Jocko Podcast - 42: Fallen Hero Mikey Monsoor, SEAL Vet Andrew Paul: Leadership, Life, Loss, & Lessons Learned

Episode Date: September 28, 2016

0:00:00 - Opening 0:11:54 - Andrew Paul 0:16:36 - BUDS with Leif 0:19:52 - Detailed to Boat Unit 0:22:54 - Delta Platoon, Task Unit Bruiser 0:27:30 - Work-Up, Mikey Monsoor Stories, Learning about Leadership, Rough Tactics 0:52:17 - Deployment.  Challenges, Stories, and Leadership 1:16:25 - Homecoming / Mikey KIA 1:29:13 - Rough Transitions to Civilian Life 1:43:24 - The Unassuming Badass in the Mortgage Business 1:49:14 - Internet / Amazon / Onnit Stuff, JockoStore and Jocko White Tea 1:53:39 - Closing / Mikey MonsoorSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 42 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. Now, in podcast number 11, we brought on Laif Babin, who was the Charlie Platoon commander. Charlie Petun was a part of Task Unit Bruiser. Obviously, Laif is one of my brothers. Guy wrote the book, Extreme Ownership. So that's Laif Charlie Patoon and when he was on that first podcast we talked about a bunch of things but one of the main focuses of our conversation

Was some of the brothers that we lost Mark Lee who was the first seal killed in Iraq We talked about Biggles Ryan Job who was gravely wounded in Ramadi and who later died after complications from a surgery to repair those wounds. And finally we talked about Chris Kyle, who was also when Charlie Patoon was the lead sniper in Point Man and who ended up writing the book American sniper,

which was turned into a very successful movie. And Chris, as you know, was senselessly murdered as he tried to help out a fellow veteran. and on that podcast we didn't talk in any depth at all about Mikey Monsor who is another one of our brother seals from tasking a bruiser who was also killed in Ramadi and if you don't know Mikey was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor after he smothered a grenade with his body in order to save three of our other teammates And one of the reasons I didn't want to focus on Mikey during that podcast is because Mikey was in Delta platoon, as opposed to Charlie Petun. Charlie, there's two platoons in the task unit, Charlie and Delta. And Charlie was, Laif was the platoon commander and Tony Afradi, who was on the podcast as well.

He was the platoon chief. And before I went and talked about Mikey, I wanted to bring somebody from Delta Poltun. Tune on the podcast. It's a little bit trickier than it sounds because most of the guys from Delta Blatoon are still active duty. And the ones that aren't active duty, they're not around. I couldn't get a hold of them or if I could get a hold of them, they were busy or they were out of the area.

So it's just been hard. It's been a challenge. But I did want to wait. And finally, and today, we're lucky because I got one of my good bros. here guy by the name of Andrew Paul who was the assistant platoon commander in Delta Paltune Task Unit Bruiser seal team three but I wanted to start off today by reading a speech that I gave at one of the ceremonies that took place when Mikey was awarded the Medal of Honor and this was not the ceremony that took place at the White

house with President Bush which actually the entirety of tasking a bruiser did attend that and it was awesome but I gave this speech at a Navy ceremony that took place I think it took place later in the day or perhaps the next day at the Navy Memorial in Washington DC and that day there was a ton of senior naval officers in in attendance and basically the whole of the seniority of of the the of the Navy was there you know this the chief naval operations and the secretary of the Navy and there was a bunch of other Medal of Honor winners there including a couple other seal medal of honor winners and it was a a very fitting day and it was a great honor for me to be able to give this speech ladies and gentlemen it is obviously very humbling to be here

today as it was humbling to be on the battlefield of Ramadi with my fellow seals and the 228 brigade combat team the iron soldiers and then the one one a d the ready first combat team which was formed up by our brothers from the army navy air force and marines and it included such hallowed units as the first to the 506 band of brothers the 137 bandits and the 3-8 Marines. I met Mike Monsor when he checked into SEAL Team 3 as a new highly motivated young frogman. As we trained and prepared to deploy to Iraq, everyone learned that Mike was an incredible person. He was gifted at everything he did, hardworking, funny, and selfless.

He was the ultimate teammate, the ultimate friend. When Mike died, a picture of him circulated in the news. It showed Mike and his platoon mates and the war-torn streets of Ramadi, shrouded in a mist of greenish-yellow smoke, which was used to mask their movement from the enemy. That picture says so much. Mike's gun is at the ready.

His face is calm, almost smiling, despite the obvious chaos and danger around him. Ramadi at the time was the epicenter of the insurgency in Iraq, a city filled with peril. The hardened enemy was bent on destruction. They fought with ruthlessness, constantly on the attack with machine guns, mortars, grenades, and IEDs. Brave men died or were wounded every day. And every day, brave men continued to push forward into the fray. For those of us who were there, that picture of Mike captures all of this.

In the picture, his brother's seals are nearby, but Mikey is out front. I have looked at this picture over and over again, and it speaks to me. As someone that had the pleasure of knowing Mikey as a friend and had the honor of serving with him on the battlefield, this photograph tells me a story. As I look at that picture, I hear a voice in a humble but confident tone. This voice says to me, I am Michael Monsour. I am patrolling through the streets of Ramadi. It is a city devastated by war.

Bullet holes cover the rubble the buildings. Burned out cars litter the streets. I am walking just because. my point man I am ready my eyes sting from the sweat my gun and gear are heavy but these things do not bother me there is no comfort here but this is the life I have chosen and there is no other place I would rather be I am Michael Mansour I pray and I believe my faith is my shelter my faith is my strength Fear thrives in this place, but fear is no match for my faith.

Faith conquers all. The word of the Lord proves true. He is a shield for all those who take refuge in him. Lord, protect my brothers above all else. You have made me ready to protect them. I am Michael Monsor. I am far away from home. I miss my family.

I miss my mother, my father, my sister. and my brothers everything I am is rooted in them I want to hold my nephews and nieces again I want to make them smile and laugh but I am far away from home instead I smile at the Iraqi children when we pass them by when we encounter Iraqi families I treat them with respect and dignity I know the importance of family because there is nothing more important to me than my family. I am Michael Monsor. I love my country, my fellow seals, and the men fighting alongside us. The men fighting alongside us in the streets are infantry men, grunts. I know these grunts are not just soldiers and Marines, but fathers and

brothers and sons. I know because my father and brother were also grunts, proud Marine riflemen we are fighting a determined enemy but we are strong our strength is our brotherhood soldiers sailors airmen and Marines fighting together a brotherhood bound by sweat and blood and tears together we live in dust and dirt and filth and death death is everywhere many of my brothers have fallen mark is gone but we fight on for for the men to our left and right we fight on i am so proud to be part of this band of brothers i am michael monsore i am ready forged by faith and family molded by belief and brotherhood i have lived life to its fullest I have not looked back I leave nothing but love and I have no regrets

I am Michael Monsore I am the frog man on the high ground and I have given everything for you and that was the did my best to share my thoughts about Mikey and I'm honored here to have Andrew Paul with me today. Like I said, the former assistant platoon commander from Delta Paltoon to share some stories about Ramadi and about Mikey and about tasking a bruiser and about himself and the lessons that he learned over there. And how he carried those lessons to civilian life and the kind of challenges he faced there. So Andrew Paul.

my brother welcome to the show thanks for coming on thanks for having me bro it's an honor to be here and you know the main thing listen to that speech

I remember when you gave it my hope and prayer today is that whatever I do here today it honors the legacy of our brothers absolutely absolutely and we'll get into plenty of that

but in order and I hate to do this because everybody does this when they start like this type of situation. It's almost like a bar pickup line. You know, hey, so where are you from? Right. So, uh, that being said, Andrew, so where are you from?

Where am I from? I'm from New England, New Hampshire. You know what? We had Tony's, Tony was just on. Another New England, uh? That's right. If I don't get some boys from Texas on here, I'm going to get, I'm going to start hearing about it.

You've got to be real hard to grow up in New England. Let me tell you. It's cold. True. True. So, so. You grew up in New England, and by the way, for those of you that just listen on the podcast, what do you weigh?

155. 155. So the image that everyone has of the big Navy seal is not, first of all, it's not true. Their seals come in every shape and every size, and Andrew comes in the smaller size. And so, but how did you, so, so what did you, how did you hear about the seals? Like, what made you decide that that was what you wanted to do? Yeah, you know, first of all, I've always been the kind of person that, like, tell me I can't do something and I'm going to just show you. So, I mean, things like, oh, we're in high school and someone says, we're talking about like the Boston Marathon.

And I'm like, oh, I'm going to run. Oh, you can't do the marathon. Oh, okay, watch this. Ran the Boston Marathon. But, you know, probably saw a movie because, you know, when I was growing up, there wasn't a lot of information out there about the SEAL teams. And so. Tell me about it. Right?

I mean, even less for an old guy like you. So there wasn't a lot of information, but somehow, you know, probably saw a movie, ended up reading a book. And then, you know, started to do some research and found, well, first of all, outside my immediate family, uncles, grandfather, all served in the military. So grew up with that strong sense of wanting to serve my country and always had a sense of wanting to protect people who couldn't protect themselves. So it was drawn to that kind of line of work. Then began to read about the SEAL teams and at least, from what information I had available, it seemed like, hey, they were the best.

So I'm like, all right, well, if that's the best, then that's what I want to go do. And that was, you know, that was in its infancy as a young kid. But then, man, I just got on to that like a bulldog, bulldog on a pork chop and just, I mean, tunnel vision went after it. And you get you, did you go to college? Did you already have that decision to your mind when you went to college?

Oh, yeah. So you knew you were going to go to OCS. You knew all that. Did you go to ROTC? I did ROTC. So the thing is, is that I didn't know, I didn't know anything. I mean, I didn't know about, I didn't even know what ROTC was.

I didn't even know what enlisting was. I had no clue. No exposure. I just knew I wanted to be a seal. But we started looking at going to college, and I went down and I looked at Vanderbilt University, among others, John Hopkins or RPI, I was an engineering major. And I knew nothing.

And all of a sudden I walked into this almost like job fair kind of style thing, like welcome to check out the school, and there's this guy in uniform. And he's course got a picture of like some Navy SEAL frog man coming out of the water over the beach. And I was like, hey, what's this? Most realistic picture of all times. Right, because that's what we'd.

do every day. Right. And oh, hey, what's this? He goes, oh, this is ROTC. What's that? He goes, oh, well, you go to college. We pay for college, and then you go in the Navy. And I'm like, wait, you can be a

seal through this program? He's like, oh, yeah, absolutely. Big lie. Like, they take like 16 guys a year. Yeah. But, oh, yeah, you can be a seal. Oh, okay, wait, let me get this straight. So I go to college.

You pay for it. Watch this. I get to go in the Navy, and I can be a seal. Yep, I'll sign me up. So that's how I found out about RTC. Recruiter, just straight. truth from the recruiter you got to love it that's right yeah yes you can be a seal little did I know so you get done with uh college get your commission you do ROTC yeah and then you go to go to

buds show up to buds that was funny I showed up so I asked the ROTC instructor hey um you know like what's the process for checking in do I just like what should I wear oh just wear you know appropriate civilian attire oh so I show up to the Bud's quarterdeck and like a collared shirt, I walk on to the quarter deck, and one of the most sadistic instructors possible happen to be standing there. I walk on, I'm like, hey, I'm here to check in, like,

like the all-seeing eye, just like glances, like, you said, what? I stopped checking into buds wearing that. I'm like, uh, maybe I should go put a uniform on. Yeah, good idea. Run out to my car. You're here in three minutes of your uniform, son. Right.

went on, put on my SDBs, came back, promptly got wet and sandy. Yeah. That's how it works. SDBs, because you don't know, it's like the high level uniform with all the ribbons and all that crap on it and you got to, you know, you got to take good care of it. So when you take that and you wear it down to the ocean and then you jump in the ocean and then roll around in the sand, it's not a good deal. So the good news is there weren't a lot of ribbons on there yet. Yeah, you have one ribbon.

So, and you end up going through Buzz with Laif, right? Which people know who Laif is, obviously, which is cool. And then you get done with buds. I mean, buds is buds. I don't really care about buds. Yeah, some funny Laf stories, though. Talk about my bro. So I got pneumonia in Hellweek first time through, so I got rolled back to start over.

And then Laif transferred in. So Laif was our class leader. And so me, the Delta Platoon commander, who one day you'll hear from, and he and I, we all went through buds together, but they were both lateral transfers in, so they were senior to me in rank, right? They were already like JG and a full lieutenant. And so there's games in Buds, right?

Like you're trying to win. So, you know, we were wise to the games already to try and win. And Laif, you know, my brother is, like, life is black and white with my brother, Lake. Okay, so I'm going to hear about this one. But he, so, you know, it's right and it's wrong. And there's like, and so we're like, you know,

And buds are sort of like, if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying. And if you get caught, you ain't trying hard enough. I mean, so, and there's an element of that in Buds. Obviously, not completely. But so, you know, we're pulling all kinds of games. And his boat crew is losing because we are just, we're cheating to win. And he's getting so pissed. Like after the race, like after class, he's like, hey, you got.

And then he finally wizened up and started playing the game. Yeah, that thing about you ain't cheating, you ain't trying. That's sort of one side of buds. Right. And what was cool was when I went through buds, they actually told us like these couple instructors were like, listen, that's a little saying. It's not true. Right.

And they actually said, if you're cheating, you're cheating yourself. Right. Which else? And then obviously, then they start saying, look, if you got guys that are cheating here to get through this training, you really want them in the teams with you? No. Right. I don't want a guy that has to cheat to complete a run or a swim. Negative.

Yeah. I mean, there's a difference between like cheating, like cutting off the run versus like you're in competition. You're knocking the other guy, whatever. to, you know, competing. Hitting a guy in the face with a paddle, just that type of thing. Right. So you get done, so you get done, because you were junior, when you get to the, you went right to Team 3, right?

Right. So you get to Team 3, but you don't get to go on deployment with Team 3. They hook you up with being a boat unit commander. Yeah. So no one's going to know what that is. All right. So the deal was, and this has changed throughout the years, but like when I checked into team three, there was this brief period of time, whoever was in charge of the time,

decided that thirdos in a platoon was a bad idea for officer development. So this is no more thirdos. So basically I was faced with being a talk jockey or going over to the boat team and at least being in charge or something to get some leadership experience. So I went over to the special boat teams, which is part of Naval Special Warfare. And ultimately when they deploy, they deploy as part of the task unit or the task group. And it's all integrated and part of, you know, Visit board search and seizure, maritime operations, such as leadership interdiction, maritime interdiction operations.

And so the boat unit, which is special boat teams, is run essentially at the leadership level by seals. So the commanding officer of the boat unit, the executive officers are seals, the boat dead OICs, the mark five, although we don't have Mark Vives anymore, are seal officers. So look, as a brand new officer, at least had an opportunity to deploy in a combat zone to lead men, and to work with my SEAL brothers who were conducting operations in the Northern Ravian Gahl. Yeah, and just an overview, I'm just going to sum this up as quickly as I can. So obviously, seals work on water a lot, and we drive our own little boats, our own little, you know, 12-foot zodiac boats with 55-horsepower motors on them or 35-horsepower motors on them

or whatever. But the bigger boats, we don't drive those. So anything, you know, you see any of those bigger boats are driven by these guys that are called, They're now called SWEC Special Warfare Combatant Crewmen, which are guys that that's what they do. They're boat drivers. And they do, they insert and extract us, you know, drop their boats out of various aircraft.

So it's a legit job. And that's what they do. And so you were in charge of a group of those guys took boats on deployment to the Arabian Gulf and did what you did over there. Right. The reality is, it's not the dream for the seal, young seal officer.

to do that, but it's a good, like you said, it's good, all of a sudden you're in charge of something real. You know, when you're out on the water, and I tell people,

I used to tell people, when I was in the team, they say, listen, when you're on the water, it's a real world op. Because if something goes wrong when you're in the water, I mean, first of all,

you can drown, you can get lost, there's all kinds of bad things that happen. So if you don't plan right on the water, it doesn't matter if there's enemy or not, you got a big giant enemy. It's called the ocean,

and it will kill you if you're not squared away. And I think actually that's one of the things that makes SEALs good is that we work in the water. And the water is one of the toughest enemies you can come up against. It's unforgiving. So that wraps up that. You come home from that deployment. Yep.

And now you are still at SEAL Team 3 or you go back to SEAL Team 3, I guess, technically. Yeah. And now we form up and you become the Delta Platoon Assistant Platoon Commander. Checking in. Awesome. Working for the Delta Platoon Commander. Who you guys were bros already? We were bros.

Yeah, we've known each other for years, went through buds together. And Laf, so you guys must have been pretty stoked on that. It was cool. It's kind of like getting the band back together, you know. And look, those two guys had just come off of not the greatest appointments either in terms of a junior officer seal, right? Because they were deployed and they were the assistant commanders and they were getting stuck with not so fun work. Right. You know?

So we were stoked to be, all right. They were stoked like, hey, now we're the OIC. We're not going to be the guy stuck back doing the paperwork. And we were getting the band back together. And then when we found out you were our task unit commander, it was like, oh. Because we all knew we were going to be in the platoon together. And then we didn't know who our TU commander was going to be yet. And then we were all those rumor, rumor, who we were going to get.

And then we heard this guy, Jocko was coming over. Oh, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Did you know who I was? How'd you know. I only knew who you were through them. Like when other guys, like, oh, Jock. Badass. Dude, this is going to be awesome.

Right? Because, like, we already had an inkling that, like, if this dude was going to be our T. We had our best shot at getting into combat. Although we had no idea what was about to happen. Good assessment. Yeah. Yeah, your reputation was great. But you were coming over in that case from being the Admiral State.

Yeah, it's coming from being the Admiral's aide. Yep, 13 months with the Admiral, which was a rough tour in terms of things that normal seals. Same thing, right? Don't like to do. That's right. And I, and, you know, for instance, I mean, just straight up wearing a uniform every single So people don't so people understand in the world when and I don't know what it's like this moment today when I was in the teams when I was at seal team one seal team two seal team seven we I didn't wear a shirt right there's like no I'm a 35 year old man making money doing with a family I'm not wearing a shirt at work like oh I'm in my office cool I'm not wearing a shirt I'm wearing a shorts and a bear jungle boots right that's it so I do that for my whole life right since I was a kid since I was a 19 year old kid when I got through so I now I'm I go to be the Admiral's aide, and I have to wear a uniform every day, not just one uniform,

I have to wear khakis, then whites, then blues, and you're just in this constant uniform, and seals are not good about uniforms. They're just not, it's not one of our strong points. And so, so that's one of the things that made the job not very fun. But there's a good lesson there, right? So here, I mean, everybody knows you as an incredible leader, awesome seal, and yet for this period of time, you had to do this job that was not particularly fun. It's kind of like, you know, I had to go over and be the seal at the boat unit, right?

But, dude, life is full of things like that. And when you were part of the team, no matter what, you do it to the best of your ability. And you did an awesome job as the Admiral's aide, not necessarily what you wanted to do being a trident, wear and frog me. So I got an email from one of the assistant platoon commanders in Charlie Patoon a year ago. And he said, hey, bro. I'm going to go be the aide. Yeah, I know. You're talking about it.

And so I just saw him, and he was laughing. He goes, your email back to me, you said, this is going to be very hard for you because you're not good at this kind of thing. And I was pretty good at it. So you're going to have to work, like, extra hard to make this happen. And he was laughing. We were both laughing. Yeah.

Because you know who I'm talking about it. He's not a guy that is all over the minutia. Of course, he did a great job because he stepped up his game. But, yeah, when you get a task with something, you do. it and you do it the best of your ability and and you know just to continue that story because i have to say this it was a it was a pain the ass job it wasn't fun for me but man did i learn a lot did i understand a lot did i get to know all the inner workings of of the community because i was there with the guy you know with the admiral that was in charge of all the seals i was with him for 13 months

i mean all day travel you know wake up pt we were just i every meeting you know so it was a it was a great learning experience for me and I was appreciative and he was a great guy he's a great guy and he really cared about the seal platoons which is which is awesome when a guy puts the number one priority he'd always talk about okay what's what's the seal platoon need or how does this affect the seal ptoon yeah so then we got in but now you're in your first workup right going through work up getting getting your game on awesome best time in my life awesome yeah anybody's in the military now in active duty teams if you're listening to this band just enjoy it man enjoy it I mean there's other things in life sure but like you can you just you can't replace

that time it and there's stupid stuff you deal with yes but trust me enjoy this man you won't find it anywhere else nothing like that awesome yeah do you what do you I talk about this sometimes so one of the scars that you get from the military from the seal teams is if you go if you like to shoot weapons still oh yeah and you want to go shooting you have to pay for ammunition right and that's expensive and i'm serious i remember times in the seal teams where i mean your your thumbs are getting your thumbs are literally getting sore from reloading magazines for days and days you're shooting all the all the bullets you could possibly ever ever ever want to shoot ever you're going to shoot them all in a week

or two weeks. And so it's so fun. It's so fun. And for us, and for those of you don't know, so you go through a workup prior to going on deployment, which is now you're working together

for the first time. This is when I'm getting to know you guys. You guys are getting to know me. We're all getting to know each other where the whole unit is coming together as a team. And this is where the real bond forms and you're doing super hard training.

You're living together. You're working out together. You're working together. partying together, you're eating your meals together. It's just a 24-7 rock and roll awesomeness. And that's how you get to know these guys. That's how you get to know your team. Yep.

So me, Mikey, and another guy were the new guys in that platoon. One other guy? He's still on active duty. Yeah. Yeah, no, I'm just saying there was only three new guys in that platoon. Yeah. Dang, I forgot about that. Yeah, in Delta.

And Delta, yeah. Needless to say, Delta and Charlie were of slightly different dynamic. Yeah, you guys were, you guys are a different dynamic. Just like people have different personalities. Fletoons have different personalities and teams have different personalities, and they can morph and change. But nonetheless, both great platoons, both great platoons. Oh, yeah. And so it was only you and Mikey and one other guy?

Yeah. I don't know who the other guy was. Yeah. Yeah. The tick. You guys were the only three new guys in there? Yeah. So it can be a harsh,

it's a harsh environment to come into when you're, when you're a new guy in a seal platoon. But I, so I'm with, so I'm with Mikey and we're doing, we're just, I don't even think we're doing mobility, but we are driving out to the ranges.

And he's the, he's the turret gunner, right? And I say something to him like, hey, when we're approaching a road, you know, you look at your field of fire and if there's no vehicles coming, you know, say, clear right.

And so he did it once and he's clear right, you know, kind of quiet. I was like, hey, man, you got to sound off. The driver's trying to drive. He's got radio on. He needs to know what's going on, man. You need to sound off. Yeah. And the next intersection we got to, he said, clear right.

And he said it super loud. And I thought to myself, wait a second. Is he, you know, taking a piss out of me? Is he being sarcastic with that yell? Right. No. And no, he was not. No.

I told him to yell. He was like, okay. I will yell. I will yell. And that's where it worked. One of my other favorite stories about Mikey was, and this is another like new guy related story. Was, so you go through CQC training, close quarter combat, close quarter battle, whatever. It's basically shooting in small spaces, taking down buildings, that kind of thing.

And it's a, it's a, there's a lot of instructor focus on the mechanics of what you're doing. So it's a very, it's a very mechanical thing. And if you're making mistakes, it's not going to work out good for you. And by the way, as a new guy, there's tough scrutiny. But the reality is, it doesn't matter if you're new or not. Like they are watching everybody. Everybody's getting watched. You could be a third platoon guy and get canned from the platoon for a safety violation.

And you can get a safety violation in two seconds out there. In a half a second. Yeah. It doesn't take much. So and what they're trying to do is they're trying to put more stress on you right because they want to they want you to handle the stress so they stress People out by just you know these little minute details of what you can do right and wrong and to be honest with you Some of them don't matter some of them you're like okay that doesn't matter you and and and and I know they don't matter because they they they morph over time and they'll teach you know One phase they'll be teaching one thing and then if later they'll teach the phase they'll teach another thing then later they'll teach another thing so

It's not, there's a million different ways to do it. And you could argue, this one's better, but there's a million different ways to do it. But they do, they pick whatever they're going to choose for that block of training is what you're going to do. And if you want to sit there and argue with them, oh boy, this is not going to work out good for you. So what I told all the new guys in Delta and Charlie between and I said, hey, listen, when the instructor cadre is telling you to do something or they're yelling at you or they're getting on your ass about something, you just look at them and say, Roger that. you guys got it roger that and these guys are like roger that and that's the best attitude you want to have right

because what do you want to be a new guy that's like hey no i don't agree with your tactics they're a person that's deployed you know overseas 14 times no you don't want to be that guy you might think you're right but no this is what you know that's not what you want to do so i told the guys you say roger that so we're going through the training the training's great and we're doing really well our task units doing great

you know but still guys are guys are making mistakes whatever and finally the master chief And of course, for like Tony and I, we're friends with all the cadre guys because they're all our bros from being in the teams. And one of the leader guy, he comes up to me and he's like, hey. He's hard, by the way. This guy is intense. He goes, hey, what's up with this guy, Monsor? And I was like, I don't, what do you mean?

What's up? He's been doing a good job. What's up? He goes, every time I tell him something, all he does is just look at me and say, Roger that. And I go, hey, brother, you know what? he's doing exactly what I told him to do. I literally told him the only thing I wanted him to say to you guys or wanted anything

you guys to say to you guys was Roger that and make it happen. So when we were out there, there was another platoon that was there at the same time. Do you remember this? They were and I'm pretty sure the chief got canned from the platoon. He safety violation and there was some and there was that talking back going on right?

Like hey, I've got three deployments under my belt and you know there's a degree of humility in that Roger that response. That's what it's like it's it's Roger that I'm open to the correction you have for me. Yeah, for sure. And so and these guys, you know, he's on the put on the, and there's a balance there. I mean, he's leading his platoon and taking a stand for, you know,

and being in charge. But at the same time, like there's a humility and a respect in that response, and he was not doing that. And I'm telling you, like, he screwed some things up and they safety review board. I mean, I remember holding a safety review board for the chief of that platoon. Yeah. Not our task unit, but it did they do not play around. No.

And that's the way. It's supposed to be. That's right. Because it's intense. And what people don't get is that you're trying to recreate the intensity of combat as best you can. So they're creating high stress situations as stressful as possible. And like you said, sometimes creating elements that aren't necessarily real, but just to

overload you with a number of things you have to process under pressure. And then are you going to make good decisions under pressure? And that right there is what translates to combat. Good decisions under stress and under pressure. Yeah. Yeah, and you're right, though, about that humility piece. And that was our attitude going through. Right.

You know what? I mean, between me and Tony, I don't think there was, I'm just trying to think if there's any instructor cadre that was putting us through. Right. You know, there were some guys that were, you know, but it wasn't like there was someone that was just, you know, had tons more experience than the two of us. Right. And yet, you know, both Tony and I, hey, Roger that. Yeah, hey, sounds good. We'll make that adjustment.

because you know what? It's great. Just having Tony on the other day. He was just saying, look, I'm learning something new all the time, learning something from the new guys. And that's the attitude that prevailed through the task unit. Not of, hey, we're the best. We don't have to listen to anybody.

But, hey, we're going to work as hard as we can. We're going to be the best we can. But we've got open minds and we're ready to learn at all times. It's a fine line between competent and cocky. No doubt about that. And being humble, you can be confident. you can be sure and you can be humble and respectful and open to learning new things and man you may be surprised at what you learn yeah there's no doubt about that so what else do you

remember from workup in terms of hey you're a new guy you're checking in you know tony and i told some stories of what it was like when we were checking into team one it was when we were new guys it was a very rough environment to roll into yeah what did you think when you got to you know being a new guy well I remember like literally day first of all day one that I was checking into the platoon space I got like the combo of the platoon space right and I went in and I'm man brand new and so I'm going to be protective of my platoon you know so I go in I'm walking out of the platoon space making sure the door is locked behind me because you know other platoon guys go in and just destroy another guy's platoon space or whatever and I'm walking down the hallway and our LPO

who is goes down to the door and he doesn't have the combo right and he goes he goes hey hey what's the combo to the space I'm like I gave him some wise ass remark did you not know him

no it didn't know him yet right how'd that work out for you it was hilarious like he he goes hey what's the combo to the space I'm like hey man I can't give that to you and I didn't know he was the LPO he goes he goes on the goddamn LPO what's the fucking combo to the platoon space

like roger that three one together than two you know and I proceeded to walk down the steps I'm going oh god almighty I am just I just met the LPO and it was not on good terms oh man that's awesome and then he and I turned out to be good friends but um I remember we're out doing land warfare training and this is like where you know you're cutting the metal like you said you're getting to know each other and you know the guys in the platoon also trying to figure out with these new guys like all right what have I what have we got here what can we rely on you know and uh so

one night I remember us doing a little bit of boxing and it was forced boxing new guy on new guy you know and survival of the fittest oh my dude and then at times it was just three on you know every man for himself and it's just like your head's on a swivel and it's mikey the tick and me and we're just wailing away and it's just going and it's hey who's going to continue to fight Basically, right. And dude, oh, everything. You know, I'm an officer, and these two guys are just, you know, obviously whaling away. But I'm like, hey, man, I'm going to just fight to the bitter end.

And it was pretty awesome. Hey, did you do Jitsu before you got? I did. You had just enough to make it that you could hold your own when I would do the officer, cummete. Yes. I did do some, and, you know, to keep in mind. Where did you train? On the East Coast when I was in high school.

And I got into Gracie, jujitsu like literally like i was already training when the first ufc ever came out right and so it was pretty cool and then that was always a big shocker for people because you were you were you were by far smaller than the other platoon officers and yet you had that jiu jitsu and when you have the jiu jitsu you didn't have a lot either what were you even a blue belt i don't even know you yeah you were you were probably like a high level white belt but but to be fair like at the time it was all very very new like the world of MMA today is oh yeah totally different oh totally different as you know but at the time like I mean I even went to in high school with my with my instructor who was at who was a teacher at my

school he was into it so he and I would train like five in the morning before school me versus him much larger man but we would learn jihistu and then we went and did seminars with hoist gracie in upstate New York we would drive and it was cool like I got to get out of school and go train again this is just proof that jiu jitzy so good because He would, I would make these, these officers, like we meet at 5 o'clock in the morning, and I'd say, okay, and I would train with everybody, but then I'd say, okay, now you two, you two, fight to the death. And they would just get after it, but he was, he was 150 pounds. He's going against guys that are 200 pounds. You know, they have him by 50 pounds.

And taller than me, too. And he would just, you know, there's, you know, it just doesn't work, you know, you got to, you got to know that, you got to know, you got to say that I, and I'm not going to say that I weigh, and these are tough guys. No, you survive, though. That's right. That's right. Like they weren't tapping me out, you know. Didn't you usually tap them? I usually choked out a certain guy who didn't like that very much. It's hard. It's hard, man. Jiu-jitsu's a humbling thing.

Yep. But, you know, and the thing at that time, because they were bigger than me, was more about energy conservation, right? And so, like, I mean, I just let them wear themselves out, and then they try and get things on me. And then I just sneak my way around there, buddy. I also remember you volunteering for the taser. Oh, boy. Yeah. So you actually had an attitude like you have you look like I can hang I'm going to handle this like no factor what you want to tase me bring it. That's right. You know you don't see the guys on cops when there's a big tough crazy guy all on PCP and he gets tase he rips the taser out and throws the thing and he just keeps coming that's what Andrew Paul had to look like I'm gonna

I'm gonna just go you're gonna tase me bring it let's go I mean hey I'm a new guy in the platoon right I mean I got to earn my spot right and so Somebody somebody had, actually it was the LPO, he had one of these things. Yeah. And I was like, oh, and I'm going to tell you what, like it had these like two modes, one where you could shoot or you could like put it right up to the guy, you know. And I was like, hey, let's go, shoot him. I'm like, come on, let's go. And then like the whole platoon, like everybody like met down in the back cave.

And there may be a video floating around somewhere. This one had the winter barbs, if those you guys know what a taser is. Like the bar, the winter barbs are longer to get through, the sweater. Get through that down coat. Yeah. And so when... Of course, he was like, what were you in a T-shirt or just no shirt?

I was in a T-shirt. Okay. Yeah. And I was like, oh, wait, how'd those winter barbs work out for you? So it's like, there's like, oh, they're getting ready to do it. They're like, oh, wait, wait. And, you know, these are my guys looking out for me. Appreciate it, guys.

They're like, oh, here, put this ipro on. Oh, that's a good idea. Right. So put some eye pro on. And then, like, it's got a laser on it. Right? So the laser, and you, if you see the video, like, Like you can hear guys going, like guys are wincing.

Like nobody's been tays. Like nobody knows what's going to happen right now, right? Boom. So this thing comes out at like 45 degree angle. And one like goes into my sternum. And the other one goes below my belly button. All right. So I'm like instantly over.

All that, all that thinking he was just going to just rip those things out. He went rigid. And thank God we put a mat down. Yes, there was a mat. Because he went rigid straight and. fell like a brick. Just boom, nothing. And then just...

So clearly, and I remember this, too. Like, it hits you, and, like, it hits you in that spot. And, like, your hands go to grab. Like, you've been stung or you've been hit. So my hands, my hands get, like, three quarters of the way there. By the time the electricity freezes the body. So my hands are kind of, like, stuck in front of my chest and my abdomen as an attempted to grab the spot.

So I go over and, all right, they turn the thing off. And then they go to get these things out. Somebody's got a pair of pliers. And the bar. I remember that hit my ad. You know it's good when you need pliers to dislodge the bars. So, like, it went into the muscle. Like, because, like, I remember ripping and coming free, but not free.

And it was still beneath the skin. Yeah. And then it just, like, just rip it. You see, this is the teams, man. This is what makes the team so fun. Yeah. One day you show up at work, you volunteer to get tased and you're going to get some. The best thing you can do is just volunteer in a situation like that.

Yeah. Yeah, you know, and just like, come on, let's go. Yeah, bring it. And then they got, oh, okay, right on, you know. Yeah, well, you did the right thing. I'm sorry, it didn't work out too well for you. I think it worked out great. All right, so we get word.

We get done with our workup, and now it's time to go on deployment and get on deployment. And we found out, what, two weeks before, you guys were on leave when we found out we were going to Ramadi instead of where we originally supposed to go, which was. in Iraq, but we knew, I mean, I knew Ramadi was going to be the, uh, the best place to deploy to. And we show up over there. And what was cool, I thought about with, uh, with that deployment is the way we task organized and every, basically every leader got their own element. Yeah.

Yeah. And put you guys. It was like, oh yeah, you know how you've been working for this? And we've been all, no, you're going out on your own. You're, you're in charge. Yeah. And that was, uh, that was awesome. And that, what made me feel good was that when we were in the workup and we made you guys run operations, even though you were new guys and made you put you in pressure situations and put you in charge of ground force commander while you were, you know, most troops didn't do that.

Right. But I knew that there was a possibility. And furthermore, what happens if, you know, your platoon commander gets killed? What happens if I get killed and then you're the guy? Then you got to be able to step up and run stuff. And so we did that through the chain of command. And we did, I will admit to this. Yes, we made sure that we had crushed the workup.

And then it was like, okay, we've dominated. Okay, now we start training the new guys up on how to lead. And that was important, too. Because it's, you want to do well in the workup. You want, because that's where your reputation has a task unit comes from is how well you do going through these various training box. Well, that's why we earned the spot to be able to go to Iraq, right? Because the thing is, is that some guys are going elsewhere.

And you're all vying, look, I mean, you're all vying because you want to go to combat. And some guys are going someplace else, not in Iraq. and, you know, I hate to say it, but that's not where any of us really wanted to go. Oh, nothing I hate to say about that. If you're in the SEAL teams, you want to go to war. That's right. That's right.

We all wanted to go to war. That's what we were fighting for. We were competing. There are three task units. We were competing as a task unit to get top spot to the most dangerous place, and that's where we want to go. And that turned out to be Ramadi. Now, by the way, on that workout, too,

just from a leadership perspective, I don't know if you remember, you know, not everybody made it through the workout. There were guys who were cut loose, safety issues, not stepping up, not leading, pushing that leadership opportunity down to the junior officer or whatever and not stepping up or doing something unsafe or just not having what it took.

And just from a leadership perspective, you have to be willing to make that hard decision. And reality, I know you and Lave have talked about it, when you've given everybody that guy every opportunity, when you've evaluated it and you've kept notes and you've tried to train and you've tried to correct, it's not a hard decision, right? Yeah, actually the Commodore, I don't know if you were there, but the Commodore asked me, we were on deployment.

And he goes, you know, hey, Jack, well, this is in front of everyone. He says, you know, well, I shouldn't say everyone was in front of the leadership. He says, hey, how are the guys that were in Workup maybe weren't performing up to par? How are they doing over here? I was like, sir, they're not in this task. They're not here. That's right. They didn't make it.

That's right. They've been removed. That's right. So, yeah, that's a great point. And again, it's a hard thing to do because you really, you really wrecking someone's life. Well, think about it, right? So this is a guy who is,

who, so there's a guy who's an officer, right? So, I mean, we didn't really, we kind of glazed through it, but it's hard to get a spot to go to Buds as an officer. Yeah. It's very competitive. So this is a guy who's an officer who got a spot to go to Buds,

made it through Buds, which is hard. Made it through SQT, got to a platoon. This guy is not a slouch physically. You know what I mean? Like, this is not, this is not some loser. You know,

this is a guy who made a great American, patriotic person. That's right. That's right. A great guy who stepped up, who made it through something that many, many other men could not make it through and had to make a hard decision, you know, on your part with the Delta Platoon commander to not have this guy continue with us. And so if that can happen even within the SEAL teams, those of you guys who were listening, right? I mean, don't you think that's also possible that within your organization, you might have to make a similar kind of decision. We also have to make that decision in the SEAL teams. We're not exempt from making that decision. Yeah. And also very much like the civilian sector, you know, there's HR. Basically in the military, there's HR. There's human resource department. You can't just walk and say, I don't like

this guy. I'm going to fire him. That's right. No, okay. Well, what, have you counseled him? Has you, you paperwork on him? Does he know that? Have you verbally? Have you written it? It's all these things. That's right. We went through that whole procedure. Yep. And, you know, if there's an extreme case of course you can you can make it happen but it's going to cost you a little bit of political capital because honestly if I'm your boss and you come to me and say hey I want to fire this guy and I say okay why well I don't I don't you know he's not doing his job anymore and I say okay did you counsel him no not yet but I want to fire him anyways that's going to cost you some political capital yeah I'm actually looking at you

going wait a second why didn't you train this guy yeah you as a leader why didn't you step up and train this guy what what are you doing it because that can be a cop out right hey if I'm too lazy to train mentor then you're copying out as leader but if you've done all those things as a leader and you can really document that and see that and the guy's still not performing, then the next leadership decision is time to part ways. And that really is, I mean, that really is one of the best things about the SEAL teams is when you're raising your guys up, when you're, when you're teaching guys what you know and you're saying, hey, man, this is what you need to do.

Hey, bro, here's the way this works. Here's what you did over here. Here's what you should do. You know, that's just, that's your, that's your legacy. That's what you're leaving behind is, is, hey, this is what I learned. and I want to teach it to as many guys as I can. That's what you're trying to do. So if you're not doing that,

that's jacked up. You know, that's jacked up. And it's the same thing in the civilian sector. You know, here's a good one. I was working, you know, we work with companies, and I was working with a company the other day, and they got a guy who sort of, you know, oh, well, well, maybe he's not the best mentor, right?

But he wants to get promoted, of course, because everyone wants to get promoted. So this guy wants to get promoted. And they're trying to, they haven't had luck saying, look, you've got to be a mentor, you've got to lead, you've got to be a better leader, you've got to raise people up. And I just, you know, talk to the boss and I said, well, ask him this question. Yeah, you know what? I definitely am looking forward to promoting you. Give me the three names of people that you've prepared to take your position.

Right. Goose eggs, right? It's going to be goose eggs because he hasn't done that. That's right. So that's a key component. You know, you definitely want to, you want to be, as a little. leader, you should be looking for your replacement all the time. And I, with Laif and with the Delta Patoon commander, I wanted those guys be able to do my job.

And that's my whole goal. And I wanted you to be able to do my job. Right. And I'll tell you, by the time we went on deployment, everyone pretty much could do my job. So that was success for me. Because guess what that allowed me to do on deployment? Look up and look out and figure out what we're going to do next and all that other stuff. So that should be your goal from a leadership perspective for sure.

And as you just pointed out, when you get to a situation, where you've done the coaching, you've done the mentoring, you've done the counseling, you've written, you've set the expectation, you have a person that still isn't cut in the mustard,

you got to go. It's not a hard decision at that point. And you have to be loyal. People get mixed up too because there's a loyalty component. Because you form of his relationship, we just talked about this big relationship with all these people.

Well, guess what? You have a relationship with that person that you're about to fire too. But then the question becomes, are you going to be loyal to that individual or you're going to be loyal to the team? Because you're hurting the team. That's exactly right.

That's the team. Yep. so that's that we went on deployment with a strong bunch of pipe hitters all right so we get on deployment we you you guys we kind of and this is again this is something tony and i talk about we were task organized and we changed that we changed it on a fairly regular base okay we know what we this area is getting hot need more guys over there and we would just kind of there's a lot to do there's a lot to do there's a lot of work to be done there was a lot of bad guys um when you when you look back and you're kind of so now you're on your first combat deployment what was the thing that struck

you as damn like okay this is what because i'll tell you people ask me that and like the first firefight i got in on my first deployment to iraq and honestly i was like okay i felt like i was a hundred percent prepared i agree completely and i was like okay cool hey guys you know it's just very simple very straightforward so some guy said to me one time and this is an outside guy and said He goes, it seems to me that in the Hill teams, you guys do stress inoculation really well. And so I would say yes, because that's, that is exactly my same. First firefight I got in, I was like, no big deal. And, you know, look, you know when the rounds are close, right?

Like, you know what that sounds like. And they're really close, and it's no big deal. By the way, it's not really very loud when they're shooting at you, right? I mean, you hear a certain sound. But then, of course, he's fire maneuvering. It gets a little bit loud. But that's awesome. It's just like every drill we've ever done.

And it was no big deal. It was almost habit at that point. You knew exactly the maneuver. So no big deal. The first time I went out in a Humvee in Ramadi, so keep in mind, like you said on the introduction, when we got there, guys were getting IED and killed every single day. Every day the message traffic came over and it was KIA, you know, IED. So first Humvee ride I go out in and I'm looking out the window and by the way like you can't really roll these windows down. It's not like you can, you don't want to roll these windows down by the way.

They're bulletproof windows so you want to keep them up. Right. And you know so like you actually can't shoot back if you want to, right? The only guy who can shoot back is your turret gunner. And for the first like I would just say minute and a half I was like wincing. I was like waiting for this clack to go. boom you know and then finally i was like you know what there's nothing i can do about it and i literally let it go right then so that was that that was like that's a strong memory like i remember even for all

the training and again the first firefight was no big deal and um but driving down in a humvee sitting in the back completely helpless i mean you have two choices and life is a lot like this you can sit there and worry yourself away about it well is it this intersection is it this intersection or just go you know what here's a deal. I can't control it. So I'm just going to be ready. So when it's my time to bust out this door or do whatever we got to do to do an immediate action drill or whatever, I'm ready to do it. And the rest of it, you just let go. You let go because anything else is not effective. Yeah, you're not, you're not only just are you worried, but now you're, you're actually doing things bad. You're actually being negative. You're thinking about

things that you shouldn't be thinking about, and it's not helping you. It's not helping your team. So I like that. Just to kind of sum up what you said. You were in Ramadi for six months. You were scared for about a minute and 30 seconds. Yeah. And after that, you're like, all right. And I think that's the attitude that I think that's the best, I don't know if this is the right thing to say or not, but to accept the fact that there's things you can control, that you cannot control, and that one of those things is, you know, an IED, a sniper bullet. I mean, and now there's things that you can do to influence because guess what?

We do training, we prepare, we're keeping our eyes peeled, we're taking routes that we know. have been cleared to the best of our ability we're on the street we're moving we're moving from cover to cover we're doing everything that we can but guess what it doesn't matter that's you can do everything right and doesn't matter you can still get blown up you can still get shot that's the way it is so if you sit around and just think about that all the time it's just going to drive you crazy one and number two it's going to make you do your job worse yeah because you're going to be less aggressive and I think you got to stay aggressive to stay alive you you want to be aggressive you want to be you know what yeah we'll go make

that happen oh they're they're do I want to sit in the vehicle right out or get out and get out and get some ground I mean that's just the type of thing that's a mindset it's a mindset that that wins that's it it's the winning mindset and if your goal is to win then you have to recognize that certain thought processes are not effective and they take away from your ability to win and you know I see people get worried about stuff that kind of thing right so you just you take a step back you I want to win right the guy said to me one time hey do you think do you think fear is a is a is a a useful emotion.

I thought about it for a second, because I mean, I've heard lots of different people talk about fear and, you know, this and that. And, you know, I would say for maybe I'll change this one day, but right now, this is where I've come to on fear. Maybe for the caveman who's walking through the jungle and they get attacked by the Sabre 2 Tiger and that fear, that fight or fight response is enough to make him react in a moment in order to avoid being slashed by the tiger. But other than that, fear was not a fight or not.

effective in battle because you do not make good decisions when acting in fear. And you have a better chance of survival. You make better decisions and you have a better chance of winning and defeating and crushing the enemy when you remain calm. You do do do do to look. Observe, orient, decide, act. Yeah. Yeah, I get asked, I obviously get asked about fear a lot.

And, you know, I always say, look, fear is not a bad thing because it's the thing that makes you go, okay, I need to be ready. Right. It's a thing that makes you rehearse. It's a thing that makes you say, okay. Okay, and for me, again, the fear wasn't about the fear of getting killed, getting blown up. The fear was always about, I don't want to do a bad job. I don't want to make a bad decision.

I'll tell you, you're in a leadership position? That is the heaviest fear that you have is I make a mistake. My team does something that doesn't bring credit upon us as a union. And by that, I mean, doesn't do a good job. Like you're just, I don't even know where that comes from. It's just want to do a good job. And the fear is, hey, I hope I don't do anything that gets my guys hurt or killed. I hope don't do anything that's a bad decision that makes, that does that hurts us strategically as a nation.

Yeah. Those are the two fears that I think make you rehearse, make you practice, make you reinforce, make you reinforce, make you aware of what's happening. But you can't, what you can't do. I mean, for me, fear is makes me aggressive. Like, oh, I think this guy's going to do something to me. Cool, I'm afraid of him. Cool, I'm going to attack him. I'm going to kill him.

You know, I'm going to take them out. I'm going to do something. You know, and I actually see that time, you know, I see that in MMA too, where when you see someone happen to somebody where they get a little bit, they get a little bit rocked or something, if they let that fear make them back off and go into a defensive mode, it's exactly what you just said. If it makes you into a defensive mode, it's going to, you're going to, the person's going to, because, man, you can smell that.

That's right. You can smell that. So when I think the reaction to fear is like, oh, I'm afraid right now. Cool, I'm going to attack. I have to attack. Like, oh, I don't feel comfortable about where the troop is moving right now or where my squad is moving right now. I don't think it's a good thing.

Cool. I'm going to attack. I'm going to take some high ground. I'm going to maneuver. That's healthy. Yes. That's healthy. That's healthy.

But you're also trained and prepared mentally for that kind of thing. Most people, when they start acting in fear, they start making poor decisions. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. So in that sense, it's like, hey, get over your fears. Because you have to recognize it when you're acting in fear. you'll have a less desirable outcome than if you can get over it calm down, you know, observe, orient to side act.

Yeah, no doubt about it. All right, what about what about just playing leadership challenges? I mean, here we are stressful deployment. Yep. It was it was the most stressful deployment that anybody had had up until that point in Iraq. Yeah. And even talking to, you know, the Vietnam guys, this was a stressful deployment. Yeah.

A very stressful deployment in the amount of, combat that was happening. Well, urban combat things happen so fast. So, but from a leadership perspective, what did you, was there anything that you didn't expect? Was there any lesson that got confirmed?

Yeah. So, and it's funny because you know, over time in the deployment, you really mature, even in a short amount of time. And I'll give you a quick story. So it was one of my last ops before I left country. And there

was another unit that had come in to kind of partner up with us and we went and did this op and so the officer in that unit who's a good friend of mine by the way was it might have been his second combat op right and so I've been on I don't even know how many at that point and so we went and did this operation and it involved some army units and so we're sitting in this position and And so, like, classic blunder, the army guy who's sitting there is on the rooftop and he's smoking a cigarette. Like, like the classic World War to sniper victim, smoking a cigarette, trail of smoke going up. And, I mean, this is a classic. I mean, single sniper shot shoots him.

And it just, I mean, it misses his face. face, well, let me put it this way. It took his earlobe off, right? Round cracks into the wall behind us. That's it. Immediately, everybody just like, blah, like just unloads firefight, right? And so we're calling it a medevac for this guy because it kind of, it still cut them pretty good. And trying to figure out there's going to be any more fire or whatever the situation is. So, so this guy is like, well, I'm like, hey, so time to call a QRF and get out of here.

He's like, well, you know, I think, I'm like, you think what, dude? what else do you think is possibly going to come from this? And, you know, I mean, I probably would have thought, hey, maybe we can still get something from this. It was my first or second, right? But it was just clear. Like, I mean, at this point, I mean, we've already got a lot of guys hurt on this deployment. We've already lost Mark.

And a few other guys, you know, Biggles has already been shot at this point. So you have to weigh, like, what more are you going to gain? I mean, first of all, this guy just, this sniper just got a, bead on this guy. I mean, and by the grace of God, he is still alive. And we've shot like, so what else is going to happen? I mean, they're either just going to set up and get a better position or get another shot, but they certainly aren't going to do anything. We certainly aren't going to see anything that they don't want us to see at this point. So the battlefield is lost. I mean, this op is, it's over. It's time to pull chocks and go. So anyway, the army came and

busted down the swall with the fighting, it was awesome. I mean, I love the Bradley fighting viewhole. But, you know, that's just sort of like a quick, it's like obvious, it's obvious to me at that point. And on a Monday morning, you know, quarterback 10 years later, as I'm explaining this, like anybody's listening and go, well, yeah, obviously time to go, right? But you know what? You're in that position and guys are still trying to get after it. And there's still things going on out there. You might think, well, maybe there's still something we can do here.

Yeah. And by the way, there was other times where similar situations happened and different decisions were made. And they worked out great. Yep. You know, and so I think your overall statement is like you gained perspective right over time and you're able to look at things from a, from a better perspective and from higher altitude for a lack of a better way to say it. You're able to understand what's happening on the battlefield more. And that's definitely something that if people are listening and it's something that they want to become aware. It's something that you can actually act on because that perspective, it can.

can be gained through time and experience, but it can also be gained by detachment and saying, okay, what am I really doing here right now? What are we really going to gain? And you can make a faster progress down the line to have to make good judgment calls based on not just experience, but just on knowledge and trying to capture the right perspective at the right time.

Plus a big tactic for those guys was slowly evolving and happened after we left. So is there anything else that you start, that you learned again that you didn't expect or that was useful for you from a leadership perspective? Yeah. So, you know, I found myself in a position a lot of times of kind of stitching, keeping the platoon stitched together, you know, because in an intense situation, guys start to have different opinions about things, you know.

They do indeed. Yeah. And so, so on this deployment, I was not the point. platoon commander, right? My good friend was the platoon commander. And when you're in a position of leadership, you're making a lot of hard decisions. And not everybody always agrees with the decision that gets made. And so a lot of times the role I needed to fill was to back my platoon commander and continue to keep the platoon together behind the platoon commander because he was tasked with making some hard decisions. So sometimes it was, you know, sometimes, you know, so look, I would just,

The analogy I would give to you is that you may be in a role in a company in an organization where the best thing you can do to be part of the team is to help keep the team on focus for the mission. And that might mean spending some time with one or two guys who are over here having a disagreement about the decision or which way things are going. And truly, one of the best ways that you end up having to do that or doing that is, number one, you build the relationships with the guys. so they know and trust you. Number two, your platoon commander

is got a lot of stuff on his plate. Right. And so one of the easiest things for him to cut short is the guys of explaining, hey, here's why this is going on, here's how, why this is going to. So you, as the intermediary, saying, okay, I know what he's doing.

I know why he's making this decision. Let me explain this down the chain of command. That's right. And that's so helpful. So helpful. And when you've got guys in a platoon or any organization, a high-performing organization

that are really strong-willed and have strong opinions. And by the way, are intelligent and it can make really articulate points as to why they don't agree with something. You know, again, my role in that situation was to ensure that mission success continued to happen,

that we were still effective as a unit. And that meant me kind of behind the scenes trying to keep some guys on board. Yeah. And it's interesting, and I'm sure people have noted this already, but when you're not, you said there's these different people inside of a platoon.

I mean, just if you listen to the podcast that I just did with retired senior chief, Tony Afradi, and you, you guys' personalities are very, very different, very, very different.

And that's just some of what you get in a seal of platoon. And you know what? It's not just someone getting a seal poutine. It's some of what you get in any organization. That's right. There's no clones. There's not people being turned out. They can have the same background.

They can go to the same school. They can have the same level experience. they can be totally different people. That's the way it is, and that's the way it isn't the seal teams, and that's the way it is in every organization. It's part of why we're so good, right? Because you got guys that think differently.

They have problems differently. Yes. But I like the fact of what you're saying is you had to be, you found yourself in the role of, okay, you know what? I got to make sure that the guys understand where the platoon commander is coming from

with the guy that if there's something that actually makes sense, I got to bring it back to the platoon commander and say, look, this isn't one of the guys complaining about something. Here's the legitimate point that's being made. Right. can have that discussion maybe brings in one of those guys and said okay tell me what you're talking about here and then you guys can move forward and come up with the best

possible plan but yeah as a peacemaker for all practical purposes is is what's is where you what you end up being and you know before what the one of their peacemakers needed because it wasn't a lot of peace over there not a lot of peace and one of the stories I think that little Mikey story here that kind of shows you the level of violence that was happening in Ramadi. So I came to visit because I was on the other side of Ramadi and the guys from Delta, first a small section of guys from Delta and then all of them ended up on the eastern side of Ramadi with the first of the 506 band of brothers.

Awesome outstanding unit. Amazing guys. to a man and with an amazing commander. But so Delta Patoon ended up over there. Well, anyways, I had gone over to visit, go do some ops with them and see what was going on. And when I showed up, you know, I showed up and, and this was a few, this is probably like a month and a half in. Because the guys had taken over some crappy building. Full metal jacket.

Yeah, full metal jacket. And had built it out FMJ. So if you guys seen the movie Full Metal Jacket, that's a scene in the movie where these guys, these buildings are all blown out. Well, this building where not just the Seals, but a bunch of guys, Army guys, lived in this building and it was all blown out

and it looked like this. It was awesome. It was awesome. Full Metal jacket. And when we first got in there, the first one we first went out there, it was dirt, it was literally dirt floors,

just mosquitoes everywhere. It was just horrible. And now some time had passed. And the guys, of course, You put seals somewhere, they're going to dial some stuff in. The CBs that we have. Yeah, the Cs we had. Oh, my gosh.

The Cs we had were phenomenal. And you don't know what CBs are. They're sort of the Navy's version of engineers. And they're fanatically hard workers. And the crew that we had with us in Ramadi, that was, that was, they were part of our task unit. They were just total hard chargers and bust their ass and make stuff happen. So they had, and the other thing, the other thing you have to do when you're a CB is you have to learn to a acquire things because there's a lack of things in combat zone.

That's right. And so your good CB can come up with, let's call it, you know, 120 sheets of four by eight plywood. Right. That, our master, our CB master chief was awesome. We got there, dude, they had, they had these racks built out for us in this blown out concrete building that had like shelves and stairs to go to the upper. Dude, it was awesome. Yeah. It was, so they take, that's what they had done.

It's taken and just built. the like into these basically small plywood condominiums inside full metal jacket and i so i showed up there one time and you know we're hanging out and you know the platoon commanders give me a little debrief on stuff and just kind of tell me how things are going and then someone says uh hey did you see mikey's video and i go i go no and they go go go see mikey's video and so i'm i go okay so they go his rooms back there and what does his room say on it oh man like mikey's palace or something like that. Yeah, so I would a great story about Mikey's Palace, by the way.

So go ahead. Let's hear about Mikey's palace. So the CVs have built these awesome plywood paradise for us. And so, you know, people will sleep. We would sleep all different times, right? I mean, daytime, nighttime, whatever, because the obstacle was so intense. And so everything was totally blacked out. And I got like an odd sleeping style.

Like I could, well, as a mole rat, we have a slightly different cycle. So Mikey had a different cycle. Like everybody would be asleep and I would be awake. I'd like, I always could find Mikey awake. And Mike, so you go in, you go in, he was on the ground floor. And so you'd go down and it was pitch black and you'd have to feel your way through it, all these bunks. And then you'd go down around this corner, down in this hallway, and you make a sharp right. And then there'd be this faint glow coming from Mikey's palace.

And so Mikey's bunk was the last one up against the wall. And there was like an extra like three feet between his bunk and the wall just the way it worked out. And so he had like these tapestries that his family had sent him hanging from the wall. And he'd have like poncho liners all hung out, blocking the whole thing out. And so it was all dark. It was like his little cave.

And you go back in there and I don't know where he got him. He had like extra pillows on his bunk. And like he had his laptop like rigged. That's like a TV screen. If you always be watching movies. And he always had all kinds of giedunk back there. So I go back in there. And I go in the glow from Mikey's palace.

I go back in there. And then we just sit there and he like, Hey man, you want some of it. You'd have beef jerky. He'd have sodas. He'd have like ramen noodles. And he'd always have like this heating element. Like once you plug into the wall.

He'd like, hey man, he'd hook up the heating element, boiling water right there and some ramen. If ever I was hungry in the middle of the night, I could get down there to Mikey's Palace. I knew I could get some grub. And he'd hang out and watch movies and stuff. And he was always up weird hours like me. And it was just cool, man. He had just, yeah, it was cool. Pictures, posters hanging on the wall.

He had that thing tricked. Out-biled. Yeah. Yeah. So these guys are like, hey, have you seen Mikey's movie? And I go, no. So they go, we'll go back to Mikey's palace and check it out. And so I make my way back there, same thing.

You know, you're making your way back there in the dark at the headlamp on, even though it's noon or something like that outside. But the place is blacked out. Anyways, I get back there. And I'm like, Mikey. And he didn't know I was at, that I was at Corregador, you know? So he was just, you know, kind of like. hop to or whatever in a very

I don't want to make that sound too extreme but he was surprised to see the commander right but anyways I'm like Mikey he's like oh he's like hey you know and he's all chill and I said hey let me see your movie man and he gets a smile in his face and I go okay this this must be interesting so anyways

he breaks out his camera he's showing me the movie on the camera right but it's got volume and I'm sitting there watching it and anyways the movie is it's a big fire fight going on it's just there's just a big bad firefight There's machine gun fire going off. And he's literally sticking his hand up with the camera above the edge of a rooftop.

And he's filming. You can see stuff getting shot and whatever. And then the funny part is he brings the camera down. He's, you know, hiding in this rooftop. And he points the camera at himself. And the area of Ramadi that they were working in was a place called the Malab district. And like many things in the military, it had taken on its own little life, its own little legend, the Malab district. And Mikey points the camera at himself, and he says, it's the mulele-la, baby.

And so it was really funny. And I get done watching this, and of course I'm still, you know, Mr. Big Bad Jocko. And I get done watching it. And I go, hey, Mikey, listen, bro, when you're out there, you shouldn't be filming stuff. You need to be on your gun. I mean, that's just what you need to be doing. You need to get on your gun, and you need to keep shooting. You need to be putting down suppressive fire.

And he looks at me, he's kind of sheepishly, you know, because he felt bad. And he goes, he goes, he goes like, hey, sir, I was out of ammo. And I started laughing because that's probably 800 rounds of 70s. Maybe more. Probably more. Probably 1,200. Yeah. Just a massive amount of machine gun rounds that he had gone through.

And he'd shot them all. That's what Winchester means. Means you'd shot, you had nothing left. And he said, you know, sir, sorry, sir, I was Winchester. I just started laughing. I was like, well, if you're Winchester, make some good movies, then I guess my brother. He got after it.

Yeah. So that's another good Mikey story. So you actually ended up going home early from deployment. Yep. And because you had another kid on the way. Yep. Gunner. He, and the thing is, is it's like, gosh, I mean, hindsight is 20-20, man.

You know, when, man, man, when this. stuff goes like this. We knew that that was going to be the end of the deployment. And so it was like, all right, cool. You know, you just go back with the ad bond for the redeploy. And so that was all part of the plan from day one, basically. All right, cool. Because my first son had been born on my last appointment.

So as it was, and by the way, so start heading back. Wife gives birth early anyway. So there you go. Two deployments, two kids, not there. Common story for a lot of military guys. But for people who are not, you know, I mean, imagine like you're not being there for either of your kids. My wife, she's a trooper, but she was running out of steam. So it was cool to be able to go back and at least try to be there.

But Gunner's always been in a hurry. So he came early. And then, so, yeah, went back. Start handling the redeploy. So by that, he means we're, some guy comes home from deployment a little bit early to start basically preparing for us to come home, getting ready for all the administrative stuff that's going to take place. And Andrew was that guy making that happen. And then there was like three other guys that like a week later came and followed me too.

So it was near the end, but a tough call anyway. And then I remember where I was when I got the award. So, you know, I was back at the team and I was actually chatting with Delta Platoon Commander via a method that we use. And he, so I knew they were going out. And, I mean, I distinctly remember going, all right, man, get some for me, you know. And so I was home.

I got the call at like 1230 at night, our time, local. And so I knew right away that it was one of our guys. They wouldn't, you know, nothing over the, you know, over the phone specifically. But I knew because I had just talked to our guys, you know. And I was like, God, I'm money. So I raced into... So you get the call that just says come to work?

Yep, get to work. And I'm like, all right. So, and admittedly, I'm a little frantic, you know, because these are my brothers, you know, and I'm not there. That's really hard. So, you know, you can have some survivors guilt over that kind of thing, you know. You know, what seems like, hey, look, we got this. Deployment's basically over. and go back thinking you're making a right decision

trying to balance stuff with your family and then for that to happen and you know he's one of my guys he's one of my guys and I wasn't there and that's hard you know it's been almost 10 years now and time helps to heal those kinds of things but I had a lot of guilt over that

and so anyway we kind of figure out what's going on. I get the brief and figure out who it is. So, um, start figuring out, okay, so now it's, now it's a race for those you guys who don't know. I mean, look, here's a thing. We live in a 24-7 news world. Um, and it's a race to notify the family before they find out through some other means. And, uh, he, you know, lives up in Orange County, so we start assembling a team. Um, and, you know, admirals and, uh, Commodores are involved. And, and, uh, And look, this is the second guy. We have not lost SEALs in Iraq to this point.

Mark and Mike now. So, you know, who's going to go up and do the notification? And, I mean, like, I had to, like, dig my heels in. I was like, listen, this is my guy. I'm going. And it was at first, like, and then I was like, no, no, no, no. I'm going. And thank God I did that.

Because, I mean, I wouldn't have it any other way. We're racing. We put the guys together, throw the blues on. and we driving up and um you know look when we when we got to mikey's family's house um you look and all they wanted was to talk to somebody who knew mike and the other four guys that were standing there didn't know didn't serve with them didn't work up with them didn't deploy with them and you know in this grand scheme of god's plan i have to ask you know we pulled over before pulling up the pulling up to the house and put on our blues and i literally thought to myself okay

that we are about to give the worst possible news to a parent about their kid is dead and I remember thinking you know God just use me right now I don't know why I'm here in this timing but just work through me just use me you know so you know we knocked on their door and you know Mrs. Monsour looked out and she later knew you know that we I mean, she took a few minutes to get to the door. She looked out and saw five men standing there in Blues. So that was very hard. You know, you go in and obviously family is upset and you're doing the best you can to keep it together.

I mean, for me, this was my guy. This was my brother. And I'm standing there giving them the news and trying to keep it together myself. And, you know, the good news is that one by one, they sort of looked around and said, well, did anybody know, Mikey? And I was like, yeah, I knew Mikey. He was mine. And so they, you know, politely asked everybody to leave, but wanted me to stay and just talk about the deployment, tell stories about Mikey, what he was like, what was going on. And, you know, I want to, the Monsors are an unbelievable family.

And I totally want to respect their privacy, their private family. And they're just, they just been so amazingly. humble and gracious through this whole thing and I just don't want to sit here and tell stories about about this right I don't want to do it um one of the things that are the only the only thing i'll i'll say about this again out of disrespect for the monsoor family um is when you just said about about you telling them what deployment was like well in talking to them, one of the things that they said was their impression of the deployment.

So, so like I said, and you guys have heard stories about Ramadi, and you can go on YouTube and just put Ramadi 2000s, and you'll see what Ramadi was like. That's what Ramadi was like. And it was incredibly violent and crazy. And these guys,

Charlie and Delton, were in the thick of, of it, in the thick of it, on a almost daily basis. And the reason I'm building that up is because the emails that Mikey had sent home to his family were, oh yeah, having fun, not much going on here. Don't worry about me. We're just training some Iraqis. Don't worry about me.

We're just trying to work on the infrastructure. Don't worry about me. It's all good here. I'll be home in a little bit. Those are the kind of emails that he was. sending home in order to make sure that his family wasn't worried about him right and it shows you what kind of a guy that mike he was um so so any is there anything else again without without going into your personal you know your personal interactions with this incredible family that you want

to say and maybe from the perspective of as much as i hate you know you know you're not you To say this, there's going to be other people that are going to do this job, being this person that does the notification. Is there anything else that you could give advice to people that have to do this job? Or, you know, if that ever befalls people that are, we get a lot, Andrew, we get a lot of big, a lot of military guys that reach out to me all the time that are active duty, that are doing work. And anything that strikes you as something that you learned from this experience. Here's what I learned is the worst thing I've ever done in my life. And the worst thing. And combat itself was a piece of cake compared to this.

I would love to go back to combat. Any issues or concerns or anything from my military service was completely centered around this. It was an extremely heavy burden to bear. So if you were ever in this position, I don't have any good advice for you. There's nothing you can do to prepare yourself for this type of situation. The only thing I could tell you is reach out to guys who've done it before. I will gladly talk you through it because one of the best selves that I've found for this kind of pain is hanging out with your brothers and spending time with them. I will always have time for someone who's had to be a Kiko.

Always. Call me. Let's go out. Let's hang out. I won't suggest drinking a beer, but if a beer is what you want to do, we'll do it. But the bottom line is that just the intimacy of being around, another guy who's been there, is very comforting. And so, you know, when you go through a stressful situation like this, do not isolate yourself.

There are other guys who have been through this, and a true brother will be willing to take the time for you. I'll find the time for you, no matter what, no matter how busy I am. And so I just want to be a resource now. I know that there's only so many hours in the day, but if you're going through something, if you've gone through something like this, reach out to your brothers. Find a connection to another military guy because nobody can understand it, like a number. another military guy. And that's part of the stress of it. Part of the stress of it is that you don't feel like you can possibly explain what you're dealing with to anybody else. There's no way they

could possibly understand and comprehend it. But another guy who's been to combat can, and we can sit in the room next to each other, even if we sat there and said nothing, we would get each other. And so you've got to reach out to each other. Do not isolate. That's great advice. And actually, one thing that's very interesting to me is that I get emails from guys and they're basically doing that they're going to do that right now with us there's some of those guys out there that are that are going okay yeah and and the message is yeah I mean the military guys had been through this kind of stuff before again I was never caco I never even came home from my guys you know there was another kind of another kind

of misery I guess to just know you're just sending people home It's awful. But yeah, don't isolate yourself. Talk to your brothers. Find them. And tell them what you're thinking about. Yeah. And this is awesome, right?

Because Twitter and Facebook and messages like this, we can kind of reconnect, you know. We can kind of talk about doing some cool stuff together, whether it's jujitsu or running a badass race or doing something to challenge you physically or mentally. We all can kind of give ourselves an electronic high-fi. you know through something badass you're still doing today and you know what here's the other thing too transition man man so so so so so we so that happens I'm home and in February 2007 I get off active

duty and so for those of you that don't track in the calendar here Mikey died September 29th 2006 that whole thing unfolds we got home I got home I was the last with the last group to leave and we left Ramadi October 21st. Took us a couple days to get home, but now we're home. We get post-deployment leave. We reassemble, well, you do post-deployment kind of debrief types up, then we get post-deployment leave. So now you're talking, it's December, all of a sudden December, you know, October, it's November,

it's now it's Thanksgiving. Now it's a sudden it's December, boom. And so not much time has gone by. It's been packed. And February, you're getting out of them. I'm gone. And that war machine keeps cranking by. the way so the guys are back there ready to do another platoon they're doing pre-deployment work

whatever dude whatever it just it keeps on cranking and and then poof i'm out of the navy and uh i jump right into the mortgage business because you know nothing like a natural transition from the seal teams and the battlefield of romadi to doing 30-year fixed mortgages and it's and it's 2007 though yeah so you actually weren't doing fixed mortgages for 30 years the mortgage industry for those of you that don't know, the mortgage industry in 2007 was a place where a lot of people were making a ton

of money and it was about to all come to a scree-by-scrut job. I was not making a ton of money. I was just like to add. I was brand new, right? So I leave this steady two-week paycheck, brotherhood and a job I'd wanted to do my entire adult life at that point

and had it just come up a great deployment and get into the mortgage. Now, I did that because I need to be home. And by the way, as much as a struggle was to get out, and I really, my heart was truly torn in two opposite directions. Man, I look back in the last nine, ten years that I've had, the opportunity to raise and shape my two young boys,

to be the young men that they're becoming, have been absolutely priceless. But, you know, so I find myself February sitting in the quiet office of a mortgage office at like 6.30 in the morning because that's just how I roll. I got a key. I'm going to get in there early. I'm going to figure it out.

And, you know, first guy's not showing up, it's like nine, you know, I'm in the reading guideline books trying to just, you know, I have no paycheck, I have no income. And so, man, it got rough. I started to struggle. I'm struggling financially, for one thing. I'm struggling emotionally. I'm struggling in building new relationships and, you know, kind of like a little bit of a chip on the shoulder and a sort of a little bit of an attitude from combat to trying to build relationships in the civilian world. And that was tough. But, I mean, there were mornings I sat there quietly.

And by the way, that picture that you talked about at the beginning of this deal, I have that hanging on my wall. I look at it every single day. And one of the things that continued to drive me, and for military guys who were listening, as corny as this may sound, the legacy of my brothers is what drives me. The opportunity to help my fellow veterans drives me. Because, you know, doing mortgages, yeah, not super exciting, right?

but I sat there quietly trying to figure it out. I got divorced. I lost a house to foreclosure. I showed another house. There's a time when I looked over, my young son, Gunner, is sleeping on the floor. I got no furniture in the house. A house that's days from, it's already been foreclosed, and it's days away from the sheriff coming to, say, get out. And that drives me.

And I think about Mikey and the sacrifice that Mikey and Mark made, and it drives me. because they made a sacrifice. And in some ways, this is bad talk right here. In some ways, I beat myself up that I wasn't on the roof that day with Mikey because that was my platoon. And I came home early for my son. And then I think, well, if I had it on that roof, maybe it could have been me.

And then there wouldn't be a father there to raise Gunner and to raise Tristan into the next generation of warriors. And either way, the sacrifice that Mikey made, He made that so that I could live. And I have an obligation to use every ounce of my ability, to use my mind and my body and my drive and my determination, to fight and kick and scratch every single day, to honor his legacy,

to build and to mentor young men, to help my fellow veterans, and to make this country a greater country. And all of those things, the more I do, the more I feel like I can honor Mikey and his legacy. And to do anything else would be to slight the great sacrifice that he made. And so, think of your brothers, if you're in the military, and you're out now, and you're trying to figure out what.

Think of your brothers, honor them. Andrew, you and I were having dinner. Actually, we were having dinner at the christening of the USS Michael Monsor. Awesome ship. And you were going into that situation, and you just kind of rattled it off just now, like it wasn't no big thing. Right.

Your kid is sleeping on the floor because you have no bed, no furniture. By the way, that paycheck you've been accustomed to getting for whatever five years in the Navy is gone. Right. When you get out of the military after five years, you don't get anything. You get nothing. So you have no paycheck coming in. There's no salary in the mortgage industry. Right.

So it's all 100% commission. Your son is sleeping on the floor because you have no furniture. Right. You foreclosed on one. house, you short sold another house, and you're about to get evicted. That's your life at this point. Not to mention, in the back of your mind or in the front of your mind, you got this thought that Mikey died and you weren't there.

Did you look at all that and shrug your shoulders? grit your teeth and say I'm gonna kick this thing's ass where did you start at the very bottom I'd like to think I bounced because I hit so hard never give up the legacy of my teammates I mean here's the deal I think about guys that are committing suicide today or thinking about committing suicide and think about this do you want to give that nasty enemy, even one more victory. Fuck them. I am going to win because I am not going to let them defeat me.

And I look at my boys, I prayed a lot. For me, it's my faith. And Jesus Christ saved me. So I keep fighting. And you know what? That's just never going to quit. Never. you are not done until you're six feet under.

You ain't done. I would tell you, if I ever found myself in combat where I was shot and dying, and often my own in Afghanistan or something like that, for example, I would take the last grenade I had, pull the pin and lay it underneath myself, so that when the enemy came to try and get my gear, they blow themselves up.

Because I am not done until I am gone. And even then, if you've laid the right foundation, the legacy you leave, the messages, and what you've done to help the next generation, that's it. I'm just never going to quit. Never. You can knock me down and I will get back up.

You can knock me down and I will get back up. I will get back up. I will get back up. And obviously, well, for those of you don't know, because you don't know, Andrew, he did get back up. He absolutely got back up. He now runs a very successful business

and is out kicking ass on a daily basis and taking names. and it's been you know a lot of this you know again whenever I look at myself and I went on this big little or I went on this big kind of tirade about how you need to mentor your people and all that and take care of your brothers well guess what you know where I was when Andrew was going through this shit I was working I was working he didn't call me he didn't and I didn't make myself available You know, so you, you know, taking care of your friends goes beyond just when they ask for help. You need to seek them out and make sure that they're doing all right.

Because I let him go, and that was that. He got out of the Navy, and it was bye-bye. And keep in mind, I wasn't going to come and ask you because maybe I was a little embarrassed, you know, about how dire my situation was. So if you're a leader, just know, just like kids who are going through buds, they're going to hide their injuries, right? because, you know, I don't want to come to the guy who I respect and say, hey, I am flat out right now, bro. You know, so I'm just going to keep digging. And I know we've talked about it. You're like, man, why didn't you come to me?

I don't, you know what? It wasn't in my nature to do so. Maybe that wasn't the best decision. Maybe I should have reached out. But either way, I wasn't going to quit. Well, that's awesome. And it's awesome to see what you've done and see where you're at now. Like I said, kicking ass and taking names and raising two.

badass young men. They're good boys, man. The next generation of warriors. That's one of the things I've become passionate about. I'll tell you, you know, when you get out and you transition, it's hard because you leave this brotherhood, you leave this common goal. And, you know, you're fighting for freedom. You're fighting for liberty.

And you're fighting for your brother and your sister. You're right and left. And then you get into some job where you're sitting at a desk, type it on a computer, which is boring. So you have to, look, here's a deal. You have to find a purpose behind what you're doing. And mortgages, like seriously, jumping out of planes, blowing things up, shooting guns, diving rebreathers, a haul all high ends up to doing 30-year-fixed mortgages?

I mean, wha-waw. I mean, how do you get excited about that? Look, you don't. You don't get excited about doing that, right? I'm going to be honestly, what you get excited about is something else behind it. And for me, it's helping my fellow veterans. So those you don't know, 90% of my business, I do VA loans. Okay, so why?

Because I want to help my fellow veterans. nobody will take care of a veteran better than I will. And that's my mantra, right? If a guy goes down the street, you will not be taken care of better than if he comes to me because I am deeply passionate about helping my fellow veterans. And that's how I get passionate about the job that I do now. I find a purpose behind what I'm doing.

And so you might be in some job now that you're out. And you might be go, God, this sucks, you know. But find a reason behind it could be a small thing, right? Like there were jobs in the military that sucked. There's parts of every job that sucks. You just got to deal with it. That's life. And find a purpose behind what you're doing.

And then I will just tell you, this is like one of these secrets of life that I have found. Life is easier when you find a way to help somebody else. When you find a way to help somebody else, miraculously, your problems begin to go away. So, focus on somebody else's problems and how you can help them. And all of a sudden you forget about yours. and so find a way to help other veterans. I see guys, I see veterans today who have been blown up and lost limbs and have been in similar difficult situations.

And they are doing fantastic because they've started organizations or leading organizations or are deeply involved in organizations that are helping fellow veterans. And there it is. It's like this miracle. You sit out to help somebody else and all of a sudden, your problems just seem to melt away. So if you're struggling right now, you can reach out to me,

Facebook, Twitter, whatever. Just share your story, connect, and then find a way to help someone else. And do it in a way that you're passionate about, man. I mean, I'm passionate about raising my two boys into the next generation of warriors. I'm passionate about, I mean, first,

look around at the spineless cowards that society is raising today. Who is raising the next generation of warriors to keep America the greatest country on the planet? this generation that says that everybody gets a trophy, that you get a freaking graduation certificate when you graduate from first grade. That's bullshit, all right?

So you get a piece of coal and a kick in the ass. That's right. You get something when you earn something. And so raising my boys into hard young men to become gentlemen, strong warriors, men of character who will have a spine and stand for something. That's what we need to do. And those you guys who have been to combat and serving our military, you know how to do that.

If you don't have kids, find a way to get involved in local high school, maybe a local middle school, and be a role model and set an example for some young boys to be the next generation of badass American warriors who will stand for and protect this country and protect liberty. That's something to get pretty excited about. I get passionate about that. Yeah, that's something that everybody needs to get passionate about. And like you said, especially the veterans that no one understand that, and they know one understand and appreciate what real freedom is.

That's right. Well, I think that's all we've got for tonight. Did you have any closing comments? I think you just about summed up. Well, first and foremost, Andrew, thanks for your service. Thank you for answering the nation. call and I appreciate what you did for me and what you did for the teams. Thanks for coming on the podcast and sharing your lessons learned not only about combat,

but about what comes after combat. And for those of you out there listen to the podcast and you want to keep listening to the podcast, you want to support the podcast, my brother Echo Charles going to tell you how to do that. Before I tell you, I actually have a question. Yeah, yeah. This is way lighthearted question compared to, you know. Let's go. So when you go into the mortgage industry.

Yeah. And, you know, there's other people in the office as well. Like, what did they think about? Did they know, you know, your past? They find out, you know, but it's hard too, right? Because in the SEAL teams, we have a quiet professionalism. And so one of the things that I've struggled with is, you know, look, I'm certainly proud of my service, but I don't want to use my service in my background in the SEAL teams as a way to advertise.

and there are, I mean, there are douchebags in the mortgage business who prey on military, dude. And they've got some great fancy marketing, but their heart's not in the right place. So relationships, little by little, it sneaks out, and it's fine if other people know. But no, I don't walk in there and tell people that, hey, I'm a Navy SEAL. I mean, it's not real style. Tony was just on and I don't know why we've never talked about this before. I've never talked about this before. But like, anyone that actually calls themselves a Navy SEAL is like suspect.

Right. You go, hey, how's it going? I'm a Navy SEAL or I wasn't a VAL. It's just so, like, you can tell me that you're going, wait a second, what's this guy's deal? Right, right. Just no. Right. No.

Exactly. But like you, like, okay, Jock walks in. We meet Jock, for example. And he's, you know, whatever, he's Jock. We're going to be kind of like, hey, are you a Navy SEAL kind of thing? But you, you're kind of like, an everyday guy kind of thing. So you're like, kind of like the guy in the movie who they show him working. or whatever, and it flashes back to his past,

and he's kind of this superhero, you know? You're like one of those kind guys. Do they, like, do you think that they looked at you like that? Like, oh, yeah, you're just, you know, our guy, co-worker kind of thing. And then maybe one guy heard a rumor, hey, this guy is, you know, this, this hardened warrior in there. The other guy's like, no, no, no, he's no way, look at that guy. You know what I mean?

Yeah, and that's how I'd prefer it. I mean, I'd rather be. Oh, them not knowing. Yeah, I'd rather be in the shadow. I mean, because look, here's a deal. None of us do this for accolade. of us do this for the look at me. And the guys who advertise, like Jack was saying, they're suspect because they probably

didn't really do it, you know. But I'd say probably one of the best compliments I probably ever got was I heard about a conversation that happened when I wasn't there. And this guy was like, hey, yeah, did you know that guy's a Navy SEAL? And the other person said, no, no way, that guy's, he's so nice. You know? Yeah, yeah, good to go. That's what I mean.

Yeah, I'd rather be stealth like that. You know what makes it even more interesting is, again, we'll look. use jaco as an example if jaco kind of walks in a room and guys you know let's say a troublemaker guy they're going to look at and be like i don't know if i want to start anything with this guy big he may or may not have been a you know a team guy but then you you don't have that to look at you right what you're but not only and you know jiu jitza though to me that makes it even more is yeah but that's all you you need really so it makes it that much more interesting to me you know and it's great right because, you know what, a lot of times,

but I would say more often than not if we were out as a platoon, guys would actually want to start a fight with a guy that looks like Jocko because they're looking to like test themselves. Whereas like guys, I mean, that would be a massive miscalculation. Like really end of life event,

extinction might have event kind of decision. To be, not to counter, I know exactly what you're saying, but like the facts are, people don't mess with me when I'm out in public. Yeah. They just don't. But I know exactly what you're talking about.

It's always some big guy, the tall guy, get somebody coming up to him. And actually, you know, you and I talk about this, too. For those of you're on the podcast, you can't, that are listening, Andrew doesn't look like stereotypical seal. He's 155 pounds. He's, how tall are you? 5-7. 5-7.

Susan, look, he's not your stereotypical seal-looking guy. Now, again. That the public would think. That the public would think. Because I was going to say, there's no stereotype. and some of the most badass guys are, they're every size. But this is something that Andrew said to me one time, which was, you know, he's, you know, basically people see me and what do they think?

They think, oh, this guy, you know, he's just going to be a knuckle-drager and he thinks everybody needs to be big, giant, you know, head smashers, right? And the fact of the matter is, what I care about is can you do your job? And can you do it well? Are you tough? Are you brave? can you lead? And that's why Andrew,

I, he was like, actually surprised. Like, when he finally told me, you know, he's like, man,

you know, I was kind of thought, you might not like me, you know, because I'm, you know, smaller and, and,

you know, I don't look like a seal. And I was like, bro, it's not about how you look like. It's about how you act. And can you do this job? Are you brave?

Are you going to step up? Can you lead? Great example. Leadership. Right, like that's what you, that was one point is you focused on what was the capability of the person on your team, not what they look like. And some guys can do that, right? They can go, well, you know, this or that. But you were like, hell know, I mean, this guy, he puts out, he can get the job done, he's leading.

So. Oh, you're kind of like is Dalton. Oh, I remember. Yeah. When they were like, hey, I thought you'd be bigger. He's this badass bouncer with this. Right, right. Is that a bad comparison?

Will that give me killed that comparison? Well, he does actually. you know, look a lot like Patrick Swayze. Thank you. I appreciate that. Every hands. Yeah, I'd rather remain stealth, you know, and use that to my advantage, you know, and kind of remain thought as the underdog, you know.

You won't see me coming. Remember we were hanging out at your house, Jocco, and Tristan said, he goes, hey, who would win in a fight you or Jock? And I was like, thanks, buddy, right in front of Jock. And I was like, I'm going to smash you later. and I go, well, I'm not stupid enough to start a fight with Jocko. Oh, wait until he's asleep. Awesome.

I'm glad we're on the same team, brother. But yes, if you do want to support this podcast, there are some ways. If you don't know already, we didn't talk about supplementation or many things that would require supplementation. But if you're into it, Onit has the best ones. Common knowledge, I know. 10% off. Onet.com slash jaco, 10% off. If you need info on any of these supplements,

like the literature behind it, all that stuff, it's on there. Extensively, if you want. 10% off. Support yourself, your wallet as well. Also, when you do Amazon shopping, we have a click-through link on our websites, which supports the podcast,

and, you know, when you shop. And, of course, subscribe to the podcast. podcast on iTunes and YouTube. Leave a review. Leave a review. Yeah. Leave a review.

Let me know what's up. Yeah. Let us know what's up. Yeah. Yeah. Those reviews are helpful, man. Because, yeah, like, if they're like, hey, Joccoe, stop saying like, like, like, like all the time.

No, I don't say like all right. That's why. That's why. You know what I mean? So, yeah, there you go. But, you know, prefer, yeah. So, yeah, leave a review, man. If you're in the mood.

And then, of course. Jocko store you can buy some shirts some mugs some rash guards some stickers we have women's coming out in three days it'll be out by the time this is out it's out

women's is out yeah yeah I gotta say I like the krill oil I use the krill yeah and I'm on yep and I'm on the I like the the um the much what's that the shroom tech

that is good getting you through the workout you got the jub tech on huh I like it did I just Was I was I bullshit? You're good to go. I like it. The Shroom tech is legit. Yep.

As is the crow oil. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The cruel oil. I was telling him last time where I started the creel oil. And because I was looking where when I work out, I have, you know, sore joints. But I do have sore joints when I wake up.

I just never thought about that when people say sore joints and stuff. You know, you just sore my ankle, all this. And my daughter would jump on my back to wake me up. Now I got to walk downstairs with this girl on my back. Take cruel oil, maybe three, four days. later, no problem. I can get up, I'm walking down the stairs, easy. Like, noticeably, you know.

Nice. So yeah, krill oil. Jump on it. Also, on Amazon, got that, get some of that jocco white tea right here. Tasting good, you can step up your game with the antioxidants and a microdose of caffeine. Get you rocking and rolling. And while you're out there, just go ahead and grab yourself a,

go ahead and grab yourself a copy of extraxiety. Ownership, the book that me and my brother, Laif Babin, wrote. And if you already have a copy, that's cool. Just go ahead and get one for your boss, man. Get one for your team. Your mom, your dad, whoever. Hardcover digital. Or if you want to hear Laif and I talking for eight straight hours,

get the audiobook, because that's what it is. And also, if you want even more, come out to the Extreme Ownership Mustar October 20th and 21st in San Diego, California Leadership Conference will be breaking down. the fundamental principles of combat leadership. And teaching and talking about how to employ them on the battlefield in business and in life. So register. And we'll see you there.

Andrew Paul is going to be there, by the way. Dang. I'll be there. Echo Charles is going to be there, by the way. We're going to be getting after it, so come on out. And as always, if you want to keep kicking it with Echo Charles and with me, we're all up. in the inner webs, Twitter,

Instagram, and even that Facebookie, we're there? Echo is at Echo Charles. I am at Jocka Willink. And if you want to get Andrew Paul, go. The Andrew M. Paul.

The Andrew M. Paul. Is that on Twitter? On Twitter. The Andrew M. Paul. So if you want to get the Andrew M. Paul, and you can hit him up. Facebook? I'm on Facebook, Andrew Paul,

veteran advocate. Well, there you go. Boom, boom. Awesome. And once again, Andrew, thank you for coming on. Thank you, brother. It means a lot to me to have you on here, and I really appreciate you coming on. And now to everybody listening, uniform, people in business suits, people in coveralls, everyone.

We talked today about Mikey Mansour. and I want to leave you with this Mikey Monster was named after St. Michael St. Michael is the warrior archangel that led heaven's army against Satan. St. Michael was known as the principle of the angelic warriors

and was seen as a protector against the darkness and in the Christian religion specifically in the Anglican and the Catholic and the Lutheran churches, September 29th. September 29th is known as Michael Mass, St. Michael's Day. And that day, September 29th, 2006 was the day that our St. Michael, Monsor, the city of Ramadi, sacrificing his life to save the lives of three of his brothers and I would ask you this when September 29th comes around remember that while you honor the hero and you

honor the warrior that Michael Monsor was please also remember that Mikey was a person smiling kid is a jokester he was a determined man a brother a son an uncle a friend and Michael Monsor was a young man with hopes and plans and aspirations and dreams dreams for his future and dreams for his life and in that moment of truth he gave them all all those hopes and all those dreams he gave them all this is echo and jaco and my brother andrew paul