High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 65: Think Like a Seal with Tom Dillard, Retired Navy Seal

Episode Date: August 23, 2016

In this interview, Tom Dillard, a retired Navy Seal shares with us the Seal mindset and how we can apply it to our lives. Tom spent 20 years in the Navy and the last 15 years as a Seal. He shares with us how Seals “earn their trident everyday” while maintaining a sense of brotherhood knowing it is a privilege and honor to represent the Seals. Tom describes the importance of controlling your emotions and how a Seal does that. In times of adversity, Seals find the opportunity to grow from it because “resilience gets you through.” He shares with us how goal setting, mental rehearsal, and present moment focus helped him as a Seal and how we can use them too. You can reach Tom at [e-mail].            

Welcome to High Performance Mindset with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Do you want to reach your full potential, live a life of passion, go after your dreams? Each week we bring you strategies and interviews to help you ignite your mindset. Let's bring on Sindra. Welcome to the High Performance Mindset Podcast. This is your host, Sindra Kampoff. And today, I am very grateful that you're here, ready to listen to an interview with Tom Dillard. Before I introduce Tom, I just want to thank you so much for those people who have recently gone over to iTunes to rate the podcast and make a comment. I really appreciate it, what that does. It allows us to reach more and more people each week with mindset

strategies. So I'm going to read one that came in a few days ago from Sumitra. Sumitra says, I've learned so much from this podcast. Thank you so much, Dr. Sindhra. And I applied it to my sales process. So Sumitra, thank you so much for tuning in andra. And I applied it to my sales process. So, Sumitra, thank you so much for tuning in and for making that comment. And if you regularly listen to the podcast, or let's just even say that you've listened to one and you know one's been helpful, we would so much appreciate a comment and a rating over on iTunes. It just helps us reach more and more people each week. So thanks so much for doing that for us. All right, so we are going to turn to an interview with Tom Dillard.

I had an amazing privilege of listening to Tom Dillard provide a presentation to the Minnesota Vikings rookies. And so I was able to listen in on that presentation, given my involvement with the team. And I wanted to ask Tom to come on the podcast because I thought his message would be really, really helpful and just inspire all of you who are listening out there. And so what Tom has done in this interview is really describe to us what it means to think and act like a SEAL.

So Tom is a retired Navy SEAL. He was just retired maybe three or four days before I interviewed him. So it's a very recent retirement. And he spent 20 years in the Navy. The last 15 years as a SEAL. And so what he describes to us in this interview is really how to think like a SEAL, how SEALs earn their trident every day. And he describes what that means and just the privilege and honor that they have in respecting the SEALs day and he describes what that means and just the privilege that an honor that they have in respecting the seals so he describes a lot of things related to mindset in this interview he talks about the importance of controlling your emotions and actually how to do

that and one of the things i really like um towards the end of our discussion is he was describing the difference that the seals use in describing the difference between arrogance and confidence. And he says, you know, arrogance and confidence are different. Confidence is leading by example and knowing it's not about you. But he describes how arrogance can really turn into cancer. And there's no arrogance for what we do. So I really love this conversation. Um, it was really eyeopening for me and I learned quite a bit about the seal mindset,

um, and how I could even apply it in my life and in my work with athletes and leaders and entrepreneurs. So I'm hopeful that you will find it helpful as well. Um, and if you liked Tom's interview, um, again,

head over to on to Twitter or Instagram or Facebook, wherever you go. We'd love to hear from you and just tell us what stood out to you about the interview. What's one thing that was helpful? All right. So without further ado, let's bring on Tom Dillard. Welcome to the High Performance Mindset Podcast. This is your host, Cindra Campoff.

And today I'm excited to provide you an interview with Tom Dillard. Tom is a just-retired Navy SEAL. So, Tom, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, Sindra. So, Tom, tell us a little bit about what you do now and just your passion in general. Well, so in general, I just retired less than two weeks ago, and I am looking to continue my passion, which has always been helping others and serving others. And I feel that I could fulfill this passion through strength conditioning or human performance coach, which is mental performance. And I just believe that most athletes train really, really hard in the physical aspect,

and I'm not sure how much of the mental aspect they train in, and it's all about mental. You know, when I was a SEAL instructor, we tell our students it's 10% physical, 90% mental. Yeah, and why do you see, you know, it's such a large component? I mean, 90% is a lot, Tom. So what would your rationale be for why it's 90%? Because, you know, regardless of how good of a shape you are, you know, we get you out of your comfort zone and you think you're good at something the next day, you're exhausted, you're broke, you're tired, you're mentally, physically beat down. It's not how fast you're going to run, how fast you're going to swim that's going to get you through the day.

It's all in your head. Your mind is usually what holds the most common men back from achieving their goals. It's all in your head. It's like I can do this regardless of the circumstance. And you push yourself, and you have to thrive on the challenges. Nice. I can't wait to talk to you more, Tom, about your philosophy and how you became to understand that your mind is 90% of what you do as a SEAL. So let's just get started with a little bit about your background.

So, Tom, can you tell us just briefly how you became a SEAL? Yeah. So I graduated high school in 90 um was pursuing firefighting and you know the first Gulf War was going on I tried I actually tried joining the Navy three different times and um you know they found out I had asthma in high school so then I waited a couple years and then I went back and they were actually fully manned the Navy they weren't accepting anybody which is pretty incredible so then I went back and they were actually fully manned, the Navy. They weren't accepting anybody, which is pretty incredible. So then I went back another year and a half and I was able to get in.

Went to boot camp. Went to school. Actually went to a ship for two and a half years and then my first trip to Bud's and I went three times, three separate trips. I finally made it due to injuries each trip. And overall, it's taken me almost 10 years to become a SEAL. Once I decided a year after high school, this is what I wanted to do. So it took you 10 years.

Well, 10 years. I never gave up on it. You know, in time, I think I just needed that big enough why, and that was September 11th. Yeah. Why September 11th? Why was that your why, and how did that become your why? I was back in Orange County going to another fire academy, and came home one morning from surfing and turned the news on and just saw what happened, and it just really fired me up. And I just wanted to do something about it.

I wanted to be a part of, you know, something. I went down to the Reserve Center that next morning and said, hey, I want to go back, and I had orders a week later. And that why carried me through. That why is me through. That why is what got me back into training. Once I got in, it's easy. It's a no-brainer.

It's all about the boys around you, the brotherhood, the challenges in and out daily. Just having your passion of helping others and being able to be part of something bigger than yourself was, you know, the amazing part. So brotherhood, a passion for something bigger than yourself, and serving the world and serving others. You know, tell us a little bit about, Tom, like the Navy SEAL philosophy. How would you describe that? So, you know, I mean, you know, the philosophy, I mean, I guess, you know, trying to break it down, I mean, with us it's just loyalty, you know, the philosophy, I mean, I guess, you know, try to break it down. I mean, with us, it's just loyalty, you know, to country and to each other,

to the team and to our teammates. You know, you're at the bottom of this upside-down pyramid. Everything's before you. You're the last one. You know, just taking responsibility for your actions, the actions of your teammates. And the biggest one I like is you earn your try-to every day. When I talk to sports teams, I'm like, you earn your jersey every day, either on or off the game field or the practice field or the weight room or whatnot.

It's a privilege and it's an honor, and it's something that you have to earn every day. It's one of our biggest philosophies. It's not given to you and you're not entitled to anything. And it's a volunteer program. Right. The SEALS is a volunteer program. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And what does it really take to become a SEAL? I know you've been in the Navy for 20 years. So what's the actual process? Can you outline that for us? It's changing time. When I went in, I think the average age was 25 to 27. In the last five, seven years, the Navy's kind of changed that due to funding and whatnot and recruited more kids out of high school and college.

So the average age dropped down to 20, 21 initially. And it's affected our community a little bit you know a little junior or whatnot but um it's a long process you know you go to boot camp then you go to prep school it's all in chicago area then you um report for seal training that's buds and that is over six months long and once you're done with that you go through another seven month pipeline of training then you get assigned to your team yeah and tell us what bud's training is like i mean my guess is it's intense and when you're describing like earn your trident every day my sense is you really have to earn it every day there yeah so in training um you actually get your trident at the end of the total of 13 months of training.

And in order to get it, you know, the buzz is broken down in three phases. One's, you know, the physical, mental aspect. They break you down and see if you really want to be there. Second phase is all about diving. It's not your fun recreational diving. The third phase, you know, you learn how to shoot and blow stuff up and i you know you and i um i have been connected because of our work with the minnesota vikings and i heard you speak to the rookies and i saw some images and pictures of bud's training so can you just give us a few stories or examples of you know what they really put you through and how that

makes you both mentally and physically stronger? You know, they love, I'm sure everyone's seen on the Discovery Channel, you know, little workouts with the logs or the boats. Right there, I mean, those workouts are phenomenal for, you know, holding each other accountable. No one can slack on those workouts. It builds teamwork. You hold yourself and you hold each other accountable. And those are the one, I believe, one of the hardest workouts is the log PTs. It doesn't matter how strong you are or how little you are.

They're tough, and it will make or break most trainees yeah and what do you actually do in that exercise can you give us a description in case people haven't seen it on discovery channel or yeah it's just um you know part of a telephone pole yeah anywhere between five and seven guys on it and you're just running up down the beach with it, carrying your shoulders, extend arm, overhead press, carrying, carrying it in front of you, taking it out to the ocean and back up, running up down burns. It's all about, you know, racing, being competitive and pays to be a winner and not the losers. Otherwise you start over and you continue doing it. Yeah.

And it's you're, you're exhausted within 10 minutes of doing it, but it could go up to three hours and it's all in your head again. You know, how bad do you want it? Do you want to be that guy that fails your, you know, your team there and quits and walks away? Or you will be that guy to help the guys around you motivate each other.

Yeah. And Tom, give us some strategies on like how you kept on going through those types of exercises, but just, you know, your general everyday experiences as a SEAL. You've got to have fun with it. You can't, you know, you can't be the guy in the locker room, we call it, you know, the cancer, complaining about everything. You've got to enjoy it and you've got to embrace it.

You've got to enjoy being uncomfortable and being challenged and just getting fired up. I mean, you know, being around each other and the class as a whole, or even in training. I mean, everybody's such high performers at that point that you're just excited to be there. You realize that there's a small percentage of you, you know, in the world that has the opportunity to do this. And at that time you're getting paid to do it. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, when you were saying your Trident, tell us what the Trident is and what that actually means to a SEAL. Because I love your analogy of, like, earn your trident every day, earn your jersey every day, you know, earn the privilege to do this, not just take it for granted. Yeah, trident is a symbol, you know, heroes have gone before us you know sworn protected and then you know

died you know protecting it um you know we wear it you know we're accepting the responsibility of our profession and our way of life um like i said it's a privilege so it means a lot to us um you know you you earn it through training and like i tell guys when i was an, it's a privilege. So it means a lot to us. You know, you earn it through training. Like I tell guys when I was an instructor, it's like when you're done with all this SEAL training, you go to your platoon, you still have to earn this thing, and it gets harder. It never gets easier in this community. It gets harder, you know, workups, deployments,

and you have to continue earning your trident. Even if you decide to retire at 30 years, you're still earning that trident up to your last day in your 30-year career. It's never given to you or you're never entitled to it. It can always be taken away. Yeah, absolutely. Just like a starting spot on a sports team or, you know, a job that you might have. So, Tom, tell us about one or two principles that have been really important to you in terms of mindset or psychology that you've learned going through the BUDS training and then just becoming a SEAL and being so long in the SEAL training and how many years you were a SEAL.

Going through training, initially it's just goal setting. You can't concentrate or think the end state like, am I going to graduate? It's many months away. You have to set short and long-term goals. And you can set weekly goals, daily. In BUDS, it's more like hourly goals. Make it through each hour. And sometimes it's each evolution.

And during those evolutions, you even break it down. For instance, when you're working out the logs and you're having to run over the berm, well, your short-term goal is to get over the berm, not when is this thing going to end or three hours from now. It's just get over the berm with your teammates, and what's the next challenge? You've got to break it down.

And then if you have the opportunity mentally mentally rehearse things the night before, if you have the opportunity to know what you're doing the next day, a time evolution or whatnot, just mentally rehearse it the night before. You know, just like studying for an exam in college. You just think about it and you go to sleep and you wake up and it's go time yeah and you know tom what i hear about like the importance of taking the short-term goals is really having a present moment focus not getting too so far in the future that you forget what you're doing right now and and having some short-term goals just to keep going and just

to make it through the next 30 minutes absolutely yeah. Yeah, I was telling the rookies, you know, you've got training camps, OTAs and whatnot. You know, don't think about tomorrow. You know, don't think about this afternoon or workout number two. Just think about what you're doing right now. You know, what's important right now, you know, is, you know, my philosophy, like what's the task at hand, you know? Yeah, there was a few things that I heard you say when I sat into your presentation. One of those was the importance of just like controlling your emotions and staying, you know, in control of yourself.

Tell us why that's so important as a SEAL. And how did you learn to do that? Because I know there are times that you were uncomfortable and you had to just push through the discomfort of training, but also, you know, just the discomfort and perhaps the fear of what kind of situations you're in. So how did you control your body and how did you learn to do that? You know, through arousal control, we tell each other there's a time to turn the switch on and off. And when it is on, you don't dial it up 100 percent um you know because if someone's anxious or nervous or whatnot it feeds but if someone's confident in what they're doing and they're leading by example that speaks volumes so it's all about controlling your emotions you know there's

a time and place for it and you know i told, I told the students, you know, the time is, you know, you control the way you think, what you're saying, and your actions. No one else is making you flip out. No one's making you, you know, lose your mind. You can control that. And you control that by being tested. I mean, obviously, you're tested a lot through BUDS. And you're being evaluated a lot by not just instructors but your peers as well. Like, hey, do I want to be with this guy?

Do I want to deploy this guy if we do make it through? But you're always being evaluated, and we're self-evaluators ourselves. You know, we pick skin. We critique each other, and that's how we get better. And plus, you don't want to be that guy losing it. You want to be the positive guy, not the negative guy. There's no room for negative, you know. Yes. that guy losing it you want you want you want to be the positive guy not the negative guy there's no room for negative you know yes yeah so I hear just the importance of like um being intentional

being the guy that you want to be around like showing up as the person that you want to show up like what did you do when you um were very anxious you know and maybe you could even just generally tell us about a situation that a SEAL could be put in where they might feel really anxious. And then, you know, what would you tell them to do to calm their body and calm their mind? Well, you know, you always tell guys, you know, rely back on your training. But if you're really anxious or if it's negative, you know, you turn a positive, you turn to motivation, you turn into a challenge. Like this is a challenge right negative, you know, you turn it into a positive. You turn it into motivation. You turn it into a challenge.

Like, this is a challenge right now. You know, nothing's given. And I thrive on adversity and challenges. You know, so, you know, if a guy's losing his cool, like, hey, hold. Take a pause. Take a breath. Think about what's going on here. And rely back on your training.

You know, all the SEALs have gone through the same training, buzz, the same pipeline. And think about how many other times was worse than this. And there's plenty, I'm sure, just where, you know, you can see it is not so difficult. You've already gotten through more difficult situations. And so, Tom, what I hear you describing is just like changing your lens, changing, you know, reframing and changing how you're seeing the adversity.

Yeah, absolutely, you know. Change the lens and stop focusing on whatever's bothering you or the negative aspect, you know. Focus on the positive things, like move forward, be on it. There's a time and place for it. We'll take care of that later. Let's move forward. Mission,

task at hand, you know, it's what it's about. You know, one of the things that I heard you talk about was the importance of, um, like no arrogance, you know,

and just, uh, making sure that, um, you know, I remember you saying there's no room for arrogance. So, uh, you know, tell us a saying there's no room for arrogance. So, you know, tell us a little bit about that, what that means and how we can apply that in our lives.

So, you know, we talk about arrogance versus confidence. We like confident guys, you know, guys that are quiet, humbled, lead by example. It's not about themselves. Arrogance, you know, we see it as it's about them. It's like, look what I did. Look what I'm doing. I was awesome. And boasting about it, you know. And the arrogance can turn negative and it can turn into cancer in the locker room or in the platoon or whatnot. So we like confident trainees, confident operators.

Not so much arrogance. And are they out there? Sure, they're out there everywhere. Everyone's got them. Yeah, for sure. So what do you think, Tom, in terms of how, what did you learn as a SEAL that could be applied to, I mean, you've already given some sport references,

but what about business or life? How would you apply what you've learned to us in our day-to-day lives? You know, I think it's the whole middle of toughness, accountability, and prioritizing things in your life and having goals. You know, this could apply to everyone's lives, especially to a business. And, you know, businesses, you know, there's still a place for teamwork and definite leadership. I mean, you know, on the sports team, you learn

some of the same character traits I learned on the teams. Physical, moral, courage, resiliency and loyalty to team and teammates. I think all this would apply. Yeah, absolutely. And just even being loyal to people that you work with,

loyal to your family. I can see a lot of applications. You've got to earn that trust and respect. You don't just walk in and, you know, expect respect from everybody. You have to earn it. And that's the big thing with our community. Everybody earns their respect. And what do you think separates SEALs from others? You know, we've come to understand that they are mentally tough. They can get through anything. They can push through discomfort. They can be comfortable being uncomfortable. What do you think separates them just from people in everyday lives? Just tell us what you think about that. I think one of the biggest things that separates us from everyone else is

our achievements of human performance and succeeding at all costs. You know, we are common men with uncommon desire to succeed. And, you know, we know what everybody expects us, especially our nation, to be physically and mentally harder than, you know, our enemies overseas. And we're willing to accomplish those goals at all costs. The ability to control our emotions and actions that we talked about, regardless of the circumstance, that sets us apart from other men as well.

Love it. Love it. Can you give us some examples, Tom, of times where you really have to work on succeeding at all costs? So, you know, Buds, I don't know too many guys that would say, well, it was a piece of cake, because they would be lying. If it seemed easy, the instructors would make it hard on them somehow, you know, to test them,

because everyone's got to be tested, but Buds was definitely, you know, in a couple of deployments, but, you know, I relied back on Buds. You know, as I was going through, this was my third and final time. I'm getting older. I've got to start moving forward. I was the one that succeeded at all costs.

I was broken, and I just kept going. I knew this was my last straw, and I wasn't willing to leave until I graduated. And I think I got that mindset. That helped get me through. I made that decision, and I had a big enough why, as we talked about, and I trained to that truth and got through. So would you encourage people to consider what their why is? And what I hear is that it really got you through that last time of BUDS. It allowed you to be successful, to become a SEAL.

You know, that would you recommend for people who really want to just keep on pushing through? Yeah. Regardless of what you do, you've got to figure out what's your purpose? You know, why are you doing it? And is it your passion? That's what's going to get you through, you know, um,

some people may see money is, you know, is there drives them, but it's gotta be more than that. Otherwise you're never going to give it a hundred percent. It's going to be the bare minimum, collect your paycheck and move on, you know,

and you know, with athletes, I truly believe that if they had that, why is either the love of the game, the love of being around other athletes, their peers, whatever that purpose is, being part of something bigger than themselves, helping others win, it would make them an elite performer. I mean, they'll be unstoppable because they have a reason, more than a selfish reason know, reason like, hey, I'm just collecting these paycheck moving on. And our community, you know, we don't see that. If we did, we would weed those guys out. You know, either you're, you know, walk around as a Navy SEAL or you're a team guy. Team guy, you know, we nickname each other. We're there for each other. So many applications to life.

I think just as I hear you talking about just the philosophy and what it takes and how you keep on going. So, Tom, tell us about a time that you've had to sacrifice. You know, I just know what you've went through in terms of your training and your dedication to our country. So tell us about that. You know, it's pretty straightforward. The biggest sacrifice I've had in teams was just leaving my family, you know, for training trips and deployments. That was the hardest sacrifice was leaving them.

Otherwise, you know, it was an honor and privilege to serve. Yeah, how did you get through that? How did you keep on, you know, leaving them every time? Like, what was a strategy you used to, you know, move on and, you know, still thrive as a SEAL? You know, it's a personal choice. It's, you know, just knowing that you're going with the boys. I mean, you're going out to get challenged. You're going out to train.

And you're going out to hang out. You know, it's being part of that brotherhood and knowing that you're going to eventually deploy together. And it's not, you know, I never thought negative, like, oh, I don't want to go or whatnot. That's what we do. And it was necessary, and we looked forward to it. Not all trips were fun, but you've got to have some of those non-fun trips that challenge you. Yeah.

Yeah, and, you know, what I hear is just this philosophy of, like, seeing difficulties as opportunities and, you know, being excited for challenges instead of getting small or thinking small, but really, you know, embracing them and seeing challenges as positive. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So, Tom, tell us a little bit about, you've already kind of've already kind of said why you think understanding your why is really important. And what I heard you say is just the importance of having a deep why, not just a superficial why. So you've told us a little bit about why you got into the SEALs because of September 11th. But what is your why? How would you describe that?

My why is just some of the values I got from my dad was just service to others and just never quit attitude. And, you know, with me, it's helping others, helping them to succeed in life, be better people. You know, I work on it with my kids every day. And, you know, I coach a high school football team for a couple years, and it's very fulfilling, impacting those young men's lives. But at this point, it's the same in the military. It was always about service to others.

I just want to continue that in the civilian world. And, I mean, well, honor and privilege, it was to serve such a great country, the American people, and my family and friends. I mean, not everybody might agree with us or the government or politics, but that's to the side. You know, it was for the people that cared. Mm-hmm. I like the service mindset.

You know, you're doing it just not for yourself but for a bigger reason. Absolutely. So, Tom, tell us about a time that you failed. And I ask you that question because just with the emphasis that nobody's perfect. Oh, yeah. We all fail. You know, and there's a lot that we can learn from times that we make a mistake or fail. So tell us about a time that you learned or you failed and then what we can learn from it.

You know, back in Bud, I did feel a, it was a four mile beach time run. I had an injury at the time and in regards to the injury or whatnot, I did not pass the run. So you get an opportunity, you know, and then there's potential to get dropped. So, you know, you, you have, you know, either you feel sorry for yourself, most people feel, you know, and you let it distract you, or you grow from it. You look at it as another opportunity, and, you know, opportunity perservere regardless of the circumstances. The way I look at it is it's a challenge.

Like, okay, well, I failed. All right, next time I do this, I have no choice but to pass, and you move on, and when that time comes, you just go out and you do it. You know, failing, you know, I mean, most people, they face a difficult challenge or a hardship or obstacle, they just want to give up, you know, but if you work through it, it builds resiliency, and that's what gets you through tough times in life. And once you learn how to fail, I mean, you're unstoppable. You can't be afraid to fail.

No one wants to fail. No one likes failing. But I do believe you've got to fail once in a while. It makes you stronger. Mentally makes you stronger. I think you can learn a lot from times that don't go so great. Oh, yeah. Helps you just become better. It does. One thing I wrote down that you said that I thought was really just powerful right there is, you know, you can either feel sorry for yourself after you

make a mistake or you fail, or you can go for it and see it as an opportunity to persevere despite the circumstances, to stay resilient and to stay focused on what you want. Absolutely. I mean, if you truly have that goal or passion, that big enough why, you're not going to let one failure stop you from it. One drop past or one, you know, strikeout or whatever it is, you know, in sports, you just move on. You're like, okay, you learn from it. Maybe ask others, hey, have you ever felt like this before? What'd you do, you know, in your locker room or, you know, in your routine or whatnot? And you move forward. It's over with.

There's nothing you can do. It just builds you stronger. So, Tom, take us to like an aha moment that you've had in your life, you know, something that you really learned about yourself. And what can we learn from your situation? Well, just pretty quick one. I would just say when I finally graduated Buzz after a few trips and a long haul, I graduated. I was standing around my brothers. It was just like, like wow this is it and you know the takeaway is you'll never give up pursue that that goal and um understand your why

if you truly want something you're able to accomplish it and you just don't give up that's the thing that moment there was you know within a week was almost like you missed it. Like it was just such an impactful event in your life. It was fun. I mean, it was hard, like alive. But it was hard in a fun way. Yeah, tell us about that. How was it hard in a fun way?

Because people might be listening and be like, what do you mean? How is hard fun? You know, if it's log PT, instructors yelling at you and making you do all these exercises, you're just thinking like, all they're really trying to do is think of hard stuff for us to do with these logs. I mean, you know, it's not like, okay, it's not us versus them or anything. It's just, they just want to see how tough we are and you just want to impress them. I mean, they're your role models, you know,

and I was in the other end as well as a role model. And it's just suffering and going through pain, you know, with your boys. It's fun. You know, you motivate each other and you just laugh about it. At the end of the day, like, wow, we just did this or, you know, we got this tomorrow and you look forward to it because you're doing it together as a team. You're doing it as a team. But perspective is so important

there. You know, you could see the difficulty as, you know, not exciting and something you can't get through, or what you're saying is have fun with it, see it as positive, see it as something that you can thrive through and that you can be resilient through. Yeah, absolutely. So, Tom, let's go to the top 10 traits of high performers. I know you have that in front of you there.

Yeah. If anybody wants to check this out, you can find the PDF on my website at drcindra.com. So, Tom, which one of these, as a SEAL, would you say that you exhibit the most? I would just say, number one, they are gritty. Yeah. And tell us why you're gritty, Tom. You know, just as you got broken down, I mean, that whole adversary, you know, setbacks, challenges, obstacles, building resiliency, the whole mill of toughness.

And, you know, you have on there passion, you know, towards long-term goals. I mean, you never quit on it. Well, I like how it's broken down, you know, gritty. Yeah. I heard you say, I mean, this is really what you've been talking about through all this interview is to keep going. And you, you know, despite that you didn't make the seals and you didn't get through Dubs training the first time,

you kept on going and you kept on staying passionate about what you wanted and your goals. So which one of those would you say you're still working on? And I ask you that question just because we're all a work in progress. And, you know, it's really we're all a work in progress. And, you know, it's really difficult to be a 10 out of 10, maybe even impossible on all these traits. Right. Well, currently, you know, I'm in a situation where I would say it's number two.

I do have a purpose, but, you know, it says have a clear purpose to your work. Well, I don't have that work yet, so that's definitely what I'm working on is to find my purpose outside of the military now. Yeah. The biggest challenge for me right now is, you know, I know my passion and my why, but finding that purpose in the civilian world, that belonging, that's my biggest one that I need to work, that I am working on.

I'm sure you're like many SEALs. I mean, I don't think we said this at the beginning of the interview, but you've only been retired for 12 days. Yes. So very newly retired. And, you know, I'm just thinking about the research that I read about transition. It makes sense right now that you're looking for that why and connecting it back to the civilian world. So let's go to the speed round, Tom. And what I want you to do is just think of, like, the first thing that comes to your mind.

Can you think of a resource or a book or anything like that that you'd recommend to the audience? Yeah, you know, a couple of X-Team guys wrote Extreme Ownership. I think it's a great leadership tool for business, sports teams alike. And a buddy of mine named Joe Sweeney wrote Moving the Needle. I think it's a good book

on transitioning, networking, and it'll help any athlete, military, business to get a clear mind and pursue their goals. So extreme ownership and moving the needle. Tom, what's the best advice you've ever received? Best advice I received? A friend of mine, actually, as I was transitioning um i was doing a lot of volunteering you know with an nfl team the high school team a couple train facilities before i got out um during

my transition time and you know it's hard to buy my i said you know i'm saying yes to everybody he's like well think about this if you don't learn how to say no you won't be able to say yes to something that really matters in your life and that was impactful for me um because i do have five little ones and um it's taken a lot of time away from them but you know i just thought it was necessary for this transition yeah so you had to say no to being a seal so you could spend more time with your family and your five little ones who are i believe are napping right now as we're talking, right? Well, unfortunately, I had to say no to, you know, volunteering outside my job. Okay. I was, you know, helping people outside my job, helping, you know, some personnel in

my job with strength and conditioning, and I was busy, you know, on top of my job as well. So, yeah. That was the best advice. I really took that in. I was like, oh, I never even thought about that. Yeah, so good, so good. What's the success quote that you live by, and how would it apply to us, Tom?

You know, it's the only easy yourself to excel through all challenges every day. And I think as an athlete, this concept can keep you motivated because it puts things in perspective. You know, when you wake up knowing that every day pulls new challenges, you're ready to face them head on, and you'll be well-equipped to achieve any goal you set. So the only easy day was yesterday. Tomorrow's going to be harder. Every day gets harder. You know, that mindset, you'll be fine. Awesome.

Only easy day was yesterday. Love it, Tom. So let's wrap up the interview today. What advice would you have to those high performers who are listening and what I really mean by high performance is just you know you're working to reach your greater potential your standard of excellence

what advice would you have to us I'd say you know I think I talked about it earlier most athletes work on the physical performance very hard but why not work on the mental performance? And I think it's more important, like I talked about, than physical performance. And that will separate you from the ordinary men and help you to be a lead performer by working on those mental traits. And you have 10 of them.

We have several traits. Those are our own, but a lot of them are resonates with each other and um you know again at the end of the day the best way i ask is just remember your why embrace it and train to the truth tom you have given us so many things to think about today um so many golden nuggets i want to just repeat a few of those back to you to summarize because this is what stood out to me. We talked a lot about your why, understanding your why and coming from a deep sense of purpose. It's not just superficial and really kind of owning that why every day. I loved that you talked about earning your trident every day, earning your jersey every day,

and seeing what you do as a privilege and earning that you can keep that privilege every day, earning your jersey every day, and seeing what you do as a privilege and earning that you can keep that privilege every day. And I thought it was really beneficial, just in general, how you talked about seeing adversity as challenging and not something to become small or allow you to become small, but something you can rise to and you can thrive through just by your perspective and seeing it as an opportunity instead of a difficulty. And I love the SEAL philosophy. I think there's so many applications we can make in life and sport and business.

So I just want to thank you so much for spending some time with us and, and sharing about the Navy SEAL philosophy so we can incorporate into our lives a little bit more. Absolutely. You know, I appreciate it and I'm looking forward to talking more. Awesome time. So if we wanted to connect with you, how would you suggest that we do that?

Uh, you know, I've talked in a couple of teams and, um, high school, college, and NFL. And either you're looking for physical or mental training, I get help with my experience. And you can reach me on my email. Right now it's dillard, D-I-L-L-A-R-D, I-V at Gmail.

And I am in the Minnesota area, and, you know, I like to work within the community here. Excellent, excellent. Well, Tom, I just want to thank you so much for your time and your energy. Again, if you'd like to reach out to Tom, you can do that at tdillardiv, that's the fourth, at gmail.com. So again, thank you so much for being here today, Tom. I appreciate your time and your energy and your insights. Thank you for listening to High Performance Mindset. If you liked today's podcast, make a comment, share it with a friend,

and join the conversation on Twitter at Mentally Underscore Strong. For more inspiration and to receive Sindra's free weekly videos, check out DrSindra.com.