Breath, Presence, and the Warrior’s Mind: A Conversation with Mark Divine

Last week, I had the chance to sit down with someone I’ve admired for years—Commander Mark Divine, former Navy SEAL, founder of SEALFIT, and one of the clearest minds I’ve come across when it comes to discipline, resilience, and inner stillness.

We spoke for over an hour, but I’m still thinking about one particular moment—when he said:

“The breath is the bridge between the body and the mind. It’s the simplest thing you can control in any moment—and yet it shifts everything.”

Mark teaches something called box breathing. If you haven’t tried it, it’s a simple, elegant pattern: inhale for four counts, hold for four, exhale for four, hold for four. It sounds minimal, but when you actually commit to it, it becomes an anchor. Something ancient and quietly powerful.

He shared how his breath practice and meditation was a really useful tool that helped through BUD/S training—something only 10% of people finish—and how it has become the cornerstone of his work teaching high performers and leaders to find calm in chaos.

What I found most compelling is that this isn’t about achieving a peak state. It’s not about hacking your way to focus or pushing harder. It’s about learning to be—to stay—in presence, no matter the storm.

Mark calls it “cultivating the witness.” The idea that through conscious breath, you train a part of yourself to step back, observe, and respond from a deeper intelligence, not react from fear or ego.

It resonated. Especially now, in a season of building and stretching. In those in-between moments—before a meeting, or right after a hard conversation—I’ve been coming back to that simple square rhythm. It gives me clarity. And a sense of being tethered to something real.

We also spoke about meditation, and how his SEAL teams used it not for spiritual ascension, but as tactical mental training. Sit. Observe. Witness your thoughts without attachment. Build the muscle of staying steady.

He laughed and said, “It’s the hardest thing I teach—because it’s so damn simple.”

And yet, here we are. A former SEAL commander telling me that the most important thing you can do to prepare for anything… is breathe.

I love that.

There’s something beautiful about warriors who meditate. About integrating stillness with strength. It reminds me that the real edge isn’t in how loud or fast or busy we are—but in how quiet and clear we can become.

More soon,
S.