WELLNESS

Antonio Millares III

Fitness and Fortitude

Member Antonio Millares III shares how a two-wheeled trek along the Pacific in 2016 led to a journey of self-discovery.

Afriend of mine was all set to get married, and right before the wedding, she called it off and they split up. My friend went into a little bit of a tailspin. He said he was going to ride from Cannon Beach, Oregon, to San Francisco. It’s about [1,100 kilometers]. And I told him, “I can’t let you do this alone, my brother. I’m with you.”

We ended up doing it over seven days, averaging around 150 kilometers a day. It was the hardest thing I had ever done physically in my life. What I received from that was this inkling of what mental fortitude is, and just how far you can push your body.

Afterwards, I had the memory of that achievement and I longed for that. And that led me to a somatic leadership course in Northern California with Dr Richard Strozzi-Heckler in 2018.

It was a five-day course about exploring why we show up the way we do. I came up with my declaration, which was “strength will be my true north direction,” because I realized that I had been this scared person hiding in plain sight.

A retired Navy SEAL commander by the name of Mark Divine ended up being in that class. Mark [the founder of SEALFit and Unbeatable Mind] agreed to be my accountability partner. I became a certified Unbeatable Mind coach through Mark’s organization. That took around two years and involved totally changing my lifestyle. The physical training was a stepping-stone to an integrated training program developed to train special forces candidates physically, mentally, emotionally, intuitionally and spiritually.

When somebody is training their body, they can go so far. But when someone is training across these five “mountains,” they can reach 20 times their potential. As a litmus test, I’ve done a number of crucible events to test the connection between all of these.

In 2019, I did back-to-back Spartan Beast races in California, which are 13 miles [20 kilometers] with about 30 obstacles. The hardest part was the mental side, the fear associated with doing things like that.

And that was the case with the 24hour SEALFit event I did in September. I went through a lot of peaks and valleys during that, and I overcame things I had never faced in my life before. I took those experiences into The Project [a 75-hour event in November].

For the first 50 hours, it was very physical. We were fed a fraction of the calories we burned each day, so we were hungry, tired and cold the whole time. They try and break you as fast as they can, then slowly introduce coaching. It was about getting past the physical, mental and emotional [discomfort] and tapping into your clear-mind awareness.

A lot of times, we avoid situations that might make us feel vulnerable. It’s a defense mechanism. But once that is stripped away, there’s a whole other playing field that we are opened up to.

I’m definitely physically stronger now. But more so than anything, I have learned to trust the flow of life. I have an openness now, and I don’t try to control things. I’m OK with the unknown.

As told to INTOUCH’s Nick Jones.

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