Uncommon
Simple Principles for an Extraordinary Life
This is our fourth Note on one of Mark Divine’s books. Mark is a retired Navy SEAL Commander. He also has twenty-five years of experience as an entrepreneur. In this book, he teaches us how to be Uncommon. Over the last decade, Mark has become a dear friend, soul brother, and big investor in and supporter of Heroic. So... When he told me he had this book coming out, I was fired up to receive an advance copy. I read it in basically a single sitting. It’s fantastic. It’s packed with Big Ideas. I’m fired up to share some of my favorites so let’s jump straight in!
Big Ideas
- The Uncommon ContractTo be Uncommon.
- Momentum SuperpowerSpaceX launch and you.
- Master Your Mind20X your potential.
- The Two VoicesChoose wisely.
- Live with VirtueHit the ultimate target.
“In the navy, common was what we called SOP: Standard Operating Procedure. Common is a trait shared by two or more individuals, a behavior that appears frequently, or a truth that is well known by a community. We are groomed to be common by family, trained to toe the line in school, and cajoled to conform by peers and social media.
Let’s face it, common is, well, the norm. It’s perfectly acceptable to be common. But trust me on this: it is worth it to be uncommon. There is joy and freedom like you cannot imagine once you align your thoughts with your actions to live your unique and purpose-fueled life. To be uncommon, it is critical to rewire the fragmented and limited mindset you have been trained with. An uncommon mindset is integrated and exponential in capacity. Mastering innate physical, mental, emotional, intuitional, and spiritual intelligence, or what I call the five mountains, is the key to unlock this mindset. I’ve spent over three decades mastering my five mountains, allowing me to break free from the prison of a common, predictable life. Freedom isn’t free and it takes work, but it is seriously worth it. I wrote this book to teach you how to master your five mountains so you can live an Uncommon life too.”
~ Mark Divine from Uncommon
Welcome to the fourth Note on one of Mark Divine’s great books.
We started with his classic book on mental toughness called Unbeatable Mind.
I can still vividly remember reading that book a decade ago when I was going through a particularly challenging time. During that time, I read basically every book on mental toughness I could find and absolutely loved his book. It changed my life and remains one of my all-time favorite books on the subject.
From there we covered a couple other great books by the former Navy SEAL commander: The Way of the SEAL and Staring Down the Wolf.
And... Over the last decade, Mark has become a dear friend, soul brother, and big investor in and supporter of Heroic. So... When he told me he had this book coming out, I was fired up to receive an advance copy. I read it in basically a single sitting. It’s fantastic. Get a copy here.
It’s packed with Big Ideas. I’m fired up to share some of my favorites so let’s jump straight in!
Download MP3
Download PDFWe can’t do life alone, not to the level of greatness and self-mastery that our true self knows is possible.
Get the BookThe Uncommon Contract
“Are you ready for this? Ready to tap your maximum potential, performance, and purpose, to live free from fear and regret? Are you ready to take responsibility each day to evolve into the best version of yourself? …
The quality of your life is not about the size of your bank account, the length of your résumé, or the power you wield over others. It is a measure of your wholeness as a human and how you show up in service to others. It is expressed through the strength and balance of your physical, mental, emotional, intuitional, and spiritual domains.
Ask yourself if you are really ready now to commit to this work. It would be a fail to get temporarily inspired and then go back to being common. So, decide now that being common is a thing of the past.”
That’s from the Introduction in which Mark challenges us to sign a contract with ourselves in which we make the ALL IN commitment to showing up as our best selves.
Fun fact: I read this book on Mark’s birthday. I sent him my signed version of his contract with a Happy Birthday text.
Here’s the contract: “I, __________________, commit to becoming uncommon. I will work the practices and exercises offered in this book until I have them mastered. If I waver, I will get back on track. If I take a break, I will recommit. I will not quit. This is worth it. Period.”
A few things come to mind as I read that passage.
First, I thought of W.H. Murray’s brilliant wisdom on the power of commitment. And, I thought of the etymology of the word mediocrity along with the ancient Sanskrit word for being a hero in the beginning. We’ll chat about each of those in a moment.
First, let’s chat about the “five mountains” of Mark’s philosophy.
The book is organized around optimizing and integrating FIVE domains of our lives. Each of these domains has its own section:
The Physical
:
Dominating the fundamentals to get in the best energetic shape of your life
The Mental
:
Training your mind so you can tap into your 20X potential
The Emotional
:
Integrating your life’s experiences that might still be dis-integrated
The Intuitional
:
Tapping into the infinite wisdom of what we would call your daimon
The Spiritual
:
Connecting to your purpose while dedicating your life to service
Now... Let’s chat about what happens when we START a Heroic quest with all kinds of enthusiasm then give up the moment it gets hard.
As we’ve discussed MANY times, this has been such a powerful tendency for so long that, over 2,000 (!) years ago, the ancient wise men and women of India gave it a NAME. They called it arambhashura—which means “to be a hero in the beginning.”
To state the obvious—we don’t want to be heroes in the BEGINNING. We want to maintain our commitment all the way through the INEVITABLE challenges to the successful completion of our Heroic quests.
The wise men and women of ancient Greece had a lot of experience with this tendency as well. Did you know that the word mediocrity LITERALLY means “to be stuck in the middle of a rugged mountain”?
Yep. When we’re heroes in the beginning, we start strong then we give up right about in the middle of our Heroic quest. Oops. That’s a GREAT way to get mired in mediocrity. To be, as Mark would put it: “common.”
Know this: There’s only ONE antonym to the word mediocrity. That word? Excellence. The ancient Greeks had a word for THAT as well.
It’s the one-word summation of all of our work together... ARETÉ.
Finally, there’s the W.H. Murray quote that I’ve memorized and silently said to myself thousands (!) of times... “Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness concerning all acts of initiative and creation. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans; that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen events, meetings and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would have come their way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets: ‘Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!’”
Microsoft’s co-founder Paul Allen once said: ‘Everyone needs a coach. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a basketball player, a tennis player, a gymnast, or a bridge player.’
The human brain is roughly 2 percent of total body mass but uses 20 percent of the body’s available energy to operate. Think about that. Twenty percent of your nutritional intake is used to fuel 2 percent of your body! And the quality of that nutrition has a huge impact on the functioning of the brain. This should be motivation enough to think carefully about what fuel to put into the body’s fuel tank.
Leadership capacity is directly proportional to your authenticity and ability to respond to unpredictable events.
Momentum Superpower
“SpaceX rockets require gargantuan effort and massive amounts of energy to launch—37 million horsepower to be precise. But once that rocket is in flight, it requires a fraction of that energy to keep moving. Recall that the average locomotive takes 5,000 horsepower to start from a dead stop to overcome the inertia that is the starting resistance. That’s because what is called the rolling resistance is tiny compared to the starting resistance. They are pretty darn hard to slow down, too, once cruising along on autopilot. A panic stop for one of GE’s 200-plus-ton locomotives is a half mile because, as you know, objects resist change to their state of motion.
This power of momentum can be put to beneficial use by you, too, when you adopt and sharpen new habits and patterns. The changes required to develop momentum toward your new goals require an outsized effort in the beginning… especially if you are starting from a dead stop. Yanking on your workout clothes three to five days a week, committing to journaling nightly—these things require you to overcome that gargantuan “starting resistance.” But once you’ve habituated the changes in routine and made them an indispensable part of your everyday rituals, you’ll be cruising along with little effort. You’ll feel the momentum and appreciate the progress as you become stronger and more energized. And you’ll be able to look back, thanks to your journaling practice, to see the progress and adjust course when necessary. At this point, you’ll have developed what I call momentum superpower. That comes when all the hard work and effort of starting and sticking to the early stages of the work is behind you. At that point you will find it untenable, almost impossible to stop. This momentum will carry you effortlessly and relentlessly from that first worthy target to even loftier goals that become accessible to you because of your progress and new skills.”
Imagine that SpaceX rocket taking off.
The launch requires a staggering 37 MILLION horsepower to get that rocket off the ground headed toward its destination. But... Once the rocket has taken off, it only requires a FRACTION of that energy to stay on course.
The same basic idea holds true in our lives. The hard part is breaking the inertia of our existing behaviors. That requires a LOT more energy than most of us are willing to invest. Of course, the good news is that when we have the WISDOM to know how the process works and the DISCIPLINE to do what needs to be done whether we feel like it or not, things get a LOT easier.
Speaking of inertia... Mark tells us: “Inertia, from the Latin iners, meaning lazy, is the name for the tendency of an object in motion to remain in motion, or an object at rest to remain at rest, unless acted upon by a force.”
Ultimately, we want to invest that energy in the “launch” of our new behaviors and then RELENTLESSLY execute our protocol for a long enough period of time such that it becomes harder to NOT do the thing we know is best for us than to do it.
Good news and bad news here.
Bad news: It’s going to take your equivalent of 37 MILLION horsepower to launch and break through the “starting resistance” of your current behaviors. Good news: It gets a LOT easier.
Final thoughts before we move on.
Mark was a Navy SEAL. All Navy SEALs (and all 70,000 special forces operators and their command support personnel) report to a four-star Admiral or General. The current four-star General who runs the United States Special Operations Command is a guy named General Bryan P. Fenton. I have his Heroic portrait hanging on my wall intensely staring at me as I type this.
No joke. He’s on my wall—right above my Yoda Phil Stutz and right next to Marcus Aurelius. And, General Fenton’s Heroic portrait is, BY FAR, the most intense of all of them on my wall.
When I go to him for wisdom during my meditation/during the day, he often tells me what he told the commanding officers I was blessed to serve last year. He tells me: “We relentlessly train. Over and over and over again until we never get it wrong.”
I repeat: Here’s to turning up the heat and doing the HARD WORK to forge the behaviors that will help us fulfill our destiny. Let’s do it so relentlessly that it becomes harder for us to NOT do the things that are best for us than to do them.
P.S. Check out Habits 101 and Willpower 101 for more on the art and science of installing and deleting habits. And, of course, check out Basic Training and our Heroic Coach program as well.
Bottom line: If you want to be uncommon and serve in a unique way, you must see what you desire, and then practice in your mind. Your desired future depends on this.
But please also be playful, avoid expectation hangovers, and don’t be so serious that you compromise your health or become a drag to others. Don’t try to be Mr. or Mrs. Perfect. A perfect human and perfect results don’t exist. There is only perfect intention with imperfect effort built upon the desire to get better and be more whole. And the road to getting both of those is a wild one!
Master Your Mind
“To manifest your purpose-fueled destiny, any and all disempowering stories holding you back need to be eradicated and replaced by new empowering stories. To do this, we will start developing a new internal dialogue, accompanied with imagery and emotions that support your emergent dreams. If you want to influence a billion people and become a billionaire, then you need to think and be someone worthy of that level of leadership and service. It is completely doable because you get to decide how to construct ‘your’ world. And your world is the only world there really is for you. So, you need to begin to see, feel, and embody this new figure, experience the emotions of being a world-renowned leader or a billionaire. When your future memories (recall I stated that an imagined future is a memory of a future yet to happen) and emotions line up with your current thoughts, words, and emotions, then stunning results will follow.”
That’s from a chapter on “Mastering Your Mental Mountain.”
Why do we need to master our minds? So we can tap into what Mark calls our 20X potential. How do we go about doing that? With relentless training.
One of my new all-time favorite books is called The Confident Mind. The book is written by a guy named Dr. Nate Zinsser who trained THREE generations of soldiers at the United States Military Academy at West Point and has worked with a range of elite athletes as well.
Dr. Z tells us we need to (RELENTLESSLY!) make positive deposits into what he calls our “psychological bank accounts.” He encourages us to do that on three time horizons: the past, the present, and the future.
We start by creating a collection of TEN of the moments in our lives that we are most proud of. FEAST ON THOSE HERO BARS. That’s like you to crush it. Then we need to see a future in which we achieve our next set of ambitious goals—creating what Mark calls “future memories.” Then we need to create a series of affirmations that we repeat to ourselves—affirming we ARE that version of ourselves we aspire to be.
Then... MOST IMPORTANTLY, we need to EMBODY the qualities that best, most Heroic version of you embodies. When? Yep. As always... All day. Every day. ESPECIALLY... Today.
P.S. Dr. Zinsser got his PhD from the University of Virginia. His mentor was a guy named Dr. Bob Rotella who is another one of THE most respected guys in the field of peak performance.
Whenever I give a keynote or connect 1-on-1 with an ELITE athlete or coach these days, I ALWAYS recommend they check out Rotella’s GREAT book How Champions Think. I’ve personally reread my own Notes on that book dozens of times. This passage in particular came to mind when I read the passage above: “Jack [Nicklaus] told the golf team... ‘You have to be a legend in your own mind before you can be a legend in your own time.’”
Mastering your mental mountain is achieved through disciplined practice. Period.
I believe it is utterly imperative to find your calling... and take a stand to fulfill it or suffer life with that faint ache in your heart and that nagging feeling in your guts. Henry David Thoreau said that most people live lives of quiet desperation. That is common...but that is not you.
The Two Voices
“The Cherokee culture believes that two wolves reside in us all. For those of you who have read my other books or gone through my programs, yes, I’m retelling this resonant Native American parable. It’s the best darn metaphor out there for our purposes and lays the foundation for all our work.
The fear wolf lives in our mind. It’s nasty, dark, gloomy, cynical, envious, and in constant need of attention and feedback. It’s responsible for all our jealous, judging, angry, doubting thoughts. It’s always finding fault with self and others and thrives on false beliefs that lead to self-limiting concepts. The fear wolf eats I’m not enoughfor breakfast.
The courage wolf resides in our heart. It’s associated with feelings of goodness, abundance, optimism, compassion, gratitude, and high self-esteem. It feeds on positive imagery and kind words of forgiveness and encouragement. When fed over time, courage wolf transforms into unconditional love of self and others, and a limitless self-concept.
The parable goes that a grandfather tells his grandson about the two wolves that live inside us, and he explains how they’re at war. The boy then asks, ‘Grandfather, which wolf wins?’
‘The one you feed the most,’the grandfather replies.”
That’s from the section on “Mastering Your Emotional Mountain.”
Mark wrote a whole book inspired by that metaphor. It’s called Staring Down the Wolf.
As I typed that passage out, I thought of another slide from my standard keynote on how to forge antifragile confidence/activate our Heroic potential. Quick context...
I always walk people through the seven objectives of our Heroic framework that form the backbone for Basic Training in the app, our book, and our Heroic Coach certification program.
As you know if you’ve been following along, we need to Know the Ultimate Game, Forge Antifragile Confidence, Optimize Our Big 3, Make TODAY a Masterpiece, Master Ourselves, and Dominate our Fundamentals so that we can Activate Your Superpower.
One of the simple slides I have at the end of the section on how to win the ultimate game says:
REMEMBER THE TWO VOICES…DAIMON VS. DEMONCHOOSE WISELY
The ancient Greek philosophers echoed the Cherokee wisdom. They called that wise, disciplined, loving, and courageous voice in our heads our “daimon.” You know what they called the OPPOSITE of that voice? They called it your “demon.”
I get goosebumps typing that out and I get goosebumps EVERY time I share the fact that, etymologically, the word demon is simply the diminutive of daimon.
With that in mind, I repeat... If you want to win the ultimate game by closing the gap between who you’re capable of being and who you’re actually being so you can forge excellence, activate your Heroic potential and fulfill your destiny, remember the two voices in your head.
And wisely choose which one you listen to. All day. Every day. ESPECIALLY... Today.
The courage loop creates a self-reinforcing spiral of success where you experience the reality of your 20X potential, setting the stage for daily emotional resilience that will last a lifetime.
Nelson Mandela was seventy-two when he was released from prison and seventy-six when he became president. Colonel Sanders first started franchising Kentucky Fried Chicken when he was sixty-five. If you’re not dead, doing something new is not impossible. And if you’re not near-dead, what are you waiting for?
Live with Virtue
“Staying on target with your unique calling means mastering the following virtues. I’ve coupled them into soft and hard virtues, kind of like yin and yang, where yin is inner: reflection, potential, feminine, flowing; and yang is outer: action, performance, masculine, rigid. When you find balance, each of these couplets becomes an infinity loop, flowing back and forth unrestricted. Part of the kokoro mindset is to appreciate the flow instead of struggling between being one way or the other on one end of the polarity spectrum.”
That’s from a chapter in the final section of the book on “Mastering Your Spiritual Mountain.”
Want to stay on target with your unique calling? Echoing what we say all the time, Mark says: Live with virtue. More specifically, he encourages us to integrate THESE virtues:
Simplicity and Boldness
Excellence and Non-Attachment
Drive and Contentment
Trust and Respect
Justice and Peace
Courage and Commitment
Honor and Truth
Discipline and Joy
Of course, we can’t hit a target we haven’t set which is why Mark helps us get clarity on what we’re here to do. He has an “ikigai” chart that integrates what you love (your passion) with what the world needs (mission) with what you can get paid for (vocation) with what you’re good at (your job). Check out Purpose 101 (Parts I and II!) for more on our take on that.
For now... What do YOU plan on doing with this one, precious life of yours? Here’s to taking clear aim, closing the gap, and giving us all you’ve got, Hero! It’s time to be Heroically UNCOMMON.
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