HOW TO CHANGE THE WORLD.
The ninth week of SEAL training is referred to as Hell Week. It is six days of no sleep, constant physical and mental harassment and one special day at the Mud Flats. The Mud Flats are an area between San Diego and Tijuana where the water runs off and creates the Tijuana slues—a swampy patch of terrain where the mud will engulf you.
It is on Wednesday of Hell Week that you paddle down to the mud flats and spend the next 15 hours trying to survive the freezing-cold mud, the howling wind and the incessant pressure from the instructors to quit. As the sun began to set that Wednesday evening, my training class, having committed some “egregious infraction of the rules” was ordered into the mud. The mud consumed each man till there was nothing visible but our heads. The instructors told us we could leave the mud if only five men would quit—just five men and we could get out of the oppressive cold.
Looking around the mud flat, it was apparent that some students were about to give up. It was still over eight hours till the sun came up—eight more hours of bone-chilling cold. The chattering teeth and shivering moans of the trainees were so loud it was hard to hear anything. And then, one voice began to echo through the night—one voice raised in song. The song was terribly out of tune, but sung with great enthusiasm. One voice became two, and two became three, and before long everyone in the class was singing. We knew that if one man could rise above the misery then others could as well. The instructors threatened us with more time in the mud if we kept up the singing—but the singing persisted. And somehow, the mud seemed a little warmer, the wind a little tamer and the dawn not so far away.
If I have learned anything in my time traveling the world, it is the power of hope. The power of one person—Washington, Lincoln, King, Mandela and even a young girl from Pakistan named Malala—can change the world by giving people hope.
So, if you want to change the world, start singing when you’re up to your neck in mud.
Source: The commencement address by Admiral William H. McRaven, ninth commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, at the University of Texas at Austin on 17 May 2014
This is a re-post
Tania
Recommend0 recommendationsPublished in Senior Chatters
The power of positive thinking…….only needs one to take the lead with enthusiasm and many others will follow……..also the opposite…….one negative person can bring the rest down…….
Good post. Very true.
Thank you dj
Hi Star…Very true…Thank you…
I have never personally met this man. I was 3 years before him. Since I did not attend UT, I was not present to hear his address. But I do know of him, like a brother would know his own.
Star you write: The power of positive thinking…….only needs one to take the lead with enthusiasm and many others will follow……..also the opposite…….one negative person can bring the rest down…….
This is correct, but only a part of the thought.
Single strenght, focused determination, loyality from each member of your team working and striving towards a goal or mission, against all possible odds. Never giving up, never leaving one of your own behind even if this meant the end of your own life is a start towards understanding the creed of the Trident.
As well this training also reinforces the premise that if one fails to reach the goal or can not reach the gaol the next in the time takes the lead.
To explain Hell Week. suffice it to say that it is not 6 days but 7 days long. And the main goal of this hellish period is to weed out those that are not able to deal with harshness, pain, cold, sleep deprivation hunger, phycial trials that exist under combat conditions. The is the time that each must face himself and answer the question do I go on? or do I quit? While under combat conditions, the wrong choice could cost you, your buddy and possibly the team a dire price.
this idology is the reason why am able to be here and write these words
It sounds like the six weeks of training that the army do here, sailor, my son did this in his six weeks of training , obviously on a different plain to you, but then they decide whether to go on or not.I was so proud to attend the Passing out Parade, as was his father.I am only thinking it sounds pretty much the same…Thank you
What a coincidence Sailor……..I was privy to a vey similar conversation yesterday in a cafĂ©……..my fella who was in the SAS and a stranger who had been a marine, he was 88 and looked 10 years younger, anyway they got chatting and were echoing your words………you had to totally trust each other, you only had each other to rely on…..an unspoken bond that couldn’t be broken….
my Trident tho a bit tarnished still sits on my uniform, that lay stored in a cedar chest along with my wife’s wedding gown. Like you, my Mom stood in the small crowd and clapped the loudest, to my ears.
Thank you for the C and P and honor to your own….
Yes I choose to be positive, very good once again Tania thanks
Thank you, glad that you like them