Cutting Through BS Excuses!

I’m going to keep this short ..

Short, but sweet.

Recently I’ve made a significant pivot in how I’m operating my business and as such, I am conducting many more 1:1 coaching sessions.

To cut to the chase, I’ve noticed two significant reasons why people find it hard to achieve their goals.

Today I’m going to cover the first one:

  1. Procrastination.

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Rhys Dowden - 05 July, 2018.

Cellulitis, Selection & Sleep Deprivation

We jumped off the trucks, grabbed all of our equipment and walked into the transit lines. Everybody collapsed on their beds and went straight to sleep.

I, however, was off to see the medic. My elbow and most of my left arm was double its normal size. I had bursitis of the elbow and it was infected. I required IV antibiotics.

It was day 30 of the Commando Selection and Training Course or CTSC. Those of us left on the course, 30 from the original 100, estimated we had 3 or 4 days to go before Selection was over.

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Rhys Dowden - 03 April, 2018.

Accepting Your Weaknesses

I’m not a great runner, in fact, I’m not even a good runner ..

To be brutally honest.. I fucken suck at running!

And you know what? That’s just fine ..

Why?

I’ll tell you shortly, but first a bit of background info to set the scene ..

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Rhys Dowden - Mar 15, 2018.

Discipline, Decisions & Diarrhoea

I always thought I knew what self-discipline was and how to employ it. After all, the concept is quite easy, right?

You have a task to do, you really don’t want to do that task, but you make yourself do it anyway.

Or…

You’re in a particular situation where you have two choices:

  1. Do something, which you know you shouldn’t, i.e. give in or capitulate, or
  2. Don’t.

Easy.

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Rhys Dowden - Feb 04, 2018.

Monster Mountain

It was time to move. We packed up all of our equipment, attached our night vision goggles to our helmet mounts, took a last sip of water and began heading down the mountain.

We’d been high up in the Afghan mountains for a little over 18 hours. We were conducting an overwatch mission and were given a new task, which required our team to move locations approximately 3 kilometres away.

The descent was steep and treacherous, with guys in our team losing their footing on a number of occasions and sliding part way down the hill. This made the going slow.

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Rhys Dowden - Jan 05, 2018.

Surviving And Winning

I woke up coughing ..

Shit ..

Day 5 of selection.

I didn’t need this ..

I didn’t want this ..

I had this ..

A chest infection.

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Rhys Dowden - Dec 22, 2017.

Motivation.. Discipline.. Habit.. Obsession

A couple of weeks ago I received my Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) black belt from my coach Daniel Almeida.

That was cool ..

A great day.

I received my belt from my professor and also his professor who was in Australia conducting a BJJ seminar.

I was surprised ..

Really surprised.

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Rhys Dowden - Dec 7, 2017.

Winning After A Loss

A few weeks ago I won gold at a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competition in Brisbane. It was my first win as a brown belt.

A win is great, but what was special about this win was the fact that only 1 week before I was beaten in my first competition as a brown belt. Soundly beaten. I was put into a chokehold after about 10 seconds and fought for the next 2 minutes trying to get out of it. I finally had to tap (submit) or pass out.

What’s worse was that it was my home competition and everybody from my club was watching.

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Rhys Dowden - April 6, 2017.

8 Things I Learned In SF - Part 2

Continuing on from last week's blog in which I admitted how many times I've probably watched the greatest movie ever, Predator...

...here's Part 2.

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Rhys Dowden - January 20, 2017.

8 Things I Learned In SF - Part 1

Let's be honest, I've watched Predator starring Arnold Schwarzenegger at least 147 times...

... at least!

While it's a great movie, it's typical Hollywood and there's many, many things wrong with the movie in regards to how things actually are within a Special Forces unit and the missions we undertake.

Here are 10 things I learned in Special Forces...and a few myths busted!

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Rhys Dowden - January 13, 2017.

F*#k Fear

“STAND UP!” Yelled the Parachute Jump Instructor.

We all stood up. There were 30 of us trainee paratroopers in total ready to jump out of a C-130….at night.

I was on my basic parachute course during the reinforcement cycle for the 2nd Commando Regiment. This was my last night jump to qualify as a paratrooper.

“HOOK ON!”

This was the last one, I thought, trying to reassure myself.

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Rhys Dowden - 15 Feb, 2018.

Dead-Legs, Deep Breathing & Dulling The Pain

We lined up in front of the Huey helicopter that was about to insert us 60kms North into Helmand Province; the most deadly province in Afghanistan.

These Huey helicopters were beefed up versions of the ones that flew many, many missions in Vietnam back in the 60s and 70s and they were awesome machines. Twin engine, 4-blade helicopters with plenty of grunt and manoeuvrability.

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Rhys Dowden - Jan 20, 2018.

Prioritise & Execute

The lights turn on .. Time to get up .. It’s on.

The mission. 

Another one of many I’ve conducted .. At night .. In Afghanistan.

It was 2300 hrs.

My sniper team stirred.

Read more..

Rhys Dowden - 28 Dec, 2017

Bullets, Bad Guys & Breakfast

We crowded around the Special Reconnaissance Vehicle, or SRV, to chew the fat. The SRV is a cut down and improved version of the land rover vehicle the Military has had in service for many years. The roof was chopped off, bigger wheels attached, the suspension bolstered, a gun turret added and, of course, a fridge securely positioned in the back.

It was March in Afghanistan, Helmand Province. It was cold and rainy. We’d just spent the previous night recovering a number of vehicles bogged in the red clay mud that was an integral part of this beautiful countryside.

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Rhys Dowden - Dec 13, 2017.

Getting Out of Your Comfort Zone

Last year I was contacted by a good mate of mine who I’d known for many years. We’d done Army cadets together and he had also joined the Army, a few years before I did. He was now a Warrant Officer and posted to a transport unit in Townsville.

‘Bill’ decided to get in contact with me after he’d watched a couple of videos I’d released about mindset training and wondered if I’d like to fly up to Townsville and give a mindset seminar to his unit.

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Rhys Dowden - Sep 8, 2017.

Just Like Bond (except not)

“Want to go to Dubai?”

This was the question from a close mate of mine as soon as I answered the phone.

“Sure, when?” I asked.

“Plane leaves at 8.30pm” he replied.

It was just before 5pm and I was about 30mins from home. The airport was about an hour from my place. That didn’t give me much time to stuff around.

“I’ll make it,” I confirmed.

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Rhys Dowden - June 27, 2017.

First Mission Fun

My first mission within a Sniper team didn’t exactly go the way we’d planned…

We were inserted via Chinook helicopter a little after midnight on a moonless night. It was dark, really dark.

We were each carrying around 65-70 kgs of equipment. It was heavy...

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Rhys Dowden - February 23, 2017.

A Really Bad Day...Or Two!

So I was having a beer the other night, relaxing and decompressing after a long, but fulfilling week. I was going through some emails, scrolling Facebook and generally chilling out.

I was relaxed, until the point I knocked my beer and spilt it all over my laptop. I quickly grabbed a towel, mopped up the surface liquid and turned the laptop over.

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Rhys Dowden - December 29, 2016.

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