David Goggins

David Goggins (born February 17, 1975) is a retired United States Navy SEAL, American ultramarathon runner, ultra-distance cyclist, Former Guinness World Record holder, triathlete, public speaker, and author.

There are no prerequisites to becoming great. You could be raised by a pack of wolves. You could be homeless and illiterate at thirty years old and graduate from Harvard at forty. You could be one of the most accomplished motherfuckers in the country and still be hungrier and work harder than everybody else you know as you attempt to conquer a new field. And it all starts with a commitment to looking beyond your known world.

Whatever failures and accomplishments pile up in the years to come, and there will be plenty of both I'm sure, I know I'll continue to give it my all and set goals that seem impossible to most. And when those motherfuckers say so, I'll look them dead in the eye and respond with one simple question.
What if?

It's time to level-up and seek out that blue-to-black line. The line that separates good from great. It is within each of us. #GreatnessIsAttainable #NeverFinished

Quotes

2010s

Can't Hurt Me (2018)

Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds. Carson City: Lioncrest Publishing. All quotes are from the paperback edition.

• At first, when you push beyond your perceived capability your mind won't shut the fuck up about it. It wants you to stop so it sends you into a spin cycle of panic and doubt, which only amplifies your self-torture. But when you persist past that to the point that pain fully saturates the mind, you become single-pointed. The external world zeroes out. Boundaries dissolve and you feel connected to yourself, and to all things, in the depth of your soul. That's what I was after. Those moments of tiotal connection and power, which came through me again in an even deeper way as I reflected on where I'd come from and all I'd put myself through.
  • p. 344

• At forty-three, my wildland firefighting career is just getting started. I love being part of a team of hard motherfuckers like them, and my ultra career is about to be born again too. I'm just young enough to bring the hell on and still get out there and get after it. I'm running faster now than I ever have, and I don't need any tape or props for my feet. When I was thirty-three I ran at an 8:35 per mile pace. Now I'm running 7:15 per mile very comfortably. I'm still getting used to this new, flexible, fully functioning body, and getting accustomed to my new self.
  • p. 356

• My passion still burns, but to be honest, it takes a bit longer to channel my rage. It's not camped out on my home screen anymore, a single unconscious twitch from overwhelming my heart and head. Now I have to access it consciously. But when I do, I can still feel all the challenges and obstacles, the heartbreak and hard work, like it happened yesterday. That's why you can feel my passion on podcasts and videos. That shit is still there, seared into my brain like scar tissue. Tailing me like a shadow that's trying to chase me down and swallow me whle, but always drives me forward.
  Whatever failures and accomplishments pile up in the years to come, and there will be plenty of both I'm sure, I know I'll continue to give it my all and set goals that seem impossible to most. And when those motherfuckers say so, I'll look them dead in the eye and respond with one simple question.
  What if?
  • p. 356

2020s

Never Finished (2022)

Never Finished: Unshackle Your Mind and Win the War Within. Carson City: Lioncrest Publishing. All quotes are from the 2022 paperback first edition.

• Most people live their whole lives without ever contemplating what it means to be great. To them, greatness looks like Steph Curry, Rafael Nadal, Toni Morrison, Georgia O'Keeffe, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, or Amelia Earhart. They put all the greats on a pedestal but think of themselves as mere mortals. And that's exactly why greatness eludes them. They turn it into some untouchable plane, impossible for almost anybody to reach, and it never even crosses their mind to aim for it.
  No matter what I'm doing or which arena I'm engaging in, I will always aim for greatness because I know that we are all mere mortals and greatness is possible for anyone and everyone if they are willing to seek it out in their own soul. In Gogglish terms, greatness is a state of letting go of all your faults and imperfections, scavenging every last bit of strength and energy, and putting it the fuck to use to excel at whatever you set your mind to. Even if some motherfucker out there told you it was impossible. It is a feeling pursued by those rare souls willing to extend themselves beyond reason and pay the cost.
  • p. 275-276

• I don't jump to earth from outer space, but I know that atmospheric line between blue and black. It is the glimmer of greatness that runs right through the human soul. We all have it. Most of us will never see it because to get there requires a willingness to extend yourself to the limit without any guarantee of success.
  • p. 276

• Just as words can be redefined, never doubt that we can redefine ourselves. It can feel impossible at times because we live in a world filled with arbitrary boundaries and fixed social lines that are as thick as the walls around a fortress. Worse, we allow those walls to limit us in too many ways. The brainwashing starts early, and it starts at home. The people we grow up with and the environments we grow up in define who we think we are and what we think life is all about. When you're young, you can only know what you see, and if all you are ever exposed to are lazy people, content with mediocrity or who convince you of your own worthlessness, greatness will remain a fantasy.
  If you live in the ghetto or in a dying industrial or farming town, where buildings are boarded up, addiction runs rampant, and the schools are a mess, that will factor into the possibilities others envision for you and you envision for yourself. But even privileged people can feel shackled by their circumstances. The vast majority of parents don't know what greatness looks like, so they are ill-equipped and afraid to encourage big dreams. They want their children to have security and don'r want them to experience failure. That's how limited horizons get passed down from generation to generation.
  • p. 277

• There are no prerequisites to becoming great. You could be raised by a pack of wolves. You could be homeless and illiterate at thirty years old and graduate from Harvard at forty. You could be one of the most accomplished motherfuckers in the country and still be hungrier and work harder than everybody else you know as you attempt to conquer a new field. And it all starts with a commitment to looking beyond your known world. Beyond your street, town, state, or nationality. Only then can true self-exploration begin.
  After that comes the real work. Fighting those demons every morning and all day long is maddening. Because they only ever want to break you down. They don't encourage you or make you feel good about yourself or your long odds as you fight through all the toxic mold and curst that is self-hate, doubt, and loneliness. They want to limit you. They want you to quit before you get to pliability, where the sacrifice, hard work, and isolation that felt so heavy for so long become your haven. Where after struggling to visualize greatness for years, it is effortless. That's when momentum will gather like an updraft and send you airborne and spiraling toward the outer limits of your known world. It's time to level-up and seek out that blue-to-black line. The line that separates good from great. It is within each of us. #GreatnessIsAttainable #NeverFinished
  • p. 279-280

• I wish I could more fully express what it's like to defy the medical mind to parachute into wildfires at forty-seven years old. I find the sensation almost impossible to describe. All I can say is that I hope you and everyone else get to feel this one day because to overcome all obstacles and bump up against the outer reaches of your capabilities is the pinnacle. In those rare, fleeting moments when you are washed in the sense of infinite possibility and overwhelmed with glory, everything they ever did to you or put in front of you- all the knockdowns, breakdowns, and fuck-yous and every bit of the pain, doubt, and humiliation- is fucking worth it. But the only way to get there is to continually seek greatness and always be willing to try one more time.
  I never needed to be the hardest motherfucker in the world. That became a goal because I knew it would bring out my best self. Which is what this fucked-up world needs from all of us: to evolve into the very best version of ourselves. That's a moving target, and it isn't a one-time task. It is a lifelong quest for more knowledge, more courage, more humility, and more belief. Because when you summon the strength and discipline to live like that, the only thing limiting your horizons is you.
  • p. 304-305

Quotes about Goggins

• David Goggins is a Retired Navy SEAL and the only member of the U.S. Armed Forces to complete SEAL training, Army Ranger School, and Air Force Tactical Air Controller training. Goggins has completed more than seventy ultra-distance races, often placing in the top five, and is a former Guiness World Record holder for completing 4,030 pull-ups in seventeen hours. A sought-after public speaker, he's traveled the world sharing his philosophy on how to master the mind. When he's not speaking, he works as an Advanced Emergency Technician in a big city Emergency Room and, during the summer, as a wildland firefighter in British Columbia.
  • Description of Goggins on the back of the paperback first edition of Never Finished: Unshackle Your Mind and Win the War Within (2022) by David Goggins