Cleared Hot - Powered By BRCC - Episode 169 - Chadd Wright

Episode Date: February 22, 2021

Born and raised in the mountains of rural northwest Georgia, Chadd grew up obsessed with becoming a SEAL, but when the Navy discovered a rare but asymptomatic cyst on his heart, he was disqualified from entering BUD/s. Chadd refused to give up, ultimately tracking down a surgeon willing to perform a procedure deemed too risky by every cardiologist he previously petitioned. Cyst successfully removed, Chadd went on to realize his SEAL dream, serving over the next decade as a Team Leader on multiple deployments to conflict zones across the world. He became a SEAL instructor. A Master Training Specialist. Chadd even served a stint as President Obama's bodyguard. Along the way, he battled PTSD and traumatic brain injury.  Now retired from the military, Chadd has found new life as an elite ultramarathoner — a spiritual quest for self-knowledge and mind-body mastery that has compelled him to tackle some of the world's most insane endurance slogs like The Revenant — a 118-mile footrace across south New Zealand with over 52,000 feet of elevation gain that not one person has ever successfully completed.

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My guest today is Chad Wright, a former Navy SEAL and current badass. His story of getting into the military and actually getting into the SEAL community is pretty crazy. He did some things that I probably wouldn't have had the ballast to do. And his story of what he's doing now, the ultra endurance, and I may be, I might be describing that incorrectly. I'm pretty sure he describes it in depth when we were talking. but the length of distance that he is running now and the goals that he has for himself now, they are unbelievable, which is why I said former SEAL, current badass. Now I'm going to shut up.

Episode 169 with Chad Wright. Enjoy. To the smoke, I'm looking at danger close now. Oh, what a minute. Can't be clear. Look how good you look. Radio check. Oh, yeah.

It's a good check. I got you Lima, Charlie. Hey, look, Andy, before we get started, man. We're already started? Oh, well, before we dig in. I don't even know what we're talking about today, dude. I start every podcast that way. Okay, that's perfect.

I'm confused about a few things. It's far away. So, there's a, you know, everybody has their favorite Navy SEAL these days, and, you know, there's plenty of ultra-running Navy SEALs out there. I only know of two, you and Mr. Goggins. Well, and so that's my question. Why have lowly old Chad out for a conversation, and not David Goggins? You know, I'm just confused, man.

I get asked about David a lot, and I will get asked about whether or not I want to have him on the podcast. The reality is, I don't think he would come on, and I don't think the conversation would be very fun. I think we have a disagreement on specifically and only how he portrays his military career. So I have some criticism that would only be understood by people from our community. And that criticism, though, I think would better be saved because I look at what he's doing now. And the reality is regardless of how I feel about him, he's out there motivating millions of people. So what's the point of the criticism? Let it fly.

I don't want to shotgun anybody with anything. His platform is massive. A magnitude of order or order is greater than my own. So let him go out and do great things. And that's my exact same viewpoint, man, is, you know, I think there's a lot of things that are said in a way that are dangerous for your everyday person. And, you know, if you're holding yourself to this standard, that's portrayed by him and others. Yeah. It's not sustainable, man.

But I'm the same way, man. It's like, ultimately, the message I think has helped hundreds of thousands of people without a day. out. So I think the issue is people try to replicate exactly what they are doing. Because there's two things. You see somebody who's incredibly inspirational and aspirational. I'll use Jocko as an example. Yeah. The dude gets up at 4.30 in the morning or probably or a little bit before because most the time is, I see you, man. It's put in 430. And for him, he does okay with less sleep, I think, than most. I think that the number I last heard for recommended sleep is about eight hours. there's both sides of that.

Some people need 10. Some people can crank it out on 5 or 6. If you're somebody who needs 10, but you're looking at somebody who is getting up at 4.30 every morning and you feel that you have to do that too, and it crushes you, you're missing the point of the message.

He is putting out there his disciplined behavior and the impact that it has on his life. You could set your alarm for a different time in the day and get up then discipline. You know what I mean? So there's the. message and then I think the mistake, and I don't think it's bad that people try to emulate those behaviors. I think it's inspirational and aspirational, like I said. But if it's not working for you,

don't grind yourself into dust in the attempt to be somebody else. Take the message that they're portraying and put that into your life. Agreed. I mean, I have a weird take on discipline anyways, and we can get back to that. We can pick up on that later. But, you know, I guess I'm really honored and humbled to be here, man. Don't be, believe me. Well, no, you don't, you don't, dude. I'm a moron stumbling my way through life. You don't, look, man, you're, you're little, you're, now I realize you're a humble

person. I believe that. But you, brother, I've been listening to you for quite a while. You're actually one of the first Navy SEALs that I ever listened to on a podcast. And I'm a Navy SEAL. I always wonder how many people listen, how many other, Seals listen to me. You know what I mean? Listen to my podcast. I hope not many listen to mine. Even though some of my friends, like they'll hit me up and they'll be like, they'll laugh and

they'll be like, thank you for just being you. Because I'm an idiot and I say dumb stuff. Yeah. But you also say some really, you also articulate things in a very real way that have helped me in my own mission. And, you know, I guess that's the reason I'm so honored and humbled to be here. You know, I know you could have had anybody. And that was a joke, that question in the beginning. Why would you have me instead of David God? because I'm obviously totally different. You know, that was a joke, you know, but... It's one that's not addressed often, though.

People will skirt around that issue, and that's the... The way I describe it is exactly how I feel. I think what he's doing is awesome, but it's not, you know what I mean? It's not the right place for either of us, whereas I think you and I could probably have a conversation that could hopefully lever people to their next level

or give them motivation or inspiration, you know what I mean? I think a lot of that, there's more opportunity for that with you, then there is an argument and a disagreement that could potentially negatively impact the SEAL teams between he and I. 100%. Well, and here's the thing while we're on that subject. I think that we can raise another million dollars for the Navy SEAL Foundation. I think we can raise $2 million for the Navy SEAL Foundation.

Let me tell you how we can do this. I think that we need to have – have you ever heard of a last man standing race? Are we going to talk about running? Because I'm out. you're not part of it you're not going to be running hold on though can I be the coach with the clipboard in a whistle

using only negative feedback as reinforcement and motivation yes I'm in that's perfect so here's what we're here's my vision there's this race format and I've competed in a few of these races

it already sounds terrible just based off the name I think I know where this is going it's last man so what this last man standing is is it's a 4.16 mile loop and you have one hour to run that loop. So if you run it in 50 minutes, you get a 10 minute break. If you run it, you know, 59, 59. You might as well keep on going. Yeah, you just keep on going, right? But see, this race, this race format, and it totals up to be every 24 hours is 100 miles. So it's easy to keep track of the distance. But it takes speed out of the equation. And it

boils everything down to sheer grit and durability. Yeah. Because, dude, you only got to go four miles per hour. What do most people pick for a pace on that? Like, do they try to get rest or do they just really throttle it back and just consistently try to move? It's, for me, personally, it's different for everybody else. For me, personally, I did one called the Mid-State Mile a couple months ago.

I think it was in June, and I won that race. I'll tell that story here in just a little bit. I finished last almost every single loop. So I would come in, I would have maybe a minute to sit down, shove some food in my mouth, top my water bottle off, and get back out there. Now, there's strategy to it, though, because as the field dwindles and it gets down to just you and a few other really strong dudes, you can start, when you see them falter, you can show a little strength, right?

Talking about psychological warfare. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, dude, this format boils it down and takes speed out of the equation. It's all about grit and durability. Imagine if we had me and David Goggins and maybe even somebody like Cam Haynes or somebody. That would be it. Actually, that's an excellent addition. The gladiators.

Dude, we're the gladiators, man. Give the people what they want, right? The three of us, last man. standing. I'd call you guys the three horsemen. I don't know if I'd call you the gladiators. Well, I'm just saying we essentially are the, we're out here doing these crazy things and people like to watch them, right? That's in all three of your wheelhouses. Okay. Narrated by you and Joe Rogan. I mean, I'm in. I can't talk for Joe or Cam or David, but I'm in. Well, that's the thing. Look, man, that's the thing. I've had this vision for a while and I've never put it out publicly. But I'm

just saying, man, and these races, when you're running this race, man, and you get 30, 40, 50 hours deep into this thing, like it's fun to watch. Oh, your vision questing at that point, I'll imagine. It's brutal, man. And it's head to head, dude. And it would be so, it would be just be such a grueling, awesome event. And I just see it, I just think, I think we could raise a million dollars doing that. I don't think it would be hard to raise a million dollars doing that. If we had that lineup of individuals, you know, promoting the event. And it's just so much fun to watch. I mean, the one I did in Mid-State Mile Man, the last couple laps, I'm running against this dude.

He's a national, he's on the American national ultra-running team, super strong athlete, Greg Armstrong. And he's literally pushing his body. His body's shutting down. He's pushed beyond. And dude, the last lap, it's on video, it's on my Instagram. This dude comes through the finish line, and I'm waiting for him, and he comes through the finish line, and his quads are locking up. And he just crosses the finish line and literally crumbles and collapses onto the ground. And to be honest, I've been battling this dude for 30 straight hours.

30 hours, man. And I'll tell you how I'll beat him later, but this dude, I could not talk to him. him without crying. You don't get a lot of opportunities in life. We did in the SEAL teams, but in regular life. Not even like that, though. Like you're describing with that long with just one individual back and forth. I mean, we worked in some interesting situations, but most, I mean, I'm two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve.

You know what I mean? Surrounded by your buddies, not an endurance event like that where bodies are shutting down. Yeah. That's a very intimate and personal battle between the two. Well, at the end, when the two people are remaining. And you see this man crumble, and you know, it's like he knew he couldn't beat me at that point. Now, previous to that, I didn't think I could beat him because he had a resume that would put mine to shame, you know. And he knew he couldn't beat me.

He was literally for about four hours, he was running just so I could push myself harder. That's the only reason he stayed in the race. He knew he couldn't win. But he just kept going. He didn't want to cheat me. He didn't want to cheat me out of finding my limit. Now, at 30 hours, I felt like I could go another 30 hours. I never failed my limit, right?

But Greg wanted to continue to push me for me, not for him. And that's what was so beautiful about it. Does that make sense to you? It does. And that is, like I said, that's, I think, a much more intimate experience between the two of you. Yeah. What would the terrain on that race? Was it largely flat?

Were you guys navigating some altitude gain and loss? Yeah, so that race had, it was like 350 feet of gain and loss per mile. Per mile? Per mile. So I think it clocked up to be like, I don't know, it was like 33 or 35,000 feet of elevation gain and loss over the course of that 30 hours. All right. So let's talk about the three horsemen race that obviously is going to happen now. I think it should be double that elevation gain and loss.

If possible, it should be uphill both ways. Here's the problem with that. With this race format, with this event that we're going to do and raise a million dollars, the harder the courses, the easier the races, because the sooner it will end. The easier the terrain is, the harder the races, man. Yeah, because you'll basically, you'll crush people way early. Yeah, because I'm good at climbing, man, because I live, dude, I live on a 500-acre ranch in the mountains. I don't go to town.

Like, I just stay in the woods all the time. I'm surrounded by 7,000, 8,000 acres of public land. So the hardest way would be no... Flat. Yes. Flat, paved road. So you know you could make the distance, and then it would truly become a between-the-ears evolution.

A hundred percent, bro. I like this. We could make it even harder to do it on a treadmill. Oh, no, man. In front of a wall with nothing on it. No senior. change whatsoever. That's got to be that, yeah, that'd be absolutely miserable.

So here's what we'll do. The three horsemen. We're going to get three Connix boxes. You're going to do it in isolation from your competitors. You're going to be running alone in the box, not knowing whether they're still going or not. That would be freaking insane. That would break people mentally

and emotion. Do you realize we could televise that? I would only want to televise. I would enjoy narrating the end when the fucking paint started coming off the wall of the mind. You guys that are hosting and talk, y'all don't need to come in until we're like a day into this thing. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Because the whole front half, look, man, when I run a 100 mile race, I run 95 miles for five miles of growth. Like all the growth comes at the end. You know what I mean? So, yeah, you guys, it wouldn't get interesting until we got deep into this thing, you know what I mean? But anyways. I mean, it's an interesting, it's a hell of a format. the three of you, if it was flat, man, I wonder what would be possible? How far? Would you set it up the same way? 4.1 miles you said it was? 4.16 miles. Would you set it up exactly the same? So it's 100 per day?

That makes it easy, yeah, to keep up with distance and all that, you know. And these races that are done all over the country. You know, this isn't a new format. This isn't my idea. It's just a certain. I just love the format because I'm not the fastest. I'm not the strongest. I'm not the strongest. the reason I win is because I'm a little more patient than people. Yeah. I can stay a little more present than people in the moment. I'm a little more deliberate than my competitors about where I, every step I take, the words that come out of my mouth, all that stuff. And I'm just a little bit more gritty.

That's the only thing. That's the only reason I, that's how I win races, man. Yeah. You know. I think that's the difference between people making it through buds and people not. I get asked all the time. One of my least favorite questions, parents will come up to me. Hey, can my kid be a seal? I'm like, I don't know by looking at you.

And I look back when I went through and then as an instructor, there's not some herculean difference. It's not physical. You can't look at a kid and be like, you've got it. Because I've been wrong on almost every bet that I made as an instructor, be like, oh, that kid's going to crush it. Ding, ding, ding. It's like, perhaps not.

It's all between the ears and people look relatively the same. It's just a little bit more grittiness, a little bit more mental toughness, a little bit more resilience or tolerance when it comes to pain. Yeah. That's what it gets people through at the end. It's not some, you know, some Adonis chiseled out of stone that shows up. I mean, there's those guys at buds too, and sometimes they make it through and sometimes not. But, yeah, it's a little stuff that makes the difference.

Well, I've heard you say before, Andy, you know, the number one reason people quit is they start looking at that big picture, man. Oh, yes. And look, man, this plays, this is, I've seen this play out time and time again. Even going back to the Mid-State Mile race when I was battling against Greg, you know, I told you I didn't think I could beat this dude. There was a distinct moment, though, that I knew victory was mine. And he came to me in between one of the loops, and he said, Chad, we got six hours until we reach 100 miles.

I just smiled at him because it was like, dude, hey, man, I thought you were going to win. You know, I didn't tell him that, obviously, you know. And then you feasted on a small portion of his soul and it drove you. No, then I, so the loop after that, I knew he was checked out. So the loop after that, we get off of that loop. We come in and I tell everybody's standing around. I'm like, hey, guys, did y'all hear about that race I did one time called Hell Week? It was like five days long and we ran over 200 miles with boats on it.

And this dude's sitting over here listening to it, you know what I mean? And he's thinking, he's thinking, oh my God, this dude's going to be able to run. What he doesn't realize is I'm hurting just as bad as he is. That's the thing, man. I think that so many people think that their freaking pain, their depression, their freaking, all the stuff they're feeling in life is unique to them. They think that I'm immune to it. Negative, man. I hurt just as bad as you hurt.

I feel the same things you feel. I get depressed just like anybody else does. I go through highs, lows, peaks, valleys, the whole nine yards, bro. That's another misconception I think people have. about the special operations community in general. But when people will ask me about, you know, our old life of being a seal, they think it's people who are immune to those things.

Always having the best of a day, never depressed. Like, how can you guys go through that? You obviously, pain doesn't bother. It's like, no. No, it bothers me just as much. Like currently in my life, I have a buddy here, you know, Montana beautiful rivers and lakes and I have a buddy who likes to go river rafting.

And he invites me all the time. My number one, as soon as it starts coming out of his mouth, hey man, do you want to go to the, no. He's like, why? I'm like, because I hate the water. He's like, why do you hate the water? I'm like, dude, your raft looks exactly like an IBS. Oh, man. It actually holds six people with a fucking coxin in the back.

It's, and I don't. And cold water too, me. And I don't like getting cold. And I didn't like getting cold in buds. And I didn't like being covered in sand and chafing until I was bleeding from under my armpits and between my legs and a bald spot on my head. But I did it But it doesn't mean that we're immune to those things And I wish

It's not that I wish I hope people understand that That there's nothing special About me or anybody really I would say In that old job we still feel those same things And we have to work our way Through those things and deal with them I just try to be as honest as I can about it

Because I do know Some people from our old job Who want to put the Superman suit on And act as if bullets are bouncing off and that there is no, you know what I mean? Like it's always, you know, let's frog man our way through this. It's like, uh, or we could stop and deal with the bullshit and be a better person after it. Agreed, 100%.

Yeah. And then, you know, all those things that we experience, pair that with isolation of, you know, the year of 2020. It's a bad recipe, man. Yeah, man. Bad recipe. It really is, man. Now, I mean, this was my first year of business. And 2020 was?

It's 2020, my first year business, and we actually, we've done really well, and we've brought people out of the woodworks to, that want to come and be a part of an event, want to be a part. So I love teaching. I love developing curriculum. I love taking people out into the wilderness and teaching them, just like, you know, John Barclow. I remember John Barclow taking me out in Kodiak and showing me all these simple tasks. How not to die? Yeah, how not to die, man. So, you know, we've developed curriculum similar to that, and we take groups out and we teach, man. And that's been a really great thing for us this year. So we haven't been as isolated as most have. What's your business? So the business is called Three of Seven Project. Three stands for body, soul, and spirit. Seven is the biblical number for completion.

Okay. So we look at all things body, your physical body, your soul, which is your mind, your will, and your emotions. And then your spirit, which is your connection to a higher power, right? So we try to master, nourish, and maintain those three aspects to live just a complete and wholesome lifestyle. That's where the idea came from. And it's really developing into a training pipeline because I got, in 2020, man, and even before that, but especially this past year when all this crap happened, dude, I guess people think that these Zoom calls are like the end all. be-all. Look, man, you can't learn but so much on a freaking Zoom call, man. And I got people, I mean, people that are in this space of like they want, they want to be better, they self-development,

they think they can listen to a podcast or jump on a Zoom call. And look, you know as well as I do, man. The only way that I can make a real impact in a person's life is to teach them these principles that you and I live in our lives. Teach them that and then put them in an environment where they have to execute on those principles. And that's the step that people will miss. But listening to podcasts, great. Oh, yeah. The Zoom calls, great, but there has to be follow on action after it, or it probably won't have the impact that you might be looking for.

It comes and goes, man. I've seen, you know, I've seen that, yeah, I've seen that in people on Instagram. I've been on Instagram for a freaking year, man. How are you liking that experience? It's crazy, dude. It's crazy, man. It's a necessary evil for your business. I tell you, man, it's been good, though.

I mean, it's been good. And, you know, I see people, though, they come and they go. They come and they go. But, you know, the people that come out and participate in the events that me and I have a small team, my little brother and two more dudes that I really respect, they're my co-instructors. and they come out and do these experiences that we put on and we see the real lasting impact. And, you know, we teach all kinds of stuff. But it's not like a beat down session, man.

It's like, really, we're teaching you real skills and putting you an environment where you can execute those skills, mindset and practical, like, you know, hands-on skills. So that's what we're doing. And I have a podcast, too, that's finally starting to make some money. All right, dude. You started a podcast. We're back. We're back.

Tech issue that should be largely invisible to everybody, except for the two of us in this room. I'm not going to tell anybody about my super secret tech scabby, Sills. And ability? Oh, he's good. I did one thing. The only thing I know how to do with tech. Actually, I know how to do two things.

Unplug things and plug it back in or turn it off and turn it back on. Sometimes I'll pair those two, so I guess I have a third option. But boom, we're back and going. We're recording. you started a podcast. Yeah, and that was actually a good example of what it's like to start a podcast. Because, yeah, we started with a little Yeti mic with a USB cable and, you know, and it was like, and I think that's another thing, you know, this is a long game, man, this podcast is.

It's like. It's a learning game too. It is. Like you just said, a perfect example of I just happened to catch out of the quarter of my eye. That doesn't look right. And previously I probably been like, it's probably fine. Yeah. So we'd talk for hours and I'd be like, oh, yeah, he, Chad. So we have a choice. We can try to pull the audio off to video cameras, which is rough. Or do you want to pretend like we didn't have that conversation to do it again? That'd be tough, man. That'd be tough. And that's with our podcast, you know, I've been, we've been doing it now for a little over a year, the 3 of 7 podcast. And it's just now getting to the point where it's generating some income and it's actually reaching enough people that you feel like it's worth the time.

that you put into it because this is a huge time investment. It's time investment and it is a learning curve that is steep. You'll feel like you can level it off. You're like, all right, I got it. I got all my checks like I did before we started and then you're like, shit, what just happened? It's consistent learning curve and what I've been finding is, you know, efficiencies in the editing, efficiencies in the recording system. It's never ending.

And I don't want it to be. I don't like doing things that have a defined end state, like an arrival point where you're like, I'm done. I hate stuff like that. Yeah, I agree. I think it's what I liked about our old job is that, I mean, I think there probably were people who had the headspace of I'm good, I'm as good as I'm ever going to be, and those people were dangerous.

I always had it in the back of my mind. If I ever feel like I know everything that I'm doing or I've arrived or I don't need to work hard or doing it, like I've got to get out of here because you're at your single most dangerous point ever. Agreed. I thought I was good as an operator until I went to, to be an instructor. And that's the real...

It's interesting when you try to teach. That was the real turning point for me, man. And that's why I think I'm so passionate about teaching. I mean, I'm good at it because I enjoy it. But I think that was one of the things that really showed... It really identified my own personal deficits. Because like you said, you can get to that point where you think, what else can I learn in another freaking ULT cycle?

Unit level training for people listening. What else am I going to freaking learn? And then you go to trade. at as I taught land warfare and then maritime operations. And it takes you to the next level as an operator. And I think that's what drives me to continue to teach now as a civilian is because it's really the natural progression to ever being, becoming something that I call it a master, becoming the master of anything.

You know, it's the progression is you got to be the student, right? Then you've got to go out and you got to do the freaking job. And then you can do the job for a long, long time, but you're never going to master anything until you get to the point that you're teaching others how to do those things that you have been doing. Teaching is definitely part of mastery. It immediately gauges your depth of knowledge in any subject. And I tell you what, there is a disconnect between really high-level operators and really high-level teachers. oftentimes they don't exist in the same person.

Yes. And I would actually rather have the person that is a slightly less capable operator, but an amazing teacher than somebody who is just a wizard behind the sights of their own gun, which is a time and place for that. But how do you generationally move a community forward if the only thing the person can do is just hammer home rounds on target? Because they're going to time out. I mean, I don't know if you could be a seal when you're 80.

I mean, that would actually be sweet, get wheeled around by new guys. I told you to push me over here and just minigone on your wheelchair. So maybe that would be awesome. But at some point, you're going to time out. Agreed, brother. That's an interesting point, man. I haven't thought about that dynamic in a long time of which is better. I don't know if it's necessarily a matter of better.

I think one can move the community generationally forward, which in the back of my mind, I guess to me, I always realized that I was renting my trident. You know, I earned the Trident by going through the pipeline, but the seal community was not mine, ever. And I think the best that I could ever hope to do would be leave it as good, definitely not worse, but hopefully a little bit better than I got into it. That's the way I viewed it from the first day to the last day and teaching people. And that's why when I went back as a Bud's instructor, I look at all the time I spent just under 17 years in. My most rewarding tour was when I was a Buds instructor. And I got to go back and actually teach people because you could see the impact that you were going to have on the future generations of the community.

Yeah, yeah. And not everybody sees that because there were some guys there who were just dicks. You know, they wanted to be there to beat their chest and it was about them as opposed to being about the students. I remember sitting there one day like, these kids, which is what they were, which is what we all were, mostly, except for the ones who weren't kids because they were in their 20s. I mean, we're talking post 9-11, volunteering for a career where you know you're going to get engaged in combat. Like, if you don't immediately have a level of respect for that, like, you're in the wrong spot, you know. And you're going to end up working with these people. So you don't want to get cold cocked in a bar, perhaps treat them as a human being.

True that, brother. True that. Yeah, it's been an interesting journey for me, too, in the last year, man, kind of figuring out how to, in a way, detach from that. from that part of my life right man um you know that that's been a it's been kind of a i don't know it's i guess it's been easier for me than most um and i never want to i never want to i never want to uh i never want to lose that part of me right yeah but i definitely i definitely am realizing that i am more than that man and i think teaching and doing what we do as business owners and that type That's helped me a lot in that journey, help me become who I'm going to be now for the rest of my life.

You know what I mean? How long have you been out? I got out January 2019. So two years, basically. About two years, yeah. Okay. So I've been out for seven. And what I would say and what I've discovered or I think is going to be true for anybody who had our job or a job similar to it is that you will not be able to detach.

that's something that I had to wrap my head around regardless of what it is that you are able to do next in your life or whatever I'm able to do or attempt to do at some point in the telling of that tale let me just tell you right now the term Navy SEAL is going to come up it's going to come up and that's okay as long as it's not what defines you and it already sounds like it's not what defines you but I had to come to grips with regardless of how much I also want to move away because everything everything that I do I try to I'm trying to again redefine myself you know I got out of the military I was doing some flying stuff uh did some military instruction on the free fall side of the house some shooting instruction the public speaking I'm trying to move away from the seal community meaning standing on my own two feet not shunning them but just trying to be able to

stand alone on the outside of that but you will not be able to anytime you go publicly speak it's trust me somewhere in your bio somewhere in your intro it's going to say navy seal i have come to peace with that and the only thing the only reason i think i think i've been able to is that i try to do so many other things that are not directly tied to that so that trident that three dollar pin that you can buy at the exchange on almost any navy base doesn't become who i am it's just what i did and i'm super proud of that but i want to do other things so i can look so i can look back and say i also did this and this and this. And so I'm no longer trying to like detach.

I just accept the fact that that's going to be the case. And then I also feel like I feel there's a burden with that Trident that we have to carry forward with us for the rest of our lives as well. Because most people will probably never meet somebody who was a seal. And if you're a dick or you're short with them or you're arrogant or you shut them down or you don't want to have a conversation with them, that's their touch point. You're right. So it's a burden and but also at the same time it's an incredible honor.

And I keep that in the back of my mind and then just try to focus on everything but that because I cannot control the fact that people will generally always talk about that. So go ahead and do that. But let's talk about the other stuff I do too. Yeah. And that's a perfect dynamic, Andy. And, you know, I think this one of your biggest strong points, man, is, you know, I listen to you quite a bit. And you like, you love to debate. You love to have the hard conversations. But you're very, you're very strong at our time. articulating things, just like you articulated that dynamic between what we did and now who we can become and how they mesh together in a way. And the danger is what you did becomes all that you ever were. And I'm sure we both know. I mean, I know people who are stuck in that world. And I feel sorry for them because, again, you will time out. This, you know, 9-11 from 9-11 to 2021. They'll probably the longest sustain period of combat. In the history of the United States, it's going to come to an end at some point. And so the people who are in their 30s or 40s now in the community, 30 years from now, nobody's going to give a shit about your stories. You know, and if you're stuck in that world looking in the rearview mirror, I mean, do whatever you want with your life.

But, wow, there's so much more opportunity to go. and you know you hear people talking about the dash this is your birthday eight and the day that you die there's so many other things you can fill it with you're right brother and you talk about people nobody's going to care about your stories man and so that's one thing that i've learned how to do is um here's the thing the stories are cool from you know being an operator being in buds the stories are there right but for me i don't when i go and talk to people i don't really try to just sit around and tell those stories. What I've tried to do in my own mind is extract the valuable principles that were in the story, right? And then tell the story in a way that it highlights

the valuable principles that, you know, that that story possesses. You're educating, not entertaining. Exactly, man. Exactly. And that's been really helpful for me. You know, there are only a few stories that I tell when we, when we have a group come out and we get to spend time together. and we're at one of our training events. But those few stories are the ones that have the valuable, you know, the valuable, I guess, principles woven into them. I couldn't agree more. I have had, because 2020 was the year of no public speaking due to no people being in the same room together.

Yeah. But I've had organizations reach out, and they're pretty honest about what they want. You know, we want to have a keynote speaker at a dinner, and it's about 30 minutes. And could you just come and, you know, just tell some stories? And my answer is no. I've had the same request, man. I won't do it, and I don't care what the check they throw my direction is because, and I'll tell them, listen, I, the stories are valueless unless there is an educational component tied to it. My goal when I speak is I want to leave people with very simple principles that can improve their life, whether it's how they view themselves and specifically leadership from that moment going forward.

I'm not going to come in and talk about, so there I was. And then the bullets were flying over my head. Because if you want that speaker, go find that speaker. I am not that person. And like I said, I don't care what the check is. I'm not doing it. Same here, brother. But that's what people think they want to hear.

I can't tell you how many times I'll be in out with a corporate team or whatever. And somebody, that's what they ask is, oh, was there ever a time that you just really thought it was over? Like, right this moment. Yes, when you're asking me, I feel like I just need to leave. I'm like, what do you want me to freaking say, dude? Like, come on, man. All right. The other thing I was confused about, is it Stump or Stumpf?

I don't care. I've stopped. It's Stump with an F. Because when Steve Weatherford says it, it's Stump. Yeah. But it's spelled Stumpf. And he knows that. He just, I don't know, perhaps he has a reading disorder.

I'm not even sure. Steve's the best. My last name has haunted me my entire life. I had to ask, bro. Yeah. I'll respond to Andy Stump and people will spell S-T-U-N-S-E-N. M-P-H. I'm like, listen, it's not phone book. There's a f on the end of it, but it's not pH like phone book. It's S-T-U-M-P-F. And like I said, I stopped caring a long time ago.

There's like a, there's a soft at the end, stump. Okay. I know now. And having said that, I could care less. If it's some semblance of that, I'm like, yeah, here, like present. Got you, brother. All right. Sorry, I had to ask it. I said that was the other thing I was confused about. Yeah, man. So has the podcast journey been for you guys? Are you, and before you answer that, a word of caution to people who want to start a podcast

because I get questions about this too. When people write to me and they say, hey, I want to start a podcast because either A, I want to be the next Joe Rogan and we have to have a very serious talk about what that would take because there's Joe's numbers and then everybody else's numbers. Yeah. But two, they will approach me and say, you know, I want to do it. and they're looking only at the economic aspect of it. And I would say that is the wrong, that is an incorrect reason

where I would push people away from wanting to start one because of that. Because it takes a long, it's an investment. I don't think I had somebody reach out to me for an ad for a year and a half. Yeah. And it grows over time. And it requires an audience. And nobody's going to listen, in my opinion, at least, if you don't have something to actually talk about.

If you're only doing it because you're looking at a dollar figure down the road, I mean, do it again, do what you want, but that's a long road to hoe. A hundred percent, man. I mean, the podcast, it's the thing in, it's the aspect of my business that takes the most amount of time. With the least probably financial reward. With the least financial reward. I mean, you think, man, you can go and do a speaking engagement and make $30,000 to $40,000 in an hour. And guys, we're talking about these numbers.

sound crazy to you. I don't have a lot of money, okay? I don't, I don't go do a $30,000 speaking engagement every week. Old Chad here, old Chad here's worth about $50,000. That's about all I'm worth, all right? So don't get me wrong. I buy a lot of guns. So I make money, but I buy a lot of guns and optics and ammo and toys, right? So don't think that I'm trying to be boastful here. But, you know, that's about the average for a speaking fee. Those things, you know, make a lot of money and profit. And, you know, that podcast, man, I mean, I pour a lot of time and effort into that. The equipment's expensive.

Your time's expensive. Yeah. Your own personal value. I would say now, you know, it's the most rewarding part to me is that, like I say, now it's reaching enough people that I feel like it's really, and that's my reward. The feedback you get to the listeners? feedback I get and see that people are listening to it and enjoying it. And then as far as income, we have started the Patreon account, which has been great, man.

And we do special things for that Patreon. Hopefully you have your clothes on for these special things. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, we do a thing called resurrected. It's Bible-based content that we provide for our Patreon people. I just didn't know if we needed like a children's warning on this episode.

Come see Chad on Patreon with no pants on It ain't got that far yet We ain't that hard up yet So the Patreon's been awesome man Because you know with the way that The way that the social media is becoming so censored You have to be

I mean to be honest with you if you post on Instagram Or something like that You have to be conscious of what you say on there Or it's just going to screw you all up You know what I mean And Evan Hafer told me one thing one time about posting on social media. He said it needs to either be informational, entertainment, or there was one other component.

I'd have to think about it to remember it. But he gave me basically a guideline on what to post. But the Patreon is like a private social media network where these people can come. They basically give $25 a month to support the show. And then, you know, we try to check in there with them. We make private posts. We have, you know, conversations on there that. And it's really not censored.

That's what I love about it. It seems like there's no big heads, you know, limiting. I mean, we get on there, man, and we talk about all kinds of, you know, stuff, faith and moral issues. Talk about what you want to. Exactly, man. So that's been really rewarding. And it's allowed us to generate some income. And I'm just so thankful that there are people out there that enjoy the show enough that they'll actually give $25 a month if they're hard-earned money to support.

to support us, man. I actually have one too, and I don't know if I've ever talked about. I'm probably the worst marketer or advertiser possible. But I do, on Mondays, I do an hour-long Q&A. So the Patreon just gives people the access to that. And it's been crazy. There's a community of people that have developed from, we hosted on Zoom, so everybody can come on.

That's what we do. Yeah, be interactive. And now they're communicating back and forth with each other and doing stuff completely outside of my involvement at all. But it's cool. I hop on on Mondays. People have questions about the SEAL teams or exercise or, you know what I mean? Shooting or guns and optics and whatever they want.

And it's just another way to sit there. It's much more two-way because they're literally asking the question. But for me, I tell you what, man, the coolest part has been the feedback that I get from the podcast. I have had probably three or four emails now that have just, rocked me and put me back on my heels. And it was people talking about they had intended to kill themselves. And they changed their mind from listening to the podcast. And I don't even know how to, I don't know, how do you respond to that?

It's, um, other than thank you for making the choice to not take your own life. You know, I don't, I don't look at myself as a master of anything or somebody who has incredible knowledge. I mean, I'm a moron trying to struggle my way through life through the highs and lows. And I just try to be honest about them. But, I mean, how more, what could you possibly ask for more than somebody to reach out and let you know that, you know, they're alive at least for another day? Because something you talked about or said made an impact and it changed their trajectory of their life. I could give a shit about money.

I would take that over anything else. Agreed, brother. And that really resonates with me, man, because we, you know, I just had a guy not long ago. he's actually a pretty much a friend of mine that came out and hung out and you know participated in some training and uh he hit me up a few days after that and he said and of course i you know keep his i'm not going to mention his name but you know he says you know my i've been thinking about taking my life for a long time every day for a long time and he said this this has changed everything and i thought holy crap man and see my

So my C-daddy, Jake Hubman, killed himself. Yeah. I was headed out. Mine did, too, to be honest with you. Did he really? One of the guys who was the most inspirational. And I worked directly with him and for him in my first platoon, killed himself last year.

I'm sorry to hear that, brother. It was a rough one. Yeah. That one put me on my ass. I mean, in a lot of, in a lot of ways, I still am. Like, I am doing my best to work my way through that. But fuck. Yeah, man.

What a sobering phone call that was when I got that call. Yes. I'll never forget, too, with Jake, man. That dude, just like you said, Andy, I mean, he taught me everything. And he gave me tough love, but he was a good leader. I remember one time we got done with a run out at Salk. And I always carried an aide up, even though I'm a little skinny white dude. They always stuck me with A-dub because I could rock that freaking thing.

He's talking about an automatic weapon. Yeah. Probably a 60 year. That was a Mark 46. Or 46, yep. Belt fed. We're talking fun. And we got done with a run, man.

And, you know, I had the A-dub propped up. We were doing a little debrief right there. And I got a little acesadaisical because we were shooting blanks for this run. And I didn't flip my safety selection. back to safe and Jake saw it and you know he wasn't happy about it and I had to run for the rest of that week I had to run from the barracks we were staying in to the range every day for a week and full kit in order to pay pay my dues well Jake's the one that gave me that punishment but Jake ran every one of those days with me because he took his job of developing me as a seal

so seriously that he actually felt that it was partly his responsibility that I made that mistake. And he was just a good dude, man. Yeah. How many times you leave it on fire after that? No, no, never. Exactly, man. Some lessons burn deeper than others. Yeah.

So in a way, when you get those emails, when you get those messages from, you never know the impact you're making, man. And half these people that have these men and women that are thinking about taking their lives, seriously, you're not going to know it. You don't know it until they reach out to you and say, hey, this is where I was. And something that you said or did has changed that trajectory. And it's, you know, not saying that it's all me, man, but it does feel good.

I mean, like you said, what better could you be doing with your time? Yeah. If that's one person, man, one person, you know, that's enough for me. But one person, they impact so many others. 100%. Yeah. I worry less about people who can vocalize the struggles that they're going through. I worry more about the people who just internalize.

You know, with my buddy who took his life, I just, and I still struggle to understand what he must have been feeling that he arrived at that was the answer, the amount of pain or frustration or anger at himself, what he was dealing with. and I you know I mean what would you say to the guy if he was still here if I knew it now I'd be like dude you're not alone like we all you know what I mean

because I think that feeling of being alone or isolated again I'm not an expert on suicide at all but I feel like when you get to that place where you think you're the only one

that's feeling like that that option starts to look a lot more attractive than it should be yeah and too man you know another part of that story you say what would you say

to somebody you know I can remember after Jake took his life. We came back. We were out at mobility and we came back and of course it was my job to clean his cage out. And I'm cleaning, I'm cleaning his cage out, inventory and gear. This gets me a little upset just telling this story, but I get to the bottom of his locker and I pull out like three, four bibles, man. Like just like, and I'm like, man, you know, this dude was searching for something. You know, I didn't know, back then,

I wouldn't know what to say to him, to be honest with you. You know, I feel like I have a better grasp now of what I would say to him. You know what I mean? And the issue is a man's heart. And I don't know if you can understand that. We have to work on changing a person's, like a true, real and permanent change of a person's heart. If you can get a person's heart, his soul and his spirit, right? If you can get those things in alignment, everything else just falls into place.

At least that's how it's worked with me, you know? It's a tough one. Man, the impact it has on the people that are left behind too is just hard to quantify. Yeah, that was a tough one. That was in October. It was damn. Yeah. It, you know, yeah.

It takes a while. to process it. I still have it. It's still, that's I mean, it's still hard to even talk about those things and whatever. I'm not the only one with that story quite obviously. Yeah. What led you to the SEAL teams?

We should start back at the beginning. It sounds like you're from Wisconsin. Yeah, yeah. Dude, I'm going to tell you, there ain't a lot of old country boys from Georgia that make it through buds, brother. That doesn't surprise me. actually, but yeah.

I mean, so yeah, what was your path that got you there? Bro, I was working in a concrete factory in North Georgia. I just graduated high school and went to work, construction basically. And nothing wrong with that. I grew up in a my father was a mason. I grew up on

job sites. It was actually phenomenal experience. Work ethic, tenacity, tolerance to pain. Hey, I love it, man. I mean, the first thing I did when I got out of the seal teams was go and start a landscaping business just so I could get back to work, right? Just get my hands back in the dirt, man. I'll never forget, and then I'll tell you

why I got in buds. I'll never forget when I started my landscaping business straight out of the seal teams. I was down in the dirt pulling weeds at a funeral home and I'll never forget the funeral home owners like walking by me in their suits and ties looking at me like I was a piece of freaking trash. And I want to be like, and I just smile because I'm like, I've literally stood outside the president of the United States bedroom where he was sleeping overseas in charge of protecting his life. And just now, because I'm down here pulling weeds, you're beneath them. Yeah, you, and now they didn't know my background. Yeah. You know, it's just, hey, be careful how you treat people. What'd you call your landscaping business? I actually

called it Frogman landscaping. I thought it would be. tried and cut and trim or some shit. Frog man landscaping. And of course, nobody outside of Virginia Beach knows what a frog man is. Or San Diego. Or San Diego. Yeah, yeah. But anyways, I was working a construction job right out of high school.

And, man, I just came to this realization that if I didn't get out of that small town and I grew up in, that that was going to be my law in life. How small are we talking? I don't know the population. it was, I mean, it's small, dude, like one red light, you know. A couple thousand people, probably, yeah, I've never kept up with how many people live around there. Did you have any military service in your family? No, no, I had never even seen anyone in a uniform until I went to the recruiter's office. Okay.

Legitimately, man. I mean, I had no clue. And so I'm thinking, what can I do to get out of here to get out of this? I just what it wasn't fulfilling me man I just for some reason I just wanted more out of life and and I can I think I attribute that mostly to my mother um we were raised by really strong women in our family and they really developed us uh in a in a great way um so I remember I was on this laptop one time what year is this this would have been 2006 okay and it comes up you know back then they were recruiting really hard man i mean you could get a steel contract all you had to do is

pass a pst one time yeah which is a physical screening test which is not incredibly no it's not it's well it took me about a dozen times to pass the dang thing but i mean i'm sorry from scratch right i see this flyer says you know navy seal training uh the hardest military training in the world it was one of the flyer things and it was almost just like a banner ad banner or something that I saw on a web page. Probably was an ad banner. It was one of the early pop-up ads. Yep.

No kidding, man. I remember him too. That's what it was. I'm like, hey, you guys need to do better intel collection because I'm in the Navy and I'm still getting this ad. You guys need to knock this shit off. Like, your algorithm is not working incredibly well. Yeah.

No doubt, brother. But I saw that and something about it to me was it resonated with me. I like I've always been I always like to go all in on whatever I do I mean even with hunting I get front sight focus on stuff man and that's just part of my my genetic makeup I don't think it was something that was taught to me or it's just how I am if I'm gonna do something I want to I want to do the hard thing yeah and so I went took me a while to pass the PST because I never swim in a swimming pool until I went to take the dang thing so my wife taught me, she was then my girlfriend, taught me how to breaststroke. I learned I was not

going to pass that PST with doing a breaststroke because it just smoked me. I couldn't run because I was about 210, 220 pounds. No, you were not. I swear, dude, straight up. Pictures or it didn't happen? Oh, I've got some pictures. I've got stretch marks too. I got stretch marks in my armpits. Now, this was muscle. I mean, I was squatting like 500 pounds. Like, you know, I was getting a little help too. You know, I was into weightlifting. Chicken breast or chicken breast in the needle. Yep, I get it.

Yeah, man. So finally I passed the PST, get a sealed contract. And that's where my story deviates a little bit from everybody else's. You know, I went into the Navy, get all the way through boot camp, and we're doing that freaking stupid thing at the end of boot camp. It's called like battle stations or something where they have a, it's like a, they have like a mock ship. They may not have did this when you went through boot camp, but it's like a mock ship and you go and you do this all night long thing. They're flooding these compartments and all. And then after that, you change your recruit ball cap out and you get

your Navy ball cap. I do not remember doing that. Okay. They may not have did it. They've got a huge facility, an indoor facility now. Yeah, I went through a 96. Oh yeah. They didn't have that. They didn't have that back then. And so we're going, we just get done with this thing, this final training exercise in Navy boot camp. And we're like walking to get our Navy ball caps in the RDC, which is like a drill instructor for Navy boot camp. He pulls me out and he's like, Chad, you have to go see the dive medical officer. They found something wrong with your dive physical. So I go up, they pull me out of formation. I freaking march over there to see this cat. And he's like, Chad, you have a seven centimeter paracardial cyst on your heart. And he says, this thing is not ever going to cause

you any issues. It's the reason you didn't even know it was there. They found it on a chest x-ray. And he's like, but we're afraid that when you dive underwater or you go to altitude, skydiving, essentially the pressure change would burst the cyst, which would be bad. And so he says, look, man, we're not going to perform this surgery to take this thing off your heart. You can go to the fleet. Was it on the outside layer of your heart? It was the paracardium. So the paracardial sac that your heart is actually contained in.

It was a paracardial cyst. So it was on that paracarcal. Okay. Yeah. There's a whole, the Navy wrote a whole medical. journal on my case because I'm the first naval special warfare candidate that they've ever seen this in, which is the reason they didn't know how to deal with it. So he says, hey man, you'll never be able to be a seal. Your contract's Nolan Boyd. You can go to the fleet. And I'm like, no,

man. Yeah, how about no? Yeah. But they made it a really a pain in the butt for me to get out. I mean, they put me in this dang TPU, temporary holding unit. I'm sitting there twiddling my freaking thumbs for seems like forever it was probably like two months had my mom call our congressman and like just trying to pull some strings to get me out of there to get out of the navy out of the navy okay so your choice you basically were given you can't be a seal so you're like I'm out then I don't want it yeah I don't blame you yeah okay that makes sense I did that's not where I had set my goal man for sure you know and there's nothing wrong with being in a fleet like that's that's an awesome career man people can make an awesome career out of that don't take it that way guys that's just

this not where I have had set my goal, personal goal. So I chose to get out, finally got out, and I get back home to Atlanta. First thing, all my buddies, all my redneck buddies that all knew I was going off to be a seal, right? They all laughed at me when I was leaving. And boy, they all got a real good laugh when they saw me back a few months later. Because they're, dude, everybody quit seal training. So of course, that's the, from a mathematical perspective, the odds were not in your favorite. That's the first thing everybody thinks, man. And here I am, dude, I'm still uneducated, man.

I'm not, like I say, I've never been the smartest, the fastest, the strongest, any of that. And, you know, they're all like, oh, you know, of course, of course, Chad quit. And I'm actually, I'm over here like, no, I actually have this really rare cyst on my heart that just. I didn't even get a chance to quit. Yeah, I didn't even get a chance to even tow the line, man. But of course, that's everybody that quits buds has an injury or an excuse. use, right? So obviously, everybody thought I fit into that category, and I started trying to find a surgeon that would take this thing off my heart and went to multiple surgeons, and I was a kid,

you know, and these heart surgeons would be like, first of all, none of them had ever operated on a paracardial cyst, not a single one that I went to. So they were like, no, the risk versus reward for this surgery is way out of whack. We're not doing this, right? Yeah. But finally I found a surgeon named Dr. Cooper. And he said, yeah, man, let's do this. Dr. Cooper was in the Army. He was hard, dude. I follow him on Instagram.

I mean, great guy. And I remember, dude, you know, and that's a big deal. I remember it's all fun in games until you're in the car riding to the daggone operating room. Voluntarily. This is a gamble. because even if I had this thing removed and I survived the surgery and fully recovered, the Navy didn't say, oh yeah, you can

come back. Yeah. Heck no, the Navy cut me loose and said, we're never going to see Chad again. So this was a gamble, man. And so I'm riding in the hospital. I look over my dad and I'm like, man, dude, they're about to split my chest open. Do you really think I should do this? And he's like, son, if you want to be a seal,

you don't have any choice. And I was, Roger that. And so laid out on the operating table, They removed assist from my heart. It took me quite a while to recover. Did they have to stop your heart to cut that thing off? I don't know. I don't know.

I'd have to ask Dr. Cooper that. Maybe he did. I don't know. I mean, I don't know if I'd want to cut stuff off around a beating heart. I'm going to be totally honest with you. I didn't ask any questions. I just said, hey, man, can you do this? He said, yeah, we're going to do it.

And I said, Roger that. What time? Where do I need to be in what time? And then you wake up and like, hey, how did it go? Good. I remember, dude. I remember waking up, and my grandmother was there. She was holding my hands, and I remember the first thing that popped.

This is how bad I wanted it at that point. I remember waking up. The first thing I said was I got my dreams back. Dude, there was nothing was going to stop me from that point forward. Unless the United States Navy got in your way. Exactly. Exactly, man. I can think of one thing that might get in the way of your dreams.

But I knew if I could at least get on the start line, I was going to be good to go. And so recovered and was back in the Navy less than a year after the surgery. So this all happened pretty quick. How was the process of getting back into the Navy? It was pretty tough, man. A lot of paperwork. A lot of waiting. A lot of just unknown.

Did they make you go through boot camp again? No. So I went back in because I had made it to the last day and made it through that last final training evolution. They sent me back as a navvette, so like a veteran, Navy veteran, basically, prior service guy. And I sat in a holding cell, I got all my paperwork from the surgeon, the civilian doctor, brought it, and I'll never forget walking back into the Diomedical Officer. Because this was such a short span of time, the same dude was there, the same dive medical officer and I mean walking into those office and he's like

what the crap are you doing back here man and of course I had this packet of paperwork and you know I give it to him and they take they take like six months to it goes like I think it went all the way up the chain like yeah all the way up to the top

and everybody wants to get eyes on it and they wrote their little paper about it and all this and they finally blessed me off and what did you do for that six months I was in that Navet holding unit and we just trained, man. We just worked. We went down to the little dive locker there at RTC and they just beat us all day, you know,

every single day. Sounds about right. Yeah. That's all we did. Yeah. But it didn't matter to me at that point. I had so much invested in that. I mean, because I, man, back home, we didn't have health insurance.

Like, this wasn't just like, I didn't grow up with a bunch of money or nothing. This wasn't just easy to make this decision to do this. This was, you know, I had to have help. Yeah. And, but it was a blessing at the end of the day because everybody always asked me, if you would have went to, if you went to Buds the first go around, and do you think you would have made it? The honest answer is no.

Really? Really. I really, I really don't think, I really don't think that I was ready physically, to be honest with you. I think, I think that my body was not during. enough. So, so I took it seriously that first time. Yeah. But I just wanted to get in, right? And I told you, I'm coming from 220 pounds, don't know how to swim, can barely run enough to pass a PST, go to boot camp. And if I would have went straight to buds, I think something would have broke. This is just,

this is just my prediction. I don't know, you know, I don't know. But man, that second go around, after that heart surgery and then that six months of of uh of conditioning yeah holding time conditioning and i at that point i took it very very seriously you know what i mean because i just had so much invested man yeah and so breeze through buds um what class for you 278 yeah yeah no issues man uh went straight through and was never rolled that's what's funny about me about some of these cats, some of these cats that we talk about brag about, they've been through Hell Week four, three or four times. I'm like, well, that just means you're a turd. Yeah, it's not something that I would want to intentionally do. It is, uh, yeah, uh, I guess more power to you.

Uh, yeah. I always, I always had an issue with rollbacks, man, and buds. Uh, not, not, now there, there were some cases where I think, obviously it was a legitimate. This dude was a good. There were some people who fell off an obstacle and then decided to relocate their femurs. Exactly. Exactly. But man, by time you got to third phase, and you know more about buds than I do, you know more about what's going on behind the scenes. I was never there. You know, but time I got to third phase, man, we had like 18 dudes that were original.

And I felt like it should have been us 18. I was like, why do these cats get a third, fourth, whatever chance? Because the United States Navy was tasked with growing the force by 500 seals in a matter of about five years. Yeah. Okay. I mean, that's a portion of it as well. I mean, in a way, I feel like it degrades the final product. But in some cases, now, Andy, I'm not saying everybody. I'm saying there's some legitimate cases.

It was interesting as an instructor to give you a peek behind the curtain. You know, you get a performance role and you get a medical role. the two things that you're essentially guaranteed you're going to get. You know, if you fail the four-mile swims in first phase, they will retread you to retrain you, but you're not going to get a second one. But there were, you know, and that exists to allow people who might need a little bit more training,

fill in the blank, or recovery time, you know. But there is bureaucracy involved behind the scenes. You know, there are questions about percentage, of throughput, you know, percentage of the class that's, you know, why is X number of people not passing the dive physics test? You guys must be doing a shitty job as instructors. It's like, no, maybe it's a combination of the instructors and the people that were actually working with. There was an emphasis on getting people through. And I don't say that in a negative manner, but it, I mean, it's, they wanted to grow the force. And they still do. Yeah. Yeah. And if they

modify the standards, that's where the problems start creeping in, in my opinion. That's a good point. That's a good point. Yeah, and I don't think the standards were being modified. I just think if you go through the pipeline that is sealed training all in one shot, I mean, that speaks volumes for the individual that does that. There's luck involved, though, too. And I will tell you that from being an instructor. There were some injuries of guys that was completely out of their control. 100%. Now, in those cases, my comment is Nolan Boyd. All right?

Yep. But I talked about that being deliberate, being deliberate about, right, every step you take, being deliberate about every obstacle you go over. Like, in that patience, it takes patience in order to be deliberate. I mean, you know, those are the type of things that it takes to get through a pipeline like that all in one shot. or to run a 100-mile race. Yeah. Really.

You know what I mean? So if you go and you run a hundred-mile or that is a testament to the fact that you are patient, that you can stay present with your task. You can be deliberate about everything that you say and do. And yeah, I don't know. I don't even know why we're talking about this. I've just always, you know, that's my story, man. Yeah.

Made it through buds. Got to the SEAL team. You were at East Coast guy? Yeah. Yeah. Virginia Beach. Yeah, I was East Coast. Also known as the JV SEAL teams, but it's fine. I mean, obviously the West Coast teams are superior.

Every way, they're better operators, but. Yeah. I'm just choking for people listening, screaming at their radio. What teams do you start at? Seal Team 8. Cool. Yeah, and did a couple rotations there. Went over to TradeDet.

Did my deal at TrayDet for a couple years, and then I was medically retired in January 2019. which that was one heck of a freaking process, man. What led to the medical retirement? TBI, man. You know, I got to a point, you know, and here's the thing, man. They can't really identify this. The lines between TBI and PTSD are so blurred.

I think there's 13 symptoms and they share 11 of them. Okay. It gets, I mean, even so dang smart. Even the, well, I went through the same process. And I had somebody who was smart explain it to me because trust me, I am not. But it gets difficult even in the diagnosis because, you know, like apathy, short temper. Is that post-traumatic stress or is that TBI? Is it both?

It's it. They both exist. Which one is it? Yeah. The reality is I think they know, what was, what did I hear one time? They know more about the surface of the moon than the actual interfunctionings of the brain. Wow. I believe it, man.

I believe it. Because going through that process, that was a very stressful process to me. I don't know, man, maybe it's different for everybody, but I had- Did you want to initiate it or did the military initiate it for you? Well, they didn't give me a choice. I went to the doctor because here's what was happening. I would be out at night on nods and I would lose my balance and I would just like fall over. and so what had happened was my vestibular system, which is in your inner ear, on the left side, it was like completely destroyed.

They gave, they put me through this whole dang test thing and they gave me a percentage of the, you know, how well it was functioning on each side. And I didn't know that at the time. So like, I'd be out on nods and I would like squat down to take a knee while we would stop the patrol. And I would just lose my balance and fall over. and I was like That's got to be rough Yeah I was like This is this is getting kind of dangerous

For me like as And for my team Yeah You know what I mean So that's when I went and told them about that And then dude They just start sending me down This freaking rabbit hole dude

And they're sending me to these dang doctors Like every day And like They pull me Pull me back out of the Out of the mix And just like My full-time job

seemed like it was going to these doctors And I had never went the doctor. Like my whole Navy career, you know, it was like I didn't have it yet. My medical record was about three pages long. Same. So was that damage to the vestibular system? I'm assuming there was a close proximity to a blast of some kind. Well, I was a breacher. So that'll do it. Yeah, we had, I had quite a self-induced blasts. Quite a few close proximity as a blasts. You know, we always, you always try as a breacher to get minimum safe distance, but. Emphasis on the word try. Yeah, it depends.

Situation, it depends. And, you know, I guess that's what it was. And I know the blast affects different individuals, affects their brains differently. So there could be another dude that's a breacher that's exposed to even more than I was exposed to, but his brain just takes it better. And apparently mine didn't take it too well. And it was, yeah, it was throwing me off. Even my thought processes and just, I just didn't feel right, you know what I mean? Didn't feel like yourself?

It didn't feel like myself, man. I know exactly what you're talking about. It's really difficult to explain. They sent me through NICO, the National Intrepid Center of Excellence. I'm Walter Reed and taking these battery of tests. They're like, hey, you're doing fine. I'm like, I understand that the result of this test shows you that, but I don't feel like the person that I used to be.

Like, there is a disconnect of the firing of my brain. And I'm like, well, based off the objective analysis of this test, it looks like everything's okay. I'm like, all right, I guess I don't know how to explain to you that, you know, because I didn't have a test from before. That's the problem. That would have been awesome. If I would have had a test when I came in and then a test when I get out, I could be like,

see, this is the difference. I have no other way to explain to you that my brain is not functioning the same way. Yeah, yeah. Maybe they'll start doing that for guys. That would actually be... Well, they're making guys now where sensors on their kit. Well, I mean even just cognitive testing on the way in. I think they are doing that now.

It's awesome. Otherwise, what reference do you have? I'm pretty sure. image your brain and be like, look at all these, I forget if it's darker white spots, because I was not eligible for the MRI. But they'll look at like, oh, this is damage, damage, damage, damage. It's like, okay, but when was this and where did that come from? Like, oh, we don't know that.

Like, okay, so it could have been Pop Warner or sucking up a six-foot strip charge on a door, which one of these causes? And, yeah, we don't know. Yeah, no, they don't, man. They don't. And they do that instead of sending people to NICO to save money now. Now, they still do send people to NICO, but they've still. up a basically a local program called the warrior concussion clinic and it's ran locally so you know

you're going home every evening and i almost wish i just would have went to nico because that whole process man gosh it stressed me out i do not like going to doctors and telling them things that are wrong with me yeah it bothers me really bad and i've never told this story before man but It was stressing me out so bad toward the end of it. This sounds crazy, guys. This sounds, look, I'm talking about being stressed about going to a freaking doctor every day. And, you know, a year earlier, we were jumping out of a freaking C-17 at 14,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean. Like, that kind of stuff is easy for me.

This crap, for some reason, was hard for me. And, like, I'm standing there. I'm just maxed out with all these doctors, been hitting. me with all these questions and tests and crap all day telling me, oh, this might be wrong with this. Dude, and I'm having a conversation with my wife, and next thing I know, I'm pissing in a trash can in my freaking kitchen. I like, like my mind had left my body. At least it wasn't on the floor. At least it was a trash can. And when I, my wife looks at me and she's like, what are you doing? I'm like, holy crap. All right, man, I got to change, like, this is maxing me out,

man this sounds crazy dude but so anyways that's how that's how tough that transitional period was for me and you feel like too man you feel like you're you almost feel like you're blackballed from the team too man from the guys that you've been working with because you know you walk into the office and you know you've been out doing these freaking doctor's appointments and bull crap for the last three weeks and they've been working yeah and you walk in there and they're like dude where you been you know what's what what's what's what's what's special about you you know and I'm like I'm doing what I'm told man yeah um yeah it is tough it uh the steel teams are an interesting beast they can make you feel as if you're absolutely essential but then you come to the realization

once you move on so do they oh 100% a hundred percent my yeah we have how could you want to leave quitter we need you to be here and they're like that whatever that guy's gone hey come here new guy. That's it. And I'm fine with that. That's the mechanism. That's the way it has to be. The machine has to keep moving on. But it will trap people if you don't realize you need to keep your head up a little bit and think about your own personal future. Otherwise, you can get behind the eight ball. I know a lot of guys who have been at the 18, 19 year mark, they're like, yeah, I'm going to start on my education. I'm like, ooh, you could have started that early. You could have been done with it. I mean, you know, the time to start your bachelor's is not when you're at your

19th year in the military. I'm not saying you should prohibit people. people from doing that, but a little foresight you could have been done at your 19th year. Yeah, yeah. No, 100%, brother. Did you deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan, or where did your deployments take you? So basically, when we got to SEAL Team 8 and I guess it would have been 09-ish, they were coming off of their last Iraq deployment, and then we took over the whole continent of Africa. So all my deployments were Afri-Com, and we were all over that continent. it, man. What were they having you do? You know, we were, it was, some of it was, was fed.

Foreign internal defense training partner forces largely. Some of it was working with other three letter agencies, you know, providing security for them when they would go out and meet with contacts. We, I got to play QRF for the embassy in Tunis, Tunisia. It got hit. simultaneously with the embassy in Benghazi. Boy, they freaking, they did some work on that. When we got there, dude, they had burned like 300 up-armored SUVs in the embassy lot. They had smashed out all the freaking windows, took the flag. It was a mess.

That was a fun mission. Guys were all over the place. I mean, and we would deploy, we would deploy in four-month deployments, and we would deploy in very small teams. Like, when we went into Tune, for that mission, we had, I guess we had four guys, and we met with a, it was called a SIF team from the Army, Green Berets. We linked up with them.

It was cool, though, man. We, like, flew in in a, I don't want to get, I feel uncomfortable telling about too much of this stuff. Just go as broad as you want, man. Yeah, I mean. You flew in in an airplane. Yeah, we flew in in an unmarked aircraft, and they, like, pay the little dude off, and we get out, MP5s and backpack.

and, you know, concealed. MP5s, interesting. Going with a pistol caliber round. I like where your head's at. So we had all of our, you know, primary weapons and, you know, combat equipment and body armor and stuff. But we actually, once we got into the embassy, we set up our ready room and, you know, had all that stuff stage there.

But that was a fun mission. So it was a different career. For me, my career as a seal was, I think, very atypical. from what most people were experiencing during the years that I was in. And in a way, I've always resented that. I don't think that's uncommon. I felt like, to be honest, well, you man, I had a lot of anger. I had a lot of anger about that.

Not that what we were doing was, it was fun, and we were making an impact. We were making a difference. but you know we weren't freaking we weren't setting up sniper hides and freaking killing dudes every night and that's what everybody wants to do right but it's what everybody thinks they're going to be doing freaking luck of the draw man yes expectation management is a huge thing and i'm over that now man because what i what i've realized is the stuff the stuff that that the missions that we did get were they were valuable and they were valuable from a lessons learned standpoint. They were valuable to our country. The work we were doing,

I think, was valid and it was needed. And it took me some time to reconcile with that, man. I can totally understand that. You know, my career was either lucky or unlucky, depending on the optic that you view it from. Because if you get yourself into those more DA or direct action-centric roles, you know, the knife cuts both ways. I ended up on the wrong side, you know, of an enemy gun. And on the same time, you know, I had plenty of opportunity for other people to end up on the wrong side of my gun. But perhaps this will help you put it behind you as well, too, because I get asked this question. I actually got, I answered this question. I do a Friday episodes where it's just Q&A.

And the guy was asking about, you know, the older generation of special operations. And who's better or how do you, you know, what's the metric? And in the modern day, oftentimes I see a mistake of using combat as the metric. whether or not you were a good seal. The people who put me through training were in that dead zone, if you will, from post-Vietnam to pre-9-11. They saw none.

And I could not hold them on a higher pedestal. I still look up to them. So what is that? I mean, so I happened to come in in a time period where I got to see combat, but it's irrelevant and it shouldn't be the only metric because those guys who put me through were amazing and then the seal teams are going to cycle through.

You just can't use that. I mean, let's be honest. A lot of guys use the metric of how many people they've killed as whether or not they're a good team guy. Or they've been successful, right? They have to cross some threshold. Who cares? Because I'll take the guy who has no combat but has the ability who is trained for a decade and understands TTPs, those tactics, techniques, and procedures at a deep level and can teach and can mentor and can lead. I'll take that guy with no combat experience over the dude who's done 10 years of combat experience,

but he's a functioning alcoholic and he's on his third marriage, no relationship with his kids, he's in debt, he's in risk of losing his security clearance. Like that's not a good seal. That's a ticking time bomb. So don't worry about the combat experience. It's not the metric that should be used because if it was, and it's the only one that matters, well, then we have to throw away three generations of seals that existed. post-Fietnam pre-9-11.

And once I came to grips that, I was like, oh, okay, this shit's not that important. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's, I'm going to do my job, and it's part of the execution of that job. But again, I look back at my career, which was average at best, and the thing that I feel the most proud of

is my time at buds. There's no combat there. I mean, there's psychological combat with the students, but. Well, no, I couldn't agree with you more, Andy, and that's the thing. It helps frame it for me, though, because you can be like, you know what? But, okay, it re, it's a different optic to view it from, and you'll realize, like, you know what, it doesn't matter how many combat missions you've been on.

That's not what is important. What's important is whether you left the community in a better place than when you went into it. Yeah. And if I personally, you know, look back on my life for the last whatever's been now, 12, 13, 14 years, what were the most valuable portions of that career and even up to this point? now, the most valuable portions for me were definitely the initial training pipeline, really forging me and teaching me a lot of principles that people don't. It's a crucible. It's that crucible.

The time that I spent as an operator, yeah, man, there was, like I say, we did a lot of, we did a lot of good work. We did a lot of fun stuff. But to me, that wasn't, all of the value that I paid. pass along now to our students, it's not really coming from stories in that block, right? I feel like what I did in that block was be a terrible person. I really do. I mean, I really do.

I mean, I just, dude, when I got to the SEAL team, man, you know, I was not a good person. and freaking all I you know I just remember freaking drinking and partying and sleeping with women and and living it up and acting like a freaking idiot yeah that's a lot of what I did during that during that block as do many yeah you know and and gosh man even even when we were overseas man some crazy crap just acting like an idiot man and I guess there's lessons there too I guess I just haven't delved into them yet. But I got saved, man, during that block. And I guess that's the one big thing, the biggest thing, valuable thing that I can pull out of that big chunk of my life was getting saved.

I mean, maybe it wouldn't have happened if you weren't doing those other things. You know, sometimes you need that stark contrast between, you know, before and after. Oh, definitely. I mean, we were staying in this freaking building on. deployment man and uh there's dude there was a dag on there was a demon in this thing man i'm not kidding you i'm not kidding you man this freaking thing whatever it was i had no connection to god at all and we were living in this place me and four other guys and one of the dudes that were there he's he was a christian and he starts reading his bible and it i

Dude, I'm not kidding you. It aggravated this freaking evil thing that was this evil presence in this place. What kind of shit was going on here? I'm not kidding you, man. We're talking about like cups being knocked off. I'm talking about, dude, I was laying in bed one night. First of all, first of all, when this first started happening, I was laying in bed one night, and I heard something hit my door.

And it jolted me awake. And then I heard like singing, like almost like singing or voices up in the house. down the hallways of this building we were living in. And I was like, what in the crap? I knew it was just us, our rooms were adjacent, me and one dude, and then the other dudes were across the hallway. And I knew there was nobody else in there. So I get up, I'll look out in the freaking hallway, there's nothing there.

And I'm like, well, that was freaking weird, but it kind of shook me. You know what I mean? And so I get back in bed. And then the other guys that were. there started freaking having similar crap like bumps in the night like just and two just a feeling of oppression man like it was affecting our relationships between one another like when i would when when when when when when i'd walk in this daggone place we were staying in it had a stairwell and i will go to walk up the stairwell and i would feel something watching me like bearing down on me

to the point that I would have to look back up to the landing to see what it was. Like it was that freaking real. And these other dudes are like, yeah, man, this, I feel it. Man, this is weird to the point that after about a week and a half, we're all sleeping in the same room together. Like, we moved our freaking crap into the same room together. Okay. And so I called my little brother, and I knew that he was a Christian.

Christian. And I said, man, I don't know where else to turn. But while all this was going on, too, we started telling the support people there that were working. We were like, yeah, man, this freaking weird crap's happening in this barracks over here, man. And they were like, oh, yeah, well, Senior Chief So-and-so was staying in that same place by himself two weeks ago. And he was telling us that some weird crap was happening too. So, I mean, look, man, y'all could take this for what it is. I got nothing to sell you. I'm just telling you what, it can happen, man. I call my brother, man. I'm like, dude, we got to do it. Look, I know you've got some sort of understanding of this spiritual stuff. Can you give me some advice here? So he put me

in touch with his pastor back home and his pastor called me overseas. I had a little Vodafone, you know, and I put him on speakerphone and he's like, all right, I waited to everybody else leave so they wouldn't think I was crazy. And he prayed over this place, dude, that we were staying in. And when he did that, like total peace returned to that place. And peace, like, just tranquility, even amongst us, each other in our relationships as teammates. And after that, I was like, all right, there's some power here, right? And so that's when I started, that's basically when I decided to look into exactly what the Bible says. about what God is and what Jesus is.

And that totally changed the whole trajectory of my life. Did it change what you thought of the SEAL teams or your occupation when you started having that exploration into, I'll just call it, religion or spirituality? Not at all. Not at all. Because you know what I do, man? I ain't been to church. I don't go to church unless I go to speak at a church.

And personally, I wouldn't consider myself be a religious. person and watching religion from afar, there's a difference between going to church and being religious. Oh, yeah. And again, I don't engage in that world, but I can see that it's like, just because you go there, I don't necessarily think it might mean that you're living up to what they're talking about. Oh, we screwed it all up. It's a freaking clown show, dude.

So, I mean, I started, I literally gave my life to Jesus, some of you guys, that sounds like religious talk. but in a real way that's the awesome thing i started i got me a bible and i started looking at this thing and seeing oh man okay this makes this makes sense to me this is this is what um you know this is how this stuff works this is and the message of the gospel uh the message of of god first of all it's it's interesting to me that nobody's even debating this question of of whether we were created by a sentient being that is far out of our element, right? Or evolution, basically this all happened

because of whatever freaking random circumstance. Nobody's debating that anymore. Like, why don't we debate that? I think people still talk about it. Maybe people talk about it, but look, dude, if you really debate that, you see that, you see that, Even science, and here's the thing, being an atheist or believing in God, not even saying believing in Jesus, but believing in a creator, neither one of those are a science, right? Those are just beliefs.

But the science, the science, actually leans heavily toward creation. It was logical to me. When I read the story of creation in the Bible, it made sense to me. me. It just did. It still does. Maybe it's because I have a simple mind. I don't know. The Bible's written at about a fifth grade level. It made sense to me, the order, right? And yeah, it's like, that makes so much sense to me. It's so easy for me to understand it. Even the fact that we were, say there's a being that did create us. Why did they create us? Why did a God create us? If you can believe that.

If you can believe we were created, why? Why? It's simple to me. I would say that guy was probably very bored and wanted to watch just a total shit show. Why do we have dogs? Why do we have dogs? To eat scraps. Okay.

Some people. Because we want companionship, right? Yeah. We were, the Bible again says we were created in the likeness and image of our creator. So we enjoy that companionship. with something lesser than us, but that will love us unconditionally. In my mind, that makes sense why

if there was a God somewhere in, not even in the universe, but outside of the universe, why would he create us? Because if we are created in the likeness and image of him, that tells me that he would want companionship with something the same way that we do. And essentially, I believe that's the way,

that's the reason that he did create us. the fact of whether you believe in creation or evolution to me that's an easy one man because like I say the science points so heavily toward creation and the theory of evolution has been disproven time and time and time a freaking gin man I think that one depends on who you talk to but I mean so for myself I would say I would describe myself as an agnostic I have no idea either way yeah and so I can understand But let's say you trace evolution all the way back to the beginning. Well, what kicked off the beginning? Yeah. You know, so there's a connection there on either one of those sides. And I just don't know.

Well, see, I can't even understand evolution because I can understand adaptation and I can understand mutation. But I cannot understand evolution. A dog. We have all different types of dogs. small ones, big ones, wolves, coyotes. I mean, obviously the best ones are mini Dotsons. Yeah, mini Dotsons. They hunt, I mean, they're bred to hunt bears and lions.

There you go, brother. I'm down with that. That's not true. Just so you know, though, that's not true. So don't buy a pack of many Dotsons for them. I saw some lion tracks today. Yeah. But a dog is, he's always going to make a dog.

I can't understand, nor have I ever seen an example of something turning into something completely different. Well, you never will because we don't live long enough. I mean, the optic of you and I, we're fucking blink of an eye, you know what I mean, in the overall totality of time. Would there not be evidence in the ground? I mean, I think there is probably evidence of the, and again, I don't know the correct term, because right now we're so far outside of my wheelhouse

when it comes to knowledge and understanding. I'm not a scientist either, by the way. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like, so, I mean, we, I mean, everything is. I'm saying is my opinion, I am not a scholar or even educated on this topic, really. But I think you can see the adaptation or mutation or evolution. You can see that historically through, in my understanding, at least, different species of animal as time goes on. For example, whales having hip bones, as if they used to or that species used to walk on land. You know what that means to me? The fact, you know how

a whale's flipper, if you pull back the skin, it looks like a human arm in hand? Or like you said, a hip bone or something. You know, the design, that points to me that they were made by the same creator. They were designed by, you see a similar design throughout multiple species of animals. That to me doesn't say, well, that means that we have evolved. And that's the reason that these species have similar characteristics. That to me tells me that they were designed by the, the same creator.

Using the same logic of design. And again, I'm not the authority on this. I think other people would say that to them, that is an example of a changing environment that they were living in a forced adaptation or mutation. And I don't know which of the hell does is correct. It don't make sense to me. But I try to always keep things simple and go with what's logical in my mind. And here's the thing.

You and I could completely disagree. We could get six people in here and a devout person who is creation. I don't even know what the other options would be in this conversation, but it's like, cool, all of you believe whatever you want to. Like, we can all believe what we want to believe and, you know, live the best life that you can. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I mean, I think, I think that I should probably be more well-versed on the evidence pointing to creation if we're going to have, if we're going to have this conversation. That's my bad. I'm so far out of my wheelhouse on this topic. And again, because of that, that's where I say I land in the middle. I'm agnostic.

have no idea. Yeah. And ultimately, man, you know, when I got, when you, when you understand the Bible, then, then you have to ask, well, why Jesus? It is absolutely heinous that I follow a Jewish man that died on a cross 2,020 years ago. That's heinous. That's foolishness. You have to answer that question then. So for me, believing that we were created is the easy part. That's the easy part. The hard part is saying, why this guy named Jesus? Because all of a sudden, now if you read the Bible, which is the best-selling book in the history of the world, still to this day, he is the cornerstone of it all. So in other words, if you just believe in God, sorry, bud, that ain't going to do you no good all the sudden jesus becomes the cornerstone and that was the hard

question for me in my walk you know and i had to figure out why jesus why why you would follow the things that he said no why why do i think why do i think so so essentially we we he died on a cross right He was literally God in flesh. He came down onto the earth, was born of a virgin, lived a perfect life, was crucified on a cross, was laid in a tomb, and then he rose out of the tomb on the third day and ascended back into heaven. That's freaking crazy, man, to believe that. But you have to believe that. Because... I mean, that's why they call it faith.

if I'm not mistaken. Well, I think there are aspects of it that you can look at that can help you in that, right? Because we can't believe, you can't believe that that happened. And so the reason that you have to believe that is because that was the atonement for our unrighteousness. Right? Because obviously, if we believe in a creator, we believe that the creator was perfect. In other words, the creator of all of this, he cannot tolerate unrighteousness. righteousness. And so we had to have an atonement, right, because sin entered mankind. And Jesus was

our lamb, basically. He was our sacrifice. And if you don't believe in the atonement of his blood that he shed on the cross and you don't believe that he rose again giving you victory over death, hell in the grave, that's what matters. That's the message of the gospel, right? That's it. That is what you have to believe in order to be right with your creator. That's hard, man. Was that atonement supposed to be for all time, or are things that had happened up into that point? Because there's some shit going on in the world that is a little wild. Now, what do you mean currently?

No, I mean, you know, so, again, not a biblical scholar, but you're talking about, you know, dying for mankind, the atonement for the sins of man up until that point? or was that atonement symbolizing into the future as well? You know what I mean? Do you understand what I'm asking? Yeah, no, yeah. It's for all time. Okay, that was my question. That atonement is for all time.

And throughout all the mankind. And, you know, a lot of people ask, well, what about the, what about all the people before Jesus? You know, what about all the people that lived on the earth before Jesus died on the cross, man? and you know I think that those I think there are places in the scripture that answer that answers that question and it talks about how those individuals prior to Jesus that didn't have that didn't know God that didn't know the creator some freaking civilization living out whatever native Americans for instance those people will be judged by their creator but they will be judged based off of morality right just the type of people they were

Right? Well, we don't have that excuse anymore because we have access to that atonement. They didn't have a choice, right? And you look at morality in and of itself. How do you even explain morality? What is? It's tough because it shifts by person. Yeah. Or by region. You know what I mean? It's tough. That's a tough one. Why does it even exist? Where did it freaking come from? So we can feel guilty, I think, so we can. I'm joking, obviously. So you can shame others. No, trust me, it's, you know, I, I think I've talked about this before, but so I've never, I would never have, I have never considered myself to be a religious or faithful person, but I'm very envious of people who are able to live their life that way.

It, for me, it is, it's a bridge. So the story that you, not the story, but where you're talking about the, the death, all of that, the rising from the dead. for me personally it's a bridge too far to believe it's foolishness and but here's a thing I see people who are incredibly religious I see the positive impact that it has on their life and I think that's it's amazing and they'll say well all you have to do is is believe and the problem is I can't force myself to believe no you can and and that's what I'm saying like I don't know I try to live my life the absolute best that I can and if I'm wrong well guess what that's on me but I also am not going to try to fake it. It's just been something that I've never been able to, I guess, find my true North on, which is what I said. You know, I land in the middle on it. See, I couldn't believe either.

And even though I had that experience that led me to finally open this book, I couldn't believe either. And but I knew that this book made sense to me. And I knew that I wasn't a good person. I just, my heart wasn't right. I wasn't a good person. I wasn't. wasn't perfect by any means. I knew that. And I understood that if there was a creator, he was perfect because he created something that's magnificent and perfect. Literally, this creation is perfect. We're ruining it right now as humans, but. I generally ruin any environment I go into it. Yeah, it's a perfect creation, though. And then I show up and people are like, if anything, if anything was a little bit off,

it wouldn't work, you know. And so I couldn't believe either. So what I, what I had to do is I had to literally humble myself to the point. I wanted to believe really bad because like I said, I saw that there was power there. I saw the impact then that it was making in my little brother's life and the changes that he had made and how he was experiencing the fullness of life. And I wanted that, man. And I had to humble myself enough to get on my freaking knees and say, God, can you help me believe in this? Can you impart some faith to me so that I can believe in you? And that worked for me. And it's in a way later on I found out that was scriptural. I didn't know that then, but the Bible says to each man, God has given a measure of faith. And the Bible also tells us to ask, seek, and knock,

which implies that we have to humble ourselves to the point that we are going to initiate. that relationship with our creator. Now, it's hard to get on your knees and ask a God that you don't believe in to give you the faith to believe in him. And that's a supernatural thing. Faith is a supernatural thing. Because you're right, you can't fake it, man.

Yeah. You can't. And when I did that, and when God imparted that faith to me, it changed everything about me. It changed everything about the way I talk. It changed everything about the way I acted. It changed everything about what I do now. when you realize that I can't die

I can't I'm going to I'm literally going to live forever I cannot die that changes everything I feel like that could make you take some unnecessary risks I don't mean I can't die in a physical sense I will suffer physical death but it literally go from here to the presence with my creator right in the blink of an eye and it changes everything about how you live your life, about what you want to do, what you, the message you want to put out to other human beings.

And two, because it did change me as a person, it changed my heart. I want everybody to have that, man. I want everybody to have what I have. You know what I mean? And I'm passionate about that, dude. Should be. You know. But I don't know, brother.

What year was that? That would have been 2012. Okay. So you did another seven years after that in the teams. Yeah, so I got out. I got saved on deployment, got back home from that deployment. Completely changed, man. I didn't, I was just, I mean, to be honest, what you do. I was on fire for God, man. And get back home, my wife is literally dying from a drug addiction. Like, I walk into the house and, you know, I didn't know it because you know how it is going in it. You know, even in a training cycle, you know.

You're gone more days than your home. Yeah, man. And so, you know, get back home and she's, you know, in freaking drug-induced comas for days at a time and literally dying. What was her poison? Pills. Yeah. How'd she get started on that path?

Long time ago when she was, you know, 15, 16 years old. Yeah. She had just been on and off. But it got so bad to that, you know, to that point that it, again, could no longer be swept under the rug. Were you aware of it leading up into that point? No. I mean, I mean, well, I could sense maybe at time something was off, but when I would come

home, I wanted to freaking have sex and hang out and go on a date. I didn't want to talk about. This might be a little off. What's going on there? I didn't want, there was no time for those conversations. I mean, to be honest, right or wrong, that's just how. No, I know exactly what you're talking about. The thing is, if you don't make time for those conversations, I say this often.

If you don't handle the issues, the issues will handle you at some point. Just get the timeline long enough, and those issues are going to come back like a bear trap and snatch you up. 100%, brother. And that's essentially, you know, that's what happened in that situation. It had all come to a head where it was, you know, I was about the loser. That was going on. My friend got hit by a drunk driver. He died.

and just kept getting hammered with all this stuff. And I'm like, what in the world, man? But I had this new tool, right, that was prayer, right? And that I got to see, dude, I go crazy, man. I'd be marching circles around my little house in Virginia Beach, praying that God would deliver my wife from this addiction. Because there was nothing that I could say to make her stop. And there's also probably nothing that you could do.

Nothing. It's the most helpless I've ever felt. Addiction is something that can only be handled or changed by the person who is addicted. Yep. And that's, is there anything more rough than seeing somebody destroy themselves like that and doing everything that you can? And then finally come into the realization like, shit, I can't do anything. Nothing, brother. They have to do it on their own.

Completely helpless. Yeah. So. I hate that feeling too. I hate that helpless feeling. You ain't lying, brother. But, you know, I just, that's all I did, man. is I turned to this God that I now served and kind of leaned into him and leaned into that

measure of faith that he had given me and said, you know what, God, you know, I've not been serving you long, but I'm going to stand upon these promises that you give me in your word. And, you know, she comes to me. I had been home for probably, I don't know, maybe a month or two, watching her die. And she finally comes to me one day for no apparent reason. and says, hey, I want to get clean. And, you know. I'd imagine that was a hard road.

That was a hard road, man. Yeah, so. That stuff gets their hooks into you deeply. The prescription pills, man. And that was one of the hardest decisions I, one of the hardest decisions I had to make in the teams is when she did finally come to me and say she wanted to get clean, you know. And then I had to walk through this process with her.

I remember having to going back to my guys at the SEAL team, man and being like, hey, I'm going to have to take a knee. And, man, you don't talk about tough, man. That was really, really tough. But I'm glad I made that decision. I'm glad that I put her, you know, before, I put her where she needed to be as far as the order of priority in my life. You got to think about it. One was just an occupation.

Yeah, yeah, man. At the end of the day, they might pound that trident into your casket. but it was just a job title. That's it, brother. That's it. So she got clean, and yeah, that was, that kind of, that really helped set my faith in concrete. And a few things that happened on that deployment before we came home also helped. And that's why I believe the way I believe, essentially.

I guess you could say that's my testimony. And I want, like I say, I want everybody to have that. And that's a big thread in all the things. that we teach and talk about. But we try to be real with it, man. I think that's all you can do is be honest and real about how you feel and it's going to stick with some people

and bounce off others. I mean, you know, I think, again, watching religion from the outside, I think there's a timing aspect to it as well. You know, it'll hit or stick differently on people depending on where they are in their life and what they're going through. Yeah.

Yeah. But again, I am the least educated person. on the face of the planet to talk about that stuff. I'll hear you, brother. Well, hey, brother, I believe if you seek it, I believe you'll find it. But that's on you to seek it. You know what I mean? Yeah.

That's on you. But that's all I can say about it. How'd you end up standing outside of the president's bedroom while he slept? Oh, we were doing. We've glossed over that one. Which president was it? Obama. Yeah.

Yeah, I've augmented the Secret Service cat team on two different occasions overseas. How was that? Three different occasions, actually. I wouldn't want the job. You know what I mean? It's reactionary in nature. I'll never forget, man. I'll never forget being in Africa.

And the dude, Obama's in this meeting, you know, and we're like his inside. We've got the inside perimeter. So we're just outside of the building that he's in. And then we push the local forces out to, set an outside perimeter, and they're not supposed to let anybody get through to us. Like if somebody makes it to us, it's a problem. We're supposed to freaking smoke them, you know what I mean?

Because we're the last line of the fence. You guys are the moat with the dragon in it. That's it, brother. And so I remember this freaking idiot, African dude on a moped just blows through that outer security perimeter. And, of course, all the little local guys, they probably don't even have bullets in their guns and they're just yelling and screaming at him and he don't freaking give a crap dude he's just coming straight at us man and um got a big jacket on and i jump out of the SUV that we were in and

this dude's coming right out of me and i'm drawing down on him but in the back of my mind the whole time i'm like if i shoot this dude and he doesn't have a s vest on or he doesn't have a gun he doesn't have something on it. If I shoot him, they're going to fricking crucify me, man. That's not a position that I want to be in. That's a tough headspace. Yeah. And he's coming straight out of us, man, and he's not slowing down. And, you know,

I don't shoot the dude. And he gets within our perimeter and we finally stop him. And he doesn't have anything on him. And probably has no idea who's there or what's going on. He had no clue. In all reality, I should have killed the dude. But with that particular administration, it was, they didn't like us. And they made it clear they didn't like us.

Really? Look, man, anytime there were cameras around, anything, they did not want any weapons showing. They did not want any kit on. They hamstrung us. They hamstrung us the whole time, man. and you could just you could just get a sense, man, that if you make a decision,

you better be right because these cats are not going to cut you any slack. Not that we deserve any slack, but in a situation like that, that was real, that was, I mean, that was a real, that really happened. Yeah. You know what I mean?

What do you do? You know, you're told, you're told what to do, but then in the back of, you're playing a freak, you're a police officer, man. And no, I mean, it was cool. It was cool.

to get to meet the president a couple times and this and that, but I wouldn't want that job, man. I hosted the cat team a couple times when I was on the East Coast. And just that job of protection. Like you said, there's not a lot of offensive maneuvers that you can make because you have to sit there and wait for somebody to do something that then rises to the point where you can respond, whether it be taking a lethal action. It's just, and I just hated that feeling because there's, it's hard to describe, you know, drawn down on somebody and having them close the distance so you have to make a decision quickly. And in the back of your mind, you sit, is this the right thing to do? It is the right thing to do, but am I going to get utterly murdered for me? Yeah, man.

There's a lot of, there's a lot of weight and gravitas in that decision. Yeah, yeah. I'm glad there's men that do it, man. And, you know, that's not, not for me, though. and, you know, all this mess that's going on now, I tell you, it's going to be, we're in some interesting times right now, and I think it would be remiss to not, you know,

comment briefly on that stuff, on everything, that the environment that we're in now as a nation. It's so weird, man. My brother bought me this mask, because when you fly, you got to wear a freaking mask. Yep.

Or they're not going to let you on a plane. And I thought, I'm going to do an experiment here. And my brother bought me a mask. and it's just mesh. It's literally a piece of mesh. Like my beard hairs stick through the mask. And I'm like, I'm going to wear this thing and see how serious they really are about this thing.

I'm going to guess they let you on. They literally, nobody said anything. I've been wearing it. Some of these places around here you have to wear it. And Georgia, you don't have to freaking wear it here. But in the airport. And I'm like, this is just a freaking game, man. this is literally a game. This is control. To me, I've had coronavirus. It knocked my freaking

dick in the dirt. I've had it as well. I ain't going to lie to you. I take it seriously. If you're freaking old or sick, don't- Or high-risk. Yeah, don't get that mess because it put a whoopin on me, son. I ran a marathon on day five and it liked to daggone killed me. Well, it's because you're probably not supposed to run a marathon on day five. I had to reconcile some stuff. You might have had some, you know, some culpability in there. I had to reconcile some stuff within my own head, man. Yeah. But, you know, aside from that, and look, man, another conversation that interests me that nobody's having is the history.

Look, man, if you look at the history of the rise and fall of any empire throughout human history. And especially most recently, you can look at the Roman Empire. if you see if you study that it is astounding it is the similarities are astounding to what we see going on right now and you you can predict the next thing that's going to happen you really can huh i am not a student of that stuff oh man it's it's it's very very interesting and one of the most interesting things to me is is that the empire essentially history will tell you the empire fell around 375 AD it fell but nobody even realized that it had fallen so looking back on it historians looking back on it they look at that date and they say okay this is essentially it

had fell the fact that it had failed they had essentially lost control so in that 375 AD it was the first time that they had these outer civilizations civilizations civilizations civilizations that lived on the perimeter of the empire. They called them barbarians. They weren't barbarians. That's just what the Romans called them. They were other civilizations. That was the first time that these other civilizations were moving into the confines of the empire

and setting up autonomous zones, which essentially tells you that at that point, the empire had lost control, the government of the empire. Now, leading up to that, what led them to that point where they had lost control of the confines of their empire? It was lavish spending. It was over taxation. It was moral and ethical decay. It was all the things that you see playing out right now.

It's very, very interesting. And then finally, what toppled it all over is they're trying to take, the empire is trying to take back these autonomous zones from these barbarians, right? And then they get hit with a pandemic. Fuck. The plague. I tell you what, the coronavirus, like I said, I've had it too. And the mask thing, you know, I have a buddy named Brian Bishop,

and we've had some interesting conversations, and he's not anti-mask. He doesn't like to wear a mask. But I think the handling of it, I do believe there is an aspect of control. But I think the biggest issue is it just highlights the failure of leadership at the highest levels of government. And I'm not talking about just the office of the president of the United States. I'm talking about congressmen, senators, that couldn't even get the messaging correct or consistent. Because you're not the only person I know of. I mean, people are like, oh, I'll just wear a chain link fence as a mask. And nobody says anything. I'm not trying to be a dick, man.

I just wanted to see how they would react to it. And I'm not a risk to anybody. I have the antibodies. I know. I breathe antibodies every time I exhale. And I do believe it's real and I don't want anybody to die. And I think that the people that are a high risk category, they should absolutely protect themselves. But the government and the people in charge did such a disservice by the way that the information was just bumbled and mishandled and going back and forth. And could some of that be control? I do think a lot of people that seek government service are not trying to seek service of the people that elected them. They're there for themselves and their own empowerment.

So yeah, I do believe there is an essence of control. I guess my definition of control would be they're trying to figure out ways to benefit themselves and fuck everybody else, right? That type of control. Yeah. And then the leadership just poor, I mean, poor communication, poor handling, it just, it sucks.

And then now people have very little faith, it seems, in the government, how we're electing our officials. It's not looking so hot on people's faith in that system. The officials themselves. Yeah. Interesting time. And this was all part of, again, history.

This is all, this is all, this all happened before. Yeah. Nothing that's happening here is new. This has all happened before. And that's another thing that you saw with the collapse of the Roman Empire, specifically, is in the latter days of that empire just before collapse, you saw the public really withdrawing from their fate in. So in other words, the public used to take pride. We used to could take pride in our nation.

And some of us still do, me in particular. It hurts my heart. It hurts me inside to see what our nation is becoming. I'll be blatantly honest with you. It is collapsing. I hate to say that. That's not to scare anybody. I'm just comparing it to history, right?

And the point we are and the things we're experiencing. And yeah, it's harder and harder for people to take pride in their nation, to have confidence in their government. And that's a big issue, man. That's a big freaking issue. If they don't figure out a way to restore confidence in our electoral system by the time the next presidential election comes around, I don't, and again, this is just my personal assessment, I don't think it'll be recoverable. I think that's one of the main issues that they have got to figure out before the next. next election. Yeah. Yeah. I agree 100%, man. Because it's two election cycles in a row where people on both sides, and both sides of the fence are culpable in where we are right now. Of course, it seems that one side is like, it's their fault. And then the other side's like, it's there

fault. It's like, yeah, maybe just point one finger at yourself and one at the other person, because it's both your fault. But I don't think our country could tolerate a third election cycle, presidential cycle where there's no faith in the system itself. That could well be the tipping point. Yeah, I agree, man. It's been wild, brother. It has been wild. I don't like seeing how people are engaging with each other, both. I mean, it's much more explosive and inflammatory in the online world because there's that lack of getting punched directly in the face when you say something that you shouldn't. Yeah. But I am seeing that creeping out beyond the internet and Ethernet and all of those worlds. And I don't know. Again, I find myself in a place where I don't have

any answers, but I have concern. Well, you know, my wife told me the other day, I was talking through some of this stuff with her because I've really kind of tried to delve into that historical aspect of the rise and fall of empires, read a few books on it and educated myself. Just so I think it's valuable because you can in turn posture yourself and put yourself in a position. If you can literally have at least an idea or a theory of what's coming next, that helps tremendously in your own preparation as a human being. 100%. And she's like, well, the economy was pretty good for the last two years. And I'm like, you realize that was a facade. We're trillions of dollars in debt. And you're telling me that the economy was good. Like the economy of this nation is

it's a facade. Just because we as individuals in our own little communities are making money and trading with each other and we have a few good years, if you look deeper into the economy of our nation, I don't know how you can ever recover. It's monopoly money. We have monopoly money. Literally, they send me this money. You know what I do?

I go out and buy a gun. because I was in Salt Lake City the other day at a restaurant and I tried to pay for my meal with cash. They literally would not take my cash. At that point, it was monopoly money. It was worthless. I could not trade that legal tender for food. Now, that's an isolated incident, but this is just how I believe. So what would history say will happen next?

what happened in the Roman Empire was eventually it gets to the point that the illusion that we are still in control as a nation of ourselves and our government, that illusion can at some point will no longer be able to be maintained. And then life still goes on. It's not the end of the world when that happens. Yeah, there's not a mushroom cloud. No, all that happens in the case of, the historical evidence is the empire just fractures into multiple individual kingdoms or states.

And life goes on. You know what I mean? It's not the end. And man, I hope it doesn't come to that. To be honest, will you, this is an interesting conversation for me because it's interesting. Really, though, the heart of everything that I do, I wouldn't have this conversation if it wasn't. Your listeners can handle this conversation. I wouldn't have this conversation with Rich Roll or any of them other cats because people can't

freaking handle it. I'm interested in spiritual things, man. You know, that's really what, that's really what's driving me right now. I love looking into this stuff. I love history because I love history. And I think it's smart to be aware of what's going on within your community, within your nation. You shouldn't be, you shouldn't just turn a blind eye and be completely ignorant of it. But it's not the freaking in the world, man.

Yeah. And it's also not going to be easy. You know, there's no solution that's going to be a light switch going on and off. It'll be, if the erosion, which I would agree with you, there are many metrics for me that I have a serious cause for concern. To stop that erosion, first you would need to baseline it and then start to rebuild. And that is not a matter of minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, or it's multiple years. It's generational in nature. So I don't know.

Well, the only theories, the only predictions that we can, really, the only lot, the only theories that have any merit have, for me personally, is from looking back at history. That's the only way that I can have my own theory of what's coming next and it has some form of merit, you know, you hear. We're far less unique and special than I think we would like to believe, like, we are creating stuff. It's like, eh. you might be creating things, but you're using it for the same purpose that somebody else created something for in the past. Multiple times, by the way. Let me tell you, this is another real benefit about being a part of the kingdom of God, Andy, is you know that we are part of a kingdom that has endured the fall of many empires.

You're part of a kingdom that has, look at, look at Christianity in and of itself, You had these 12 dudes that were fishermen. They were handpicked by this freaking Jewish dude named Jesus. They nailed him to the cross. What did all 12 of those dudes do? They freaking ran off. They denied him. They quit.

They said it's all over. Right? And then all of a sudden, they come back out of nowhere and start what is the New Testament, Christianity, the new covenant. and it spread throughout the entire world and endured for thousands of years. How did that happen? How did these dudes go from fleeing and saying, screw this, man, to all of a sudden creating this new covenant and religion that's endured for thousands of years? The only answer to that to me is they saw that joker when he rose from the dead.

All those 12 disciples, they said, all right, this is all over. I'm out. they even were asking, weren't you with that dude named Jesus? Peter said, no, I don't know who that is, right? I don't know. It's all there. But then all of a sudden, when he came out of the tomb, they saw him and they were like, holy crap, the dude just rose from the dead.

And that changed the game. I can see that changing people's minds. Yeah. Imagine that. Imagine that. And so then these guys were able to stand up this kingdom, this body of Christ, that has now endured. And they stood it all up

while being oppressed by that Roman Empire. The Roman Empire saw the Christian, when I say church, I mean the body of all the Christians. They saw them as a threat. Right?

So they were freaking killing them as fast as they could kill them. This thing has now endured for thousands of years and throughout the rise and fall of no telling how many freaking empires and it's still here, man. And that's the part,

That's the kingdom that I'm a part of, man. And I don't know. That feels good to me. That's another reason I want everybody to have what I have. You know what I mean? I have no doubt. Shifting topics. Sorry, bro.

No, it's good. Trust me. I am open to exploring and talking about absolutely anything. It's my favorite aspect of the podcast is I get to sit down and have conversations with people like you about things like this. And I'll tell you where I reach the limits of my knowledge. And I'll tell you where I don't know what I believe or where I land. and it is what it is.

Yeah. Oh, you have the hard conversations, Andy. I try to. You do a good job at that. Easy conversations. They're kind of boring, I guess. I agree. Where did your passion for running ridiculously long distances come from?

That's a good question. It's the activity that I made to despise the most. You know, I really, I went out on a little mission this morning up in these mountains to some lake called Strawberry Lake. See, I'm going to have to Google that. Yeah. What did you get into? this morning because you were texting last night you're saying you're going to get a run in and then you said that today it's a run slash hike yeah I almost hit you up last night

say hey man you want to go running and I was like I bet Andy freaking hates running two letter response no and so yeah yeah this morning was awesome man I just got out and got in the mountains my beard froze it's a little chilly out yeah I got to see some big cat I got in this spot I you know I got in this spot were, what is it, aspen trees? Are those aspen trees? Again, now we're at a place where I don't know a damn thing. I think they're aspens, you know, their evergreens and the limbs grow all the way down to the ground, and I was on this little single-track trail at the foothills of these massive freaking mountains, and I'm going, and there's rabbits all in there. And I see in the rabbit

tracks everywhere, and then I see a set of big rabbit tracks and some big cat paw prints right behind it. And they were pretty fresh, too, in the snow. And I was like, all right, buddy. Oh, there's cats out here for sure. So I just got out exploring this morning. You know, I really love that. I love land nav. I love teaching land nav and getting out and having those, I call them missions, you know. It's such a great skill to have, though, too.

Yeah, it is. Even just to be able to read a topo map. Oh, yeah. Orient and be able to, you'll never be lost. Yeah, and we teach that to all our students, and it's astounding. We have not had a student yet, and we trained 48 people last year. We have not had a student yet that had any knowledge. whatsoever of how to use a map and a compass, and it's a very simple skill, but it's being lost.

It's 30 to 45 minutes of explanation, and then the rest can be practical. And, I mean, once you have a compass, a topo map, you're never going to be lost again. You don't got to worry about batteries. You don't got to worry about freaking satellite. You don't, nothing, man. You're good to go. Yeah, it was one of my, I enjoyed doing those evolutions as well. I was a point man for a long time, too, and it's, oh, nice. Yeah, I loved it for two platoons. And then when I was over on the East Coast as well, I was walking point for that. And it just, I always enjoyed it. And I almost never pull that a compass or a GPS. Terrain navigation is the way to go.

Yeah, man, it's the way to go. Yeah, but so don't dodge the question. That time in my life that I told you I was freaking going crazy because they were sending me all these doctors and stuff, a buddy of mine approached me and said, hey, man, I'm going to go do this 50-mile race. He was a team guy, too, and I didn't even know freaking people could run 50 miles. I was going to say how much were you running at that point? Like none, like none.

Which is the correct amount you should run. Oh, yeah. And in the teams, man, it was not practical to be a freaking ultra marathon runner. I mean, you're putting on, you talk about... 3-9-11, you might have been surprised. There was two camps of people, the triathlete group and then the Steel Palace group. And that was, it was, you kind of picked and chose. Well, I mean, did.

Pick and chose, however you would say that. But yeah, there was a lot more endurance-based. running but I didn't start wearing plates everywhere until post 9-11 okay right like the training rucks were nothing in comparison to the rucks that I would carry overseas so I think that methodology flipped yeah my whole career yeah we were we were kidded out and you know you carrying a mark 46 or mark 48 with a full combat load out and water and food running a marathon a day is not the training program negative man so I wasn't running much and my buddy I knew I was I knew pretty much that my career was going to come to an end. So I was pretty been out of shape because I still

wanted something to test myself on a high level. And just to stay sharp, man, and to continue to compete, continue to thrive, you know, being a seal, there's an aspect of competition as a seal, not only amongst you and your brothers, you know, you guys hold each other accountable. Let's just be honest, everything in the SEAL teams is a competition. Everything, man. And I love that. I mean, that's part of the fibers of my being. We used to race, I mean, go out and get drunk and you'd be standing at a urinal next to your buddy, racing to see you could pee faster. That's how deeply down the competitive nature goes.

And, of course, you were racing to drink your beer before you went to the urinal as it is anyway. I will say I've always been halfway decent at running. I've never really shown off with it or anything. The only time I shone off with it was in seal training. One time, a buddy mine, I spit a big chew of the butt. on his boots that he had just polished, pissed him off. He filled my boots up with sand that night. We were on the island, San Clementi.

And we woke up the next morning and go out for Chow P.T. up Al Huey. And he challenges me to a race in front of the whole class there. And, of course, the whole class, none of them knew I could run. They all knew that dude could run. He was always first. And I smoked him up Al Huey. And I turned around the whole class was like, what the freaking crap just happened, dude. So I've always been a decent runner.

But I wanted something to challenge me on a high level. My buddy told me about that race. It was a 50-mile-long mountain race. And I went and I did it. And it freaking crushed me, dude, because I did it with like very, very minimal training. And it put a hurting on me. That's what's going to happen if you go into that with minimal training. Oh, yeah.

It should be expected if you're listening to this. if you don't take the time to train for that, it's going to spank you. But see, that's not the way my mind works. I'm just like, oh, man, if this is humanly possible, then yeah, I can, I'm going to go do it. Don't get me wrong. I appreciate the headspace. I'm just saying for people listening, if you attempt that same maneuver, it's going to be, you're going to be a little bit sore from basically the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. Brother, in the South, we call that being stove up.

I was stove up, brother. I have not heard that term before. to tell you, man. But, you know, it hit the spot for me, dude. And then I went and from there, I did pretty well, actually. And my buddy that I ran the race with, he said, man, you could be competitive at this. And I thought, well, maybe I could. So I went and signed up for a 100-mile race.

And my first 100-mile race was called the Crueljewel. It had 33,000 feet of elevation gain and loss over the course of 160. miles. So it's one of the hardest 100-milers in the, I guess, in the nation, definitely in the southeast, really rough terrain, really rough trails. You're supposed to qualify for it, of course. I called the race director. I pulled my Navy SEAL card, said, hey, man, I'm about to retire from the SEAL teams. Could you let me run this race? And they said, yeah. And I got eighth place out of a field, a world. People came from all over the world to run this thing, and especially all over the nation. The jump from 50 to 100 miles, so it's twice the distance? Is it twice as difficult?

It becomes a game of patience. So it doesn't necessarily hurt any worse. So you reach, I personally I reach this point, I call it the steady state, where the pain is what it is and you come to accept the pain for what it is. Now, I'm not trying to sound tough here, but you just realize that this is as bad as it's going to hurt unless something breaks. Yeah. Which something, I mean, I have torn muscles and stuff like that, and that stops you in your tracks. But you get in that steady state around that 50 mile mark,

usually for me, 50 to 60 miles. And from that point forward, man, it's constant forward motion. It's being patient enough to continue to move forward and to accept the pain that you're feeling for what it is until you reach the finish line. And patience is something that I think a lot of people are missing. It's a virtue or an attribute that's missing in a lot of people's lives. And a 100-mile race for me is a practice of patience.

Really it is, man. And then, too, not letting that pain get to your head, again, breaking things down into small digestible segments. I was just going to say, how easy could it be to just get overwhelmed? I'm 50 miles in. And instead of thinking, I'll just take these next miles as they come, you're like, 50 more to go. People would just be hitting the ejection seat. Oh, yeah, 100%, man.

Because even when you're at, even when you're at 70, and you still got 30 miles left. You have over a marathon left to go. Yeah. And these races aren't on a freaking paved road. Anything but, it seems. They're in rough terrain. You're out in the elements. It's nasty.

So, yeah, that's what it becomes. And like I say, that's what allows me to really be. competitive at these. It's really not because I'm the fastest. I train, you know, I'd say average training week for me unless I'm really serious about winning a race, 30 miles a week running, 30, 40 miles a week, which is crazy. Very easy. Yeah. And you would like, huh, that's a third of the distance, well, you know, less than a third of the distance for a hundred mile or. And then you could go out and, yeah, that's crazy. I would have, I would have guessed you would have had to have been closer to the distances that you were going to compete at. If you, if you want to,

wanted to run 100 miles right now. Yeah, which I don't. And I never will. If you decided you did, because you are who you are, and you and I share a very common, a very common mindset, although you're much smarter than me. It's not an accurate statement, but I appreciate the sense of it. Come on. You could go out and run 100 miles.

Mentally and physically, I mean, you're in good shape. I mean, you might tear a hamstring or something like that, but you're going to get it done, man, because you know. I might end up walking it at the end, but yeah. Yeah, you know how to execute those principles that have kept men like you and I really essentially kept us alive in different times and places. So it becomes easy for us to execute on those principles out on the trail in a controlled environment. You know what I mean? I do. Those same principles that when I go.

and publicly speak, I'm talking about those same things executed in a boardroom perspective or an office perspective or from a leadership perspective. It's not magic, but if you can wrap your head around them, you can do some magical stuff. Yeah. And you know, one of the most, one of the craziest things, I had a dude one time at a, it was actually at one of those last man standing races. His longest race that he had ever ran was a 10K. And I took him 100 miles that day by just teaching him those principles we're talking about. One of the most powerful principles that's allowed me to endure in these races is I call it the power of the spoken word, right? The things that come out of our mouth. And that's one of the things I like about you is I think you're very,

you're articulate because you don't waste words. I think you think about every word that you say. I've been known to ramble. Don't give you wrong. Well, yeah, but still, it's articulated rambling. And, you know, that's probably one of my biggest tools. You know, it's so easy to run past people on these races and you say, hey, you know, how you doing? You know, how's your race going? You know, maybe they're in a bad place and they're like, oh, you know, I've had, even something as simple as, oh, I've had better days or, you know, this is hurting or that's hurting. Instead of just saying freaking, dude, I'm doing outstanding. Even if it freaking sucks, man.

I mean, you know. False motivation. is better than no motivation. It really is, man. And here's the thing. I'm not saying that you can speak things into existence. I'm saying that your mind is very, very powerful. And those words that you say can change your mindset and what your mind thinks is happening. And that's what the power is. Especially as you're getting pressed into those places where you're discovering who you really are. That power of, you know what I mean? It's the same thing as buds. I would wait until hell week, wait until they were tired and cold and wet and hungry

and try to speak thoughts of quitting into their mind. There you go, brother. And they're more receptive. I mean, if you catch somebody not on a hell week Monday morning, like, you can say whatever you want to. They don't care, right? Because they have that armor up. You strip that armor away and that power of influence is,

it's hard to describe. For me, when things suck and they do often, but whether it's physically or mentally, I tell myself, you know, I can always do one. Or like, you know, you're working out. You're doing an exercise, something like that. And you want to put the bar down. I can always do one.

Or just take the next step. That's that power and just verbalizing that, like you said, it can change your entire perspective, which can, of course, change the entire outcome of whatever it is that you're doing. Yeah. Very powerful. It really is, man. And that's something I take very seriously in my own life. And, you know, I don't cuss, man.

And a lot of people think, well, Chad's a freaking Bible thumper. he doesn't cuss and it's like no that's not what it is it's just the fact that i have done the best that i can possibly do to take control over every single thing that comes out of my mouth right right literally god's word said says your tongue is the rudder of your life right and we know what a rudder is and how it works it's a little bitty thing yeah that's set right here in this powerhouse that is your brain and your head and it literally can control the direction of your life um and you know it's It's worked for me. It's helped me tremendously. You know, that's just another tool that I would challenge everybody that's listening to this to try to be cognizant of those things that you're saying, especially in moments when life gets tough, right?

And everybody around you is complaining and whining. The most critical time to keep track of what comes out of your mouth. Yeah. 100%. And make sure that what comes out of your mouth is commensurate with your behavior, because if they're going in different directions, you're going to have issues regardless of who you are and what's seat. you're sitting in. It's one of the biggest things I see in leadership failures is they say one thing and they do another. Do you know what we call that hypocrisy? Indeed. We call that hypocrisy. Indeed. Yes. Lord knows I've seen plenty of hypocrisy, especially being in this, in the arena that I'm in,

of professing my faith in God and a lot of the people that I deal with are in that same arena. Hey, I've found myself being a hypocrite times in my life as well too. You know, it's, I do my best to put those in the smaller column and more of not being a hypocrite in the column that's more full. So do you, I mean, it sounds to me like the running for you is that continuation of that challenge. And I'm but to assume, like I said, have no desire and will never, unless put at gunpoint, run a distance over like 100 yards. And even if I was at gunpoint, I probably would try to figure out a way to take the gun from somebody versus running that distance. You've got a special set of skills to be able to handle that situation, don't you?

despise running. But it seems like you're using it as that tool to mentally and physically challenge yourself. That's all it is, man. And another thing, too, is it helps keep me on the ground level, man. Look, man, people look at the stuff that you and I are putting out, man. And again, just like you said, if we're not living it, then look, if your coach or your mentor hasn't done crap. and if they're not doing crap, why are they your coach or your mentor?

You can only ride the wave of a past accomplishment for so long. A ship does not sail on yesterday's wind. So doing these really tough endurance events is a way for me to stay in the mix in my own life to where, you know, when we have students out or when I go give a speech, I don't feel, I feel qualified. Because I'm like, yeah, man, I just freaking practice. just put all this stuff I'm about to teach you, I just put it into practice and I won something

that was really hard. That gives me confidence, man. And, you know, so it does play a role in that manner too. It can help, I guess, give me some credibility. And, you know, I'm a humble person. There's a difference between humility and confidence. Oh, absolutely. You can be confident and still practice humility in your life. You know what I mean? I do. But running to me, it's now, I think it's morphing into, I'm not racing a whole lot. Are there even a lot of races going on in the current?

There wasn't last year. But, you know, I'll probably run two races this coming up, or this year now. I'll probably run two races and then I want to go set the fastest known time record on a long trail. In North Georgia, North Alabama called the Penhote Trail. How long is it? 335 miles. What is the current record? Five days and 16 hours.

What do you think is possible? I think I can do it in the four, four day range. Yeah, I don't know if I could do it in sub four. 335 is a little long to run all in one shot. And this is in mountainous terrain, right? Again, I don't run, I don't pick flat trails or anything. I want to be in the mountains. So I'm really, for me, I think it's morphing into more of this.

It's more like, I want missions. I'll still race a couple times a year because I enjoy that competitiveness. But, you know, you set out to set a world record on a trail that's existed for a long time and it's 335 miles and it's unsupported. Yeah. Oh, the entire time it's unsupported? Yeah. So you've got to run with all your food. Or can you cash stuff?

You can cash stuff. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot, that becomes like, it becomes like a mission, man. Oh, for sure. There's a lot of, I enjoy, you know, I think it's just, again, within the fibers of our beings to want to plan and execute these really cool, complex missions. I think it helps me connect to my past and it helps me, you know, gives me credibility moving forward, which I think is important. There's so much crap, dude. on there's so many of these cats on the freaking social media and I've been and hung out with some

of them that got millions of followers that got millions of dollars and I look at these cats and I'm like what have you done what how it's freaking mind boggling to me I don't want to be that person man if I ever accumulate financial wealth I'm going to tell you how I did it. it and hopefully it's going to be visible to you of how I did it. And then you're going to go buy guns, aren't you? Yeah, exactly. That's one of my biggest weaknesses is I'm not driven by money. That hurts me in business, man.

It might hurt you in business financially, but I think that that could pay dividends in the long run or provide you more financial opportunity in the long run. I've made some decisions in my life that were specifically about money. Like, I want to make this amount per year because I had a lot. a very different perspective about money then that I did now. I used to think it was about what you make. Now it's like it's actually about what you spend. Because if you don't spend a lot, you don't need to make that much.

And, you know, the things that you buy and accumulate, they're not going anywhere with you. When you come to the end of the road, you know, so maybe recalibrate. Again, people do what you want to with money. But for me, it was huge. And I just made some poor decisions occupationally that or stayed at a company that I should have left years before, just about money. Yeah. And it's like, God, I'm so unhappy. I didn't enjoy the people that I was working with. I wasn't fulfilled by the job. Why did I stay? I think about it. I'm like, because of the paycheck. I'm like, never again. So I'm glad I made those mistakes, but it's been powerful for me to be

able to avoid things because oftentimes in the modern world, what I find people will lead with the money and it's very attractive, but you got to take a pause and think a little bit deeper. because the check up front, man, that's not going to be helping you years down the row when you're still suffering the pain of those choices. I've had to do that multiple times just in this last year, man. I mean, I had a brand that tried to buy everything that I do. Oh, really?

They offered me a million bucks. Yeah. And I told them no. A million bucks is a lot of money, but what if it's the million bucks and you have to split over 30 years? It's substantially less. Exactly. So now I am who I am.

And the way I work as an entrepreneur is I really try to make my decisions in everything, even in life, not just as an entrepreneur, but I try to adhere to a standard. So I make my decisions based off the standard that I've chosen to live my life by. And then I let the results fall where they may. So a perfect example, two examples of this. I ran 100 mile or the other day. when I show up to a race people expect me to win and I'm there to win I'm going to try to beat you that's always that's my goal I'm running this race I get 60 miles in my stomach blows up I cannot even stand up straight it hurts so bad I have to lay down on side the trail in the

fetal position until I can stand up and walk again at that point the results out the window right but what is my standard my standard is I will never freaking quit I'm going to get this thing done. My standard is, look, I knew I couldn't win the race. Why didn't I just cut the course a little bit? Why prolong my misery? Because I live by a standard of integrity and honor. Honor is the adherence to what is right. Those are the standards I live by, right? So when the results go out the window, I try to live my life by a standard. Now, in a business, we have an experience we just did the first one the other day called the Proving Grounds. We rent this camp out. It's freaking awesome and it costs

$30,000 to rent this camp well I put this I build out this whole curriculum put it out on Instagram and I thought man people are going to be hungry for this right and it was right when the this wave of coronavirus that we're writing right now it was right as it was really

ramping up and I put it out I thought man we'll get 70 people for this right off the bat and like just trickles they just trickle in man And at the end, we've got like 14, 15 people signed up. And my partners call me.

Now, I own the company, but I have obviously co-instructors. They don't own the company, but I call them my partners. They're like, Chad, what do we do, man? What do we do? And, you know, I'm like, we barely have enough money coming in to even break even on this experience. But I know this experience is going to be powerful. and there is a certain group of men and women that have rogered up for this. I'm not going to fail them.

I am not going to fail them. They want this. They have decided to show up, to tow the freaking line in order to grow as human beings. And I'm not going to fail them. So my business partners call me and I say, I don't care if I lose $10,000. I am not going to cancel this event. Because guess what everybody else is doing? Every other freaking event has been canceled.

And there are still people out there that are hungry, man. They're hungry to learn. They're hungry to grow. They're hungry to make progression in their life and be better people. And they're looking to people like us to provide that environment. And that's what I do, man. That's my mission. That's my whole business.

And so I told them straight up. Negative. So we, you know, we carried it. it on. We did it. And it made a tremendous impact on the 13 that did Roger up. And I wouldn't trade it for any dollar amount. And those 13, the cascading effects of that will have an impact so much greater. And you can look at it as lessons learned, figure out what worked. You know what I mean? It's your mod one. Yeah. And I don't market for anything. Everything that we do is organic. So I've never ran an Instagram ad. I've never paid for market.

I guess is what I'm saying. So I think there's things that we could have done that, like you said, there's lessons learned, there's things that we could have done to maybe have put it out. But now, the reason I don't market is people that come out to train with us, I want them to know who I am. I don't want them to see some ad banner on social media and click it and say, oh, this looks cool and freaking sign up. I want them to have some sort of connection and know who I am.

Because I'm about to start hitting them with some crazy mess, man. I'm going to be talking about Jesus. I'm going to be talking about not quitting. I'm going to be pushing. You know, we're digging into all these aspects, all these realms of body, soul, and spirit. And it would freak somebody out that think they're signing up for some hammer session. Seal PT weekend with a seal. That's not what we do.

You know what I mean? So that's important to me. And maybe that's why I don't advertise. I don't know. That's just two examples of living and making decisions based on. off the standard that you've chosen to live your life by and not based off of emotion or based off of the result that you thought you could achieve. Your emotions are terrible leaders. They are wonderful servants. They make you who you are. But if you allow them to lead you in business and life

and whatever you're doing, you are going to freaking fail, right? It's a recipe for disaster. Yeah, the young emotional leaders were oftentimes the most challenging in our previous occupation. Yeah, man. Yeah, man, I'll never forget. I'll never forget seeing one of our platoon chiefs. We were in a situation. You probably know the dude. I'm not going to say his name.

I don't know if he's still in. But I remember we were in this situation where freaking crap was going haywire, man. And all my team – not all my teammates, but I remember seeing – I can just see – this in my in my mind's eye seeing teammates in mine just like running back and forth like freaking chickens with their head cut off and it's and and I look over and the chief is sitting in a chair like this on comms and he's just talking man just as calm cool collected he's coming up with a plan he's no emotion involved and I'm like man that is the man that I want to be you know that powerful example that was the first example I'd ever seen of that dynamic of allowing

logic to lead you instead of emotion. Yeah. I'll never forget that. I had some senior enlisted leaders that were exactly like that, and it left such a mark on me that it was all I ever wanted to emulate. Spoiler alert, I wasn't perfect. It's been a few times in the old life, the old job where I let the emotions get a hold of the reins. It sucked.

Yeah. Made some mistakes. Fortunately, they were in training environments. But again, I mean, I just, I try to live. learn from the mistakes that I make because they are a plenty and just try not to repeat them. 100% man. And I actually think that, well, I don't know what was easier. I find myself that the harder environment to practice this principle is in places like marriage and it's, you know, in everyday life, that's where it's been really challenging to me to adhere to that principle. Because a lot of times in the teams, you know,

You're at least surrounded by dudes that are going to hold you accountable when you do start to allow those emotions to take over and hopefully they reel you in with the quickness. Yeah, they're not going to give you too much rope. They're going to snatch you back to reality pretty quick. But when you're dealing with your freaking wife at home or, you know, something, you know, whatever, or you're a business owner like I am, you know, all, none of my people, I mean, I hate to say they're not going to hold me accountable because I think they would if it got bad enough, but they look to me. You know what I mean? Don't be afraid to tell them and empower them to hold you accountable. Oh, no, I do. I do.

I mean, you know, and that's one of the, yeah, we won't go down that road. What do you get planned for 2021? Business side. You can do some more events? So our backpacking trips, we call it the basic course. Those are in the North Carolina, Tennessee line in a wilderness area. We take people out for three days. We were on one of those a month during the summer.

And then we're going to run another Proving Grounds in April. We probably won't do another one of those this year. I want to grow the podcast, man. I want to pour my heart and soul into that. I wouldn't mind going and doing a little more speaking. Yeah. You know, if it pops up, but it is what it is. That one's outside of our control.

That comes back or it doesn't. Yeah. And that's not our decision. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's, yeah, it's tiered for me, man. It's like the podcast. and then if you want to, if you want the opportunity to make a little more real impact, it's the speaking engagement.

And then the most real and permanent impact is really the coming together to actually train intentionally, which is what we do through the basic course and stuff like that. Yeah, that physical interaction really solidifies a lot of the lessons. With small groups and, you know, my business plan is a terrible business plan. It can't be scaled because we only work with teams of like eight people, the basic course, It's an eight-person class. We couldn't make it bigger if we wanted to because we're limited to the number of people

we can take in the areas to minimize the footprint. But, you know, you get much over eight or ten people and, you know, you don't get to spin that, you know, everybody's like, well, what was that? What was that, Chad said, you know? And I don't want it to be that way, man. And I do this stuff, man, because I freaking care, dude. I mean, I literally care.

And, you know, that's what's driving me. So, you know, we're going to keep leaning into that and figuring stuff out as we go. And then I want to break that Pinnhote Trail record, probably race a couple times and that'll be it. It sounds like a relatively full year. Yeah, it'll be fine. My goal for 2021 is just be alive at the end of it. I haven't even broken it down to the granular goals that you have. Well, and dude, we just moved into this farm, this ranch in North Georgia on like, I told you it was like 500 acres and surrounded by all this public land.

and gosh, dude, I'm just, I'm loving life, man. That's awesome. For people who are interested, where can they find you? Yeah, I appreciate that, Andy. Just 3of7project.com, the number three of the number seven project.com. Or you can follow me on Instagram if you want for however much longer that thing's going to be up and running. It's Chad Wright 278. The podcast is 3 of 7 podcast.

It's spelled out on the podcast, 3 of 7 podcasts, wherever. podcast are found. If you want to listen, let me know what you think of it because, yeah, the way I run, my whole view on my business is that it's so it's bigger than me. So I've designed my business the way that Christ designed his following. So I view my customers as the body of the business. So I'm like, you guys are the body of the podcast, of the events of everything that we do. So let me know what you think.

about it because I'm going to change it and make it what you guys want it to be. Y'all are the body of it. If y'all want to do something different, I'm down, man. I'll, we'll, we'll build something else out, you know. So yeah, I love the interaction with the with the people that follow and listen. It's cool. It's been fun, man. It's awesome. Dude, I can't thank you enough for making the travel up here. We've been at this for over three hours. Are you freaking serious, dude? Closing thoughts by Chad. The floor is yours. You know, look guys, I got a freaking and simple mind.

Closing thoughts is just to thank you, Andy. I mean, I don't know if it's thoughts or not, but you know, you're a very powerful dude, man, and you're very, like I say, you're very intelligent, very well articulated. I respect you on a high level. And to be honest, we're just a little intimidating to come into your layer

and have these conversations. I've never thought of this as my layer, but now I will only think of this as my layer. There you go, brother. And, you know, and to share, what you've built with me is really an honor. It really is. My pleasure, man. I know a little bit of what it took to build what you've built. Not, you've been at it a lot longer than me. So I don't know the full spectrum, but I know a little bit of what it took. I'll fill you in on all the

mistakes I made so you can skip them along the way. You know, just thank you so much, brother, for sharing with me, man. I really do appreciate it. My pleasure, man. Thank you. Thank you again to ladder life insurance for supporting this episode of the podcast. Latter makes it quick and easy to get covered for life insurance. To lock in your best rate today and get your family covered with ladder, go to ladderlife.com slash cleared hot. That's it for the week, everybody. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you. Thanks for taking the time to tune in, whether you're listening on an audio-only platform or you're watching on YouTube. I appreciate that you take the time. every week to tune in. People ask me a lot, what can they do to help me spread the word? And the

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