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Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
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Staring Down the Wolf summary
Mark Divine
7 Leadership Commitments That Forge Elite Teams
17 mins
Brief summary
In 'Staring Down the Wolf' by Mark Divine, the retired Navy Seal offers tactical advice on how to overcome the fear and uncertainty that most leaders face. He draws on his personal experience and training as well as ancient warrior traditions to teach effective leadership strategies.
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Staring Down the Wolf
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Commit to courage, learn to embrace risk, and train hard.
The Navy SEALs have an acronym to describe the world – VUCA – “volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous.” Inside each person are two wolves that navigate this VUCA world: the fear wolf of the mind and the courage wolf of the heart.
The fear wolf encapsulates all the things that hold you back emotionally – your fears, negative biases, and destructive patterns. This fear wolf also holds you back from accomplishing your goals. If you’ve ever felt stuck, chances are you needed to confront the wolf to set yourself free.
This confrontation is called “staring down the wolf.” It’s only by boldly facing your negative patterns and behaviors that you can lessen their impact, blow past your fear, and begin to feed your positive courage wolf.
The key message here is: Commit to courage, learn to embrace risk, and train hard.
As a former Navy SEAL, Mark Divine knows what it is to be dropped into situations where courage could mean the difference between life and death. But how did he summon his courage? By training – the right way. That involved adopting a risk-tolerant mindset that made him ready for anything.
Usually, our fear kicks in during stressful situations. That fear tells us to play it safe. Sometimes, though, playing it safe is the opposite of what’s needed – as demonstrated by a UN peacekeeping force in Mogadishu, Somalia.
In October 1993, a helicopter went down, stranding two pilots amid gunfire between hundreds of Somali forces. The Pakistani peacekeeping forces decided to wait for backup before acting, but the American forces knew that time was of the essence. Instead of allowing fear of combat to hold them back, they took a calculated risk to face gunfire and rescue the pilots. Their courage motivated the Pakistani forces to join, and together they helped the pilots escape.
Now, that was a risk so spectacular that it inspired an Oscar-winning movie, Black Hawk Down. But the same lessons apply for your life. The SEALs embrace risk because of their intense training, which recreates real-life battle situations and physically and mentally prepares them for just about anything. In fact, they’re primed to stare down their fear wolves when under pressure.
With their fear wolves silenced, they can then make informed decisions. They focus on the mission and put it above everything else. In this case, the mission was to rescue the pilots. The SEAL unit’s core principle, “no man left behind,” drove them to take the risk. So, ask yourself, what risks do you need to train for – and what’s going to drive your courage when it’s needed most.
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What is Staring Down the Wolf about?
Staring Down the Wolf (2020) is a leadership guide to forging great teams in the face of adversity. Drawing upon the teachings of the Navy SEALs, one of the world’s most elite military units, it shows what it takes to command an elite team.
Who should read Staring Down the Wolf?
- Leaders seeking to align and strengthen their teams
- Military aficionados
- Anyone who needs inspiration to push past their plateau
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