Excerpt: Mark Divine is a force of nature. Read these 21 powerful quotes on accomplishing goals, mindset mastery, controlling your inputs, and taking control of your destiny from The Way of the SEAL (his book) and see for yourself.
“When we create rituals around powerful tools for performance and awareness, such as the morning and evening rituals, or when we train the fundamentals common to our missions or critical nodes, then we are grooving peak performance behavior into our subconscious. These are good routines that will help unlock creativity and success.”
Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“The art of positive self-talk is simply paying attention to your inner dialogue and directing it toward positive, performance-based language. Most people don’t take the time to sit back and witness their own thoughts, which is an essential step toward realizing that our thoughts are not who we are. They don’t control us. They’re just thoughts. The only power they have is what we give them—what we feed them. Once you create that mental distance between you and your thoughts, you can start to tame and manage them.”
Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
The difference between false-positivity and performance-based positivity is in the types of actions each inspire you to take. In the first, you put a happy face on, you mask your emotions, and you distract yourself from the real problems with positive thinking—it’s a diversion and is nothing more than an avoidance strategy that leads to inaction. In the second, positivity is looked at as a strategy that can be deployed and used to best deal with tough situations or emotions that are at hand. Because if we’re going to deal with the situation(s) regardless (given that you’re not going to bury your head in the sand) we might as well do it from a place where we are mentally at our best.
Read More »Mark Divine Quote on The Art Of Positive ThinkingBook Overview: In The Way of the SEAL, ex-Navy Commander Mark Divine reveals exercises, meditations and focusing techniques to train your mind for mental toughness, emotional resilience and uncanny intuition. Along the way you’ll reaffirm your ultimate purpose, define your most important goals, and take concrete steps to make them happen. A practical guide for businesspeople or anyone who wants to be an elite operator in life.
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Great on Kindle. Great Experience. Great Value. The Kindle edition of this book comes highly recommended on Amazon.
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Excerpt: Mark Divine, author of The Way of the SEAL, shares insight as to what the mindset of a SEAL might look like when it comes to optimal living.
“Why avoid TV news? The thing is, most people are addicted to a constant flood of what is passed off as news but is mostly just superfluous nonsense about celebrities, politicians, and minor events. Additionally, because of the ‘scare factor’ necessary for keeping eyes glued to the screen (which in turn attracts advertisers and income), TV news is notoriously negative and will have a big impact on your subconscious over time—as with any high-functioning computer, the output of your mind is shaped by what you put into it.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“The morning ritual is particularly effective in its ability to set the tone for a positive, energized day during which you are more likely to use spot practices and implement your new skills to greater effect. The evening ritual provides the perfect complement, helping you lock in the achievements of your day, glean the most important lessons or insights, and go to bed with a feeling of satisfaction and confidence in what the future holds.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“I might intuit that someone feels uneasy or distrustful, and so I would focus on meeting that person’s eyes or speaking warmly and directly to them. Or my gut may feel tight, in which case I’d scan for signs that someone isn’t being fully honest and exercise greater caution in how much information I share. Often I feel someone’s negative, needy energy, and I strive like hell to avoid that person or minimize the impact. I will leave the room when I sense the negativity of a person who has me in his or her radar. If I can’t excuse myself politely for some reason, I visualize a protective shield surrounding my body that won’t allow any negative energy through. This works well to keep me balanced in meetings.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Rutted routines that develop from doing the same thing the same way every time—often unconsciously, or at best without deliberate decision-making—are those that stifle creativity. However, when we create rituals around powerful tools for performance and awareness, such as the morning and evening rituals, or when we train the fundamentals common to our missions or critical nodes, then we are grooving peak performance behavior into our subconscious. These are good routines that will help unlock creativity and success.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Any plan is better than no plan, and a good plan executed now is far better than a perfect plan executed too late.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Failure does not deserve to be addressed with recrimination or pity. Rather, failure must be honored for the insight it provides. Failure is the grist for learning; it is our teacher.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“I believe the world is chaotic and destiny favors the prepared. Unfortunately, sometimes chaos just refuses the harness, no matter how well you bulletproof your mission and how committed you are to finding a way. Moving forward despite chaotic conditions—and sometimes because of them—is inherently risky, and since we don’t shy away from risk, you will inevitably experience failure, probably more often than you succeed, actually.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“The tougher things get, the smaller your goals should become.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“An optimist is one who sees opportunity in every difficulty. A pessimist is one who sees difficulty in every opportunity.” ~ L. P. Jacks, via The Way of the Seal
“The nature of the outer, conscious mind is to receive input, process it through our story filter, and then make meaning out of it. A problem arises when too much of what flows through our minds is negative: The conscious mind dwells on negative things and obsesses about them. Sound familiar? It’s well known that whatever we focus on tends to become our reality, even if the focus is on not wanting something. Negative input can plant seeds of destruction in our subconscious mind, which then partners with our conscious mind in a conspiracy for failure.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Drive is fueled by desire, belief, and expectation that we can achieve something extraordinary through our efforts. It feeds on discipline in that it becomes stronger as we commit ourselves at deeper levels to our pursuits.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Discipline is the spark that ignites the fire of a habit. Those fires must be lit daily, and discipline provides the original source energy. The word discipline literally means to be a disciple to a higher purpose. Developing the discipline to train hard every day means you become a disciple—not to the training itself, not just to looking good or stroking your ego, but to the higher purpose of developing yourself fully as a human being and as a leader.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“When it comes to habits, the best approach isn’t to focus on eliminating unwanted behaviors but to replace them with new habits and drown the old out. This is true of replacing a nasty habit like smoking with a healthy habit like exercise, and it’s just as true with replacing a character habit like laziness with a more useful one such as embracing the suck. Our habits define us: Solid character habits define a solid character.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Whether we’re talking about mental or physical effort, the first step to embracing the suck is to step up and face your fear of suffering. We all share this fear, which stems from a deep-rooted need for certainty and security. Pain is your body’s way of telling you that security is threatened because something is out of whack. However, when you consistently experience the personal growth that accrues from deliberately putting yourself out of balance, such as with hard workouts, you begin to embrace that temporary pain for the rewards it brings. The fear recedes into oblivion as you embrace the suck.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Too many of us succumb to a weak internal story informed by flawed but popular beliefs. We are reactionary to objective events, easily buffeted by the winds of change. Pop culture, people we interact with daily, and external events shape and reinforce this subjective reality. In these instances, we end up being extras in someone else’s story, reacting our way through life, lacking integrity and out of balance.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
