Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds

By David Goggins

• Don’t shy away from the truth. Be raw, be real, call yourself out.
• Write down by hand all your insecurities, dreams, and goals - put them somewhere where you will see everyday. It’s okay to be unkind with yourself in these moments because we need thicker skin to improve in life. Break down each step and write down as a separate note.
• Do something that sucks every single day - finish your showers with cold water
• Taking souls is a ticket to finding your own reserve power and riding a second wind. It’s the tool you can call upon to win any competition or overcome every life obstacle.
• When you examine where your experiences with a fine-toothed comb and see where your issues come from, you can find strength in enduring pain and abuse.
• Visualize - not only the feeling of success, but the challenges that are likely to arise and determine how you will attack those problems when they do
• You can’t prepare for everything but if you engage in strategic visualization ahead of time, you’ll be as prepared as you possibly can be
• Reach into your cookie jar
• 40% rule - even when we feel like we’ve reached our absolute limit, we still have 60 percent more to give
• Life will always be the most grueling endurance sport, and when you train hard, get uncomfortable, and callous your mind, you will become a more versatile competitor, trained to find a way forward no matter what’
• It’s about wanting it like there’s no tomorrow - because there might not be. It’s about thinking of everybody else before yourself and developing your own code of ethics that sets you apart from others. One of those ethics is the drive to turn every negative into a positive, and then when shit starts flying, being prepared to lead from the front.
• We can’t control all the variables in our lives. It’s about what we do with opportunities revoked or presented to us that determine how a story ends.
• If you truly want to become uncommon amongst the uncommon, it will require sustaining greatness for a long period of time. It requires staying in constant pursuit and putting out unending effort. This may sound appealing but will require everything you have to give and then some. This is not for everyone because it will demand singular focus and may upset the balance in your life.
  • That’s what it takes to become a true overachiever, and if you are already surrounded by people who are at the top of their game, what are you going to do differently to stand out? It’s easy to stand out amongst everyday people and be a big fish in a small pond. It is a much more difficult task when you are a wolf surrounded by wolves.
• We need to surround ourselves with people who will tell us what we need to hear, not what we want to hear, but at the same time not make us feel we’re up against the impossible.
• What if?