The Profile Dossier: David Goggins, the Toughest Athlete on the Planet

“Sometimes you have to go to the darkness to find the light.”

David Goggins grew up living in fear.

At school, he experienced incessant bullying and racism. At home, he suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of his own father.

“The most important conversation you’ll ever have is the conversation you have with yourself — and my conversation was absolutely horrifying," Goggins says. "I thought I was dumb. …