How Can I Get 1% Better Today?
The answer – Be Foxhole Worthy
On our drive home from Mississippi, I was listening to David Goggins’ book Never Finished, and it reminded me of a leadership activity we’ve done with our team called the “Foxhole Exercise.”
Here’s how it works. Imagine you’re in a foxhole and your life is on the line. You get three people beside you to help you survive. The person behind you is the most important because they’re protecting your blind side. The person to your left is next most important, and the person to your right is third. When we’ve done this with our team, players assigned point values to the people they would choose — three points for behind them, two for the left side, and one for the right. We would collect the names, total the points, and quickly discover who the team truly trusted in difficult moments. It revealed more than popularity. It revealed trust, toughness, dependability, and leadership.
As Steph and I talked about this on the trip home, I asked her who she would want in her foxhole. She answered immediately. I struggled with it. Not because I couldn’t think of good people, but because I kept thinking about the qualities I would want beside me when everything mattered most.
We would probably all agree on the kind of person we would choose. Someone who doesn’t cut corners. Someone who tells the truth, stays disciplined, shows courage, and refuses to quit when things get hard. Someone who is trustworthy, loyal, attentive, committed, and dependable. Someone who will fight for others, not just themselves.
That’s the challenge for all of us today: Be foxhole worthy.
Live in such a way that people know they can count on you. Become the kind of person others trust to have their back in tough times. Don’t try to build that reputation overnight. Build it one decision at a time. One disciplined response at a time. One day at a time. One percent at a time.
John Perry, Never Stop Getting Better
Source: Patrick Robey, Head Baseball Coach Belhaven University