17 Dec 2025 · 0 min
Navy SEAL Mike Hayes explains his proactive mindset: you can't have a bad day happen to you, you have to make one. He teaches his daughter the same distinction, drawing on stoic philosophers like Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius.
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There'S two different religions. Number one is that you can't make me have a bad day. You know, the Taliban can shoot at me or whatever, but they can't make me have a bad day. I'm the only one who can actually make me have a bad day. And that mindset of like, you can sure try and I hope you don't try that hard. I'll try to be in situations where I don't let people try to help make me have a bad day. However, comma, that's something that I can control. Then it's a little bit like stoic philosophy if you look at Epictetus or Marcus Aurelius or Seneca, et cetera. But now set that aside. When my daughter is 20 now and I've been through the years that you were just describing, no matter what I did, it was only what degree of wrong was. I. Always told her when she went to school, make it a great day. Because what hit me when she was, I don't know, kindergarten or first grader, the first walking out the door. Have is a passive verb. Have means the world is going to happen to you. Make is an active verb. And that mindset of make it a great day was literally what I said every day for her walking to school. And I love the young woman that she's become because she's got a mindset that is very proactive, very leadership oriented and very how do I help others. And a lot of the things that are implicit in this conversation, I'm seeing it as a parent come out. I won't spoil alert the story toward. Actually at the end of the book where I talked about my daughter, it made me cry. It makes me break down every time I think about it. So it really, it is so special when we as individuals or coaches, whether it is family or people we are working with, we can see the results in them. There is nothing finer than that. It is so awesome and powerful.
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