Cleared Hot - Powered By BRCC - Don't Live in the Rabbit Hole | Full Auto Friday | 5.29.2026

Episode Date: May 29, 2026

Two questions this week, plus a video I've been asked about more than anything in recent memory. I break down the paraglider that got hit by a plane and why this stuff almost always lands on pilot error. I answer a man rehabbing from a spinal tumor who can't run, swim, or ruck anymore and is staring down a third surgery. I tell him about my own injuries, the rabbit holes I went down, and what actually got me out. I tell the story of waking up from emergency surgery, sneezing, and being sure no one recovers from this. They put your intestines back by shoving them in. Walking to the end of the block was the whole goal. And I answer a Marine on hazing. What's training and what's just a broken person dumping their baggage on you. Where the line is. Why drunk, angry, and violent isn't preparing anyone for anything. Today's Sponsors: David: David is offering our listeners a special deal: buy 4 cartons and get the 5th free when you go to https://www.davidprotein.com/CLEAREDHOT AG1: For a limited time only, go to https://www.drinkag1.com/clearedhot to get a FREE AG1 Flavor Sampler and AGZ Sampler to try all the flavors, plus FREE Vitamin D3+K2 and AG1 Welcome Kit with your first AG1 subscription order!

Okay, got the red smoke. I'm looking at danger close now. Ladies and gentlemen, here we are. It is Friday, and you know what that means. We are going to do some Q&A. And let's just dive right into this. I have three questions that I'm going to answer today. But before that, a request for everybody out there. I'm going to describe a video that has been forwarded to me hundreds of times. And I just want to say, I've got to. Got it. Thank you. Thank you to everybody who has sent me this video. It is terrifying. Everybody wants to know what I think about it. So here we go. I'll try to figure out a way to put this video into the episode. If I can't do that, I'm going to broadly describe it. Now, this is about parasailing, which is an activity that I have never done. And it can look really similar to speedwing flying. Or is a paragliding? This is paragliding. shows you how much I haven't done this activity. It has a fabric wing that is over your head. You're suspended in the skydiving world. It would be your canopy and then the suspension lines that come down to your container or the harness that you are wearing that has your mane and your reserve.

I don't know what they call it in the paragliding world. It seems like at some point they crawl into this really cool black. And it doesn't always have to be black. But in this video, it's a black one. cocoon or sack. So a lot of their body, I think, is protected from the external elements. And sometimes you hear some beeps. And I think that's probably has to do with whether or not you found the right lift or you're going up and you're going down. It seems to be pretty cool tech associated with it. And man, they're just out there cruising. They're, they're gliding

through the air. So it's a fabric wing with suspension lines that come down. I don't know what type of harness that the person is wearing. But like I said, they're in this really cool little cocoon-like sack. In this video, a woman is really just out there living her own life. She is paragliding or parasailing, whichever one is the correct term, and appears to be having a very good time. Everything appears to be going 100% completely fine. And man, 360 cameras, I tell you what, they have their pros and they have their cons. from getting anything going around you, 360 pro. As you start to zoom in, they lose a lot of, you know, they'll be pitched as 8K.

You start to zoom in and it really starts to grade the footage. But didn't need it in this one because the angle is essentially of, let's say, for, I'm trying to do this verbally and visually. Visually, it's easy if I'm facing this direction. My toes are facing the same direction as my eyes. And it almost seems like you're laid out a little bit. So you really lean back with your upper body. feet are out in front of you. All the suspension lines were going up really nicely to the wing.

And then what appears to be a Cessna aircraft flies directly through all of that. And those two things, fabric wing, fabric suspension lines, Cessna or Cessna looking like aircraft with spinning propeller at a very high rate of speed and a rigid wing do not seem to mesh well. I have the video is being held. It appears to be either handheld or mounted to the woman. So it really doesn't show what happens to the aircraft after this. But if the wing was performing adequately or perfectly in the seconds before that aircraft hit it, just take the opposite of whatever that would be and you can imagine what it would look like. It looked like a completely wadded up. Some of the lines looked like they were cut.

Some of the fabric looked like it was cut. Pretty gnarly. Now, a cool piece of equipment that it seemed, and I don't know if this is required, and maybe this is a choice that some people have. Well, I guess it would always be a choice. So maybe some people fly with this and some people don't. On the top of that little cocoon sack, it looked like there was a little bit of a pocket. And she reached in and threw out a handheld reserve parachute,

which is the only thing I can guess that it's probably called because that's exactly what she did. It looked to be square in nature, certainly not a wing that had lift and forward glide capability like the one that was above her head. And she survived because of that reserve parachute. Now, I think my thoughts on this are probably the same as everybody else's. What the hell, man? Why would you do that? And another very reasonable question is, how does this even happen? Well, if you listen to last Friday's episode, Michael and I were discussing what can only be described as the mating ritual between two F-18s that I believe used to belong to the Navy.

And in an air show, even though the vast majority, almost every other direction than the convergence was wide open blue skies. These two F-18s collided. It seemed as if one converged on the other from above and behind and just settled right in on top. Hard to say from the angle if the one underneath was coming up as well. But once they connected, they did not become unconnected. And all four people punched out. And then one of the Navy's more expensive fireballs was created on the ground. So pilots are okay, probably still doing paperwork right now.

Both of those aircraft were functioning completely normally. And I made the comment then, and I stand behind it just because I read incident reports pretty voraciously to try to learn. And just out of, I guess, morbid fascination, aircraft, of all types, fail from time to time. There is a absolute certainty that mechanical issues occur. But the statistics on this stuff really, really, really leads in a different direction. when it comes to accidents both fatal and non-fatal. And that is pilot air. I don't know, and I'm sure there's going to be an investigation that involves those two F-18s.

I'd be shocked if it was anything other than pilot air. I believe those two aircraft were functioning completely normally. Not a parasailer slash paraglider. Looking at the video, the woman didn't seem to be overly excited. She seemed to be having a good time doing exactly what she wanted to do. so I'm going to assume that the wing that was above her head was flying normally. The aircraft that from behind, by the way, so this was not a head-on, this was from behind, that flew directly into those suspension lines and canopy, it's briefly in the video.

It doesn't appear to be in a dive. It doesn't appear to be in a turn. It appears to be completely straight and level, which begs the question, how does this happen. And as much as I love aviation, and as much as I love sports and activities that involve the big blue sky out there and testing gravity and using wings of all types, even rotary wing stuff, the helicopters that I'm flying now, each individual blade is out there acting like a wing. That is how it creates lift that overcomes the weight that lifts you off the ground. Four independent wings. Actually, it would be six because there's two on the tail rotor as well

for the helicopter that I fly. So I love wings. I love all that stuff. But it takes such a microscopic lapse in paying attention for something to go really bad. So I don't know what the person in the parasail paraglide configuration could have done. Maybe they heard the aircraft from behind. But today's episode is brought to you by David, the industry leader in protein bars. There's two different type of bars I'm going to talk about today. First, there is the gold,

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Buy four cartons and get the fifth free when you go to Davidprotein.com slash cleared hot. That's Davidprotein.com slash cleared hot. And if you prefer to shop in person, David is available at leading retailers nationwide, including Target, Walmart, Kroger, Wegmans, and the Vitamin Shop. Just check out their store locator and find a location near you. Back to the show. In almost all instances in aviation, the less maneuverable type of aircraft, and yes, I know a paraglider isn't a type of aircraft.

But if we look at this through the lens of what is more maneuverable? a parasailer or paraglider or a powered aircraft. It's going to be the powered aircraft is more maneuverable. Then you could throw into that hot air balloon, which is even less maneuverable than the parasailer paraglider. And you can look at these things and these are rules of the road. But they have to be respected. And this isn't to assign fault or blame because I am sure that whatever aviation authority

is responsible for that area of the world. This is going to sort itself out. The captions were not in English. So I'm going to assume this wasn't in the United States. I have no idea what governing agency will take care of that. But they're going to look at things like what was the least maneuverable aircraft or wing in the air. You are supposed to give birth to those less maneuverable things. So if an airplane and a hot air balloon are converging, this isn't rocket surgery.

Which one do you think should maneuver? That's right. The one that actually has the ability to maneuver well. So if you're going to look at this, absent any other information, you could say potentially, yeah, this was the aircraft's fault. And maybe it was. We'll let those organizations deal with that. But you still should ask yourself, how did you not see the very bright, multicolored wing? Well, they could have been flying into the sun.

A variety of things. And this is an interesting one, too. I don't have an immense amount of experience flying near areas where these type of activities occur, but I am familiar enough, at least with the charts in the United States. If this is a heavy, densely populated area where this type of parasailing paragliding activity occurs, they're oftentimes going to be marked on your charts. Why do they do that? So people in the aviation world can be aware to be on the lookout for these type of things or in your route planning, maybe just go to an area or around that area

so you don't have to look for something that might be harder to see with maybe the sun directly into the cockpit making it much harder to see through the plexiglass. That could easily have happened. The pilot also could have easily had this Cessna have, I'm assuming it's a Cessna again.

It's very briefly in the video, but it looks like a Cessna. Could have been on autopilot. Autopilots are not incredibly expensive and they're in all sorts of aircraft. And that could have been engaged And this person could have been heads down for 15 seconds, just looking at a chart. Maybe they were looking up a frequency at the airport that they were getting ready to go to.

Maybe they were looking up the frequency for the weather reporting station that was either at the airport or nearby the airport. And so they're head down and they're dialing it in on a gauge or pushing it in on touchpad. You know, not the fastest aircraft in the world, but you're not at a walking pace either. So there are so many other things and so many situations that I can see. how this happens. But all of those, other than that aircraft, losing the ability to maneuver via some mechanical means or even an engine failure, you still should have the ability to avoid somebody under a fabric wing. It's going to be declared and deemed as pilot error. And that's rough. But that is right in line with the statistics. The most dangerous thing out there are other human beings.

And I don't know any other way around that. I've had close calls in aviation. And I'm not trying to have close calls in aviation. Sometimes it's a matter of somebody being unfamiliar with the airport environment that you are perhaps practicing your traffic pattern in. Actually, God, I'll give you a perfect example of this. I wasn't directly involved in what I will call this close call. But this is how easily and quickly something like this can happen.

When I was getting my initial rotary wing license. A lot of that is in the airport environment. You're practicing hovers, hover auto rotations, auto rotations that are straight in, 90 degree turns, 180 degrees turns, how to land, manage your airspeed, all of these things, all very, very, very, very normal. And I will call them very simple procedures. Simple, not easy.

When you're not the only person in the pattern, you declare your intentions on the radio or if it's an air traffic control tower, controlled airport. You were in positive communication and they are in control of the kind of the flow. The airport I was learning at is not a tower controlled airport. So you are declaring your intentions. So we had positioned ourselves by the departure end of the runway, the northern departure end of what would that be? What would that be? Runway 1-3, because we were going to be departing southeast. As we were sitting there on the ground, we heard.

radio traffic from a aircraft, singular, a singular aircraft in the pattern. And they were declaring that they were making a left traffic pattern, meaning their turns to come to land would be to the left. Fixed wing, that makes a lot of sense, because most of the time the pilot is in command is sitting on the left-hand side of the aircraft. A lot of the times on helicopter, you're sitting on the right. So if you wanted to, you could, of course, go straight into your landing pad or position because you have more maneuverability as a helicopter, you would do a right-hand. pattern if you want. And that's also a nice separation from helicopter and fixed wing traffic. Not a requirement, but oftentimes you see that happening. So we're sitting there and we're on the

radio frequency. And they made the call that they were turning from base to final, meaning their last left-hand turn to align with the runway. We looked to our right and you could clearly see that aircraft. We happened to look to the left. And there was another aircraft that was approaching from south to north. So think about this. Freight trains on collision courses. The airplane that was approaching that was going to be landing to the south, continued to make their radio calls. The airplane approaching from south to north made none. Eventually, I think it was my instructor got on the radio, let them know. So the one coming to the south, I believe, gave it power, went up and allowed the one that was landing from South North to come in to land. They didn't make a single radio call until they had landed

and taxied all the way to where they were going to be parking. Why? They were unfamiliar with the airport and they had the wrong frequency punched into the box. Way easier to do than you would think. That's how fast, though, stuff like this can happen. And it's a wild hypothesis, right? If my instructor hadn't said anything, would they have collided? Who knows? Did he definitely help the situation by saying something? 100% right, but we can't really say what would have happened. But that's pure pilot error from people who are trying to do it right. So it's dangerous. None of these activities are inherently safe. There is risk involved and even when people are trying to do it well. The difference between 122 decimal 8 and 1-2-2-0-8, which is actually not possible to get onto the radios,

but 1-21-8. You know, very little one numeral digit off and you're talking to nobody. You're declaring your intentions the way that you think you are supposed to. Maybe you read it off of, you know, where I live, 1-2-2-decimal 8 and 1-2-2-2-decent. Muldine apply to about seven airports in the Flathead Valley. And you can hear people talking on those frequencies at other airports while you're landing. And you get used to it over time. You get used to listening to the airport that they're at and the frequency, not the actual dial in frequency, but the frequency of which people will talk, how often they will talk and where. And it

becomes very manageable. It's very overwhelming when you first start. All of this to say when people ask me what I think about this. Incredibly gnarly situation, probably 100% avoidable, probably pilot error. And the person whose fabric wing got just annihilated is incredibly lucky that they probably practice and executed their emergency procedure as well because they got another canopy out over their head. And I didn't actually watch the video until they landed, but I just assume that they made it to the ground. Okay. Like I said, I'll try to put it in there so everybody can see this for themselves because it's a real doozy. That's my thoughts on it.

Super scary. Aviation is amazing in all of its different forms until it isn't. It is not an inherently safe activity, but you can reduce the risk to an incredibly low and manageable level. It's incredibly rewarding. It's incredibly enriching. It's amazing to learn. It's amazing to explore.

But never get to a problem. place where you are complacent and think that you have it dialed. My theory on that is, if you get to that place, hang up that hobby and go do something else because that is where you are going to be the single most dangerous in your aviation journey. So I've seen the video. Thank you to everybody who has sent it to me. You don't need to send it to me anymore. And hopefully that little breakdown illuminates maybe, I don't know what that necessarily could have illuminated, but hopefully it helps with people, or at least, least answers the question. Hey, what do you feel about that? All right, let's get into the questions

for today. Email number one. Andy, thank you for reading this. On the off chance, it doesn't get lost in the sea of listener emails. I'm 24, and for the last 12 months, I have been the proud owner of an osteoid osteoma, not a doctor, so I hope I said that correctly. A benign tumor happily living on my T4 vertebra right behind the shoulder blades. It is basically a built-in knife that stabs me every time I twist, bounce, or my personal favorite, roll over in bed like a normal human being. Pretty much feels exactly like a fracture bone that never gets to heal. I've already been through two tumor ablations in the past two months. They tried to roast their little bastard with a probe and both failed.

Today they told me I'm probably headed for a third surgery where they crack me open and literally scoop it out. Third times the charm, right? In the middle of all this delightful fun, I ended a little. long-term relationship, quit my job to go all in and start the business I've dreamed about forever, and lost some people close to me. But honestly, that stuff is background or almost background noise compared to the real tragedy. I can't train. It's an interesting way to phrases. There's a little bit more to this email, but this sticks out to me a little bit.

I understand the importance of training, and I think you're going to get into this because I feel exactly this way as well, this intrinsic tie between my physical activity and my mental health. But there are other very, very, very important things in my life. And a lot of those would be closely associated with or perfectly defined by people close to me, long-term relationship. Those, I get what you're saying. Be cautious thinking that, your ability to exercise is going to carry the day in every and in all circumstance and situations. It can fill a void, but I don't think it can fill it completely. Just food for thought.

Back to your email. Physical fitness has always been my number one outlet in life. I've run back-to-back 90-mile ultras. Okay, so you suffer for mental health problems. So I'm 16 miles in open water. That's a joke, by the way. I just can't run after getting shot. So my theory is you need to learn how to fight so you don't have to run away anymore.

and rucked 85 miles with a 50-pound pack. I live to push myself until I hate myself. Now, I can't run more than 50 feet or bench press an empty bar without agonizing pain. My former ultra-self is somewhere in the corner just waiting to be let back out again. So the struggle has been to learn how to direct that deep, intrinsic motivation of being at my physical peak to now releasing that energy into starting a business and improving relationships in my life. I'm sure you can attest with your foot nerve-related injuries and your gunshot wound that when you were in pain for so long at all time in it at all time seems like it will never end. I know exactly what you're talking about there. That is how I have been feeling. And as strong as others think I am, I am finding myself recently just observing that it sure would be easier to not go through all of this. But to anyone else who is going through something that seems like it won't end, I urge them to find.

find a way to redirect their energy into something that they can control, much easier said than done. I completely agree with that advice, and I also agree with the last or end portion of that sentence. It is easier said than done. That doesn't make it any less important. It's tough to take your own advice sometimes, but if you're not willing to take your own advice, I personally believe you should be very cautious giving it. And that is not directed at the person in this email. That's just a general statement. My question for you is, have you had a time where you just thought to yourself, I don't see how this could end? I think many people would benefit from hearing how you got through that and chose not to give in to negative thoughts.

I've been listening to you for years, and I guess it's given me the comfortability to open up on this. Thank you for your service in and out of the military. P.S. Get that kid Michael under control over there. He's been forgetting to turn on those lights a few too many times recently. You have no idea. He forgets to do so many other things that I just choose not to mention. And I've been trying to get him under control, but he's resisting me. So I'll do what I can.

Have you had a time where you just thought to yourself? I don't see how this could end. I totally have. And let me be clear about something. Your sentence, I think many people would benefit from hearing how you got through that and chose not to give in to negative thoughts. Spoiler alert. I have given in to negative.

thoughts. I have played the world's smallest violin to myself many times. I've made the wrong decision many times. I have thrown arguably, I was going to say the world's largest, but let's say in the world's top 10 largest pity parties for myself of all time and convinced myself that the world was against me and that nothing was going my way and that I was being wronged by the people involved in the situations where things weren't going my way. So I don't want anybody out there to ever think that I have some magic tool, wisdom or advice that has allowed me to not at least do very deep explorations down into all of those things. What I can say is this. In my robust experience, deep diving, those rabbit holes, which is exactly what they are,

here's what I found when I finally emerged from them. And maybe this is what people can take from this. allow me to have done the research for you. At the end of all of that, like I said, top 10 biggest pity party for myself. At the end of that pity party, nothing, and I mean nothing, changed for the better. Every ounce of energy that I spent trying to figure out who had done something wrong to me or whose fault it was that something had happened to me, or absorbing the negative thoughts and just you go ahead and be as creative as you want to, and I assure you there have been times in my life where I completely allowed those thoughts to take the wheel.

At every single time that I devoted energy to any of those endeavors led me deeper into the situation that I didn't want to be in. I have never emerged from one of these rabbit holes better off for it. What I have done is wasted time, money, energy, friendship capital, relationship capital, trust capital, all of it. And I came out in even a greater deficit. And for anybody out there that is staring over the precipice of one of these things, if you decide to not take what I have done for scientific purposes, of course, the research that I have done, because that's why I did it, of course. It's never just me being a total and utter dipshit.

If you want to go down that path and you want to test it out for yourself so you can prove me wrong and come out of this and say, oh, no, I went and had a pity party for myself and I came out of it way better off. Go ahead. Go ahead and do that. I'm not here to tell anybody how to party. if you want to do that, please do. Report back to me and let me know how much better or worse your life, God. You're just going to be delaying the things that you actually need to do. Now, it's okay to be frustrated and it's okay to be upset and it's okay to feel as if people have wronged you because that legitimately happens sometimes. What I'm saying is don't invite that into your house and live with it for a season of your life. maybe address it, take the time to work through it. If the analogy of tug of war works well for you, put down your side of the rope. If this is somebody else that is helping you get into that headspace, let go of the rope.

If it's a relationship, an argument, whatever it may be, let go of the rope. Tug of war requires two participants. It really doesn't work well when there's just one person out there trying to just pull you towards them and you're not holding on to anything. don't let it become a season of your life. I have done that. I don't have words of wisdom to prevent anybody from ever experiencing those things because I'm not sure it's possible. But learn the lessons quickly because I have done the research to let you know what happens when you take the time to learn them over an extended period of time. You look back, regretful over the time that you wasted. You nailed it in your email. You have to find something that you can

control. So there are two instances in my life, and I can tie, I'll tie this to physically, because for me, as I said earlier, I have always had this intrinsic tie as well between physical and emotional. One was in 2005 when I got injured overseas. And the other one, I don't even remember how long it was ago that I had the bowel obstruction and ended up having to have emergency surgery when we were down near Salt Lake City. Needy, I mean, I actually, yeah, I didn't choose either of those. So I had no. control over either of those happening. I had no control over the end state, the initial end state of where it left me physiologically. But I had total control over the actions I took

leading out of them. I did a poor job initially when I got hurt overseas. But I would say that that was a good test bed for some of my research of the pity party and oh, woe is me. I remember those lessons. And I've always tried to be really open about that time period in my life. And I was not doing great. I was drinking too much. And a bunch of different pill bottles, yep, totally real. I think it was somewhere between 12 to 16 pill bottles at one time that were prescribed by a doctor.

That makes it okay, right? washing it down with alcohol. For clarity, that part wasn't prescribed by a doctor. Not working out. Probably was a total asshole to everybody that was around me. And it was because I was emotionally crumbling because I wasn't in control of the situation. And I just spiraled and spiraled and spiraled. I hit mental rock bottom for sure when I realized the impact that everything that I was doing was having on my cognitive ability. It had to work myself out of that. physically I was very unable to do much but it was exercise that I used to slowly dig myself out of that over years

it was earlier on 2005 I think that the support systems and the medical the military medicine and medical system in the military is far better suited and adapted to those type of injuries I don't fault the military for where they were in 2005 I just think they were less used to seeing that type of injury. I was really on my own for my own protocol. I had very, very little oversight, which was both good and bad. Bad because I could do what I wanted to, which included nothing if I didn't want to. Good because I was able to find my way back through pathways and protocols that I created for myself. Or not going to say that I created them for myself. I chose the path that I wanted to go. The protocol, and I've talked about this openly, I used the Strength and Conditioning

program CrossFit to rehab myself from that injury and then ended up, that's how I ended up working for the company. It's a totally different story. When I had the bowel obstruction, that was actually way gnarly your pain than getting shot. Different for sure. The being shot was much more pinpointed and precise. And not that the bowel obstruction wasn't that, it just was a radiating type of pain that was completely and utterly debilitating for a much longer time period than it was when I got shot. Zero out of five stars don't recommend either. So hopefully neither of those happened to you. But eventually going to surgery and they were going to try to do it laparoscopically. And the doctor did talk about if that didn't work, what they were going to have to do is

basically cut me wide open and pull all of my intestines out on the table. Thank you, anesthesiologist, for not allowing me to emotionally participate in any of this because I don't think that would be awesome to watch, nor do I want to know how they do that. So it didn't work laparoscopically. And when I woke up, I think the first question that I asked my wife was, did they cut me open? She said yes. And I tell you what, physically incapable of doing almost anything. All they asked me to do that day was stand up and walk to the nurse station. I sneezed shortly after I stood up and I felt like every suture and staple that they had put into me completely blew out and that I was going to crumble to the ground. And my first thought was nobody gets better from this. And then days in a

hospital bed. Then days in a passenger seat. It took us three days to drive home from Salt Lake City to Calaispell, Montana. It's not a three-day drive. That's a one-dayer. Days laying in bed. And this was at a time where I was very active doing jiu-jitsu. Just my life. was and is active. So what could I control? Well, first off, I could control my outlook on where I was versus where I wanted to be. Any physical goals I had for the near term? It's not that you can ignore them or that you shouldn't have them, but you have to be realistic. Put them to the side. Whatever it was, no longer important or relevant in my life. Not that I'm a Spartan man or is a no, Spartan. race or an Ironman type guy. But if that's what I had wanted to do, guess what? That's going to be

put on the next calendar year because that is, although you may want it more than anything, completely irrelevant. Unless I would say this happened in like a January and that was in like an August, September, October type, meaning really long, wrong way to work yourself back. But this to me, I think happened in December. And yeah, if there was anything in the first half of the next year afterwards, put to the side. Because I had my previous experience of rehabbing, I knew that regardless of how useless I felt in the moment, if I could control what I could control, which at that point became my diet, my rest, my hydration, my sleep, and maximizing the limited physical activity that I could do, I was going to be okay.

But I also knew, based off my previous experience, that success, well, not even success, what would be the correct word? Progress was going to be measured in literal feet, not metaphorical feet, literal feet. Walking is one of the first things they want you to do post-surgery, especially in abdominal surgery. And from my understanding, if there's a doctor out there, you can correct me if I'm wrong. It helps settle everything back into place. because I asked the doctor, did you take all of my intestines out and put them on the table? He's like, oh, yeah, 100%.

Then they, with their finger, just kind of work their way through it. And I had questions. Main question was, how do you know that you put it back properly? Do you lay this thing out? And it's this little, you know, you have to lay the intestines out inside of the boundaries of a drawn-out little circuitous pathway. He goes, oh, no, now you just stuff them back in there. Like, what? I'm sorry.

You're a surgeon. You went to multiple years of medical school and residency and have done this a bunch of times. You just shove them back in there. And guys like, yeah, yeah, that's how you do it. And then the body sorts itself. I'm like, okay, you know how to do this? I don't.

Walking apparently helps with that. Sorry for the tangent. But I think the first time I went for a walk with my wife, we went, I think, we went to the end of the blocking back. Now it's smoked, but a good smoked, because I knew what that meant. That was as far as I could take it without taking it too far and hurting myself. And also while I had staples, so it was sutures all internally and then staples, medical staples on the outside, which look a lot like the regular staples you put on paper. So I wonder if they get them both

at staples. That might be in a different aisle. No sweating up until that point. And I think it was two or three weeks before the staples got taken out. After that point, sweating was okay, but it's not like I was going to be able to do anything that was producing of sweat other than walking. So end of the block became two-thirds of a block, a block, two blocks. At the townhouse we were living at at the time, there was a little bit of a shorter loop and a longer loop, so I would do two laps on the shorter loop. And then one day I was feeling good after the two laps.

And so I did two laps on the shorter loop and then a lap on the longer loop. And I think people can understand where I'm going with this. The trend of focusing less, like you know where you want to be. You know, and this is now directly back to the person who wrote this email. The physical things you were able to do were amazing. They're awesome. I suspect if you are smart about this and you keep that desire to return to that level or type of fitness in mind, you will be able to return to that level of capacity.

Now here's the thing. Given the type of injury, which again, I'm not a doctor, but given the type of injury that you described, running, swimming, which is heavy upper body, rucking, which is heavy upper body with the weight on your shoulders, I'd say there's a chance, depending on what the rehab looked like and the long-term impact of having this in your body,

you may not be able to return to those special. specific types of activities. And that's going to be a tough one. But it's also survivable because there are many other amazing feats of physicality that you could work your way towards. And right now, you may not know what those are. And right now, you may not have any interest in that. And that's okay. Put that aside for a little bit. Because as you already nailed, this isn't about anymore or what you can't do. This is about what you can do. You can immediately, before you go into surgery,

get yourself into the best shape possible via the means that you can. Whatever it is that you can do, even if this walking in a community pool, to get your body as physiologically as prepared as possible, diet, recovery, sleep, all of this stuff. You're going to go into your surgery in the best condition possible.

With the goal of coming out of it, in the best condition possible with the understanding you're going to be largely crippled probably for a little bit. But you obviously know how to build yourself up to be able to do these things, focus on that path. And also realize you didn't just wake up one day and run a 90 mile ultra. That was probably years in the making. So that's how long it takes to build this stuff. Keep those as your mountain peaks. Right now, that mountain peak is out on the distance. And it looks like, Everest and Everest doesn't look that big when you're far away. Actually, I take that back. Everest looks pretty goddamn big, regardless of how far away you are from it. So maybe Everest isn't

the best example of this. I just don't know another really recognizable mountain. Right now, you're looking at Everest, but it still looks pretty far off. And you can recognize there's a tremendous amount of work you're going to have to do before you even start to try to climb Everest. That's the point I'm trying to get to. Maybe that's better. So control what you can. listen to the doctor, find a specialist to help you rehab, and set a realistic expectation and approach for yourself. As you slowly start to feel better, the biggest risk to your recovery and rehab in the long term is going to be pushing it a little bit too far. I would say, and I'm saying that because I am also guilty of it. I got back on the jiu-suitzumats a little bit too early. I didn't

pull any of the sutures or that stuff out. But the few. feedback I received from my body was like, hey, you're kind of a dipshit. I was like, yes, you know me so well, don't you? Didn't do that again, though. I gave it another month before I started moving around a little bit. So don't push it and focus all of that energy that you can on what you can control. It took me the better part of six to eight months before I felt like myself again. But my nutrition was better. at the tail end of that, even after all of that slow recovery. I can't say my training was because my training was different.

But I was starting to really focus on stuff that I hadn't before. But my limited physical capacity now allowed me to. I started tracking different metrics, whether it be sleep. Again, hydration, that's one that people just, and to include myself, I'm still horrible with hydration, but I'm constantly trying to do better. The nutrition was a huge piece of that. and just figuring out different ways to scratch the physical itch. I don't enjoy walking places, but it's all that I could do.

So I found enjoyment in that because I knew that even though that activity wasn't my end-all be-all, it was at least slowly reorienting my true north back towards where it is that I wanted to go. So hopefully that helps for anybody out there listening. You are going to get to a place where, especially with a bad injury, you might be asking yourself, this is never going to end or telling yourself it's never going to end. I've been there, especially when my leg was just, it felt like it was on fire 24 hours a day. And I would be a little bit immune to it during the daytime because I was busy. But at nighttime, I would just lay there.

And it was the only thing that I could think about. And you just think it's never going to end. And the only person telling yourself that is you. It will end. That doesn't make any more bearable in the moment. It doesn't make it any harder or easier, I should say, to shoulder. to that, but everything will come to an end unless you make a decision that somehow immediately and instantaneously stops that. And at all costs, you have to guard yourself against that.

Control what you can. When I was finally able to sleep again with my leg, it was because I had found my way back to exercising. And the activities that I did that first day, which it would be a laughable warm up for a 70-year-old. Now, it was covered in sweat, but that night, I slept better than I had in probably a year and woke up feeling at least... I didn't have hope,

but I thought the concept of hope existed. And that's all it took to reorient the headspace. And so I remember that the next time I got hurt. So hopefully that helps. Today's episode is brought to you by AG1. Well, guess what? We're into February. How many of you are still just jamming on your New Year's resolutions? I think the data shows that most people are done with them by about 21 or even 14 days. I've talked about this, man, for well over a year. My goal to dial in the macro and micro, but oftentimes the micro elements of my hydration and supplementation game. And this is where AG1 comes in. I use it in the morning to hydrate. And it helps me dial in all the micro nutrients that I, honestly, just don't pay attention to. AG1 is the opposite of complexity.

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This is a limited time offer, only available while. supplies last. That's drinkag1.com slash cleared hot. Drinkagy1.com slash cleared hot. Back to the show. Question number two, really shifting gear here. Hazing in the military. My question, on one of the recent episodes with Dr. Mike Simpson, he talked about hazing when he first became a ranger. You both discussed the left and right limits of hazing. And it seemed like you both came to the same question. What is the intent? Is the intent to actually train someone? Or is it, as Mike said, new and inventive ways to shit on people because someone else shit on you. That's where my question comes from.

I would add to that, and this isn't in the email, I'm just thinking about this. The intent does matter. To train someone an initiation ritual either at the end of or involved in a crucible and allowing you or inviting you into a community, or as Michael said, a way to shit on someone because you got shit on yourself. intent in my opinion, and this is all that it accounts for, absolutely matters. Hazing somebody or punishing somebody because you were punished has no purpose behind it and no meaning behind it other than you are not in control and very likely you are an asshole.

And we'll get to that here in a second. For some background, I was an 0-311 infantry rifleman in the Marine Corps. I arrived at my first unit about 10 days after they got back. from Afghanistan, which sucked because all of us new guys knew it would probably be a while before we got the chance to deploy. To put it mildly, as new guys, they hated us. That's the mildest way I can say it. That's a really shitty dynamic. And I'm trying to think about the new guy versus experience guy dynamic in the world that I came from. I cannot think of a single reason why somebody with experience, which is all the deployment is, it's not magic,

it's not the receipt of unknown and unknowable information. It's literally just experience. Why that would lead you to hate somebody who is new. I can see the headspace of telling yourself, they're less than you because they don't have the same experience or they don't have the same value as you or they are not as useful as you, but to hate them? And again, those were your words describing them. I don't know what they would necessarily say. But I'm going to assume, and I think the rest of this email flushes this out,

that the treatment and behavior you had pointed towards you from them, it doesn't make any sense to me. I don't know why they would have hated you. That's a bizarre one to me. At the time, we understood that. We accepted the new guy role and did what we thought new guys were supposed to do. None of us really had a problem with it because we believed everyone goes through it at some point and eventually earns their place. I never thought of it as hazing. I was always told it was in parentheses good training.

Even 10 years later, when talking to a doctor about my time and service, he asked me about hazing. I told him hazing didn't really happen like that anymore, that there was good training, but not hazing. When I explained the difference, as I understood it, he looked at me and said, oh, buddy, you don't even realize it was wrong. That was the first time I ever considered maybe it actually was. When we first got to the unit after a few weeks, our seniors would come to our rooms almost nightly, usually around midnight, banging on the doors, demanding to be let in. The first couple of times, it was framed as training. They'd come in drunk and make us call up nine lines, which, for people listening, Nine lines is the full back and forth between a controller on the ground and an aircraft overhead

with the intent generally of releasing ordinance from the aircraft to a target on the ground. It is a very synchronized and choreographed exchange of information. There are nine lines of information that you need to transfer back and forth. And they have medevac versions, all sorts of stuff. They'd come in drunk and make us call up nine lines while they created chaos in the room. Honestly, I had no issue with that. I could see the real world application and we got very good at it. There is a real world application of that. Is the time to do that at midnight when the people who are trying to teach you in very soft air quotes shit-faced? I don't think so. An argument could really be made against that. Is there a potential chance that the training had value? Sure. Learning it in that way and the intent by.

behind those individuals? Questionable. On separate occasions, oh, so hold on, skip a paragraph. But after the first few times, the training aspect disappeared. They would still come in drunk, angry, and violent, but nothing about weapon systems, nine lines, or actual training ever came up again. Most of the time, they just shit on us for being weak, being new guys, or anything else they could think of, and we just had to take it.

on separate occasions I was choked, my roommate's hand was broken, and one time I was thrown around a laundry room like a rag doll. None of it ever started under the topic of training. They would just come in and do whatever they wanted. One time, I wasn't there for it, but two close friends of mine had seniors come into their room, piss and shit on the floor, and make the junior Marines clean it up. Again, I didn't witness this happen, but I was in the room minutes later after one of them called me. Second I saw them and heard who it was, I knew it was true. I had plenty of stories like that, enough that I actually wrote a book about it, though I don't want to put that name or put the name out there yet because it's currently with an editing team. During the writing

process, I started researching hazing culture. One thing I was taught by my senior Marines and something I've always seen echoed by others is that this kind of hazing prepares you for combat, both while deployed and when you come home after. That mindset was drilled into me as a young infantryman. It is the reason I told my doctor I wasn't hazed because I genuinely believe that. And honestly, part of me still does. It's also why none of us ever reported it or even really talked about it for years. We thought it was normal. But when I hear that argument now and hear others repeat it, it makes me second guess myself and even second guess the book I wrote. I never deployed. I never deployed to combat. I wanted to. The call just never came. I enlisted straight out of high school,

and I chose Marine Infantry because in my mind it was the fastest path to war. So I honestly don't know if they were right or if I'm crazy for questioning it now. I know this was long-winded, but my question is this. You've deployed to combat. Is there any truth to the mindset that this kind of treatment is necessary preparation for deployment? Is this type of hazing actually needed? and where do you think the left and right limits of it are? Thank you for your time. Okay. I'm going to answer this and I'll answer it as directly as possible.

My answer is my opinion. It is only my opinion. I don't speak for the military. I don't speak for the Navy. I don't speak for the SEAL community. These are just my thoughts. Where is the exact question? Is this type of hazing actually needs?

needed. Is there any truth to the mindset that this kind of treatment is necessary preparation for deployment? I'm going to break this into two categories. The first one I already addressed a little bit. Them coming into your room at a time that you don't expect and introducing stress, which is a very polite way to put that, and forcing you to understand and be able to perform nine-line procedures. There is some real-world value and application in that. Having said that, there is something that stuck out to me on both of these, where it had a loose attachment to training value, and then where it departed from that completely. And that is, they would show up drunk. And if you, as the person who is going to go haze someone and you think that you need to be

drunk to do so, or that it only occurs during times where people are drinking, then you are completely fucked up. Everything you described after the nine-line evolutions has absolutely nothing to do with any type of training that I have ever seen or heard of that prepares you for a combat environment. Anybody who told you that, in my opinion, again, which only counts for me, is so incredibly fucked up and out there on an Olympic gymnastics floor, bending the mental gymnastics to try to arrive at a place to describe utterly shitty personal behaviors that probably need to be addressed with a specialist, a counselor or a therapist somehow manipulating that into, I'm doing this for your benefit.

I'm doing this because this prepares you for war. How does somebody coming into your room and pissing and shitty? on your floor, prepare you for combat. I don't even think you need to have experienced combat to understand the ridiculous nature of that question that I just asked you. I'm not a professional, okay? When it comes, I'm not a psychologist, psychiatrist, I'm an expert in post-traumatic stress, but everything after that nine line where you described it, the training aspect disappeared, drunk, angry, and violent, sounds like these individuals, instead of handling their shit and doing the work that they need to go through to deal with the baggage that they brought home with them, all they're doing is they're dumping that baggage on you under this guise of, it's going to prepare you for war. No, fuck you.

Everything that you described here is the exact opposite of what we were talking. about in that episode when it comes to the intent of making you feel like the unit in any the intent to bring you closer to the group that you are entering versus the intent was for people to act out their own bullshit and create an excuse that allows them to get away with behavior that should never be tolerated. There is a reason that the term hazing is viewed the way that it is in the military. And it is because of the actions of the people that you were exposed to or actions like that. It's obviously, of course, not this individual group because it's a larger community than just those people. But choked, a roommate's hand was broken. Okay, how does that prepare you for war?

We're going to break your hand. And if a deployment were to come up, oh, you're probably not even going to be able to go because you're combat ineffective with a broken hand. So how does that prepare you for war and for combat? Complete and utter bullshit. Throwing around a room like a laundry room like a rag doll? What's what's that preparing you for again? Hard to say. Um, they would just come in and do whatever they wanted. Yeah, that's a great description of what was going on. The pissing and the shitting. Yeah, it's, uh, I don't know what to say other than when I hear or read this description. I know the type of person that was exhibiting that behavior. and they don't have the intent to make you better at your job.

They don't have the intent to increase unit cohesion. The hazing stuff that I was involved with, one, safety was always a paramount. Occasionally, alcohol was involved for sure, but never everybody in the group. There was always oversight. And an absolute, I can't say certainty, but an intent not to injure somebody was always present. That's not what it about. That's not what that is about. If you're outside of those bounds, you're just abusing people.

They've already been through the crucibles. They've already been through the difficult training process. They've arrived there. What you're describing sounds like people, again, I know this. person. They are on the verge of or have been broken by their experiences. And instead of doing the work themselves, they're abusing other people. And I have no tolerance or place for that. That is the exact opposite of what Mike and I were talking about. Do me a copy. Send me, or do me a copy. Do me a favor. Send me a copy or book when you can. If you have the ability to do so digitally, I'd like to

check it out. Your experiences with this are vastly different than my own. I have I heard horror stories of that from the community. I mean, honestly, not to what you described here. This to me is kind of the next level. But I'd be curious to read it. And what I can try to do. And the reason I ask you to send me a copy is I can give you at least my honest feedback. So you don't second guess yourself. You can get an opinion from somebody who can look at this through the lens of the things that you experienced under the guise from what sounds like a small group of people telling you this is what you need. This is preparing you for where you're going to go to somebody who has been in that world and I can look at that and say, or at least give you my opinion, which again,

is all it is, and let you know whether or not I would agree with that or not. And then you can take it for what it is worth. The type of hazing you described, no, it's not actually needed. It does the opposite of what Mike and I were talking about. And it shouldn't be allowed. And some people will hear that and say, oh, you're just being a pussy. You guys, you know, what's wrong with all that stuff? It's unknown and unknowable and uncontrollable. And you have to, like, yeah, there's ways to do that stuff inside of very tight boundaries that don't involve somebody dealing with the stress that they brought home and only able to deal with it in a manner like this where they're drunk and angry and violent.

Fuck right off if that's your opinion. you can sharpen the blade to a razor's edge without any of that bullshit. And that is how people get hurt and that is how people get killed accidentally. And if you want to demean the entire military and create an environment where externally people look at this and they go, what in the actual fuck are you guys doing it and why are you doing it like that and you immediately need more oversight, keep doing stuff like that because that's where that leads. But in all of this, what sticks to me the most is that those people who wanted to treat you in that way were broken. And I don't mean irreparable, but probably after that deployment, they were coming back with some stuff.

And instead of taking a healthy path through that, they drug you along into that unhealthy path. They might be able to sit there and tell you, oh, yeah, we're doing it. So we're prepared you for war. Fuck off. Not the case at all. at least in my opinion. And that's all I have for that question.