Tom Rancich on Female Fitness

Teammates, have you seen the November 2009 SHAPE magazine cover? The cover girl is The Office's Jenna Fischer, wearing a bikini and a big confident smile! According to Ms. Fischer, "I ditched the trainer and got THIS body on my own." Here at Perfect Fitness we're fired up that the Perfect Pushup is part of her workout. Every two or three days, Jenna does Macho Jacks, Pendulum Rows and finishes off with Triceps Pushups, from the knees, using Perfect Pushup handles. The November SHAPE magazine is on newstands now.

Now according to Tom Rancich, my SEAL Team swim buddy, all it takes is six weeks to get into bikini shape. Yeah sure you're thinking, but Tom knows why it takes the average 35 year-old woman so long to put on that bikini. Keep in mind that Tom Rancich has spent the last six months at the beach, leading a group of Navy veterans who were tasked to remove potentially lethal practice munitions dropped decades ago at former target ranges along South Beach in Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts.

The secret: confidence. Says Tom, "I have spent the entire summer at the beach and you have no idea how many 30-somethings I talked to who were wearing ass blankets or frumpy one pieces with skirts no less! They would have been fine in bikinis...except they lost their confidence." You all know the famous SEAL motto, "the body obeys the brain." It's not enough to work the body -- you have to unlock your body's potential so that you can get more out of life -- and that starts inside your head. Check out my Right to Bare Arms workout and start making changes from the inside out.

CHARLIE MIKE -- ALDEN

Defining Your Mission Part 2

Teammates, it’s easy for me to say: “follow your heart” – or “go after your dreams”, but it’s a totally different ballgame when you try to apply it to YOUR reality. However, you CAN do it – it’s a matter of how badly you want to make the change and understanding WHY you want to make the change in your life. This principle goes for anything in life you’re after – a new body or a new life. Understanding the “WHY?” will become the definition of your mission – this understanding will lead to your purpose, and consequently to your passion.

Like a fire triangle: heat + fuel + oxygen = fire;
The success triangle is: passion + purpose + persistent action = success.

Define your passions, identify a purpose that truly Fires You Up, and I promise you (along with staying fit!), you’ll have the power to perform persistent action. After all, you are defined in life by your actions – whatever they are – your actions DEFINE YOU. And that’s why I’m so motivated about helping folks get fit – because your level of health directly correlates to your ability to TAKE ACTION AGAIN AND AGAIN – i.e. PERSISTENT ACTION…and persistence is the NAME OF GAME!!

Get your game on and CHARLIE MIKE!!

ALDEN

Picture of Buzz Aldrin's footprint on the Moon courtesy of wikipedia

Defining Your Mission Part 1

Teammates, on the last blog I defined what a mission is, on this blog I want to define YOUR mission. Let me be clear – I have no intention of defining your specific mission because I can’t – only you can. My hope is to challenge you with some questions – and your ability to honestly seek the answers will directly help you define YOUR mission.

First, a quick recap on the definition of mission:
• a mission is a purpose-driven goal
• a goal is a dream with a deadline

So how do you sort through the goals that are worth “dying-for” and the goals that are “nice to have”? There’s no right answer here, but I can tell you from experience that there are two kinds of goals out there – there are the nice-to-have superficial ones and then there are the ones that will define you and your character – they’re big, scary and hairy and will leave you doubting yourself until you start to try. My question to you is:

What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?

Answer this one slowly – take some serious time to dream – look inside yourself and ask honestly, what would I do if I knew I wouldn’t fail at whatever I tried…then ask yourself that again…and then again and again. The true answer won’t come immediately – you’ll have to sort through the superficial ones first – like having a billion dollar bank account or a private jet, but the ones that will start to percolate to the surface are ones that have a deeper meaning to you – they’re the ones that have a purpose. Sometimes, actually most times, that purpose doesn’t immediately connect with you.

You’ll have to journey a bit down the planning path of a couple of your dreams, but the sooner you learn to connect a purpose to your goal, the sooner you’ll stop viewing work as a “9 to 5” job and start seeing work as an opportunity to excel beyond what is currently possible or even what some may consider acceptable.

Huh?

Stay with me here – you see most folks get caught up very early in life in the game of earning money as the ultimate reward. No doubt, having money opens doors to new possibilities, but for most, we end up chasing a never ending rainbow of superficial stuff – cars, boats, houses, jewelry, etcetera and get stuck in a vicious cycle of: “I work because I owe, and owe because I work” (and btw I’m as guilty as the next guy for coveting different “superficial things”), but the trick is to earn these things doing what you love, not doing what you “have” to do to continue make payments on the things you’ve wanted. Once you get ‘stuck’ on the car, house, credit card payment treadmill it becomes increasingly more difficult over time to get off the vicious cycle.

Part 2: how to follow YOUR dream

CHARLIE MIKE -- ALDEN

Picture of Buzz Aldrin's footprint on the Moon courtesy of wikipedia

Fire in the Gut: Tim Grizzell Update

CHARLIE MIKE Teammates - I just wanted to provide all of you with an October update on the status of Fire in the Gut – Innovative Performance Shirts for Athletes with a Warrior Attitude (www.fireinthegut.com). We were supposed to go live last month in September. As I mentioned previously, not everything always executes as planned. We have had some unforeseen productions issues that caused a slight delay.

The formal launch of the company will be in the next few weeks. A newsletter for all of you is forthcoming – you can sign up at my website. I recently activated a Twitter Account (www.twitter.com/timgrizzell) where you can track live updates on the launch.

Also, here is a sneak peek of the men’s crew neck short sleeve shirt. I am fired up and I look forward to sharing the new products with you soon.

Tim Grizzell

P.S. Alden--Congratulations on CHARLIE MIKE reaching the 2-year mark--you are truly helping others unlock their potential! Fired up for you brother! Tim

Definition of a Mission

It's CHARLIE MIKE's Two Year Anniversary! Get ready for a week of Defining a Mission, updates from the CM SEAL Team bloggers and a few surprises!

Teammates – probably one of the more over-used terms today is “on a mission” but what does it really mean? Does it stand for getting a couple of cold beers at an over-crowded bar or perhaps finding a coveted toy before it disappears off the shelves mid-December? I want to define the true term, because once you appreciate it, you’ll think about it in a whole new light.

In the military, On a Mission literally means in harm’s way, and in SEAL Team on a mission meant doing whatever it takes to get it done – including if absolutely unavoidable, the ultimate sacrifice … so why are there men and women out there willing to die to complete a mission? Because they have linked to a purpose so strong – so powerful – so much bigger than themselves, that they are willing to do whatever it takes to succeed.

Now imagine if you pursued your goals with similar purpose – imagine if you linked a purpose so powerful to your goal that you’d take on overwhelming odds to accomplish it – what would you accomplish?

It’s been often said that a goal is a dream with a deadline attached to it – but a mission – well that’s a goal with a purpose welded to it!

As you decide your next goals in life – first start by deciding their purpose – when you recognize a purpose worth giving it everything you got, then you’ve found your mission.

Go after it and never quit!

CHARLIE MIKE – ALDEN

Potential Entrepreneurs Pt 2

How will you grow, fight off imitators and keep your competitive edge? In a phrase: Passion Driven Purpose. Huh? It’s about linking your company – your values – your mission statement – to a purpose. If the sole focus of your company is to profiteer, then your goals will be aligned for the short-term “get-rich” schemes and it won’t deliver long-term value.

If your company’s goals are directly aligned with a higher purpose – in our case, helping people unlock their body’s potential (and our number one core value is WE CARE about the health of our customers), then some powerful forces with start to align with you.

* First, you’ll take a long-term and creative approach to bringing true value and success to your customers. The more you help your customers succeed, the more they will help you succeed. If it’s all about “taking” from your customers, then they have no incentive to “give” to you.

* Secondly, the true super-stars of talent out there work for much more than a paycheck – money itself isn’t enough. There’s a much more important value element that a profiteer company can’t deliver, that’s providing people with the value of delivering on a higher purpose – of giving back to society, to communities around us, and the environment.

When you start with goals that have a purpose, and build a team of like-minded teammates, then no competitor becomes a long term threat. And if a competitor chooses to truly bring purpose into their mission – then it raises the bar on all of us. And one final note – when a company knows its purpose, it Fires UP the passion in all the people it attracts, and when this occurs, work is no longer work and creates an unstoppable work ethic and crucible for creativity!

If you’re thinking of taking the leap to chart your own entrepreneurial path whether inside an existing company or out on your own, trust me when I tell you, you’ll never regret the journey – it won’t be easy, but in the words of a military recruiter: “It’ll be the hardest thing you’ll ever love.”

CHARLIE MIKE - ALDEN

Rancich on Rugby in Olympics

Yes...unfortunately sevens is not rugby...it is a game invented by backs (backs get all the glory, the pack gets all the blame) so they can prance around and not have to worry about being spanked by a 220+ ogre who is both fleet of feet and powerful and irritable by nature (not to mention suave and debonair). I mean if the pack invented its own game we would have shortened the field and added people so there was more opportunity to kick ass not run free.

But other than that I think it is great that rugby ...sorta … is in the Olympics but I am thankful of one thing and hopeful of another...I am hopeful that this leads to 15s in the Olympics and I am thankful that it isn't that league rule crap. Oh and if you noticed I said both but named three things...you are such a back :)

Tom Rancich, CM SEAL Team blogger

Scrum picture courtesy of wikipedia. Here's a link to a wikipedia article about the Rugby Unionand the picture of the black eye above is courtesy of Guam Motleys vs Australian SAS---Guam Motleys 6, Australian SAS 0.
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Lt. Commander Thomas Rancich, US Navy SEAL (Ret.) is the co-founder of VRHabilis, a disabled veteran-owned small business that seeks to employ the highly trained and motivated veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars for work in construction and related fields. Rancich and co-founder Elliott Adler are pioneering the concept of using adaptive technology to bridge the gap between industrial and medical technology. Their company contributes proceeds to two worthy causes: a fund for the development of adaptive technology that will allow disabled veterans to pursue their desired career path and the EOD Wounded Warrior Fund.