked off with yellow tape and
orange cones, making it look like a crime scene. For the participants, it felt
like one too. The only difference was that we had actually volunteered for
this punishment. Two of the hotel guests that evening were my parents.
They weren’t there to socialize; they’d come to watch their baby boy suffer.
My mom would later describe the moment as one of sheer horror. She only
watched for a few minutes before retreating to the blissful denial of their
luxury hotel room, 1,200-thread count sheets and all. I don’t blame her. She
couldn’t even bear to watch my college rugby games because of the injuries
I sustained during my first two matches.
Another hidden gem from this evolution is the extremely porous nature
of the rocks—similar to a sharp coral. Due to adrenaline, you don’t realize
it at the time, but as you crawl over the rocks straining to carry the heavy
boat, the tiny razor-sharp edges are shredding your hands and wrists. Your
water-soaked flesh is already soft and vulnerable. The aftermath looks like
an evil forest fairy with a vengeance wielding a tiny ice cream scoop went
to town on your skin. Small, deep, bloody pockmarks remain. Many have
those scars for years to come.

“Gentlemen, take all that pain, shaking, and misery and turn it into
aggression. Let it drive you,” the instructor said calmly into his megaphone.
I snapped out of it—I was still lying in the surf zone doing rocking
chairs. And then the most unimaginably morose feeling swept over me.
This incomprehensible pain was going to last twenty-four hours a day until
Friday afternoon. And it would only get worse as the week went on. Home
seemed like a distant memory.
Light at the end of the tunnel? Not even a tiny fucking glimmer.
Assuming you don’t live in a cave shielded from all of the suffering life
throws at you (although living in a cave would still suck), I’m sure this has
happened to you: you try to comprehend a difficult situation, but in the
moment your brain just doesn’t get it. Like when I tell our oldest son to stop
playing Fortnite and do his chores.
In that moment, I quickly learned a fabulously simple solution:

Just give up.

Don’t fight it.
Embrace the pain.
Beg for more.
Change the narrative in your mind.

If you’re struggling to wrap your head around an uncomfortable

situation, then the following happens: As soon as your brain receives input,
the synapses start to fire their little electrons and look for pre-existing
structures to attach your new input to—such as hypothermia, bone
fractures, and flesh-eating bacteria. But in this case, there just isn’t any
place for the electrons to attach because the input is new, shitty, and
unfamiliar—it doesn’t quite fit anywhere. Then your brain becomes sad,
very sad. The new input is like sand in your hands. Or in this case, covering
your entire body. Your brain just lets it trickle through—comprehension
becomes a challenge.
In that moment, the Embrace the Suck philosophy was born. I not only
gave in to my reality, I embraced it. It was exhilarating (maybe it was just
my drunken state of hypothermia, but you get the idea). As I laid in the surf
next to my brothers, shivering violently, I reminded myself that I had
chosen this. I had sacrificed everything—a good job, nice apartment, time
with friends and family—and had to crush the boundaries of my comfort
zone just to be accepted into the program. This was purposeful suffering. It
had meaning. There was a vision. A call to serve. If I didn’t lean into it, all
would be lost.
Suck it the fuck up. You earned your right to be here. You have a long
way to go, so embrace the suck and get it done.
Those of us that embraced this mindset succeeded in our endeavor.

Mental Model
The Pain Transformation Process
Psychologists who have studied victims of severe physical and emotional
trauma have found that while individuals who have experienced great pain
and suffering aren’t exactly thrilled about it, the vast majority feel they have
grown substantially from those experiences. Many claim to have gained an
eye-opening perspective on life and become more responsible, more
resilient, less self-absorbed, and even happier.
Polish psychologist Kazimierz Dąbrowski argues that fear, anxiety, and
sadness are not always undesirable or damaging states of mind, but rather
representative of the necessary pain for psychological growth. To avoid
pain is basically to deny our own potential. You don’t build muscle or
physical stamina without experiencing pain. But it’s the type of pain that
signifies forward progress. Similarly, we can’t develop psychological
resilience without experiencing emotional pain and suffering.
And let’s just say you don’t reach peak mental and physical toughness
without embracing a whole lot of suck. As the famed Marine Corps officer
Chesty Puller said, “Pain is weakness leaving the body.”
This saying is revered by rugby players worldwide. Before games, I
used to find a private place, take a Buck hunting knife I’d received for
Christmas as a kid (yes, that’s what you get for Christmas in Texas), and cut
my thigh—I’d rub the blood on my face to prepare for battle. Then I’d tape
up the wound and head out to the field to warm up. I know what you’re
thinking. Brent, what the hell is wrong with you?! If I didn’t leave the rugby
field with a significant injury—or if I failed to inflict pain on the foe—I
would berate myself for not playing hard enough. Eight concussions, three
shattered teeth, and one Hell Week later, I found out that my tolerance for
(or maybe enjoyment of) pain would serve me well.
Becoming more resilient starts with changing your perspective on
adversity. Pain can in fact be transformed into a useful energy force for
accomplishing great feats. For gaining perspective. For building physical
and emotional resilience. When you can master the ability to control pain
whatever form it comes in—and even lean into it, it doesn’t have to hurt so
badly.
Pain Don’t Hurt

I don’t usually look to the late Patrick Swayze for life advice, but his role as
Dalton in the ’80s film Road House embodies this mindset perfectly. Dalton
is a PhD-educated, karate ass-kicking, professional bouncer brought in to
transform a local bar. Kind of like the hit TV show Bar Rescue, I guess.
Dalton is what’s called a “cooler,” a specialized bouncer with a mysterious
past who is lured from his job at a club in New York City to take over
security at a nightclub in Jasper, Missouri, the wild and raucous Double
Deuce. But a corrupt local businessman isn’t having it and sends his goons
in to take back control.
Dalton has been in yet another knife fight at his new place of business
and heads to the hospital for stitches. In walks the doctor. She’s wearing a
white lab coat, has big bangs and an aggressive blonde perm. She examines
his many scars with a confused frown, then asks if he wants a local
anesthetic.
In a southern accent he says, “No thank you, ma’am.” She then asks
him, “Do you like pain, Mr. Dalton?” His famous response: “Pain don’t
hurt.”
Pain, sorrow, and tragedy—like getting stabbed by an angry drunkard in
a crappy bar—are not what we seek out in life. But much of life’s suffering
is inevitable. The more readily we lean into pain, loss, and disappointment
the sooner we will learn how to gain from these experiences and move
forward. Of course, there are certain experiences we’ll never truly embrace,
such as the death of a parent, friend, child, or spouse. But there are ways to
celebrate life and still find happiness in times of loss. And it’s not about the
pain itself but rather how and why we choose to suffer. And most
importantly, what we can potentially gain from it. More on that in Chapter
Seven.
And sometimes, pain and adversity open the door to new opportunities,
like meeting a pretty doctor with a bad perm, winning a rugby game,
completing Hell Week, accomplishing athletic feats of greatness,
transforming a business, defeating our nation’s enemies, landing your
dream job, or finding the love of your life.
Let me ask you this. When the hell have you ever accomplished
anything spectacular while nestled safely in your comfort zone?
We both know the answer. Never.
We all know today’s culture has a fascination with risk-takers and we
crave motivational social media posts that keep our head in the game. Like
when David Goggins makes you realize you’re a wimp who complains
about dumb shit! We also know that our openness to taking some risk (not
blind dumb risk, but calculated risk) directly correlates to new possibilities
and a bright future. Yet what do we often do? We stay comfortable in our
safe little world living vicariously through other more daring beings.
Why? Because the very instincts we humans once needed to avoid the
pain of being devoured by a saber-toothed cat or attacked by a band of
marauding warriors are the same that keep us from taking new risks.
Venturing out. Trying new things. Getting out there in that big scary world
and saying fuck it. Saying yes to life. The good, the bad, and the ugly.
But guess what: the world isn’t actually as scary as it was a long time
ago. Sure, the world is, and always will be, a place of needless violence and
suffering. War will always exist. Foreign and domestic terrorism isn’t going
anywhere anytime soon. Global pandemics will take lives and businesses.
But for most, the likelihood of experiencing the horrors of old, such as
being keelhauled by pirates, burned at the stake, stomped to death by a
mastodon, or carried away by an angry torch-wielding mob, is quite low.
And while it is part of our universal nature to seek pleasure and avoid
pain, culture plays a central role in how we deal with suffering. In the West,
we generally reject suffering. We see it as an unwelcome interruption to our
pursuit of happiness. So we fight it, repress it, medicate it, or search for
quick-fix solutions to get rid of it. In some cultures, especially in the East,
suffering is acknowledged for the important role it plays in people’s lives on
the meandering path toward enlightenment. But the fact that suffering
yields benefits does not imply that we ought to seek it actively—sickness
strengthens our immune system, but that does not imply that we need to
look for opportunities to become sick. We naturally seek pleasure in our
lives and try to minimize the amount of pain we endure. Yet it still finds us.
So how do we channel emotional, psychological, and physical pain and
use it as a pathway? By following the Pain Is a Pathway mental model.

THE ACT: Fully experience your pain and emotions.

THE PROCESS: The largest mistake people make is masking their
emotions and denying their true suffering. This is counterproductive
and can lead to deeper problems in the future. When each emotion
comes, feel it. Your body will tell you when it’s enough. Cry, scream,
and cry again—maybe not in public though (or SEAL training).
Submit to the beginning of a process that will take time to complete.
To feel is to be human, embrace it!

THE ACT: Challenge your perspective.

THE PROCESS: The downward spiral never lasts forever, hence the
saying “This too shall pass.” But when it seems the razorblade-
covered waterslide to hell has no end, you can still find ways to focus
on the positive instead of the negative. Perspective plays a key role
in acceptance. Our brains can be evil fuckers—controlling us,
distorting our reality. We must take a step back and challenge our
existing way of thinking, conduct a “perspective audit,” if you will.
Ask: What is the root cause of my existing stress and suffering? Is
my current perspective realistic? Is it solving any of my challenges?
Or could there possibly be a different—and more productive—way of
looking at things?

THE ACT: Surround yourself with the right influences.

THE PROCESS: During these times you’ll find out, like I have, that
there are some people you can count on and some you can’t. Take
this opportunity to weed out those in your life who may be holding
you back. Find inspiration in a mentor or someone you love or
admire. Lean on family and friends. If you don’t have anyone to lean
on, reach out to a therapist. If that doesn’t work, focus on building
new positive relationships. But for God’s sake, cut the negative
losers from your life who don’t wish you well.

THE ACT: Stay (or become) active and avoid negative coping
mechanisms.
THE PROCESS: It’s useless to focus all your energy on events that
you no longer have control over. Instead of wasting time in this way,
get active in your everyday life. Take up distance running, swimming,
biking, martial arts, or all of the above. And commit to it. Physical
and mental wellness are crucial for embracing the suck. Meanwhile,
if you are dealing with depression, sadness, or anger, stay away
from alcohol and other substances that will only magnify your pain.
You may think you are drowning your sorrows, but you’re really
providing them with fuel. But that’s not the kind of fuel you need for
your journey.

THE ACT: Know that bad things don’t actually come in threes
(not sure I totally believe this yet).
THE PROCESS: Sure, maybe you woke up today with your
downstairs bathroom flooding the entire bottom floor only to open
your email and read a message from your largest client that they are
canceling their contract. Then later, at your annual checkup your
doctor tells you that you may have prostate cancer. You’re like,
“What the fuck?! Seriously?!” Scientists found the reason why bad
things “come in threes”: they simply don’t. We look for patterns in
random data as a way to extract order from disorder. This is called
confirmation bias—the tendency to favor information that confirms
our assumptions, preconceptions, or hypotheses whether or not they
are actually and independently true. Our need to find patterns and
make sense of everything can distort reality.

THE ACT: Accept and forgive.

THE PROCESS: Holding on to hatred and resentment—for
ourselves or others—only poisons you. Hatred for the enemy that
killed your teammate, an ex-spouse and her attorney, the drunk
driver that took your sister, COVID-19, the IRS, cancer, everything. It
keeps you forever trapped in the past, focusing on an element that
you’re letting define who you are today. Learn to let go. To give up.
Give in. When you do, you’ll feel the weight lifted and be able to
channel the renewed energy into positive new pursuits. This is easier
said than done, of course, and it’s not something that will happen
overnight either. The only way to truly learn to let go is to allow time
to heal you. You’ll know when you get there.

Accepting that life will eventually knock you hard on your ass is a
stepping-stone to growth. Just expect it to happen. Constantly trying to
avoid hardship and pain will only prove detrimental to you. Each
experience, each moment that you have is precious. Life is short. I
challenge you to make the best out of even the worst circumstances. Like
me, you may be amazed at the power, wisdom, and strength you gain.

Great, So What Now?

You might be reading this and telling me to go fuck myself, that I haven’t
been through the kind of suffering you’ve endured. And that may very well
be true. My intention with this book is not to appear that I know it all or
have experienced all the hardships life has to offer. I’m simply providing a
tool to use in your own way while navigating darkness and uncertainty.
I’ll admit, I grew up relatively privileged. I’ve never been fired from a
job, physically abused (other than SEAL training and combat), or
threatened with a debilitating illness or injury. Not yet anyway. But I’ve
seen the horror of war-torn countries. I’ve taken life, up close and personal.
I’ve lost many friends. I still have blood-stained cammies in a Para bag in
my garage—the blood isn’t mine. I don’t remember the last time I slept
through the night, I still wake up every half hour or so—apparently that’s
not normal. I’ve been through a horrible divorce driven by infidelity and
drug use. No, not by me. I was a full-time single parent to a toddler while
building two companies for years before meeting my incredible wife. Who
knew? I’ve experienced financial hardship and the extreme stress of
business and entrepreneurship. My pet monkey drowned in a cardboard box
in Africa. As I write this, I’m pivoting to save my current company. I’ve
had horrible diarrhea while on missions in Iraq, more than once. So, like
you, I’ve been through some “shit.” And I’m sure life has more in store for
me.
Anyway, the point is, we all have our own journeys. But pain can be an
incredible pathway to living an extraordinary life if used correctly with the
right mindset. We just have to embrace the suck along the way.

Questions to ask yourself:

Do I have more of a fixed mindset or a growth mindset?
If I reflect on some of my more physically and emotionally
painful experiences, how did I initially react? How long did it
take for me to heal? Could I have done things differently?
How do I apply painful experiences to my growth and
development?
Am I becoming more resilient, building brain calluses, or
continuing to react in the same way to adversity?
What do I do on a regular basis to inject a little positive pain
into my life?
When I have been especially resilient, what was true about
me?
 2
YOU GOT DEALT A BAD HAND—GET
OVER IT

In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.

—SUN TZU

I don’t really play poker. I can think of better ways to spend my time,
especially when it comes to pissing my money away. But poker is all about
analyzing the odds. Most mediocre players don’t understand this, which is
why they are fixated on the cards they’re dealt. When they lose, which is
often, they think, Damn, I keep getting dealt shitty cards. They were either
unlucky because they still got beat with a good hand or because they never
received good cards in the first place. They see no holes in this flawed
logic.
Good and bad cards are dealt to all of us in the same proportion over
time. Luck tends to even out. Winning with bad cards—in poker as on the
battlefield of life—is a skill that anyone can master. In fact, real winners
don’t believe in luck. Through vision, hard work, preparation, appropriate
course correction, and resilience, they make their own luck. Especially
when it comes to bouncing back from adversity.
Outside of unavoidable illness and injuries—or worse—successfully
finishing BUD/S has nothing to do with luck. The last month of BUD/S,
before transitioning to SEAL Qualification Training (SQT—the advanced
portion of the pipeline), is spent on San Clemente Island, the southernmost
of California’s Channel Islands owned and operated by the US Navy. (Also
known by SEAL instructors as “the place where nobody can hear you
scream.”) Let’s just say that bad hands get dealt a lot on the island.

The Wheel of Misfortune

September 2001, San Clemente Island, California
11:00 P.M.

We slid quietly over the sides of our black Zodiac boats into the cold dark
Pacific about a half mile off the coast of the island. This was our final
training exercise (FTX). BUD/S was almost over. The following week we’d
graduate and begin SQT. Little did we know the following week would also
mark the beginning of two decades of war… the Twin Towers would fall in
Manhattan. Our world was about to change.
We were clad in dive hoods, black dry suits, and long fins, and our faces
were covered in camo paint. We had our Kelty tactical backpacks in dry
bags to keep our gear, explosives, and extra ammo from getting wet. Once
in the water, the boats pulled back quietly. We floated in our position for
about ten minutes watching the shoreline, then sent in our two swimmer
scouts to secure the beach.
Once ashore, they signaled us with three quick flashes from a tactical
SureFire flashlight—the sign it was safe to bring the rest of the team over
the beach. We swam toward the insert point silently kicking our fins, rifles
perched atop our buoyant dry bags should we take fire from the beach—
carefully maintaining a low profile. When we were in about four feet of
water, each man removed his fins and either slung them over his wrist or
quickly attached them to his belt with a carabiner. We moved stealthily out
of the water and across the beach to our swimmer scouts while scanning in
all directions for threats. We were heavily armed shadowy figures gliding
over the sand ready to strike fear in the heart of the enemy. Our scouts had
found a nice rock formation that allowed for good cover and concealment
for the whole team. We set up a security perimeter and began transitioning
out of our dry suits—all of us wearing jungle cammies underneath. Within
minutes we were ready to move out. During our mission planning process,
we’d mapped out the best route to the enemy compound—a small village
and weapons cache. The journey would take us several hours, each student
carrying about sixty pounds of gear. I was a machine gunner—carrying the
M60 and about one thousand rounds of belt-fed 7.62 ammo. So, let’s make
that about 100 pounds of gear. The first leg of the route involved scaling the
cliff that bordered the beach for miles in both directions. Off we went, hot
and sweaty while humping, wet and cold while taking short breaks.
At about 3:00 a.m., we arrived at the coordinates where we’d construct
several hide sites to observe the enemy target for three days before initiating
our assault. We spread the team out along a ridgeline that provided a great
vantage point of the compound about one click (one thousand meters) down
in the ravine below. Time was of the essence as the sun would be peaking
over the horizon soon. Harsh punishments are doled out if the instructors
discover your hide sight. We busted out our shovels and started digging—
others began gathering brush and any available material. The terrain on the
island doesn’t lend well to natural concealment, so we had to get creative
using our packs and camo netting. An hour later, we were huddled in our
respective hide sites mentally preparing for three days of living in, well,
basically a shallow dirt hole. Talk about embracing the suck!
For the next few days we rotated duties for keeping “eyes on”—making
hand sketches of the enemy target, notating sentry routines, taking photos,
and relaying intel back to the tactical operations center (TOC) using our
Special Operations Tactical Video System. I spent my downtime sleeping,
dipping Copenhagen, and daydreaming about our graduation. Sounds fun,
right? On the night of the third day, we were ready to make our assault. We
packed up our gear and broke down the hides.
We spread out into a skirmish line—each man a few meters apart—and
moved down the slope toward the compound. About two hundred meters
from the target, we transitioned into an L-ambush formation. One element
would be the “base” that would soften the target with a violent barrage of
fully automatic machine gun fire. The other element would be the
“maneuver” that moved in quickly to begin clearing the compound of
remaining enemy threats. Once set, we began the onslaught. Speed,
surprise, violence of action.
Thwaaaaaaaaaaap! Thwaaaaaaaaaaap! Thwaaaaaaaaaaap!
I was in the base element. We were all lying in the prone position.
Hundreds of well-placed rounds ripped through the walls of each structure.
My M60 barrel glowed red as hot empty shell casings expelled from the
powerful weapon began raining down on us, finding every piece of exposed
skin. The best part is when they wiggle their way inside your camo top
burning the shit out of you as they roll down your back. I still have the scars
to prove it.
“Shift fire, shift fire,” the team leader of the maneuver element said over
the radio. We continued the barrage, but shifted our angle of fire toward the
opposite end of the compound from where the maneuver element would
approach. They moved in quickly and began clearing structures, tossing
crash grenades into each hut before entering. Bang! Bang! Bang! Then our
element moved in—right through a fucking cactus field, of course—to
assist with clearance. Once the target was secure and all enemy threats
eliminated, we set security and started prepping explosives to blow the
weapons cache.
“Gleeson, we’re ready for the det cord,” our squad leader said, telling
me to ready the detonation cord used to connect multiple explosive devices.
“Roger that, stand by,” I replied, quickly digging into my pack. Then
digging a little further. Then a bit further. Fuck! Oh shiiiiiiiit.
“Gleeson hurry up, bro!” he said again. “Dude, I can’t find it. No idea
what happened. I know I packed it!” I responded with a nice blend of panic
and utter embarrassment. Luckily our philosophy is two is one, one is none.
One of the other guys in the squad passed forward the det cord he had
packed. We set the charges and moved out of the blast radius.
“Three, two, one. Execute.”
BOOOOOOM! The explosion vaporized the wooden structure, sending
fragments of plywood soaring into the moonlit sky. We humped out at a
rapid pace so we didn’t miss the extraction time window. About ten minutes
later, we hit the beach and signaled the boats. They immediately signaled
back, and we swam out through the surf zone in true frogman fashion (yet
still only tadpoles). Once on the boats, the instructors called the mission
complete and we headed back to our campus on the other side of the island
for the after-action review—a formal military debrief. My serious infraction
did not go overlooked.
We succeed and fail as a team. So, when individuals make mistakes,
everyone pays the man. Several of us had screwed up or received safety
violations. The instructors assembled the class in formation and ordered
three of us to the front where the infamous Wheel of Misfortune had been
placed.
Okay, so you’ve seen the show Wheel of Fortune, right? Sure you have.
You spin the wheel, pick a letter, and try to solve the puzzle or go bankrupt.
But on the show, bankruptcy doesn’t come with severe physical punishment
—you just lose the money you’ve earned. Now picture a smaller wooden
version of the wheel, but each slot you land on offers a prize of torture, like
getting wet and sandy or endless push-ups, burpees, star jumps, or other
exhausting rewards.
“Gleeson, you’re up!” one instructor shouted. I cringed as I spun the
wheel. Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop… pop.…. pop.… … pop.… .… pop. It
slowly came to its resting place. One hundred eight-counts. It was the worst
of all the exercises, basically burpees on steroids. The class groaned. We’d
been dealt a very bad hand for sure. I could feel the eye-daggers shooting
into my back.
“Alright, you see the wheel. One hundred eight-count body builders.
Bust ’em!” another instructor growled in a Texas accent. “Hooyah,
Instructor Smith!” the class shouted at the top of our lungs in unison. Our
class leader took count as we busted out each eight-count. But there was a
catch. The class was actually fired up and in good spirits. We were basically
done with BUD/S. The next day we’d perform class skits where we get to
make fun of our instructors’ personality flaws, then head back to Coronado.
Each student had embraced so much suck that there was literally nothing
the instructors could do to break us at that point, and they knew it. Months
of psychological and physical punishment had made us harder and mentally
tougher than we’d ever been in our lives. And we’d only get harder as the
months and years go on. We’d been dealt a bad hand due to very avoidable
mistakes. But so what? Was doing one hundred eight-counts our first
choice? No. But we’d happily do one thousand if we had to. We had
frogman fire flowing through our veins.
Our class laughed and made jokes, taunting the instructors to give us
more. “Beat us harder! What else you got? Hooyah! Hooyahhhhhhh!”
There was no longer a boundary to our comfort zone. Acceptance of pain
was comfortable.
It had become a pathway.
Of the more than 200 students who began in BUD/S class 235,
ultimately only 23 of the original students graduated BUD/S and began
SQT. With the war now raging in Afghanistan and rumors of conflicts in
Iraq, we all knew that we’d be taking the fight to the enemy, and soon.
Mindsets rapidly shifted to the reality that we were now wartime SEALs.
After earning my Trident, I was assigned to SEAL Team Five based in
Coronado, California. That’s when the real training began.

There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who

have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never care
for anything else thereafter.
—ERNEST HEMINGWAY

In November 2002, my task unit was given the final word that we would
be heading to Iraq. SEAL Team Three would be part of the initial assault on
the Al-Faw Peninsula, then push north with conventional forces. My task
unit from Team Five would take over to run “capture or kill” missions in
and around Baghdad,
Ar Ramadi, and Al Fallujah to be the hunters of bad men.
We’d been given our ticket to The Show, which many thought might be
over before it really began. We were wrong.

Iraq 2007
SEAL Team Ten, Two Weeks Before Deploying Home

If you’re curious as to what true resilience looks like, keep reading. This is
the story of my friend and SEAL brother Jason Redman.

If knocked down, I will get back up every time.… I am never

out of the fight.
—NAVY SEAL ETHOS
“One minute out,” the call came over the radio. Three helicopters packed
with combat-hardened SEAL operators and their Iraqi counterparts were on
their final approach to the enemy target in Al Fallujah. They’d been tasked
with capturing a high-ranking Al Qaeda leader, a terrorist they’d been
hunting the entire deployment. This intel was as good as it was going to get.
There was also a general consensus that they could be walking into a
shitstorm of a firefight against highly trained terrorists.
As the SEAL assault force commander, Jason was seated in the lead
bird, which was about to touch down in the street right in front of the main
gate of the compound. We call this “flying onto the X.” Speed, surprise, and
violence of action are crucial. The team breacher and point man were seated
on one side of the helo with Jason and another SEAL on the other. The
landing was supposed to position the breacher’s door facing the gate for a
speedy exit. But as luck would have it, they landed facing the opposite
direction. Time was of the essence, so they had to adapt. Jason and another
SEAL leapt from the bird and sprinted to the main gate, the rest of the
assault force close on their heels, suppressed weapons pointing in all
directions scanning for threats. They checked the gate and to their surprise
found it was unlocked. The team entered quickly in expert formation, a
result of years of training and hundreds of similar combat missions. They
stacked along the outer wall of the main building as the breacher worked to
open the door. Jason’s heart pounded yet he maintained total situational
awareness. Each man moved with complete resolve, knowing they might be
walking into a barrage of gunfire immediately upon entry. With the door
quickly breached, they flooded the large front room. But instead of taking
AK-47 rounds to the chest, there was nothing. They continued to clear the
target, moving through the main building and smaller surrounding
structures. No bad guys. A dry hole as we call it. They did, however, find a
massive weapons cache in one of the smaller buildings along the perimeter
of the walled compound. Once the target was officially called clear, they set
security and began a sensitive sight exploitation (SSE). Jason stood on the
front steps of the central building directing traffic as a Spectre gunship
circled overhead providing air support.
“Sir, looks like we’ve got several potential enemy squirters moving from
a house into the field across the street about 150 meters north of your
location,” said one of the gunship techs.
 “Roger that,” Jason replied. He quickly called the TOC and relayed what
the pilot had told him. Standard operating procedure is typically to make
pursuit, so Jason gathered a small team of SEALs, Iraqi counterparts, and
their interpreter and moved quickly down the road toward the last known
position of the enemy. As they moved to the edge of the field the gunship
continued to relay the enemy positions in the thick brush.
“Can you tell if they have weapons?” Jason asked the gunship. “No, sir.”
Jason called for the team to spread out into a skirmish line, each man about
ten meters apart. In a conversation I later had with Jason about this very
moment he told me that his Spidey sense was tingling big time. Something
just didn’t seem right. And if you’ve ever pursued enemy fighters through
extremely thick brush at nighttime, you know that night vision goggles are
about as worthless as chicken shit on a pump handle (just some good old
Texas slang for you).
Jason requested everyone switch to another frequency so they could
communicate with each other while he maintained additional comms with
the gunship. But not everyone heard it, so the right and left flak teams
ended up on different frequencies. So, when Jason ordered them to push
toward the northeast part of the field, the left flank team continued toward
the northwest creating a massive gap. Now with almost zero visibility and
no solid updates from the gunship, Jason ordered his team to take a knee
and wait. A minute later his interpreter approached him and mentioned that
the left flank team was no longer there. Shit. They were still on the other
frequency and hadn’t heard the call.
Jason and his team moved from their position and continued to push
toward the northeast edge of the field. The thick brush soon opened to a
clearing, a flat dirt lot between the field and adjacent road about fifty meters
to the east. As they broke into the clearing Jason’s corpsman stepped right
on top of a hidden enemy fighter. The fighter tried to roll over but the
SEAL delivered a three-round burst to his chest. A firefight immediately
ensued—the corpsman taking a round in the leg. Jason called out to the left
flank team. “I think that decision really fucked us,” he later told me.
All of a sudden, they took a violent barrage of heavy machine gun fire
from a barricaded enemy position only twenty meters away. They had
walked right into an ambush. Jason took a large caliber round through the
elbow and was stitched across the body armor and helmet, his left NVG
tube blown clear off. Jason hit the ground, his left forearm dangling by a
thread. His other teammates were now behind the only cover in the open
area, a tractor tire. Jason was between them and the enemy position with a
firefight raging inches above his head. He knew he had to get out of the kill
zone to the cover position. Rounds were cracking all around him. He got up
and began running. A machine gun round hit him right in front of his right
ear and blew out the right side of his face. Down he went. His teammates
witnessed what had happened and assumed the worst. They fought on.
Jason’s team leader and Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC) hopped on
the radio and pleaded with the gunship to drop ordnance danger close.
“Negative. We’ll kill you if we drop,” they replied.
Alive but unconscious, Jason laid face down in the dirt with a pool of
blood quickly expanding beneath him. When he came to, bullets were still
flying. He knew he didn’t have long to live. He called out to his teammates,
shocking them that he was alive. “Give me a headcount! How long until the
medevac?” he yelled. “I’m on it, bro, stand by!” the team leader called
back.
After reminding them again they could be killed, a gunship crew
member requested the SEAL’s JTAC number and confirmed the drop.
About a minute later, the enemy position was destroyed by heavy ordnance
from the gunship. The machine gun fire stopped immediately. Jason’s
teammates ran to his position and began dragging him as the medevac helo
landed thirty meters away. The pain was unbearable, so Jason found his feet
and walked unaccompanied the rest of the way. “All I remember is looking
down and seeing what seemed like gallons of blood streaming onto my
boots as I walked,” he told me.
Jason soon found out that he had been shot seven times in the face,
chest, and arms. The most devastating round had entered through the right
side of his head and exited through his nose—or where his nose used to be.
His left elbow had been thoroughly shattered and his forearm was attached
only by flesh and tendons.
Jason arrived at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda,
Maryland, on September 16, 2007. Over the next five years, he endured
thirty-seven surgeries and required twelve hundred stitches, two hundred
staples, fifteen skin grafts, and one tracheotomy. He lost his sense of smell
and has a limited range of motion in his left arm.
 While Jason was recovering, he had many visitors, including teammates,
family, and friends. But he quickly became frustrated by all the sorrow and
tears, so he hung a sign on his hospital door. The bright orange poster read:

Attention to all who enter here. If you are coming into this room
with sorrow or to feel sorry for my wounds, go elsewhere. The
wounds I received I got in a job I love, doing it for people I
love, supporting the freedom of a country I deeply love. I am
incredibly tough and will make a full recovery. What is full?
That is the absolute utmost physically my body has the ability
to recover. Then I will push that about 20 percent further
through sheer mental tenacity. This room you are about to
enter is a room of fun, optimism, and intense rapid regrowth. If
you are not prepared for that, go elsewhere.
—The Management

The sign attracted the attention of then-President George W. Bush,

whom Jason later had the chance to meet in the Oval Office. The sign now
hangs in the wounded ward of Walter Reed National Military Medical
Center.
The doctors provided a laundry list of things Jason would never be able
to do again. In public, almost everyone assumed he had been in a terrible
car accident or motorcycle crash—nobody ever asked if it had been through
military service. He later had a T-shirt made that read: “Stop staring. I got
shot by a machine gun. It would have killed you.” Jason, and many others
with similar stories, live the SEAL Ethos every day. They are still in the
fight. No regrets.
Inspired by that? No shit. Me too. Feel kind of stupid because you just
screamed a flurry of expletives after stepping on a Lego? Jason has made
far more than a full recovery. He fully recovered physically, is in a better
state of mind than ever, is happily married with children, and coaches
individuals and organizations on his “Overcome” philosophy of resilience
and leadership. He’s a successful entrepreneur, world-renowned
motivational speaker, and two-time best-selling author of The Trident and
Overcome. He’s grateful, kind, and still gives to causes greater than himself.
Basically, he’s a total badass. Not too shabby. The point is that anyone (with
the right amount of resolve) can embrace this warrior mindset and
overcome seemingly insurmountable odds despite getting dealt some shitty
cards. How we view and respond to adversity is a choice.

In 2001, Glenn E. Mangurian suffered an unprovoked disc rupture that left

him paralyzed from the waist down. He contends that a traumatic event can
cause one to rethink their life, beliefs, and moral convictions. In his
Harvard Business Review article “Realizing What You’re Made Of,” he
shares six pillars for gaining wisdom through adversity:

1. You can’t know what will happen until tomorrow—and it’s better
that way.
2. You can’t control what happens, just how you respond.
3. Adversity distorts reality but crystallizes the truth.
4. Loss amplifies the value of what remains.
5. It’s easier to create new dreams than cling to broken ones.
6. Your happiness is more important than righting injustices.

Building resilience—which we will dive deep into in the coming

chapters—starts with embracing the suck. Moving from causal thinking and
analysis paralysis to action-oriented execution. Moving past the “Why me,
why now?” mindset to finding a new path; asking, “What have I gained
from this, and how can I use that as fuel for my journey?”

Mental Model
The Five-Step Root Cause Analysis
How often do we spend way too much of our valuable and very limited
time dwelling on why awful things happen to us or our loved ones as
opposed to finding the root cause (if there is one worth defining) and taking
action to move forward? Usually way too much time. Causal thinking and
analysis paralysis can keep us locked in our tiny box of mediocrity, content
to eat Ritz crackers and watch daytime TV, impairing our ability to learn
from bad experiences and take fucking action. Causal reasoning is the
process of identifying causality, the relationship between a cause and its
effect. The study of causality extends from ancient philosophy to
contemporary neuropsychology, but let’s keep it simple: I’m basically
talking about dwelling on the past. We should learn from it, but not dwell
on it.
On the battlefield, analysis paralysis can literally get you killed. In the
moment, you don’t have time to ponder a mistake or mourn a fallen
teammate who’s bleeding out fifteen feet away. When you get pinned down
by enemy fire and have to choose between three bad options, you still have
to choose. When your platoon commander gets shot in the face, you still
have to win the gunfight before you can render any significant aid.
Otherwise, more casualties pile up. It sucks, but that’s the reality of war.
On your path to embracing the suck and living an extraordinary life, you
will be dealt some bad cards. Obstacles crop up in the most untimely
manner, be they an enemy ambush, a global pandemic, a citywide riot, or a
horrible medical prognosis. So what? Control what you can and deprioritize
what you can’t.
There is a big difference between being trapped in causal reflection and
applying lessons learned to take action. When we can transform our minds
toward action-oriented thinking by accepting life’s sick little jokes and
learning what we can along the way, awesomeness and winning are sure to
follow. Just remember, winning never comes without adversity. They are
joined at the hip.

If it doesn’t involve at least a little bit of pain, adversity, or

challenge, it’s not worth doing.
 You have goals for your life, right? If not, you’re a loser and this book
won’t help you. But assuming you do, please keep reading. When have you
ever achieved anything truly fulfilling without some challenges along the
way? Never. If you have, the goal wasn’t that great in the first place. Sorry,
I’m just saying. Maybe it’s starting a business or family, getting into a great
school, developing your skills at a sport you love, growing a vegetable
garden, raising your children, mastering the art of walking on stilts, or being
elected president. Whatever the goal, there are always obstacles and bad
cards to contend with along the way. Businesses fail. Families fall apart.
Schools deny applications. Coaches pick other players. Gardens get
ransacked by teams of hungry special ops vermin that attack in the night
(those fuckers ruined our garden, by the way). Children become teenagers.
Only a weirdo would feel the need to master the art of stilt-walking. And
not just anyone can become president—although I’m starting to think that’s
not the case anymore. But let’s not go down the politics rabbit hole right
now.
You can’t always control what the Wheel of Misfortune has in store for
you or when and where you’ll get hit with enemy fire, but you can control
what you learn from these experiences and how you fight back. You can
wallow in misery or tell tragedy to go fuck itself with the mindset David
Goggins explains in his book Can’t Hurt Me. You can drop heavy ordnance
on that enemy position, get up, dust yourself off, and live to fight another
day. When obstacles strike (and they will), you need to identify the root
cause, apply lessons learned, and move on with life.
How? By using the Embrace the Suck Five-Step Root Cause Analysis
mental model.
 For example, let’s say you lost your job. That’s The Shitty Thing That
Happened. It was unexpected, came out of nowhere with no significant
indicators and no lengthy explanation from your manager. Okay, so now
you have a name for the problem. Now you ask yourself why you think this
happened. Make a list of possibilities both in your control and potentially
out of your control. Let’s say, hypothetically speaking, that the company is
in financial strain due to an unforeseen global pandemic and downsizing
your division, while keeping their top performers—you’re apparently not
one of them. There’s your High Level Cause.
Okay, why? Move to step three to identify the Deep Level Root Cause,
only focusing on the aspects in your control—actual or perceived
underperformance. Don’t dwell on anything beyond your sphere of
influence. Ask yourself why five times, digging deeper each time.

Why? Well, I guess I could have taken more ownership over my

role regardless of the lack of clarity provided by my manager
(who’s an asshole, by the way).

Why? There was a lack of clarity because it wasn’t provided but,

most importantly, I didn’t ask.
 Why? Because I’d been in this role for a year and felt unsafe in
shedding light on the fact that I wasn’t totally clear about my role
or how I contributed to mission success.

Why? I suppose my manager doesn’t really foster an

environment of psychological safety, but I was also relatively
comfortable doing the bare minimum.

Why? The star players who were “all in” had a lot more work to
do and were always called upon to take on new projects. I
enjoyed leaving at 5:00 p.m. every day to go to yoga. Well damn,
now I have no job but plenty of time for yoga (but the studio
closed), wallowing in misery, and walking my Shih Tzu in the
park by my apartment—which I now can’t afford.

Move to step four and make a list of your Lessons Learned. Perform
your personal after-action review. Ask: what did I do well, what did I not do
so well, and what will I change to enhance my performance? Document
your findings. With that data, you are now ready for Action Planning. Make
it specific. And make sure your goals are concise, realistic, and time bound.
We’ll get into the Embrace the Suck action planning model later, but start
with a simple objective statement such as “to never lose another job for
underperformance.”
But sometimes things aren’t so clear cut. Have you ever experienced
stress or anxiety but were unsure what was really driving those feelings?
Sometimes it’s truly as easy as using this simple tool. Interestingly enough,
I often find that what I’ve initially labeled as the Shitty Thing isn’t even
what’s causing the stress. When we mislabel what we’re worrying about,
we are ill-equipped to develop the proper plan of action to alleviate the
anxiety. Once properly identified, you can develop a plan of attack that only
addresses the elements that are under your control.
By using this model in its simplest form, the process becomes muscle
memory. It becomes your natural state of mind when faced with adversity.
You continue to build mental calluses and emotional fortitude by executing
your action plans. Your personal feedback loops place you in a constant
state of course correction and improvement. You bounce back faster each
time tragedy strikes. Your perception of adversity and its impact on you and
those around you evolves.
Did Jason get shot in the face? You’re damn right he did. He was already
a great combat leader, and now he’s an even stronger person for it. He
didn’t waste a second crying about it. He walked his bad ass to that
medevac helicopter and never looked back. He turned tragedy into a tool for
inspiring others. Pretty fucking cool in my opinion.

Great, So What Now?

Well, now you start using this approach. Test yourself. Reflect on how
you’ve reacted in the past when dealt crappy cards and measure how
quickly you recovered. Build a baseline to improve upon. How long did it
take you to course correct? To shift fire on the battlefield? To call for air
support? Be open to learning from others you know who had to become
more resilient just to survive tragedy—be it a brain tumor, divorce, car
crash, getting fired, losing a small business, being laid off, or taking a little
point-blank machine gun fire. How did they get through it? You’d be
surprised. Once you open up and start sharing your struggles with others
you trust, you’ll always find people who have been through much worse.
Use that knowledge to gain perspective.
Identify the root causes of your failures, pain, and barriers to happiness,
then develop a plan and execute, execute, execute.

Questions to ask yourself:

When I get knocked down, do I get back up quickly or tend to
drown in self-pity?
Do I trend initially toward surprise, denial, and anger when
given feedback or do I accept it and take action?
What have I learned from the adversity I have experienced in
my life? Did I apply that to make positive changes? If so, have
I been consistent in applying those changes?
Do I spend too much time analyzing what’s beyond my control
or find the silver lining and move forward?
How am I going to hold myself accountable to using the Five-
Step Root Cause Analysis mental model?
 3
OH, AND MAYBE YOUR VALUES ARE
ALL WRONG

Values are like fingerprints. Nobody’s are the same but you leave
them all over everything you do.
—ELVIS PRESLEY

Why do horrible and unjust things happen to good people? Why are kind
people inflicted with terminal illnesses while evil and selfish people seem to
breeze through life without a scratch? Why do people of great principle die
young before having the opportunity to get married, have children, or leave
their mark on the world? If you are a person of faith (whatever faith that
may be), you most likely believe there is a greater plan for each of us—a
plan we will never fully understand and that may only come to fruition
when we stay true to our values. (Assuming those values don’t suck, of
course.) Core values are the fundamental beliefs of a person or
organization. These guiding principles ideally dictate behavior and can help
us understand the difference between right and wrong. When clearly
defined, they provide a beacon that keeps us on the path to an extraordinary
life.

BUD/S Class 235 Hell Week

March 2001, Coronado, California
10:05 P.M.

By Wednesday night, there were only about forty students remaining in

class 235. We were running on fumes, delirious from sleep deprivation and
the sensory overload that comes with nonstop pain. But we were starting to
see the light at the end of the torture tunnel. Some in our class had been
rolled back for injuries and would pick up with the next class once they’d
healed. But most had decided this life wasn’t for them. Soon after each man
succumbed to the suffering and could embrace no more suck, they went to
the infamous courtyard—called “The Grinder”—and rang the bell that
hangs there, then placed their green helmet in line with the others.
It had been raining for three days. I had no skin left on my knees,
between my legs, around my waist, in my armpits, or on the top of my head.
My nipples were bloody nubs. I was covered in blisters. The severe sting of
the saltwater on the open wounds was a nice touch as well. Oh, and my
elbow was, of course, still fractured. One of my buddies who was in my
crew actually had two broken shins—but he suffered through the extreme
pain in silence so he could finish Hell Week.
We stood at attention on the pool deck awaiting further instructions for
our next evolution—the caterpillar swim. I wish it were as cute as it sounds
—like an activity at a little kid’s birthday party—but that’s unfortunately
not the case. Our class leader, John, was hunched over on the stairs gasping
for air. He was suffering from severe pneumonia and his lung air sacs,
alveoli, were filling with fluid as each hour passed. He’d been in med
checks all week, but still led the class like the passionate professional he
was. But John now looked worse than any of us. The instructors asked him
if he could continue and, of course, he said he could. But by the look of his
physical state, I feared he wouldn’t make it much further.
They ordered the lot of us to get in the pool with our boat crews. We
were fully clothed. The caterpillar swim is a race against the other crews.
The students in each boat crew are swimming on their backs, legs wrapped
around the waist of the man in front of him, using only their arms for
propulsion. The evolution is very difficult when you’re fresh, so imagine
the challenge it posed four days into Hell Week. My crew was halfway
down the length of the Olympic-size swimming pool when two instructors
dove into the water. Another instructor with a megaphone told us to exit the
pool and sit along the fence facing the opposite direction with our heads
down. John’s body had gone limp and sunk to the bottom of the nine-foot
section like he was wearing cement boots. We heard the panic in their
voices as they tried to revive him. They then quickly loaded him in the
ambulance that was on standby. The class was told to run back across the
street to the training center and wait in the classroom.
A few hours later, we still waited, exhausted and confused. All of a
sudden, the door opened and the commanding officer of BUD/S walked in
and headed straight to the front of the room. He wasted no time.
“Mr. Skop is dead. Mr. Porado, you’re the new class leader,” he said,
looking at the officer who was second in command. He paused to let the
news sink in. It was like we’d been kicked in the gut, already fragile from
injury, illness, and sleep deprivation. Tears streamed down cheeks, flowing
from eyes bearing a thousand-yard stare. “Gents, get used to this. This will
most likely be the first of many brothers you’ll lose. And unfortunately, we
have to secure Hell Week now. You guys are done.” Then he left the room
like it was just another fucked-up day at the office.
A wave of guilt hit me as soon as I felt the relief of hearing those words.
We were done. We’d finished Hell Week—the toughest week of military
training known to man. But we were done because John was dead. I
struggled to comprehend the meaning of it all, having never lost anyone
close to me before. The commanding officer’s words unintentionally
foreshadowed the events to come. The 9/11 attacks occurred a few months
later, and I can’t even recall how many SEAL funerals I’ve been to since.
Too many.
John was a man who lived by a set of solid core values. He was a well-
respected leader who didn’t deserve to die. It goes to show that life can be
very short—why waste a second of it living misguided by a poor set of
values?
As they say, the show must go on. The following week, training
resumed. Since our Hell Week had been secured a day early, the instructors
needed to exact their vengeance. Normally, the week after Hell Week is
called “walk week.” Your body is so broken they don’t demand the usual
sixty miles per week of running. You’re allowed to walk. But there was no
walk week for class 235. We got beat harder and more viciously than ever.
It was punishment. Bad cards being dealt each day. But we didn’t give a
shit. We had a mission to complete. The pain of losing John was the fuel
needed for our journey.
As I previously mentioned, the Naval Special Warfare community has
invested millions of dollars in research trying to identify the cognitive,
physical, and emotional attributes of the students who are most likely to
graduate. The most interesting data points are centered on the difficult to
measure but important aspects of shared values, emotional maturity, and a
deep passion to serve. Feeling connected to the mission carries guys
through the most painful times. They have a vision that must be fulfilled, a
goal so important that nothing will stand in their way. They have core
values that mesh well with the SEAL community.
Every decision we make is either a conscious or unconscious attempt to
satisfy our needs. Even in SEAL training. Over time, humans have
developed six ways of making decisions—instincts, subconscious beliefs,
conscious beliefs, intuition, inspiration, and values.
Values are an integral part of life and they play an important role in the
way our lives unfold. They are, of course, highly personal and can vary
significantly from person to person. It’s important that you know what your
values are, so you can make the best possible decisions for executing your
personal mission plan.
It’s important to ask ourselves the following questions:

What do I value most in life?

What is my ultimate purpose? My why?
What is my plan for fulfilling that purpose?

If we can’t answer these questions with conviction, it becomes very

challenging to align our decisions, activities, and behaviors with achieving
our goals. Our values will be tested many times on the battlefield of life,
and our experiences can shape those values, for better or worse. And
sometimes, even when we have clearly defined those values, we lose sight
of them.
But what if one day you realize—or are told—that you have shitty
values? And maybe those values are leading you in the wrong direction? Or
possibly driving you to pursue goals for all the wrong reasons? Consider a
guy I used to know, let’s call him Jeff. He was an intelligent, eager young
entrepreneur who’d found some relative success with his first couple of
ventures after grad school. He was driven by money and the notion of
prominence, but also suffered from a solid case of “only child” syndrome.
He was entitled and selfish. All his personal and professional goals
revolved around acquiring more things. More money. A bigger house. A
Ferrari by a certain age. The list goes on and on.
One day, Jeff was complaining to me about his marriage—his “bipolar”
wife, their constant fighting. He was bitching about how she was always
yelling at him for not helping with the baby, taking out the trash, or fixing
the broken kitchen drawer. I listened, pondering his point of view but trying
to understand hers as well. I knew the guy really well, so I asked him how
he planned to address these common but unavoidable realities of a marriage
partnership. His prizewinning response was that he’d prioritize his wife and
kid once his start-up reached a certain revenue goal. Yep! A certain revenue
goal. As if it was part of his business plan. When revenue hits X, I will fix Y.
You can’t make this up.
After a brief pause, I responded, “Okay, sooooo you’re telling me you
will prioritize your family—your family—only after your company reaches
X revenue, which potentially, or most likely, has an unforeseen timeline?”
Of course, what I was really thinking was, They won’t be around by the time
that event occurs, if it ever does. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. I just
can’t focus on that right now,” he confirmed. His firm conviction made it
even more shocking.
His values seemed to be… what’s the phrase I’m looking for… total
shit! Not to mention I knew he was using “business trips” as a reason to
engage in extreme debauchery and play poker all night. He’s another reason
I don’t care for poker, by the way. Did his wife have anger issues? Ya
think?!
You see, Jeff had perfectly normal aspirations for a young entrepreneur:
growth, monetary reward, building something great, providing jobs, and
creating shareholder value. But he was also doing it at the expense of others
and based on a totally misguided set of values. Not long after that
conversation, his wife left him and they entered an emotionally (and
financially) costly divorce process. He soared to new heights of pill-
popping, anxiety rendering him incapable of properly leading his business
to the next level. It never even came close to reaching that revenue target,
and his business was sold for its debt years later. He learned valuable
lessons from these experiences and went on to do great things. But I assume
he always asks, “What if?”

If our values don’t align with what we want out of life—I mean, of course,
the things that really matter—then we face far greater challenges than when
they do. Sometimes our perspective is skewed. We chase the wrong dreams
and faulty aspirations that leave us empty, void unfulfilled.
One of my favorite poems is all about living a life of value, knowing
your core values, and living by them every day. The poem is titled “Death
Song,” and it was written by Tecumseh. Tecumseh was a Native American
Shawnee warrior and chief, who became the primary leader of a large,
multi-tribal confederacy in the early nineteenth century. Born in the Ohio
Country (present-day Ohio), and growing up during the American
Revolutionary War and the Northwest Indian War, Tecumseh was exposed
to warfare and envisioned the establishment of an independent Native
American nation east of the Mississippi River under British protection.
Tecumseh was among the most celebrated Native American leaders in
history and was known as a strong and eloquent orator who promoted tribal
unity. He was also ambitious, willing to take risks, and make significant
sacrifices to repel the Americans from Native American lands in the Old
Northwest Territory.
The poem is widely shared in the Naval Special Warfare community,
and in many ways captures our values and how we approach life and work.

So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.
Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view,
and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your
life, and beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life
long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble
death song for the day when you go over the great divide.
 Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a
friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all
people and grovel to none.
When you arise in the morning give thanks for the light, your
strength, the food, and for the joy of living. If you see no reason
for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and
no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit
of its vision.
When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are
filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they
weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again
in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going
home.

The last paragraph has the most impact on me. It’s about living with the
end in mind—your personal exit strategy, if you will. It challenges you to
define what winning looks like and work backward from there, rather than
leaving your list of regrets to chance. Personal transformation in the
embrace the suck journey often involves values analysis before you can
start getting comfortable being uncomfortable, and auditing our moral
convictions so they are authentic and in line with what we want out of this
short life.

James Clear, American author, entrepreneur, and world-famous

photographer, says, “Making better choices is often a matter of choosing
better constraints. By limiting your options to those that fit your values, you
are taking an important step to ensuring that your behavior matches your
beliefs. Plus, constraints will boost your creativity. Know your principles
and you can choose your methods.” Essentially, any action or choice should
clearly fit within your value lane markers. Deviation outside those markers
typically ends in tragedy. Again, that assumes your values don’t suck. You
need to ask yourself what you are willing to do to live by those values and,
even more importantly, what you are unwilling to do to avoid deviation.
John Skop was a man of great values and solid moral conviction. He had
been an intel officer at SEAL Team One prior to joining BUD/S class 235.
His values drove his decision to take his service to this great nation to the
next level. He cared so deeply about becoming a SEAL and giving to a
cause greater than himself that he was willing to risk it all in chasing that
dream. His paddle is a constant reminder to me of the importance of living a
values-driven life.

Mental Model
The Personal Values Manifesto
Since 9/11, the NSW community has constantly applied lessons learned on
the battlefield to adjust its conflict strategies and tactics. Our ethos is
essentially the culture statement that guides who we are and why we exist.
It defines our values. By 2005, we had been operating in volatile and
uncertain environments for four years, but we’d never taken the time to
clearly articulate who we are as a team, a community. What do we stand
for? What’s our true purpose? Why do we exist? What do we expect of
ourselves and each other? What foundation exists from which we make our
decisions? What values not only define us, but who we want to bring into
our crazy little world? So, in 2005, a leadership off-site event was
scheduled. Sounds very corporate, right? The goal was to create the NSW
credo. And thus, the Navy SEAL Ethos was born:

In times of war or uncertainty there is a special breed of warrior ready

to answer our nation’s call. A common man with an uncommon desire
to succeed. Forged by adversity, he stands alongside America’s finest
special operations forces to serve his country, the American people,
and protect their way of life. I am that man.
My Trident is a symbol of honor and heritage. Bestowed upon me
by the heroes that have gone before, it embodies the trust of those I
have sworn to protect. By wearing the Trident I accept the
responsibility of my chosen profession and way of life. It is a privilege
that I must earn every day. My loyalty to country and team is beyond
 reproach. I humbly serve as a guardian to my fellow Americans always
ready to defend those who are unable to defend themselves. I do not
advertise the nature of my work, nor seek recognition for my actions. I
voluntarily accept the inherent hazards of my profession, placing the
welfare and security of others before my own. I serve with honor on
and off the battlefield. The ability to control my emotions and my
actions, regardless of circumstances, sets me apart from other men.
Uncompromising integrity is my standard. My character and honor are
steadfast. My word is my bond.
We expect to lead and be led. In the absence of orders, I will take
charge, lead my teammates, and accomplish the mission. I lead by
example in all situations. I will never quit. I persevere and thrive on
adversity. My Nation expects me to be physically harder and mentally
stronger than my enemies. If knocked down, I will get back up, every
time. I will draw on every remaining ounce of strength to protect my
teammates and to accomplish our mission. I am never out of the fight.
We demand discipline. We expect innovation. The lives of my
teammates and the success of our mission depends on me—my
technical skill, tactical proficiency, and attention to detail. My training
is never complete.
We train for war and fight to win. I stand ready to bring the full
spectrum of combat power to bear in order to achieve my mission and
the goals established by my country. The execution of my duties will
be swift and violent when required yet guided by the very principles
that I serve to defend. Brave men have fought and died building the
proud tradition and feared reputation that I am bound to uphold. In the
worst of conditions, the legacy of my teammates steadies my resolve
and silently guides my every deed.
I will not fail.

Let’s break this down. In the first paragraph we define who we are and
state the fact that “I am that man.” If I couldn’t have authentically believed
that I am that man the day I began BUD/S, I would have had no business
being there. The most powerful statement related to values, however, is:
“The execution of my duties will be swift and violent when required yet
guided by the very principles that I serve to defend.” Regardless of the goal,
when we sacrifice our values in an effort to achieve that goal, all is lost.
Earning the Trident pin is truly a privilege bestowed on us by the heroes
who have gone before—a privilege we earn, not once, but every single day.
Have you ever taken the time to write down your values? You’ve
probably thought about them or even talked about what matters most to
you, but have you actually documented your core beliefs and values? If you
have, did you also apply the behaviors you expect from yourself and others,
as well as specific ways to hold yourself accountable? If special operations
units, winning sports teams, and high-performing business organizations do
it, why shouldn’t we do it for ourselves?
So if you haven’t, let’s do that now using the Personal Values Manifesto
mental model—which consists of clearly defined core values, supporting
behaviors, and accountability mechanisms.

STEP ONE: Get off your ass and go get a pad of Post-it Notes.
Yes, now, please. Find a quiet place void of toddlers, coworkers,
lawn mowers, clowns, and terrorists. Grab yourself a good pen
with plenty of ink. Start by writing one core value on each Post-it.
For example, faith, integrity, wellness, family, etc. Remember,
they must be meaningful to you. Authentic. Not values you think
others would like to see you have. There can be an aspirational
element to each—something to aspire to improve or live by more
closely—but they have to be real. Write down as many as you
can think of. Don’t worry about themes or redundancy. We’ll get
to categorization later.

STEP TWO: Okay, now you have a pile of pink Post-it Notes
with very inspiring and thought-provoking shit on them. You’re
saying to yourself, Man, I value lots of stuff, this is great. If you
only have one or two Post-its, you’re a lost cause. Just kidding—
keep at it, then come back to this step. Now categorize them into
themes as best you can. Group them into piles, stick them on
the window, the mirror, a white board, whatever works best. You
will dive deeper when you detail the supporting behaviors and
 accountability mechanisms in the next step, but for now, narrow
it down to between four and six core values.

STEP THREE: Now you are ready to list Supporting Behaviors

for each core value. For example, if integrity is a value, what
does that mean to you specifically? What behavioral norms are
you going to live by that support your value of integrity? What
lengths are you willing to go to and what are you absolutely
unwilling to do in order to live by that value? If wellness is a
value, what are you going to do every day to embody that value?
Get up at a specific time for exercise? Set time-bound goals?
Design a new dietary plan? And no, I’m not talking about New
Year’s resolutions—that shit’s for losers. These are things you’re
going to do consistently year-round, day in and day out. A
lifestyle. Make a short and concise list of two or three supporting
behaviors for each value.

STEP FOUR: Great, you’ve listed your supporting behaviors.

Now what? How will you hold yourself accountable? Be as
specific as possible. List at least one accountability mechanism
for each behavior. For example, if a supporting behavior is to
make time for daily exercise, your accountability mechanism
might be to set an alarm for 5:00 a.m. each day, or 4:30 a.m. if
you’re super hardcore. You can also have others hold you
accountable; tell everyone you’re doing this. When you stray,
which you will, define how you will get back on track.

STEP FIVE: Put it all on paper. Print it out. Laminate it. Keep it
on your desk. Tattoo it on the back of your eyelids. Build an app
that sends you reminders—but please throw me a bone when
you sell it for beaucoup bucks!

When our consulting firm takes clients through this exercise, the
outcome is called a Team Charter, and it defines the values, behaviors, and
accountabilities that are used for everything from talent acquisition and
onboarding to training, performance management systems, and decision-
making. And again, if high-performance teams use this model, why
shouldn’t we use it for ourselves or our families?

Great, So What Now?

Don’t be like Jeff. Be like John. John was called over the great divide as a
young man, but he lived each day leading up to that fateful night in Hell
Week by a set of authentic core values. That’s why he was loved. That’s
why he is deeply missed.
If you take the time to make it real, your Personal Values Manifesto will
not only guide you to new heights, it will help you avoid the many pitfalls
of temptation. So get after it.

Questions to ask yourself:

When was the last time I audited my value system?
Do I make decisions based on a specific moral code? If I have
one, how often do I stray from it?
How has adversity shaped my values? How have they
transformed?
Am I being honest with myself about how my priorities align
with my values?
Am I willing to use this tool and apply it every day?
 4
TAMING TEMPTATION TIGER

I can resist anything except temptation.

—OSCAR WILDE, LADY WINDERMERE’S FAN

Imagine you’re standing on a cliff’s edge, surrounded by thick green jungle

foliage for as far as the eye can see. Colorful birds chirping in the distance.
On the other side of the vast precipice is Glory Town, where your life goals,
ambitions, and delusions of grandeur reside. Unbeknownst to you, the
bottom of the ravine is where Temptation Tiger lives. You’ve heard the
rumors of his immense power. Legend has it that many have ventured into
his lair, never to return.
As you gaze longingly at the magical glow of Glory Town (where your
dreams will come true with no real effort or adversity) contemplating a way
across the ravine, you notice some movement below. Temptation Tiger
casually strolls out of a dark cave. He has a Grey Goose martini in one paw,
a perfectly rolled joint in the other paw, and a smokin’ hot lady tiger on
each arm. His fur is glossy and well-maintained. His teeth are white as
polished ivory. He’s wearing a red silk smoking jacket and a purple paisley
ascot tie. You think to yourself, Huh, he doesn’t seem so bad. He’s clearly
legit!
He looks up, catches your gaze, and says, “Come on down, we’re having
a little get-together tonight. You should join us—the more the merrier!
Plenty of booze, cannabis, heavy hors d’oeuvres, and pretty girls. Gonna get
a poker game going later too. Oh, and all the other players suck, so don’t
worry. Your chances of winning big are high!”
 Well, I do enjoy a good game of poker, you think. I’m not great, but
good enough. The extra cash would definitely come in handy for the rest of
my journey. And I could really use a drink—it’s hot as hell out here. And
who doesn’t like shrimp pot stickers and pretty lady tigers? I’ll just swing
by for a bit and then head toward Glory Town later.
With a slight bit of trepidation (and a small voice in the back of your
mind questioning your judgment), you find a nice thick vine and begin to
shimmy down the cliff face. Once you reach the bottom, Temptation Tiger
strolls over with outstretched arms and a toothy grin and gives you a warm
hug. His furry embrace instantly makes you feel safe. The voice of reason
in your head vanishes and you’re confident in your decision. Glory Town
can wait a little while. Let’s get this party started! Out of nowhere, the
music starts bumping and fireworks burst into the fading light of dusk.
Remember how things turned out for Jeff? The next morning you wake
up with a raging headache, dizzy and still a bit stoned, with no money and
no lady tigers. Oh, and there seems to be no rope ladder to climb up the
other side toward your real dreams. Your headache suddenly gets worse.
Glory Town now seems out of reach. Anxiety and regret set in. All is lost.
You realize that you allowed temptation to lure you down the wrong path,
outside of the healthy constraints of your values. Can you recover from
this? Most likely. Was this avoidable? Absolutely.

Sometimes, Temptation Tiger really bites us in the ass. Literally. Take

Vladimir Markov. He was a selfish and misguided poacher (and ironically
also a beekeeper) who met a grisly end in the winter of 1997 after he shot
and wounded a tiger, then stole part of the tiger’s kill.
The most biodiverse region in all of Russia lies on a chunk of land
sandwiched between China and the Pacific Ocean. There, in Russia’s Far
East, subarctic animals—such as caribou and wolves—mingle with tigers
and other species of the subtropics. It was very nearly a perfect habitat for
the tigers until humans showed up.
The tigers that populate this region are commonly called Siberian tigers,
but they are more accurately known as the Amur tiger. Imagine a creature
that has the agility and appetite of a cat and the mass of an industrial
refrigerator. The Amur tiger can weigh over 500 pounds and can be more
than 10 feet long, nose to tail. These majestic tigers can jump as far as 25
feet; vertically, they can jump over a basketball hoop. They are obviously
not to be trifled with.
Nevertheless, one day Markov and his shitty values came across a tiger
who was gnawing on a fresh kill. Driven by greed, temptation, and the
accumulation of relatively insignificant wealth, Markov thought to himself,
Perfect! Two birds with one stone. A kill to eat and a tiger to sell on the
black market. Markov took aim and shot the tiger, but he only wounded
him. The tiger ran off into the woods, hungry and really pissed off. So,
while licking his wounds, the tiger developed his plan for taking revenge: a
good old-fashioned Navy SEAL–style ambush.
A couple days later, the injured tiger hunted down Markov in a way that
appears to be chillingly premeditated. The tiger staked out Markov’s cabin,
systematically destroyed anything that had Markov’s scent on it, then
waited by the front door for Markov to come home. Martini in one hand,
joint in the other. Instead of a smoking jacket, he was cloaked in rage.
When Markov returned to the cabin, the tiger flicked the joint to the ground,
gently set his drink on the table, then swiftly and violently took his
vengeance. He dragged Markov into the forest, killed, and ate him. All that
remained of the beekeeper were stumps of bone sticking out of his boots, a
bloodied shirt with an arm still inside, a severed hand, a faceless head, and a
gnawed femur.
The moral of the story? Only shoot things that deserve to be shot. Don’t
steal. Don’t poach. And don’t let temptation lead you to make poor
decisions, or you too may end up just like Markov, bloody stumps and all.

Crested Butte, Colorado

May 2000

Crunch… crunch… crunch. My Oakley hiking boots penetrated the freshly

fallen snow with every labored step. The sun had just begun climbing
slowly over the horizon, but the KÜHL pants and Under Armour T-shirt I
was wearing were already dampening with sweat. My chest was heaving
with each labored breath in the thin Colorado air at eleven thousand feet
altitude. My twin brother and college buddy followed closely behind me,
our day packs full of climbing gear, cans of tuna, peanut butter crackers,
and plenty of water—two full Nalgene bottles each. A storm would be
setting in later that day, and we needed to make the peak by early afternoon
so we wouldn’t miss our turnaround window. This was the third time in a
week we’d made this steep ascent; it was part of our ridiculous training
regimen. My buddy Matt from Southern Methodist University and I had
been living in Crested Butte for a couple months, training for ten to twelve
hours a day for the Navy SEAL selection program. I was in the best
condition of my life—at least up to that point.
But let’s back up a bit. I grew up in Dallas, Texas, in an upper middle-
class family with my mom, dad, twin brother, and a yellow lab named
Jenny. We lived in a white ranch-style house on Prestonshire Lane. My
brother and I both attended St. Michael’s for elementary school, followed
by the Episcopal School of Dallas (ESD) for middle school. Coincidentally,
one of my BUD/S classmates, SEAL Team Five teammates, and now dear
friend was at ESD at the same time—but I wouldn’t find that out until years
later. My dad was a successful commercial real estate pro and Mom was a
speech pathologist. She also did a lot of volunteer work through the Junior
League in her spare time. Life was pretty good, with no real adversity to
speak of.
We attended Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas for high
school. We initially weren’t thrilled about leaving ESD, but we weren’t
given a choice. It turned out to be an amazing experience. I joined the swim
team my freshman year. Apparently, the team needed someone with a
strong backstroke. I was a freestyle guy myself and I hated backstroke, but I
was the new guy, so guess who got to embrace that suck? Gleeson did. I
know, I know. Get some real problems, right?!
Anyway, high school was going pretty well. Around the latter part of
sophomore year, I reconnected with my best friend from elementary school.
He was attending the public school that I would have gone to had I not been
in private school, Hillcrest High School. Unfortunately, Temptation Tiger
had already started sinking his claws into this young man’s cerebral cortex.
He’d skip school, drink, and hang out with the other “cool” kids. He was
known as a tough guy, good fighter, and a lady’s man. He was a bad boy
and I wanted a piece of that action. We started hanging out again. This was
a very different crowd, socially speaking. But there seemed to be a pattern.
My Jesuit buddies—when not distracted by sports, academics, and charity
work—liked to drink beer, listen to country music, and engage in the
occasional brawl. If that ain’t Texas, I don’t know what is. This other crew
liked to drink, listen to rap music, and fight. So essentially, there was
temptation all around, and I made no real effort to avoid the tiger’s warm
embrace.
I had a fire burning deep inside my soul. It wasn’t driven by childhood
abuse or poverty; no this was something else. I wanted to experience things
outside of my sheltered existence, the good, bad, and ugly. So I did. One
day, I challenged one of Dallas’s biggest high school bullies to fight me for
retribution from another incident. He was two years older, a football player,
twice my size, and an asshole to boot. He was always picking on people,
like Biff Tannen from Back to the Future. Meanwhile, I was a swimmer
who played drums in the jazz band. I’m not totally sure why I did it. I
assume I wanted to prove something to myself in an immature, misguided
high school kind of way. And, of course, I wanted to reap the glory and
respect from my soon-to-be victory.
Let’s just say it didn’t turn out well. Like something out of a movie, we
met at a pre-designated time next to a dumpster behind a pizza restaurant.
Crowds began to swarm—my camp and his. He pulled up in a blue Ford
Mustang, got out, and left the loud rumbling engine running. I assumed
we’d talk some more shit and feel each other out before getting our hands
dirty. We’d shove each other a bit, then people would jump in to break it up.
Easy day. I’d check the box and be a hero. Glory and accolades would soon
follow.
Nope. He walked right up and knocked me the fuck out—or so I’m told.
With my limp jazz-drumming body on the ground, he then kicked me in the
head to finish me off. He may have spit on me too. Not sure.
I regained consciousness in the car. My bad-influence-of-a-friend was
driving me home. Yes, that’s correct. My very own Temptation Tiger.
“What happened? Did I win?” I slurred in my bloody haze. “Haha, hell no.
You got your ass kicked, stupid!” he laughed. In his defense, he was
actually concerned. I flipped the passenger side mirror down and went into
panic mode. “My parents are going to kill me!” I groaned.
So first, I wasn’t supposed to be hanging out with him. My parents had
forbidden it after a high-speed car chase involving Dallas’s finest, but that’s
a story for another time. Anyway, I clearly had a broken nose and the areas
around both eyes were starting to turn that fun purple-yellow color. My jaw
was very sore, and I was spitting gravel into my hand. Damn. That’s not
gravel. Those are teeth. I am soooooo screwed. There is no way to hide this
one.
I walked into the house and my mom saw my face from across the
kitchen. “Oh my gosh, what happened?!” she said in a panicky Dallas
accent. “I ran into a wall playing football after school,”I replied sheepishly.
Yes, that’s all I could come up with. She kind of bought the lie at first, but
she was clearly skeptical. When my dad got home and saw me, he
suspected what had happened but didn’t say anything, probably trying to
spare my mom more grief. I saw that idiot years later at a holiday party in
Dallas after joining the SEAL Teams. He looked a lot less intimidating.
Luckily, I still graduated from Jesuit with decent grades and began
college at Southern Methodist University in August of 1995. I made the
rugby team freshman year and fell in love with the sport. There was no
more swimming nonsense; it was time to crack some skulls! I became close
friends with a guy named Matt from Lubbock, Texas—a fraternity brother a
year behind me in school. We started hanging out more and I quickly
learned of his dream to become a Navy SEAL. I didn’t know much about
the SEAL Teams at the time other than the fact that they were invincible
gods of war! And, of course, glass-eating, fire-breathing behemoths. I’d
read a couple books about SEALs in Vietnam, but that was about it. At that
stage, I had no real intention of serving in the military.
I graduated in May of 1999 and took a job as a financial analyst at
Trammell Crow Company. Matt was a senior and began training hard for
the Navy. I trained with him on nights and weekends, but I had no intention
of joining him on this ridiculous journey of “nautical nonsense” (yes, I’m
borrowing that phrase from SpongeBob SquarePants). Every night when I
arrived home from work, I would quickly change, throw some swim fins
and goggles in a backpack, and run four miles to the SMU natatorium from
my downtown apartment. Matt and I would swim for about an hour, mostly
freestyle and combat sidestroke, the stroke of choice for the entrance PT
test. After busting out some push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups on the pool
deck, I would run four miles home, make a late dinner, go to bed, then do it
all again the next day. On the weekends we would run one or two laps
around White Rock Lake—which is a nearly ten-mile loop.
At the time, distance running wasn’t my thing. It sucked. But I gradually
started loving the pain, and I became addicted to the endorphin high
afterward. As a wise SEAL once said, All you need is a pair of shoes,
shorts, and a place to puke. We signed up for the Dallas White Rock
Marathon, which was the first race for both of us. The goal: run the 26.2
miles in under three-and-a-half hours without walking a single step. Maybe
that doesn’t seem like that big a deal for you runners out there, but back
then, believe me, it was. I was too big from having intentionally gained
weight for rugby. So, at 6′1″ and 220 pounds, I wasn’t exactly built for
distance. I needed to transform mind and body.
Before and after our workouts, Matt and I had long conversations about
the history of the Naval Special Warfare community, the missions, the
mindset, everything. We were fascinated. At work, I sat at my desk on the
forty-second floor of a downtown high-rise building daydreaming about
what it might be like. Matt and I started training harder. I started reading
more about the Teams. One day, everything clicked. I felt a call to serve. A
need to engage in purposeful suffering. To test myself. To reassess my
values. To give to a cause greater than myself.
The next day, I started removing every element of temptation from my
life that stood in the path of my new goal; become a SEAL. The tiger had to
go. I more or less eliminated my social life—not that it was that great in the
first place. I changed my dietary habits and daily routines. I even removed
people from my life who were a negative distraction. All my behaviors and
accountability mechanisms had to be totally aligned to achieve one goal.
My new philosophy: Remove every opportunity for temptation and
distraction—any obstacle or competing priority. Maintain total mission
focus.
About a month later, I gave my notice to the firm, packed my things, and
Matt and I moved to Crested Butte, Colorado, to train at high altitude. It
was a place where Temptation Tiger could never find us. We brought long,
thick nylon ropes and hung them high in cypress trees to climb daily and
build upper body strength. We cut an eight-foot log from a fallen tree to
carry with us on trail runs. Using that same log, we performed log PT, just
like we would in BUD/S. We swam in ice-covered lakes, training our
bodies to accept extreme conditions. We ran for miles on mountain trails
each day. Climbed tall mountains. Did endless calisthenics. Any
punishment we could think of, we did. And we didn’t train in REI’s finest
athletic gear either. Other than the days we did the long mountain ascents,
we wore the same uncomfortable battle dress uniforms and boots we would
be wearing in BUD/S. After several months, we were ready. We left for
Navy boot camp soon after returning home. During boot camp we
performed the SEAL PT test—running, swimming, push-ups, pull-ups, sit-
ups. The test begins with the 500-meter swim, a mass of bodies sprinting
back and forth in the indoor pool. One poor kid almost drowned and had to
be pulled from the water. He must have showed up by mistake. At the end
of that day, only three of us (out of the hundred or so who tried out) were
sitting in the office awaiting orders to BUD/S. Matt, me, and another guy.
Why? Because we had removed temptation and prepared ourselves like
crazy people on a radical mission, leaving little to chance.

Resilience is not about hard work toward short-term gains,

but rather maintaining the long-term grind toward an
ultimate goal.

Nothing had stood in our way, especially not Temptation Tiger. But it
was only the beginning.

Mental Model
Taming Temptation Tiger
The power to resist temptation has been extolled by philosophers,
psychologists, teachers, coaches, and mothers. Anyone with advice on how
you should live your life has surely spoken to you of its benefits. It is the
path to a good life, professional and personal satisfaction, social adjustment,
success, performance under pressure, and the best way for any child to
avoid a Mom’s icy stare over a very silent dinner. Of course, this assumes
that our natural urges are a thing to be resisted—that there is a devil inside
(or at the bottom of a cliff) luring you to cheat, offend, err, or indulge.
Why can’t I keep myself from doing X? Why can’t I accomplish Y?
There are many possible reasons why we fail to resist temptation in our
lives, but one of those answers is that we are not exercising self-control.
You can’t embrace the suck without it. Is this too simplistic? Given recent
findings in psychology and some ancient philosophical thought, simple or
not, for many people this is the key.
In the recent book Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human
Strength, Roy Baumeister and John Tierney discuss some of the
psychological research related to the virtue of self-control. The book kicks
off with the claim that research shows two qualities are consistently good
predictors of success in achieving one’s goals in life: intelligence and self-
control. We may not be able to significantly increase our intelligence, and I
would argue that point a bit, but we can increase our capacity for self-
control. We can train it into ourselves.
The book discusses the muscle model of self-control. Each of us has a
finite amount of willpower, which depletes as we use it. Also, we use the
same stock of willpower for many tasks. If I use up most of my willpower
during the day at work, I may have less self-control at night and be
impatient with my wife and kids. This is the downside. Like a muscle,
exertion results in fatigue. However, over the long term, a muscle that is
consistently exercised increases in stamina and power. Fortunately, the
same is true of self-control as it is for resilience. Like our comfort zone, our
reserve of willpower can grow over time. Our capacity for self-control is
benefitted by setting clear and realistic goals, by monitoring our progress
toward those goals and sharing our successes and setbacks with others.
When we exercise self-control, over time our willpower can increase in
both stamina and impact. This is good news.
One way to cultivate self-control, for example, is to regularly exercise.
In one longitudinal study, individuals who began an exercise program
increased their self-control over a two-month period. They exhibited better
self-control in behaviors that are both related and unrelated to exercise, as
well as their performance on a self-control task in the laboratory. They
watched less television; smoked fewer cigarettes; consumed less alcohol,
caffeine, and junk food; engaged in less impulsive overspending; and
procrastinated less often. In addition, they studied more, were more faithful
in keeping their commitments, and reported an increase in their emotional
control. The findings of this study suggest that our regulatory stock is not
set; it can be increased by several behaviors.

We become just by doing just actions, temperate by doing

temperate actions, brave by doing brave actions.
—ARISTOTLE

Practice doesn’t make perfect, but it can make us better at resisting

temptation and becoming the kind of people we want to and ought to be.
Want to be more resilient? Practice the behaviors and decisions associated
with resilience. Want to exercise better self-control? Start with small
decisions and build from there.

Temptation isn’t always about being lured down a dark path to do bad
things. The modern world we live in is full of real-time messaging,
distractions, and competing priorities. We are constantly inundated with
alerts and communications from our many devices. Technology ensures we
are always connected. And because of these advancements, our needs and
expectations have changed. Constant distractions require us to be more
disciplined than ever before.
Just like a responsible business leader has a specific mission plan with
structured milestones and key performance indicators (KPIs), so too must
those of us wishing to achieve specific personal goals. That mission plan is
critical for maintaining focus on both the long-term vision and the path that
gets us there. And there’s nothing wrong with shifting the plan or changing
our goals—in fact, sometimes it’s absolutely necessary.
 So, without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to the Taming
Temptation Tiger mental model.

Clearly Define Your Goals: We’ll get more into goal setting and
the planning process in later chapters, but it’s necessary to touch
on now as it relates to avoiding temptation and competing
priorities. When we don’t make our goals concise, time bound,
measurable, and realistic (with a strategic plan to support each
goal), it becomes much easier to allow distraction to derail
progress. New shiny objects appear, and we start chasing
“opportunities” unrelated to our goals and values.

Visualize Winning: Literally. Elite athletes and coaches do this.

Special operators do it. Successful entrepreneurs do it. Great
philanthropists. Oscar-winning actors. You name it. When we
visualize the winning outcome and how we will arrive at that
outcome, our brains begin working backward to define the path
forward. If your goal is to run a marathon, then visualize yourself
running the race and feeling the pain, the emotion, and the joy of
 the finish line. Picture each training day leading up to the race.
What will you do? How will you feel? What temptations will you
avoid?

List Obstacles: The best way to avoid temptations and

distractions is to list them. Give them a name. Rank them based
on your tendencies toward weakness in these areas. What
threats and blockages stand in your way? What has caused you
to fail in the past? If you tend to not finish projects you start, ask
yourself the five whys of the Root Cause Analysis Model (here).
Get to the root cause and label it.

Remove Roadblocks: Gradually begin managing these

tendencies and removing obstacles. If you’re stuck in a dead-
end job or relationship, stop being so weak and get the fuck out.
If you want to be a better leader for your team at work, make
time to engage in personal and professional development. And
yes, that means doing it at the expense of other enjoyable but
time-wasting pursuits. Remove all rituals, activities, and
behaviors that stand in your way—but don’t do it at the expense
of other people’s well-being.

Unfuck Yourself: Have a plan for rapid course correction. Find

an accountability partner, a trusted friend or colleague with
whom you share your goals, objectives, challenges, and desired
results. Schedule regular check-ins with your accountability
partner and encourage them to keep you on track and be
brutally honest when necessary. Get angry with yourself when
weakness sets in. Or as David Goggins would say, “Go to war
with yourself.” Then unfuck yourself and course correct as
needed.

Temptation is just a reality of life. Without it, there would be no such thing
as willpower. Life will test you on a regular basis. So be prepared to ace the
test!

Great, So What Now?

Finding magical opportunities beyond our comfort zone requires focus and
follow-through. It also requires action-oriented thinking and resilience. As
we continue to develop discipline and mental toughness, we will be more
equipped to bounce back.
Mental fortitude and emotional intelligence are necessary for life beyond
our comfort zone. They equip us with the battle gear for resisting
temptation and crushing our goals.

Questions to ask yourself:

Do I stand tall in the face of temptation or allow the Tiger to
pull me down the wrong path?
Upon reflection, what have I learned about previous failed
attempts to resist temptation? How can I apply those lessons
learned?
What are the top three temptations holding me back? Can I
use the Taming Temptation Tiger mental model to attack those
roadblocks with a vengeance?
If I know certain temptations hold me back from living a more
fulfilling life, why haven’t I changed those behaviors?
 PART 2

GET COMFORTABLE BEING

UNCOMFORTABLE

The only easy day was yesterday.

—NAVY SEAL PHILOSOPHY
 5
IF YOU AIN’T FAILIN’, YOU AIN’T
TRYIN’

Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the

seed of an equal or greater benefit.
—NAPOLEON HILL

Iraq
Enemy Target in a Rural Area Outside Baghdad
11:43 P.M.

So there I was, waist deep in shit. Literally. In life, things don’t always go
as planned, do they? Let me explain the events leading up to and following
this shitty situation. Here are thirty-one steps to saying, “Well that sure
sucked!”

Step 1: One of our Humvee’s tires blows out on the way to the
target. Stop. Throw in some chewing tobacco. Set security.
Change tire.

Step 2: About a mile out from the target, the AC-130 Spectre
gunship providing air support radios that people are moving on
target.

Step 3: Arrive at target. Assault team inserts about one click

(1,000 meters) from the target house and moves in on foot.
Step 4: We find not one but three structures on target. We
reconfigure into a skirmish line and move through the target
area, clearing one structure at a time.

Step 5: While moving toward a small structure with my squad, a

four-man fire team, I maintain focus on the main door. As I move
closer, I fall waist-deep into a cesspool. I’m covered in human
shit. We were only a few minutes into the mission and it had
already become a crappy situation.

Step 6: The AC-130 gunship radios that we have six squirters

(people running off target) heading north. They drop several
40mm grenade rounds to stop the squirters’ movement. One
squad hops into a Humvee and races off to go round them up.
The AC-130 talks them into the enemy location. It was just two
women and four children—unharmed.

Step 7: We finish clearing the main target house, finding only

one male. Not our guy.

Step 8: During our sensitive sight exploitation we encounter

heavy resistance—from cows, goats, and llamas. They were not
happy about our presence.

Step 9: We find dozens of SA-7s, AK-47s, RPGs, and grenades

under large tarps in the small farmhouse. No bad guys, but at
least we found the weapons cache.

Step 10: I’m still covered in human waste. It stinks.

Step 11: We load some of the weapons into the Humvees and
pile the rest in the main house. Our explosive ordnance disposal
(EOD) technician sets explosive charges to destroy the
weapons.

Step 12: Before blowing the charges, we decide the humane

thing to do is herd all of the enemy cows, goats, and llamas into
a pen on the far side of the property so they don’t get
incinerated.

Step 13: Heavily armed Navy SEALs attempt to herd livestock. It

does not go well. I specifically recall one of our guys—rifle slung
—trying to drag a pissed off goat across the yard using a rope
that had been placed around its neck. Hence the term “goat
rope” (slang for “totally fucked up”).

Step 14: Our lead breacher—a big-time cowboy—comes out of

the house and takes over, successfully herding the animals into
the pen like a pro. It was impressive.

Step 15: Pile into the vehicles and begin exfil off target. Charges
blow, sending a giant fireball into the night sky.

Step 16: One of the vehicles—a $300,000 fully armored

Mercedes G-Class carrying our agency guys and their source—
goes off the road. The intel guy at the wheel had limited
experience driving while wearing night vision goggles.

Step 17: The Mercedes is damaged and must be towed. While

towing it behind one of the Humvees, the rural farm road
narrows, and it rolls off into yet another ditch—with the agency
guys and their source in the vehicle. It’s now lying on its side in a
six-foot-deep trench. Its occupants have to crawl out of the side
windows.

Step 18: I’m still covered in human waste—but at least it’s

starting to dry.

Step 19: We secure cargo straps to the Mercedes, and are able
to pull it right side up and out of the ditch using one of the
Humvees.

Step 20: The convoy resumes exfil and starts heading back to
base. The sun is now coming up. We enter an urban area and
traffic is starting to pick up. Rush hour!

Step 21: The convoy increases speed (standard procedure in an

urban area) and the Mercedes hits a curb and goes halfway off
the side of a bridge. Unbelievable! It’s now wedged into a
smashed cement barrier.

Step 22: Convoy stops, we dismount, throw in some chewing

tobacco, set security, and start directing traffic. Humvees attach
cargo straps but can’t budge the heavy SUV.

Step 23: I flag down a guy with a large cargo truck to help. He
was reluctant, to say the least. Maybe it was my smelly pants
that turned him off, not sure.

Step 24: For two more hours, we direct morning rush hour traffic
and attempt to get the Mercedes off the side of the bridge. It’s
now 10 a.m. the following day. Already above 100 degrees.

Step 25: We eventually say screw it, remove radios and

sensitive material, and leave the SUV behind. We would have to
come back later and get it.

Step 26: We arrive back at base. I take off my disgusting pants

and throw them in the pit where we burned our trash. I walk back
to the tent in boxers and body armor. Fatigue sets in.

Step 27: A few of us and some Army brothers with a flatbed

head back out to retrieve the Mercedes on loan from our agency
partners.

Step 28: We arrive at the bridge only to find that some

innovative individuals had been kind enough to dislodge the
Mercedes from the side of the bridge. The only problem was that
it was completely stripped! No doors. No wheels. Engine gone.

Step 29: Return to base.

 Step 30: Write big check to agency partners.

Step 31: During the after-action review, you think, well, that sure
sucked.

My very first big stage speaking engagement was at the 2012 Inc. 500|5000
Conference and Awards in Phoenix, Arizona, in front of more than 600
people. This particular keynote was part of Inc.’s “vetrepreneur”
celebration, which honors and supports military veteran business owners.
Oh, and I was sharing the stage with none other than world-renowned
speaker and author Simon Sinek. Which I found out upon arrival. No
pressure at all. But, nervously I took the stage and did my thing. People
clapped and that was that. No big deal. Easy day. My only priority was to
connect with fellow veterans transitioning or starting businesses anyway.
About a week later, I had a call with Eric Schurenberg, event emcee and
editor-in-chief of Inc. magazine to debrief. Being the feedback-craving
former SEAL that I am, I asked what he thought. Admittedly, I was teeing
up “the ask” for speaking at future Inc. events—a potentially great way to
generate brand awareness and thought leadership for my company at the
time. After a brief pause of awkward silence, he said, “Well, Brent, it
wasn’t good. It just wasn’t polished. You seemed unprepared. It was just
kind of all over the place.”
Bam! It was like a donkey kick to the face. Speaking was something I
felt I could find a passion for, but clearly wasn’t good at yet. And I hate
losing far more than I enjoy winning. This felt like losing. I’m thinking, B-
b-b-b-but everyone clapped, and I think a couple people even stood up!
Maybe they were going to the bathroom. I don’t know. What does this guy
know anyway?! Surprise. Anger. Disappointment… then gradually,
acceptance. Realization. Motivation. I vowed never to be unprepared again.
I didn’t realize it, but I had developed a growth mindset having endured
both the rigors of SEAL training, combat, graduate school, and now the
unforgiving battlefield of business and entrepreneurship. Now I speak, on
average, fifty times a year all over the world and religiously maintain a very
specific preparation process. Eric’s feedback was painful at first, but it
became a source of motivation. It was an awakening. As Winston Churchill
once said, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal. It is the courage to
continue that counts.”
It was the same when the SEAL instructors would tell us that we should
just quit. That training would only get worse—why put ourselves through
all that? As a result, some would actually quit. They momentarily forgot
that pain is temporary, but quitting is something that stays with you forever.
Others found the fire in their gut necessary to carry on. Just enough fire to
embrace the suck!
Before their rise to the top, some of the world’s most successful people
experience epic failure. We like to celebrate the success of the people we
admire or envy but often overlook the path that got them there. It’s a long
road that is always marked with obstacles and failure. Their crowning
achievements stem from drive and determination as much as from ability.
Persistence and certitude provide the ammunition for combating failure.
As Thomas Edison once said, “I have not failed. I have only found ten
thousand ways that something won’t work.” But let’s face it. Failure sucks.
Nobody sets out to fail or tells themselves, Gee, I can’t wait to take a
fucking face-plant on this project, so I learn some valuable lessons. Hell no.
We don’t tell ourselves we hope we get fired from our dream job so we can
build some emotional and psychological resilience. We don’t say, Hey, I
sure hope a global pandemic strikes so I can learn how to apply for
government funding or unemployment. The lessons learned come after the
surprise, depression, disappointment, and anger wear off and enlightenment
slowly starts to set in. If we choose to let it do so. If we apply lessons
learned and vow to work our asses off to make incremental improvements
over time.
There are endless examples. Oprah Winfrey is North America’s first
black multibillionaire, a world-renowned media mogul, and one of the
greatest philanthropists in American history, but she was fired from her first
TV job as an anchor in Baltimore for being—get this—too passionate about
the stories. Jerry Seinfeld was booed off the stage many times early in his
career, with close friends and family telling him to take life more seriously
and choose a real career. As we all know, he is now one of the most famous
comedians of all time. And can you imagine your childhood without
Disney? Well, that could easily have been reality if Walt had listened to his
former newspaper editor, who told Walt he “lacked imagination and had no
good ideas.” Undeterred, old Walt went on to create the cultural icon that
bears his name. David Goggins grew up combating childhood obesity,
depression, learning disorders, and abuse. Now he’s a retired SEAL and
known as one of the most elite extreme athletes in the world. All of these
are perfect examples of a growth mindset.
They say that nothing breeds success like failure. Indeed, most of us
eventually accept that failure is a reality of life, essential for growth even.
But still we hate to fail. But why, when we intellectually acknowledge that
failure can be turned into opportunity, are we so afraid of it? One of the
models we teach leaders and business executives in our leadership and
organizational development programs is Steven Kerr’s simple performance
formula. Kerr is a senior advisor to Goldman Sachs after a six-year term as
a managing director and Goldman’s chief learning officer (CLO). Before
joining Goldman, he spent seven years as General Electric’s CLO and vice
president of corporate leadership development, working closely with Jack
Welch and leading GE’s renowned leadership education center. He went on
to co-found the Jack Welch Management Institute. His formula is as
follows:

Ability x Motivation = Performance

Obviously, you can break ability and motivation down into many
elements but overall, this is it. We use this model to help leaders better
understand how to coach and mentor those on their team. If, for example,
you have a direct report with high levels of ability and motivation in a given
role, and then promote them into a new position, things might change in the
near term. In a new role, they may be tackling challenges they have not
faced, so their ability is lower. Sometimes people simply burn out
regardless of ability and subject matter expertise, so motivation lessens as
does performance. You get the idea.
Why is this a multiplication formula and not an addition formula? I’ll
pause for you to consider your answer.…
Okay, time’s up. Because if one factor is zero, performance equals zero.
Also, known as failure. Most candidates arriving at BUD/S show up with
both high levels of ability and motivation. That is, until they are put in
situations they’ve never dealt with and placed in the most physically and
mentally adverse scenarios of their lives. That’s what makes the training
program a very level playing field. Sure, some students are rock star
runners or swim like dolphins. High ability and motivation results in high
performance in those specific evolutions. But when tested in other areas,
that’s often not the case. Meanwhile, others seem to be totally averse to pain
and stress, but struggle in various pass-fail evolutions that require focus and
technical ability.
Each phase in BUD/S has pass-fail evolutions. In most, the student is
only given one or two chances. If failure is the result, they’re packing their
bags—“haze gray and underway”—off to the fleet. The first evolution is
the fifty-meter underwater swim. The students line up along the side of the
Olympic-size swimming pool at the Naval Amphibious Base across the
street from the Naval Special Warfare Center. They jump in feet first, do an
underwater somersault (which can cause you to blow too much precious air
from your lungs), and without pushing off the wall, swim down and back
for a total of fifty meters. Sometimes heads break the surface early gasping
for air or students pass out before reaching the wall. Fail! Devastation soon
follows.
Another wonderful evolution is called drownproofing. The student’s
arms are tied behind his back and his ankles are tethered together. He must
then perform a series of exercises like swimming multiple laps for hundreds
of meters, bobbing up and down in the deep end, and swimming down five
meters to pick up a swim mask off the bottom of the pool with his teeth.
This goes on for a long time. If you aren’t very comfortable in the water or
motivated enough to find the resilience to dig deep, failure is imminent.
Some students who have dreamed of these moments their whole lives
have those dreams shattered in a matter of minutes. And there are no
participation trophies handed out. Some can try again months or years later
and succeed. Some are never seen or heard from again.

But Everyone Gets a Trophy, Right?

The two youngest of our three children (a six-year-old daughter and a four-
year-old son) played soccer last year. Let’s just say their level of
commitment and performance could have been better. I get it, they are very
young, and I sound like an asshole, but I’m trying to make a point. Our son
Ryder’s main coach held a small trophy ceremony after the last game of the
season. He handed out the trophies one at a time, telling a brief story about
each player. Ryder’s turn came around.
“Okay, who’s up next? Can any of you guys tell me who this next trophy
goes to? I’ll give you a hint… he likes to aimlessly walk the field while
eating chicken fingers during the game,” his coach said in that tone you use
when talking to four-year-olds. You had to be there, but during one of his
games, when he was on the field of battle, he was wandering around eating
a giant chicken finger. It was pretty hysterical. But the SEAL in me yearned
for just a bit higher level of accountability and performance.
Three of the kids on Ryder’s team immediately shot their hands up
saying, “Ryder, it was Ryder!” Ryder proudly rose and accepted his well-
earned trophy. It was his first badge of honor signifying weeks of
dedication, hard work, and discipline on and off the battlefield! He was so
excited and utterly pleased with himself; the whole car ride home he kept
joyfully exclaiming in a squeaky voice, “My first trophy ever! Can you
believe it?!” As soon as we got home, I took the trophy away and told him,
“We don’t reward mediocrity in this house.” He immediately burst into
tears.
I’m kidding, of course. I congratulated him yet again and then helped
him find a prominent place for it on the shelf in his room. Then cooked up
some chicken fingers.
At what point do we start teaching our children to embrace the suck?
And how about failure? When is it too early? When is it too late?

The Science of Failure

According to Professor Martin Covington of the University of California,
Berkeley, the fear of failure is directly linked to our sense of self-worth. His
research on students, published in the Handbook of Motivation at School,
found that one of the ways we protect our self-worth is by believing we are
competent and by convincing others of it too. For this reason, the ability to
achieve is critical in maintaining self-worth. To fail to perform essentially
means that we are not able and, therefore, not worthy.
Professor Covington found that if a person doesn’t believe they have the
ability to succeed (or if repeated failures diminish that belief), then they will
engage in other practices that seek to preserve their self-worth. Often, these
practices take the form of excuses or defense mechanisms. They regress
back to—or stay—in a fixed mindset that reduces motivation and therefore
ability to perform.
When it comes to dealing with failure, the professor grouped students
into one of four categories:

Success-Oriented Students: These people are typically lifelong

learners and see failure as a way to improve as opposed to
proof of their crappy self-worth.

Over-Strivers: Professor Covington calls these students “closet-

achievers.” They are so fearful of failing that they avoid it at all
costs, even if it means exerting themselves beyond what is
reasonably expected.

Failure-Avoiding Students: These students don’t even expect

to succeed. But they also simultaneously dread failing, so they
do the bare minimum or try to blend in. In BUD/S, the instructors
called this being the “gray man.” This strategy never works.

Failure-Accepting Students: These people have basically

already accepted defeat and failure as their reality. These
students are very difficult to motivate. Seeing failure as
inextricably connected to our sense of self-worth—or lack
thereof—puts it in perspective. “By making our self-worth
contingent on categories such as academic success,
appearance, or popularity, we fail to value ourselves solely for
the fact that we are human beings and accept that failure is part
of the human experience,” the professor explains.

Mental Model
How to Win at Failing
Failure is usually a fairly demoralizing and upsetting experience. It can alter
your perception and make you believe things that simply aren’t true. Unless
you learn to respond to failure in psychologically adaptive ways, it can
paralyze you, demotivate you, and limit your likelihood of success moving
forward.
The Embrace the Suck model has Eight Failure Realities that you must
understand in order to get comfortable being uncomfortable.

Reality 1: Failure makes the same goal seem less attainable.

In one study at a special operations sniper school, instructors
had the students fire at targets from the same distance on an
unmarked range. They then had the students estimate the
distance to the targets. Students who scored lower (fewer target
hits than others) believed the targets to be significantly farther
out than students who scored the highest. Failure distorts
perception if you allow it to. The good news is that there are
ways to avoid this.

Reality 2: Failure alters your perception of your abilities. As

much as failure can distort your perception of goals, it can also
alter your assumptions about ability. I’ve seen students who quit
BUD/S or fail the selection process fall into deep depression—
sometimes even become suicidal—while others come back a
second or third time over the course of years and ultimately
succeed. Failure can make us doubt our skills, intelligence,
desirability, and capabilities. Simply acknowledging this is the
first step to self-correction.

Reality 3: Failure can make you feel helpless. According to

psychologists, this is a mental defense mechanism. When we
fail, the brain sends signals making us feel temporarily helpless;
it’s an emotional wound so to speak. Like when a toddler
touches a hot stove—the brain says, “Whoa buddy, don’t do that
shit again.” The same applies with failure. When we allow
ourselves to be convinced that we are helpless, we successfully
avoid future failures. But that’s actually what makes you a failure
—when you listen to the voices and rob yourself of future
success.

Reality 4: A failure experience can cause a fear of failure

complex. People can also trend toward avoiding success as
much as they try to avoid failure, but the two usually go hand-in-
hand. Success rarely comes without some failure along the way,
which makes the journey very uncomfortable. So rather than
working on improving their ability, skills, or approach to
succeeding at something, people head back to home base—
their own cozy little comfort zone.

Reality 5: Fear of failure often leads to unconscious self-

sabotaging. Like the college student who decides to stay out
drinking until 2:00 a.m. before a big job interview he “knows” he’ll
bomb. Or the young kid who doesn’t pick up a sport as naturally
as her peers, so she tells her parents she hates it and wants to
quit. These kinds of behaviors can turn into self-fulfilling
prophecies and increase potential for future failure. But the best
accomplishments in life usually reside on the other side of fear.

Reality 6: The pressure to succeed increases performance

anxiety, causing choking. Choking at those critical gaming-
winning moments. Blanking out during the test after weeks of
studying. Leaving out the most critical talking points in your big
speech. Usually, all of this is a result of simply over-thinking. This
is why proper preparation is the bedrock of achievement and the
most powerful tool for overcoming performance anxiety.

Reality 7: Willpower is like a muscle—it needs both training

and rest. As we’ve discussed, much like muscles that become
fatigued, mental willpower can become overworked and
undernourished. Soldiers participating in sustained combat
experience battle fatigue, which causes clouded thinking, lack of
 ability to control emotion, confusion, depression, and inhibited
decision-making ability. So when you feel your willpower fading,
be sure to rest and be willing to revisit your motivations once
you’ve nourished your willpower muscles. Just don’t rest too
long!

Reality 8: The healthiest psychological response to failure is

focusing on what you can control. This ability is a
fundamental tenet of building resilience. Failure can result in us
focusing primarily on the cause of our current adversity. We look
backward instead of forward. We focus on the elements we have
no control over as opposed to developing an action plan—
leveraging what is in our control.

Mark Owen, one of my closest friends, former teammate, team leader of a

tier one NSW special missions unit, and author of the number one New York
Times best-seller No Easy Day, told me a training story about reality
number eight. Years ago, some guys from his squadron were participating in
a lead climbing course outside of Las Vegas. In this rock climbing style, the
lead climber must ascend various sections of the route in order to place
“protection” in the case of a fall. That, of course, means that if you climb
fifteen feet above your last piece of protection and fall, you’ll be
plummeting thirty feet before the rope catches you with a violent jolt, which
sucks.
Mark was about eighty feet up and roughly twenty feet above his last
piece of protection when he froze. He didn’t trust his footholds and couldn’t
find his next move. Within seconds, his teammates noticed from below and
the taunting and jeering began. The climbing instructor, a wiry little guy in
board shorts and climbing shoes figured he’d use this as a coaching
moment, so he lit a cigarette and started scaling the rock face—without a
rope. In no time at all he reached Mark, still frozen against the wall.
“What’s up, bro?” the instructor inquired.
Mark looked down at his teammates who were still making fun of him.
Then he looked out to the Vegas skyline. “Why are you looking down at the
guys? They can’t fucking help you. Neither can Las Vegas. Stay in your
three-foot world bro. Right here. Only focus on what’s in your immediate
control. Ignore everything else,” he said.
Maintaining focus on what is in our control and ignoring (or at least
deprioritizing) everything else is a core tenet of the growth mindset and
applies equally in achieving goals and overcoming obstacles in our personal
and professional lives.

When I hung up my sword and stepped off the battlefield, I immediately

began graduate school. This was part of my military transition strategy to
retrain my brain toward business. At the time, entrepreneurship wasn’t even
a path I had considered. Later, during the program, our finance professor
assigned group projects. You know, the kind of projects where two people
do all the work and the other three drink beer. Yes, that kind. Well, while
some of us were kicking back drinking beer we had an epiphany! It was a
white space that had great potential, like with all entrepreneurs’ brilliant
ideas, right? Long story short, that project became the foundation of the
business plan for my first company, a home finding search engine. We were
to become entrepreneurs who’d retire at 35. Masters of our own destiny!
The less brave comfort zone wanderers would envy us, watching our rise to
the top while they grinded away at their mediocre jobs working for the man.
Tales of glory and unprecedented success would echo for eternity. It would
be outstanding!
Upon graduation, we hit the fundraising trail, expecting to bat away
angel investors and venture capital firms right and left. I mean, I was a
Navy SEAL for crying out loud. Who wouldn’t throw money at this? At this
point, I hope you’re picking up on my sarcasm. We quickly realized that
this whole entrepreneurship thing is fucking hard and super risky. There
was a lot more suck-embracing than anticipated. Simply put, the failure rate
for start-ups is the same if not higher than the failure rate for SEAL training
candidates. But what the hell, if you ain’t failin’, you ain’t tryin’!
Ultimately, we raised millions and that business—and others to follow—
were successful. But not without a road riddled with the pockmarks of
micro-failures, costly mistakes, and salty tears. My tears. The recession
didn’t help either. Didn’t see that shit coming—despite my econ professor’s
many warnings. But this was a different battlefield and I was ill-trained in
sniffing out the inevitable ambush. Obstacle after obstacle, I learned to
focus on what was in my control and worry less about what wasn’t. I
learned to stay in my three-foot world.
Mitigating Failure Through Calculated Risk

So how the hell do we know when we are taking calculated risk versus
blind dumb risk? Simple. When the crazy shit we decide to do turns into a
positive outcome! I quit my lucrative job to join the Navy to try out for a
program that has the highest attrition rate in the US military. Then, of
course, came 9/11 and risks that followed. Know how many combat
missions I’ve been on with very limited intel? More than a couple! Then I
dove headfirst into entrepreneurship with no money, no income, and a
condo I couldn’t afford. Several years later, I met my unbelievably amazing
wife at a wedding in Costa Rica. We got matching tattoos four weeks after
meeting. Obviously. Oh, and then we got married a couple months later.
And, yes, we are still married!
So in retrospect we can go back and label risky decisions as calculated
by saying, “We just knew we were meant to be together” or “Failure wasn’t
an option” and stuff like that. But wouldn’t it be nice to have a model to
follow so we can better weigh the potential outcomes and necessary
contingencies when the unforeseen occurs? Of course it would.
We can pull from part of the goal setting and strategic planning
frameworks we will dive into later, which are designed to tackle risk and
mitigate failure.

Define the Goal. Such as marrying the girl you just met, taking
down a terrorist stronghold with limited information, finally telling
your unappreciative boss to fuck off, or launching yourself from a
perfectly good airplane. Make the goal as concise, measurable,
achievable, and time bound as possible.
 List Threats and Hazards. Don’t really know the girl, could end
badly. Unknown number of terrorists on target. Will probably get
fired when I tell my boss to fuck off. Parachute may not open.
You’ll come back to this list when weighing your options.

Identify Resources for Successful Execution. Need to buy a

ring. Shit, need money. Should probably ask her dad’s approval.
Need Spectre gunship for air support. Need backup job ASAP.
Need properly packed parachute—and some skydiving lessons.

Assess Go/No-Go Criteria. Use the information at hand to

make the best possible decision to proceed—or not. Do the risks
outweigh the resources and rewards? Be careful about getting
advice from others. Ensure your sources are trusted and as
unbiased as possible. But in my experience, when you’re about
to toss yourself willingly into the unknown oblivion of risk,
everyone tells you not to proceed. Sometimes you gotta say fuck
it and go with your gut. And remember The Three Ps!

Always Debrief. Somewhere down the road, assuming your

decision was to move forward, it’s important to debrief the
execution and outcome. What went well? What didn’t? What
unforeseen events cropped up that I didn’t have contingencies
for? How did I respond? How will I execute better next time?
Document your findings and refer back to them the next time
you’re about to charge the hill.

Great, So What Now?

Seeking the magical opportunities beyond your comfort zone will be paved
with small (and sometimes large) setbacks. But failure can be one of life’s
greatest gifts. And who doesn’t like a good gift every now and then?
Calculate the risks and potential rewards.
Ask yourself how much regret you’re willing to carry for not pushing
the boundaries of your comfort zone.
 Questions to ask yourself:
How do I respond in the face of failure and setbacks?
What could I potentially gain by looking at failure through a
different lens?
Does failure drive my goals further away, or like Thomas
Edison, just confirm a few ways things won’t work?
How often do I assess the odds and take calculated risk?
How might I feel toward the end of my life if I realize I never
really strayed from my comfort zone?
 6
DO SOMETHING THAT SUCKS EVERY
DAY

Do something that sucks every day.

—DAVID GOGGINS

Sounds strange. “Do something that sucks every day.” David Goggins’s
philosophy on mastering your mind is simple: push the boundaries of your
comfort zone daily, mentally and physically. Psychological and physical
fortitude require training—they are perishable qualities. Our comfort zones
are surrounded by moveable barriers. When we take decisive action in
pushing against those barriers, our comfort zones begin to overflow with
challenges, tasks, and fears we used to deem insurmountable. They become
part of our everyday lives. Whether it be obstacles at work, difficult
relationships unattended to, goals unaccomplished, or fears not faced, the
more you lean in, the more you score. Then you move the goalposts and do
it again.
As he mentioned in the foreword, David Goggins and I met in the fall of
2000 at BUD/S. We had both been assigned to class 235. He was an
intimidating beast of a guy who didn’t smile much. Okay, never. He’d
already been through Hell Week twice due to injuries. No wonder he wasn’t
smiling. I have heard David say numerous times, “Life fucking sucks. Get
over it.” His experiences are captured in his best-selling book Can’t Hurt
Me.
Later in life, driven by the notion of giving to a cause greater than
himself, David applied to join the United States Air Force Pararescue. He
failed his ASVAB (Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery) twice
before he succeeded and entered Pararescue training. He then became a
member of the United States Air Force Tactical Air Control Party, also
known as TACP—we love our acronyms. He served his time in TACP and
left the United States Air Force to return to civilian life. He ended up with a
job as an exterminator, regained excess weight, and fell into a deep
depression. The demons of his past returned to haunt him, pulling him
further into the depths.
One day, David looked in the mirror and told himself that he refused to
live that life. That he would not be a slave to his sordid past. He still had a
passion for military service, so he decided to step up his game and go to the
local Navy recruiter’s office. He told them he planned to try out for the
SEAL program. At the time, David was 6′1″ and 297 pounds. The recruiters
discouraged him from even attempting, saying he needed to lose at least
forty pounds. So, David went home. Two months later he returned, having
lost a significant amount of weight and in amazing condition. He still
needed to trim down more, but he figured BUD/S would take care of that.
David succeeded in graduating from training (after doing Hell Week
three times) with my class in 2001, and we were both assigned to SEAL
Team Five. But this was not enough. Not enough sacrifice, not enough
purposeful suffering. During his second platoon cycle, he attended the elite
Army Ranger School and graduated as the Top Honor Man. Ranger school
comes with its own unique set of challenges, and David was not ordered to
do so—he had requested to go.
After many of our brothers made the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan in
2005 during Operation Red Wings, he began long-distance running to raise
money for the Special Operations Warrior Foundation. The Foundation
gives college scholarships and grants to the children of fallen special
operations soldiers. What do I mean by long-distance? I mean one hundred
miles or more.
David sat down one day and typed “hardest ultramarathons in the world”
into the Google search bar. Yep, that’s how his mind works. Why start
small? He found the Badwater 135, notably one of the most challenging
races known to man. He attempted to enter as a fundraiser, but organizers
told him that he needed to enter another ultramarathon first and finish with
a qualifying time, as the Badwater is an invitation-only event. Literally two
days later, with no training, he signed up for the San Diego One Day, a 24-
hour ultramarathon held at Hospitality Point in San Diego. David had never
even run a 26.2-mile marathon, but he was able to run 101 miles in nineteen
hours and six minutes.
Soon after, David completed his first marathon (Las Vegas), in a time
that qualified him for entrance into the Boston Marathon. After those two
events, having yet to be invited to the Badwater 135, he entered the
HURT100, an ultramarathon in Hawaii that is widely regarded as one of the
hardest ultramarathons in the world. He was ninth to cross the finish line—
only twenty-three runners completed the course. He was pissed he didn’t
win. He was subsequently granted entry into the 2006 Badwater 135. He
finished fifth overall, an unheard-of result for an ultramarathon novice.
Sure, we run a lot in the SEAL Teams, but not 100 miles. That’s what
helicopters and Humvees are for!
You see, David is driven by a fire that burns deep inside his soul. It’s a
fire, in large part, fueled by adversity. We all have that flame. Not
everyone’s is derived from extreme hardship or abuse, but we either choose
to use it to our advantage or we ignore it. David continues to do something
that sucks every day. As I write this, he is completing the five-day Moab
240. “I need to recertify myself as a savage,” he said in an interview. If
that’s not the epitome of a growth mindset, I don’t know what is.
We don’t all have to run 240 miles to be a savage every day. It’s up to us
how we choose to define what being a badass means.

Another world-class runner who experienced more adversity and suffering

than you or I could possibly fathom? Meet good old Louis Zamperini. His
greatest obstacle was his own mortality—you’ll know what I mean in a
minute. His story of resilience is captured in Laura Hillenbrand’s number
one New York Times best-seller Unbroken: A World War II Story of
Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. During World War II, his entire focus
was on surviving, and the odds continued to stack against him. He joined
the Air Force in 1941 and was stationed in the Pacific as a bombardier on a
B-24 Liberator bomber. At that time, flying into combat was only half the
danger. Due to numerous technical problems and inadequate training, more
than 50,000 airmen died in noncombat-related accidents. So it was not an
unusual occurrence when Louis’s plane crashed into the ocean as he and his
crewmates flew on a search-and-rescue mission for another plane that went
down earlier that day.
What was unusual, however, was that Louis survived the crash and the
subsequent forty-seven days he spent on a raft. Starvation. Sharks. Strafing
by enemy fighter planes. Extreme thirst. Hallucinations. Death. “The odds
of being rescued if you ended up on a life raft were terrible,” Laura
Hillenbrand told NPR in 2010. “The rafts were very poorly equipped.”
Louis and his crewmate survived at sea longer than any other known
survivors, drinking rainwater and eating the fish they managed to catch.
They were regularly attacked by Japanese fighter planes forcing them to
dive into shark-infested waters.
But his struggle to survive had only just begun. Believe it or not, things
were about to get worse. There would be a lot more suck to embrace.
Emaciated and weak from floating around the Pacific for a month and a
half, Louis was captured by the Japanese and eventually sent to a brutal
POW camp where he was beaten, starved, and overworked.
Unfortunately for Louis, he also happened to be a world-famous
Olympian. Who would have thought that this could get him into trouble?
But it did. He had competed in the 1936 Olympics and was one of the
fastest distance runners in the world. A jealous and sadistic prison guard,
Mutsuhiro Watanabe—whom the prisoners nicknamed “The Bird”—singled
out Louis for particularly cruel treatment. This guy was a real entitled
asshole, and he developed a bizarre obsession with Louis.
These events are dramatized in the movie Unbroken, based on Laura’s
best-selling book. Amazingly, Louis survived two years in the POW camp
before being released at the end of the war. He was the ultimate savage,
never broken. Finally at home, he was free and no longer living under the
threat of torture and death every day. But now he faced a new and
unexpected obstacle: living with the trauma of the past two years and the
inescapable memories of the brutal treatment he received. “Louis came
home a deeply, deeply haunted man,” Laura says. Once his physical needs
were finally met and the brutality of the war was over, Louis had to
confront his invisible scars.
 Every night he would wake up screaming from horrible nightmares
about the cruel guard who had tried to break his spirit and nearly killed him.
His thoughts would return to his horrific experiences and he would relive
the beatings in his mind. Coping with the traumas of the past—what would
now be diagnosed as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)—was an
obstacle he had not prepared for. He began abusing alcohol and soon his
marriage began to suffer (he married Cynthia Applewhite shortly after
returning home).
Fortunately, true to his resilient spirit, Louis found ways to overcome
this new obstacle, just as he overcame the odds during the war. He
overcame PTSD and went on to live nearly seventy more fruitful and happy
years, free from the terrors of the past.
Of course, this wasn’t suffering he chose. He did, however, choose how
to react. So where did this resilience come from? His family moved to
Torrance, California, in 1919, where Louis attended Torrance High School.
He and his family spoke no English when they moved to California, making
him a target for bullies because of his Italian roots. He regularly found
himself in fights. His father had taught him how to box, so he soon found an
interest in brawling. His older brother, a high school track star, convinced
him to join the cross-country team in an attempt to save him from his
downward spiral. He quickly found a passion for running and channeled his
inner rage (the flame) into positive aggression.
He developed resilience that ultimately saved his life.

Mental Model
Practicing the Things That Suck
Stress and anxiety can be great tools if you know how to use them. If you
choose to use them. With all the media and medical attention on the
negative impacts of stress, it’s easy to conclude that it’s irredeemably bad,
something to be avoided at all costs. This applies to both physical and
emotional stress and anxiety.
I have a different perspective, as do many psychologists who are well
versed in this field. Pursuing a stress-free life often causes more stress down
the road; problems compound and when we fail to face our greatest
challenges, we never overcome them. The same applies for comfort zone
expansion—the challenges and suffering we choose to pursue. If David
hadn’t joined the Air Force, he probably would have never become a SEAL.
If he hadn’t become a SEAL, he definitely wouldn’t have started running
insanely miserable 240-mile races (it’s not for everyone). He wouldn’t get
to experience the joy of suffering for something meaningful—supporting
our warriors and motivating people all over the world. He’d be safe,
depressed, and overweight in his mediocre comfort zone.
Think about a time when you experienced substantial personal and
professional growth, or a time when you performed at your highest level.
Say finishing a race. Building a business—or saving a struggling business.
Being accepted to your reach school. Landing your dream job. Or raising a
child. What was it that motivated and fueled you to grow, learn, and
improve during these experiences? I’m willing to bet those times invariably
involved some stress, suffering, and struggle.
Drawing on their work and research with executives, Navy SEALS,
students, and professional athletes, behavioral psychologists Alia Crum and
Thomas Crum developed a three-step model for responding to pressure and
harnessing the creative power of stress while minimizing its deleterious
effects.
The model is simple and looks like this:

STEP ONE: See it.

We typically only stress about things we give a shit about. It shows we care.
When we can start labeling that stress, the solutions for navigating it
become far more apparent. For example, on the days I’m feeling stressed
out or experiencing some anxiety, I ask my wife, Why the hell am I so
stressed? The intention is not necessarily for her to answer the question.
Though when she does, she’s always right. It’s a method for me to break
down the possible root causes and identify them. And usually it’s not what I
initially think and totally unrelated to what’s actually consuming my
thoughts.
Neuroscience research from Matthew Lieberman of UCLA shows how
just acknowledging stress and adversity can move reactivity in your brain
from the automatic and reactive centers to the more conscious and
deliberate ones. For example, therapists who work with veterans suffering
from PTSD use a desensitization method that gets to the root cause of the
trauma, which is usually a very specific event. This allows the person to
acknowledge it, see it, and eventually move past it.

STEP TWO: Own it.

As I mentioned, we usually only stress about things that matter to us.
Owning this realization unleashes that positive aggression I keep referring
to, because deep down we know that the things that really matter in life
don’t come easy.
As a board member of the SEAL Family Foundation I often give
potential donors tours of the BUD/S training facility. One attendee asked a
great question of the SEAL instructor assisting with the tour. “So what’s the
secret sauce? How do you take regular guys and turn them into elite
warriors that can overcome almost any amount of adversity?” The answer
was even better than the question.
“In SEAL training, the instructor cadre design situations that can be
exponentially more stressful, chaotic, and dynamic than a combat operation
so that the team learns to center themselves in the most arduous
circumstances. When the stress of the training seems unbearable, we can
own it, knowing that ultimately it is what we have chosen to do—to be a
member of a team and win in any situation.”
Basically, we do something that sucks every day, so we get comfortable
being uncomfortable.

STEP THREE: Use it.

Though it often feels like it, the body’s stress response was not designed to
kill us. In fact, the evolutionary goal of the stress response was to help
boost the body and mind into enhanced functioning, to help us grow and
meet the demands we face. Louis knew that if he wanted to become the
fastest man in the world, pain, stress, and suffering would be a regular
gateway to victory. If he wanted to survive torture and starvation, he’d have
to dig deep.
And while the stress response can sometimes have adverse effects, in
many cases, stress hormones do in fact induce growth and release chemicals
into the body that rebuild cells, synthesize proteins, and enhance immunity,
leaving the body even stronger and healthier. Researchers call this effect
physiological thriving, and any athlete, combat veteran, or POW survivor
knows its rewards. As we have discussed, it’s all about perspective. Shifting
the narrative on anxiety to excitement and opportunity can improve
performance on any task or objective.
How to Do Something That Sucks Every Day

It’s difficult for most of us to compare ourselves to people like David and
Louis, world-class athletes, top scholars and musicians, astronauts and
award-winning rodeo clowns. Living an extraordinary life means something
different to all of us based on our values and goals. We must first define
what a winning outcome looks like, then work backward to design the
intricate web of pathways that will connect us to fulfilling that prophecy.
The challenge is that we often engage in activities that have no real
connection to our passions, purpose, values, or goals. It’s about doing the
right things that suck. People choose jobs that leave them unfulfilled. Stay
in relationships that will only end in suffering. Hold grudges that only cause
more pointless pain. Follow paths defined by others, which are rarely the
paths less traveled. Get caught up in hateful acts for no real reason. Become
distracted by laziness and temptation and give up on fitness goals. Quit
when the going gets tough.
So how do you do the right things that suck every day in order to
overcome adversity, exceed your goals, and live an extraordinary life? Let’s
start here. We will apply this later when covering your personal mission
plan and execution strategy.

List Your Top Twenty Personal and Professional Goals:

These should be two different lists, but keep in mind how these
two areas of focus will impact the other. There is really no such
thing as work-life balance. Its work-life integration. Listing twenty
goals sounds like a daunting task, but let’s do it anyway.

Narrow the List Down to Five or Six Goals: So, after all that,
I’m asking you to cut fourteen or fifteen goals? Yes, I am. Really
consider the goals that have true meaning to you. Reflect on
 your passions. Your true purpose in life. Your values. Which goal
would have you leaping out of bed every morning ready to kick
ass and take names? Which goals might have a positive impact
on others? Anything else is a distraction.

Define the Actions Necessary to Achieve Each Goal: Make a

list of five or six specific actions (let’s not worry about the time-
bound nature of these activities yet). Reflect on each action and
identify elements that make you uncomfortable. Again, as I
previously mentioned, the most meaningful goals that will
provide the greatest satisfaction will have aspects that make you
cringe.

Start Practicing the Things That Suck: Okay, now you have
five or six personal and professional goals, each with one or two
things that suck assigned to them. Make a list. Put it on your
desk, anywhere it’s visible on a regular basis. Take every
opportunity to practice, practice, practice. If you want to compete
in an Ironman but aren’t comfortable in the water, you better start
swimming. You get the idea.

What do I mean by practice? SEALs are arguably the best at what we do

in our given field. Yet we practice, rehearse, dirt dive, execute, and debrief
constantly. Over and over. The general public might assume SEALs are
constantly deployed downrange, but we actually spend 75 percent of our
time training. The other 25 percent of the time we are deployed. And on
deployment, when we aren’t fighting, eating, or sleeping, we’re training—
living each day in a constant state of improvement.
When I began seriously training for the BUD/S program well before
joining the Navy, I’d lost much of my endurance for long-distance
swimming and running. Sure I had been a college athlete, but just a year
working in corporate America had robbed me of my stamina. I struggled
with the longer runs, often falling way behind my buddy with whom I was
training. That really pissed me off. During the first few sessions at the SMU
pool, just swimming 100 meters seemed like crossing the English Channel.
I hadn’t swum competitively in years. I was nowhere near being prepared
for the BUD/S entrance PT test. Outside of research and designing a very
specific training regime (all of which sucked big time) my vow was simple:
puke during or after every workout, push the limits every time.
I know it sounds a bit stupid and barbaric, but it worked. I knew I would
never be prepared and make the gains in short- and long-term strength and
endurance necessary unless I made myself suffer. I planned to mark fitness
off my list of concerns, and that was the only way. That piece was in my
control. One day, I was training at the SMU track. Suddenly, Olympic
champion sprinter Michael Johnson walks onto the field. Just me and MJ. I
wasn’t going to let the fact that he was the fastest man in the world
discourage me! Let’s just say I puked a lot that afternoon.
If one of your personal goals is related to fitness, I recommend creating
your own Wheel of Misfortune packed with exercises and routines designed
to train you in key areas—you know, the ones you hate the most. One of my
professional goals is to transform people and organizations through
enhanced leadership ability at every level. That means I must constantly
study and practice the art and science of leadership. One of the things on
my list of stuff that sucks is having difficult conversations. On the literal
battlefield, I ran swiftly to the sound of gunfire. In my current personal and
professional life, however, I struggle with conflict avoidance. Tackling
challenges and difficult conversations is critical for effective leadership. So,
I make a point to practice, practice, practice. And it gets a little easier every
time.
Military leaders make tough decisions every day. It takes some serious
getting used to. Especially when those decisions put their own team
members in harm’s way. Unfortunately, these leaders have plenty of
opportunity to practice. The point is, ultimately, once you have clearly
defined goals, you know what stands in your way. The question is, how bad
do you want to conquer those goals?
How willing are you to embrace the suck?

Great, So What Now?

Now it’s time to start practicing the fine art of getting comfortable being
uncomfortable. Comfort zone expansion is impossible without the
consistent execution of this process. Over time, you’ll find that not only
does the discomfort dissipate, but you begin to enjoy many of the activities
and obstacles you used to loathe. Then you make a new list and violently
execute.
We cloak ourselves in mediocrity when we are unwilling embrace the
challenges that stand in our way of greatness. So, use the models in this
chapter to expedite your voyage to deeper levels of mental fortitude.

Questions to ask yourself:

What do I do regularly to at least peek over the barriers of my
comfort zone? When I do, what do I see? Does it compel me
to leap over or climb back down?
How do I channel the negative energy from adverse
situations? Do I reinvest that energy into something new?
What positive benefits could come if I started doing something
that sucks every day? What is my growth potential?
Am I committed to tackling the list of things that suck, knowing
it will drive me closer to my goal?
 7
CHOOSE WISELY WHAT YOU SUFFER
FOR

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most

massive characters are seared with scars.
—KAHLIL GIBRAN

Iraq
1:13 A.M.

Panting vigorously, we ascended the stairs of the high-rise apartment.

Apparently, it’s not “tactical” or “sneaky” to cram a bunch of heavily armed
operators into an elevator. So up we went, heading to the fourteenth floor.
Our mission: kidnap or kill two high value enemy targets. Our task unit had
broken into three teams—two assault units and one mobility unit providing
exterior security. The mission plan called for two simultaneous breaches.
One apartment was on the second floor while the other was on the
fourteenth. We had drawn the short straw on this one, and boy were we
suffering as we moved swiftly up the stairwell. Me especially.
I was sweating profusely—not so much from the exertion and weight of
my kit, but from the wonderful 103-degree fever baking my brain. I had a
horrible flu, or food poisoning, or both. Not sure. But it sucked. I shouldn’t
have eaten that fucking lamb, or whatever it was at the meeting with that
sheik yesterday, I thought. My stomach was in knots. I’d spent most of the
day in a fly-infested oven of a porta potty. I’ll spare you the details.
The two apartments were housed in one of three seventeen-story
buildings that were part of the complex set in a U-shaped configuration. All
apartments were accessed by exterior hallways, kind of like a huge motel.
We hit the fourteenth floor and moved stealthily down the breezeway. The
tantalizing stench of diesel fuel, burning trash, and human waste permeated
the air. We found the apartment and stacked along the exterior wall as the
breacher set the explosive charge. I loved this dude. Remember the guy who
herded the goats and llamas into the pin for us on that goat rope of an op?
He was a good old boy from Texas who spent his day either working out or
making breaching charges, safely tucked behind the walls of his private
bomb-making room.
He crept back to our position ten feet from the door. We radioed the
other team, passing the word that we were set and ready. This would be a
simultaneous breach. They confirmed. “Charge is set. Three. Two. One.
Execute,” our breacher whispered.
BOOM!!! The concussion of the two blasts was so extreme it shattered
nearly all the windows in all three high-rise towers. It was surreal. But
that’s not all it destroyed. As glass from the apartment windows just above
our heads vaporized—sending the crystalized dust spraying in all directions
—I felt a concussive blast of my own. Oh shit!
If you’ve ever assaulted an enemy target with diarrhea streaming down
your legs, you may recall that it’s not super cool. And you certainly don’t
feel like a badass Navy SEAL operator—more like an embarrassed
preschooler on the playground. Nevertheless, we surged forward, peeling
right and left into the apartment. The blast had destroyed the front living
room. Luckily no noncombatants were injured. We flowed into the hallway
to the left of the main room. An enemy fighter pulled a “spray and pray”
maneuver—sticking his AK-47 around the corner from the room he was
hiding in, sending massive bullets aimlessly down the corridor in our
direction. The 7.62 rounds pounded the walls, each thankfully missing their
intended target. We moved rapidly toward the burst of fire, tossed a grenade
in the room, then finished our clearance, finding the high value target hiding
in a back room. Our HVT now in custody, we radioed the other team. The
other assault unit soon let us know they had their guy in custody. Two
minutes later, we were climbing back into our vehicles. I was a prisoner
handler, so I had our HVT secured in the back of one of the Humvees.
“Bro, did you crap your pants?” one of my teammates asked with a look
of disgust on his face while flipping his night vision goggles up onto his
helmet. “Yeah, asshole. I did.” Naturally, a roar of laughter ensued. “Fuck
off, I’m sick,” I said annoyed and exhausted. My pants and top were soaked
in sweat. We were ready to exfil off target. I couldn’t wait to get back to our
compound and toss my pants in the burn pit. Again! But no such luck.
“Gents, we just got spun up for another op,” our platoon commander
called out. You’ve got to be kidding me! After a quick mission brief, we
piled back into our Humvees and Chevy Suburbans and headed out to the
next target, a house about thirty minutes way. The guys smirked as they
scooted away from me in the back of the Hummer. “Bro, you stink!” they
laughed. The other target was a dry hole. No bad guys. Four hours later, we
finally arrived back at our base. I shot out of the Humvee and headed
straight for the burn pit. I sat down, quickly pulling off my Oakley trail-
running shoes, then ripped my pants off. Otherwise still in full gear. I
walked back to my room at the compound pant-less, head hanging, rifle
slung across my chest, in full body armor. Why does this keep happening to
me?!
I supposed I could have opted out for this mission, seeing as how sick I
was, but I couldn’t bear missing the action and fighting alongside my
brothers. I was suffering because I’d chosen to do so.

With our struggles and accomplishments come the problems we ultimately

choose to take on. It all goes back to the choices we make. Even when we
make good choices, we set ourselves up for new problems—they are just
better than the problems that would have come with bad choices. Do we
avoid life’s many problems and challenges when we stay safely in our
comfort zone? Sure, maybe. Can we avoid making bad choices when we
don’t take any risk? Yes. But what potential bad problems could arise
within the confines of our comfort zone? Depression? Dissatisfaction?
Mediocrity? Always asking yourself, “What if?” All the above?
Would anyone admit they are satisfied with the status quo? That
mediocrity is just fine by them? Actually, yes. Some people would. But they
are fooling themselves. Comfort zone expansion is a pathway to finding
new opportunities that could never be seized without a little bit of
calculated risk. My ultimate decision to quit my new job and join the Navy
went over like a turd in a punch bowl among close friends and family.
Picture that.
You’re going to do what? Have you lost your mind?
Brent, that’s a huge risk. You have to join the Navy first, then attempt to
be accepted into the program. Then you have to actually make it through—
and most people don’t! Then you’ll just be stuck in the Navy.
Oh, and isn’t it like really dangerous?
All valid points.
My decision didn’t come overnight, of course. It was a long process of
training and weighing risk. But I knew the harder I trained and prepared, the
lower the risk could potentially be. I say “potentially” because there are just
too many unseen obstacles. Failure. Quitting. Being dropped for
underperformance. Severe injury. Death. But I knew that deciding not to
take on this challenge would lead to bad problems. Regret. Depression.
Mediocrity. Always asking, “What if?”
Naturally, my decision to leap over the wall of my comfort zone and
race off into the abyss would come with new problems. New struggles. New
pain. These would prove, however, to be good problems. Problems I
essentially chose by taking the road less traveled.
I forced myself to suffer in the mountains of Colorado for months before
joining the Navy. We experienced extreme suffering during Hell Week and
the pain of losing a brother. Each day at dusk, the instructors lined us up on
the beach and made us wave goodbye to the sun as it slowly melted into the
horizon—a ritual for welcoming the bitter cold and darkness soon to follow.
Nights that seemed like they would never end. Yet each morning, the sun
would rise again, warming our souls and saying, “You’re one day closer to
the end—keep going.” We earned our Trident pins and soon discovered that
life as a SEAL at war is full of sacrifice. Later, we suffered on the
battlefield as we cut our teeth as wartime SEALs. But this was suffering we
welcomed, as do the new warriors taking our place. We suffer at the loss of
our sisters and brothers who sacrifice their lives for the teammates to their
right and left. But if they were here today and you asked them if they had
any regrets, they’d say, “Not one.” Do they wish they’d made a different
choice? Nope.
Life is a series of choices. But how many choices do we make each day?
How many are consequential? How many don’t really matter? Some
sources suggest that the average person makes up to 35,000 choices per day.
Assuming that most people spend around seven hours per day sleeping and
thus blissfully choice-free, that makes roughly 2,000 decisions per hour or
one decision every two seconds. But does this enormous figure really hold
up? Did some poor research assistant spend a whole day taking note of
every minute detail of every fleeting choice that crossed her mind?
Furthermore, any estimate will heavily depend on a person’s very own
definition of decision-making. Finally, not all decisions may be important in
the grander scheme of things.
Whatever the statistics are, we cannot deny being faced with a never-
ending stream of decisions from the moment we crawl out of bed in the
morning. Sometimes, seemingly small choices can have monumental
consequences. We must not underestimate the butterfly effect. Commonly
cited in chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the idea that a small change can
result in much more significant events—one tiny incident can have a huge
impact on the future. By ignoring email or other notifications on your phone
(which we should all do more of, frankly), you may miss an offer for your
dream job or a one in a million match on a dating app. But then again,
maybe it wasn’t meant to be. Consider the decisions made on the field of
battle. Every single choice you make has a consequence.

We’re taking enemy fire from an elevated position. Do we engage

or retreat? Call air support or not?
I’ve been staring at an enemy target through a scope for three
hours. Do I close my eyes for a minute and risk missing the
crucial shot? What would the consequences be?
An enemy combatant is acting violent and hostile but doesn’t
appear to have a weapon? What about a suicide vest? Do I
engage? If I’m wrong, will I be prosecuted for murder? What’s the
risk?
 Enemy squirters flee into a field. Do we pursue?

Obviously, not everyone is faced with these types of choices that have
life or death consequences. And I’m not suggesting we obsess over every
single decision we make at work, at home, or at Starbucks. Instead, I am
arguing for more awareness of the vast quantity of choices that present
themselves each day. Decisions large and small.
No matter the exact number of daily decisions we make, we might as
well pay attention to them, because—as author John C. Maxwell famously
put it—“Life is a matter of choices, and every choice you make makes
you.”

The Village of Choice

Let’s say you live in a small, sustainable, peaceful village. And that village
is in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by a dense forest. The general
consensus among your fellow villagers is that bad things live in the forest—
scary beasts, thieves, venomous snakes, quicksand, tax collectors, the
potential for starvation, and, of course, rodents of unusual size. Under no
circumstances do you go into the forest.
But what’s really out there? Nobody knows because no brave soul has
ventured beyond the borders of the safe and peaceful village. The villagers
have convinced themselves that they are happy. Some of them truly are,
because they don’t know any better. But you? You’re bored out of your
fucking mind. You’re curious. You have a fire burning deep inside, a voice
asking, What if?
So, one day you say, “Screw it.” Maybe there are scary things lurking
out there. Maybe there is the possibility for pain, even death. But maybe
there are great things beyond boring village life. Who the hell wants to farm
squash and tend to pigs their whole life, only to end up marrying their
cousin? Not you. Hell no. So you go for it. You pack a small bag with a few
necessary items and head out.
Later that night you make camp and start a small fire to keep warm. You
soon realize it’s pretty cold out there at night. And dark. Boy, is it dark. And
a bit scary. You keep hearing weird sounds. Possibly the scary beasts or tax
collectors?
As you drift off into a restless sleep, your mind wanders back to your
cozy little hut back in the village. It’s warm, and there is a pot of squash
stew on the stove and lanterns casting a gentle glow across the room. It sure
would be nice to be tucked into your bed rather than curled up, shivering on
a mossy boulder.
The next morning you awake, alive and well. You haven’t been eaten
alive by a beast or bitten by a poisonous snake. You’re actually comfortable
being a little uncomfortable because you chose to venture out. You’re
satisfied with your decision because now you know a bit more about what’s
out there. You pack up and head deeper into the forest. Ten minutes later,
you twist your ankle on a slippery log and get attacked by a swarm of oddly
aggressive mosquitos. You then remember that a friend once told you that
mosquitos kill more people every year than any other predator—something
about malaria. You’re screwed. But you keep moving forward—and you
don’t die.

When you’re in hell, just keep going.

—WINSTON CHURCHILL

You remind yourself that these are good problems and some suffering
you’d rather have than, say, depression, boredom, and mediocrity. You can
now proudly claim the title of adventurer! Later that afternoon you come to
a clearing. You step out of the dense forest into what happens to be a
thriving metropolis. There are beautiful buildings, and happy, gorgeous
people are bustling down the avenues, clearly on their way home from
amazing jobs they adore (probably not farming squash) and into the arms of
loved ones they deeply care for. It’s clearly paradise—a utopia you would
never have known about if you didn’t leave. You decide right then and there
that you’ll never go back to the village. Sure, it took a little bit of suffering
to get there (not as much as you thought), but now you can get the medical
attention you need and find amazing new opportunities.
Many people prefer to stay in their comfortable village. If they do
venture out, it’s not very far. People stay in jobs they hate because they are
too fearful of the risk involved in quitting and finding something new. They
stay in unfulfilling relationships for years, only to be consumed by regret
and the feeling that they’ve wasted their life. We postpone tough decisions
we know need to be made because the idea of confrontation gives us deep
anxiety. People quickly adopt a victim mindset because things never seem
to go their way. They aren’t as lucky as all those successful and “happy”
people they see on social media. They don’t ask for that promotion they
know they deserve due to fear of rejection.
These are all choices. Bad choices, indecision, and inaction lead to bad
problems. Good decisions, calculated risk, and action lead to good
problems. Which do you prefer? Why not choose what you are willing to
suffer for rather than letting life—or others—choose for you?

SERE school sucks. Advanced SERE is even worse. SERE (Survival,

Evasion, Resistance, Escape) school is a program for teaching special
operators and fighter pilots how to evade the enemy and withstand the
suffering of being a POW.
It was a cold, dark night in an undisclosed location in California. I was
three months away from deploying to Iraq for my first combat deployment.
A few of my platoon mates and I had been sent to SERE. SEALs can’t
deploy to a combat zone without having taken the course. The instructors
were all speaking Russian and never broke character.
I was starting to forget that this was just training. In the mock POW
camp, my home was a small cement cubbyhole just large enough for the
fetal position. I had spent the previous five days navigating the deep woods
with an Air Force fighter pilot attempting to evade the enemy. Each night
we’d spoon under a bush trying to share body heat. They only allow you to
carry ChapStick and water. No food. By the fourth day, I had eaten both of
my sticks of strawberry ChapStick. It tasted better than a meal at a five-star
restaurant. It was awesome.
I was standing against a cement wall in one of the interrogation rooms. I
had been dragged from my tiny cell where I’d laid shivering in my
underwear all night, dreaming about what I would eat when I got home. The
bright spotlight pointed at my face was blinding, but its warmth was a
welcome change from the thirty-five degree December air temperature.
Two of my muscle-bound “captors” stood to my right and left. An
interrogator was seated at the desk in front of me. I was desperately trying
to recall the week of classroom training we’d had prior to being flung into
the wilderness.
The questioning began. I attempted to use the techniques I learned in
class. I’m so tired. I don’t remember much. I think I’m injured. Name. Rank.
Serial number. Stick to your story. Lie without actually lying. My captors
weren’t convinced. SMACK! A huge paw slammed against my face,
flipping my head 90 degrees to the right. What the fuck? Blood trickled
down my chin. Now I was pissed. SMACK! The other man’s meaty hand
came from the opposite direction. My blood was boiling, and I desperately
tried to control my emotions. I didn’t do a good job. I lunged at one of the
instructors with a flurry of well-intentioned curse words as my only
weapon. The other instructor was on me in a millisecond; he put me in an
impressive chokehold.
The instructor playing the role of interrogator stood quickly and broke
character, calling a brief training time-out. “Gleeson, you pull shit like that
again and we’ll just fail you,” he said in a calm, professional tone.
Basically, I had to sit there and take it. You know, get the full benefit and
training value. Otherwise, I’d fail and not be able to deploy. Then, the
training time-out was over, and it was back to the old slap and tickle. Then a
bucket of water and some rags were brought into the room. I’ll let your
imagination take it from there.

Sometimes embracing the suck… well… sucks! And we don’t always

choose our suffering. Why do innocent people suffer injustice, racism, and
inequality? Why does a parent have to die and leave young children, or why
does a person have to lose a leg, their ability to move, or their eyesight?
Why does a person have to suffer from rape or cancer, or get killed in
combat? For some, the greatest pain may be not knowing why they suffer.
Suffering is often easier to bear when we understand its purpose. When we
are able to accept it and shift focus toward the potentially positive aspects
of our existence.
And then there is purposeful suffering. The kind of suffering that is
necessary to become truly fulfilled. Psychologists have studied the area of
happiness extensively and the findings are what most assume, but few of us
are willing to accept. The more things we acquire, money we make, or
recognition we receive for accomplishing great—but sometimes
meaningless—goals, our happiness level actually decreases. But when we
strip away the material items or push the limits of our comfort zone, our
happiness increases. Why? Because our perspective on what matters to us
changes.
I guarantee that training for—and competing in—a challenging race
would bring you more happiness and fulfillment than buying a new car.
Investing your limited time to give back or support a cause close to your
heart will always bring more joy than yet another social engagement with
friends you see all the time. Being disciplined about your fitness and
wellness routine would bring you far greater satisfaction than making a
little more money every year. A BUD/S student’s morale during Hell Week
soars just by putting on dry socks, even though the rest of him is soaking
wet and chilled to the bone.
The term “perception is reality” usually has a bit of a negative
connotation. But it doesn’t have to. If we change our perception of
adversity, imagine what could be possible. As British Explorer Sir Ernest
Shackleton once said, “Difficulties are just things to overcome, after all.”
Simple right? If we all could embrace that mindset, life’s challenges
wouldn’t seem so bad. But Ernest was a bit of a different breed.
He was a British polar explorer who led three expeditions to the
Antarctic, and one of the principal figures of the period known as the
Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. During the second expedition (1907–
1909) he and three companions established a new record by making the
largest advance toward the South Pole in exploration history. For this
achievement, Ernest was knighted by King Edward VII upon his return
home.
After the race to the South Pole ended in December 1911, he turned his
attention to the crossing of Antarctica from sea to sea, via the pole. To this
end, he made preparations for what became the Imperial Trans-Antarctic
Expedition, which lasted for three grueling years. Ernest published details
of his new expedition early in 1914. Two ships would be employed;
Endurance would carry the main party into the Weddell Sea, aiming for
Vahsel Bay. From there, a team of six, led by Ernest, would begin the
crossing of the continent. Meanwhile, a second ship, the Aurora, would take
a supporting party under Captain Aeneas Mackintosh to McMurdo Sound
on the opposite side of the continent. This party would then lay supply
depots across the Great Ice Barrier as far as the Beardmore Glacier. These
depots would be stocked with the food and fuel that would enable Ernest’s
party to complete their journey of 1,800 miles across the continent. Sounds
super fun, right?
Legend has it that Ernest posted this ad in the Times when recruiting for
the expedition. It read:

Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long
hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honor and
recognition in event of success.

Sounds like a Navy SEAL recruiting poster! Ours might read:

Low pay. More misery than you could imagine. Potential for death.
But hey, you get to be a pipe hitter, serve your country, and purge the
world of evil.—Uncle Sam

I know what you’re thinking. Well that sure was stupid. Ernest clearly
was no marketing expert. Definitely not a talent acquisition professional.
Good luck with that! Actually, over the coming weeks, 5,000 crazy bastards
applied for the expedition. These people were clearly nuts! Maybe they all
thought the ad was a joke, but it was no joke. Basically, the applicants were
saying, “I’ll take an order of pain and suffering with a side of misery and
potential death please.” But with the promise of adventure and possible
noteworthy achievement, that was enough.
As usual, Murphy came a-callin’. Disaster struck this expedition when
Endurance became trapped in pack ice and was slowly crushed before the
shore parties could be delivered to land. The crew escaped by camping on
the sea ice for many miserable months, living off limited rations
supplemented by raw seal and dog meat. No ChapStick, apparently.
Embrace the suck, gents—you signed up for it! Shackleton’s recruiting ad
was accurate after all.
Eventually, the ice disintegrated enough for them to launch the lifeboats
and reach Elephant Island. Ultimately, they inhabited the island of South
Georgia, after a stormy ocean voyage of 720 nautical miles. It was Ernest’s
most famous exploit. In 1921, he returned to the Antarctic, but died of a
heart attack while his ship was moored in South Georgia. He was buried
there at his wife’s request.
Sir Ernest Shackleton was a man driven by ambition. Away from his
expeditions, his life was generally restless and unfulfilled. In his search for
rapid pathways to wealth and security, he launched business ventures that
failed to prosper, and he died heavily in debt. Upon his death, he was lauded
in the press, but was thereafter largely forgotten. But later in the twentieth
century, he was rediscovered and rapidly became a role model for
leadership as someone who, in extreme circumstances, kept his team
together.
One could argue that at his core he may have been driven by the wrong
values, as we discussed in Chapter Three, but he clearly had a drive that
fueled his ability to achieve lofty goals. That same drive (fire) ended up
saving the lives of his crew. His career was full of extreme suffering that he
specifically chose in pursuit of his passions.

Mental Model
Suffering Practices
In the early days of my entrepreneurial adventures, I felt a lot like Sir
Ernest. Adrift in uncharted waters. Running low on supplies. Safe return on
investment doubtful. Occasionally gnawing on raw seal meat. I’ll admit, it
was very challenging and stressful. But it was also extremely fulfilling,
because it was mine to own. It was suffering I chose once again. As I
mentioned, start-ups have a similar failure rate as SEAL training, but I
didn’t care. Because I’d already pushed the boundaries of my comfort zone
beyond what I could have ever imagined, I knew that this path could be
successful as well. Not without obstacles, anxiety, and failure, but
ultimately successful.
So, it’s not just about being more thoughtful in choosing what you are
willing to suffer for, but also how to engage in proper suffering. Almost
every self-help book seems to be about how to be happy, how to be
empowered and engage in positive self-talk, how to be in a fabulous
relationship, how to build wealth… in other words, how to be anything
other than the inevitably suffering human beings most of us are at some
point in our lives. But we all experience suffering, so why fight it? Better to
embrace it, understand it, and learn to walk the path in harmony. Better to
understand the steps we take to arrive at suffering and learn how to navigate
these trying periods in our lives in a more healthy manner.
The Embrace the Suck model has five suffering practices that are backed
by research to help you grow through times of struggle.

1. Find safe relationships to process suffering. Suffering is

meant to be dealt with in a relationship. We all need people to
walk alongside us on the journey of suffering. We know from
research and experience that social support plays a huge role in
helping people cope with trials and eventually grow from them.
You need people who provide a safe place for you to express
your true feelings about your pain. Even though it’s difficult when
you’re going through a hard time, you need to do your part in
reaching out and being vulnerable. A deeper appreciation of
vulnerability is one of the positive changes people tend to
experience when they grow through suffering.

2. Face and express your emotions. Once you find people to

walk with you on this journey, you need to approach and express
your emotions, rather than suppress and run from them. It’s
commonly known that sharing your emotions related to suffering
leads to positive outcomes. Conversely, research indicates that
suppressing emotions leads to negative outcomes, like
increased rates of anxiety and depression. You need emotionally
safe relationships in order to do this. You have to trust that your
vulnerable emotions will be handled with care and compassion.
When you express your true emotions in the context of safe
relationships, it sets in motion a series of positive processes.
You connect more deeply to others, which is healing in itself. In
addition, you begin to discover the meaning of your suffering in
the context of your life story.

3. Process the emotions of suffering all the way through.

Once you start talking about and feeling the pain of your
suffering, stay with the feelings until you get to the end of the
emotional arc. This principle comes from what is sometimes
called a functional theory of emotion, which suggests that
emotions are fundamentally adaptive. Emotions are your
automatic evaluation of the events in your life. They provide
information that is crucial, and they orient you to what is
important for your well-being. For example, sadness is adaptive
because it helps you grieve a loss. Emotions have a natural arc,
or progression, in terms of their intensity and clarity. As you
begin to feel the impact of your trial, you may start off ruminating
about the situation. It’s important that you don’t stop at this
phase. You need to embrace your emotions more fully to
experience their adaptive benefits. As you engage in this
process with people you trust and continue the arc of the feeling,
the meaning becomes clearer, and there is a sense of relief as
you experience the full measure of your own emotional truth.

4. Reflect on and reorder your priorities. Trials have a way of

making you rethink your priorities in life. This can help you grow.
But you must actively reflect on what is truly important to you
and then be intentional about changing your routines, habits,
and rhythms in ways that align with your revised priorities. That
might mean spending more time with your spouse and kids and
cherishing each present moment with them. It could mean
accepting and even embracing your limitations. Maybe it’s
leaving the next item on your to-do list undone when the time
has come to do something else, and trusting that you will
 complete the work in order of priority. Or possibly it means
finding your identity through relationships rather than
accomplishments.

5. Use your experiences of suffering to help others. Many

people find an immense sense of meaning in helping others
who’ve gone through similar trials. Even if others didn’t
experience the same challenges as you, using your pain as the
fuel for empathy and compassion for others is a way of
redeeming your suffering. It helps you create meaning out of it.
Many veterans suffering from PTSD find peace in serving fellow
veterans. Research shows that volunteerism is one of the most
powerful ways we can engage in our own healing. In the same
way, this is a core reason grieving parents of fallen soldiers start
foundations in their name. And frankly, that’s why I serve as a
board member for the SEAL Family Foundation as well as
mentor young men into and through the SEAL training program.
So, get off your ass and go find a cause greater than yourself.
Trust me, you’ll never regret it.

Great, So What Now?

So, whether the pain and emotional obstacles we experience are chosen or
dealt to us, practicing purposeful suffering undoubtedly leads to a better
life. BUD/S students who make it through training can bear the suffering—
lean into it even—because they have chosen to accept it as a means to a
better end. A pathway to a specific goal. It’s no different for elite athletes,
successful entrepreneurs, or anyone who has chosen to expand their comfort
zone in pursuit of something they are passionate about. It’s a willingness we
all have if we just tap into it. If you just embrace the suck and the good
problems that will undoubtedly follow, you’ll eventually find greatness—
whatever your definition of that is.
Challenge yourself to identify both the suffering you have chosen, the
suffering you haven’t, and the meaning in it all. Consider how you can
derive positive benefits from your most arduous and painful times. What
perspective could be gained and applied to transforming your mind?
 Questions to ask yourself:
What problems can I identify in my life currently? In the past?
Did they stem from good choices or bad choices?
Do I embrace the challenges I face when pursuing aggressive
goals and new opportunities, or do I allow those obstacles to
turn me around—to push me back in the direction of my safe
village?
What potential satisfaction could I derive from taking more risk
in life?
What do I willingly suffer for and why?
Do I have the ability to change my perspective on the suffering
I didn’t choose?
What potentially amazing things could I discover about myself
by engaging in purposeful suffering?
 PART 3

TAKE ACTION: EXECUTE, EXECUTE,

EXECUTE

In the absence of orders, I will take charge.

—NAVY SEAL ETHOS
 8
WIN MORE THROUGH DISCIPLINE
AND ACCOUNTABILITY

The first and best victory is to conquer self.

—PLATO

In the early stages of BUD/S, all students are divided into boat crews,
seven-person teams that consist of six enlisted students and one officer, the
boat crew leader. This teaches prospective SEALs to work diligently in
small teams just like on the battlefield and requires teamwork,
communication, discipline, and accountability—all paramount skills for
team success in any environment. Team discipline and accountability begins
and ends with personal discipline and accountability and demands total
engagement from each team member. The crews that win the most have
members who look out for the person to their left and right more than
themselves, which creates an overlapping web of high performance.

We demand discipline. We expect innovation.

—NAVY SEAL ETHOS

During Hell Week, many of the activities involve competition with the
other crews. Some crews come together quickly; they are highly disciplined
and work collaboratively to achieve their goals. Each team member holds
themselves and the others to the highest standard. When they fall short, they
debrief and apply lessons learned for continuous improvement. Kaizen is
Japanese for resisting the plateau of arrested development—otherwise,
never being satisfied with the status quo. Its literal translation is
“continuous improvement.” These crews find strength in one another during
the most arduous times. The leaders inspire the team by taking on the
hardest tasks and carrying more than their share of the weight. And they
win, consistently. Other crews succumb to the pain, suffering, and misery
and fall apart. They allow external influences to deteriorate their personal
and team-level accountability and discipline. Infighting and finger-pointing
ensues. And they lose, consistently.
Sometimes the instructors perform what I refer to as leadership
experiments. They take the leader from the crew that is consistently
winning all or the majority of the races and swap them out with the leader
of the crew that is losing the majority of the races, then sit back and see
what unfolds. The outcome is relatively consistent across classes and quite
fascinating. The crew that was always dragging in the rear, under new
inspirational leadership, almost immediately moves to the middle or near
the head of the pack. Why? Because the leader knows how to quickly
transform the mindsets of the individuals and culture of the team. To
reignite their aggression. To give them that collective passion—a will to
win as a team through discipline and accountability. They become inspired,
and unified, and they operate under a new mission narrative they can
emotionally connect to.
Meanwhile, the crew that was winning the majority of the races, under
new seemingly poor leadership, continues to lead the pack! Why? Because
the winning culture and mindset of each team member was already so
ingrained that no one person or externality could dismantle what they’d
created. The level of individual and team discipline they have forged is
unbreakable, even in the worst of conditions. They thrive on adversity.
In BUD/S, SQT, and selection programs for other elite NSW special
mission units, the instructors weigh data from peer reviews heavily. On a
regular basis, the members of the class anonymously rank their peers with
the opportunity to provide explanations. If you have ever done a 360-degree
review in your company, you get the idea. So, imagine a 360-degree review
on steroids where the stakes are extremely high. Students who are
consistently ranked at the bottom are brought in for a board review and
considered for removal. But the reasoning for a candidate being rated
poorly by their classmates may not be what you imagine. It’s not because
they aren’t the fastest runner, the best swimmer, or a proficient shooter on
the range. It’s behavioral. The student lacks discipline, integrity, and
accountability. They don’t put the team’s needs before their own. They fear
failure and therefore don’t take calculated risks. They lack creativity and
innovation. Basically, they are someone you wouldn’t want to be standing
next to in a gunfight in Ramadi.
Discipline and accountability aren’t just the path to winning more in
your life, but the true gateway to happiness and fulfillment. Think about it
this way. I’m sure you’ve come across people in your life who seem to
always put in the required work and effort for any given task, be it their job,
a hobby, or maybe a fitness goal. Yet the result or outcome seems to be
consistently lackluster. Then others who put in the same amount of time and
perceived effort seem to always be in a state of kaizen—continuous
improvement. If both groups are putting in the time, why would the result
be different? Research on this topic brought me to K. Anders Ericsson, a
Swedish psychologist and Conradi eminent scholar and professor of
psychology at Florida State University, who is internationally recognized in
the field of human performance and expertise.
In their Harvard Business Review article, “The Making of an Expert,”
Ericsson, Michael J. Prietula, and Edward T. Cokely provide deep insight
into the subject of deliberate practice. They argue that it’s not so much
about the time invested, but rather how we go about pursuing continuous
improvement. I didn’t become a proficient open water swimmer by floating
in the Pacific for hours on end. You don’t become a great golfer simply by
hitting the course three days a week with your buddies—especially if you’re
slamming Busch Light tallboys the whole time. I’d imagine even the top
hotdog eating champions have worked deliberately on their craft.
In the beginning of the article, they highlight the work of Benjamin
Bloom, a professor of education at the University of Chicago who
published a revolutionary book called Developing Talent in Young People,
which examined the critical factors that contribute to talent. Bloom’s studies
focused on what sets apart effort from developing true expertise. His work
focused on musicians, artists, mathematicians, and athletes. Three key areas
he highlights as differentiators are:

1. Intense and focused practice

2. Study with devoted teachers
3. Support from family during key developmental years

A quote from the article that can’t be overlooked is this:

The journey to truly superior performance is neither for the faint of

heart nor for the impatient. The development of genuine expertise
requires struggle, sacrifice, and honest, often painful self-assessment.
There are no shortcuts. It will take you at least a decade to achieve
expertise, and you will need to invest that time wisely, by engaging
in “deliberate” practice—practice that focuses on tasks beyond your
current level of competence and comfort. Moving beyond your
traditional comfort zone of achievement requires substantial
motivation and sacrifice, but it’s a necessary discipline.

We train for war and fight to win.

—NAVY SEAL ETHOS

To illustrate this point, one of the most critical and unfortunately

relevant skills SEALs must master is close quarters combat (CQC). Much
of the fighting we have done over the past two decades has been in urban
environments—large cities and dense rural villages—which is arguably the
most dangerous type of combat due to 360 degrees of threats. CQC training
is predominantly performed in a structure called a kill house. One of our
famous training mottos is “slow is smooth and smooth is fast.” Basically,
the crawl-walk-run philosophy. You begin learning the trade in BUD/S and
then start refining your skills in SQT. Safety violations in the kill house are
one of the fastest ways to get dropped from training due to the extremely
serious nature of this craft. We train in live-fire scenarios. Yes, real bullets
in tight spaces. The goal is to capture or eliminate enemy threats without
putting a round through your teammate’s head or shooting an undeserving
noncombatant.
In the kill house, well-trained SEAL instructors watch your every move
from a web of catwalks that span the entire structure. One evolution might
be that the team will breach an exterior door, then dynamically enter the
house moving down corridors clearing room by room. Each room has a
different scenario set up; armed combatants mixed with noncombatants,
hostage situations, different furniture configurations, you name it.
Instructors who hold your future in their hands watch every move in
extreme detail. Body position, foot movement, appropriate speed, muzzle
discipline, following best practices, everything. Oh, and don’t shoot the
fucking hostage! That will earn you some serious remediation. The kill
house we use at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, for example, has a
ridiculously steep hill next to it—a small mountain, really. If you throw a
round off target, shoot the hostage, or incur a safety violation, your ass runs
the hill in full gear.
All of our training is deliberate, and as the SEAL Ethos says, “My
training is never complete.” Being in a constant state of kaizen is critical for
our survival. Painful self-assessment (and peer feedback) is our prescription
for enhanced performance. This continuum expands your comfort zone to
the farthest reaches you could ever imagine. We train deliberately. Assess
performance. Then train again.

Team Accountability
As previously alluded to, personal discipline and accountability directly
apply to success in a team setting as well. In my first book, TakingPoint: A
Navy SEAL’s 10 Fail-Safe Principles for Leading Through Change, I argue
that accountability is the most critical cultural pillar for high performance in
any team environment, especially as it relates to navigating the murky
waters of volatility and uncertainty—a battlefield the whole world is now
accustomed to.
Consider the following story of Dave Schlotterbeck, formerly the CEO
of Alaris Medical Systems. It’s a case study of a leader who learned to
master change in his organization and bring impressive results to the bottom
line by building a culture that embraces total accountability. And while his
organization wasn’t being bombarded by a global pandemic, attacked by a
swarm of hungry locusts, or threatened with death and dismemberment, its
journey from the depths is proof that accountability is the road to true
transformation, whether it be personal or professional, team or individual.
Dave knew that he needed to change the organizational culture at Alaris.
People were avoiding risks and shrinking from opportunities out of fear of
failure, and there was a total lack of discipline. Like BUD/S boat crews that
consistently lose the race. Almost everyone in the organization was more
worried about protecting themselves and finding another job than getting
the results the company needed. Dave recognized that to change the results,
he would need to change the mindset, how people interacted, and the way
they approached their work—the culture. So he went in search of a new
approach to transform the organization. I refer to this as a “culture-driven
transformation.”
Dave led the process for redefining the company’s rituals and beliefs so
they better aligned with the actions necessary to achieve desired results. He
transformed the Alaris culture and literally changed the landscape of the
medical systems industry. In just three years, Alaris increased its share price
from $.31 per share to $22.35 per share, growing as much as 15 percent a
year in a market where competitors were achieving no more than 3 percent.
Soon thereafter, the company was acquired by Cardinal Health, a Fortune
20 company, and later spun out as the nucleus of CareFusion—one of
TakingPoint Leadership’s clients. Today, CareFusion is one of the largest
medical device suppliers in the world. Dave describes the culture change at
Alaris as the “most difficult job” he had to perform during his distinguished
forty-year career, but it’s also the one he takes greatest pride in. Why?
Because it was so fucking uncomfortable—my words, not his. Learning
how to change a culture, and change it quickly, is a vital part of the new
leadership skill set required for operating in volatile, uncertain, complex,
and ambiguous environments, whether it’s business, family, relationships,
or the battlefield.
Based on that story, consider how discipline and accountability not only
apply in a team setting but also to our own personal and professional
performance.
When I was in middle school, I fell in love with rock climbing. I enjoyed
the physical and mental challenge of it, and actually discovered I enjoy
heights. My twin brother and I attended a hardcore expedition camp each
summer that involved rock climbing, ice climbing, and mountaineering. By
the time we finished high school, we’d become relatively proficient
climbers and had summited several of the highest peaks in North America.
My twin was far more advanced than I was, however. From the ice-covered
peaks of Wind River in Wyoming to the jungles of Costa Rica, there was
definitely some purposeful, blissful suffering that came in handy later in my
career as a SEAL.
Those with a passion for climbing aren’t all cut from the same cloth.
And some are purely insane. Take Alex Honnold, for example. He’s a
master of focus and discipline in his trade. Alex lived in a van in Yosemite
National Park for over a decade. No, he wasn’t homeless—he just wanted to
live in a van and climb all day, every day. He is best known for his free solo
ascents of big rock walls. How big? Insanely big. And what do I mean by
free solo? I mean not using any ropes.
Alex is the author (with David Roberts) of the memoir Alone on the Wall
and the subject of the 2018 biographical documentary Free Solo. As one of
his close climbing friends and colleagues said in an interview in the
documentary, “Imagine an event in the Olympics, but if you don’t earn the
gold medal, you die.”
Alex was born in Sacramento, California. He started climbing in a gym
at the age of five. By age ten he was climbing every day and he participated
in many national and international youth climbing championships as a
teenager. He had found a passion, and he was extremely disciplined in his
quest to fulfill that passion. His practice was deliberate.
In a Rolling Stone interview he said, “I was never, like, a bad climber as
a kid, but I was never a great climber, either. There were a lot of other
climbers who were much, much stronger than me, who started as kids and
were, like, instantly freakishly strong—like they just have a natural gift.
And that was never me. I just loved climbing, and I’ve been climbing all the
time ever since, so I’ve naturally gotten better at it, but I’ve never been
gifted.”
Okay, whatever you say, Alex. Whatever you say.
He gained mainstream recognition after his 2012 solo of the Regular
Northwest Face of Half Dome and was featured in the film Alone on the
Wall and a subsequent 60 Minutes interview. In 2014, Clif Bar announced
that it would no longer sponsor Alex, along with four other climbers, who
were mostly free soloists. “We concluded that these forms of the sport are
pushing boundaries and taking the element of risk to a place where we as a
company are no longer willing to go,” the company wrote in an open letter.
Basically, saying: We can no longer support your lunacy and suicidal
tendencies!
On June 3, 2017, he made the first ever free solo ascent of El Capitan,
completing the 2,900-foot Freerider route in three hours and fifty-six
minutes. The feat, described as one of the greatest athletic feats of any kind,
ever, was documented by climber and photographer Jimmy Chin, and was
the subject of the 2018 documentary. The good news is that the film didn’t
turn out to be a tragedy!
What makes him so good? The fact that he really, really gives a shit
about climbing. In fact, it’s one of the few things he really cares about. And
that passion drives his discipline and accountability. And he uses his
passion and talent to give back. The Honnold Foundation is a nonprofit
organization dedicated to bringing solar energy to impoverished
communities. Alex not only uses his fame and connections to support this
goal, but he also donates a whopping one-third of his income to the
foundation every year.

Interestingly, research supports the fact that when our

passions can lead to giving to causes greater than ourselves,
we are more successful and dramatically more fulfilled.

We only have so many things we can really give a shit about in this short
life. If we try to give a shit about everything, chase every shiny object that
passes us, or have too many goals, we end up with mediocrity. Multitasking
simply means you’re doing many things in a half-assed, distracted manner
all at once. We have to pick something. We must prioritize in order to
execute. For Alex, it’s climbing. For David Goggins, it’s running and other
ridiculously painful endeavors. For Sir Ernest, it was exploration. For
Louis, it was purely survival. For me, it’s dating my wife. Did I write that to
score some points? Damn right I did.
Happiness and fulfillment come from focus, discipline, and self-control.
It may be hard to believe when you’re facing an all-you-can-eat buffet, the
prospect of making a quick buck, or the lazy lure of sleeping in versus
getting on the Peloton, but studies show that people with self-discipline are
happier. Why? Because with discipline and self-control we actually
accomplish more of the goals we truly care about.

You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize

this, and you will find strength.
—MARCUS AURELIUS

People with a higher degree of self-control spend less time debating

whether to indulge in behaviors and activities that don’t align with their
values or goals. They are more decisive. They don’t let impulses or feelings
dictate their choices. Instead, they make levelheaded choices—even if those
decisions involve some calculated risk. They are the architects of their own
beliefs and the actions they take to achieve a desired outcome. As a result,
they aren’t as easily distracted by Temptation Tiger and tend to feel more
satisfied with their lives.

Mental Model
Mastering Self-Discipline
There are actions you can take to learn self-discipline and gain the
willpower to live a happier, more fulfilling life. If you are looking to take
control of your habits and choices, here are the nine most powerful things
you can do to master self-discipline—which, again, is imperative for life
beyond your comfort zone—and maybe even redefining “extraordinary.”

STEP ONE: Know your weaknesses.

We all have weaknesses. Whether they’re the desire for alcohol, tobacco,
unhealthy food, obsession over social media, or the video game Fortnite
(what the hell is with this game, by the way?!), they have a similar effect on
us. Weaknesses don’t just come in the form of areas where we lack self-
control either. We all have our strong suits and the stuff we kind of suck at.
For example, I don’t care for having difficult conversations (as I mentioned
earlier), lengthy paperwork that involves digging up old documents I never
saved in the first place, holding my temper when someone is shooting at
me, picking up dog poop, or calling into automated phone systems. And
therefore, I actively (or purposefully) suck at these activities. So, I strive to
tackle them head-on—or I delegate them to others. (Never forget about the
subtle art of delegation!)
Self-awareness is a powerful tool for comfort zone expansion, but it
requires constant focus and acknowledging your shortcomings, whatever
they may be. I suffered from bad allergies and asthma growing up, and had
terrible eyesight. Those were some significant weaknesses when
considering becoming a SEAL. But so what? I trained hard to improve my
lung function and used money I’d saved for LASIK eye surgery. Too often
people either try to pretend their vulnerabilities don’t exist or they succumb
to them with a fixed mindset, throwing their hands up in defeat and saying,
“Oh well.” Own up to your flaws. You can’t overcome them until you do.
What did Jason do when the doctors at Bethesda went down the list of shit
he’d never be able to do again? Exactly.
If you haven’t been zipped up by a high-caliber machine gun, you have
no excuse.

STEP TWO: Remove temptations.

Like the saying goes, “out of sight, out of mind.” It may seem silly, but this
phrase offers powerful advice. By simply removing the biggest temptations
from your environment, you will greatly improve your self-discipline. Just
tell Temptation Tiger thank you for the invite, but you’ll pass on the
evening of debauchery.
 When I decided I was going to pursue the lofty goal of becoming a
SEAL, everything had to change. If you want to eat healthier, toss the junk
food in the trash. Want to drink less? Throw out the booze. If you want to
improve your productivity at work, turn off social media notifications and
silence your cell phone. Prioritize and execute. The fewer distractions you
have, the more focused you will be on accomplishing your goals. Set
yourself up for success by ditching bad influences.

STEP THREE: Set clear goals and have an execution plan.

If you hope to achieve greater degrees of self-discipline, you must have a
clear vision of what you hope to accomplish, just like any goal. You must
also have an understanding of what success means to you. After all, if you
don’t know where you are going, it’s easy to lose your way or get
sidetracked. Remember to prioritize. When we work with our corporate
clients on strategic planning, execution, and organizational transformation,
we remind them that having ten priorities translates to no priorities.
A clear plan outlines each step you must take to reach your goals. If you
want to become an ultramarathon runner, most of us don’t start with a 100-
mile race. Crawl, walk, run. Create a mantra to keep yourself focused.
Successful people use this technique to stay on track and establish a clear
finish line. At TakingPoint Leadership, we call this a guiding metaphor,
something you can visualize and connect to. For example, one client uses
“Always charge the net” because he loves tennis and has a goal to be more
aggressive in his role at the company. In the coming pages, I’ll provide you
a detailed model that can be used for just about any objective.

STEP FOUR: Practice daily diligence.

We aren’t born with self-discipline; it’s a learned behavior. And just like
any other skill you want to master, it requires daily practice and repetition.
It must become habitual. But the effort and focus that self-discipline
requires can be draining.
As time passes, it can become more and more difficult to keep your
willpower in check. The bigger the temptation or decision, the more
challenging it can feel to tackle other tasks that also require self-control. So,
work on building your self-discipline through daily diligence. This goes
back to step three. In order to practice daily diligence, you must have a
plan. Put it on your calendar, your to-do list, whatever works best for you.
With practice, anyone can do something that sucks every day.

STEP FIVE: Create new habits by keeping it simple.

Acquiring self-discipline and working to instill a new habit can feel
daunting at first, especially if you focus on the entire task at hand. To avoid
feeling intimidated, keep it simple. Break your goal into small, doable steps.
Instead of trying to change everything at once, focus on doing one thing
consistently and master self-discipline with that goal in mind. As we say in
the SEAL Teams, “Eat the elephant one bite at a time.”
If you’re trying to get in shape but don’t exercise regularly (or ever),
start by working out ten or fifteen minutes a day. If you’re trying to achieve
better sleep habits, start by going to bed thirty minutes earlier each night. If
you want to eat healthier, change your grocery shopping habits and prep
your lunch the night before to take with you in the morning. Take baby
steps. Eventually, when you’re ready, you can add more goals to your list.

STEP SIX: Change your perception about willpower.

If you believe you have a limited amount of willpower, you probably won’t
surpass those limits. We have covered how willpower can deplete over
time, but what about changing that perception? The BUD/S student who
believes they probably won’t make it through training won’t succeed. Why
assume our will to win can only take us so far? When we embrace the
mindset of unlimited willpower, we continue to grow, achieve more, and
develop mental toughness. It’s the same philosophy as setting “stretch”
goals.
In short, our internal conceptions about willpower and self-control can
determine how disciplined we are. If you can remove these subconscious
obstacles and truly believe you can do it, then you will give yourself an
extra boost of motivation toward making those goals a reality.

STEP SEVEN: Give yourself a backup plan.

In the SEAL Teams, we always have contingency plans. Psychologists use a
technique to boost willpower called “implementation intention.” That’s
when you give yourself a plan to deal with a potentially difficult situation
you know you will likely face. To be clear, I am not referring to a backup
plan under the auspices that you’ll probably fail at Plan A. Let’s say you
aspire to become a trapeze expert, but say to yourself, “Well, I’m probably
going to suck at this, so chances are I’ll be sticking with miniature golf.”
That’s a crappy backup plan wrapped in mediocrity. We are talking about
contingencies for intentional course correction, not planning for failure. So
be bold and keep moving forward.
Going in with a plan will help give you the mindset and self-control
necessary for the situation. You will also save energy by not having to make
a sudden decision based on your emotional state.

STEP EIGHT: Find trusted coaches or mentors.

The development of expertise requires coaches who are capable of giving
constructive, even painful, feedback. Real experts are extremely motivated
students who seek out such feedback. They’re also skilled at understanding
when and if a coach’s advice doesn’t work for them.
The elite performers I’ve known and worked with always knew what
they were doing right while concentrating on what they were doing wrong.
They deliberately picked unsentimental coaches who would challenge them
and drive them to higher levels of performance. The best coaches also
identify aspects of your performance that will need to be improved at your
next level of skill and aid you in preparation.

STEP NINE: Forgive yourself and move forward.

Even with all our best intentions and well-laid plans, we sometimes fall
short. It happens. You will have ups and downs, great successes and dismal
failures. The key is to keep going. A very close SEAL buddy of mine has
had a lifelong dream of not just serving in the SEAL Teams but also making
it to our tier one special missions unit. He has every qualification this unit
could possibly want, but for some reason they didn’t select him on his first
application attempt. Did he wallow in sorrow? Not for one second. He
immediately developed a plan to take more college courses and train even
harder, and he transferred teams for a better chance to get picked up next
time. Easy day.
 If you stumble, find the root cause and move on. Don’t let yourself get
wrapped up in guilt, anger, or frustration, because these emotions will only
drag you further down and impede future progress. Learn from your
missteps and forgive yourself. Then get your head back in the game and
violently execute.

Great, So What Now?

Well, for starters, make the choice to be more fucking disciplined. Hold
yourself more accountable! These are choices that only you can make. No
one else.
Give yourself time to master discipline and accountability holistically
and in a given field. Remember, a disciplined mind leads to disciplined
thought and disciplined action. I’ve found, for example, that greater
discipline and personal accountability with fitness gives way to enhanced
focus and follow-through in my business leadership ability. Think about it
this way, if you were to measure your self-discipline, where would you
place yourself on a scale of one to ten? Be honest with yourself. Self-
discipline is one of the cornerstones of achievement, not just the
achievement of big goals, but also the carrying out of simple daily tasks and
chores.
Without a certain degree of self-discipline, you act like a jellyfish. You
get carried away by external forces, the environment, the media, family, or
colleagues, floating aimlessly at the whim of the tides. Possessing self-
discipline means to hold the steering wheel of your life and to become a
doer, instead of a drifter.

Questions to ask yourself:

When I make a promise, trivial or important, do I keep it?
How often do I change my mind after making a decision?
Do I get up in the morning intending to do something, only to
postpone it for later, and when the day is over, it is still not
done?
When a certain action, task, or chore is difficult and takes time
to accomplish, do I go through with it, or quit after a while?
If my answers to the above questions place me on the low end
of discipline and accountability, what the hell am I going to do
about it?
 9
MODELING MINDSET AND BEHAVIOR
FOR VIOLENT EXECUTION

The path to success is to take massive, determined actions.

—TONY ROBBINS

Somewhere Over Iraq

2:00 A.M.

Our four CH-47 Chinook helicopters flew low and fast over the barren
desert, filled with two SEAL platoons and Polish special operators on our
way to the target: a massive hydroelectric power plant and dam that had
been seized by retreating Iraqi forces. Our mission was to assault, capture,
and hold the plant until conventional US forces arrived. The intelligence
regarding the size and makeup of the enemy force protecting the plant
wasn’t very detailed. According to the intel, however, their intent was to
destroy the dam, resulting in mass power and electrical outages and
flooding of the land below. Our mission was to ensure this didn’t happen.
This was our first combat mission in Iraq, but we hadn’t even deployed
“in-country” yet. We were still staged at Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait
doing our turnover with SEAL Team Three when we were handed this
mission. As the helicopter rope suspension techniques (HRST) master in
my platoon, my initial job was to prepare the helicopters and supervise the
fast rope insert onto the target. I was sitting on a tight coil of thick green
nylon rope next to the open door of the helicopter, monitoring our progress
toward the insert point. I shivered slightly from the cold gusts blasting
through the bird. Even though it was about 70 degrees outside, the stark
contrast to the daytime heat—which was well above 100 degrees—
confused the mind and body. We had been in flight for about three hours
and our legs were numb and our bodies were stiff. The night sky was clear
and illuminated by a full moon, which made it easier for us to see the
landscape below but also made our helos nicely silhouetted targets for the
enemy. Hills, dunes, and palm groves dotted the land beneath us.
“Ten minutes out,” came the call over our radios. Now we were all
awake. Each man passed the signal—ten fingers—down the line and
checked weapons, radios, and night vision goggles. Each man double-
checked the gear of the man next to him. We all put on our thick welding
gloves that protected our hands from the intense friction that came from
sliding down the nylon rope.
“Five minutes.” Now, we were all on our feet, getting ready for the exit,
hearts beating a little faster. Intense focus permeated our minds, each man
envisioning his mission responsibilities. We had been rehearsing
relentlessly day and night for this mission. When our platoon and the Polish
GROM unit (elite special forces warriors) were tasked with this mission, we
had been given roughly two weeks to prepare. And we train for war and
fight to win.
We’d used every resource at our disposal to develop the mission plan,
rehearse, poke holes in the plan, and rehearse again. We planned and trained
for every possible contingency. We would dirt dive every choreographed
move. Every decision. Every possible blockage. We used satellite imagery
of the plant to build a framework of the compound, from landing zones to
every structure on the target. We started by defining the objective, and
identifying threats and necessary resource needs, then we used that
information along with the intel at hand to determine go/no-go criteria.
From there we assigned every possible action needed to fulfill the objective
—what, who, when.
The helo crew chief and platoon commander leaned out to confirm our
target location. “One minute.” Each man passed the signal, one index finger
extended. Hearts hammering, our point man (Mark Owen, who later went
on to become a tier one special missions unit team leader and number one
New York Times best-selling author of No Easy Day and No Hero) and I
grabbed the coiled fast rope, lifted it up, and got ready to throw it out. The
plant was enormous, stretching out across the horizon in front of us. Even
the intense buzzing from our helicopter’s spinning rotors didn’t drown out
the noise of the rushing river below us. There was no way to know exactly
what was facing us, but anybody who was in that building and the
surrounding structures had no idea what they were in for either. We’d all
trained for years for this moment. It was time for the training wheels to
come off.
Twenty feet above our landing zone, the helo came to a steady hover,
and I threw out the rope, adrenalin masking the strain of seventy pounds of
gear strapped to my body. Every man down the line gave a thumbs-up. With
one final fist bump, we were ready to go. In rapid succession, each SEAL
launched himself with well-trained precision out into the black abyss,
grabbing the thick rope and sliding quickly down into the tornado of
swirling sand below. We were ready to take the fight to the enemy.
I would be the final man to exit. As the last guy in the stack cleared the
door on his way down, I leaned out and grabbed the rope. As it always was
in training, the noise was deafening, the rotor wash intimidating. But what a
fucking rush. With both hands on the rope, I let my body weight carry me
forward and quickly began my descent. A split second later… BAM! With a
sudden and violent jolt, my rapid downward motion ended.
Shit! I immediately knew what had happened. Despite a year of training
for this deployment and two weeks deliberately practicing for this very
moment, old Murphy came a callin’ as usual. Anything that can go wrong
will go wrong. Let me back up really quickly so you get the picture. This
was my first platoon as a SEAL, so I’m one of three new guys. And new
guys get to carry the heavy shit. So in addition to my body armor, helmet,
night vision goggles, small day pack, suppressed M4 rifle, Sig Sauer P226
9mm pistol, CamelBak full of water, rifle and pistol magazines, radio, and a
few grenades, I was also carrying a thirty-pound fully gassed quickie saw
on my back. I’d zip-tied it to an old rucksack frame so I could wear it like a
backpack. Well, now that fucker was caught on the floor of the helo. My
body was dangling twenty feet above the concrete landing, and my hands
were gripping the rope as if my life depended on it, because it did. The river
below raged on both sides of the helipad. I looked down and could see that
the rotor wash had already ripped the chain-link fence surrounding the
landing zone out of the concrete.
 Well, I’m really embracing the suck now, I thought. The torture of
BUD/S was looking pretty good right about now. As I was about to lose my
grip, I looked back over my shoulder at the crew chief standing behind me.
He knew just what to do. With one swift kick, he dislodged the saw from
the floor of the helo and down I went in somewhat of a freefall, my hands
doing little to slow my descent. I hit the deck hard, feet first, then onto my
back. My spine crackled over the massive metal cutting saw. The inertia
caused my rifle to swing up and smack me in the face, splitting my right
eyebrow open two inches wide down to the bone. A river of blood streamed
down my face, but I didn’t realize it until later when a teammate said,
“Dude, what the hell happened to you?!”
I prayed for the air that had been so violently ripped from my lungs to
return. I quickly unfucked myself, got to my feet, and sprinted up the hill to
catch up with my team. Luckily, I was only one small cog in this highly
matrixed team. At the same time I was attempting unintentional suicide, we
had snipers fast roping onto the roof of the main structure, a SEAL mobility
unit landing desert patrol vehicles (DPVs—think dune buggies with 50
caliber machine guns) around the perimeter, and our Polish GROM brothers
fast roping into their predetermined sectors. As the primary assault force,
we stacked along the side wall of the main entrance, set charges, and blew
the metal doors off their hinges. And into the breach we went.
Ultimately, we were successful in our mission. We cleared the giant
power plant, capturing the enemy and eliminating threats as we went. The
next day we searched miles of dark, wet tunnels that snaked beneath the
massive property. We held the target for three days, then passed the torch to
conventional forces. We took no casualties other than one of our Polish
teammates who broke his ankle during the fast rope.

As nineteenth-century Prussian military commander Helmuth von Moltke

put it, “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” A more modern take
on it comes from world-famous boxing champ Mike Tyson: “Everybody
has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Damn right, Mike, damn
right. The point is, the best-laid plans come under fire. There is no such
thing as a perfect plan.

A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect

plan next week.
—GENERAL GEORGE PATTON

Preparation and execution beat planning all day long. But you still have
to plan. We teach our consulting clients, many of whom are multibillion-
dollar global organizations, the TakingPoint Leadership planning,
execution, and debriefing model. Much of that model is derived from how
we plan in the SEAL Teams. Proper planning and debriefing create an ideal
rhythm of execution and a constant state of kaizen.
I might ask you, “When you set a goal, do you usually have a plan for
achieving that goal?” Your answer most likely would be, “Sure, of course.”
But how well do we actually plan? Do we use the right approach? Want to
become more resilient? Get in better shape? Earn a promotion at work?
Start your own business? Find the love of your life? Raise children into
healthy, kind, responsible young adults? Swim the English Channel? Break
the Guinness record for holding your breath (it’s twenty-two minutes, by
the way)? Go to Wharton for your MBA? Become a Navy SEAL or Green
Beret? Well, what’s your plan?
As we all know, great plans have both long- and short-term elements.
Personal and professional. Macro and micro. Strategic and tactical. So,
whether you are planning to open a neighborhood coffee shop, be accepted
into Juilliard, or climb Mount Everest, you gotta have a plan. Not just any
plan. You need to use a specific framework. And let me just say, embracing
the suck is a lot easier when you have a solid plan of attack.
So, since you asked, here it is. And yes, all this needs to be documented
on paper, in a Google Doc, whatever, so long as you can refer to it
regularly.

STEP ONE: Define the objective.

The objective must be concise, quantifiable, time bound, and support the
strategic imperative. What’s a strategic imperative, you ask? Basically, a
strategic imperative is a longer-term goal supported by a series of
objectives. Let’s take a look at a few different styles for Objective
Statements. Depending on what you’re trying to accomplish, I prefer to use
slightly different approaches with varying degrees of specificity.
When it’s a personal fitness goal, for example, I like to be very specific.
When training for a marathon, your objective statement might look
something like this: By June 1, 2021, I will run a marathon in under three
hours following XYZ training regime on a weekly basis and completing at
least two twenty-mile runs during the two months prior to the race.
When we run planning workshops with our corporate clients, we often
use the objectives and key results (OKR) methodology. In this case,
objectives are memorable qualitative descriptions of what you want to
achieve. Objectives should be short, inspirational, and engaging—
something you (or a team) can emotionally connect to. An objective should
motivate and challenge you. Key results are a set of metrics that measure
your progress toward the objective. For each objective, you should have a
set of two to five key results. More than that and you won’t remember them.
Here’s an example for a business team:

OBJECTIVE: Create an Awesome Customer Experience

Key Results:
Improve Net Promoter Score from X to Y.
Increase Repurchase Rate from X to Y.
Maintain Customer Acquisition Cost Under Z.

Either approach works well. The idea is that your primary objective is
clear, inspiring, and easy to remember.

STEP TWO: Identify threats and blockages.

Now that you have a clear, concise, quantifiable objective, you need to start
thinking about what stands in your way. Opening that coffee shop you’ve
always dreamed about? Well, list all the things that could throw a wrench
into that plan. What’s going to punch you in the face? Maybe the price per
square foot for rent is a bit higher than you anticipated and could go up
again next year. The location is okay but not ideal. You’re uncertain about
customer traffic. Your budget is limited—if things don’t take off in one
year, you’ll have to find an investor or close the doors. A global pandemic
pops up. Uncertainty! This list could go on and on.
Once you have your list of potential threats, bucket them into things that
are in your control and things that are not in your control. Put the items
outside your control off to the side. Maintain situational awareness, but
don’t waste too much time or energy on them. Your focus needs to be on
mitigating the threats that are in your control. Stay in your three-foot world.

STEP THREE: List needed resources.

Planning to capture a high value ISIS leader? Well, what resources do you
need? Ground intel. A direct action assault force. Quick reaction force. A
comms plan. Air support. Information on enemy movement in the region.
Guns and shit. Whatever you think you need to accomplish the mission.
Keep in mind that some resources you need might be at your disposal
and some may not be and must be sourced or acquired. Running that
marathon? Proper shoes would help. Maybe a trainer who specializes in
distance running. Regardless, specifically note the resources not
immediately at your disposal because those will require specific time-bound
“actions.” We’ll get to that in a second.

STEP FOUR: Determine go/no-go.

Based on the objective, threats, and resources needed to accomplish the
mission, determine if the mission is achievable. Do not use this as an easy
way out. This is simply a method for ensuring your objective is reasonable,
even if it’s a stretch goal.
For example, one of the no-go criteria we listed as a threat during the
planning process for the mission I described earlier in this chapter was a
sandstorm, a threat out of our control. Well, guess what. Two nights in a
row, while we were literally on the tarmac in our helos getting ready to take
off, the mission was canceled due to sandstorms. What a shock!

STEP FIVE: Apply lessons learned.

This is where you ask yourself, “Have I or anyone I know attempted this
before?” If so, consider what went well, didn’t go so well, and any insights
you could apply to this current plan. If you’ve never run a marathon before,
go find someone who has, such as a friend, coach, or mentor. If you tried to
open the same coffee shop when you lived in Seattle but you had to close
the doors after a year, what happened last time that you need to note in this
new plan to open in Austin. Take into account the good, bad, and ugly. If
you plan to kidnap that ISIS dude, what happened the last time you
accomplished a similar mission?
The list doesn’t have to be long. Only note the most relevant lessons
learned that apply. Once you have the list, you may need to go back and
adjust the objective statement or key results.

STEP SIX: Create an action plan.

The action plan is a list of all the time-bound items that must be executed in
order to fulfill the objective. That might mean obtaining the resources not
immediately at your disposal or executing on the key performance
indicators (KPIs) and milestones that need to happen between now and
when the objective is to be completed.
Here is where discipline and accountability come back into play. Each
action must have a what, who, and when. Make three columns on your
planning sheet. The what is, of course, the action itself. The who is the
person responsible or accountable for making it happen. Depending on the
objective, that may not always be you. If this is a quarterly project based on
your annual strategic business plan, there may be four or five different
people needed in the who category. When refers to the time-bound nature of
the plan. Each action needs a due date.

STEP SEVEN: Assemble your Red Team.

Here comes the fun and often frustrating part of the planning process. Now
that you have the plan about 60 percent complete—keeping in mind we are
only taking it to 80 percent, which I’ll explain in a minute—it’s time to gain
an outside perspective. And by perspective, I mean have two or three other
people poke holes in your plan.
First, select a couple people with some relevant knowledge of you and
your plan or goal. This is your Red Team. Next, present your plan:
objective, threats, resources, go/no-go criteria, lessons learned, and
associated actions. Allow them a few minutes to digest and ask clarifying
questions if needed. For this to be done properly, the Red Team members
will take turns saying only, “Have you considered…” Your only response is,
“Thank you.” No rebuttals, no arguments. So, for example, when you
present your plan for running that marathon and your neighbor (an avid
runner) says, “Have you considered that you’re a lazy piece of shit who has
never followed through with a fitness goal… ever?” After a brief,
uncomfortable moment, your response is, “Thank you!” Jot down the
relevant input you hadn’t considered and use that information to adjust your
resource needs, threats, actions, or contingencies, which is the last step. Or,
just do a 5K!

STEP EIGHT: Create a contingency plan.

Make four columns. Label them trigger event, potential additional data
needed, action to be taken, and desired outcome. Based on the feedback
from your Red Team and the list of threats in your control, make some
contingency plans. Remember, Murphy can come calling anytime. What
can go wrong probably will, right?
Gotta go snatch that ISIS asshole? Well, you listed “unknown number of
enemy on target” as one of the threats. The contingency you label might be
that you get on target and discover you’re outnumbered. The key indicator,
of course, is that you’re getting overrun quickly. The action would then be
to abort the mission and exfil off the target or call in your quick reaction
force of heavily armed, highly motivated killers. And as mentioned, when it
makes sense, rehearse for the contingencies.
For example, if I’m preparing for a big keynote or motivational speech,
regardless of how many times I’ve spoken, I’m still highly regimented in
my rehearsal process. That includes visualizing not just the win, but what
could go wrong. Technology fails. The audience sucks. I suck. Protesters
invade the ballroom. The stage collapses. The event is an hour behind
schedule, and I have a plane to catch. Who knows? Still gotta have a plan.

Mental Model
The Outcome Pyramid
Here is where we tie it all together. By now you’ve hopefully identified
some areas in your life where you could embrace the suck a bit more. Push
the boundaries of your comfort zone. Achieve loftier goals. Be more
consistent. Build resilience. Bounce back faster. Get over the shit that
doesn’t matter. Spend less time and money on pointless crap. Remove the
toxic haters standing in your path. Hang out less with Temptation Tiger. Or
all of the above.
So now what? Now you’ve created your Personal Values Manifesto. You
know the benefit of living beyond your comfort zone. You’re hopefully
clearer on your purpose and your why. You’ve identified clear objectives
and you know how to plan like a Navy SEAL. And most important, you
know Hell Week sucks. But your purpose, beliefs, and values won’t bring
you fulfillment unless they drive you to take the necessary actions to
achieve your desired results and live your extraordinary life. Let’s face it, a
person, team, or business has two types of results: existing outcomes and
desired outcomes.
Now let’s talk about how to move away from existing results and run
passionately toward desired outcomes. The goals that really mean
something to you. The things you deeply give a shit about. The stuff that’s
bigger than you—more significant than your selfish desires that will lead
you nowhere.
Let me introduce to you the Embrace the Suck Outcome Pyramid. There
are five tiers.
 At the top of the pyramid you have your desired Outcome. Again, there
are two kinds of outcomes: existing and desired. Maybe that’s an
overarching life goal of leaving the world a little better that you found it or
a shorter-term goal of losing fifteen pounds. Regardless, it must be a clear,
concise, quantifiable, and time-bound objective.
The next tier on the pyramid is Actions. This is where the planning
methodology comes into play. The desired outcome is the result of
achieving the objective and the rest of the plan falls into the Actions tier.
So, plug that plan into tier two.
The third layer of the pyramid is Beliefs. Now we plug in your Personal
Values Manifesto. This is where you start asking the questions: Will my
beliefs and values drive me to proactively take the actions necessary to
achieve my desired outcome. Is that outcome even in line with my beliefs
and values? If not, should I even be pursuing it?
The fourth tier is Purpose. Your overarching why. Let’s say your why is
to leave the world a better place than you found it. Ideally, that purpose
helps influence your values. Your values fuel you to take the appropriate
actions (as part of your plan) to achieve your desired result. Maybe it’s
starting a nonprofit that helps veterans with PTSD. Boom. The world
instantly becomes a better place. Mission accomplished.
The final and most important tier of the pyramid is Rituals. For example,
let’s say your company is going through a major transformation due to a
global pandemic—hypothetically speaking, of course. You have several key
strategic imperatives associated with this transformation—your desired
Outcome. Therefore, the company needs to take new actions, refine
procedures, implement a new operating model, and change the culture to
achieve winning results. The Actions. In this case, sometimes there is a
need for newly defined Beliefs. Not a shift in core values, but rather a new
way of thinking—putting away the old and embracing the new. Like
leadership and business expert Marshall Goldsmith’s game-changing book
What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. Same concept.
You must then ensure that any new beliefs or actions taken align with
the company’s overall purpose. Finally, you need to ensure that all existing
or needed rituals support the purpose, beliefs, and values. So, if your
company needs to be more innovative to maintain its competitive
advantage, you need people doing cool innovative stuff. If there are no
rituals associated with innovation, you need to design them. For example,
start an innovation lab during working hours each week where people can
work on whatever project they want, as long as those projects are associated
with the company’s goals and objectives.
The Outcome Pyramid is a model to ensure you are doing the right
things for the right reasons to achieve better goals and drive desired
outcomes. Not hoping tomorrow will be better, but mandating that it will be
so. It’s how you model mindset and behavior for violent execution. And
remember, a good plan executed violently today is far better than a perfect
plan next week. Why? Because there is no such thing as a perfect plan, and,
chances are, tomorrow will be different, bringing new challenges and new
opportunities.

Great, So What Now?

Use the models! They can be used in any environment from DIY home
projects and mastering the art of stilt-walking to building a new business,
raising a child, or battling depression or obesity.
Living life beyond your comfort zone sucks even more if you don’t have
a plan and your values don’t align with what you are trying to accomplish.
So make sure they do.

Questions to ask yourself:

When a shiny thing passes by or a new idea pops into my
head, am I thoughtful in whether to pursue it? Do I create a
plan or jump into the abyss?
In my pursuit of personal and professional goals, how often do
I ask myself if those goals align with my beliefs and values?
If I have a goal that aligns with my values, do I have the
appropriate rituals that support my beliefs in pursuing that
goal?
Do I have the right mindset, the tenacity and resilience, and
the will to win necessary to accomplish my goals? If not, why
the fuck not?
 10
WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE, SO GET
OFF YOUR ASS AND EXECUTE

Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never
taste of death but once.
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, JULIUS CAESAR

Recent studies show that humans have a 100 percent mortality rate. Taxes
are the only other certainty in life. But we fear the unknown of death. The
when. The how. The why. Who will be by our side? What will we have
accomplished? Is there another life after this one? A heaven? Or is this
short life all we get? The answers to these questions all lie in our own
unique beliefs. The bottom line is that we have no time to waste.
As Tecumseh said, “Be not like those whose hearts are filled with the
fear of death, so they weep, and pray for a little more time to live their lives
over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero
going home.” To sum up his words: live life so you have little to no regrets
when your time card gets punched. Live a life of meaning, of responsibility,
of giving to others. Live your life so that you have no reason to fear the end,
so when death comes, you can say, “I’m ready.”
Death scares us. We have a hard time embracing its reality, so we avoid
talking about it, thinking about it, and even acknowledging it when we lose
those we love. Yet, in reality, death is the light by which the shadow of all
life’s meaning is measured. Without death, without an end or a journey over
the great divide to something better, life has no significance. As tribal
leaders used to say in ancient Afghanistan, narik ta. Meaning, what’s the
point? Without death, everything would seem inconsequential, all
experiences arbitrary, all values and metrics would be zero.
As I mentioned, the 9/11 attacks occurred two days before my class
began the advanced portion of SEAL training. And as we all know, 9/11
changed everything. Especially for our servicemen and women. That’s
when we all knew we’d be going to war. For how long, nobody knew. At
what cost? We assumed a very high cost, but at the time we couldn’t fathom
it would be this high.
When you graduate from SEAL training you feel invincible. But you’re
not. I distinctly remember saying goodbye to my parents the day I deployed
to Iraq in 2003. We were the first task unit of 30 SEALs going in-country to
hunt the bad guys. My parents were staying at the W Hotel in downtown
San Diego. They’d flown in to see me off. Their son was going downrange
to take the fight to the enemy. When it was time to say our final goodbyes,
my mom turned to me and placed her hands gently on both sides of my
face. She couldn’t speak, but her body language said enough. Tears
streamed down her face as she smiled a smile of fear and pain, chin
quivering. She was saying goodbye. Not goodbye like, “I’ll see you in six
months.” But “Goodbye.”
Despite what you see in the movies, SEALs aren’t immortal. We are
very, very mortal. And I hate to break it to you, but we don’t breathe fire or
eat glass either. And those of us still standing feel guilty every day for being
alive when our brothers aren’t. But if you could ask the fallen if they had
any regrets, they’d say not one. They sang their death songs and died like
heroes going home.
As King Richard I said in an address to his men during the Third
Crusade in 1192:

Our destiny awaits us, but even though we are outnumbered do not
fear the hand of death. Everybody dies eventually. Not everyone can
choose to end their time with glory and honor. To stand as brothers in
arms, shoulder-to-shoulder, shield-by-shield, sword upon sword,
battling our enemies for freedom and the greater good. That my
friends is a glory worth fighting for. That my brothers is an honor
worth dying for.
San Diego, California
June 2005

I yawned as I poured a cup of coffee. I grabbed the remote and turned on

the TV, tuning in to CNN or Fox News, I can’t remember. And there they
were: Mike, Axe, and Danny in images that had been recovered from
Taliban propaganda websites. They were SEAL warriors who’d made the
ultimate sacrifice on the battlefield. The coffee mug slipped from my hand
and shattered on the floor. Tears welled in my eyes as I watched the report.
Two weeks later, I attended Mike’s funeral at Calverton National Cemetery
in Suffolk County, New York.
The day began at the funeral parlor where attendees came to pay their
respects. It was pouring rain. When we exited the funeral parlor, six of
Mike’s teammates carried his coffin to the hearse. Local Long Island police
and NYC firefighters were standing in ranks, saluting at full attention in the
rain. It was overwhelming. A procession of dozens of cars proceeded to the
church. The highways were shut down and lined with fire trucks for miles.
They were in pairs, one on each side of the road, ladders raised suspending
the largest American flags I’ve ever seen. After the ceremony at the church,
the procession headed to the National Cemetery.
Michael Murphy and I had been in BUD/S class 235 together until he
was rolled to 236 for stress fractures. His was my second Navy funeral and
first SEAL funeral, and it was the most powerful yet gut wrenching thing to
witness. Folded flags were presented to his mother, Maureen, and his
fiancée, Heather. One of his teammates kneeled humbly in front of
Maureen, head bowed, arms extended, holding the flag high. He didn’t
move or look up until she accepted the flag, torn but stoic. His platoon then
lined up, each man walking up to the casket to say farewell. They each
pulled their Trident pins from their chests and slammed them into the wood
of the casket; the gold pins lining the smooth mahogany lid symbolized
their brotherhood. Each teammate, friend, and family member lost a piece
of themselves in that moment.
Operation Red Wings was a counterinsurgent mission in Kunar province
in Afghanistan that involved four Navy SEALs. Murphy and two other
SEALs, Danny Dietz and Matthew Axelson, were killed in the fighting, in
addition to sixteen US special operations soldiers (eight SEALs and eight
160th Army Special Operations Aviations) who were killed when their
helicopter was shot down while attempting to extract the SEALs. At the
time, it was both the largest loss of life for US forces since the invasion
began and the largest loss for the SEALs since the Vietnam War. Marcus
Luttrell was the only surviving SEAL. He fought his way to a local village
where he was protected. Eventually, villagers sent an emissary to the closest
military base, which allowed a rescue team to locate him. The story is
captured in his riveting book, Lone Survivor, which became a 2013
blockbuster movie of the same name.
Mike was the commander of a four-man reconnaissance team. They
were on a mission to kill or capture a top Taliban leader, Ahmad Shah, who
led a group of insurgents known as the “Mountain Tigers.” The team was
dropped off by helicopter in a remote, mountainous area east of Asadabad
in Kunar, near the Pakistan border. After an initially successful infiltration,
local goat herders stumbled upon the SEALs’ hiding place. Unable to verify
any hostile intent from the herders, the team cut them loose. Hostile locals,
possibly the goat herders they released, alerted nearby Taliban forces, who
soon surrounded and attacked the team from an elevated position. A raging
gunfight ensued. After Mike radioed for help, an MH-47 Chinook
helicopter loaded with reinforcements was dispatched to rescue the team,
but was shot down with an RPG, killing all sixteen personnel aboard.
Mike was killed after he left his cover position and went to a clearing
away from the mountains—exposing himself to a hail of gunfire—to get a
clear signal to contact headquarters and relay the dire situation and request
immediate support for his team. He dropped the satellite phone after being
shot multiple times, but picked it up and finished the call. While being shot,
he signed off saying, “Thank You,” then continued fighting from his
exposed position until he died from his wounds.
Mike, Danny, and Axe fought like warrior poets and were killed in
action, taking more than half of the large Taliban force with them. Marcus
Luttrell was the only US survivor. Mike was awarded the Medal of Honor
for his heroism and selflessness on the mountain that day. All three of
Mike’s men were awarded the Navy’s second highest honor, the Navy
Cross, for their part in the battle, making theirs the most decorated Navy
SEAL Team in history at the time.
Mike’s eulogy was a powerful testament to who he was as a son, a
warrior, a teammate, and a man.

One Mile off the East Coast of Africa

4:30 A.M.

The large dhow listed back and forth violently as the sea raged beneath us. I
was huddled under a large plastic tarp on the aft upper deck of the boat with
my teammates Scotty and Jeff and our interpreter. It was pouring rain and
we were soaking wet. I can’t divulge the purpose of our mission, but we’d
been living on this piece of crap for about a week now, eating homemade
pancakes and drinking sweet tea. Our toilet was a hole in the back deck that
opened out to the crystal blue water. By now my limited Swahili was
actually passable. We wore only shorts and T-shirts. Also in our possession
were two large black Pelican cases full of weapons and sat comm radios.
Our vessel was staffed with a relatively capable ragtag crew of nine locals.
The sea state seemed to be getting worse and we were contemplating
calling for extraction from the Special Warfare Combatant-Craft Crewmen
(SWCC) team on standby many miles south of our location.
“Man, we’re really embracing the suck now, huh brother?” I said to
Scotty. He was next to me under the tarp, our only protection from the
downpour. My knees and elbows were raw and bloody from sliding around
on the dirty deck as the dhow swayed back and forth. Infection imminent!
“Do you guys smell smoke?” Jeff asked. “Oh shit, yeah I do,” I
responded. We threw off the tarp and moved over to the ladder that went
down to the second deck and then to the engine room below. Through the
opening, we could see flames shooting out of the engine room. “Hey guys,
check this out,” I said.
“Ummm, well that’s no good,” Jeff said with his usual mischievous grin
(but with a slight bit of concern quickly developing in his facial
expression). Four of our crew began bucketing water into the engine room.
Another guy was then tossing the water back out. This was quickly
becoming a goat rope. A total shitshow.
“Geezuz… let’s get down there and help these guys,” Scotty said with
an eye roll. We headed down while Jeff got on the radio to our SWCC team.
He ended the call by saying, “If you see three white guys floating in shark-
infested waters clinging to wooden pallets, that’s us.” Luckily, we put out
the fire and the sea state eventually calmed. We felt like true sailors once
again.
Both Scotty and Jeff have gone over the great divide, now residing in
Valhalla. Many years after our Africa trip, Scotty was among the four brave
Americans killed in the cowardly suicide bombing attack in Syria on
January 16, 2019. Several years prior, Jeff was found dead on the floor of
his apartment. Cause of death was unknown. I look forward to the day we’ll
all reunite and tell tall tales of life in the Teams.
In 2012, I was a cast member on Mark Burnett and Dick Wolf’s CBS
reality series Stars Earn Stripes. The basic premise of the TV show was to
pair celebrities such as Nick Lachey, Dean Cain, Terry Crews, Laila Ali,
Todd Palin, and Picabo Street with former special operators to compete in
missions. My friend and teammate Chris Kyle was the other SEAL on the
show. Soon after the show aired—on February 2, 2013—Chris and his
friend Chad Littlefield were murdered. Chris and Chad were shot and killed
while walking downrange to set up targets at a gun range near Chalk
Mountain, Texas. Eddie Ray Routh, a twenty-five-year-old Marine whom
Chris was mentoring due to PTSD, killed them both. The case attracted
national attention due to Kyle’s fame as author of the best-selling
autobiography American Sniper, published in 2012. Clint Eastwood later
directed a film adaptation based on Kyle’s book. Taya Kyle, Chris’s widow
and mother of their two children, carries on the name as a best-selling
author and veteran advocate. And, yes, she’s a total badass.
Death comes for us all. For the most part, we don’t know exactly when.
Why waste a precious moment on pointless activities and relationships that
leave us hollow and unfulfilled? Why leave our list of regrets to chance?
Why not spend more time giving to causes greater than ourselves? Why not
take total ownership and plan our extraordinary life with the end in mind?
 Mental Model
Working Backward from the End
The second habit Stephen Covey covers in his groundbreaking book The 7
Habits of Highly Effective People is “Begin With the End in Mind.” Close
your eyes and think about someone giving your eulogy. Do they talk about
how much money you made? Your job titles? How big your house was?
How many cars you owned? That you kicked major ass at Fortnite? That
you made Dean’s Roll every semester? That you not once, not twice, but
three times had a clever tweet go viral? That you had thousands of
Instagram followers?
If you’re like most decent human beings, that’s probably not what
you’re envisioning. You’re probably imagining them talking about your
virtues. You likely imagine a trusted friend talking about your character and
relationships. The kind of husband, father, wife, mother, and friend you
were. How hard you worked to give your kids not only a good life, but a
sense of purpose and a sound moral compass. How you still did little
romantic gestures for your spouse, even though you’d been hitched for
decades. How you’d give the shirt off your back to your buddies. You
probably imagine him sharing stories both funny and sad that highlight your
integrity, kindness, and curiosity and the effect you had on the lives of
others.
According to Covey, before you can live a good, meaningful life, you’ve
got to know what that looks like. When we know how we want people to
talk about us at the end of our life, we can start taking action now to make
that scenario a reality later. With the end in mind, we know what we need to
do day-to-day and week-to-week to get there. We know how to execute our
mission plan.

Now it’s time to make your Embrace the Suck Regrets Checklist. Use the
model below to ensure you live an extraordinary life with no regrets that is
full of purpose, giving more of yourself to others, and leaves a legacy that
makes the world a better place. I’ve provided some themes, but I leave it to
you to customize this for yourself.
 You can take it from here.

Great, So What Now?

The point is, we’re all going to have to sing our death song someday. What
will the words of your song be? What mark do you want to leave on the
world? What do you absolutely not want to regret on the day you pass? Will
you reflect back and realize you didn’t take many risks and stayed safely in
your village? Or will you know that you left everything you had on the
battlefield of life?
The choice is yours.

Questions to ask yourself:

Am I willing to purposefully suffer to seek true fulfillment and
happiness?
In my current state, what would people truly say about me
after I’m gone?
What am I willing to change about myself to live by my eulogy
virtues?
Do I prioritize the stuff that aligns with my values and the
values of those I love?
What do I not want to regret when this life comes to an end?
 EPILOGUE
TRANSFORM YOUR MIND, LIVE
EXTRAORDINARILY

Let everything happen to you. Beauty and terror. Just keep going.
No feeling is final.
—RAINER MARIA RILKE

Now, my friend, it’s time for you to step forth onto your battlefield and
take the fight to the enemy. To go to war with yourself. Time to build
resilience muscles, set and achieve lofty goals, pursue excellence and
innovation in all you do, and master the art of maximum performance. I’d
like to leave you with a few Navy SEAL sayings (some you now know) to
keep you focused and energized. You can use them as fuel for your journey.
Embrace them. Share them with others. Do what you must each day to
embrace the suck and live an extraordinary life. Through discipline and
resilience, you’ll win this battle and many more to come.
Good luck!

Fail-Safe Principles to Transform Your Mind and Live an

Extraordinary Life

Embrace the suck. Accept life’s challenges for what they are—
opportunities for growth and development. Make the choice to
lean in, not run away.
The only easy day was yesterday. There are no easy days for
high-performing individuals or teams pursuing an existence of
excellence. Tackle challenges head on, controlling what you can
and ignoring what you can’t.

Get comfortable being uncomfortable. Push the boundaries

and confines of your comfort zone every chance you get. The
more you do, the more your comfort zone expands.

Persevere and thrive on adversity. When you face adversity,

just walk right up and give it a big old bear hug. Befriend it.
Recertify yourself as a savage every chance you get.

It pays to be a winner. We all have a different definition of what

winning means to us. Clearly define your objectives, have a
plan, and dominate your battlefield.

In the absence of orders, I will take charge. Don’t wait for

someone else to dictate your life for you. Take charge. Discipline
and accountability are the true path to enlightenment and
fulfillment.

Stay in your three-foot world. Focus on what is in your

immediate control and deprioritize everything else. This allows
you to prioritize and execute where you have the maximum
impact.

Demand discipline. Expect innovation. Disciplined and

creative people achieve more of their goals. Don’t waste time on
things that don’t align with your values and desired outcomes.

Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Improving performance in

any aspect of life takes time. Get the little things right first, then
keep moving the goalposts.

Eat the elephant one bite at a time. When it comes to

achieving big goals and navigating life’s obstacles, when we
have too many priorities, we have no priorities. Prioritize and
execute.

Uncompromising integrity is my standard. Integrity and trust

have a direct and measurable impact on personal performance
and the success of any team or relationship.

Never out of the fight. I believe in this life philosophy so much

that I have it tattooed on my arm in Latin. Numquam Proelia
Derelinquam. It needs no interpretation.
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Where do I begin? I learned the first time around that writing a book is a
complex journey involving many people—it’s a team effort in every sense
of the word. The timing of this book’s release lands at the conclusion of a
very challenging year for people across the globe. Challenges that will have
ripple effects for years to come. But my inspiration began with the
humbling experience of being blessed with the opportunity to serve
alongside some of the greatest warriors that the world has ever known. Our
servicemen and servicewomen—and their families—who give so much to a
cause greater than themselves, will always touch me with great emotion.
They stand ready to answer our nation’s call and defend us against enemies
who wish to destroy us. And some, of course, give their lives. We sleep
peacefully at night because of the brave men and women who willingly run
to the sound of gunfire and set aside their own selfish desires to protect our
way of life and the freedoms we enjoy.
I could never have accomplished this rewarding effort without the loving
support of my amazing wife, Nicole. She is my best friend, business
partner, and commanding officer. Thank you to my three amazing children,
Tyler, Parker Rose, and Ryder—and, of course, to our new bundle of joy
due in January 2021. We will soon have a full fire team! Writing is a
creative process that often requires quiet and solitude, not something that
comes easily in a full household of five amidst a global pandemic. Without
the uncompromising support and leadership of my wife, the completion of
this project may not have come to fruition.
I owe special thanks to my amazing team. My literary agent, Farley
Chase, who took a chance on me once again. His guidance, feedback, and
advice continue to prove invaluable as I refine my craft as an author. Thank
you to my editor, Dan Ambrosio, and the unbelievably talented team at
Hachette Book Group.
And last but not least, a sincere thank you to my Navy SEAL brothers
who participated in this project. To David Goggins, who was generous
enough to contribute the foreword. David continues to inspire people all
over the world—I’m proud to call him BUD/S classmate, Team Five
teammate, and friend. Special thanks to my warrior brother Jason Redman
for allowing me to tell his riveting story of survival, perseverance, and
resilience. Your books have inspired many to reform their ideas about
resilience and overcoming adversity. Looking forward to our new
adventures. Thank you to Mark Owen (badass pipe hitter, former teammate,
and number one New York Times best-selling author of No Easy Day and No
Hero) for your friendship and guidance over the past twenty years.
Everyone who contributed to this effort further solidifies the fact that
nothing of any great value can be accomplished by any one individual. It
takes a team.
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 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

 
BRENT GLEESON is a Navy SEAL combat veteran and successful
businessman. Upon leaving SEAL Team Five, Brent turned his discipline
and battlefield lessons to the world of business and has become an award-
winning entrepreneur, best-selling author, and acclaimed speaker and
consultant on topics including leadership, building high-performance teams,
culture, resilience, and organizational transformation.
Brent is the founder and CEO of TakingPoint Leadership, a progressive
leadership and organizational development consulting firm with a focus on
business transformation and building high-performance cultures. Brent was
named a top ten CEO by Entrepreneur magazine in 2013.
Brent is a respected thought leader in leadership and organizational
transformation. His expertise is both real-world and academic in nature,
having built several high-growth organizations.
Brent holds degrees in finance and economics from Southern Methodist
University, certificates in English and history from the University of Oxford
in England, and a graduate business degree from the University of San
Diego.
He is the author of TakingPoint: A Navy SEAL’s 10 Fail-Safe Principles
for Leading Through Change, which was a number one new release on
Amazon in organizational change and business structural adjustment.
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