PUDDLE JUMPERS: Powerful Mental Techniques from a Navy SEAL Performance Coach and Father of Three
FREE EXCERPT · INTRODUCTION & CHAPTER ONE
Puddle Jumper
noun | [pud-el jum-per]
Brave, joy-seeking souls, especially children, who leap into life’s messy, muddy moments with full-hearted abandon.
They see a half-frozen mud puddle and run for it, not from it. They’re not scared of getting dirty, falling down, or looking like a lunatic while chasing what lights them up.
They live fully, laugh loudly, and remind the rest of us that true happiness isn’t found in the clean, controlled parts of life. It’s found mid-jump, covered in mud, grinning like a little maniac.
That’s a Puddle Jumper. And I’d take a team full of them any day.
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INTRODUCTION
We’d just come off the mountain after a great, long day on the slopes, legs smoked, everyone ready to chill out. While slogging through the parking lot back to my car, gear dangling off every limb, the youngest of my three kids, Tyler, spots it: a half-frozen puddle of slush and mud, so gnarly it looked as if it had its own ecosystem. I can still picture his face light up as he started running straight for it with the delight of a dog chasing a tennis ball.
Tired, cold, and looking forward to getting home in front of the fireplace, my default parent mode kicked in, ready to shut it down. I opened my mouth to snap, “Don’t even think about it, T-Man!” But I suddenly stopped myself.
Why? Because in that split second, I realized something. By stopping him, I wasn’t protecting him. I wasn’t helping him. I wasn’t really looking out for him at all. I was projecting my own adult hangups: the inevitable mess, the inconvenience of a drenched six-year-old on the drive home, the extra laundry, him looking ridiculous. Instead, I had to ask myself an important question all parents must ask themselves at times: Why the hell not?
So as he looked over his shoulder, I took a deep breath, smiled, and said, “Get after it, dude!” He launched in full send mode. Muddy ice slush all over his clothes and face, laughing like the little maniac he still is today. And that’s when it hit me: these are the kind of kids I want to raise. Those who jump into life, not around it. I want to raise puddle jumpers, kids who aren’t afraid to get dirty in pursuit of a joyful life.
As parents, we’ve got to check ourselves. Too often, we’re shutting down our kids, not just out of our unfounded concerns or personal bias, but because we’re dragging around our own baggage: fear of judgment, need for control, leftover perfectionism from our own childhood.
That day, I almost stomped out my kid’s curiosity. But I caught myself. I let him jump into the mud, and boy, I’m glad I did, because this wasn’t just about letting a kid be a kid. It was about clearing the runway for purpose to land. I’ve had some incredible jobs in my life, from Navy SEAL to entrepreneur, but being a dad tops them all. It’s the one role that humbles you, teaches you, and pays you back in moments like this: muddy boots, wide smiles, and a reminder that you’re the luckiest guy on earth.
Clearing the Runway
At 28, I became the head instructor of the US Navy SEAL sniper course. But over the next few years, even as I achieved the peak of my SEAL career, teaching the next generation of elite snipers, I started to feel the cost of that life. My marriage was on the rocks, and I could see the distance growing between me and my kids. After living on adrenaline during 13 years of go-go-go deployments, followed by demanding 90-hour work weeks as a sniper instructor, I had to face a hard truth: if I wanted any kind of future with my children, I needed to make a change. So I made the most difficult call of my life. I left the Teams. I chose my family over the Navy, knowing that no mission, no matter how critical, was more important than being there for my kids.
What I never expected was that the same mental management techniques I’d learned and used to teach deadly SEAL snipers would also apply to my transition to civilian life, along with all the land mines I’d encounter on the way: the loss of my first business, my entire life savings destroyed, divorce, and all the time spent trying to be a good father to my three children.
The core principles of being a great sniper align with those of any effective mental management program for performance, such as with sports: visualization (or mental rehearsal), a positive outlook in all situations, self-image management, and positive verbal cues. As a dad, I’ve used these principles to develop my own style of parenting. This proved to be an incredible tool and parenting hack for me as a divorced father of three.
We are not a perfect family, and I’m not a perfect father. I’ve made plenty of mistakes, but regardless of my missteps, I can say I’ve been consistent with my love and support. And though we’ve been through a lot of tough times as a family, we’ve come out the other side better for it.
We’ve also entered a new era as parents. All of the tightrope-walking, shark-dodging, and dream-protecting we do for our kids often takes place without the village our grandparents took for granted. According to Pew Research, fewer than 30 percent of U.S. parents live near most or all of their extended family, and many report feeling isolated in their parenting role. The extended family used to live down the street. Now they’re a time zone away on FaceTime. Neighborhoods once raised kids shoulder to shoulder. Now most of us are winging it behind closed doors, searching for answers on the internet at midnight and hoping we don’t screw up the one job that matters more than any other.
CHAPTER ONE: CULTIVATING MENTAL STRENGTH
“Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one.” — Bruce Lee
Let’s talk about Bruce Lee. He wasn’t just a martial arts icon and cinematic legend; he was a philosopher in motion, a man who taught discipline, grit, and the power of self-awareness through every punch he threw and every word he spoke. He was also a father. The teachings he passed on to his students, fans, and kids weren’t just about fighting; they were about living with purpose and confronting hardship with strength. His own daughter, Shannon Lee, remembers him as strict but loving and warm. Raising kids can feel like facing off in Bruce Lee’s Enter the Dragon, surrounded, outnumbered, and one wrong move away from defeat.
What keeps our kids steady when the world tilts is mental toughness. Mental toughness is the ability to choose calmness and clarity when everything erupts around you. In the SEAL Teams, especially as snipers, we trained our minds before we ever touched a firearm. Mental preparation was paramount. Parenting’s no different: you either lead with calm clarity, ready for any situation, or you freak out amid the inevitable turmoil. It’s a conscious choice, and whatever you choose, you’re modeling behavior for your children.
Mentally tough, emotionally sharp kids don’t fall apart when life punches them in the mouth. And as we all know by now, life rarely pulls punches. Kids need independence, resilience, and the ability to stand strong in a world that won’t always be kind to them when we’re not around. Sure, we want to protect them from danger: bullying, mental health struggles, bad influences, violence, addiction, and the endless pull of digital screens. The weight of those fears can keep us parents up at night, wondering if we’re doing enough, if we’re getting it right. Worse, though, is when we default to overprotection.
(Photo: The Webb kids getting their SCUBA certification in 2020 in Puerto Rico)
In the early ‘90s, the University of Arizona created a biosphere project to mimic space colonization on Mars. Scientists lived and studied in a closed environment to learn how to exist on other planets. One of the most shocking discoveries was that the trees in the biosphere grew tall, but after a time, they would just fall over. Scientists found that, in order to build a firm foundation, the trees actually needed the stress from wind, which was absent inside the biosphere. Just as trees need stress to grow strong, so do our children. Remember this the next time you’re afraid to let your kid go on that overnight trip with friends or ride the subway by themselves. Kids also need to be prepared to weather the storm of negativity in their everyday lives, especially in the age of social media and internet clickbait, where it flows like the Nile.
The antidote? Positivity. Positive teaching, positive self-talk, and positive reinforcement. This trait can be developed through the same tools I learned and taught in sniper school: visualization, debriefs, and mindset drills. The same tools I’ve used to raise kids who don’t crack under pressure.
A Life-Changing Call
I had just come off an intense combat mission hunting terrorists in the caves of northern Afghanistan. It was November 2001, not long after my deployment with SEAL Team 3 in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. When we returned to base, I got the message that my first son, Jackson, had been born. Excitement hit me at the same time as fear. All I could think about was surviving this deployment long enough to make it home and meet my new son...
Read the rest in Puddle Jumpers.
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Brandon