All week, going back to last Saturday as we met in the weight room and then had film, we talked about toughness. Make no mistake, we were not the tougher team. I think we can all come to that understanding and realization. We were not the toughest throughout the week of practice. We had distractions, we had lost focus, and then obviously both Friday and Saturday in our games, we were not the tougher team.

Throughout this week, we re-emphasized our toughness and also our standards.

What does toughness mean?

That's rhetorical, which means I don't need an answer.

Let me give you a little perspective about the word toughness.

In physics, toughness means the amount of energy that a material of any kind can withstand before breaking. For instance:

• A toothpick can withstand up to and not beyond three pounds of pressure per square inch before they snap.
• A hundred pounds per square inch is all that it takes to break the skin of a human being.
• A watermelon 🍉 takes about 240 to 360 pounds per square inch to crush it.
• In order to break someone's femur 🍖, the largest bone in the body, it takes about 740 to 900 pounds per square inch.
• To crack someone's skull 💀, it takes 1,100 pounds per square inch.
• To bend steel  it takes nearly 40,000 pounds of pressure per square inch.

Now we know how much pressure it takes to break something, but...

Wow do you build toughness?

Simple. You add something to it.

Three pounds of pressure will not break five toothpicks. Three pounds of pressure only breaks one toothpick, but you added four toothpicks to the equation.

The shell of a turtle is tougher than the skin of a turtle.  You add the shell, you now have protection.

The muscle that is around your femur, the more you train that, the more you add to that, the more power, the strength, the flexibility that you have, the less likely you're going to fracture your femur. 

Remember, a lot of this has nothing to do with how physically strong you are.

When we talk about toughness, the toughness we lacked was mental toughness.

That's being able to focus, to get rid of distractions, to operate and run a play without making a mistake. That's mental. The toughness we talk about doesn't come from the strength of your muscles or the flexibility or mobility of your body.

The strength and the toughness we're talking about come from your spirit and soul. To be mentally tough, like a bundle of toothpicks can withstand more pressure, we also have to understand what's going to add mental toughness.

Above and beyond your playing days, you're going to need mental toughness for things much harder than a football practice.

What can you utilize every day to build mental toughness?

• Face challenges.
• Do hard stuff.
• Have the discipline to eat right, sleep right, exercise, and take care of your body.
• Build and maintain confidence.
• Develop and control your emotions.
• Learn from your past mistakes and bad experiences.
• View your failures as your fuel.
• Surround yourself with mentally tough people.

Not complainers, whiners, or those with a victim mindset.

That's how you add three pounds of pressure to one toothpick by adding four more, and you will never break those toothpicks with three pounds of pressure.

Mentally tough ones will outmatch a physically stronger human being.

Many of you don't realize this, but diamonds are formed over a hundred miles deep in the earth's surface. Diamonds start as nothing but carbon molecules.  But under tremendous pressure, under tremendous heat, in fact, under 725,000 pounds per square  inch and at a temperature of 2,912 degrees Fahrenheit, those carbon atoms come together to make the strongest natural element on this planet. 

Let me describe that to you. There are six other substances on this planet stronger than a diamond. Every one of them is man-made. Number seven on the  list but number one that naturally occurs as a diamond and all it does is  it just adds to itself. One carbon compressed onto another carbon; compressed onto another carbon; compressed onto another carbon under immense heat and pressure, and something priceless is created.

That's mental toughness

Mental toughness is not just what you've been through; it's what you've done with what you've been through.

It's not about playing the victim card.

Find somebody else, build strength with each other. Build strength within. You've got to create your mental toughness, like turtles have shells. You don’t do it by having easy times. 

That's why the quote is said this way: "Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, weak men create hard times."

Your toughness, both mentally and physically, is dependent upon how you handle pressure.

It's not what happened to you, it's what you do with what happened to you.

Turn it into a diamond. 💎

Beat the Pirates