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I'll spell that to you because it's not as you
think, T -E -A -M -B -U -I -L -D -R .com. Welcome
to the Behind the Shield podcast. As always,
my name is James Gearing, and this week it is
my absolute honor to welcome on the show West
Point graduate, Green Beret, and co -author of
Perseverance is Greater than Endurance, Blaine
Smith. Now, in this conversation, we discuss
a host of topics, from his own journey into the
military, the ROTC program, special forces selection,
working with GORUCK, nonprofits, his unique perspective
on war, leadership, and so much more. Now, before
we get to this incredible conversation, as I
say every week, please just take a moment, go
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Every single five -star rating truly does elevate
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return is that you help share these incredible
men and women's stories so I can get them to
every single person on planet Earth who needs
to hear them. So with that being said, I introduce
to you, Blaine. Smith. Enjoy. Well, Blaine, I
want to start by saying, firstly, welcome to
the Behind the Shield podcast. And secondly,
I want to say thank you to Brandon as well. He
was on, I think we did an interview two weeks
ago, a week and a half ago, and it was an amazing
conversation. But now we're going to get to hear
your kind of parallel journey into the leadership
group that you formed and the book that we're
going to talk about. So welcome onto the show.
Yeah, James, thanks for having me. I'll try not
to let you down. I do suspect that Brandon was
a great guest, so I don't know if I can live
up to that, but I'll do my best. We'll find out.
All right. Well, very first question, where on
planet Earth are we finding you this afternoon?
I'm in Cumberland, Maine. We live in a small
town just north of Portland and I'm in my home
office. Beautiful. Well, I would love to start
the very beginning of your journey. So tell me
where you were born and tell me a little bit
about your family dynamic, what your parents
did, how many siblings. Sure. I was born in Effingham,
Illinois, which is a small town at the intersection
of two interstate highways in southern Illinois.
I was born there because my dad worked for Yellow
Freight. He's from southern Missouri and had
gotten a transfer from St. Louis over to Effingham
as a young man. And he met my mom there, who
was a young single mom, when they met. And she
worked for the Keller Oil Company, which was
the family that kind of owned everything in town.
It's like a lot of small Midwestern towns are
that way. There's a family or two that own most
of the stuff. They met. They fell in love, got
married. My dad adopted my older sister, my older
half -sister. And I was born there in December
of 1978. And really the next 18 years of my childhood,
it was like growing up in a blue collar Midwestern
household. We did move down to Southwest Florida
when I was four years old. So I grew up in Southwest
Florida and a much less developed part of Florida,
certainly than it is now. You know, kind of spent
all my time outdoors, played lots of sports,
did pretty well in school, just went to public
school. you know kind of middle class lower middle
class kid had a great childhood by all accounts
um but really grew up with those values my parents
uh cut grass clean pools my dad eventually went
back to driving a truck to the end of his career
and retired from the teamsters union but that
was what life was like around my house my parents
both worked very hard you know a lot of responsibility
you know live within your means save money do
your best that kind of stuff. Don't be flashy,
don't brag, nose to the grindstone kind of household.
But my parents loved me. They were very good
to me. They went to my sporting events and supported
me when I made mistakes, but also expected a
lot out of me in terms of my effort and my behavior
and my discipline. And yeah, that's really what
the Smith household was like back in the 80s
and 90s. You often hear about families that adopt
maybe after having a couple of kids or adopt
because they can't have any kids. What was the
dynamic that got them to adopt first and then
they had you biologically? Oh, no. So it wasn't
that. My mother was married very young at like
18 and had my sister at 19 and then was fairly
shortly separated. So when my parents met, my
mom had a child from a previous marriage. Oh,
OK. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah. Brilliant.
Well, what about sports and exercise? You're
down in Florida now. What were you doing and
playing back then? I'm a very active kid, almost
a hyperactive kid, maybe by today's standards,
but I basically played everything I could. So
I played soccer and baseball starting at five
years old and basically played both of those
sports through about the middle of high school.
I played a little bit of rec basketball in the
summer. I was in a bowling league, usually in
the summertime. You know, a lot of touch and
tackle football after school, just anything I
could do that involved sports, physical activity,
competing. You know, I loved riding my bike,
doing BMX, skateboarding, you know, kind of jumping
off bridges into canals, you name it. I eventually
picked up golf as I got a little older. I played
it as just kind of an after school program when
I was nine or 10. And then when I became probably
14 or 15. I realized I had a pretty good knack
for it. And I wasn't physically maturing quite
as fast as a lot of my peers. And so while some
boys were really big and strong at 14, 15, I
didn't really bloom until I was maybe 16. And
so that created a window where I just wasn't
able to compete at a high level in the more physical
sports like I had my whole life. And I was really
good at golf. And so I really dug into it and
became... a very good junior golfer in Southwest
Florida and eventually went on to play in college.
And that sort of became my niche, which, you
know, was always sort of an interesting thing
to talk about at parties because I didn't feel
like a golfer per se, you know, I always felt
like an athlete, but that's kind of where my
path took me. And I loved it. I mean, I didn't
do it begrudgingly. I really loved playing golf
at a high level. I don't play really at all or
much anymore, but I hope to again someday. When
I speak to people that have done team sports
and individual sports, it's always interesting
kind of pulling how each of those two dynamics
served them when they entered the uniform. Yeah,
I think both played a big role. Growing up playing
team sports was incredibly formative because
you learn things like cooperation, teamwork.
You learn to play for the name on the front of
the jersey and not just the name on the back
of the jersey. and kind of get along you learn
leadership which i think i did i was a good natural
athlete as a young kid so i had to learn a little
bit about leadership because whether you wanted
to or not other kids were going to look to you
for example your coach may lean on you a bit
more you may be the team captain center midfielder
that kind of thing but then as i got older and
got involved in individual sports golf in particular
You have to learn things like mental calm and
clarity. You have to learn to rely on yourself,
discipline. And I wasn't great at that. I would
have been a much better collegiate golfer if
I had a better mental game, probably. I think
I could actually be a fairly good competitive
golfer now if I got back into it with some of
the skills and maturity. But bringing that into
a very competitive military environment like...
the First Cav Division or the Special Forces
environment where I ended up, I think was huge
because I had both the teamwork dynamics, the
ability to lead, that desire to play and compete
on a team, but also that kind of resilience and
understanding that, hey, sometimes it's just
you and you out there and you've got to be able
to tap into that from time to time as well. I
think it's very humbling. when you're in a sport
where it's just you and i did martial arts so
i played field hockey which was kind of big um
in the uk and that was a team sport obviously
but then i fought you know the taekwondo and
it's interesting because in you know if you have
a bad game the rest of the team can kind of pull
you up or vice versa you know you can relate
um kind of compensate for someone who's struggling
that particular day when you're on the mat on
your own when you're on the course on your own
It's just you. So you can't make excuses of why
it didn't go well. You have to look in the mirror
and fix the things that were broken and come
back better. Yeah, it's definitely the case.
And I think golf was especially so because you
don't even have an opponent. It's not like a
tennis match or a fight where you can say, you
know, bad matchup or my opponent got the better
of me that day or I just caught one on the jaw.
No, I mean, it was really just you and the course
that day. And I think about special forces training
and selection when you're out there doing land
nav or the star course. It's you and a map and
a compass and a heavy rucksack, and you just
have to go find your points. And it's just you
and the course. And, you know, with some reflection
now looking back, I can see where, wow, that
probably helped out a lot. Absolutely. Well,
what about career aspirations? When you were
in high school, what were you dreaming of becoming?
I don't think it was really clear to me, but
I was very much. steeped in the 80s, 90s playbook.
You know, you do better than your parents. You
know, my parents didn't go to college. And so
that was kind of my big aspiration. I was a good
student. So the idea was I would do well in school
and I would get into a good college and I would
go away to university. I don't think I thought
way past that. I thought maybe I'd be an engineer
or some professional job. Kind of the American
dream. It was still very much sort of alive in
its original form back then. I didn't really
aspire to join the military, if I'm being honest.
I think an opportunity to go to West Point is
what really got me thinking about it. And when
I looked at the financial aspects of it and the
athletic and kind of competitive aspects of it,
it became very appealing to me as a college opportunity
more than a career path. But yeah, I don't think
I really had great aspirations to be anything
in particular. other than to to do well and go
to the next thing and do well at that and kind
of see where it took me i've had a few people
on here that went to west point and i would say
almost all of them didn't seem to enjoy it very
much so talk to me about what one would expect
maybe it's the parents listening here um you
know as far as that journey and what was it because
i remember we talked before what was it that
allowed you to enjoy it when some of your peers
were uh were having less fun i'm assuming Sure.
Yeah. The running joke is that West Point is
a great place to be from, but it's not a great
place to be. And I think there's a lot to that.
You know, I showed up with no real background
or, again, any real aspiration for a military
career. And so on one hand, it was a little bit,
you know, kind of startling or shocking to me
having to snap into that lifestyle of sort of
discipline and regimentation. and restriction
in a lot of ways. I'm a very independent person.
And so that was a big change for me. But on the
other hand, I didn't stress too much some of
the finer points of it. So I think I was able
at times, at least more than some of my classmates,
not to have too much doom and gloom around. I
messed that up or they yelled at me for this.
I was able to let a little more of that maybe
roll off of my back. And I don't think I figured
it out until it was a little too late. But I
did get to a point maybe in my last year or so,
maybe a year and a half, where I'd made some
good friends and I was able to largely enjoy
the experience and I could see the light at the
end of the tunnel. And there was a part of me
that knew that this was a special time in my
life and it was not going to last forever and
it would go away. And someday I would just be
kicked out into the army to be just another dude
wearing a green uniform who's a second lieutenant.
So I tried my best to enjoy it. It was hard all
the way to the end. I had a good group of friends
and I was able to play golf there as well. So
I got to travel a bit and get away from the Academy
quite a lot and mix it up with other college
kids. Some, which was nice. Definitely a benefit.
So yeah, I, I can look back on it now and realize
all the wonderful things it did for me, the people
being the number one thing, but you know, I don't
know, maybe 30 % of my time there. I genuinely
enjoyed. What about the actual kind of contract?
If you go into West Point, is there an expectation
of X amount of years of service after that? Right.
So the way it works is the first two years you're
there, you're generally, you're able to kind
of leave, quit, transfer, whatever, with no obligation.
But once you start the first day of your third
year, your junior year, you incur a service commitment.
And I believe it's the same now. It's five years
of active duty service and then another three
years of inactive ready reserve. So it's a total
of eight year commitment to the military in exchange
for your four years of college education, which,
you know, looking at it with the perspective
I have now is not a lot of time. You're still
a very young person at the end of that. For an
18 -year -old who's getting ready to go off to
college and you're weighing your options, you
think, well, geez, I got to do four years in
the slammer at West Point, basically, and then
another five years of active duty. So you're
committing to at least nine years of living that
Army lifestyle as an 18 -year -old. It seems
like a big commitment. And I guess it is a big
commitment, but it seems like an eternity when
you're on the front end of it. What about from
a leadership perspective? Obviously, we're going
to talk about the book and what you're doing
now. How well at that time did it prepare you
for leadership just as an individual and obviously
when you were in combat? So I think it does a
good job and I think it does about as good a
job as it could do. In helping you to understand
the dynamics of leadership, in giving you lots
of opportunities to be a leader in ways big and
small, you know, whether you're kind of a leadership
within the Corps of Cadets, you know, platoon
leader or company commander or something, or
just, you know, on the field of play or in the
classroom, there are a lot of opportunities to
be a leader and it's stressed all the time. So
you get a lot beyond just kind of the academic
study of leadership and the history of it. You
get lots of reps, which is great. You know, the
things that it can't prepare you for are just
the kind of the real life scenarios you get into
once you're out in the army that you almost have
to experience to really know how to deal with
it. So West Point is kind of a clean and polished
version of the army. You know, the people you
bump into there are largely, you know, very morally
straight, accomplished people. You know, there's
an expectation that you're not lie, cheat, steal,
et cetera. You get out into the force and you've
got 18 and 19 -year -old privates who are involved
in any manner of shenanigans on the weekend that
you've got to manage and clean up for. Sometimes
you might have noncommissioned officers, some
of whom will be tremendous, incredibly capable,
people who will mentor you and bring you along.
And you'll have others that are just not nearly
as good. And I think at West Point, you're shielded
a little from that. I think the folks who graduate
from West Point and do really well out in the
force are those who take seriously what they're
learning at West Point and apply it, but also
have the kind of mental flexibility or the interpersonal
flexibility to get out into the Army and see
it for what it really is and say, OK, you know,
I've got to learn to operate in this environment
because it's not going to be, you know, as clean.
And, you know, textbook is what you might have
learned during your years at the Academy. We
see in the fire service that, for example, our,
I mean, it's not leadership training, our officer
training, you know, they have to have these officer
classes and you rise through the ranks. And there
are people that are very academically astute
that do very well on these exams, but then you
see them actually run a department or run a fire
ground and you realize there's a disconnect.
What is your observation as far as the educational
route of leadership? And then, you know, what
does that disconnect or how can we improve upon
the fact that we take these people that have
been in the educational on the educational ladder,
but also give them those kind of moral courage,
life skill elements that we see normally from
the boots in the ground and the people that are
actually in the trenches? Yeah, sure. I mean,
I think some of it is on the front end when we
can, I think, better educate people oftentimes
about the realities of leadership and give them
a bit more of a. realistic picture of these are
the interpersonal things you're going to come
up against. Here are some ways you can prepare
yourself to be very clear about your priorities,
your objectives, how you communicate those, that
kind of thing. But I also think people just need
practice. Leadership is something that can be
learned and it can be improved. And you need
some practical application, I think, to do that.
And so whether you can do that in more of a simulated
scenario in a schoolhouse environment, that's
still pretty valuable. But I think those who
are successful in making the leap are those who
kind of understand that, look, this is a messy
business that involves people. It's never going
to be like it would be in a laboratory or a textbook.
And maybe most importantly, I would say people
need to understand like what it is you're trying
to achieve. And so, you know, not that the ends
always justify the means. I don't mean to put
it that way, but I will say if you're not really
clear on what it is you're trying to accomplish
with your team. You're going to have a hard time
being an effective leader. If you are really
clear on what you're trying to accomplish with
your team, you've got a much better chance to
try something and have it not work and try something
else or to incorporate the input of the people
that you're working with and say, we are trying
to accomplish this together. How do we do this?
If you feel like you've got to sort it all out
as an officer or a leader and have all the answers
and have a plan going in and kind of execute
against your vision. I just, you know, everything
in life is this way, whether it's having kids
or just living life as a grownup, it's not going
to go the way you thought it was going to go.
And your ability to adapt to the situation versus
kind of operating your plan makes a big difference.
That does make a lot of sense to me. When I think
about the departments I worked for in the past,
some were fantastic, but I don't remember there
really being a clear. plan as far as where we
want to be in one year where we want to be in
five years and not just you know the department
but the the safety and security of the city or
county that we protected and so it really does
then kind of um underline what i've heard even
from the military like we would just you know
um leave the fob go do our patrol and come back
and do the same thing over and over again and
when you don't have that purpose and i'll put
it on a national level There's all these sides
just fighting tooth and nail over the left and
the right. But when has anyone sat in front of
us and said, here is the obesity crisis. Here's
how many people are overweight in this country.
Here's how many people are dying from fentanyl.
We are going to get this down by X amount of
percent. As a nation, we've got to come together.
You don't hear that messaging even from the national
level. reflect on that i mean of course you're
going to flounder if you've if you've got a compass
that keeps spinning how the hell are you going
to move forward yeah i don't think you've got
any shot i mean it's a it's a complex world that
we live in interpersonal dynamics are complex
you know we live in a world now where we have
access to virtually limitless information we
have almost limitless options in how we spend
our time spend our dollars make choices what
we want to do for a living. We live in a very
fortunate society here in the U .S. We have lots
of social mobility, lots of options. You can
kind of live wherever you want. And I think that's
paralyzing for a lot of people, and it's definitely
paralyzing for teams. So I think you start with
the individual and you say, and I don't know
where you get this. Everyone's a little different.
Do you get this at church? Do you get it in school?
Do you get it in the military? Do you get it
from your parents? Some combination thereof.
If you don't have a reasonable idea of who you
want to be in the world and what you want to
stand for and what you're prioritizing in your
life, you don't have much chance at being very
good at it for the long haul. Or even if you're
one of these exceptionally talented people that's
kind of good at everything, I don't think you
have much chance of being very satisfied or fulfilled
in your life or having relationships that last
long in your life if you are not clear about
what it is you are trying to do with your life.
And then you need to share that with your partner.
Right. I mean, Brandon and I had a meeting in
December where we spent a few days getting really
clear on who we want to be as a business and
what we're trying to achieve. And it felt amazing
coming out of that. And I thought, wow, my wife
and I probably need to replicate this process
so that we can have this level of clarity on
who we're trying to be as a family and what we're
trying to give to our kids and community, etc.
So, yeah, if you can't simplify some of that.
in a way that you understand it and you can share
it consistently with people, you just don't have
much of a shot at people showing up every day
with focus, with intention, with energy to do
the things that you need to do. Because even
if they want to do great things, even if they're
generally motivated people, and if you can't
focus that in, you're not going to get the consistency
you need and you're not going to get the results
you're looking for. Yeah. I'm just thinking of
one of those old Viking ships where they've got...
you know, the slaves or whoever it was that were
rowing, but you've got them all facing different
directions. They're all working really hard,
but the ship's actually not going in the specific
direction that you all agree upon. I think that's
an interesting analogy. You know, it's not about
not putting the effort in. It's like directing
the effort to a place that actually makes sense.
Yeah. I mean, just think about, you know, going
for a hike or a run. You know, direction matters,
speed matters, but direction maybe matters more,
especially if you're out in the woods. I mean,
you can run yourself to death getting lost. I
mean, you have to have some mechanism by which
you choose a path and mark the trail and stay
on course. And again, I'm not here to tell anybody
what that should be, but I would say with a lot
of confidence that if you're not taking the time
to think hard about where you're trying to go
and why it's important for you to get there.
Not going to have much luck. Absolutely. Well,
speaking of paths, you're in West Point. Walk
me into which unit you became attached to. And
then I'd love to hear pre 9 -11 what you guys
were doing. Sure. Yeah. So I graduated with the
intention of doing my five year commitment and
moving on to kind of get a real job in the real
world. And I chose to be an armor officer. So
a tank platoon leader was my first job. and I
selected the 1st Cavalry Division in Fort Hood,
Texas, candidly because a lot of my friends were
going there, and I wanted to have a really good
time during my five years in the Army, and I
wanted to be near my friends, and I wanted to
be in the 1st Cavalry Division because pre -9
-11, they were one of the Army units that was
still doing quite a lot of stuff. They were doing
a lot of training deployments and going to Kosovo
and things like that, and so I wanted to do some
things while I was in the service. And I graduated
on June 2nd of 2001, thinking that I was going
to go down to Fort Hood and shoot some tanks
and maybe do some training and go to a lot of
concerts in Austin and drink beer with my friends,
some of which I still did, definitely. But then
9 -11 happened while I was still on my officer
basic course. So I was in the motor pool at Fort
Knox, Kentucky, doing weapons training and doing
my officer basic stuff. And 9 -11 happens about,
I guess, halfway, partway through that course.
And the complexion of things changed immediately,
as anyone listening that was alive then would
know. The trajectory of my service and my life
changed dramatically in ways that I didn't understand
then. And my feelings toward service changed
a lot. I think like a lot of people, even those
who weren't in the service at the time, many
of us felt a really strong call to... put on
the uniform and fight the enemies of our country
and to go to faraway places if we needed to do
that. So I went from thinking, hey, I'll do my
five years or my four years or whatever down
at Fort Hood and try to have some fun and do
a good job, but prepare myself for the next chapter
of my life to feeling much differently and thinking,
hey, I got to figure out a way to get in the
fight. I got to figure out how to get over there
and get involved in this at the earliest possible
moment. Well, talk to me about that actual day.
What was that day like through your eyes? Yeah,
so I was 22 years old. I had been married in
July, right after I got out of West Point. So
I was very young and naive and had a young wife
and was in my officer basic course. And I remember
we were doing the assembly and disassembly of
the .50 cal and the .240 machine gun. as part
of a tank crew gunnery skills test and one of
our instructors just came in and said hey just
so you guys know a plane has hit one of the twin
towers and it seemed at the moment like uh like
an accident maybe a small plane or a maybe a
commercial plane but there's there been some
sort of accident and so we just kind of continued
training for a while and then um then a second
plane hit And it was a terrorist attack. And
I think we still kind of thought these are small
private planes or something that terrorists have
flown in, like a van bomb that was at the World
Trade Center years prior. And then eventually
they pulled us all into a room and said, hey,
here's what's going on. We think we're no kidding
under attack. This is a coordinated and large
terrorist attack. And we're going to send you
home for the day. And you're going to stay at
home and wait by the phone. We're going to give
you further instructions about your lockdown.
Don't go anywhere. whatever and we're like oh
my god so we went home and i remember getting
home and my then wife was kind of waiting like
just dismayed like are you did you hear about
this and we went inside in time to watch the
towers fall on the live news which was surreal
to see that um yeah and you have just a huge
pit in your stomach and a lot of uncertainty
and a lot of anger um You know, we spent the
next many, many weeks. I was at Fort Knox, which,
you know, wasn't the most important army base
in the world, but because it's Fort Knox, they
really locked us down super tight because they're
like, if we're a security breach at Fort Knox,
that would potentially damage the national psyche
or something. So, you know, we just stayed on
base and went to the gym and trained. And, you
know, every Friday we'd order pizza from the
shopette and buy some beer from the class six
and hang out with our friends. That was really
it for a while. We all went and gave blood and
did all the things we were all doing back then.
We knew whatever we were going to do next was
probably pretty serious, whatever it was going
to look like. I was there until, I guess, about
December until I graduated that course and then
went on to my unit. Talk to me about the next
few years because I know you didn't deploy immediately.
There was a lag. Yeah, so I got down to Fort
Hood, Texas, I guess in December of 01, maybe
January of 02, I got to my unit. And it was good
to be there, but I was a little disenfranchised
early on just because I was so young and full
of vim and vigor and just wanted to get overseas.
And by then... I'd been watching on CNN as the
special forces guys had gone into northern Afghanistan
and toppled the Taliban with the Northern Alliance
riding on horseback, etc. And people I knew even
were going over there. Not many, but some people
I knew from West Point were with the 101st Airborne,
the 10th Mountain, and they were going over to
Afghanistan with their infantry units. And I
was spending a lot of my time in the motor pool,
working on tanks, doing mechanized stuff. And
I just was... So eager to be in the fight. I
love being a tank platoon leader. I love my soldiers.
I mean, it was incredibly fun at times, you know,
driving and shooting those tanks and going out
and training. But it was clear that that unit
was not going to be in Afghanistan anytime soon.
There are basically no roads in Afghanistan.
There's no rail. There's no port. Like, you're
not getting tanks there. So we were not going
to be in the fight. And based on that and what
I was seeing on CNN, I went to the special forces
recruiter's office very early on and kind of
said, Hey, what do I need to do to try out and
do this? And they were really, they were nice
guys and they were good to me. And they're like,
well, here's how the pipeline works. And here's
the timeline. And here's generally how it goes.
And here's a training pamphlet. You can start
doing PT. And I went back probably three or four
times until they finally said like, Hey, you're
just, it's too early. You can't come here yet.
Go be a platoon leader. You have work to do.
go take care of your business and you can come
talk to us in a couple of years. And I took their
advice. After about a year in a tank platoon,
I got selected to be the brigade reconnaissance
team leader, a platoon leader at what we called
the BRT back then, which was kind of a light
platoon that did reconnaissance out in front
of a brigade combat team. So you think about
5 ,000 people in a brigade combat team. This
is the unit that's out in front of them doing
reconnaissance, surveillance, et cetera. on foot,
on Humvees, that kind of thing. So that really
appealed to me. That was exciting. It was kind
of an elite unit within the organization, really
good soldiers, kind of a cool mission. I liked
that a lot. And so I went there and we started
training. And by then there was kind of the bubbling
rumors that, hey, there's maybe going to be a
war in Iraq. And we'd always been told that if
there was a ground war in a place like Iraq,
the 1st Cavalry Division would be very much a
part of that plan. Like we would be kind of the
mechanized hammer that would come in. And so
we were very serious in, you know, 02 about getting
ready to go over and we're going to fight this
war in Iraq and topple Saddam's regime. And,
you know, it wasn't directly connected to 9 -11
or the Taliban. And I think some of us sort of
knew that, but we're like, whatever, like, let's
go. Let's go fight the enemies of America, wherever
they may be. And so when that war started to
kick off, you know, very end of 02, we started
finding out kind of what it might look like.
Beginning of 03, units start deploying and our
number doesn't get called. Our sister unit, the
4th ID across base, for I think political reasons,
candidly, got called up to go over there and
be part of the initial invasion. And we did not.
And that was really devastating. We just assumed
we would go. We were ready to go. And then we
didn't get called to go. And so we stayed home
and we watched the ground war in Iraq unfold
with the Marines and the 3rd ID charging up through
Nasiriyah and up into Baghdad. And again, a lot
of people I knew, my friends from West Point
were platoon leaders and they were getting their
combat patch on the right shoulder and earning
their stripes. And it was hard to stay home and
watch it and just kind of keep training. I guess
the summer of 03. we got word that we would be
going over in the beginning of 04. And so we
thought, well, we'll go, we'll still get to deploy,
but war's going to be over. You know, we'll just
be kind of hanging out, mop up duty, checkpoints,
you know, that kind of thing. And so that's what
we thought we were going to do when we finally
deployed, I guess, probably the 5th of January
of 2004, our unit got on a plane and headed over
there. you know, for our rotation. And of course
it turned out quite, quite a lot different than
we expected. I want to get into, you know, the
actual deployment before you hit on a point where,
you know, you're expecting to go earlier and
then another unit is sent and you stay back and
you keep training. There's a lot of people listening
now. They're in law enforcement, they're in fire,
they're in EMS and, you know, their neighboring
agency had that, you know. bomb burning fire
or you know god forbid a school shooting whatever
those big career events um and there's a there's
a danger of complacency when maybe you don't
have those target hazards and those frequency
that other agencies might have fdmy for example
talk to me about your perspective on diligence
of training when you are in an environment that
maybe you're not being deployed, maybe you're
not seeing all these big incidents, but the importance
of the preparation still, regardless of the frequency
of the event. Yeah, that's a really good point.
And I think we benefited from knowing that we
probably were going to go and we got to see some
of what was happening over there. And so, you
know, it was front and center in our minds that
we were probably going to have to put some of
our training into play. But James, I think that's
everything. I think about everything in life
that way now, by the way. And Brandon and I talk
to people all the time that we cannot predict
what the future holds for us. You can't predict
an uncertain future, but you can prepare for
an uncertain future. You have to prepare. And
you probably shouldn't waste much time trying
to predict because you just don't know. But you
can prepare for some of the eventualities of
an uncertain future. And you just don't know
when you're going to be called. to do that. And
so what I would recommend to everybody is what
are the baseline fundamental things that you
know you need to have, that you need to possess
in order to perform at a very high level should
one of those peak kind of apex moments occur?
Because this happened to us even when we were
on the deployment. Even when we were downrange,
we would see a certain element from a unit would
get involved in a firefight or get engaged in
an IED attack or something, and you would be
jealous of those people. in those moments. Cause
you wanted to be in the fight. You wanted to
be in the mix. You wanted to kind of, and this
goes every culture throughout mankind has been
this way. You wanted to prove yourself in battle.
You wanted to feel what that, what that was like.
You know, Brandon sometimes jokes that we, we
were, we were all a bunch of kids who wanted
ice cream. We all ended up with a, with a cold
headache, you know? But to go, to go back to
your question for us, it's shoot, move and communicate.
Right. Can you master the fundamentals? For the
Ranger Regiment, it's the big five, you know,
physical fitness, medical tasks, small unit tactics.
What are those things? And you don't know which
one of those might be the one you need most in
any particular moment. But if you look at any
elite organization, at least across the U .S.
military that I'm familiar with, they are absolutely
brilliant in the basics. And so if you think
you need to spend all your time on some wazoo,
you know, high tech, high speed. you know, stuff,
you know, maybe at the edges, that's going to
help you. But ultimately it's going to be, do
you have the physical skills, strength, and stamina
to do what you need to do when the moment calls
for it? Do you have the relationship and the
teamwork with the people around you to where
something can go wrong and you can still find
a way to win? That's another thing we talk a
lot about. If you don't have that, that relationship
with your teammates. Things can fall apart pretty
quickly. And we've seen lots of teams. And if
you're a sports fan, you'll recognize this right
away. Lots of teams with incredible levels of
skill and talent who, when things start to go
a little sideways, they completely fall apart
because they don't have the kind of relationship
and trust they need to be effective in those
moments. And you'll see other teams that can
weather a bad break, a bad call, a mishap, an
unforeseen thing that comes in. And they can,
what we would do, we would call it winning ugly.
You find a way to win even when things don't
go according to plan. So investing in your physical
skills, strength, stamina, investing in your
relationships and your teamwork, you just can't
do enough of that. And you don't really have
to get too specific with the scenarios, I don't
think, at least in my chosen profession, if you're
really brilliant at the basics. This is what
I struggle with about my profession. It's interesting
because I've had so many of the special forces,
special operations from around the world. And
if they're not familiar with the first responder
professions, it blows them away that most of
us are not held to any sort of fitness standard
whatsoever. And it's not just at the administration
level. It's unions fighting it. It's all kinds
of people. And there's this perception of if
we introduce one, oh, you're trying to take our
jobs. It's like, well, you know, the bar was
set at the front door. No one was telling you
that you'd be sitting around eating Cheetos the
rest of your career, you know. But when you put
that into a real world scenario, just like, you
know, how you've described, the average firefighter
is probably these days in America run a lot of
EMS calls, maybe a single story, two story house.
But occasionally they'll get the Grenfell fire
like London did, you know, where now you're having
to climb 10, 15, 20 floors before you even start
fighting fire. And so I am a huge proponent of
fitness standards being put in, just being maintained.
They're put in when we go to fire academy, just
holding us to that level. Because not only, as
you said, is it ready the individual for the
worst case scenario, but it also forges longevity.
It forges a healthy retirement. And the fact
that there's such resistance in the first responder
professions blows my mind. Yeah, it's, I mean,
I think the kind of political administrative
aspects of this they make sense i can understand
what's going on there but i'm with you in that
show me a dimension of your life that's not improved
by being physically fit i mean your cognitive
ability your decision making ability your overall
health you're going to show up for work more
often you're going to feel better in retirement
you're going to have much better durability all
of that before we even talk about your performance
in the heat of the moment in one of these kind
of apex events so I think it makes a lot of sense.
I can appreciate that if you're a patrol officer,
you know, out there working kind of the beat
every day, what you need and what you need to
prioritize in terms of your time and skills is
different than if you're a full -time SWAT team
member, right? So that makes sense. But, you
know, if you're a wildland firefighter, that's
a little different than if you're kind of making
EMS calls in a metro. One of the things I like
so much about CrossFit, and you and I have talked
a little about this in the past, and Greg Glassman
said this very early on, the needs of an Olympic
athlete and my grandmother vary by degree and
not by type. And so, sure, I'm willing to accept
that somebody who's out patrolling the streets
every day, dealing with God knows variety of
things, their physical skill, strength, stamina
not called into task that often. I can appreciate
that they may not be prioritizing that as much
as someone who is using it on a daily or a weekly
basis, but does not still have a high foundation.
The floor should still be pretty high because
you may need to use it and it's going to make
you better in every aspect. So does the degree
to which you need to be an absolute physical
stud vary based on the job and the scenario?
Sure. It can vary by degree, but I don't think
it varies by type. Absolutely. Well, I have this
a lot with the SWAT guys that come on. I mean,
they have a physical standard that they have
to maintain. It's funny because I talk to a lot
of ocean lifeguards too. And I put the discussions
that we have in our profession, imagine if that
was the ocean lifeguard, an ocean lifeguard that's
now 80 pounds overweight and says, it's not fair
that you make him do a swim test. How would that
work? You know, it wouldn't. But even excuse
me, even with our regular patrol officers, for
example, the SWAT men and women know really roughly
what they are going to see when they they breach
a door, you know, when they serve a warrant,
whatever it is, they're already prepared for
extreme violence. And then they taper it down
if that's not called for. As you said, your average
police officer might have done 19 traffic stops
that day in the 20th one. And it's going to be
a gun drawn. And now you're in a fight for your
life. So I would argue, like you said, I mean,
this is a beautiful illustration. Yes, there
might be a slightly lower degree, but that degree
seems needs to be extremely high because that
patrol officer has no idea when they're going
to have to go from zero to 100. The SWAT team
have a pretty good idea when they're going to.
Well, you might you're likely to be there by
yourself. Right. And so I think this is probably
and I don't know your world hardly at all, but
I would imagine. When I think about my time in
the military and the special operations community,
one of the beautiful things about being there
was that it's your job to go in and train every
day. So we didn't have to go do our jobs that
often. If you think about it, we got to spend
the vast majority of our time training and preparing
to do our jobs and then a small percentage of
our time actually doing it. You know, when you're
in the first responder community, it's basically
flipped. You know, your on -duty time is almost
all kind of doing your job and then a smaller
amount of it is training and preparation. So
I think that for me, if I were kind of king for
a day, I would think, how do we create space
for more training and preparation? So if you're
going to say it's not fair to have the standard,
perhaps that's true based on the lifestyle that
some of these people are leading. So how do we
reframe that in a way that allows them to have
better access to training and nutrition, perhaps
while they're on duty, have a longer academy?
Again, I don't want to get too far into your
world because I'm ignorant of it largely. How
do we create the conditions through which people
can be held to that standard because it's realistic
for them to achieve and maintain it? Well, it's
interesting you put it that way, because I mean,
that's so pertinent to the fire service. Most
of our firefighters work 56 hours a week. There's
a lot of, there's a huge recruitment crisis with
a lot of mandatory overtime. So now you're working
80 hours a week. I just interviewed a federal
firefighter in Hawaii. He does a 60, excuse me,
a 72 hour basal work week before any overtime.
So this is what I've always said is that if we
actually fix that and give them the rest and
recovery they need for longevity and performance,
then you can now hold them to that standard but
when you've got someone working 80 hours a week
and then asking them to maintain that standard
as well you know a where are they going to find
the time and b you know if you look at physiologically
they are literally set up for failure the body
heals after training when you sleep so this is
all part of the same conversation and i agree
a thousand percent And if we give these first
responders the rest and recovery they need between
the shifts, now you have freed up some extra
time for some daytime training and things where
you can actually start sharpening the sword.
Yeah, definitely. So my wife went to EMT school
and became a wilderness EMT. And so she had to
spend some time riding on an ambulance as part
of the end of her training. And, you know, she's
big into health and fitness training. And she
just said, I don't know how these folks do it
riding around on ambulances all the time because
they're going from one call to the next. So their
whole shift, they're busy. It's not like they're
hanging out doing nothing where they can just
be, you know, grilling steaks and bench pressing.
I mean, they're just going from one call to the
next the whole time. There's not much opportunity
to stop and rest or eat, certainly not to train.
And then on top of that, at least in her experience,
they're not paying these people very much. And
so they're eating from like the snack room at
the ER or Lord knows what fast food maybe. And
so there you go. You've got to work a lot of
shifts every week to make a living. You don't
have the disposable income for healthy food and
nutrition. And so it would be easy to say, sure,
they should pack macadamia nuts and protein bars
and whatever with them and do pushups between
stops, blah, blah, blah. It would appear to me
that the reality of it on the ground for most
folks doesn't lend itself very well to that kind
of thing. Yeah. Well, it's interesting listening
to your community and the associated, you know,
SFSO communities. You know, there is that understanding
that if you're going to ask these warfighters
to operate at a certain level. You've got the
Thor 3 program, for example. You've got these
environments where there's prevention, there's
physical therapy, then you've got nutritionists
and strength and conditioning coaches and sports
psychologists and people that are trying to get
you guys as efficient as possible. And then you
contrast that to my profession and police and
EMS, where even when there is a strength and
conditioning conversation, it's like, well, let's
try and get them to die a little bit less. It's
nowhere near human performance. So we've got
such a void between where we are and where you
are. And yet so many of your community hold us
to the same level as you. Because as I point
out to people, when you're overseas fighting,
we're the ones protecting your family. So, of
course, you want us to be at the same level as
you in our respective fields. Yeah, I agree.
I mean, I think any family that's in a dire situation,
you know, wants somebody that's very capable
to show up. to help them out, whether that's
law enforcement, fire or any other member of
the first responder community. And I think that's
for good reason. These are these are jobs that
we hold in high esteem and high regard. And,
you know, resources become a real question, though,
because unlike a federal service like, you know,
FBI, SWAT or special operations. Every municipality
has its own rules, its own budget. I can't imagine
how hard it would be to try to normalize or standardize
things along a lot of those lines. I suspect
in your work, what you're maybe trying to do,
or at least what I might try to do, is try to
find shining examples. Are there places where
the local community or somebody can... help to
create the conditions to show what right looks
like. And then you can, you kind of slowly start
to, to grow it out from there. You know, I was
involved in leading a nonprofit for a long time
when I got out of the service and that's kind
of what we did. I mean, there was no money, there
was no interest in doing what we were doing,
which was health and wellness and connection,
right? So running groups, CrossFit, et cetera.
That wasn't sexy. It wasn't suicide prevention
per se. It wasn't homelessness eradication. It
was just like, you're getting veterans together
to run and work out. Okay. And it took us a number
of years of doing it in small pockets and then
kind of scaling it out using a chapter model
to where finally we could go back to the beltway
and say, hey, this is undeniable how well it's
working. Yeah, I don't know if there's an opportunity
to do that, but it would be amazing to think
some community somewhere could really dig in
and do this right and then try to export that
model or at least influence the rest. Yeah, there's
departments that are doing certain things well.
And I think this is what we've got to we've got
to understand that we're completely siloed, just
like you pointed out cities and counties. And
then you've got to realize that you have to get
rid of ego. I mean, the number of departments
I know that the county and city don't even talk
to each other or FD and PD, which is. insane
so having that humility to then go in different
places in the country and say well you're doing
strength and conditioning really well well you've
got a really good mental health program tell
me about your work week and this is what's happening
now with the work week specifically in florida
there's a revolution where departments are finally
getting it and there's i just had a phone call
with with a department out your way that wants
to look at going to it too so that there is this
happening and i think those shiny examples at
the beginning were like well yeah but we just
did it We just, you know, all this money was
being wasted downstream. Enough is enough. We're
struggling to hire good people. So we took that
downstream money and we put it up front. And
here we are. So, I mean, that's exactly what
you're saying. And then the more departments
that do that kind of thing, the more you debunk
the fairy tales that this will never happen.
They'll never go for it. We don't have the money
because, you know, largely that's complete BS.
It's just about having the courage to say. This
isn't working. How can we do it differently?
Yeah, that's it. I'll give you a small example.
When I was on a team, when I was in Special Forces,
when I first took over my team, our unit had
just come back from a deployment. So we were
in kind of a red cycle where you're just kind
of not doing much. You don't have much budget
for things. But I was new to the team and I didn't
want to just finish all my training and not do
anything for a while. So I was really eager to
get the team out and do some training. I had
to beat around the bushes a lot to find dollars,
to find ammo, to find ranges that were available.
And it wasn't easy, but that was my job. That
was what I was there for. And over a few months,
we would be kind of rolling off post to go to
some other adjacent base somewhere in Virginia
or something to do some training. And people
would be scratching their heads saying like,
I thought there was no off post training. I thought
there was no ammo. What's the deal? How come
they're allowed to do that? And the truth was,
it wasn't that we were special or given special
dispensation. It was just that. My team sergeant
and I were digging around trying to find ways
to get out and train. And when we couldn't find
ways or dollars to go do that, we were out in
the woods in the back 40 doing individual movement
tactics and things that were often deemed too
kind of lame or basic for SF guys. And eventually
that started to get some traction and people
would say, hey, maybe there are some ways to
get out and do this. Beautiful. Well, speaking
of, you know, SF and your deployments kind of
left you off at Iraq. One question I like to
ask people who have been deployed and the backstory
is simply when you are not in the military, you
get a very polarized view of war. You know, you
have the one side, you know, kill them all, let
God sort them out, stack bodies. And then you
have the other side. There are a bunch of baby
killers. And in the middle are our men and women,
arguably children that we send off, you know,
with our flag on their shoulder. So the two part
question. Firstly, as you touched on, this wasn't
actually a direct response to what happened in
New York and the Pentagon. Was there a moment
where you witnessed some atrocities where you
realized that there were some horrific people
that did need to be taken care of? Yes. Yeah.
I mean, and I saw the full spectrum. As you said,
it's not black and white. I remember crossing
the Berm in southern Iraq from Kuwait. And this
was after kind of the ground war. So we weren't.
You know, we weren't nervous about being attacked
or anything. But the first few towns we drove
through in Southern Iraq were just so dirt poor.
It was hard for me growing up in the States to
even imagine. I mean, some of the people lived
in little huts that were made out of dung, you
know, from cows or whatever. And I used to wear
a rubber band on my left wrist when I was deployed.
I would snap it to like wake me up, to make me
remember like this is not a drill. This is not
training. Uh, this is don't get complacent basically.
And I would, I would use it to help me remember
things that were important. And I remember I
made a promise to myself on that very first day
that I would never forget what that looked like
and smelled like and felt like to see those people.
And these people had nothing to do with anything.
They were just really, really dirt poor people
living in, uh, in Southern Iraq. And you eventually
get up there and you get involved in things and
you see stuff that you're like, wow, maybe, maybe
some of what we're doing is really agitating
these people and they might not otherwise want
to be killing us. Um, and then you see things
that are just pure evil. You know, I can, I can
remember, um, seeing some of like the sectarian
violence in Iraq where like these people were
killing each other. And you're like, I was stunned
by that. I was stunned to get there and to learn
that, you know, cause you think it's. you know,
it's Iraq versus Iran in their war, or it's,
you know, Arabs versus Israelis. That all kind
of makes sense simply in your head. And then
you get there and you think, well, maybe it's
the Sunni versus the Shia. And you get a little
bit more nuanced understanding. And then you
realize, no, it's like this tribe over here doesn't
like that tribe right over there because they
have some longstanding family history. And it's
just, it's absolutely, it was beyond my imagination
how brutal. Some of these people could be barbaric
to one another. I remember there was one day
that we were out doing reconnaissance and there'd
been a big attack along a major route and some
contractors, you know, their trucks, supply trucks
had been hit. And we went back to help secure
the site and just seeing what some of these folks
had done to these poor American contractors that
were just driving trucks, you know, just mutilating
them, you know, hanging them from. telephone
wires and stuff. It's just like, it's hard to
see how that's not just pure evil. And there's
a part of me to this day that wants to think
like, well, what has that person's life been
like? And how did they get to be that way? And
why were they out doing that kind of stuff? But
certainly in the moment, you just want, you want
to get out there and find every one of those
people. And we saw some things in Afghanistan
later when I was in SF that, you know, just people
would come to our clinic. And you would see things
where, you know, there'd be violence from a father
against a daughter. You know, there was a girl
that came into our clinic that had had like a
big pot, like a boiling pot of hot chai tea,
like thrown on her by her father because she
had done something, I guess, to bring some dishonor.
And she was just severely burned. And you see
that kind of thing and you just think what, you
know, what is going on? And I will tell you that.
Right or wrong, the military does a job to try
to desensitize you, to convince you that the
enemy is other, that the enemy is an inhuman,
that you should want to go and breach doors and
put rounds between their eyes. And there are
people, I think, that I came across in instances
where it felt like that was absolutely the right
thing to do. And you see some things like that
and you think, you know, maybe there's something
to this. And then you see other things that are
just these incredibly beautiful, generous acts
of humanity. And it's really hard to get your
head around in the moment. And it's very, very
hard to reconcile afterwards because you have
to reconcile not just what you've seen and what
you've experienced personally. You know, I lost
several friends that were under my command. But
then you have to somehow make sense of that with
the fact that these people are humans and the
things that you did. You know, there's a lot
of things I look back now many years later and
I think, boy, things I said and did when I was
in that headspace, in that environment, pretty
aggressive, pretty brutal. And it's okay. I forgive
myself for it. I know what I was doing then and
why it was that way. But it's a lot. It's a lot
to get your head around. The other side of the
coin that we don't hear about either is the kindness
and compassion. you know that not only from our
men and women in uniform but also a lot of the
indigenous people so you reflect about both of
those countries what were moments that really
stuck with you wow well that's a big question
thank you thank you for asking um yeah things
that just popped to mind i can remember having
interpreters that were there that just loved
their country both in iraq and afghanistan that
for all the flaws had such a deeply rooted belief
in their country and in their people that were
willing to risk their lives in ways that we weren't,
frankly. They were taking so much risk, not just
out on missions with us, but on the drive to
and from the base and in their homes. And many
of them had families taken from them or families
killed. To see that kind of patriotism and that
kind of commitment and just courage was... awe
-inspiring in many cases. I think about our interpreters
a lot. I lost an interpreter, Iman Fakhry in
Afghanistan, who was from Kabul, came from a
nice family, didn't have to be there doing that.
Could have probably kept himself safe and was
killed in the line of duty. So there's certainly
that. There are also a lot of really small gestures
from people that were probably scared, probably
frustrated with us driving around and breaking
things in our Humvees or tanks or whatever that
would offer us a cold drink. or some food, people
who had very little. In both those cultures,
in the Arab culture and in the Pashtun culture,
there is a deeply rooted, pre -Islam even, sense
of generosity and hospitality that is still very
much alive in a lot of that world. I'll stop
short of getting involved in religious conversation,
but culturally, there are really deeply rooted
veins of both the Arab and the Pashtun culture
that are just absolutely beautiful. and some
of which exist today. And it's just a shame that
through corruption and subtle other factors,
so many aspects of that part of the world are
so dangerous and so dysfunctional because it's
not like most of the people there aren't humans
just like you and I who have many of the same
kind of hopes and dreams that we do. I was talking
to someone the other day. kind of been pondering
this for quite a while now when we talk about
evolution of man we always focus on innovation
you know the wheel and fire and you know the
industrial revolution and now you know computers
and ai and these terrifying robots that you see
punching chinese people in demonstrations um
but uh i disagree completely i think that the
evolution of man is kindness and compassion if
you look at how brutal you know our history was
And so, you know, you have these cultures all
over the world. And if left alone, I mean, look
at even just take Christianity. You've got the
Old Testament, kind of brutal, kind of revenge
based. And then you have the New Testament, you
know, love everyone, get amongst all the people
that are struggling in your community and raise
them up. But that can also be interpreted as,
you know, hang black people from trees, for example.
So when the toxicity of a corrupt human being.
gets involved with the religion, and we've seen
it. It can be turned completely. But I think
that goes against the evolution of man. And this
is why it's so important to see the good that
all the militaries around the world that are
coming from a good place are trying to do is
move that needle. And there are some cultures,
including our own, that have taken steps backwards.
And I think we need to kind of refine the nucleus
of all these holy books and other... doctrine
that people subscribe to to move us back towards
this this community this kindness and this empathy
that we've you know i think we've lost even even
in the u .s if you look at the screens it's kind
of devoid yeah i don't know how much time you
have james this is a rabbit hole i would gladly
go down with you for as long as you want i uh
i agree with you wholeheartedly i've seen it
um i've experienced it so there are certain things
that i just sort of i I know it's only my experience,
but I have enough reps at a lot of things to
kind of know them to be true, at least in my
own heart, my own experience. And, you know,
our ability to cooperate on a massive scale and
our ability to love and care for one another
and to spread these ideas essentially of human
dignity and decency and worth, they're not. They're
not present in early human history. These are
new things that we've invented, right? As you
say, these are real inventions. This is an evolution
of the human spirit to be able to care for one
another and cooperate and to have compassion
for somebody across the globe that maybe you've
never met, but you can somehow kind of connect
to. And, you know, I didn't grow up a spiritual
person and certainly not a religious person,
but... Over the last couple of years, I've really
four or five years, I've been on a bit of a journey
to understand and read as many kind of from as
many traditions and spiritual texts as I can.
And you see common threads throughout. And it's
hard to not believe some of those things are
kind of true with a capital T when you just see
them over and over again. And, you know, I think
we've lost our way a bit in America because we've
made some mistakes. We've made lots of mistakes
from, you know, the history, you know. Pre -revolutionary
war. We've done lots of things wrong. There are
a lot of things we could look at throughout the
history of America and the United States and
say, that's terrible. We should be ashamed of
that. I'm aware of that. And I think about it
a lot. I also think that for better or worse,
we created the greatest country on the face of
the planet and throughout human history and have
created the most opportunity for the most humans
globally. We have something, at least a nucleus,
as you said, of something worth fighting for.
I decided a year or so ago that as ugly as it
is and as hard as it is right now, I believe
in America. I'm not going to look away from our
faults and our flaws or try to erase them, but
I'm also not going to look away from all the
amazing and beautiful things we've done as a
country and the potential we have to do in the
future. I'm in. I'm all in on America. I'll do
whatever I can to make my community and my country
better. You know, my family and I started, we
went back to church several months ago and we
just said, hey, I don't know if every word of
this is true. I don't know if all these stories
are exactly literally true, but I know how I
feel when I'm here. I know how good it is for
my daughter to hear that God loves her. I can
feel the kinship and the brother and sisterhood.
And so, yeah, I'm in. You know, it may not be
perfect. You know, Christians may have done lots
of horrible things throughout human history and
maybe doing many horrible things today. This
is the best we got right now as far as I'm concerned,
so I'm just going to invest in it. And I think
you don't have to pick America. You don't have
to pick Christianity. But I think there's something
really powerful in saying, I'm going to find
something that aligns with my true sense of what's
right, what's wrong, what's good in this world,
and I'm going to invest in it. I'm going to stick
with it and try to make it the best I can, understanding
it's not perfect. if you want to spend the rest
of your life shooting holes in American history
and the American experiment, you're not going
to run out of opportunities. There's plenty of
them or, or Buddhism or Christianity or Islam
or whatever. But if you don't, I think find something
as we talked about at the beginning of our conversation
that you care enough about to believe in and
invest in and commit to and make it as good as
you can make it. You're just going to be another
one of these grumpy people on the internet, you
know? There's so many smart people out there
that use all their smarts to find how everything's
broken and point holes and how everything doesn't
make sense. And it's like, if that's how you
want to use your God -given intellect and capability,
go ahead. But you would be better off, you know,
cooking a meal, sitting down and talking to your
family, shaking your neighbor's hand, deadlifting.
you know, and doing something worthwhile with
your life. So, you know, my life is imperfect.
I make lots of mistakes and anybody can point
out all the ways in which I'm doing that. But
like, I'm doing it in earnest, you know, at least
I'm giving it a go. One of my guests is quite
a while ago now made a really interesting point.
He said, America is the commercial for democracy.
If you watch that commercial, how much would
you invest in it? And I thought that was such
an interesting perspective. And it's not, again,
doom and gloom. But when you identify the things
that need to be fixed, then you can actually
start fixing them. So you bring a solution to
it. But, you know, there's that tongue in cheek
Team America World Police kind of mentality.
And it's very true. But I think really what we
need is Team America World first responders,
because if we actually could address the things
that we need to address within our own nation,
within our own community, within our own homes.
and really have a healthy population, address
the mental health crisis, hopefully make a dent
in some of the poor environmental decisions that
we've made, then other nations would look to
us, but how did you do that? And then I think
we'd have a lot more success in maybe spreading
some of this, what's the right way of putting
it, this idea. was thought of and this freedom
and the ability like you said to be any profession
and to vote and be educated and all these things
that we do have but I think if you're someone
on the outside and you're looking in and you're
seeing 70 % obesity and overweight and the fentanyl
crisis and we have a quarter of the entire world's
incarcerated populations and school shootings
and you're like you should do what we do I understand
why people are like that sounds a bit shit actually
so I think what Each and every one of us has
the power to do is say, you know, you're right.
We need to start fixing us. You want to change
the world, start a home. We're so busy pointing
at Fox or CNN or Trump or Biden, these people
that don't give a shit about you. And rather
than looking in the mirror and go, how can I
be a better husband? How can I be a better father?
How can I mentor someone in my own community
and raise them up? You know, how can we help
collectively get that gentleman under the bridge
off the streets and into somewhere where he can
live? then I think you'd move mountains. But
it's so easy to point a finger because it doesn't
involve you doing anything. You're pointing away
from yourself. What is it they say when you point
a finger, there's one away and three facing towards
you or pointing towards you? I think that's the
beautiful opportunity we have in America. Imagine
the good we could do if we were a shining example
of democracy. That would permeate across the
planet. Yeah, of course it would. We talk a lot,
Brandon and I, about how it's amazing how much
winning solves. When things are going well, suddenly
everybody's interested in what you have to sell.
And so you got to kind of sweep your own front
porch first with those kinds of things. This
is true at the individual level though, right?
And you said those people don't give a shit about
you. I tend to agree. I mean, I think there are
good politicians out there and I don't think
all federal entities are doing a terrible job.
But I would say that if you're waiting on anybody
to fix anything for you, you're going to be waiting
the rest of your life. And there are some really
cool ways in which we're seeing some of this.
And some of it's been a little kind of corrupted
in the manosphere, unfortunately. But I do love
this kernel of a thing that's starting to build
where there are more and more people saying,
look, I'm going to. get as healthy, as strong
as I can, I'm going to invest in my own skills.
And I don't care whether you're sort of a hipster,
like homesteader, or whether you're like a jujitsu
enthusiast, tactical games athlete, like, all
of that is coming from a similar place, which
is I'm going to figure out a way to become more
self reliant. And I'm going to be where my feet
are. And I'm going to invest in my for myself
and my family and my community and kind of grow
out from there. Because I I think there's little
else we can do. And that's almost always been
the case. It just feels a little different right
now. Because the truth of the matter is, if you
try to do anything at the scale of a place like
America, hundreds of millions of people, you're
going to eventually make decisions that choose
sort of efficiency or economy over quality. You
can't help but do that. And so to expect it to
do anything different, I think is just a little
bit foolish. So you don't ever want to let go
of your physical. or your personal agency. Because
when the machine gets big enough, it's going
almost of its own volition. It's going to decide
that it wants economy and efficiency over quality.
And you have to retain the right to kind of dig
into the quality. And if you, you know, I hate
to sound judgmental, but if you just go to anywhere,
anywhere in America, any restaurant, bowling
alley, shopping mall, et cetera. I was just at
Universal Studios in Orlando this past weekend
with my family. We had an awesome time. But if
you just look around and soften your gaze a little
bit, it's not a pretty picture. You know, I saw
a family of six. We were waiting for our dinner
reservation to open up and there was a family
of six there. It was like two adults and four
kids between probably 10 and 16. Six for six
on their phone, you know, watching YouTube, watching
a show, kind of slack jawed, you know, head forward,
overweight. I'm sure they're wonderful people.
I've, you know, I want the best for them, but
to see that you're here together as a family
and you're just kind of standing around staring
at these, these, you know, just, you're completely
entranced and boy, you know, that's hard. That's
hard to see and not think like, well, there's
a, there's a logical extent to where this goes.
And if we're not willing to walk it back a little
bit or, or turn the ship, that's probably not
a good, good ending. Yeah, well, I think there's
this kind of fat shaming conversation. I think
most people miss the point. Yes, there are some
nasty human beings that make fun of people that
are overweight, but we all know that they're
just dying inside and they need help, you know,
themselves, the people making fun of the people
that are overweight. But most of this conversation
is coming from a place of empathy. It's coming
from a place of kindness. Like, you know, imagine
if you were able to go and truly. kick the ball
around with your kids, and they had the capacity
to do it, and you as a 50 -year -old dad could
still do it, that's being robbed from you because
of the environment you're in and the choices
that you've made because of that environment.
And then you think about it from a national security
point of view. You don't think that certain enemies
of the country are also looking in Walmart and
bowling alleys and Universal Studios and going,
all right, just keep waiting. There's going to
be a time when we're just going to walk in. Yeah,
there's lots of guns, but I don't know if they're
going to even be able to... make the run to their
gun, to be honest. And I'm being facetious, but
it's true. The national security impact of this,
we've got all these people passionately talking
about Second Amendment and all that stuff, but
we have an obesity crisis. So those two don't
go hand in hand. I mean, I'm talking to a subject
matter expert. I've done basal level weapons
training. And yeah, if you don't have the physical
capacity and the ability to calm your mind, just
like we were talking about with golf, and someone
walks into your child's school or Walmart, then
you're not going to be effective. You're telling
yourself a lie. So no matter how you look at
it, whether it's police and fire, whether it's
our civilians. There's such a beautiful opportunity
to start at home and then permeate out. And,
you know, when you are a healthier human being,
you will most likely be a happier human being.
Your children are going to watch you in CrossFit
and jujitsu doing the tactical games. They're
going to start mirroring what you do. And then
you've domino effect in a positive way. But it
breaks my heart when you see these kids. And
I was a stuntman at Universal for 20 years. I
just finished the Bourne stunt show there about
two years ago. And so I saw it every single day.
And these poor kids are doomed because they're
obese at eight years old. You're telling your
child, all right, we're going to set you 12 steps
back in life because of the way that we're feeding
you. So this is what drives me crazy when there's
all this vitriol about these politicians. I just
want someone to say, hey, we have a massive health
crisis in this country. I know RFK has been brought
in, but I'm talking about the people that we're
supposed to be choosing from. Talk about the
health crisis. Talk about the fentanyl crisis.
Talk about the homelessness, the things that
are actually affecting every single person. Because
if you're talking about Ukraine and China and
all these countries that the average person has
no influence on at all, as you said, there'll
be keyboard warriors about it, but it involves
them doing nothing. There needs to be a call
to action for all of us to retain our health
and then create an environment that allows people
to make good choices. If you, you know, if PE
is canceled in your kid's school and they're
serving pizza and lunch, what are the chances
of that kid being, you know, an athlete when
they're older? We're not doing our kids any favor
at all. No, it's the kids that I feel the worst
for by far. And, you know, we moved from Florida
to Maine a couple of years ago for lots of reasons,
many of them kind of personal and family reasons.
But one of the things I love so much about being
here is that, you know. For example, it's very
cold today. There's snow everywhere. And my daughter
for PE today is snowshoeing. So they have, you
know, dozens of second graders out there. It's
freezing cold and they just bundle up and they
go snowshoeing. Last week they went sledding.
This is real stuff. You know, and you look at
their, the food they have in the morning, they
say the kids can have, you know, they can only
have one thing with sugar in it and they have
to have two other things. And it's not perfect,
but at least there's some humanity in it still.
There's some involvement from the staff and the
teachers and the parents and the community. And
perhaps it's because we live in a smaller place
and, you know, it's not a major metro per se.
But, you know, you said happy, which I think
is a sort of an elusive word, but I would say
fulfilled or joyful. People don't really know
how fulfilled and joyful they can be doing somewhat
ordinary things until they strip away so many
of these kind of distractions that are numbing
us. And I think kids are being robbed of it first
and foremost, but I see it with so many adults
too. I see it even in myself from time to time
between looking at my phone or drinking a beer
or watching TV. I mean, I've got limitless opportunities
to sort of dull or numb myself or amuse myself
to where I don't get the same fulfillment that
I get from a good hard workout or growing my
own strawberries in our garden. To see my daughter
with a basket full of vegetables that she picked
from our garden that she spent time working on,
that's not a kid that feels like they got a raw
deal. That smile is saying like, I did this.
I made this. I'm going to go cut this up. I'm
going to wash this and cut it for dinner. There's
a level of joy and fulfillment there that cannot
be replicated in a video game or something else.
And other than just telling people, just have
more discipline. It's very hard. Because there
are, you know, I'm not a big government guy by
any stretch of the imagination, but if no one
is looking out for people or putting guardrails
on some of these things, we're totally screwed.
I mean, I have two teenage sons, both of whom
have effectively unlimited access to the internet,
which is everything from porn on down. They have
unlimited access to vapes, you know, nicotine,
cannabis, you name it. I don't know how I'm supposed
to tell these kids like, hey, you should be in
the gym more, you should run more, you should
study more, you should read more books, when
they are living in a world where at their fingertips,
they have unlimited access to things that feel
good in the moment and like numb and dull their
experience of the world. It's heartbreaking.
It's heartbreaking for me as their dad, and it's
heartbreaking to see it broadly. And if we don't
have somebody at the government level who's willing
to stand in and say, hey, we can't keep feeding
this to people. Hey, you got to put a warning
label on that. Hey, that should be inaccessible
to kids. And you see little things like the jewel
pods. And I'm cool with that. I'm glad that we're
seeing some traction. But if we, this stuff is
insanely powerful, you know, social media algorithms,
nicotine, like what are we doing to get our arms
around this stuff? Because once it gets its claws
in anybody, kid or adult. Again, look around,
just go into your community and look around and
find somebody who's not vaping, drinking, taking
THC gummies, looking at their phone. Like you
can't find them. They almost don't exist. We've
all just been like mainline to this stuff. And
it's like, well, individual responsibility. You're
not going to find somebody, James, who's bigger
on individual responsibility than I am. And I'm
here to tell you, if we just go laissez faire
on all this stuff, like we're screwed. Everyone's
nuked. Well, if you watch the documentary, The
Social Dilemma that they did on social media,
the number of I think it was all men in this
case that were behind programming these apps
that literally said they had to lock away their
phones from themselves, from their children.
They know the complete inner workings of them,
and they still were getting the same kind of
dopamine hits and the addictive qualities. So
they banned their kids from using them until
they were 16. And you're saying that I think
Australia has moved it to 16 now for social media.
I think Florida went to 14, if I'm not mistaken.
So there's starting to be some of this on the
social media side. But again, kind of just to
underline what you said. I'm absolutely drawn
to these. I mean, I use the phone to promote
the podcast. And there's times where I'm meditating
again now. That is an absolute antidote to being
drawn into social media. But when I wasn't and
I had the monkey brain going on, same thing.
When there was a moment where I wasn't doing
anything, I'd reach for the phone. And I'm not
even a big scroller, but I check emails. I check
messages. I check, again, someone's giving me
some sort of interaction that will give you that
dopamine and serotonin and all that. all the
hits that we get so addicted to. So if we manage
to do without social media for millennia, it's
not going to kill you to just tell your child,
hey, you know, I'll give you access to apps that
will allow you to learn and explore. But these
social media ones, you just don't need them.
You do not need them because even the adults
on there are not the adults that you need to
be mimicking. Trust me. Most of them are narcissistic
shitbags that really need to do some self -work
and get off social media. I agree. All right.
Well, I want to get to what you're doing now.
So let's hit the transition. You went to the
SF community. What made you decide to transition
out of the military? And then again, the... The
transition itself can be very jarring to a lot
of people. You've had this tribe, you've had
this purpose, you've had this identity. What
made you transition out? And then what was your
experience like personally? Sure. So I mentioned
earlier, I didn't really intend on staying in
beyond my five years. I never saw myself having
a career in the military. And then the events
of 9 -11 and the events thereafter really pulled
me into the special forces community. And so
I went and did that. Looked like I was going
to end up doing at least about nine years, probably
on active duty, given my training and additional
commitment there. And I still kind of thought
maybe I would move on. I actually, while I was
on a team, went and interviewed and applied for
a job teaching at West Point. So I would finish
my time up in the Special Forces community as
a commander, go to some grad school and then
go teach at West Point, which was really appealing
to me for lots of reasons. Some of them family
reasons, but also because I really wanted an
opportunity to kind of invest in the cadets and
be in that environment. And sort of last minute,
the Special Forces branch kind of unceremoniously
just denied my by name request to go do that
job. And so and it was right before I was getting
ready to deploy for the last time. And it made
me realize that I really loved soldiers and I
love soldiering, but I didn't really love the
army. And they didn't love me either, you know.
And at the time, I had a young son who I was
basically not around for because he was born
while I was in the Q course, the Special Forces
qualification course. And for the first few years
of his life, I was just kind of gone all the
time. And then I had another son who was on the
way as I left for my last deployment. So my then
wife was pregnant with him. And we just decided
like, hey, this is going to be it. You know,
I'll finish up my time on a team. And once I,
you know, kind of relinquish command and finish
this up, we'll transition out of the Army and
turn the page and do the next thing. And then
on that last deployment, and I alluded to this
earlier. Four of my teammates and one of our
interpreters was killed in a span of about eight
days. And that was obviously a very difficult
and intense experience. And my son, I didn't
know if I was going to ever meet my son because
it was not looking good there for a while. I'll
just put it that way. But I made it back home.
My son was born a week or two after I got home
from that deployment. And I'd already let the
command know I was planning on transitioning
out. And James, it wasn't this way, but this
is how it felt. I felt like I had a great Army
career, had done a really great job, and went
on my last deployment, got my ass kicked, and
then I just sort of quit. Which, again, was not
my plan. It's not really what happened, but that's
how it felt for a long time. And it didn't sit
well with me to finish my career that way, which
was otherwise a really, you know, exciting and
fun and successful career. And I think, you know,
my wife and I felt like we had these two very
young boys and we were going to kind of turn
the page and move to Florida and get a real job
and have a swimming pool. And everything was
going to be awesome now that we didn't have this
pesky army thing on our back anymore. And that
was stupid. I mean, we just didn't, we didn't
have our act together. We didn't know what we
didn't know. Things were very different back
then. This was 2010. And we just didn't have
enough conversations about what we expected from
life beyond military. We didn't work together
on some of the finer points of what we expected
from one another and what life was going to be
like and all of that. And the short version of
a very long story is that our marriage kind of
fell apart a couple of years after getting out
of the Army. I was working in a healthcare sales
job, which paid me really well. It was a pretty
good job. I didn't hate it, but it was nothing
like being an SF officer. So I was really struggling
on the inside with who I was as a person and
what I was going to do with the rest of my life.
I felt a lot of guilt and shame about my teammates
being killed because they were my responsibility.
Now I'm just really torn up on the inside. I
didn't know what to do about it. And it seems
silly now, but at the time... I couldn't really
put my finger on what was bothering me. I just
had kind of this general malaise. I wasn't like
super crazy angry or like, you know, having night
sweats every night. I just had kind of a, man,
I just don't feel very enthusiastic about life,
you know, and I feel more frustrated and irritable,
you know. And then our marriage fell apart fairly
quickly, or it was probably one of those deals
where it kind of happened a little at a time
and then all at once, you know. But I found myself
very quickly as a single dad who had gone from
being a very successful kid, a West Point cadet,
graduated high in my class, became an SF officer,
was always ranked at the top of my peer group,
to being a medical sales guy who maybe had been
a bad officer who got his friends killed, and
a bad husband whose wife left him, and a bad
dad who wasn't with his kids every night anymore.
And it really, really beat me up. And I finally
said, oh, this isn't working. So I went in the
front door of the Tampa VA and asked some nice
lady in sneakers, like, hey, could I get signed
up for something here? I feel like maybe I need
to talk to somebody. They were actually really
good to me. I have a pretty good news VA story.
I know a lot of people don't, but they were good
to me. And they got me set up with an ID card
and enrolled in care. You know, a few weeks later,
I went to my first appointment to see a doc at
the polytrauma clinic at the Tampa VA. And I
went and saw Dr. A every Monday morning at 7
a .m. for several months. And he really helped
me to realize that, you know, I was a normal
person that had been through some pretty abnormal
stuff. And I was doing my best and that there
was a path forward. And I started working out
again pretty vigorously and running every morning.
you know, trying to be really present with my
kids on the 50 % of the time or whatever that
I had them. And, um, the biggest thing is I,
maybe not the biggest thing, but another big
thing is I went out and tried to start making
friends. And so I felt very isolated when I left
the military. I just kind of me and my family,
and it wasn't, it wasn't fair to me or to them
or anybody to try to live life that way. But
I didn't really know how to make friends outside
the military. I'd been in the military my entire
adult life. And, uh, I certainly didn't know
how to date. That was a whole separate thing.
But I just started going out to running clubs
at local pubs in South Tampa. And I immediately
made friends. And it felt good to be out in the
sunshine running and making friends and maybe
having a glass of beer afterwards. It felt weird,
but it felt great. And I was reminded that I
wasn't a shitty person. People liked me, you
know, and they wanted to invite me to things
and sometimes laughed at my jokes and some, some
girls thought I was handsome and it just, it,
I had to put myself out there and I started playing
rec soccer and CrossFit and yeah, trajectory
of my life bent, bent pretty positive pretty
quickly, but it was a pretty dark, deep bottom
to kind of wake me up and get me moving in the
right direction. Did you ever get to that point
of suicide ideation? No, I can honestly say I
didn't. I felt at times very rudderless and kind
of hopeless, but I feel very fortunate that I
never felt like me going away or ending my life
would be the best thing to do. And I don't know
why that was the case for me. Again, I feel very
fortunate that though I struggled mightily, I
never got to that point. Yeah, I was fortunate.
I had parents I could lean on. I went and spent
a couple days with my folks when my ex -wife
said, hey, this is it. I don't want to do this
anymore. I didn't really know what to do, and
I was very lucky that I could call up my parents,
and they were a couple hours away, and I said,
can I just come stay with you for the weekend?
Maybe you can help me think through what I need
to do now. My dad had just retired, and I would
call him almost every day when I was out making
my sales calls, driving around the state of Florida.
you know, and just to have someone to talk to.
I started calling up old army buddies and West
Point classmates and saying, hey, just to talk
to them, not to say like, hey, my life's falling
apart. Can you help me? And I was very lucky
that I had all those people in my life. But I
will also say that I had to pick up the phone
and make those calls. No one just said, I'm going
to lasso you and bring you to this running club,
or I'm going to force you in the front doors
of the VA and make you go to therapy. Or I'm
going to reach out to a friend I haven't talked
to in five years to say what's up. I had to do
all that. And it was very, very uncomfortable.
So I give myself credit for that at this point.
But I also realized how very lucky I was to have
people I could talk to and that could buoy me
a little bit when I was in a really bad spot.
It's really interesting. It's not an absolute
correlation, but it's extremely strong. A lot
of people that have been on the show that have
been in that darkest of places. I mean, they're
literally sitting there holding the weapon and
the bottle of whiskey. More often than not, there
is an element of childhood trauma, you know,
and some of it is sexual abuse. Some of it's,
you know, one parent was never there, whatever
it was. And it seems to be that when someone
still was struggling because you're going to
you've been through war, you've been a firefighter,
whatever your thing is. but they never got to
that lowest of places, a lot of times it's because
that childhood was kind of, that was that strong
foundation. And this is, I think, a really important
takeaway for us. You can have struggles when
you were younger, but if you're in an environment
that allowed you to process it when you were
that age or shortly after, those struggles, I
believe, become resilience and they become strength.
But if they're buried down and locked away. then
that's a crack in your foundation. I think that's
why we see a lot of our men and women struggle
to that depth sometimes. And they've only been
on two, three years because we're not looking
at those formative years as part of this overall
picture when it comes to not feeling suicidal
or sadly at the other side of the coin, the overdoses
and the suicides that we see. I totally agree.
Totally agree. The complex trauma is what really
gets a lot of folks. I remember taking the adverse
childhood events battery, the ACE or ACEs thing,
and my score was zero. I had a wonderful childhood.
It wasn't perfect, but my parents loved me and
they were there and I had a good childhood. And
I then had the ability to lean on them a little
bit and my friends when it mattered most. And
I think also... You know, again, not to like
toot my own horn here too much, but one of the
other things that I recognized immediately was
the temptation to be shitty to other people because
I felt so unfairly treated by the world and by
my ex -wife. And I felt like I really got screwed
in my life. I was having this kind of unfair
outcome. And there was just a little voice inside
my head that said, hey, this doesn't give you
an excuse to be shitty to other people. You know,
even your ex -wife who you're angry with, like
you're going to have to be decent to her. in
perpetuity, even if you don't want to be. You
can't take this out on your kids, which was hard
at times too. I was imperfect there for sure.
You can't take this out on other women. You can't
go out and just be an asshole to women and use
and abuse them, which was probably available
to me at the time. Again, I don't know where
that voice came from. I don't know if it was
my parents or just morality or what it was, but
I, again, feel very, very lucky that I did not
spiral uncontrollably. because I felt very, very
much at the bottom. And I suppose it could have
been worse. I think that circles around to what
we're talking about as far as compassion, empathy,
and evolution. You know, that part of this whole
conversation is the mental health crisis that
we're in. And there's a lot of multi -generational
trauma in the world. I mean, this is my, I just
finished my book last year, the second one. And
it's arguably almost a historical fiction, but
it's a modern day firefighter and it goes back
and he's learning about his father and his grandfather.
And this is so many people. It's not just what
was your childhood like? Well, you know, one
of your parents left or they were alcoholics
or whatever, right? What was their childhood
like? What was their childhood like? And if you
go back, I mean, you think about the fallacy
that was told about World War II, that these
men and women just went overseas, you know, fought
in trenches, saw horrors, you know, liberated
death camps. And then just came back and rolled
up their sleeves and were good to go. And then
that's bullshit. You listen to these people and
granddad was an absolute mess and he slapped
around grandma and he was an alcoholic. Not always.
I mean, there were some people that absolutely
function, but you had that same spectrum back
then too, you know, war is hell. So having that
compassion and empathy and starting to look back
and like you said, forgive yourself, whatever
your upbringing was. But then realize now as
you are listening, as a parent, as a grandparent,
whatever you are, that you have the ability to
do the work on yourself and stop passing that
trauma to the next generation. I think that's
a big part of this overall kindness equation.
I think it's got to be. And this is true within
your family, but it's true with your neighbors,
too. You know, if you're a little bit curious
and you wonder, like, why did that person just
get so fired up about that one thing? It's probably
not just because they were born an asshole. There's
there's something there. You know, there's a
limit to what you put up with other people's
bullshit. And I get that. But I mean, just just
the posture itself of saying, like, people are
probably trying to do their best and they're
probably not trying to harm you. Try to understand
maybe where they're coming from, I think, goes
a long, long way. And again, starts with yourself
and your partner and your kids. And it's tough.
I mean, I think about a lot the fact that. I
grew up with a pretty solid childhood, and then
I think about my two sons from my first marriage
who were growing up with divorced parents. We've
done our best by them, and I certainly think
I'm a good dad, but it really pains me. I lose
a lot of sleep at night. Are my kids going to
fare as well as I did when they run up against
life's big challenges because they had a divorce,
which we know even if you're trying to do your
best in a divorce, it harms kids. It's hard on
kids. You know, again, I try to sleep at night.
I generally sleep pretty good. But, you know,
these are things that I think we should be concerned
about. Yeah, absolutely. I'm the same. My son
was three when we got divorced. And again, I
bent over backwards to be the best father I could
be. But it doesn't change the fact that he had
to live in two houses simultaneously and bounce
back and forth and, you know, see. When relationships
didn't go well, you know, with the new partners
in the households and deal with that. I mean,
it's there's so much. And so, yeah, I mean, the
guilt and shame that you could put on yourself
is horrendous. But, you know, there are also
some things that are out of your control and
the situation is just dictated that way. And
so now you've got to kind of reassess and go,
all right, well, how can we mitigate that and
make this the best experience? And again, hopefully
turn some of his struggles into strength. as
he progresses into adulthood yeah yeah but it's
hard yeah that's so it's the hardest thing i've
ever done by a long shot i mean i've done some
really hard stuff you know and i've been good
at some things that were pretty hard and i being
a parent is just that being a divorce parent
is head and shoulders 10x the hardest thing i've
ever done yeah absolutely Well, I want to get
to what you're doing now. So talk to me about,
you mentioned about the medical company, when
you and Brandon met, and then let's walk through
to the leadership and the book. Sure. Yeah. So
the brief history is I got pulled out of that
healthcare sales job by a friend of mine named
Mike, who I'd worked with in third group, who
started this organization right here, if you're
on the screen, Team RWB, which is a veteran serving
nonprofit. And I got asked to quit my job and
be the first employee, the first executive director
of that organization. So I leapt at the opportunity.
It was right when I was getting divorced. I just
kind of said, heck, let's just start fresh here.
And so I went off and became a nonprofit leader
for five years. And that brought me a tremendous
amount of purpose. You know, I was building this
kind of nonprofit startup. So I was very engaged
at work. I was very engaged in the work we were
doing. I cared greatly about serving veterans
and their families. And it kind of gave me a
new lease on life. You know, I got to do something
that was hard and purposeful. And I got to work
with some people I really loved and kind of bring
them onto the team, including Brandon. Pulled
him over from healthcare sales into the nonprofit
world as well. I'm not sure if he would thank
me or curse me for that. Probably a little bit
of both. I think he thanked you, but he did underline
it was quite a pay cut. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So
that was a tremendous five years, you know, that
put me back. in the saddle. So professionally
and personally, it was huge. I met a lot of amazing
people and did a lot of cool stuff. And I learned
a ton about business and growth and leadership
in that role. I got to go to the White House
and do all kinds of cool stuff. And then I left
to go be the president of GORUCK, which you may
know, they're in Jacksonville, which was an awesome,
awesome, awesome opportunity as well. And I love
GORUCK and continue to. have a million rucksacks
at my house, several million dollars worth of
rucksacks at this point. So that was really important
to me. And it really gave me this appreciation
of leadership in the world outside of the military.
So at that point, I had the chance to be a military
leader in the special operations community and
had been through West Point. So I kind of knew
what that looked like. I had to repurpose my
skills and my perspective quite a lot in the
corporate environment. I think was able to do
that well and be successful there. Then into
the nonprofit environment, which was different
yet again. And so you start to see the common
threads and what really is foundational to leadership,
but also what's unique to certain circumstances.
My interpersonal skills, I think we're getting
very strong at that point in terms of understanding
how to communicate effectively with people in
a distributed environment and different types
of people and that kind of thing. And what I
came to realize was number one, Most of life's
big challenges are really leadership challenges.
Most of the big problems we're facing are leadership
challenges. Hunger is not a food problem. It's
a leadership problem, right? Climate's not a
science problem. It's a leadership problem. Largely,
we know what to do in life. Most of us know what
the right thing to do is most of the time. It's
just whether or not we have the fortitude to
do it, whether that's on a personal level when
it comes to discipline or whether it's on a collective
level, which requires leadership. I got really
excited about the potential of having a leadership
development company and going around and teaching
people about leadership because I thought that
was kind of the linchpin to everything. As you
maybe know, it's not that easy. I mean, there's
a zillion people on the planet that think they're
leadership experts. There's a limitless menu
of options for keynote speakers or workshops
and that kind of thing. And so I wasn't really
quite sure how I was going to go about it. And
I was doing some consulting on my own for a couple
of years and it was going okay. But then Brandon
and I had a conversation in late 2019, and we
kind of decided that it may be worth exploring
what building a real company could look like,
what building an actual brand that we were proud
of that we could lean on and do together would
look like. Because I was tired of kind of doing
it on my own. I was getting a little bit lonely
and a little bit sort of bored with, you know,
doing that. And so in early 2020, we started
Applied Leadership Partners. We had a good idea
of what we were going to do. We had a little
bit of momentum from some of Brandon's work and
the work I'd been doing in consulting. And then
three days after we launched our website, the
world shut down for COVID. And we thought maybe
it was dead in the water out of the gates. And
we were both very lucky in that I still had some
consulting work. Brandon had just started grad
school, so he was making some basic housing allowance
through the GI Bill. My wife was in the Intel
community at SOCOM, so she still had a steady
paycheck. Brandon's wife was an ER nurse. And
so we had some things working in our favor. We
were able to still sort of pay the mortgage and
give this thing some time to marinate. And we
just started reaching out to people and saying,
hey, how can we help you? Even if it's for no
money, we see people struggling throughout kind
of the COVID crisis as leaders in their businesses.
A lot of hard decisions had to be made. There
was an incredible amount of uncertainty in the
world. And we could sort of see that that's what
was really crushing people. There were some very
practical, real things that were harming people
during COVID. And I want to be clear, like people
were getting sick and people were losing their
businesses and bad things were happening. But
a lot of what we saw was people were just losing
their minds because there was so much uncertainty
about what was going on and what was true and
when things were going to change. That lack of
control and that lack of certainty was really
harming people. And so we thought, hey, how can
we speak into this in a way that's going to be
comforting and useful to people? And so we came
up with this idea of there's a distinct difference
between perseverance and endurance. And what
we're seeing is a lot of really hard, strong,
smart people trying to endure beyond the extent
of their endurance. And it's not working. And
so what would the conversation look like if we
said there's another way? What if you could understand
what's happening right now in real terms? You
could see it and recognize it in yourself and
within your team, and we could give you a little
bit of a path toward growth and adapting and
becoming that will allow you to maybe not be
the same as you are now, but maybe be better,
at least better equipped for what the world's
asking of you right now. And that seemed to be
a very refreshing and hopeful message for people.
And so we've done a ton of work over the last
five years. teaching teams, everything about
from empowerment and accountability and ownership
and difficult conversations. So we talk about
a lot of kind of garden variety, meat and potatoes,
leadership stuff. But one of the things that
we lean on over and over again, it's the reason
why we wrote the book, is that when a team and
when a leader can recognize themselves on life's
great ridgeline and they can accept where they're
at. and they can realize that it's not necessarily
unique or special or impossible it's just hard
and they may have to grow they may have to change
they may have to adapt in order to move through
what they're up against people can do that and
uh it's been received really well so far it's
been a fun message to share because we think
it's true uh it's good to see that's helping
people Talk to me about the difference between
perseverance and endurance. I know I think that
was the marathon runner example that Brandon
gave. But I mean, you know, people will be like,
oh, you know, you just kind of suffer through
and you become tougher. That is that is growth.
But there's a there's a difference that you articulate
really well in the book. Sure. Yeah, I mean,
I think that I think Brandon probably would have
described it, you know, the person that you are
at point B. when you're enduring is just an exhausted
version of the person you were at point a and
sometimes we need that sometimes it's just time
to put your shoulder to the wheel and get get
shit done um but through perseverance you know
you have to change as i said and the person you
are at point b is actually a different person
and that's because there are some significant
differences in going through real adversity over
the long timeline of your life or career. And,
you know, we think of those things as being uncertainty
or change uncertainty than acceptance choice
and growth. And so, you know, when you're doing
something that's hard and you know, it's hard,
you can suck it up and do it. And a lot of us,
a lot of people listening right now are good
at doing hard things. And the problem is when
we're good at doing hard things, we just keep
seeking out hard things to do. We think that.
You know, what we want in life is just on the
other side of the next hard thing. But that might
not be true at all. You know, what you really
want most out of life or what you need is to
take that path of becoming, to embrace the fact
that the world is uncertain and you can't control
everything, right? To accept your circumstances
for what they are, not for what you wish they
were, what they used to be, and to really embrace
that and to kind of surrender the things you
can't control. totally take ownership of the
things that you can. And then the biggest thing
is the choice. Even if you understand where you're
at and you totally accept that.