Cultivating the warrior mind

Talking of warriors and heroism brings to mind stirring images of brave men and women who have gone far beyond themselves for great causes. It speaks to the very best in us, but it’s a rare human being that acts with such bravery without concern for their own welfare.

Some people may be destined for the warrior path, they may have been born with that x factor that sets them apart from others in terms of their indomitable will and bravado. Others have made it a conscious decision in their every day life, by choosing the courageous path or action, however small.

In this way, the warrior mind is something that can be trained and cultivated. It’s an attitudinal shift within ourselves, one that reorients our whole being towards a more confident, empowered and directed mentality. Like all change, this takes determination and commitment.

At the centre of this resolve is the conviction that with consistent effort, we can transform ourselves, we just need to understand the process and be inspired and motivated enough to make it happen. So, let’s investigate what it means to train our warrior mind, to call on our inner strength when we need it to live a life of conviction and unobstructed success.

What is the essence of a warrior?

Something that fascinated me as a teenager were the masters of martial arts disciplines and samurai warriors of the highest order. Watching movie heroes like Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Jean Claude Van Damme only stoked this interest. I was always amazed by the formidable physical prowess and exquisite technical skill involved in this sort of discipline, but it was the mental and spiritual aspect of training at this level that truly intrigued and inspired me.

Archetypally, warriors are usually depicted as being physically powerful and imposing figures, but over and above everything else, it’s their demeanour and presence that makes an unmistakable impression. They are formidable, confident and unshakeably clear about their mission in life. It’s a steadfastness and surety of self that is inspiring and leaves no doubt about their indomitable nature, someone who commands respect from friends and enemies alike.

But most warriors are not born, they are made through the fires of experience and trials of a heroic nature. The only difference between you or I and the warrior is that they constantly back themselves to face every challenge that crosses their path. If they fail, they don’t just roll over and give up, they get up and try again and again. It’s this ever present unremitting self belief and willingness to engage, moment upon moment, day after day that breeds the warrior true, and it’s something that anyone can do. It’s simply a matter of dedication and training.

The warrior code

The path of change is not just about us, it’s not just a self-serving exercise of procuring the life we want, it’s about everybody. Training the warrior mindset enables us to gain control over our lives in a way that most people never do. We wake up to life and the power within us to change our own destiny, not god’s so-called plan for us. In that, we should make our best efforts to direct it as positively as possible.

A defining aspect of the warrior is that their life is usually defined by some sort of code. This can include positive and inspiring values that they subscribe to in the pursuit of their mission. The warrior is not a mercenary, a hired gun serving their own interests without a care for the world. They serve a greater purpose and realise they their code guides their actions so they do their best to follow that code and not lose focus.

Following a code of values or ethical principles is training in self-mastery, an ongoing process, not a destination. This is another trait of the warrior. When we commit ourselves in this way, we wrestle with the very core of our being, our uncontrolled desires, fears, emotions and mixed up beliefs.

In this training, we will surely fail to meet our ideals at times. But through that process, we come into understanding and alignment with who we are and where we are, mentally and emotionally. We just keep up our efforts, that’s why they are called ‘training’ principles. Let’s investigate further what hindrances there are to developing the warrior mindset.

Obstacles to the warrior life

Like anything in life, there are two core obstructions that get in the way of what we want to achieve. Firstly, we lose contact with our inspiration and motivation to make the changes that we want to see. Secondly, life with all its complications and demands means that we’re almost constantly distracted from what truly matters, either by necessity or by the need for relief and escape, if only momentarily.

The overriding aspect of the warrior is clarity of purpose and dedication to the task at hand. Why? Because they truly understand what is most important in life and are totally committed to its expression. To become dedicated in this way requires self belief and confidence in our path and true purpose, along with an awareness of what can derail us. Let’s look at some of the hindrances that can weaken our focus.

Clarifying our purpose

This topic is the starting point of the whole inspiration focus element and is introduced in my Inspiration to change article. To embrace our true path with a warrior mindset, nothing is more important than clarifying the reasons why it should be the centrepoint of our lives, and keeping that certainty and confidence as conscious as possible. This is a fundamental trait of the warrior. They never forget who they are and what their purpose is.

Inspiration and motivation are like a plant, you have to put effort in to keep it alive, but that effort is rewarded a thousand times over. If we accept the basic premise that everything we do is simply an expression of our priorities, we can pare back our life, deconstruct it with rigorous honesty and as much clarity as possible to define what is truly most important.

Ask yourself this question. If you could keep only three things in your life, what would they be? Is there something in your life that you think you would die to protect, people, principles or something else? Did you have a passion in earlier life that you’ve lost contact with due to the daily grind? If you’re feeling inured to life and these questions, then ask yourself why.

If we’ve been stuck in the monotony of doing the same thing day in day out for years, we may need to stimulate a fresh perspective with a new experience. Initiate a change up, whether it be big or small, crack out of the routine for a moment, be spontaneous. Sometimes we have to put ourselves in the way of life to wake from our slumber, to get our juices flowing and remember what fires us up.

Life as distraction

The second obstacle to cultivating a warrior’s focus is a symptom of the first. One could say that a life without meaningful purpose and its wholesome expression is distraction. It’s surviving without thriving, bouncing from one activity to the next without an overarching vision informing the whole. A life without perspective.

Life is difficult and full of responsibilities that are constantly vying for our attention. Lack of clarity about a clear purpose and priorities that serve our best interests can lead us astray. Not only that, but all the unconscious fears, doubts, lack of confidence, apathy, boredom and unhealthy lifestyle choices can suppress our natural instincts. Our intuition about how to live fully and completely gets lost in the noise.

Being more warrior-like is resolving to stop entertaining distraction and harmful ways of living, anything that detracts from one’s mission. Whether we’re a soldier, a nurse, a shop assistant or a full time parent, whatever we do in life, we cut away the dross and cultivate the positive conditions for growth, self care and the care of those in our field of orbit. We stay inspired and motivated, and when apathy and doubt come knocking, we act anyway.

The warrior’s dance with fear

If there’s one emotion that is central to the cause of suffering and the unpleasant conditioning of modern life especially, that emotion is fear. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, fear has a purpose, but there’s something wrong with life today and our preoccupation with it. Fear and anxiety is so pervasive we can’t even see it and how unhealthy it is, we’re not even aware that something is off.

This powerful motivating force, once used to launch us into action in the face of life threatening danger, is now constantly stimulated for monetisation and control. Advertising, marketing, social media, government, institutions, the daily news cycle, they’re all complicit in this mass provocation of worry and anxiety and have a lot to answer for in regards to the mental health of our communities.

In cultivating the warrior’s mindset, this is what we’re dealing with, and applying even a modicum of unbiased awareness to all this input will quickly reveal its agenda. We can spend a great deal of our mental life worrying about things that will never happen. It’s just wasted energy and a distraction from being present in the here and now and attending to real needs and concerns.

The very essence of the warrior’s journey is to come into relationship with their fear, to fully know its insidious and all encompassing power to distract and keep them small. In turning towards it with eager awareness, we remove its grip on us. We see its insubstantiality, that the monster is just a distorted magnified shadow of a tiny rodent. That doesn’t mean fear disappears all together. A warrior’s bravery isn’t in the eradication of fear, it’s in being able to act despite it and not turning away. Courage as they say, is ‘fear walking’.

“Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.”

— Sir Winston Churchill, British statesman, prime minister, author, Nobel Prize winner.

If we allow fear to control our actions and thinking, we remain in a prison of our own making, we limit our ability to see possibilities and opportunities that arise. We never know what doors might open, some may have the potential to profoundly change the course of our life, but we’ll never know if our fears stop us from taking advantage of these situations.

The essential characteristics of the warrior

Know what your vision is

This really is the starting point and the bedrock of a life lived with clear purpose and unremitting confidence. Without clarity of what our core purpose and values are, we just drift through life like a rudderless boat, at the mercy of the winds and the tide to take us where they may. Our uninformed views and unconscious dispositions will remain the directors of our destiny unless we wake up and captain our vessel.

Over and above everything else, a warrior is defined by their clarity of vision. It is part of that core integrity and authenticity that informs all their actions, and where all the following qualities express from. Knowing one’s objectives means we can be fully committed to them and staying true to our vision will never be in doubt.

Discipline and routine

An essential aspect of being more warrior-like is training ourselves to be more disciplined in life. In that process, we become more aware of our impulsive desires, whims and craving for momentary escapist pleasure. With this understanding, we can assess if our actions are aligning with our overall life objectives and values. So in that sense, discipline is about self respect and self care.

In the practice of discipline, we are attempting to exercise more self control, and no person ever achieved anything worthwhile without it. This doesn’t mean being cold, hard and ascetic about everything we do. Discipline can be used to punish ourselves if we’re not psychologically and emotionally healthy. Discipline is about caring deeply, it’s a forward thinking attitude that confidently invests in much greater lasting future gains.

Self control also comes from this caring place, from a healthy perspective about what we need and what nurtures us. This, versus desires that serve only to temporarily avoid our suffering and its causes. It’s about believing more in our objectives, aspirations and values than momentary distraction. A great quote about discipline sums this up beautifully.

“We must all suffer from one of two pains. The pain of discipline or the pain of regret. Discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.”

People are an expression of their desires, we simply are whatever desire wins out in any given moment, even if that desire is to fulfil a responsibility. We have to get across the psychology of this to understand what we need to do to stay focused to achieve our goals in life. Whatever the reasons are for changing ourselves or bringing our chosen reality into being, we need to keep them present in the forefront of our mind.

Part of discipline and training is creating positive routines and sticking to them. We live in creative ways and practice new skills day in day out until they become habits in the most positive sense. It’s important to stay alive to our routine, we’re always at the mercy of switching back to auto pilot, the gravitational pull of unconscious living. When this happens we can lose sight of our purpose and vision.

Being aware of our routine’s purpose means we don’t become a prisoner to it, a joyless burden that we begrudgingly fulfil. If we’re fully conscious and connected to our reasons for our why we’re doing it, this is far less likely to happen. Rather, we’ll be motivated and energised by the purpose of our activity. Remember, the routine serves us, not the other way around.

In this respect, we should notice if we’re superstitious or fearful of changing up our routine. It’s important to stay engaged and aware if it’s still serving us. As we evolve, our activities will too, switching things up keeps it fresh and challenges our tendency to become habitualised in a negative sense.

Self control

The way of the warrior is the way of self mastery. A warrior rarely loses focus of their purpose so they are less prone to their reactions. Being in control of oneself requires a significant level of personal awareness and self understanding. This means that we have more perspective about our thinking, feelings and emotions, we don’t act on every little thing they tell us. We’re mindful of when they arise, we don’t get hooked into their story, and we continue to act with clarity of mind and continuity of purpose.

Being in control of oneself and one’s actions builds character, self esteem, protects integrity and engenders trust in others because we are reliable and dependable, not prone to bouts of erratic or unusual behaviour. It is, like discipline, the highest form of self respect. When we consciously control our impulsivity and actions, we serve our best interests and the greater good. This is how a true warrior lives.

Mental toughness

Mental toughness is another trait that can be trained through commitment and determination. We become more robust by not letting fear, doubt, apathy and lack of motivation get in the way of our purpose, small or large. That complaining, distracting voice that just wants to lie down and forget it all doesn’t even get a look in. Once it realises it no longer has an audience, that voice fades into the background permanently.

Mental toughness is not only about building strength but of not being afraid to expose our weaknesses and learn from them. It comes from putting oneself in difficult or demanding situations on a regular basis, things we’d normally avoid. We don’t let the fear of our ego taking a hit stand in the way of challenging ourselves, growing and getting things done.

We’re also not averse to physical pain, uncomfortable truths or unpleasant feelings and emotions. Warriors embrace discomfort and don’t get waylaid by its story of woe. Undirected thinking, compelling feelings and emotions are understood to be questionable sources of input. This doesn’t mean we’re a cold or emotionless person, toughness doesn’t need to be associated with masculine toxicity. Being kind and empathic as well as mentally tough are not mutually exclusive.

Mental toughness is about not quitting when we hit adversity or obstacles. We build confidence and unremitting determination to overcome even the most challenging of situations by doing just that, again and again. We decide to make good on our objective, no matter what arises, stopping is not an option. Even in failure we win, because we don’t take it as a reflection of our self worth, we only see the lessons it can teach us and how it’s going to make us a stronger, better person.

Physical and mental resilience

Resilience is the quality of being able to recover from setbacks. Emotionally, these challenges can have a significant impact on us, so being more emotionally aware and practiced at controlling their effects can help to traverse overwhelming experiences more quickly.

Mental and physical resilience is intimately connected, the mind is supported by the body’s health and vice versa. The discipline, fortitude and rigour of committed physical training in itself is mental training. This supports our mental and emotional strength and overall vigour in profound ways. Knowing our physical limits and understanding that the pain barrier can be broken goes a long way to building our resilience.

Courage and fearlessness

A fundamental quality of the warrior mindset is courage, and not being conditioned or controlled by fear. Yet, in the relative safety of modern society, we live in a culture of fear. The level of anxiety, worry and drama we experience is not proportional to the relative luxury most of us live in. The warrior’s journey is knowing one’s life has a greater context. When we’re conscious of and confident in this, our ego driven fears of loss get lost in irrelevance. Its voice can’t be heard over the powerful call to great action.

All those fearful feelings, thoughts and emotions can overwhelm us with their impelling narrative. So, we turn to fully face every one of these aspects of our experience, we bring them into the light of full awareness removing their power to control us. In choosing to confront fear directly, we come to understand it, so our actions cease to be informed by these reactive emotions and associated negative thinking.

The path of courage also means not entertaining limitations in any way whatsoever. It’s only our beliefs that stop us from achieving what we can envision. The path of the warrior is one of continual growth and stretching ourselves to see what we’re capable of. This doesn’t mean we don’t assiduously calculate risk and act accordingly. All endeavours are to be considered in full to ensure maximum chance of success.

Challenging ourselves on an ongoing basis doesn’t mean we have to be constantly smashing it and achieving great things. We don’t have to be at war with the world, working ourselves to the bone to get a result, driving ourselves ever onwards. It means we don’t sit on our laurels, we dot the i’s and cross the t’s. When we’re tired and think we can possibly go any further or do any more, we do it anyway, and in the process we find out how much we’re capable of.

Grow, learn, adapt

A warrior is motivated to learn and grow, to train physically and mentally, to care for personal health, to do everything they need to do to be better every day to carry out their core purpose. Part of this is being a student of life and having a growth mentality. This prepares one for any situation, it means you also embrace failure and adversity as great teachers, not as setbacks. Remember, everything being perfect and comfortable in life isn’t conducive to strength and character building.

“Every single bit of unpleasantness or adversity is a chance to grow, to become stronger, to practice overcoming all obstacles.”

Every moment of life can reveal something worth knowing, we just have to cultivate an inquisitive and curious nature. This attitude means that we are naturally more adaptable than others. Not only do we soak up more information, we train a preparedness to engage with whatever life dishes up. No matter the situation, we cultivate an attitude that there is something to learn, an answer or a way forward, we just haven’t thought of it yet.

Serve a higher purpose

There is no more important task for all of us than defining our purpose, then pursuing it with every iota of our being. This purpose should be wholesome in some way and must to some extent involve the betterment of others. Knowing our purpose is the navigation system for our whole life, it informs everything we will do and makes every moment of our lives significant and meaningful.

So too, the warrior is a servant of those they care for and also the greater community, even all humanity, all life. Having an altruistic dimension to one’s life means you are already on the road to a less selfish life and therefore greater happiness. This frees one’s energies up by not being preoccupied with mundane and self centred pursuits. This will naturally put one in circumstances that are conducive to growth and development, the path to truth and understanding.

Conclusion

The path of personal evolution is without a doubt, the most difficult path of all, it is also the most rewarding. There is no price you can put on the deeper understanding of oneself and the life that comes with this process. The more we can manifest a warrior-like attitude for this momentous task, the greater our progress towards inner peace and freedom, and the better we can serve those we love. Every moment we draw a breath is a precious gift, let us live every moment to its fullest potential, to live our best life, no matter what!