William H. McRaven Quotes

So Hell Week is considered to be the hardest week of the hardest military training in the world. It is a week of continuous military training during which most classes sleep for a total of two to five hours over the course of the entire week.

Basic training is horrible. It's dirty, and it's ugly. But you learn it's not just about you. It makes you part of a team, which helps you to survive.

As soldiers in Israel's army, one of the most grueling training regimens we had to endure was a long march while carrying a comrade on a stretcher.

I have done a lot greater things than 'Survivor.' Going through SEAL training was much harder than 'Survivor.'

To me, basic SEAL training was a lifetime of challenges crammed into six months.

What they really do during boot camp above all else is they create conditions of extreme stress - whether through sleep deprivation or the cold and muddy weather or just noise or whatever it is - and you have to make decisions, not just for yourself, but for the Marines you're supposed to be leading at any given moment.

The guys who don't make it through SEAL training are the Rambo wannabes. If you cannot work in a team format but also function autonomously, you won't last for very long.

I'm the guy that once graduated Ranger School - a place that starves you and denies you sleep for over two months - and took a fight six days later in the IFL and won.

When you're in Ranger School, it sucks. You're not eating; you're not sleeping. You're marching miles - for months at a time. It's horrible.

Like it or not, Jesse Ventura is a Navy SEAL. He did the pushups and put up with the cold water, just like the rest of us.

In the Army, I learned how to use and respect my rifle.

There's no question that the striving, the stuff that you got out of [sports]. The depending on someone right beside you. Sitting here and calling on yourself when you're tired or getting through something painful, watching your teammates do the same. Everybody feels good when you first walk out there.

I went to a military school between the ages of six and 12 and later into the air force. You learn discipline and strength of character.

You find sprinters testing other sprinters' mental capability. But these are my good friends on the track. I don't think we need to do that.

I go out there and get my eyes gouged, my nose busted, my body slammed. I love the pain of the game.

The best part about the movie, and everybody seems to rave about it, is the boot camp part.

You're taught that you can keep going in the military. Your point of collapse is not what you thought it was. Your body is built to survive, and when you think you're going to collapse, you still have so much more left in you.

In order to drill into young men the need to stay alert and stay alive, I used to punish offenders with my fists, boots and rifle butt, and with stockade time.

In the Marine Corps, your buddy is not only your classmate or fellow officer, but he is also the Marine under your command. If you don't prepare yourself to properly train him, lead him, and support him on the battlefield, then you're going to let him down. That is unforgivable in the Marine Corps.

Back in the old Corp, we weren't training those privates to infiltrate into the peacetime Marine Corp. We were training those privates to go to Vietnam.

Football is so barbaric. Sometimes I wonder what I was thinking by playing it. I feel almost like I escaped from boot camp.

In those long, lonely miles you put in during the off-season, and in those knife-in-the-gut track repetitions and hill repeats that buckle your knees - at that moment in almost every race when you ask yourself how much you're willing to hurt to catch one more runner - you can draw strength and inspiration from your running mates.

After a hard day of basic training, you could eat a rattlesnake.

There's a certain weird something. I'm always nervous when I spar. You learn it's going to hurt, but it's only going to hurt for a little bit. It brings out the animal in you to an extent. You learn what you can take.

A different type of human has to play that sport. Hockey players keep fighting - nobody cares what's wrong with you, as long as you have one foot to skate on, you keep playing.