REPROGRAMMING Your Mind for Success with THE 40% RULE | David Goggins

This week on The School of Greatness podcast, I had the pleasure of sharing my conversation with David Goggins, someone who has mastered the art of pain and embracing his discomfort zone. Your brain is the most complex organ in your body. It needs to be pushed, tested, and challenged everyday to create mental strength. The only way you’ll ever strengthen the most powerful organ in your body is by diving head first into your discomfort zone. We don’t like to be uncomfortable, but facing that pain head on is the only way we can ever succeed or progress. Are you ready to push past your mental limits? David Goggins is an incredible man who has undergone insane amounts of stress, pain, and tragedy only to unlock his true potential in life. David is the only member of the U. S. Armed Forces to complete SEAL training (including two Hell Weeks), the U. S. Army Ranger School (where he graduated as Enlisted Honor Man), and Air Force Tactical Air Controller training. He is indisputably one of the world’s best endurance athletes. He has completed over 60 ultra-marathons, triathlons, and ultra-triathlons, setting new course records and regularly placing in the top five. He once held the world record for pull-ups, completing 4,030 in 17 hours, and he is a sought-after public speaker, coach of numerous sports teams, and he also coaches people in Fortune 500 companies. In 2018, he published a book called You Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds which helps tons of people tap into their true potential. He says that on average, people are only using 40% of their potential. David wants to raise that number significantly. In this episode you will learnWhat made David apply for the Military. What David believes the key to life is. Why getting sick was the best thing that ever happened to David. About the 40 Percent Rule. How to retrain your mind when you want to seek comfort. For more information go to www.lewishowes.com/1525For more Greatness text PODCAST to +1 (614) 350-3960Want more episodes like this one? Shaolin Master, Shi Heng Yi - https://link.chtbl.com/1428-podA Masterclass on Self-Discipline with 5 Navy SEALs - https://link.chtbl.com/1440-pod Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Lewis Howes?

  My friend, I am such a big believer that your mindset is everything. It can really dictate if your life has meaning, has value, and you feel fulfilled, or if you feel exhausted, drained, and like you're never going to be enough. Our brand new book, The Greatness Mindset, just hit the New York Times Bestseller back-to-back weeks. And I'm so excited to hear from so many of you who've bought the book, who've read it, and finished it already, and are getting incredible results from the lessons in the book. If you haven't got a copy yet, you'll learn how to build a plan for greatness through powerful exercises and toolkits designed to propel your life forward. This is the book I wish I had when I was 20, struggling, trying to figure out life, 10 years ago, at 30, trying to figure out transitions in my life, and the book I'm

• 0:46Lewis Howes?

  glad I have today for myself. Make sure to get a copy at lewishouse.com/2023mindset to get your copy today. Again, lewishouse.com/2023mindset to get a copy today. Also, the book is on Audible now, so you can get it on audiobook as well. And don't forget to follow the show so you never miss an episode.

• 1:10David Goggins?

  The most important conversation you'll ever have in your life is when you have yourself. And my conversation was absolutely horrifying.

• 1:17Lewis Howes?

  What were you saying to yourself? Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 1:43Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to today's special episode. Over the last 1,300-plus episodes, there have been so many impactful interviews that I've been lucky enough to have, and I always like to reflect on some of the most powerful. And this episode was one that resonated with most of you guys in the past, and I'm excited for the value it's going to bring you today as well. So I hope you enjoy today's episode.

• 2:06Lewis Howes?

  Why did you want to not be known then, but now you do want to have your message out there?

• 2:11David Goggins?

  Well, when Jesse wrote that book, Living with a SEAL, I was about two or three weeks from getting out of the military. So, you know, being a SEAL, you know, I didn't want to be, mention David Goggins in this book. So, the second the book popped, I was retiring. So, the book came out November 15th, or November 1, 2015, and I retired, November 2015.

• 2:35Lewis Howes?

  Gotcha.

• 2:36David Goggins?

  So, that's why. That's the biggest reason why.

• 2:39Lewis Howes?

  And when did you start putting yourself out there, doing interviews and talking about your message? And you got on social media and started sharing videos. When did you decide to do that?

• 2:48David Goggins?

  Well, I've been talking to people for several years, and I wasn't really big on, like, my mindset's very different than most people.

• 2:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 2:55David Goggins?

  It's a mindset of, I don't want to be known too much. I don't want too many looky-loos in my life, because that's where I gained my strength. I gained my strength from a place of quiet. And the more I got my story out there, the more I realized it no longer be David Goggins, the quiet man. It'd be David Goggins, the guy that's on Instagram, answering this, answering that, because I'm also a guy that's always about, if someone reaches out to me, I'm not gonna sit back and say, "Oh, you know, whatever." I'm gonna reach back to you. So, it's gonna take time out of me trying to gain strength and me trying to get where I need to go. So, that was a big deterrent for me to get on Instagram and all that stuff. I'm not, I'm not big on social media anyway.

• 3:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 3:38David Goggins?

  But then I realized that God put me in a very interesting spot in life, where He made hell my teacher. He made hell my teacher. And a lot of people don't understand that. So, I'm trying to give people a different thought process of life, where failure, hell, disappointment, discomfort is a great learning tool. And many people don't understand that. And a lot of people won't even understand this interview when we get done with it. But it's these few moments in life that you have. Like, for me, I always talk about it, Rocky I, Round 14. That one two-minute and 13-second clip of...

• 4:26David Goggins?

  Rocky getting up when Apollo knocked him down. That one clip, when I was going through a very bad time in my life, I saw what I wanted to be. And it wasn't a guy that won. It wasn't a guy that won everything he did. It was a guy that kept getting up after being knocked down. So I realized if that two minutes and 13 seconds changed my life, so it was. I saw something that I needed to be in the world I was living in. Maybe my story will give someone the two minutes and 13 seconds they need to change their life. Means that people live in a very comfortable place, that's fine. Don't listen to me.

• 5:10David Goggins?

  A lot of people are looking for that two minutes and 13 seconds. And I might be that person. That's why I started sharing it.

• 5:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, you talked about in the very beginning, I like this. Your job is to be the best of your ability. This will hurt. The mission is not about making yourself feel better. The mission is about being better and having a greater impact in the world. And it sounds like you understanding the fact that you need to put yourself out there a little bit more.

• 5:32David Goggins?

  Right.

• 5:33Lewis Howes?

  Is gonna reach more people and impact more people as opposed to always being quiet.

• 5:37David Goggins?

  Right.

• 5:37Lewis Howes?

  Is that what I'm hearing you say?

• 5:39David Goggins?

  Exactly. I had to find a happy medium.

• 5:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 5:41David Goggins?

  Because what's the point? Like, we all have a story. And I believe that we're all teachers. And if you don't learn something and give back what you learned.

• 5:52Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 5:53David Goggins?

  What's the point of living?

• 5:54Lewis Howes?

  And you're wasting.

• 5:54David Goggins?

  Yeah, you're wasting. You have all this knowledge of what you learned. Some people may think you're crazy. Some people may, you know, may put a title on you. But it's those few people who are like, you know what? I need to hear that.

• 6:05Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:05David Goggins?

  So you have to put yourself out there.

• 6:07Lewis Howes?

  So was there an awakening for you in the last few years that said, okay, I'm not, I'm not doing this enough? I'm putting myself out there. I'm not telling my story. I'm wasting certain aspects of my life by not giving that message out?

• 6:20David Goggins?

  There were a lot of emails that came in to me. And I didn't realize, when you live your life, you don't know what it's doing to people. Cause it's my life. I didn't know my life was as bad as it was because it's my life. It's what I went through.

• 6:35Lewis Howes?

  Think it's like the norm.

• 6:36David Goggins?

  It's the norm.

• 6:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 6:37David Goggins?

  That's why I did, man. But when I started getting these emails from people saying, hey, you know what? You changed my life. That part changed my life. That part of your story changed my life. And because I have so many different parts of my life that so many people resonate with different spots. Maybe it's the obese part. Maybe it's the bullying part. Maybe it's the learning disability part. Maybe it's the abusive parent part. Whatever it may be. So many people draw from my story. And I started getting these emails and I was like, God, man, you know, and I'm a big believer in something more powerful than me. I don't know what it is, but I'm not the end all. So I was like, uh, I gotta start doing more. If I'm touching these people's lives.

• 7:20Lewis Howes?

  A few people here and there.

• 7:21David Goggins?

  Right. Maybe I need to go out here and do some more.

• 7:24Lewis Howes?

  Crazy story, man. I mean, if you guys haven't gotten the book, you guys can preorder the book. This is actually a galley copy here, printed out. Uh, make sure you guys check this out. Can't Hurt Me. Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds. And I was, when I was reading the first part of the book about your childhood, I mean, your father just seemed like, was just so abusive physically. I mean, it's one thing to be emotionally abusive and another thing to be physically. And when you have both, it's like the perfect storm of like the makings for chaos in your life.

• 7:52David Goggins?

  Right.

• 7:52Lewis Howes?

  And it just sounded like he was just nasty. Nasty and everything was your fault and you were always wrong and you weren't living up to a standard, both you and your brother and your mom.

• 8:02David Goggins?

  Right.

• 8:03Lewis Howes?

  And it was just constant physical abuse over and over. I mean, the story of you just being bent over and him just like whipping you over and over and you just gasping for air. I was just like, oh, my gosh, this is crazy.

• 8:12David Goggins?

  Right.

• 8:13Lewis Howes?

  How did you deal with that? How did you like overcome the constant physical and emotional abuse?

• 8:19David Goggins?

  You know what? It's all I knew. So when you're born to that, it's all you know. You, I mean, you know something's not right. Because in my mind, at a young kid, I could tell, man, you know, the way I was processing things wasn't right.

• 8:35Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 8:35David Goggins?

  I mean, I suffered from severe toxic stress. And that was one of the big reasons why I had a learning disability. My focus in life was way off. I was afraid. I was afraid of everything. And when you have that kind of foundation, growing up, that's where you start life at. Is being abused and also working all night at a skating rink, not going to school. And you have a guy who's an alcoholic. And the second he got drunk, he got mad. So our house lived in fear.

• 9:07Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:08David Goggins?

  And the one thing that you can't ever get out of a kid's mind is your mom's mind, like, like your mom's face.

• 9:16Lewis Howes?

  The terror.

• 9:17David Goggins?

  The terror of your mom's face. So I didn't care about my brother, I didn't care about me. But I saw this woman go from Mary Poppins, the sweetest person on the planet earth. And when you see your mom start to transform to a shell, to a person whose face becomes stoic, a person who has no emotion. And that changes a kid.

• 9:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:43David Goggins?

  And when you're young, and you have to grow up so fast, so by eight years old, my mind was of a, of a forty year old's. Life came at me. And it makes your brain, you know, you're not outside playing with kids. You know, you're trying to avoid getting beat.

• 9:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:58David Goggins?

  You know, you're avoiding all these things.

• 10:00Lewis Howes?

  When you go home, it's supposed to be safe.

• 10:02David Goggins?

  Right.

• 10:03Lewis Howes?

  And you're getting beat again.

• 10:04David Goggins?

  Exactly. And what's funny about that, we lived in, on, on Paradise Road.

• 10:07Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 10:08David Goggins?

  We lived on Paradise Road. And it was.

• 10:11Lewis Howes?

  Wasn't so paradise.

• 10:12David Goggins?

  It was anything but paradise, man. You know, once those doors shut.

• 10:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 10:15David Goggins?

  You know, my dad gave everybody a different view of him.

• 10:19Lewis Howes?

  He wore the nice tailor suits, he's mild.

• 10:21David Goggins?

  That's right. Your dad's amazing. Those doors shut, man. And the devil himself came out. So it was, it was, it was rough. And that's why my foundation was so, uh, was so beaten down as, at no, at a young age.

• 10:34Lewis Howes?

  So learning disability, I grew up dyslexic, so I can relate to that of just like constantly feeling stupid and insecure. And you know, I had a tutor my entire life.

• 10:43David Goggins?

  It's horrible.

• 10:43Lewis Howes?

  Till I finished college, I had a tutor.

• 10:45David Goggins?

  Right.

• 10:46Lewis Howes?

  Second grade reading level when I was in eighth grade, it was just like a constant struggle.

• 10:50David Goggins?

  Right.

• 10:50Lewis Howes?

  Emotionally. And I took that outlet into sports and said, I'm going to just train myself to be the best I can be. In a place where I can learn something differently.

• 10:58David Goggins?

  Right.

• 10:59Lewis Howes?

  And pick up a different skill. But with, with your learning disability, with your dad beating you, screaming at you, emotionally challenging your mind, with the racism you dealt with, with the different struggles you felt with bullies. What was the hardest obstacle to overcome from up until about fifteen, sixteen?

• 11:20David Goggins?

  The hardest obstacle was myself. I started realizing more and more and more that all these people were gone. What was haunting me was me. I can't control my dad. I can't control the people calling me nigger. I can't control all these things. But they were things that kept me down. It started becoming my reality. My reality was what they made it out to be. And I became the most important conversation you'll ever have with your life, you know, in your life is when you have yourself. And my conversation was absolutely horrifying.

• 11:57Lewis Howes?

  What were you saying to yourself?

• 11:58David Goggins?

  I'm dumb. I'm nobody. I mean, my dad was great in mental warfare. A drunk, insecure man. Will make everybody around him feel like hell.

• 12:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:12David Goggins?

  Because he wants to give you no power. And that's why he was so mean to my mom and myself and my brother. Cause he didn't want anybody to get above him.

• 12:21Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 12:22David Goggins?

  He wanted to keep you down low. So when you're growing up with all this stuff, all this hate. And it wasn't the beatings. I could take the beatings all day. It was a mental torture. At a young age, your, your parents put a dialogue in you of confidence. Or you're nobody.

• 12:39Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 12:39David Goggins?

  So that voice in my head was I'm a loser. And then it was confirmed when I got in school. And in third grade, I was falling behind. They want to put me in a, in a special school.

• 12:50Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:51David Goggins?

  You know, with kids who can't learn.

• 12:52Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 12:53David Goggins?

  Then it was confirmed, what, you know, what my dad was saying. So that confirmed it. Then I started cheating. So I started realizing, you know what? I'm taking the easy way out again.

• 13:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:02David Goggins?

  And it started snowballing from there. Now, now the kids are calling me nigger.

• 13:05Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 13:06David Goggins?

  But it wasn't all the kids. So what happens is you start to get this picture that everybody hates you. Because your reality becomes so, so big.

• 13:16Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 13:17David Goggins?

  That you don't, I mean, you can't see the clear picture.

• 13:20Lewis Howes?

  It might've been three or four kids.

• 13:21David Goggins?

  That's it.

• 13:21Lewis Howes?

  Doing it over and over.

• 13:22David Goggins?

  Right. But it was the whole town.

• 13:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:24David Goggins?

  Everybody hated me. So.

• 13:26Lewis Howes?

  The world hates me.

• 13:27David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 13:27Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:28David Goggins?

  And that's when it, that's when it became toxic. And that is where I became my worst enemy.

• 13:34Lewis Howes?

  Wow. So those are the conversations.

• 13:35David Goggins?

  Those are the conversations.

• 13:37Lewis Howes?

  When did you start to realize that those conversations weren't supporting your life?

• 13:42David Goggins?

  So my mom was getting ready to get married. And this guy came into our lives, name was Wilmeth. He came into our lives. And like I always say, whenever my life's getting better. God will put another challenge in front of me.

• 13:56Lewis Howes?

  Haha.

• 13:57David Goggins?

  He gets murdered.

• 13:58Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man.

• 14:00David Goggins?

  And we moved back to Brazil. So, so we moved from this town, this small town in Brazil. And we moved to Indianapolis, Indiana. A lot more blacks, a lot more different colors.

• 14:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Weren't you living in New York at some point too?

• 14:14David Goggins?

  I was born in Buffalo, New York.

• 14:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, that's right.

• 14:16David Goggins?

  And I went from Buffalo to Indiana, and then from Indiana to Indianapolis, Indiana. Indianapolis, Indiana, you know, he got murdered when I was in Indianapolis. We went back to Brazil. We went back to Brazil. This is when the racism started.

• 14:27Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 14:28David Goggins?

  Because now I'm sixteen. So when I was first in Brazil, I was eight and nine. Kids don't care.

• 14:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:34David Goggins?

  You're just a kid. I look different, but kids don't care.

• 14:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:37David Goggins?

  Kids don't know. But when I moved and I came back, I'm no longer a kid. So all the kids I grew up with, I'm now different. I'm different. So there's about five black kids in my school. The reality came when I came out one day and all my car was spray painted, "Nigga, we're gonna kill you."

• 14:57Lewis Howes?

  Gosh, in Brazil?

• 14:58David Goggins?

  In Brazil.

• 14:59Lewis Howes?

  In Portuguese?

• 15:00David Goggins?

  No, no, my fault. Brazil, Indiana.

• 15:02Lewis Howes?

  Oh, gosh.

• 15:02David Goggins?

  Yeah, my fault. Brazil, Indiana.

• 15:03Lewis Howes?

  I was like, oh, well, you went to Brazil. I was like.

• 15:05David Goggins?

  No, no, Brazil, Indiana.

• 15:06Lewis Howes?

  Brazil, Indiana. Yeah, from Indianapolis to Brazil, Indiana. Got it.

• 15:09David Goggins?

  So I was in Brazil, Indiana, and about ten minutes from Brazil, Indiana is a small town called Center Point, Indiana.

• 15:16Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 15:16David Goggins?

  And Center Point, Indiana was, at that time, a huge hub of the KKK.

• 15:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 15:22David Goggins?

  In nineteen ninety-five, the Klan marched in a Fourth of July parade. And I don't know if the pictures, if any pictures are in there. But if not, there's a picture in the book in nineteen ninety-five, ten minutes from my house, of crosses being burnt.

• 15:37Lewis Howes?

  Ten minutes from your house?

• 15:37David Goggins?

  Ten minutes from my house.

• 15:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 15:39David Goggins?

  So when you have all this negativity growing up, and now you're cheating, and you're doing this, and your dad beats you, and your mom's fiance gets murdered, and tragedy after tragedy after tragedy, and then you come to this. And your mom's working three jobs. She's not home at all. She never saw one report card of mine. She didn't know how bad off I was in school. She was hustling, trying to make money. And I was the man of the house, lying, sneaking around, not going to school, cheating. Right, everything I could.

• 16:10Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 16:10David Goggins?

  I walked out of school one day and saw this nigga, "We're gonna kill you in my car." And I went in to get the principal. There's several incidents like this to happen. I went to get the principal and the principal, he couldn't give me any advice. And I didn't want to tell my mom about it because my mom was already bothered by my dad beating her down and now her fiance got murdered. So I didn't want to bother her.

• 16:31Lewis Howes?

  The last thing on her mind. She's like, I've dealt with this my whole life.

• 16:33David Goggins?

  Right. I didn't want to bother with anything, man. So I kept everything away from her. So I'm in the car wash trying to scrub this stuff off. And I got home and so happens, two weeks later, she gets a note from school. And the note says, your son is going to fail. He's not going to graduate. And she's like, what is this? And I had to come clean with my mom of all the years of me cheating, of all the bullying, of all this and all that. And she was such in a bad spot in her life that the best thing she could do was like, hey, you know, you're going to fail. You're going to fail school.

• 17:09Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 17:11David Goggins?

  And I was like, my God, man. Like, she was in a dark place. And I was in a dark place. And we were kind of on our own, in the same house, but living different lives. And I realized at this time in my life, she was a great mom, but I was on my own. And that's when a real big change happened for me. So I said, I'm going to join the military.

• 17:30Lewis Howes?

  Six, seventeen?

• 17:31David Goggins?

  Seventeen, eighteen. I wanted to go into the delayed entry program. And I went to take the ASVAB test and I cheated.

• 17:39Lewis Howes?

  That's what you knew.

• 17:40David Goggins?

  That's what I did.

• 17:41Lewis Howes?

  You're good.

• 17:42David Goggins?

  So I got my friend because I walked into recruiter's office and recruiter says, hey, you got to take this ASVAB test. Second I heard test, I was like, man, oh, hang on a second.

• 17:50Lewis Howes?

  I care test, it saved my life, man.

• 17:52David Goggins?

  I'm going to go, can I come back tomorrow?

• 17:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:54David Goggins?

  So I come back, the recruiter starts handing these tests out. And I'm like, great, I'm going to sit with my boy. I'm going to copy off my boy. He had a different test than I did.

• 18:03Lewis Howes?

  Ooh.

• 18:04David Goggins?

  So I couldn't copy off him. And that's when the light bulb hit on. So I failed this test several times.

• 18:09Lewis Howes?

  Failed twice?

• 18:09David Goggins?

  I failed it twice. I actually failed it. I failed it twice. And the third time, I said, Mom, I need help.

• 18:15Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 18:16David Goggins?

  And she said, um, we don't have much money, but we can afford a tutor for one hour a week for six months. Because this is my last time taking the test. And so I had to learn, so I had a third grade reading level. I'm a junior in high school.

• 18:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 18:30David Goggins?

  So I had six months to learn all this stuff. And I only had to tutor for one hour a week. So basically what happened was she would come in for an hour and I I wasn't picking it up. Any of it, I just couldn't retain anything.

• 18:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 18:45David Goggins?

  And it was so much to learn that overwhelmed me. So basically what happened was I realized.

• 18:52David Goggins?

  I had to go by the store and buy spiral notebooks. And I had to literally write down every single thing repeatedly. Like, so it may take you an hour to learn. It took me hours, six, eight, nine, 10 hours, I had to write the same thing down.

• 19:09Lewis Howes?

  Simple stuff.

• 19:10David Goggins?

  Simple stuff.

• 19:10Lewis Howes?

  I hear you, man.

• 19:11David Goggins?

  So I started, yeah.

• 19:12Lewis Howes?

  It's my life.

• 19:13David Goggins?

  So I I had to memorize.

• 19:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:15David Goggins?

  What I, so I didn't really learn it. I could just recall it from writing it down so many times that on page 71, I remember seeing that.

• 19:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:22David Goggins?

  And that's how I did it. And I ended up passing that test. And I got in the military, so.

• 19:27Lewis Howes?

  It's crazy.

• 19:28David Goggins?

  Yeah.

• 19:29Lewis Howes?

  What was the greatest lesson your mom taught you growing up?

• 19:32David Goggins?

  Honestly, the greatest lesson she ever taught me is a lesson that she, she doesn't know how much she taught me. Because she wasn't much in the teaching mode. My dad took her soul.

• 19:44Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 19:44David Goggins?

  But what I did as a young kid is I observed everybody. I wasn't really smart in the books.

• 19:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:51David Goggins?

  But I was real smart when it came to life.

• 19:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:54David Goggins?

  And I was able to sit back and watch her mistakes. I was able to see how she struggled through life and how I don't want to struggle through life. And I was able to see, she never picked me up. The biggest thing she did for me, and this is honest to God truth, and she doesn't even know she did it. When I would bust my, when I would fail.

• 20:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 20:14David Goggins?

  When I was at the bottom of the sewer, she never picked me up.

• 20:19David Goggins?

  She never gave me that cookie and said, hey, son, you know, it's gonna be okay. She didn't have time for that. And sometimes she gets upset when I talk about my past because it paints her out to be not the best mom. If I had any kind of mom in that kind of environment, I would have never made it. Because she forced me for every reason. She forced me to, you better figure this out. Or you're gonna be a statistic.

• 20:47David Goggins?

  And this is something that she didn't sit down and tell me. I realized this, this is the world that is in front of me. And what most people do is they see this world and they look at it as an excuse to get out of it. I started looking at it as this is the ultimate training ground for the rest of my life.

• 21:09David Goggins?

  I have all these valuable lessons, because if you look out in the world right now, today, it's not a nice place. But I'm very prepared for it.

• 21:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, you are.

• 21:17David Goggins?

  I'm prepared for it. I'm prepared for all the failure coming my way. I'm prepared for everything my way. And that's the biggest lesson that she taught me by not teaching me. By never saying it's gonna be okay. Matter of fact, she told me the exact opposite. Life sucks. That's what she knew. And it was the truth.

• 21:37Lewis Howes?

  That was her reality.

• 21:37David Goggins?

  That was her reality. And so I saw that. And so I started at that point in my life, I have a lot more failures, as you see in that book. But I started down the road of, instead of the path of least resistance, I started choosing the path of most resistance to prepare myself for the journey that was coming my way.

• 21:57Lewis Howes?

  Wow. And most kids don't prepare themselves for the most resistance. They wanna get out of things.

• 22:01David Goggins?

  They wanna get out of things.

• 22:02Lewis Howes?

  Get off the hook.

• 22:03David Goggins?

  Right.

• 22:03Lewis Howes?

  Put in the extra reps.

• 22:05David Goggins?

  Right.

• 22:05Lewis Howes?

  They want the easiest path to get to the top.

• 22:07David Goggins?

  Right, exactly.

• 22:09Lewis Howes?

  I look at my life as like, and here you talk about like really diving into pain and like embracing pain and finding, looking for the pain.

• 22:17David Goggins?

  Right.

• 22:17Lewis Howes?

  And I think there's like a, there's a, there's a safe pain and then there's probably an unsafe pain of just like jumping off a building and you know, whatever.

• 22:25David Goggins?

  Right.

• 22:26Lewis Howes?

  Trying to land on 20 floors or something. It's probably not the safe way to do things. But doing 200 miles of endurance running is like a different way of pain, of looking at pain. And that's what I've been looking for my whole life is like finding the pain. And I talk about like do something every day that's painful.

• 22:41David Goggins?

  Right.

• 22:41Lewis Howes?

  In a good structured environment. You've been doing that for the last couple of years now. It's like you work out every day. You haven't missed a day.

• 22:47David Goggins?

  I've been doing it for the last 20 some years of my life.

• 22:50Lewis Howes?

  20 years? Or they said 2 years?

• 22:51David Goggins?

  No, 20 some years of my life.

• 22:53Lewis Howes?

  20, every day you work out?

• 22:54David Goggins?

  So, I used to take one day off a week. I used to take one day off a week.

• 22:59Lewis Howes?

  For the body to recover, right? Makes sense.

• 23:01David Goggins?

  But that one day off was an active recovery day where I would get on a trainer and ride for like two hours.

• 23:06Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 23:07David Goggins?

  But at a, at a zone one heart rate, very low heart rate. And I replace the carbohydrates in my body while I rode because the best way to recover for me is to do something at a very low heart rate because therefore your blood's flowing through your body.

• 23:21Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 23:22David Goggins?

  As your blood's flowing through your body, refuel it with the nutrients. Cause then your blood's flowing, the nutrients is going through all your cells in your body. All that glycogen is now flowing at a low heart rate. So it's not burning it, it's refueling it.

• 23:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 23:36David Goggins?

  So every Sunday used to be that. And it kind of snowballed into, as human beings, we believe, so many people, before I give them a workout plan, they're talking about recovery. Everybody that hears me speak, they want to go straight to recovery. Work out first. Work out first before you talk to me about recovery.

• 23:58Lewis Howes?

  How to recover, yeah.

• 24:00David Goggins?

  Work out first. We are always looking for, like whenever I talk to people, people take my words and they, and they, and they put it in a way to where they want to feel comfortable. They want to put you in a box. They want to put a title on you. No, you're putting a title on me to make yourself feel better about yourself. If you read this book of mine and you see where I came from, this person was not built. This person was not made by God. This person, sorry, this person was built. I made this person. I made this person by diving into the insecurities that life gave me. Because now they're yours. They're yours to own. If you're not smart, call yourself dumb. It's okay. Because you are.

• 24:44David Goggins?

  But take that now as you're putting yourself down. If you're fat, call yourself fat. I used to be 300 pounds. We want to talk so soft to ourselves. We're looking for that recovery day. And that recovery day is everything in your life. Everything in your life is a recovery day. We're looking for it. It's not coming. It's not coming. Get over that recovery day. And that's the mentality I took with me. And what happened through that process was all the frivolous things of life started to float away. I used to tell people lies so they would like me. Because I was so insecure. When you start to build yourself up and start to have, the one thing that we don't have is confidence.

• 25:26Lewis Howes?

  Yep.

• 25:27David Goggins?

  Real, authentic confidence from hard work. Everything else goes away. You no longer look to other people for your self-esteem.

• 25:35Lewis Howes?

  Validation.

• 25:36David Goggins?

  That's right. You now know. I walk in a room now and I know the hours and years and decades I put into David Goggins. That's something, it's not on the wall. It's not a trophy on the wall. It's not a medal around your neck. It is actually a feeling in your heart. And people go, why don't you ever smile? I don't have to. I do have a stoic look on my face. I'm a very focused person. But the feeling I have in my soul and in my heart, that's why I don't need to smile. I don't need to smile. I don't need you to look at me and say, oh my God, you look happy. Because half of us aren't happy. We're giving you something that we think you want to see. I don't do that anymore. I don't care how you perceive David Goggins.

• 26:20David Goggins?

  Because through my journey, I figured out the one piece I was missing. I thought it was cars. I thought it was women. I thought it was money. I thought it was everything. The one piece I was missing was me having the courage to face myself. And once you do that on a daily basis, it's not about the running. People will go, you're just about working out. Where I got my work ethic from? Was the hours I had to spend learning this. When you sit down and you're not smart, you have a disability.

• 26:50Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 26:51David Goggins?

  And you still want to be at the top of your class. I didn't want to just get by. When I realized that I can learn through hard work. And I can beat the valedictorian in the school, but I got put in ten hours more a day than he does. You know what kind of strength comes from that? When you're sitting down, that guy that that valedictorian studied for an hour, and you know, I caught you. I caught you and I am dumb. But I have the work ethic to catch you. That's where David Gaga's got really invented.

• 27:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 27:23David Goggins?

  Was at a kitchen table with twenty spiral notebooks that were empty. And then three months later.

• 27:30Lewis Howes?

  They're dumb, yeah.

• 27:31David Goggins?

  They were full. And when you can go through that, I still have them in my storage unit. You go through these spiral notebooks of your life. And you realize this is how I learned. This is unbelievable. There's no miles. It's not about the miles. It's that, having a discipline every day to say, for me to learn this one math problem, it's gonna take me ten hours.

• 27:51Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 27:52David Goggins?

  And you realize through hard work, you can outwork anybody.

• 27:57Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 27:57David Goggins?

  No matter how bad they are. But that's the part people don't want to dive into.

• 28:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. When someone's lacking confidence in themselves.

• 28:05David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 28:05Lewis Howes?

  What's the answer you would give them? I feel like, how do I gain more confidence?

• 28:09David Goggins?

  It starts with yourself, man. You gotta start diving into those things that you are afraid of. You don't gain confidence by going to the spot that makes you feel good. It could be a false reality. And the second life gives you that challenge. All you want to do is go back to what makes you confident, or, or, or, or what gave you confidence, is that happy spot. No. What gives you confidence, what gave me confidence, was spending years at a kitchen table. Trying to learn how to read and write on my own. Realizing, I can't learn the way you learn. I can't. But I can learn. What gives you confidence is not being afraid. It's overcoming the fear.

• 28:54David Goggins?

  I used to stutter severely bad. So right now, I don't know how many people are gonna watch this. You know what gives me confidence is knowing I no longer care if I sit here and start stuttering to you.

• 29:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 29:04David Goggins?

  That's what gives me confidence is facing these things, overcoming them. And maybe not overcoming them every day, but facing them. And face them and face them pretty soon like this. You know what, man? This is where it's at. It's not in that comfort zone. It's in the discomfort zone is where my confidence is getting built. That's where it's getting built. They want an easier answer.

• 29:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 29:26David Goggins?

  There has to be an easier way. There's not. I'm sorry. I searched for it my entire life.

• 29:32Lewis Howes?

  You cheated, you lied.

• 29:34David Goggins?

  I lied. I did everything. And I still felt empty. I coach a lot of people nowadays, billionaires, who call me on the phone and say, man, I'm still missing something. It's because they did what they were good at.

• 29:50David Goggins?

  And they had this beautiful family, two, three houses, cars, everything. Has everything the world on the outside looking in like, my God, man, how can you be unhappy? I walk around with the backpack with all my stuff in it and no car.

• 30:03Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 30:04David Goggins?

  And I walk around happiest person in the world. Have nothing, happiest. It's because I found out the whole key to life. It's not in all that. You have to face yourself. So many people live to be 100 years old and they die miserable, having everything because they never examined. I call it my live autopsy. You never examine this. Happiness, peace, enlightenment, it's all up here, man. It's all up here. And I start talking like this, people go, man, you know, I don't know. It's the truth, man.

• 30:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, it is true.

• 30:43David Goggins?

  It's all up here. You just gotta be willing to go and face it. And that's the hard part.

• 30:48Lewis Howes?

  What's your biggest insecurity today?

• 30:50David Goggins?

  I'm not to be arrogant. I don't have one.

• 30:54Lewis Howes?

  What was the last one you had and when was that?

• 30:56David Goggins?

  The last one I had was probably still me. Me, we used to live in a seven dollar a month place when I was growing up.

• 31:05Lewis Howes?

  This is in Buffalo or is this?

• 31:06David Goggins?

  This is in Indiana.

• 31:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 31:07David Goggins?

  So, like, we had a lot of money in Buffalo.

• 31:09Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:10David Goggins?

  And when my mom left, my dad, we went to nothing for a period of time before she got on her feet.

• 31:15Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 31:15David Goggins?

  And that seven dollar a month place used to be, it was who I was. I was no one. I was in the sewer. My mom went there. I had nothing. And you always feel like you have nothing. I had achieved so much. I was a Navy SEAL. I'd gone through Ranger School. I've gone through Delta Force Selection Training. I, I, I'd done so much. I, I ran 200 miles, pull-up records, everything. Learned to read and write, became pretty intelligent. And I still was like, man, what is wrong with me? It wasn't until I got real sick, and I talked about in the last chapter of that book, I got real sick. And I was about 38 years old.

• 31:57Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:57David Goggins?

  I'm 43 now. And my life got real quiet. I, I went from running 205 miles in 39 hours to I couldn't get out of bed. The doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with me, but once again, it was the best thing that ever happened to me.

• 32:12Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 32:13David Goggins?

  In that moment where my whole life changed, I went from a guy who worked out every day, trained every day, to a guy who couldn't get out of bed. My life was taken from me. The one thing that kept me going was my training.

• 32:26Lewis Howes?

  Now, you didn't have that.

• 32:27David Goggins?

  I didn't have anything.

• 32:28Lewis Howes?

  Now, you just had to sit alone.

• 32:29David Goggins?

  Alone.

• 32:29Lewis Howes?

  And not train.

• 32:30David Goggins?

  And that's what changed me. And that's when I realized I hadn't thought, hadn't taken time to think about what I'd done in my life.

• 32:40Lewis Howes?

  You hadn't reflected yet.

• 32:41David Goggins?

  I hadn't reflected. I'd done all these things, but there was no finish line. I still believe that, but you must have time to reflect.

• 32:47Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 32:47David Goggins?

  I was just going. I'd finish a race of life, and I wouldn't even receive my medal. I'd go on.

• 32:53Lewis Howes?

  You're like, on to the next.

• 32:54David Goggins?

  I'd get in the car and I'd go.

• 32:56Lewis Howes?

  You wouldn't even take the medal?

• 32:57David Goggins?

  Gone. Don't care about it.

• 32:58Lewis Howes?

  Like, I'm not gonna waste an hour sitting around with this ceremony?

• 33:00David Goggins?

  Most people sit around, and that's what they like. They need the ceremony if I accomplish something.

• 33:05Lewis Howes?

  Validation.

• 33:06David Goggins?

  I haven't done anything. Let's go, let's go, let's go.

• 33:09Lewis Howes?

  Just getting started.

• 33:09David Goggins?

  I'm just getting started, that's right. When I started figuring out life, that I was leaving so much in the tank, I call it my forty percent rule.

• 33:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 33:17David Goggins?

  I was leaving so much in the tank. Once I realized, my God, man, I was this dumb, fat kid being bullied, and now I'm a hundred and eighty pound person who lost a hundred and six pounds in less than three months. Learned to read, learned to do this, learned to do that. I was like, I need more.

• 33:31Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 33:32David Goggins?

  I was fueling my mind with everything. And I never took time to say, my God, you came from this hell, and you're here. So those insecurities, and this is how I explain it the best way. SEAL training became pretty hard, and a lot of guys weren't getting through it. So they designed a SEAL pep prep program.

• 33:52Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, like a boot camp for the boot camp.

• 33:54David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 33:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 33:55David Goggins?

  And it was two months. In my last two years before I retired from the military, they sent me there to train these kids.

• 34:01Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 34:02David Goggins?

  To get ready for.

• 34:02Lewis Howes?

  Eighteen, nineteen, twenty year olds.

• 34:04David Goggins?

  Young kids. So when they get to Navy SEAL training, man, they were physical studs. They were running, swimming. I mean, they were, they were hybrids.

• 34:13Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 34:14David Goggins?

  But they get to buds, and the same amount of people would quit.

• 34:18Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 34:19David Goggins?

  This is why. We were training bigger, stronger, faster quitters.

• 34:26Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 34:27David Goggins?

  It's not about.

• 34:28Lewis Howes?

  Not the mind.

• 34:29David Goggins?

  That's right. We weren't diving into the sewer. Everybody's got a story. We don't share it on social media. We share our nice life on social media. We have, we all have a dungeon. I'm just willing to talk about mine.

• 34:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 34:44David Goggins?

  Most of us aren't willing to talk about it. I'm willing to talk about my dungeon. I wasn't getting into the dungeon of these guys' minds. I wasn't building that so-called mental toughness. Mental toughness isn't something that you sample. It's something that you live in every day. So when something hard would happen to these kids, like in Hell Week. It would draw on something that made them very insecure. And they look for comfort. Whenever hardness comes, and you don't know what it is. It may be different for you than this for me. But you go back to your insecurities. And then when you go back to insecurities, you then look for comfort. Within those insecurities. And we all look for that cookie that your mom used to give you. Right. When you were sad.

• 35:30David Goggins?

  Yeah. When you were sick. We look for our wife or our husband. We look for comfort.

• 35:36David Goggins?

  It's in those moments. You must retrain your mind. Hmm. To think differently in hell. I wasn't training them to do that. Why weren't you training? I wasn't training myself to that, because at that time. I was doing what I was told. Hmm. These guys need to meet a standard. Physical standard. A physical standard. The physical standard is not what they need to meet. It's a mental standard. You must meet in life. So going back to when I was sick. I was hitting the physical standards. I wasn't meeting. The mental standard. The mental standard is you must know how far you've come. Wow. I had come. Eight thousand miles from where I started.

• 36:20David Goggins?

  But if you never know that, you're still in the seven dollar a month place. When I was sick, I was able to slow it down. And reflect back on my entire life. And in that bed. And I thought I was dying. Because that story is long, that that sick portion of my life is long. I didn't care if I died or lived. Wow. Because I was, for the first time in my life, happy. Wow. And at peace. I reflected back on where I started. You said, wow, I have come a long way. That's right. And no one saved me. It wasn't like someone came down here. And guided me through life. When you figure this out on your own. The amount of pride and dignity and self-respect you have. That's why I walk around the streets.

• 37:06David Goggins?

  With a backpack. And just like, I don't need anything else. Yeah. You figure it out. By going inside yourself. By callusing over the victim's mentality. You're always a victim. Even if you have everything in life. You have to first realize what you've achieved, and my mom. Has accomplished so much in her life since my father. But she hasn't done that one step.

• 37:29Lewis Howes?

  Really? She doesn't acknowledge it and reflect back?

• 37:32David Goggins?

  She continues to go back to the dungeon of her past life.

• 37:37Lewis Howes?

  And live in that space?

• 37:38David Goggins?

  And live in that space, versus living the space that she's in now and reflecting back on, "My God, this is what I've done with my life." So...

• 37:47Lewis Howes?

  Have you talked to her about this?

• 37:48David Goggins?

  We talk about it all the time, and you have to be willing to go there. You have to be willing to really go there, not, not surface. I don't, I don't live on the surface of anything.

• 37:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 37:59David Goggins?

  Surface is what got me where I was at. It got me from a hundred and seventy-five pounds to three hundred pounds. Telling everybody, "I'm good." "I don't, I don't give a damn, I'm good." No, they're, they're hollow words.

• 38:11Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 38:12David Goggins?

  A lot of us speak in hollow words. I used to speak in hollow words. I don't do anymore. Everything that comes out of my mouth has substance, is real. And we all have these feelings in our bodies, in our minds, in our souls. I act on mine. A lot of us who are afraid of something, we allow our minds to choose the path of least resistance, so we go a different route. When I'm afraid of something, it's telling me, "You must do that." You must do that.

• 38:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 38:39David Goggins?

  You have to go that way. And most of us don't understand that mentality. We go left, and we wonder why we haven't fulfilled something in our lives. It's because we continue to take the journey that is mapped out. And how I look at it is, I, I, I talk in life like, a lot of us in life want to take the four-lane highway that has road maps and all this other stuff on it, man. Tells you where to go, gas stations. The next ten miles up, you're gonna see a McDonald's or Cracker Barrel.

• 39:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 39:11David Goggins?

  It's an easy route. Very few of us want to go to the right side.

• 39:15Lewis Howes?

  That Cracker Barrel's that Midwest life.

• 39:17David Goggins?

  That's right, that's right.

• 39:18Lewis Howes?

  I'm from Ohio.

• 39:19David Goggins?

  It's all about it, man. Indiana, Cracker Barrel everywhere.

• 39:23Lewis Howes?

  Dude, that's amazing. Bringing back memories. This is powerful, because I've been telling people this. I've been living that way, unknowingly, my whole life of like, whatever the thing is I'm afraid of. When I was in high school, I started doing those things.

• 39:35David Goggins?

  Right.

• 39:35Lewis Howes?

  And it's just like, I'm sick and tired of feeling afraid.

• 39:38David Goggins?

  Right.

• 39:39Lewis Howes?

  So I need to do the things that scare me the most.

• 39:41David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 39:41Lewis Howes?

  You know, I've talked about this a lot on the podcast. Tiffany's heard me share these stories. But I was afraid to talk to girls when I was a teenager. I was afraid of dancing. I was afraid of like singing and playing music in front of people. I was afraid of all these different things. And so I said, I want to do this. I'm going to give myself a challenge every single day until the fear goes away.

• 39:59David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 40:00Lewis Howes?

  And I feel like that's what more of us should be doing. I'm hearing that that's what you, how you live your life.

• 40:04David Goggins?

  That's all it is, man.

• 40:05Lewis Howes?

  And it helps me feel so much more confident. When you overcome that fear,

• 40:08David Goggins?

  Yep.

• 40:08Lewis Howes?

  of saying, this doesn't have control over me anymore.

• 40:11David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 40:11Lewis Howes?

  It's like you can be at such more peace.

• 40:13David Goggins?

  It's a hundred percent.

• 40:14Lewis Howes?

  In your life.

• 40:15David Goggins?

  Most of, like, for instance, I never thought in my wildest dreams, I could be a Navy SEAL.

• 40:21David Goggins?

  It's until you open mindedness creates that. We all shut down our mind. Like, for instance, when I broke the pull-up record, everybody around me who heard the pull-up record was 4,020 pull-ups. That's the first thing they did. Oh, my God.

• 40:35Lewis Howes?

  4,024 hours or was this?

• 40:37David Goggins?

  Yeah, it's 4,020 pull-ups in 24-hour period.

• 40:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 40:40David Goggins?

  The first thing I did versus closing my mind to like, oh, my God, that's crazy.

• 40:45David Goggins?

  I went and got a pin.

• 40:46Lewis Howes?

  So how many is that every minute?

• 40:47David Goggins?

  Exactly.

• 40:48Lewis Howes?

  Every hour, every second?

• 40:49David Goggins?

  Instead of taking life and making it out to be this grandiose thing, start breaking it down. Start breaking it down. And most of us, we live in a box. And we don't want to go outside that box at all, ever. Outside that box is all these possibilities of life. What we do is we shackle our mind. We are a prisoner in our own mind that this is all I can do. This is all I'm good at. And we, we, we take away the possibilities. You could be this. You could be that.

• 41:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 41:23David Goggins?

  You could be all these things. And I never thought at 300 pounds I could be Navy SEAL.

• 41:27Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 41:27David Goggins?

  So if my mind was shackled. Me and you would never meet. There'd be no book. Right. There'd be no book. Right. There'd be nothing. So, what people don't understand is that they live for themselves, not knowing that you have the power within yourself to change millions of lives. Yeah. By facing life, by facing yourself. And through that, I would die never knowing that I had the power to change millions of lives. It would haunt me the most. People ask me, what would haunt you the most? What haunts me the most is that if I would have died at 300 pounds, let's say I was 75 years old. I got to heaven and God has a chart like that on everybody's life. God knows all. Let's say that.

• 42:12David Goggins?

  I don't care what you believe in. Doesn't matter. I'm not judging anybody. But let's say my thing is God. You get to heaven, I'm 300 pounds, I sit down, I was a cockroach, terminated my whole life. And we're sitting down just like this, you're God and I'm David. And he gives me that chart and he says, "Look at this." And I'm looking at this chart and on the chart it has all these different things, but my name's on it. But these things aren't me. I was gonna change the world. I was gonna, I was gonna set records. I was gonna be a Navy SEAL. I was gonna be all these things in the military that I accomplished. You're gonna get the VFW award. You're gonna be honored here, honored there. And I'm like, God, I was, this isn't me. Like it says, David Goggins.

• 42:54David Goggins?

  I was an Ecolab guy, sprayed for cockroaches and I'm 300 pounds. It says here, I'm 185. It says here, I got a bachelor's and a master's. It says all these things. And God goes, "No, that's who you were supposed to be." Wow.

• 43:12David Goggins?

  My biggest fear in life is if there is a final resting place in this world and there's a final judgment and you talk to something much bigger than you. I don't wanna sit down and have a conversation with someone with something that says, "You're in heaven. This is what you should have been on earth." And are you really in heaven now or are you in hell? Thinking about how much I left on the table for fear, for not willing to go over the wall and over the next wall and over the next wall. So in my mind, I believe that and God knows all. At least I believe that. I want God to be up there right now as we're speaking,

• 43:55David Goggins?

  writing stuff down, saying, my God, he exceeded even my expectations. That's how I live my life. I now know that there is no cap on the human mind. There's no cap. We cap it ourselves.

• 44:11Lewis Howes?

  Wow. Is there a cap on the human body?

• 44:13David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 44:14Lewis Howes?

  Is there one?

• 44:15David Goggins?

  There, I,

• 44:19David Goggins?

  I don't believe so.

• 44:22David Goggins?

  Because one thing I found out was I didn't, for several years, I gave myself a way out.

• 44:29Lewis Howes?

  When you were 300 pounds?

• 44:30David Goggins?

  No, I was 300 pounds and I was all the way up till I was 24 years old. I would climb a mountain, I'd fall back down. I'd start climbing, I'd fall back down for the first 24 years of my life. I went to my first hell week, my second hell week, and then my third hell week came in SEAL training, and the CO, Captain Bowen, looked at me, I'm on crutches, I'm all jacked up. He says, hey, this is your last time you're gonna go through, buds. This is it. I had several stress fractures. I had double pneumonia, I was jacked up, and he gave me a few months to heal. He said, this is your last time going through. I shouldn't even let you go back through.

• 45:08Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 45:09David Goggins?

  I started Navy SEAL training with stress fractures. Stress fractures, not shin splints.

• 45:15Lewis Howes?

  That's hard to finish.

• 45:16David Goggins?

  Stress fractures, starting the hardest training, arguably the hardest training in the world with stress fractures. And this is when I started to not put a cap on the body, if the mind is there. Every morning, I would wake up at 3:30 in the morning, 4 o'clock in the morning, go to my dive cage, go in there before anybody saw me, I'd get duct tape, and I would tape from my forefoot all the way up to the mid of my calf, and I would put two black socks on. And so I ran not using the pivot.

• 45:46Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh.

• 45:47David Goggins?

  And I ran my hip flexors. So for the first 45 minutes to an hour, I was in absolute excruciating pain. But what motivated me, through that whole process, was the fact that this kid came from that. I'm in the hardest training in the world, in the worst shape of my entire life.

• 46:11David Goggins?

  What if I can graduate amongst these studs?

• 46:13Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 46:14David Goggins?

  All these guys around me are studs. They're stallions, they're gladiators in my class, they're all healthy, most of them. They're not broken like this. They may have some, you know, everybody's sick going through that training. But if I can graduate, it would change everything for me. If I can start the hardest training in the world, broken, and graduate. So my mind fed off of that. You are now, from the weakest man, you are now the hardest man to ever live. If you can do this. If you can do this.

• 46:49David Goggins?

  Life is one big mind game. And you're playing it with yourself. Is it true? I don't care.

• 46:56David Goggins?

  It got me through the hardest training, starting out broken. Where most people quit, I had just started.

• 47:04Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 47:05David Goggins?

  And when you take that mindset and you learn to flip that around,

• 47:10David Goggins?

  that's what made me powerful. And my body followed. And three months later, my stress fractures were healed by running on them.

• 47:21Lewis Howes?

  Calcifying it, just like.

• 47:23David Goggins?

  I've never had them since, I'm forty-three years old.

• 47:26Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 47:26David Goggins?

  I ran seven thousand miles in two thousand and seven, haven't had a stress fracture since. And I'm not saying to do that. I'm just saying that when the mind and the body connect, and you don't give yourself a way out. The only way out for me at that time was death.

• 47:43Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 47:44David Goggins?

  I'm gonna be a Navy SEAL.

• 47:46Lewis Howes?

  Or I'm gonna die.

• 47:47David Goggins?

  Or I'm gonna die trying.

• 47:48Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 47:49David Goggins?

  Period. And my body said, Roger that. We're gonna get you through this.

• 47:56Lewis Howes?

  So when the mind gives it no way out.

• 47:58David Goggins?

  No way out.

• 47:58Lewis Howes?

  Your body says, okay.

• 48:00David Goggins?

  Okay.

• 48:00Lewis Howes?

  I believe you now.

• 48:02David Goggins?

  I have to heal.

• 48:02Lewis Howes?

  I'm gonna figure this out with you.

• 48:04David Goggins?

  Yes.

• 48:04Lewis Howes?

  Do this, it's gonna be the worst part of your life, but you're gonna survive.

• 48:09David Goggins?

  We're gonna survive.

• 48:10Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 48:10David Goggins?

  And as you hear in that hundred mile race I did, I started figuring out more and more and more and more about at the other end of suffering is a life that no one, and I'm not talking about go out there and kill yourself. Don't take these words and flip them and say, oh my God, no.

• 48:30David Goggins?

  It just be uncomfortable. I call it suffering.

• 48:32Lewis Howes?

  Don't physically injure yourself.

• 48:33David Goggins?

  Yes, not saying that.

• 48:34Lewis Howes?

  And then be out for six months.

• 48:36David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 48:36Lewis Howes?

  That's no good.

• 48:37David Goggins?

  That's no good. I'm not saying, I'm not saying do what I did.

• 48:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 48:40David Goggins?

  I was in a spot that life forced me. I had a choice. I had a choice to be this guy or the guy that's in front of you. I had choices. I chose this path.

• 48:50Lewis Howes?

  And you're still choosing it.

• 48:51David Goggins?

  And I'm still choosing.

• 48:52Lewis Howes?

  You can go back to that guy at any moment.

• 48:54David Goggins?

  Cause I found out, I found out something with those stress fractures. I found out something through facing all these things. I found out a whole nother world, which is why I walk around with all my stuff in a black backpack.

• 49:08Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 49:09David Goggins?

  I found a whole nother way, a whole nother way of, no matter how far you get in life, you have to be able to go back to scratch in your mind at a moment's notice. You can never get so far beyond scratch.

• 49:26Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 49:27David Goggins?

  What that means is when you accomplish something in life, if you're willing to go back to scratch and go back to that seven dollar a month place where I once lived and visit that place for a long period of time. If you were here, when you went back to scratch, you would now be here.

• 49:42Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 49:43David Goggins?

  Scratch is what makes you better. Scratch, friction, obstacles create growth. There's no friction when you're this far up in the game anymore. You think there is, but really, that's right. When you achieve so much, the friction is, is minor. Cause why? I'm sore. I'm gonna get a massage today.

• 50:01Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 50:03David Goggins?

  I'm hungry. I'm gonna eat today. The refrigerator is always full. So your comforts are now, so your discomfort is now very miniscule to your discomfort back here in the seven dollar a month place. So you have to go back to the total discomfort to then raise your level of where you're at now.

• 50:22Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 50:22David Goggins?

  I'm not saying stay there and stay there. Visit.

• 50:25Lewis Howes?

  Visit it.

• 50:26David Goggins?

  And then you raise your level.

• 50:28Lewis Howes?

  Take a day trip.

• 50:29David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 50:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 50:30David Goggins?

  Always take day trips.

• 50:31Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, don't stay there.

• 50:33David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 50:33Lewis Howes?

  But take a day trip.

• 50:34David Goggins?

  Take a day trip.

• 50:35Lewis Howes?

  So when you complete some massive obstacle and challenge, whatever the adversity that you force upon yourself.

• 50:41David Goggins?

  Hmm.

• 50:42Lewis Howes?

  Because these are all curated experiences for yourself.

• 50:45David Goggins?

  Right.

• 50:45Lewis Howes?

  That you're scratching constantly. What happens now, since this was five years ago, you would just leave, you want to take the medal, you would just go on to the next. What happens now? Do you take, you know, a day to reflect, a moment, 10 minutes? Like, how does the process work? And then how do you get back to visiting the $7 place you lived in?

• 51:05David Goggins?

  Now, I don't have to go back and visit it. I don't have to think about it. It lives with me now.

• 51:10Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 51:11David Goggins?

  Every day of my life, that feeling that I had to go back and think about, I found a way, this habit.

• 51:20Lewis Howes?

  How did you?

• 51:21David Goggins?

  It's constantly there. I have a self-talk. I have a self-talk, it's called my cookie jar.

• 51:27Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 51:27David Goggins?

  It's a constant reminder of David Gatt. Every day of my life, I believe in quiet. There's no growth outside of quiet. The world's too noisy. Your mind needs quiet for you to find who you are. People ask, what's my purpose? Why am I here? You're not going to find it nowadays unless you lock yourself in a quiet room in your mind and find it. It's too noisy. For me, I could be in a busy street in New York City, horns honking, and I'm walking around with like, nothing. It's me and myself.

• 52:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 52:03David Goggins?

  In a quiet spot. And when you are constantly reflecting on who you are, where you've been, the journey you've gone through, the journey you can continue going through, the feeling's always there. You don't allow the world to pull you so fast that you forget. You don't allow yourself to pull you so fast that you forget. It's not about staying in that moment. It's about, you want to get to the point where that feeling follows you like breathing.

• 52:33Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 52:34David Goggins?

  It becomes a part of your life, part of your DNA. But it's made, like these calluses on my hands right now, they're made.

• 52:41Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 52:41David Goggins?

  They are now on my brain. This is now a part of me. It's a daily process, a part of me. And how I go back to a $7 a month place.

• 52:52David Goggins?

  All the time is now I go out and I dig fire line. I'm a wildland firefighter. I don't need to do it. I'm a forty-three-year-old man. I work with twenty-seven-year-old kids.

• 53:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:04David Goggins?

  And I'm a rookie. Every day I'm a rookie, it feels like. And

• 53:08Lewis Howes?

  Why do you do it?

• 53:09David Goggins?

  That's why I do it, man. There's a story I'm gonna tell you about why I do it. I have a good living now, for me, where I'm at in my life. I was out on a fire in Colorado. And we were digging fire line on this, like, fifty percent, like, it was like on the side of a daggon mountain.

• 53:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:27David Goggins?

  And we're trying to keep the fire from moving. And we're digging this fire line fourteen inches, or my fault, eighteen inches wide, three miles long. Twelve of us digging. And it is the hardest work. You make twelve dollars an hour.

• 53:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 53:40David Goggins?

  Okay? Nothing. You set up your shop, like, when you're done digging, you just pretty much lay down, you go to sleep, and you get up and you dig some more.

• 53:47Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 53:48David Goggins?

  It happens for two weeks long.

• 53:49Lewis Howes?

  What are you digging? It's like a hole, you're digging a line here?

• 53:51David Goggins?

  So you're trying to get down to a mineral source. So you're trying to get down to the earth. So, so that if that fire's moving, it can't burn dirt.

• 53:59Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 54:00David Goggins?

  So you're moving fuels.

• 54:01Lewis Howes?

  Got it.

• 54:01David Goggins?

  So not only are you digging, you're cutting down trees. It's hard work. But the moral of the story is, I'm forty-three, don't need to do it at all. This is why I do it.

• 54:10Lewis Howes?

  You're making money.

• 54:10David Goggins?

  I'm making money. I'm, I have a good life. I don't need to do it. And everybody asks me why I do it. This is why.

• 54:19David Goggins?

  This twenty-one-year-old kid was out there. And he wanted a pair of running shoes. That's all he wanted, was a pair of running shoes. Sixty, seventy, hundred bucks, whatever, you know, easy for us.

• 54:30Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 54:31David Goggins?

  Running shoes. He looked up at the mountain that we had been on for days digging this fire line. And he said that'd take me five or six hours of work to buy those shoes. Said I'm not gonna buy them. It's the perspective of life. That perspective of life right there. That is the value that we lose. When things start to come so easy in life. It's the perspective that twenty one year old had. He looked about that mountain and thought. He looked at his hands. He looked at the, at the amount of hours of pulling that Pulaski, that, that tool. And raking that ground and, and then cutting those trees and moving them and that hours of work. He looked at his feet and said, these old shoes would do.

• 55:16David Goggins?

  It's that perspective in life that we lose. And that's, that story to most people may not mean anything. It's that story I always want to have in my life. You cannot lose perspective of where you've come in life.

• 55:30Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. So true. We were in Guatemala. Was it this year or last year? Last year, we were in Guatemala last year. We, we support a charity called Pencil of Promise that builds schools for kids who live in poverty and all around the world. And every year I take a trip to just see where our efforts are being felt and, and being, and being made. These are the poorest places in Guatemala, Laos and Ghana. Places like, they have nothing. There's no schools, they're in little villages, they live on dirt, huts, everything, right? And we go and we build these schools. We actually, the, the villagers build them themselves. We just fund the experience and they empower, we empower them to do it. So that they take ownership of it.

• 56:12David Goggins?

  Right.

• 56:13Lewis Howes?

  But I'll be there for a few days and watch these kids so happy with just like a pencil. Or just so happy to just like have their family around. And they'll go and they'll show us their huts and like, they're just so happy to have community. And then I'll fly back and go through Beverly Hills. Right over here. And I'll see like these mansions, you know, I live right next to it. And I'm just like, it gives me so much perspective of like, you don't need to have all these things. No. To find peace and joy and, and connection and intimacy and all these, and all these other things that we want. You don't need these big mansions and to live in this nice place. You know, I like living here, but it's not like. It's perspective for me is what keeps me motivated as well.

• 56:56David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 56:56Lewis Howes?

  To keep doing the right things, to keep showing up, to keep working hard. And I think it's right, most of us miss that perspective in life.

• 57:03David Goggins?

  We get so far away from reality.

• 57:05Lewis Howes?

  So far.

• 57:06David Goggins?

  And the reality is, man, when I was seven years old, eight years old, all I wanted was a 99 cent quarter pounder from Hardee's.

• 57:13Lewis Howes?

  I know, right?

• 57:14David Goggins?

  And that made me happiest.

• 57:16Lewis Howes?

  Some curly fries.

• 57:16David Goggins?

  That's it, man. That's it.

• 57:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the thing is, a lot of us have been conditioned, or some of us grew up with wealth or grew up with comfort.

• 57:27David Goggins?

  Right.

• 57:27Lewis Howes?

  And so we're conditioned that way, and we grew up expecting now that things should come a lot easier.

• 57:32David Goggins?

  Right. That's a shame.

• 57:34Lewis Howes?

  And we get frustrated when we don't get it right.

• 57:36David Goggins?

  That's right. Quickly.

• 57:37Lewis Howes?

  Quickly. Yeah. And I'm always talking about delayed gratification. Like, the longer I can wait to receive gratification.

• 57:43David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 57:44Lewis Howes?

  The more fulfilled I am.

• 57:45David Goggins?

  I'm a person, so when I got sick like I did, I actually had to quit this race called Badwater.

• 57:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. 135 miles.

• 57:52David Goggins?

  Yep, through Death Valley. It was 2014, I got real, real bad. I pulled out of the race at mile 50, I went to the emergency room, and the docs were like, you know, we can't find this, we can't find that, we know what's wrong with you. When I got in that bed, so this is the crazy thing about gratification, long term. I'm able to watch grass grow by finding out this. I sat there, couldn't run a half, a quarter mile, couldn't get out of bed. The only thought I had in my mind, I pulled out of that race, I told myself, I'm gonna go back to Badwater one day and rent it. I'm gonna win the race.

• 58:31David Goggins?

  Haven't been back since. Haven't been back since 2019. I'm not saying I'm gonna win it. I'm just now in the shape to go back.

• 58:40Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 58:41David Goggins?

  Haven't run a 100 mile race since 2014.

• 58:43Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 58:44David Goggins?

  Because I've been that sick. I'm just now, imagine the gratification I'm gonna get by getting to the start line of that race, and what if I can win it?

• 58:54Lewis Howes?

  Be pretty sweet.

• 58:54David Goggins?

  Pretty sweet.

• 58:55Lewis Howes?

  Four or five years, yeah.

• 58:56David Goggins?

  Imagine that, of having that kinda self-discipline to every day wake up and having these setbacks where I can't even run a mile.

• 59:03Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:04David Goggins?

  But I'm thinking about running a hundred and thirty-five. I can't run one mile, but I'm thinking about running a hundred and thirty-five. And with that process, guess what happens? Sooner or later, you can run ten miles. It may take a year, but it gives you more and more hope that it's possible. And I'm at the point now where guess what? It's right around the corner.

• 59:25Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:26David Goggins?

  Most people in that timeframe, in that, in that, in that mindset, I can't run anymore. It's over. No. It's just gonna take a little bit longer. You have to turn the negative into a positive.

• 59:39Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 59:40David Goggins?

  Cause at the end of it all, if you can sit back and wait, if you can wait six, seven, eight, nine, ten, twelve years, when you get to that point, when you finish, that's the feeling for twelve years. It's not say wait twelve years to get there. That's what keeps you going, is you gotta feel, I want, I'm doing it for one second.

• 1:00:00Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:00:03Lewis Howes?

  Years of pain.

• 1:00:04David Goggins?

  For one second. One second.

• 1:00:10David Goggins?

  Think about it. You cross the finish line, it's over. One second.

• 1:00:15Lewis Howes?

  Most people do that, and the one second isn't what they thought it would be, and then they're pissed and upset, and they keep going on to the next, cause they never reflect back on what they did.

• 1:00:25David Goggins?

  It's not the one second, it's the twelve years.

• 1:00:27Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:28David Goggins?

  It's the twelve years that I want. It's not the race.

• 1:00:33Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:00:34David Goggins?

  It's the twelve years why you did it.

• 1:00:38Lewis Howes?

  It's not the winning.

• 1:00:39David Goggins?

  It's not the winning.

• 1:00:39Lewis Howes?

  It's not what place you got.

• 1:00:41David Goggins?

  No.

• 1:00:41Lewis Howes?

  But most of us focus on.

• 1:00:42David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 1:00:43Lewis Howes?

  Oh, I gotta win this.

• 1:00:44David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 1:00:45Lewis Howes?

  If I don't, I'm gonna be upset. I would achieve all my athletic goals for years, and then ten minutes later be the angriest person in the world.

• 1:00:52David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 1:00:53Lewis Howes?

  So angry and frustrated, nasty with people.

• 1:00:55David Goggins?

  Yep.

• 1:00:55Lewis Howes?

  And I would delay my gratification for years to achieve what I wanted.

• 1:00:58David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 1:00:59Lewis Howes?

  And I never understood that either.

• 1:01:02David Goggins?

  Being a perfectionist is the worst thing that can happen to a person. When I lost that hundred and six pounds in like two and a half months, whatever it took me.

• 1:01:10David Goggins?

  That was the biggest trophy of my entire life. I didn't care if I graduated Navy SEAL training. I didn't care. What I just accomplished in that timeframe is massive.

• 1:01:19Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:20David Goggins?

  There was no like, it was funny about this, we talk about mental toughness nowadays. It's like the biggest crave. When I grew up, it was just suck it up.

• 1:01:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:29David Goggins?

  It was just make it happen.

• 1:01:32Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:32David Goggins?

  You had to figure out, it was called figure it out, man. And all these, all these nuggets that I gained along the way, that's what it was about. It went about the Trident, it went about all those dead gone medals, it went about any of that. And that's why I hate even talking about being a SEAL, you know? I miss the stories, people, why you talk about, it didn't define me. The journey getting there was harder than going through it. So that's the whole thing about life, man, it's that journey that, that makes you who you are.

• 1:02:01Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and as opposed to focusing on did I win or not?

• 1:02:04David Goggins?

  Right.

• 1:02:05Lewis Howes?

  What did I gain from the last 12 years?

• 1:02:07David Goggins?

  Right.

• 1:02:07Lewis Howes?

  And so when you finish now, what do you think about? How, how long do you reflect back on the effort it took to accomplish that race or?

• 1:02:15David Goggins?

  A long time.

• 1:02:16Lewis Howes?

  Was?

• 1:02:17David Goggins?

  A long time. Weeks, years.

• 1:02:19Lewis Howes?

  You'll reflect on it?

• 1:02:20David Goggins?

  I reflect back now, there's times now where I will reflect back on my first 100 mile race. It's still today. And it'll give me the same exact feeling. Because what I did in that first race, when I was undertrained, I did it on four days notice. I hadn't run more than, I think 20 miles the whole year. And I, and I did it to raise money for this foundation. To try to get in the bad water. What I had to pull out of myself on that last, that's where that book, Live with a SEAL, kind of originated. Jesse Isler saw me at this race.

• 1:02:55Lewis Howes?

  He was racing too.

• 1:02:56David Goggins?

  Yeah, but he did it as a team.

• 1:02:58Lewis Howes?

  Right, you did it alone.

• 1:02:59David Goggins?

  I did it alone. And that's what I talk with people about, man. I spent so much time, people always like, why do you run so much? You know, you, you know, try to get in shape? No. The things I do in life, most of life, you're alone. You may have a whole support crew around you, but up here, you're alone.

• 1:03:20David Goggins?

  Most of the stuff I do, I'm training for that one, those moments. Those moments when I was at mile seventy and I had thirty more miles to go and I had, I crapped up my back and peeing blood down my leg, I had thirty miles to go. There's only so much someone cheering can do for you. Right. When you start to dive back in the cellar of your mind, and you're pulling out all these, all these tactics, all these mental tactics to get through this thirty miles when you're in the worst shape of your life, and no one's coming to save you, and you get through that. I wanna go back there, like, when I got done with that race, I laid in the tub, and my ex-wife helped me get up the stairs, and I'm laying in this tub, and Coca-Cola's coming out of me, just looks like dirt.

• 1:04:04David Goggins?

  You know, she's a nurse, and she's like, she's freaking out. And she puts the shower on me, and I'm looking at her, and all I wanna do is call the race director up of Bowwater saying, "I qualified for the race." And she's thinking, "We gotta go to the hospital," so, you know, she's, she's calling my mom, and my mom has a doctor friend of hers who's over, and they're freaking out. And I said, "Everybody, just shut up." Wow. Shut up. I'm in the worst pain in my entire life, and no one would ever understand this, no one. When you've gone that deep inside yourself, and all those feelings of pain that I had, I was in the worst pain of my life, ever. And some people think, "Man, you're just crazy." No, when you've done that,

• 1:04:49David Goggins?

  and you've figured out so much on your own, and all that pain and discomfort I had in that tub, laying there, passing out, everything, was confirmation of what I just figured out. I just figured out the code. I figured out a code, a code that many people aren't looking for. And I didn't want it to be numb. I, I want that feeling. This was confirmation. This was like a scientist's notes. The notes were here. The notes were all this feeling. It was a confirmation. And no one at that time could understand what I'd just done. I cracked the code to human potential in myself.

• 1:05:32David Goggins?

  And I was still like, oh my God, like this is unbelievable what I just did. So it's that quiet place.

• 1:05:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:05:40David Goggins?

  It's that place by yourself, it's those hours and years and decades by yourself in the grip of life. When life has you by the throat and choking you out and you're sitting there calm because you're trying to figure it out, you're not panicking, you're not quitting, you're not throwing in the towel. You're saying, there's a way around this. And when you figure it out, when life has you gripped in a vise and you can figure that out, that's when you overcome.

• 1:06:10Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:06:11David Goggins?

  That's when you overcome. And that's why that one moment for me in that tub, I ain't want anyone to take away from me.

• 1:06:18Lewis Howes?

  Wow. This is called the three truths. I ask this question to everyone at the end, it's called three truths. Imagine it is your last day and you get to pick the day whenever you want. You get to live as long as you want, you pick the day, but it's time for your body to go, right? You've created everything you want to create. You've, you've been at 99 percentile of potential for as long as you can live. You've done it all, you've checked off the list that everything that God says that you were supposed to do, it's happened.

• 1:06:48David Goggins?

  Right.

• 1:06:49Lewis Howes?

  Written the books, everything you want to do, done. But for whatever reason, you've got to take all of your written word and videos and, and, and audio stuff that's out in the world, you've got to take it with you. But you get to write down on a piece of paper, the three things you know to be true about all of your experiences. And this is what you would leave behind. The three lessons or what I like to call the three truths. What would you say are your three truths?

• 1:07:13David Goggins?

  The first one is you are your own hero. You are your own leader, you are your own master. And that is a big one because we idolize so many people.

• 1:07:25Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:07:26David Goggins?

  And we want to be them. We want to be someone else. And in doing that, you lose all the potential of who you are. You mimic, you be them, you are them, you become them. And you lose you. And we look up to so many people in this world who will let us down. We're humans. I'm gonna let you down. You're gonna let somebody down. If you put them on a pedestal, you then lose time when that person comes up and lets you down. You must hold yourself accountable and being your own hero, that's what that does. You make yourself so totally accountable for who you are.

• 1:08:06David Goggins?

  You focus on you and only on you to become the best person you could be for others. Because we leave a lot on the table, not searching who we are. And then therefore, you die not knowing your greatest potential.

• 1:08:22David Goggins?

  That's one. The next one I would say is, the biggest one I would say is never pick the easy road.

• 1:08:31David Goggins?

  Never. Never, and it always goes back to kind of that hero mentality. Never pick the easy road, ever in your life. That is the one road that is doom. It is doom. If you want something like six-minute abs, all these different things, people want it so fast. You may achieve what you wanted, but you want the permanent fix. The permanent fix comes from the hard road. The hard road gives you permanent results. The easy road gives you the quick fix. You will go back to where you started on the easy route.

• 1:09:13David Goggins?

  That hard route is so permanent that it ends up callousing you everywhere. Everywhere.

• 1:09:20Lewis Howes?

  You keep a six-pack forever.

• 1:09:21David Goggins?

  You keep it. Because you know the work that goes into it.

• 1:09:26David Goggins?

  And the last one is, when you get to where you want to go in life, when you finally get there, you finally reach that point, and you're there, and you're happy as hell, realize this.

• 1:09:42David Goggins?

  You're not there yet.

• 1:09:43Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:09:45David Goggins?

  When you get that feeling that you arrived,

• 1:09:49David Goggins?

  be afraid.

• 1:09:51Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:09:51David Goggins?

  Be truly afraid. Because now you start to do this.

• 1:09:56Lewis Howes?

  Slowly die.

• 1:09:56David Goggins?

  Slowly die. Either you're getting better or you're getting worse. You're not staying the same.

• 1:10:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:03David Goggins?

  So when you get to where you think the journey is ended, and you're sitting back and you're like, I arrived, I'm on Mount Everest. I climbed twenty-nine, zero, twenty-nine.

• 1:10:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:15David Goggins?

  The best thing to do is fall back down that damn mountain as fast as you can and start climbing.

• 1:10:20Lewis Howes?

  Find the next climb.

• 1:10:21David Goggins?

  Find the next climb.

• 1:10:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Oh, man, I'm gonna sign up for another event.

• 1:10:26David Goggins?

  That's it.

• 1:10:27Lewis Howes?

  Sign up for another endurance event now. Oh, just kidding. Where can we connect with you online? Where do you like to, when you spend five minutes a month, where is that space?

• 1:10:39David Goggins?

  My social media, whether it be Twitter or Instagram or Facebook, it's all, it's just David Goggins, at David Goggins.

• 1:10:45Lewis Howes?

  Cool, David Goggins. Your videos on Instagram are great. You should post more, have someone on your team post more, because they're awesome.

• 1:10:52David Goggins?

  Well, they're all me.

• 1:10:53Lewis Howes?

  They're all you, cool.

• 1:10:53David Goggins?

  Yeah, so I have no team.

• 1:10:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:56David Goggins?

  It's me, my fiance, there is no team. She'll be in the car, she'll be on a mountaintop, she'll be somewhere. It's all my material, it's all who I am. That's why I post once a week.

• 1:11:06Lewis Howes?

  Once a week right now?

• 1:11:07David Goggins?

  Once a week, every Monday, you'll get a post.

• 1:11:09Lewis Howes?

  There you go.

• 1:11:10David Goggins?

  That's it.

• 1:11:10Lewis Howes?

  It is some video that's gonna inspire you to be like, okay, I need to do at least five more minutes of working out, something at least.

• 1:11:16David Goggins?

  That's it.

• 1:11:17Lewis Howes?

  Well, I want to acknowledge you, David, for, for your intensity, your, your work ethic, your passion, and also your pure, real heart. Because just meeting you for the first time, walking in together, just like I could tell how real you are, and you're just a no BS type of guy. The adversity that you've overcome is crazy. Obviously, people have overcome more than you, me, and lots of people in the world, but what you had to overcome physically and psychologically and emotionally is unbelievable. And to see that you weren't a statistic, and instead you chose every single day to make a decision to be more than that is really inspiring.

• 1:12:00Lewis Howes?

  And I, and I know this has got an impact and inspire a lot of people, so I acknowledge you for your heart. And for inspiring me, you know, I thought I worked out hard, but this is like, I feel like I'm doing nothing with my life. So you're gonna inspire me to continue to make bigger commitments and longer commitments. Moving forward now, so I appreciate everything you do, man, and I'm excited about getting this out there. You're welcome. My final question is, what's your definition of greatness?

• 1:12:25David Goggins?

  My definition of greatness is this. It's not a definition, it's an example. This is greatness, true greatness. Let's say that's.

• 1:12:39David Goggins?

  I'm the greatest tennis player of all time. Okay, let's say that. I hate tennis. Let's say I'm the greatest tennis player of all time. And I did 22 years, I run all the grand slams, I have all the, I beat Roger Federer, I am the best ever.

• 1:12:57David Goggins?

  And we're having an interview, and you're talking about my greatness, what I achieved, and I'm retired. Don't play tennis anymore, haven't touched a racket in years. And you're making me go back through my life, you're kissing my butt about how great I am. And I'm answering your questions, every question I'm answering it, I'm with you.

• 1:13:17David Goggins?

  But in the back of my mind, all I'm thinking about is all the times I could have won those matches that I lost by not bringing my best mindset. You're haunted by all the opportunities that you missed by not bringing your best at that time, when you could have won, but you didn't win because you allowed life to interfere with that one shot. When you're sitting there getting ready to serve for the match, and your mind is not thinking about where that ball placement needs to be, but thinking about your family, this, or this at work, or that at work. That's greatness. Greatness is your recall on every single shot that you missed throughout a 20-some year career.

• 1:14:02David Goggins?

  Every shot, you can go back and say, I was here. This person was in a red shirt there. Greatness is being so aware of the time.

• 1:14:14David Goggins?

  Of life in the second that went by and you can recall like it was yesterday. Greatness is being able to go back there, not making that same mistake again and being haunted by it.

• 1:14:26Lewis Howes?

  I hope today's episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today's show with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me as well as ad free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel on Apple podcast. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend. Leave us a review over on Apple podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes. I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better. And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life,

• 1:15:07Lewis Howes?

  then make sure to sign up for the greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com/newsletter. And if no one has told you today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.