Mental toughness can take many forms: resilience against attack, calmness in the face of uncertainty, persistence through pain, or focus amidst chaos.
“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training.”
Archilochus
Below are eight lessons from eight of the toughest human beings on the planet. This advice was dispersed to Tim Ferriss on his podcast, The Tim Ferris Show, and shared via that media as well as in his book, ‘Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers‘, which I have read cover to cover and appears in my Books Club of recommended reading.
If you want to be tougher, be tougher.
Jocko Willink, former Navy SEAL Commander
“If you want to be tougher mentally, it is simple: Be tougher. Don’t meditate on it.”
This is very similar to other Jocko advice that I shared in my blog post ‘The Two-Word Secret To Success’: Get started!
In his book, ‘Discipline Equals Freedom: Field Manual’, Willink states:
People want to know how to stop laziness. They want to know how to stop procrastination. They have an idea in their head, maybe even a vision, but they don’t know where to start, so they ask and they say, ‘Where do I start? When is the best time to start?’ And I have a simple answer. Hear and now.
That’s it. You want to improve? You want to get better? You want to get on a workout program? Or a clean diet? Or start a new business? You wanna write a book or make a movie or build a house or a computer or an app? Where do you start?
You start right here. When do you start? You start right now. You initiate action. You go.
Here is the reality: that idea isn’t going to execute itself. That book isn’t going to right itself. Those weights, out in the gym, they ain’t going to move themselves. You have to do it. And you have to do it now. So, stop thinking about it. Stop dreaming about it. Stop researching every aspect of it and reading all about it and debating the pros and cons of it. Start doing it. Take that first step and make it happen. Get after it! Here and now
I wasn’t there to compete. I was there to win.
Arnold Schwarzenegger
In Tim’s interview with Schwarzenegger, he taked about a photo taken of him before he won his first big bodybuilding competition, Junior Mr Europe, at 19 years old. Ferriss asked, “Your face was so confident compared to every other competitor. Where did that confidence come from?” He replied:
“My confidence came from my vision. . . . I am a big believer that if you have a very clear vision of where you want to go, then the rest of it is much easier. Because you always know why you are training 5 hours a day, you always know why you are pushing and going through the pain barrier, and why you have to eat more, and why you have to struggle more, and why you have to be more disciplined… I felt that I could win it, and that was what I was there for. I wasn’t there to compete. I was there to win.”
Push beyond, share privation, tackle fear
Star General Stanley McChrystal
Ferriss interviewed General Stanley A. McChrystal, a retired United States Army four-star general who commanded the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the mid-2000s. He is well known as Commander, International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Commander, U.S. Forces – Afghanistan (USFOR-A). He is credited with the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, but was criticised for his alleged role in the cover-up of the Pat Tillman friendly fire incident.
McChrystal had a reputation for saying and thinking what other military leaders were relunctant to do, which aided his appointment to lead all forces in Afghanistan and also the reason he was later relieved of that command. Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates described McChrystal as “perhaps the finest warrior and leader of men in combat I ever met.” Since 2010, he taught courses in international relations at Yale University.
When Ferriss asked was in response to “What are three tests or practices from the military that civilians could use to help develop mental toughness?” McChrystal replied:
The first is to push yourself harder than you believe you’re capable of. You’ll find new depth inside yourself. The second is to put yourself in groups who share difficulties, discomfort. We used to call it ‘shared privation.’ [Definition of privation: a state in which things essential for human well-being such as food and warmth are scarce or lacking.] You’ll find that when you have been through that kind of difficult environment, you feel more strongly about that which you’re committed to. And finally, create some fear and make individuals overcome it.
Put fear in line
Caroline Paul, luger, firefighter, and more
Caroline Paul is the author of four published books. Her latest is the New York Times best seller The Gutsy Girl: Escapades for Your Life of Epic Adventure. Caroline was afraid of lots of things until she decided that fear got in the way of the life she wanted–of excitement, confidence, and self-reliance. She has since taken on loads of extreme aventures like big rivers rafting, flown planes, and mountain climbing. She was one of the first female firefighters in San Francisco.
Caroline used the phrase “putting fear in line” when telling Tim a story about illegally climbed the Golden Gate Bridge, rising to ~760 feet on thin cables. He asked her to go into more detail:
I am not against fear. I think fear is definitely important. It’s there to keep us safe. But I do feel like some people give it too much priority. It’s one of the many things that we use to assess a situation. I am pro-bravery. That’s my paradigm.
Fear is just one of many things that are going on. For instance, when we climbed the bridge, which was five of us deciding we wanted to walk up that cable in the middle of the night. Please don’t do that, but we did. Talk about fear—you’re walking on a cable where you have to put one foot in front of the other until you’re basically as high as a 70-story building with nothing below you and . . . two thin wires on either side.
It’s just a walk, technically. Really, nothing’s going to happen unless some earthquake or catastrophic gust of wind hits. You’re going to be fine as long as you keep your mental state intact. In those situations, I look at all the emotions I’m feeling, which are anticipation, exhilaration, focus, confidence, fun, and fear. Then I take fear and say, ‘Well, how much priority am I going to give this? I really want to do this.’ I put it where it belongs. It’s like brick laying or making a stone wall. You fit the pieces together.
Is that a dream or a goal?
Paul Levesque/Triple H, WWE superstar and executive
Levesque told this story, about Evander Holyfield, when discussing goal setting:
…he said that his coach at one point told him, something like his very first day, ‘You could be the next Muhammad Ali. Do you wanna do that?’ Evander said he had to ask his mom. He went home, he came back and said, ‘I wanna do that.’ The coach said, ‘Okay. Is that a dream or a goal? Because there’s a difference.’ I’d never heard it said that way, but it stuck with me. So much so that I’ve said it to my kid now: ‘Is that a dream, or a goal? Because a dream is something you fantasise about that will probably never happen. A goal is something you set a plan for, work toward, and achieve. I always looked at my stuff that way. The people who were successful models to me were people who had structured goals and then put a plan in place to get to those things. I think that’s what impressed me about Arnold [Schwarzenegger]. It’s what impressed me about my father-in-law [Vince McMahon].
Pain tolerance can be the force multiplier
Amelia Boone, 3x World’s Toughest Mudder champion
Amelia Boone is “the Michael Jordan of obstacle course racing (OCR)”. Perhaps more impressive than Jordan because she reached the top of OCR whilst building a stellar full-time career in law.
Boone has over 30 victories and 50 podiums. In the 2012 World’s Toughest Mudder 24 hours race, she finished 2nd Overall out over 1,000 competitors, with only one male ahead of her, by only 8 minutes. Her major victories are the Spartan Race World Championship (2013), Spartan Race Series Point Champion (2013 and 2015), and she is the only three-time winner of the World’s Toughest Mudder (2012, 2014 and 2015). She won the 2014 WTM eight weeks after knee surgery. Amelia is also a three-time finisher of the Death Race, and dabbles in ultra-running in all of her spare time.
“I’m not the strongest. I’m not the fastest. But I’m really good at suffering.”
Who do you surround yourself with when your ego feels threatened?
Josh Waitzkin, chess prodigy, push hands world champion, first black belt under Brazilian jiu-jit phenomenon Marcelo Garcia
What do you do when the going gets tough? Waitzkin had this to say about the best in the world of combat sports and Brazilian jiu-jitsu:
“It’s very interesting to observe who the top competitors pick out when they’re five rounds into the sparring sessions and they’re completely gassed. The ones who are on the steepest growth curve look for the hardest guy there—the one who might beat them up—while others look for someone they can take a break on.”
The magic of the single decision
Christopher Sommer, former USA men’s USA gymnastics national team coach
Tim was getting frustrated when he saw little or no progress after several weeks of practicing a new exercise, “straddle L extensions”. Despite Coach Sommer regularly reminding him that connective-tissue adaptations taking 200 to 210 days, after a few weeks of flailing Tim was at his wits’ end.
Each week, he sent Coach Sommer videos of my workouts and expressed how discouraging it was to make zero tangible progress with this exercise. Below is Coach Sommer’s email response:.
Dealing with the temporary frustration of not making progress is an integral part of the path towards excellence. In fact, it is essential and something that every single elite athlete has had to learn to deal with. If the pursuit of excellence was easy, everyone would do it. In fact, this impatience in dealing with frustration is the primary reason that most people fail to achieve their goals. Unreasonable expectations time-wise, resulting in unnecessary frustration, due to a perceived feeling of failure. Achieving the extraordinary is not a linear process.
The secret is to show up, do the work, and go home.
A blue collar work ethic married to indomitable will. It is literally that simple. Nothing interferes. Nothing can sway you from your purpose. Once the decision is made, simply refuse to budge.
Refuse to compromise.
And accept that quality long-term results require quality long-term focus. No emotion. No drama. No beating yourself up over small bumps in the road. Learn to enjoy and appreciate the process. This is especially important because you are going to spend far more time on the actual journey than with those all too brief moments of triumph at the end.
Certainly celebrate the moments of triumph when they occur. More importantly, learn from defeats when they happen. In fact, if you are not encountering defeat on a fairly regular basis, you are not trying hard enough. And absolutely refuse to accept less than your best.
Throw out a timeline. It will take what it takes.
If the commitment is to a long-term goal and not to a series of smaller intermediate goals, then only one decision needs to be made and adhered to. Clear, simple, straightforward. Much easier to maintain than having to make small decision after small decision to stay the course when dealing with each step along the way. This provides far too many opportunities to inadvertently drift from your chosen goal. The single decision is one of the most powerful tools in the toolbox.”
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The above is a small sample of hundreds of tips in Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers. Check it out!
Enjoy!
Scott
Source: How to Develop Mental Toughness: Lessons From 8 Titans …