Think Like a Warrior: The Five Inner Beliefs That Make You Unstoppable (Sports for the Soul Book 1)

by Darrin Donnelly

Passion and optimism, these are things you have to give yourself. Nobody can give them to you.”

“But it all starts with loving what you do. You have to love what you do.

That’s the only way to live your life. I don’t care what your job is, whether it’s prestigious or makes you a lot of money or any of that other stuff. You’ve got to love what you do!

“Here’s another reason why doing what you love is so important: if you don’t love what you do, you’re going t...

“And if you don’t love your job or if it makes you miserable, then you need to go do something else with your life.”

You have to

love what you do!”

“What good does bitterness ever do anyone?” he asked. “Hatred does nothing but harden your heart.

It only hurts you. I’d rather live by love. Loving others and loving what you do. That’s the only way worth living.”

don’t pray when it rains if you don’t pray when the sun shines.’

It’s easy to forget what an impact our own attitude has on those around us. Attitudes are contagious. Not only do we owe it to ourselves to be positive, but we owe it to those we love.

“Do you realize how many great things have never been accomplished because somebody decided he needed to be more realistic?

Art Merrill

“Reasonable,” he interrupted. “There’s another word people love to throw around when they fear failure, when they fear taking their best shot at life. It’s just an excuse to think smaller, to avoid the challenge of thinking bigger and putting yourself on the line.

“Managing is about maintaining. The manager tries to maintain what is already there. His job is to manage what has already been created. He wants to coast. And let me tell you, when you start coasting, there’s only one direction you start heading: the wrong direction. “Leading, on the other hand, is about creating something new. A leader must lead his people to new heights. A leader moves forward, thinks bigger, and creates a new path—a path that wasn’t there before. A leader isn’t afraid to dream big even though he must face the unknown and the untried. A leader

looks at what he has and asks how he can take it to a whole new level, a level that most people think is unrealistic or unreasonable.

It’s amazing what you can achieve when you start focusing on the reasons why you can do something instead of the reasons why you can’t.”

“Let me tell you something, there’s going to be pressure with anything you do,” Bear said. “Life is full of pressure. There are going to be ups and downs with any career you choose.

And if it’s not with your career, it’s going to be health issues, trouble with your kids, trouble with your wife, trouble with your neighbor, trouble with your car, trouble with the weather. There’s always going to be something and quitting the job you love ain’t going to change that.”

“And since there’s going to be pressure and stress with anything, that’s all the more reason you should stick with something you love doing,” he said. “If it’s all going to be hard anyway, you might as well pick something you enjoy. Don’t you think?”

Most people have no idea how much pressure they can take, how many obstacles they can

withstand, how many times they can get knocked down and still get back up. They don’t realize how far they can be pushed because they place mental limits on themselves. They quit before they ever come close to reaching their true potential.

“And the sad thing is, once you start backing down, it gets easier and easier to give up. When you quit the first time, it’s hard. The second time, it gets easier. The third time, you don’t even have t...

“It all starts with the belief that you can handle whatever challenge you’re facing. You can go further. You can withstand any trouble that comes your way.

“The first thing you have to do is recognize that setbacks are only temporary.

The pain of a hard day’s practice is temporary. The disappointment of a loss is temporary. The problem that came out of nowhere is temporary. Tough times never last and champions recognize that. They know that adversity is temporary and limited in scope. They keep the big picture in mind. They remind themselves that if they can power through the temporary tough times, the ultimate reward will be worth it.

“Quitters, on the other hand, see a setback as permane...

will never end. This false belief discourages them and makes it easy to quit. They figure, ‘What’s the point of trying if it’s never going to get better?’ They also tend to blow up problems and make them much bigger than they really are. In the eyes of a quitter, every small problem suddenly becomes a catastrophe that affects every area of their life. The mentally tough don’t do that. They know the...

“Another thing the mentally tough don’t do is make excuses or blame other peo...

Instead, they accept full responsibility for where they are and where they’re going. They don’t blame...

blame God, they don’t blame their parents, or their bosses, or their cowork...

They take charge and accept full responsibility for righting ...

Even if the cause of the problem was somebody else’s fault, the mentally tough still don’t waste time making excuses about what shoulda, coulda, or woulda happened had things gone down differently. No, they don’t waste t...

“I used to tell people, ‘If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If anything goes real good, you did i...

The buck stops with you when there are problems. No excuses. ...

“The world doesn’t owe you a thing,” Bear said. “Realize this from now on and it’ll save you a lot of heartache.

“Stop trying and start doing.

“Another thing you have to do if you want to be mentally tough is expect

problems,” he said.

But a positive attitude is about knowing problems will come up and that you have what it takes to overcome them.

if you think that way, that you’re entitled to a life where nothing ever goes wrong, you’re going to be blindsided and unprepared when life throws trouble your way.

“A positive attitude won’t prevent you from facing obstacles.

What a po...

attitude will do is help you blast through t...

“Mental toughness isn’t about avoiding problems; it’s about fighting through them. You have to have a can-do, bring-it-on type of attitude. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can somehow avoid all problems. If you think li...

“Expect problems and then expect to o...

Bear told me about the time when he was 13 years old and a carnival came to town with a guy offering five bucks to anyone who would wrestle his muzzled bear. Bryant accepted the challenge. And though the guy left town without paying up, Paul Bryant earned one of football’s greatest nicknames on that day.

“What does it mean to have a warrior’s mindset? It means that we go into battles knowing that sometimes we will win and sometimes we will lose. But regardless of the outcome, a warrior never, ever, ever gives up or backs down from the next fight. A warrior never quits. A warrior must make the decision that no matter what challenge he is currently facing or what setback he went through in the past, he is going to charge ahead again and again with reckless abandon.

“It doesn’t matter how many times the warrior gets knocked down, he will

always get back up. Again and agai...

“A warrior isn’t made when everything is going his way,” I continued. “A warrior is born in the face of adversity. It’s all about attacking the next fight, the next battle, the next game, the next practice, and the next play. No matter what has happened in the past, warriors never quit. They never say die.