The Man in the Arena

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It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Theodore Roosevelt

Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins

Like a lot of people I’ve been fascinated by David Goggins after I first heard about him and his accomplishments.

I believe this is the first exposure I had to him:

Impressive stuff.

I’ve listened to numerous podcasts where he was a guest and watched numerous interviews, so when I heard he had written a book I was like – “Roger That!” and ordered my copy immediately.

Can’t Hurt Me is that book and it does not disappoint.

From launch it’s pretty clear he had a ghost writer, no big surprise there, but that writer did a great job of translating his passion and manner of speech. It really does read like he’s talking to you.

I knew quite a bit about his past, but the book dug deep into those topics and shed light on some new stuff. Let me tell you, if 50% of what is written in this book actually happened, it’s an amazing story.

David Goggins is like the hard motherf**ker version of Forest Gump.

He goes in-depth on what it took him to overcome abuse, racism, learning disabilities, health issues, and a healthy amount of self-loathing to become a US Navy SEAL, US Army Ranger, US Air Force Traffic Controller, champion ultra runner, Ironman, world record holder, and even wildfire fighter.

You may not like his personality but you can’t deny his drive to constantly make himself a better human – and if you take some of his advice, maybe you too.

ROGER THAT!

Backpacking in Canada – A Never Quit Story

I’ve had a few “never quit” moments in my life. Not a lot, but a few. This is a story about my first experience with pushing past limitations and the power of the mind.

It happened on a backpacking trip in my early to mid-twenties. It was me, my younger sister, and her (now ex) husband and we had a 5 day trek planned for the wilds of Canada. This was back in the 90s before all this fancy ultra-lightweight gear really came into existence and my pack weighed 70 pounds. I was also fairly new to backpacking, so I’m sure I was just making it harder on myself.

Anyway, we get to the trail head, load up and head out to our first campsite 10 to 15 miles away thru the wilderness. Piece of cake, an easy first day.

Well, the Canadian wilderness had other plans. It was brutal. We slogged and slogged thru what felt like endless uphill miles and it kept getting later and later into the evening. At some point my sister’s pack was getting to be too much for her to handle, so my brother-in-law and I divided up her gear and stuffed it into our packs. I have no idea what my pack weighed, but it was oppressive. Eventually it started to get so dark we needed to use flashlights to guide our way.

For whatever reason I was ‘point man’ and I scanned the trees with my flashlight looking for the small trail markers so we knew we were heading in the right direction. This went on for hours and we were getting broken down.

Then the flashlight batteries started to die out. We had backups, but when they started to die we stole batteries from our cameras.

I remember at some point we stopped to rest and, to conserve batteries, we turned off the flashlights. And there we sat, in the middle of the Canadian wilderness, exhausted, in the dark, and we started to hear what sounded like wolves howling in the distance. It was ominous. Needless to say we flicked the lights back on and kept going.

By this time, now 10 hours into the hike, my left knee was really starting to hurt. Every step was painful and I was limping. But I continued on, as ‘point man’, trying to find our initial campsite.

Sometime within the next 2 hours my sister broke down. She’d had enough and was crying, wondering if we’d ever get to the site. We were too head-strong to just pitch a damn tent and camp out anywhere, we were, you know, trying to follow the rules. Ha, silly kids.

I had to help talk her through it and get her to the campsite, which we eventually found after 12 hours of hiking with those hellish packs on our backs through some of the toughest terrain I’d experienced.

Needless to say we were elated to find our site but decided that after that horrible start we were going to turn back and head to the trailhead in the morning. Which we did, and it took us two 8 hour days of walking to get back out. On the final day it thunder stormed for the whole hike.

12 hours of hiking with nearly 100 pounds on your back, in the dark, in pain, with flickering flashlights, while trying to keep your sister together can show you what you’re made of.

I’ve had other ‘never quit’ moments since, but that was my first real taste of it.

Don’t clear the path

If you would have your son to walk honourably through the world, you must not attempt to clear the stones from his path, but teach him to walk firmly over them – not insist upon leading him by the hand, but let him learn to go alone.

Anne Bronte

Yesterday was my son’s 4th birthday. He is a bright little guy, full of laughter, heart, and spunk. He also has mild Autism.

When a child has a learning disorder the concept of ‘not clearing the path’ can be tough to manage. How do you negotiate their learning issues? What stones do you clear from their path? What stones do you leave?

I don’t want to limit his ability to get through life’s little annoyances, but I also don’t want to set him up for utter failure. I want to prepare him according to his needs and abilities.

Thinking about it, I suppose that’s the dilemma of every parent, but it feels just a bit more…. difficult for a parent of a kid with Autism.

Dunno. That’s all for now.

Neil Gaiman – Make Mistakes

I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re doing something.

Neil Gaiman

My Current Morning Routine

What follows is a typical morning after I decided to try to make the start of my day more deliberate.

05:00 Alarm goes off
05:15 Drag myself out of bed 🙂
05:30 Make my first cup of coffee
05:40 Walk into my office and fire up my computer
05:45 Open my meditation app, start my 15 minute timer, sit, and count breathes
06:00 Read the day’s Daily Stoic entry
06:15 Open my Bullet Keeper planner and plan my day’s to-dos
06:30 Start crushing my to-do list.

Why?

I’m reminded of a passage from the book Resilience by Eric Greitens:

Growing up without a father, my dad swore he’d be a father to his sons. He often left the house around four-thirty a.m. so that he could put in a day’s work and still be home when we came home from school. He coached our teams. In many ways, being a father was my dad’s vocation.

Getting up early is hard. Really hard. I’ve been trying to stick to an early rise for some time now. But, at last, I think I have it. It finally feels like routine and it’s so worth it.

So, why? Well, for me it gives me time to focus on myself before the business of the day starts. Also, like in the quote above, it gets me out of work earlier so I can spend more time with my family.

Adding in the Daily Stoic reading has really helped me ground myself and keep what’s most important to me in focus.

Works?

I think it’s working. I’ve been consistently meditating and the extra quiet time in the morning is really helping me focus on my most important tasks of the day. Taking a little power nap (10 mins leaning back in a chair) in the afternoon can sometimes help get me thru the afternoon and into the evening.

Having the time to plan my day has really helped me stay on task and get quality work done.

Conclusion.

Is it for everyone? No, obviously my morning routine is tailored to me, and some may not like getting up early. But I urge you to try to be more deliberate with your day and force yourself to carve some time out of the day to help yourself grow.

Get Up. Get After It. Win The Day.

Live Your Life

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, 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 bow to none. When you arise in the morning, give thanks for 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 nothing, 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 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.

Chief Tecumseh, the Native American leader of the Shawnee

Getting Started

Let’s get this started.

Books. Day-to-day gear. Productivity systems. We’re all looking for the best of them.

Here’s where I opine about those things and hopefully help suss out the best of them.

Hang tight. This is just starting.

It’s been a while

Ugh, so it seems I have nothing to say on this site.

It’d be cool to blog more but I just don’t know if it’s in me. I like it, but I can’t stick to it.

Unless I can come up with some sort of theme / subject to write about.

Time to think…

Good

I just love that hard-nosed, yet fairly positive and uplifting, message. We, as a people, need more of this in our lives.