If you want clear, unfiltered advice on how to live smarter, get fitter faster and overcome life’s challenges, you're in the right place – The Hard Way.

In this edition, Joe shares:

• Why real rites of passage still matter
• How Barney Ryder swam the Channel (and Dubai) to prove it
• The one question you should ask yourself NOW
  

Hi, it’s Joe, writing this week from a stormy Florida. Most people wouldn’t try to swim the English Channel. Most 17-year-olds never even think about it. But my pal Barney Ryder isn’t most people.

A Young Man Who Chose Hard

Barney is a young British swimmer I recently had the honor of interviewing on my Spartan Hard Way podcast. He’s exactly what happens when someone chooses hard on purpose. In 2023, he trained for many months to swim the Channel solo. He gained 20 kilos in fat just to survive the bitter cold. In under ten hours, he crossed 25 miles of freezing, jellyfish-filled water. Fewer people have swum the English Channel than have stood on the summit of Everest.

He didn’t do it for bragging rights. He did it to raise more than $13,000 for MANUP?, a charity supporting men’s mental health. And when he was done, he didn’t sit back. This year he went on to complete a solo 25-kilometer swim across the waters beside Dubai, in brutal heat and salt, in just over six hours. Barney knows how to suffer. But more than that, he knows why it matters.

Why Rites of Passage Matter

When I speak with business leaders, defense departments, and top educators around the world, I keep hearing back to the same thing: our kids are soft because our culture is soft. We’ve lost real rites of passage. There was a time when becoming an adult meant facing something that could break you — a hunt, a mountain, a fast, a vigil. Today, it’s more likely to be a phone screen and an algorithm telling you you’re not enough.

When I was growing up in Queens, my rite of passage was just surviving the block. Fences to climb, fists to dodge, people to prove yourself to. It wasn’t glamorous, but I learned fast who I was. 

Barney proves it doesn’t have to be that way. He shows that struggle, by choice, is how you find out what you’re really made of. It’s why we run a kids’ Camp Spartan every year on our farm in Vermont, where we push kids way beyond the comfort zones they’re used to at home. This transformative experience offers seven days of intense workouts, endurance training, and team-building activities, all led by U.S. Military Veterans, Spartan Staff, top personal trainers, and professional counselors. We just finished one last week.

Where Do You Stand?

It’s just another reason why at Spartan we build relationships with places that still understand what discipline means: Norwich, West Point, and the SEALs. These are the new rites of passage, because kids need them, and so do we.

Epictetus said, “Difficulties show a man’s character.” Barney didn’t just swim the Channel and Dubai to test himself, he’s launching a brand to help other young people take on wild swims and brutal challenges. He wants a whole community that knows how to suffer with purpose. Spartan will be right beside him, because what he’s doing in water is exactly what we’ve always done on land: help people realize they’re stronger than they think.

If you’re a parent, a coach, or just someone wondering where the toughness went, look at Barney. He’s lighting the torch. We’re laying down the road. The hard way is our rite of passage. The only question left is: what’s your rite of passage?

Hurry Up,

Joe

You Ask, Joe Answers

Q: “Joe, what’s one thing you wish more parents understood?” — Danielle R.
A: "Struggling isn’t punishment, it’s how kids grow stronger. If you protect them from every hard thing, you’re not saving them, you’re hurting them. Let them fail, get cold, tired, and hungry. That’s how they build a backbone of grit." — Joe