Jocko Podcast - 485: We Are ALL Susceptible to Arrogance, Vice, and Villainy. The Hunn-Beating Proverb.

Episode Date: April 9, 2025

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This is Jocko Podcast number 485 with Carrie Hilton and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Carrie. Good evening. So I stumbled across a document, we'll say. We could call it a book. And this document is called the Hun Beating Proverb book, which the title, out of the gate, caught my attention. It's published in 1918 by the Continental Publishing Company up in Canada. I believe it was in Toronto was where this company was and it was published in 1918 like I said and it was obviously

geared toward warriors in this case the Canadian soldiers who were fighting against the Germans in World War I And the the primary reason that the Germans were called huns have you heard the Germans called hans before? Yes Okay, so it's the the actual hans themselves were an ancient nomadic people that lived in Central Asia, the Caucasus and Eastern Europe in the fourth and fifth centuries. And there's probably one Hun that you've, there's probably only one Hun that you've heard of, and that's Attila the Hun.

But they're not that associated, like, okay, Eastern Europe and Central Asia and the Caucasus, that's not Germany. So why are we calling their Germans Huns? Well, it's because there was a speech that was given 27 July, 1900 in Bremerhaven by Wilhelm the second and this was as the Germans were German soldiers were going and being sent off to China to put down the boxer rebellion this is what he said he said if you come before the enemy he will be defeated no quarter will be given prisoners will not be taken

whoever falls into your hands is forfeited just as a thousand years ago the Huns under their king Attila made a name for themselves one that even today makes them seem mighty in history and legend so may the name germany be affirmed by you in such a way in china that no chinese will ever again dare to look cross-eyed at a german end quote so it's a pretty freaking aggressive talk about some rules of engagement getting wild no quarter no prisoners so that's what he's saying they're gonna they're gonna create a reputation like the huns had well the Brits heard this now you fast forward to World War I the Brits and eventually the Canadians and eventually the Americans They took that speech and they and they took that name and they ran with it and started calling the Germans Huns as an insult

To them and their behavior and so so interesting the subtitle to this little book is Containing many Proverbs that point to the destruction of arrogance tyranny, villainy, vice, and the monstrous militarism of which Germany has been guilty. And there's actually, I'm not going to, we're not going to go through all the proverbs that are in this book, but there are, there was one, there was only one where I thought to myself, well, that's some straight, just anti-German propaganda going here. But I'll, I'll point it out. But that being said, let's face it, when you talk about arrogance and villainy and vice, these are things that we can all be susceptible to that type of behavior, becoming a little bit arrogant,

becoming falling to our vices. And so I think there's some pretty good wisdom in this book for all of us. So let's get into it. Let's get into the Hun beating proverb book. And by the way, there's, the book has no, you know, normally nowadays,

if someone's going to put out a book of wisdom, you know, or proverbs or whatever, they have a preamble and they'll kind of explain, you know, what they're thinking and where, how it can't, and there's none of that. It just goes right into it. And that's exactly what.

So it starts off. A brave man is often a desperado. That's the first one we're going with here. And to me, immediately I thought of, this is the person that you're walking down the street, someone that has nothing to lose and wants to start a fight with you. That's not going to be a good move.

So don't do that. Next one. A crooked. The crooked stick will have a crooked shadow. Something to keep in mind. Who are you interacting with? I mean, obviously they're not referring to sticks here. They're talking about people.

So the crooked stick is going to have a crooked shadow. It's going to be hard for that to change. Next one. A curse sticks to no one but the cursor. Man, you gotta keep that in check. That's like similar to the ones you hear if you're filled with hate. hatred for someone, it hurts you more than it hurts them. And that's why forgiveness is so important.

Forgiveness is a big, you know, I got some things I'm, I'm kind of teeing up right now. I might go through it in the muster. But the idea of forgiveness, not only, not only forgiveness of, hey, I made a mistake and I take an ownership of that mistake. Well, if you take ownership of a mistake, that was bad and it caused significant issues and you don't, you aren't able to forgive yourself. for making that mistake, it's gonna be problematic. Same thing with if you have someone that works for you

or with you and they make a mistake and they take ownership or whatever, you take ownership, whatever the case maybe, but you can't forgive them for what happened. It's, you're not gonna get through it. Same thing with relationships. Like if your kids do something that you didn't want them to do or they shouldn't have done

and you can't truly forgive them, it's not gonna work. if you're married and your wife or husband does something that you can't truly forgive them for. Now listen, are there some offenses that are unforgivable? I would say, yeah, there are. And if that happens, I wouldn't prolong what I believe to be the inevitable, right? But if you can forgive them and it takes work, you know, because you got to put your ego in check. Because normally you can forgive someone but your ego won't.

You know and then you hold that grudge against them forever and everything's a problem. You know, it's funny. I got some Some things that happened with my wife that I just big age big age big age. Big age like so she threw away she threw away I had this I had this pillow this was back and this is like 25 years ago I had a pillow that was like really old because you know when you're a young dude in the navy you're not spending money on anything so I had this pillow that was so old. I had this pillow that was so old. I had this pillow that was so old. old that it had become flattened. It was sort of, it was probably like four inches thick, right? But I, but I would, I would like take it when I was sleeping. I'm like, between my legs, like, so my legs aren't like on each other sweating. I put it there, whatever. It just was like a little, like, let's face it.

It was a little bit of a lucky pillow. Well, I came home one day. That thing was gone. I probably had that pillow for 10 years, something like that. Kind of like this old futon. you know back in the day you weren't getting a bed there wasn't no mattress uh firm or a place that was going to deliver me just going to get get a futon from a you know yard sale somewhere uh so i had this pillow she threw it away and i still bring it up yeah we we laugh about it i had a couple

tank tops you know from and they were old they were like from bars overseas kind of stained with guineas and whatever, just gnarly old, but had a lot of good memories in them. And one day I came home, those were gone. So now what do I have to do? Can I hold that grudge for what's it been now, 28 years? Sure, I can hold it. And we have fun with it.

But imagine if you couldn't, like, truly forgive, if there's some offense, look, I can forgive my wife that she threw away some of my prized possessions, which probably had a total accumulated value of, like, 20 bucks. but if you can't overcome that, if something happens to unforgivable, it's going to be problematic. And things are going to come up, man. They're going to come up.

And so that's with relationships that you have. But then also with yourself, like, if you're going to make mistakes in life. You're going to do things that you shouldn't have done. And when that happens, you take ownership of, of course. But just like I talk about when, if someone close to you dies, like remember, don't dwell. You have to do the same thing with mistakes that you made. Remember, don't dwell. Yep.

I made that mistake. It was bad. Here are the consequences. I'm not going to let it happen again, but I'm not going to dwell in the past. And woe is me and I wish it's never would have happened, et cetera. Is that what forgiving yourself looks like to you? It's like just not dwelling. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's understanding.

Just like when your kid does something stupid or your employee does something stupid or your boss does something stupid, people are going to make mistakes, man. We're human. We're human. And by the way, it is extremely difficult to operate with people without forgiveness, right? Because no one, no one goes through life without making mistakes. Your boss is going to make mistakes. If you can't forgive him and be like, oh, you know what, he had the best intent in mind. I get it. Or maybe, hey, he had a bad intent in mind and he got busted and now we all see it and he's asking for forgiveness or apologizing or owning it. And okay, cool. And that might take a little longer than an honest mistake.

Like when someone has bad intent, much more difficult to forgive them. Right. When someone is intentionally doing something that is wrong, it's not happening. Like it's going to be very difficult, much more difficult to forgive. But when someone makes a mistake, someone makes a mistake, you, you, you, you, you, have to be able to say okay I get it and and not only that expectations like if I put such high expectations on other people and they're not meeting them or even whatever expectations I put on them you can't expect people to always be perfect and basically a lot of times like you like you

can't expect an a plus from people a lot of times you got you got to expect kind of like a C Well, maybe like a B minus. You know what I mean? And if you don't, if you, if everyone that gets a B minus, you, you, you can't work with and you can't deal with, it's going to be really difficult for you to go through life. It just is. It's going to be very difficult for you to be part of a team. It's going to be very difficult for you to understand that people have shortfalls.

Like it's people have shortfalls. You watch Piki Binders, right? Oh, yeah. So one of the interesting things about Piki Blinders is like, like you got the different characters in there and you got Tommy and Tommy's you know pretty much making good calls and he's like getting a right for his making calls but bro he's got like his brothers on heroin his other brothers just like shooting people or getting in fights and and his like those other members of the family are doing things that are wrong and they're mistakes now we could argue

whether their intent is good or bad but for the most part they're just making mistakes They're just making bad moves, bad calls, emotional calls. And Tommy's just kind of having to be like, all right, you know, he's filled with forgiveness. Like he truly, like, he's forgiving his brothers on a daily basis for their shortfalls. It feels like there's a level of all the things you're saying, right, piquie blinders included. There's like a level of understanding, I guess, where. Totally. Totally.

It's like, yeah, that's, that's, you know, that's, that's, that's, that's, what's his name? I can't remember the character's name right now. Arthur? Yeah, that's Arthur. You know what I mean? Like, okay, you've got to go bail him out of jail again. And listen, at a certain point, let's not get into the, let's not go down the road of enablement.

But, man, Arthur's kind of who Arthur is. You know, he is who he is. And at a certain point, you're like, eh, that's who he is. And what we have to do is set up an apparatus. That is enablement, right? If we are, and he tries to pull him out of it. And if you have. someone that's got some self-destructive behavior like that obviously you got to draw the line

but and and part of forgiveness there i think is letting go so if you want to go carry you want to go down a self-destructive path i'm going to do what i can to help you oh you start drinking you start doing meth you start doing drugs you start gant whatever that whatever the vice grabs hold of you i'm going to do everything i can like carry bro what are you doing like let's stop this let's go let's get you rehab, I'm gonna do all those things. And at a certain point, my forgiveness of you is gonna be not just to kind of let it go. Hey man, I did what I can do. You can't save everybody, by the way.

And when the demon of vice, whether it's alcohol, whether it's gambling, whether it's drugs, whether it's, whatever vice someone grabs a hold of, that's a demon, man. In their heads, it's a demon. And it's you can't be overcome sometimes. So being able to say, yeah, the demon, the demon won. Like if you got in a grappling match with Gordon Ryan and you lost, I wouldn't be mad at you. I would think, hey, man, I wish you would have trained more. But, you know, you lost to Gordon Ryan.

If you lost the battle to alcohol, I'd be disappointed. I'd be bummed out. But I would, I would have to at some point go. That's the way, you know, he lost that battle. And I don't. I don't even know if this is right or wrong. At a certain point, that demon is stronger than you are. And I can't actually, I can't get in the ring with you, right?

Just like I can't, if you're grappling against Gordon Ryan, I can't get in the ring with you. I can't. I can't get on the mat with you. If you're grappling with alcoholism or you're grappling with drug addiction or you're grappling with gambling or whatever that vice is, I can stand on the side and come I can't I can stand on the side coach you just like I can coach you against Gordon Ryan But you got to do the work and you got to make it happen and if you lose Either one of those matches

I I at a at a certain part of my Mentality my brain and my heart I have to go You got beat by the demon and I forgive him. I mean I'm not going to give him money. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna I'm not gonna I can't afford to Invest anything else with him, but I don't hold against against him I hope everything works out. And, and, you know, it's the same thing. And we're talking about vices, but the same thing with, you know,

when someone's got, when someone's got a big ego. It's like, yeah, you lost that battle, man. It's a bummer. It's sad to see. I actually don't even hold it against you. Like, if you get out of control with your ego and arrogance and you mess up your life,

which happens more often than people think, even then I'm like yeah he lost that battle you know he lost that battle against that demon I hope he can reverse it get a sweep maybe get on top maybe score some points but I'm not even mad at that so which is a very critical jump in thought process because if you think about if you got your personality right and let's say you have a little bit of arrogance and so you do some you do some things and you do some dumb things you whatever little move you make and you take care of yourself and you don't think anyone can see like you're doing these little things I get it man if you're up against a tough demon man that the ego is a tough demon and it's strong and I hope over time we can get you to change I hope you can see that you know you don't need to be that way and maybe you even ruin our relationship

maybe you do things and you you screw me over and I'm like okay I guess you know Kerry can't really be around anymore but even then I'll be like If a year later you come back and you're like, hey dude, I was really messed up. I shouldn't have done that. And I'd be like, cool. Sounds like you got to sweep on the demon. And now you're on top and we can be good again. So I think that forgiveness is just such a key component of going through life.

Of going through life. If you can't have forgiveness for yourself, if you can't have forgiveness for others, you can have that curse from the, this quote right here, that curse that you're trying to put on other people, it's going to come back and get you. Check. Next one. A clean glove often hides a dirty hand.

You know, pretty straightforward. A deceitful peace is worse than an open war. Okay, it's definitely a good one to pay attention to. That's right up there with hold your friends close and your enemies closer, right? So having a having a relationship that's based on lies, that's based on deceit, but we're still putting up a front that everything's cool, that according to this proverb is worse than just like, let's fight. That's one thing that was nice about being in a platoon was generally speaking, it's too close contact that you can have this sort of deceitful piece. it's going to come out. Like there's too much, there's too many friction points for a, for a friction point that's

getting heated up to not set a fire. What's it like in the Marine Corps? Same thing. Yeah, very similar. We used PT as an outlet for this all the time. You know, we, we work out 05 PT, you know, every day. And we framed it as training, right, McMap. So Marine Corps martial arts program, you know, we do a little.

We framed it as train. Yeah, so we go back behind the shop. We sit, you know, do a little bullpen circle, put the two people beefing in the center and back to back and you say go and you got to start from back to back and you make it happen from there. Let's get it. You know, and we exercise those demons, bro. Yeah.

Get it out of the system. Yeah. And that's better than having, you know, deceitful peace. Oh, yeah. Now does this mean you go open war on everybody? No, that's not what we're saying. And by the way, so many of these little moments of like always tell people the truth. You know, I know there's been people say you never lie about anything.

Jordan Peterson was like hard on this. And people would ask me about this kind of thing. And I was like, yeah, but start with yourself. Start with yourself. If you're going to tell the truth to, you know, if I want to tell you the truth about something, I need to start by telling myself the truth. So if you're doing something that I don't like, the truth is there's something wrong with me.

The truth is I'm letting something bother me. The truth is I haven't given you the guidance. Truth is I haven't explained things to you properly. So start with yourself. Start, if you want to start an open war, start that open war with yourself. That's where it begins. Next one.

A few vices darken many virtues. This is in the military. They have a saying, I believe it's one awshit can cancel out 100 attaboys. Do you make one mistake? It's like it's all thrown out. And here you got someone that's got a really good, lots of good things going on, lots of good virtues,

but they got that vice or a couple little vices and that darkens everything. So be careful. Next one, after one vice, a greater follows. That's like the gateway vice, right? The gateway drug, slippery slope. The slippery slope. Who was it? I'm trying to think of, I think it might have been Chad Robes Show was on the show,

and he was talking about getting people that were like drug dealers and how it, if you find a person, like they were looking for human traffickers and how do you find a human trafficker? Well, you just start with someone that's selling drugs because if they're selling, drugs, then they're smuggling drugs. If they're smuggling more drugs, if they're smuggling more drugs, if they're smuggling more drugs, then they're smuggling people and they're selling people and they just don't care. So, and it's not, it's not 10 out of 10, but it's like eight out of 10 or seven out of 10. If you're willing to get on that slippery slope, eight out of 10, you're going all the way down. So be careful with that little action that you take. That little action that you take that might

not seem that bad. And I tell you what, especially these days, I've done, you know, I work with law enforcement a decent amount and you start looking at the numbers of fentanyl overdoses. Again, I'm just taking like a tangential turn here, but whereas when you were a kid, Carrie, you could go out and try some ecstasy or whatever and whatever, like all good. You know you're at work on Monday morning or you're back at school Monday morning. These days, you go out and try some ecstasy, which is supposed to be a little fun night drug. And next thing, you know, you're, you're ODing from fentanyl. So that's an involuntary, uh, escalation of vices that you're going to get. So kids out there, don't do it. Don't do it. You said something the other day,

you were like, we were talking about stuff that was going on and you were like, I don't accept that. And that was such a powerful thing. You know, it was just something when I heard it, I was like, Damn, like I need to, I need to start saying that to myself about some things, you know, where it's like, no, you know, there, I don't accept that. There's no next step down the slippery slope. No. Just negative. Keep moving. You know, actually, I need to keep this. I was thinking about, occasionally I'll get asked, you know, what views of you, what views have you, what views have changed for you? And I'm normally like, well, not really many. I don't really know any because guess what, what view, what, how do your view change on leadership? Well, it's a cover, move, simple, prioritize and actually decentralized command. Take it on. but things like that really hasn't changed. But one thing that if you listen to the past 10 years of the podcast, in the beginning of the podcast, when people would ask about alcohol, I'd be like, well, you know, there's a bonding and it's okay. And it's like, you do some stuff and blah, blah, blah.

And I was somewhat forgiving, going back to the forgiveness thing, somewhat forgiving of alcohol. And now I just have no forgiveness. I have nothing good to say about it. And I believe it is just 100% bad, 100% bad. If you listen to early podcasts, I probably sounded like alcohol was 50% bad or 60% bad. But now I think it's 100% bad.

There's nothing good is going to come from it. That's one vice that's going to lead to others. You're not getting rolled up at 2 o'clock in the morning for a fight. Sober. It's not happening. It's not happening. So let's keep that in mind. Next one, a fool's tongue is long enough to cut his own throat.

So, yeah, let them run their mouths. That's another thing. I get asked of, you know, how do I get people to listen to me? But also, you know, I got this person that loves to talk so much. Well, let him talk. Let him talk. Keep going. And eventually, they'll be quiet.

A grinning face often hides a foul heart. Good little heads up there. A headstrong man and a fool may wear the same cap. By the way, there's some older language in this, and you're going to find there's a lot of the word fool. So keep that one in mind. You're just going to be hearing a lot of fool. But isn't it interesting? A headstrong man and a fool may wear the same cap.

What are we talking about here? We're talking about being so stuck in your ways and so set on your own idea that you're acting like a fool. Well, I'm determined. No, you're, you're, I'm just a stubborn. I just have a, I just have a strong personality. That's a great one, right? I was one of these people got a strong personality. Oh, so you're an idiot.

So you're a fool. If it's really, you know, this goes, uh, the, the explanation effort meter. If how hard is it for me to explain my idea at a certain. point if it's so hard to explain to you, Carrie, why we should do things a certain way, or why should we go to this place, or why we should do this thing, if it's that hard for me to explain, maybe I should check myself. Maybe I'm just being stubborn. Maybe I should not be a fool. All players cannot win. All players cannot win. And I think it's the most important thing to think about here is how often are you the player that's not going to win? If you're me,

It's quite a bit. I wasn't winning much, you know? It's, if we think we're going to win every single time, we're going to have problems. All players cannot win, and sometimes you're going to get bested by someone else. And that's frustrating. I was talking to a kid the other day about winning and losing. And it was actually a female. And I said, well, do you like winning more or do you hate losing?

And immediate response. I hate losing. Immediate response, which is a drive. You know, some people are driven by that. You know, Michael Jordan,

you hear these stories, and if you watch the last day, you watch the last day, that's right. Yeah, like someone beats him in some freaking card game and he would let it fester inside of him. But,

and that's cool, if you're going to use that to drive, but, you know, every game in life is not just a game. There's real things in life. where you sometimes are going to lose. All players cannot win.

And I think it's important to recognize that. Recognize that all players cannot win. Look, try hard to win. It's kind of like the winning at all costs statement that I did a few years ago. And boy, we suckered in a lot of people with that one. And Echo made it into a whole video, and he set it up real nice.

It was me saying, you know, we have to win at all costs. And that was the big hook, as you guys in the media world say, right? Me saying, you got to win at all costs. And people are like, yeah, that's right. But then you go into the video and into the statement that I was making was what that means is win at all costs, what that means you have to compromise. You have to make exceptions.

You have to take a different path than you originally thought you were going to take. You have to open your mind. You have to change your own perception of the world sometimes. Those are the actual costs. Those are the costs. Yeah. Yeah. The cost means, oh, yeah, I'm actually going to not get credit for this thing.

Oh, that's winning at all costs? Yes, it is. That's all cost. The cost is I get no credit for the victory. How's that for a great cost? Some people can't handle that. Heavy cost. Some people can't handle that cost.

They'd rather lose. Their ego would rather lose than not get credit for the victory. It's freaking ridiculous. So important thing to keep it. in mind all players cannot win and you might be that player that's not going to win this time here's one for you ambition breaks the ties of blood okay you see what i'm saying here ambition breaks the ties of blood our ego our ambition we can get so wrapped up in trying to win that will will we'll will We'll screw over our family for that.

That's wild. That's wild. It happens. Very disturbing that it happens. But it happens that people become so possessed with that idea that they can screw over their friends and family. Why is that important to remember? Well, number one, you need to check yourself because you need to make sure you're not doing that. And number two, recognize that other people might do that because it seems so foreign, right?

You got your bro and you think there's no way they would do something against me. And yet they can. So use caution, ambition can break the ties of blood. Anger manages everything badly. Hmm. We know that one all too true. Anger manages everything badly 100%. Don't we don't make good decisions when we're pissed.

An envious man is a squint-eyed fool. Isn't that interesting? When you're envious and you're looking at someone that's with a squinty eyes, see what someone else has that you want? You're a fool. You're full. Don't let that happen. An occasion lost.

cannot be redeemed a real basic form of this one i don't know if you've ever heard me say this before but uh if you miss a workout you can never get it back is that why you were smiling immediately like if you miss a workout you can never get it back this goes back uh my very first seal platoon my my my lPO my leading petty officer he would say always go out and the way he meant it was always go out to the bar straight up this was back in the day bro like there was people there was some there were some alcohol being drank back then unfortunately

myself included but you always go out like we'd fly somewhere and you'd get a layover somewhere and you know you think oh go hit the gym nope well go go out always go out well I in my mind as a young kid I turned that into always go out like Always go. Always go do the thing. And that became a pretty solid mantra.

Always go out. Because listen, you don't always need to go out. And you got a chance to go do some training. Obviously an operation. That's a no-brainer. Like, if there's an operation going, we're going. Like, I'm on that thing.

I'm not going to be like, well, I'm not sure. I like that. No, we're going. That's what we're doing. because on occasion loss cannot be redeemed. You can't get it back. You can't get it back. What's that tendency we have?

Like what is that tendency where it's like, oh, I can make it up tomorrow or whatever? I would say laziness and or fear. So laziness is like, well, you know, I can do it tomorrow. Fear is like, I don't know if I should do this today. Let's say it's one of those two things. And going back to the movie, Soldier, which I know, which I know. You appreciate

Who's that guy that stars in that? Kurt Russell. Kurt Russell. What a underrated movie. And to be quite honest with you, that movie didn't come out until later in my life, but that's kind of the way I envisioned myself as a child, right? And in that movie,

the woman, he's a soldier of the future who just has one job, and that's a fight wars. and the he gets abandoned on this on this other planet where there's sort of people living there and he develops a relationship with his family and the woman one time asks him you know it do you feel anything and he says yes she's like what do what do you feel he says fear and discipline the reason i say that is because there's two things that can make you not go fear and laziness what overcomes both of those things discipline all day long. So whether it's lazy, it's overcome by discipline, or it's fear overcome by discipline. Now, hopefully you feel more fear than laziness, but either one of them got the same answer.

On the backside, discipline all day. Next one. Arrogance is the obstruction of wisdom. Yeah, check. If you already think you know everything, you don't need to hear, you don't need any information from anybody else. And so you're not going to get any smarter.

And boy, isn't it crazy that you can be 30, 40, 50 years old and still be in that zone? Look, I get it. You're 18, you're 15. Brah, you think you know everything. Cool. I get it. But by the time you're 30 or 32, you might want to open up your mind a little bit and put your ego and check or you're not going to learn anything.

Next, base gains are the same as losses. What does that mean? Well, there's the whole, there's the whole term base. Are you familiar with that term? No. So base in the way language, the old, the old version of this word was like kind of bad. Evil, base. It's when you read Shakespeare, it's like base thoughts will bring you.

So it's negative and borderline evil. It's not quite evil. And I would say it's sort of base would almost relate to our animalism. nature. I should have looked that one up. But if you use your sort of animalistic or brushing up against evil nature to achieve something, it's the same as a loss.

Check. So when you cheat and you win, it's the same as a loss. So be, and that's the same with anything in life, right? We're stealing something. It's not really a gain. It's a loss. You're cheating. It's not a gain.

It's a loss. Next one bad eyes never see any good. Hmm. What kind of lens something I've been talking about a decent amount lately? What is kind of lens are you looking at the world through? The thing that's interesting about this is people, we don't even understand that we have a lens on. We don't even understand the biases that we see the world through. And so if you are looking at the world through a negative lens, it's kind of funny right now.

There's a lot of political things going on. And it's very interesting to watch people that would be cheering for one thing six months ago are now cheering for the opposite thing. And people that were cheering for the opposite are now cheering for something different. Anything that Trump does is bad, anything that, you know, boom, like that's it. Doesn't matter what he's doing. It's bad. So that's the way you see it.

That's the way you see it. or anything that Trump does is good and it doesn't matter what he's doing if he's doing something, it's good. And that's the way you see it. So just be careful. No one's perfect. They're going to make some mistakes.

Elon Musk, everything he's doing is greater. Everything he's doing is bad. No, it's actually he's a human, apparently. Allegedly. He's a human. And so is he going to make some mistakes? Yeah, of course he is. Is he going to do everything perfect?

Of course he's not. But depending on the eyes that you're viewing the world through can really screw your vision up really bad So be careful that big heads have big aches Big heads have big aches a couple different ways to take that one I mean I guess you could go with the ego thing right? You know if you got a big head you got big aches the other way to take that is The more aware you are of what's happening in the world the more pain you're gonna feel that's another reality cats hide their claws check they're all soft and they purr and they snuggle up to you and then they scratch your eyes out covetness covetousness brings nothing home going back to the jealousy

thing you're going to see some themes here that's one of the themes being jealous of people coveting what they have. It's not going to bring anything home. Go get to work. Dude, you like the car that that person has and it makes you mad? It makes you jealous. Go get to work and you can buy the car. It's my recommendation. The jealousy and the envy isn't going to bring anything home. It's not going to get you a new car. Cowards die many times before their deaths. Reality. Corruption of the best becomes the worst. Corruption of the best becomes the worst. So when the good people, People get corrupted, man. You gotta watch out.

It's gonna get ugly. Cowards like adders, coil and hiss. Oh yeah, the loud mouth. Out at the bar, right? That loud mouth, he's scared. It's a good lesson to teach kids is that the person that is talking a bunch and being a bully, generally,

it's because they're a coward. So keep that in mind. Crimes generally punish themselves. There's an underlying theme in this of fate. Like, if you're doing bad things, you're gonna get hung up eventually. I like that. I believe that to be true as well. That's why I say if you do the right things,

for the right reasons, you're gonna win in the end. Well, if you're doing the wrong things for the wrong reasons, you're gonna lose in the end. Totally believe that. I've seen it over and over again. Now, can the loss come at a heightened state? Like after you've achieved a lot? Yeah, I can.

By the way, you can achieve a lot. and still have a miserable life because everything you've created is a lie you can do that that won't be good plus this one takes time and nobody wants the way you know yeah i didn't really get this until i was a little older you know you have to be able to example well you just you just have to see some of this stuff play out right oh yeah and it may take years where this dude screws you over you know and it's it's It's high road or low road. And you choose the high road because, hey, what's the low road going to get you? Other than that little immediate thing, right?

And then, but over the, if you believe that and you take that high road and you wait year, two years, it happens. Every time it happens. Yeah. That's true. That's the truth. You see that with careerists in the military, like someone that's just trying to get the next rank and they're doing the thing and they're kissing up and they're trying to grab the credit. They get promoted, bro, for sure. But man, they develop that reputation eventually.

That reputation catches up with them. So crimes generally punish themselves. Debt is the prolific mother of folly and crime. You do not need. You do not need the 2025 brand new Cadillac escalade. You don't need it, dude. You are much better off by. buying 19 or no let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go 2017 Dodge Grand Caravan

you're better off than you are going into debt to get that Cadillac that's the move and when people go into debt they start to freaking panic and that's when that's when folly meaning dumb decisions or even crime bro there was a a seal that got rolled up for smuggling weapons and i i forget the details of the case but he smuggled a bunch of weapons out of iraq or afghanistan and sold them in america and he netted like i don't know what it was like 30 or 40 grand and got rolled up and got and went to prison for 15 years or something like that for 30 or 40 grand it's just like when people start getting behind man they do dumb shit shit. So do your best not to get yourself in a position where the world has leverage on you.

You don't want to be in that situation. You ever go buy a car that you really wanted? Have you ever done that before? Yes. You are at such a disadvantage when it comes to negotiation. You need to be able to walk in to buy the car that you don't even really want this car. In fact, party should be like, I shouldn't even buy this car. I don't even want this car. And go and negotiate then. you're going to do much better job with negotiation. But when you're not, when you really want that thing, you get jacked. Well, when you get in debt, now all of a sudden you really need to get out of debt

and you start doing dumb things, start making emotional decisions. Next, deceit and treachery make no man rich. Now, you could argue that one a little bit, right? First of all, we have to look at what do we mean by rich? As our brother Bob Marley said, did you ever seen that clip before? It's classic, right?

What you mean wealthy? He's like, are you a wealthy man? What do you mean wealthy? You mean money? Maybe not. You mean friends. You mean joy, yeah, very wealthy. So with that definition, I think we're all day.

Now, do you see some people get rich while they're doing deceitful things? Yes, we do. Yes, we do. Story never ends there, though. But the story doesn't end. Punishment takes some time. It'll get there. Bottom line, deceit and treachery are not

going to work out well in the long run. Make a little short-term, but you might get some money in the wallet. Where are you going to be in the long run, though? Deadly poisons are often concealed under the sweetest honey. Debt is the worst kind of poverty. Again, it's one thing to be broke, but it's another thing to owe. Another thing to owe. So be careful.

1997 Dodge Grand Caravan, man, all day. I'll always be thankful to that 1997 Dodge Grand Caravan. because I drove it for 13 years. And I owned that thing. And boy, what a great piece of leverage that is on the world. Just be like, oh, yeah, it doesn't matter. I'm all good over here. I don't care who sees me driving this thing.

I'm, you know, I was definitely one of the top, probably the top five tough guys in the world driving a minivan. Actually. But debt is the worst kind of poverty. Now, do you have to buy a house? Yep. Do you have to get a 30-year mortgage? Yep.

Do you want to, is that acceptable? Yeah, especially if you get a good rate right now. The rates aren't great. But you get that nice three or four percent rate, maybe even a 2.25. You probably won't see those again. But is it okay to go into debt? You're going to buy a house. You're going to live in that house for a long time.

Yes. It's understandable. That's not the kind of debt we're talking about. The kind of debt we're talking about is a, is a 2025 Cadillac escalade that you cannot afford. So be careful. Envy is the rottenness of the bones. So good.

Envy shoots and others. Envy shoots at others and wounds itself. Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. So basically, those last two, being jealous and being envious are not going to be healthy for you. It's, and the more jealous,

you are the more it's gonna it's more it's gonna wreck you i've seen it wreck people before i've seen that just eat people up man so be very cautious you kind of sometimes you might have to impose it on yourself a little bit because it's very natural for your ego to be jealous and envious and sometimes you're gonna be like you lock it up man that person achieved something i'll hear i'll hear somebody make a quip about someone being uh successful and I'll say good for him, man. That's awesome. Don't you think that's kind of awesome?

You know, I got to put myself in check sometimes. Like, why does that person get? Oh, yeah, it's because they worked hard. They just got lucky. Oh, did they just get lucky? They just happen to wake up and build this little empire that they got or put that product together or get that thing out there or whatever. You just happen to do that.

That was just luck. No, dude. You don't know what they did. It's sticky too. but like people it leads to this obsessive thing that's when it gets real nasty right like when what you mean when envy turns into this obsessive oh can't take your eyes off it constant you know constant hateing yeah that's where it gets yeah dark you know yeah there's nothing better that to rep represent that than the story i tell about set where set i bought this new house and it was like a it was a

of run down crappy house, but it was in a prime location. If you surf, we surf. And I had a couple people that I know, friends will say, that had seen the house I was going to get and come by the house as we were,

you know, like setting it up. We hadn't closed on it yet. And we're kind of like, oh, you know, they pointed out a bunch of problems with it. Of course,

all kinds of problems, you know, ah, And I hadn't told Seth, I told him I was getting a new house, but I hadn't told him where it was because I didn't want to jinx it. So finally I get the keys to the house. And I go, hey, bro. And this was in the early days of texting, right?

Not that early, but this is 2012. I sent him a text like, hey, bro, I got the keys, meet me at the new house. He's like, send a location. I sent him the address. And he was like, yo. And he showed up and walked in and was like, bro, we're set. bro we are set and he was totally stoked totally stoked no envy no jealousy just freaking stoked for his bro that got a kick-ass location that's our location that's our location but that's where

he was at man he's like and i'm not kidding an hour later he showed up the house with surfboards for storage on the location so that's what we're doing don't let the envy don't let the jealousy rot your bones next one eternal vigilance is the price of liberty and by the way look we can say that about our country right but let's not forget about ourselves that's another way of saying discipline equals freedom right that's another way of saying it you want to keep that freedom man you got to stay vigilant you got not let things the thing that like about the term vigilance is that you got to stay vigilant so you don't get surprised look you get catastrophically hit with something that we know that what happens is

those little things, those little creepers that start taking away your freedom a little bit at a time, one donut at a time. It's going away. Got to be careful. Evil doing costs more than doing well. Yeah, those little shortcuts you think you can take that are going to save you some time, save you some money, they ain't. Evil often triumphs but never conquers. Again, this is like a short term win. something that's that's not a hundred percent short-term win long-term loser evil minds change good to their own nature and there's another theme in here uh from these things and what i like this is like goes back to the lens thing like if i'm if i'm evil and you're doing something i'm looking for why the evil reason that you're doing it.

So I look around the world and I change things to fit my own narrative because I'm a bad person and that happens too often. Evil conduct is the root of misery. Sure. You're doing bad things. It's going to be, it's going to catch up with you. External sheep, internal wolf. As you can see, it's one of the few that I highlighted, right?

external sheep internal wolf this is another tangential connection to this is discipline and and no compromise and no mercy all those things which i say a lot i i only say them about myself right i'm not going to compromise with myself. I'm going to impose discipline on myself and the way you carry yourself. Externally, like a sheep, internally like a wolf. Now, in this day and age, there's a lot of people that carry themselves like wolves. Right? There's like a lot of people that, that, what did Craig Jones?

Craig Jones had a great little clip that I saw, of course, but it was talking about videos. I was talking about videos of apex predator animals and Navy SEALs and ice baths. And basically it was a bunch of people externally acting as the wolf. And he was making fun of that. Rightfully so. So what this is saying is, you know, Be cool. Be quiet and carry a big stick, right?

Externally sheep, internally wolf. You ever approach someone or been confronted by someone and you said to yourself, oh, this person's, this person looked like a sheep and I can see now that they're actually a wolf. That happens. In Jiu-Jitsu, when you tie up with someone, you immediately know what is happening. Even if the person is, you know, like Jeff Glover, 150 pounds, when you tie up with him, if you didn't know anything about this dude, but you knew Jiu-Jitsu, you would tie up with him and you'd go,

oh, there's something going on here. External sheep, internal wolf. That's how it is. That's how it should be. Same thing when you get some of this big jack dude, just freaking walking around like the alpha. And you tie up with him, you're like, dude, ain't happening. Ain't happening.

Now it's hard to do that on the regular in jiu-jitsu, like, because you can be a big, tough alpha acting dude and you can't get away with that for more than a couple days on the mats before you go, I thought I was alpha, I'm not. Externally, sheep, internally wolf. Next one, falsehood is cowardice,

truth is courage. Tell the truth about what's going on. False in one thing, false in everything. A little, that's very similar to that. Have you ever heard the expression the way you do anything

is the way you do everything? Very similar, right? Very similar. And that's a good thing to keep in mind for the little things that you have to do on a daily basis. Just the little things. And it's a good thing to keep in mind

when you're dealing with someone else and you start to see things that are not in line with what we're doing. Because if they're false in one thing, it's a reasonable assumption to make that they could be false in other things. Maybe not everything, but at least other things. Some of these,

some of these proverbs are extreme, meaning everything or nothing. And I'm not an everything or nothing kind of guy. So even this one, false in one thing, false in everything, I'd be more like false in one thing could be strong possibility, false in some other things. So definitely true.

Maybe it's not to the extreme that you're false in everything. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Yeah, I'm no doubt about that. Fortune makes a fool of him whom she favors too much. Fortune makes a fool of him whom she favors too much. So you get lucky once and you start. start counting on that luck you got to be careful you got lucky once bro don't think you're going to get lucky every time it ain't happening my uncle was a car salesman and he had a small car lot where he

sold used cars he's retired now but he had his own little car lot you know probably had 10 to 15 vehicles for sale at any time and he had some buddies that he was friends with and that kind of hung around the car lot with him. And one of his friends won the lottery back in the 80s. And won, I don't know what the number is. But the way they do the lottery, if you win the lottery, they take that whole bunch of money. And maybe sometimes I think you can choose a lump sum

or you can choose to get paid out over time. I think the lump sum is a little less. Anyways, this individual chose to take the payment over time. And it was something like 20 years, maybe even 30 years. but it was 30 years and it calculated out to like, I don't know, 30 grand, 40 grand a year. So he'd won millions of dollars. And he had won it in his early 20s. And dude, don't quote me on the details of this, but I'm giving you the overall concept of the story.

The dude had won millions of dollars, paid out over time. It ended up being 30, 40 grand a year. And so he didn't really ever have to work. And he just lived off this money. And what he did was he hung out with my uncle a lot on the car lot and hung around. And, you know, whatever. And so my dad was down there and went to the car lot and was, you know, saying hi and whatever. And the guy was there.

And he was like, well, you know, This is my last year of getting the money. And next year, I won't be getting my checks. I won't get my check for winning the lottery. And my dad said, well, what are you going to do when the check stops coming in? And the guy says, I'm going to win again. So just be careful, right? You get lucky once.

You may or may not get lucky again. And if you think you're going to get lucky and you count on luck. We can't count on luck. Fortune makes a fool of. of him whom she favors too much. Next one, force can never destroy right. Check. Now, what you got to be careful of is force can impose itself

for a prolonged period of time. And that can be problematic. If you look at some of these countries that have been ruled by tyrannical leaders, those tyrannical leaders aren't right, but they can stay in power for a long time. North Korea is an example. So it's not right, but there's being imposed.

Can't destroy it. But dude, you can, you can suffer for a long time. From fame to infamy is a beaten road. Yeah. Yeah, from fame to infamy is a beaten road. Meaning there's plenty of ways to, there's plenty of ways downhill. And it's a lot easier to go downhill than it is to keep going uphill. So use caution.

Gambling is an express train to ruin. Okay. Fair enough. Careful. Gambling. Do you ever gamble? No. You used to roll,

didn't you used to roll to Vegas a decent amount? Yeah, but it was work. I was going to trade shows. You never got out there on the blackjack table, just got it on? Occasionally, but very rarely,

I don't like the idea of the chips being pulled away. I don't like that. I don't like losing money. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It bothers me. And gambling is just, it goes too quick. I've never been a fan. Yeah, I've gambled plenty, but never had the pull, you know, never had the big pull for it.

You know what's weird is you ever heard somebody say I have an addictive personality? Mm-hmm. And I think I said that for a while, probably when I was like 30, 25 to 30. Like, I have an addictive personality. It's almost like a little humble brag. Isn't it? Do you think it's a humble brag? I have an addictive personality.

You've never heard that little humble brag? It feels more like it has a negative connotation to me. Oh, okay. Personally, you know, but that's probably because I'm kind of one of those people. You legit have an addictive personality. Yeah, I guess you and I see it differently because I always would hear people be like, oh, you know, I've got an addictive personality. It was almost like a humble brag.

And I think I used to do that. I used to do like the humble brag. I got an addictive personality. I could just get so into stuff. But I realized probably 10 years ago, I actually don't have an addictive personality, I don't think. I don't get addicted to things. Gambling's one of those things where I could do it,

have fun, go to Vegas, go to Tahoe. South Lake Tahoe, by the way. Good times. Go to South Lake and gamble the whole time for 72 straight hours, by the way, because we're not sleeping when we're in South Lake as a young single CLA, it happened. So gamble the whole time and just,

leave one money lost money doesn't really matter and still be like whether i ever gambled again or not didn't really care so and and drinking was like that for me as well was like oh we're going to party this whole weekend and and then on tuesday at work i'd be like you know some guys who need another drink and be like oh i'm fine so i didn't really have that addictive personality now you're a little bit different a little bit different well more more Practically, though, I think is, is, it's just easy for me to, like, come upon something and, like, incorporate it into the thing, right? Just into what we're doing. And, well, you just made that sound so innocent, like, just incorporating the thing into what we're

doing. Yeah, you're like, yo, I can see how you rationalize that. Well, that's, that's like nowadays, even still, like, practically, right? So I used to, used to drink. It was a problem. Don't drink anymore. I haven't drank for a long time, right? But how many years you? not drink for it'll be 15 this month and that was cold turkey scenario that was cold turkey scenario and how was that caveat though i was physically separated from any opportunity to drink alcohol for a period of time jack in which but after that i kept it going and how was the withdrawals pretty pretty bad you know for that that first period of time first couple weeks because i was a everyday drinker you know it was just an everyday thing

and I was hung over. Did you think in the state of drinking every day, did you think you had a problem? Oh, you just like, this is just how I roll. I don't have a problem. Look at that loser over there.

100%. Can't even handle their booze. I'm over here, GTG. Just lies. Well, I thought I drank as much as any other kid in my age because I quit drinking when I was 23.

So when I was 21, 22 years old, and I'm getting after it every night. I thought, so is everybody else. You know, I'm a 22-year-old. kid drinking. We all do this, you know. So I didn't think of it as a problem. Was it creating

problems? Freaking catastrophic issues in my life? Yeah. But at the same time, you know, it's real easy to be like, just bad luck, you know, whatever. You try not to make the connections in your mind between all the dots, you know. Mental jiu-jitsu. Straight up, straight up. Just rationalization, justification, all that stuff, especially in my brain, pretty strong. Now, when you, do you feel like you get addicted to other little things? Like sometimes people go from being an alcoholic, they become like a marathon runner. They become a workout fiend. They become a video game.

Did you, did you have another outlet or did you find another outlet? Yeah, 100%. What was the next outlet? So I definitely like threw myself into, I started getting addicted to like the endeavors, like the things I was doing. Right. So I started doing school, then working a job, then working a weekend job. You know, for eight, ten years, I had three jobs, essentially. Was that a conscious, like, I'm just going to make myself busy,

or was that just your brain going, I need to do this is what, this is what I'm doing, this is what feels good? A bit of both, but honestly, I felt like I needed to make up for lost time. Like, I felt like I was way behind the back. And I needed to do more to get back to where I needed to be. but also being just being engaged in those things was helpful helpful for me, especially like early on after not drinking. Instead of, you know, being at the bar and partying, I was working the door.

You know, I was security or whatever. So you were still around booze even after you quit? Yeah, it was tough in the beginning. But after that, there was this point where I kind of started defining myself as a person who didn't drink. It became something I was very proud of. And it was like, you know, what, I don't, I don't do that. So it's almost like I started looking at alcohol as a commodity. It wasn't even alcohol anymore. It was a thing that I was around that you paid for, you know, and it wasn't like something I was thinking about or interested in like, you know, partaking in.

Yeah, that that attitude of it being weak because when I was a young kid and I was like straight edge and we were getting after it, it was it was kind of empowering, right? To be like, dude, you're weak and you don't have control and it was it made me feel good, right? And then unfortunately when I got in the SEAL teams, I was like, oh, that's okay, that's what we're doing and I got on board with that, which is again, it's unfortunate. It's me being a young, weak-minded myself. Because when I was a young 15-year-old and I was a hardcore kid and Straight Edge was the thing that we were doing and people that weren't doing it were weak and lame and stupid. And then I got in the SEAL teams and it was like, okay.

And now I'm a little bit older and it's like, okay, well, you know, this is what the frogmen are doing. And unfortunately it was like, okay, this is what we're doing. And bad move. but the idea which I'm back to now, which is like, oh yeah, as I said earlier, it's like 100% bad. Alcohol is 100% bad.

Drugs are 100% bad. Now look, maybe the psychedelic stuff, which I've never tried, I've never done any drugs before. But so I, like I said earlier, I can't sit here and say like all bad. Look, I know the psychedelic things. I've helped some of my friends out a lot.

So the retreat. read the whatever the voyage that they go on and all that stuff. But for a normal human that is going to day to day life and is using drugs in their day to life, like you go and do some ayahuasca voyage to heal up your brain. Okay. I'm not, I'm not pro work on that. I just know the fact that it's helped some friends. I also know it's made some other people messed up.

So I'm not an authority and it don't have enough knowledge to speak about it. What I can tell you is this. If you're doing some kind of drugs, alcohol on a day to day basis, This is not good for you. It ain't good for you. And in this day and age, if you're thinking about doing drugs and you're a 15-year-old kid, you're wrong. And you're doing something stupid.

You're doing something that can get you killed, but never mind get you killed. Like, what do you want to do with your life? These drugs aren't going to help you. They may seem cool at the time. But what you need to do is take the attitude that Kerry just talked about, the attitude that I just talked about, which is like, oh, if you're doing drugs, you're weak. You're dumb. You're putting your life at risk.

You're putting your potential at risk. So don't do it. That's what we're saying. That's what I'm saying. You on board with me? 100% quote for you. All right, that's what we are saying. So keep those things in mind.

You can get derailed, by the way. And here's another thing that's interesting is, I know people I have friends that have drank their whole life. No big deal. No factor. Literally no factor. And I've known people that has wrecked their lives and killed them. So there's two ways.

And you know how you know which one you are? You know how you know? How? You wake up dead one day. or you don't wake up. There's no, you can't like, hey, let's run your DNA and we'll see if you're gonna be an alcoholic or not. It doesn't work that way.

It's like, oh, you just happen to like drinking and you just ruin your life. Or you happen like drinking and you're fine. Why take that chance? I don't think it's worth it. I had a friend that, or my old neighbor, my old neighbor's nephew was a meth head. And he said the first time he tried meth.

That was the only thing he ever wanted. to do for the rest of his life was more meth. That's how powerful it was. And that's the effect that alcohol can have on some people. It's like the same exact effect that crystal meth has, like, oh, this is what I want to do. So don't roll the dice. And by the way, even someone that lives,

even someone that I sit here and says like, oh, no factor. It is a factor. It is a factor. Alcohol is a negative factor regardless of whether you can handle it or not. It's a negative factor. It kills your brain cells. It's poison. You're putting poison in your body. Don't do it. Check. Tangent. Complete.

Next one. God helps the strongest. This is basically a message from God to lift as far as I can do squats and deadlifts. Get one. Get some. God permits the wicked, but not forever. It's another good one. Time. Time is the ultimate kind of a Judicator of justice and God's gonna let people do here wicked things But but but not for the long haul. It'll catch him and that's in the next One here God's mill grind slowly but surely That's so metal that's so metal it God's mills grind slowly but surely So things are gonna take time and by the way that should also be a positive thing because if you're doing good work, you might not get rewarded for it today.

You may not get rewarded for it tomorrow, but you'll get rewarded for it. Joe Moss. Joe Moss, he says this thing, time and pressure. Time and pressure. Every time I say something, he's like, time and pressure.

And it's true. Factual. Keep, keep putting, keep grinding yourself. And God's mill is grinding as well, slowly but surely. You'll get yours. And if you're doing good, you'll get yours. If you're doing bad,

you'll get yours. Hate and mistrust are the children of blindness. Now what I like about that one is, if you feel like you don't trust someone or you feel like you're hating someone, go and talk to them. Like go, open your eyes, basically. It's real easy to sit in a vacuum and hear stories

about someone and hate them, but go and shake hands with them and get to know them. Likely, you'll be able to overcome that. Hatred is the vice of narrow source. Fair enough. Hasty climbers have sudden falls. Yep, no shortcuts. It's,

when you're on that rapid pace of growth, just be careful. The hasty climbers have sudden falls. Hell and destruction are never full. Ouch. Exactly. That's a, that's a,

just a little note, right? Just a little note. hell and destruction are never full there was a t-shirt well actually the boys sent me one but it said um uh make buds hard again teams are full it said on the front make buds hard again it said teams are full in the back you know we got enough well hell and destruction's not full and if you set yourself up right there's plenty of room waiting for you here's a good one he that cover His sins shall not prosper.

You're going to make mistakes. Are you going to do things wrong? Don't cover them up. If you cover them up, you're going to have problems. It's one of the rules in task unit bruiser, no cover-ups. I think Leif and I talked about on the podcast. You can't, if you try and cover things up, it will come out. It's 100% going to come out.

Do the big cover-up. We called the big cover-up. Oh, the big cover-up. Nope, it doesn't work. Can't do it. Makes it worse. Oh, it's definitely going to make it worse. And part of that came from when I was the Admiral's aide that, you know, I got to see all these things that were happening.

And one of the things that happened was there was, I got to get this story right, but there was like an army, an army element down south of Baghdad. They shot and killed a guy and they planted an AK on him. And they got rolled up and the guy with the kid the sergeant went to jail for like 10 years and What I know is if you shoot someone and You report what they were doing and why the individual was shot Then as long as it's within the rules of engagement you're gonna be okay. So what does that mean? You know here's the guy. He was by the side of the road. He was digging a hole like there's reasons why People need to get shot they're putting in IED in the road.

etc and these guys got that these guys got rolled up and I forget how they got busted but there was again I'll cover the story at some point but somehow they got rolled up and busted and the sergeant goes to jail for like 10 years and it was like oh yeah if you do a cover-up you're definitely going to be in a much worse position than if you say hey here's the situation here's what followed here's why the shots were taken and the army when I got to Ramadi the army had a means of describing this, which was good shot, bad result, meaning here's what the shooter saw. Here's why the shooter took the shot.

And it turns out that the shooter was wrong. But the shooter didn't have bad intent. And this is a good shot with a bad result. Like, okay, check. So the other end of the spectrum is we're going to try and cover this thing up. And when you try and cover things up, it just don't work, man. It doesn't work. comes out in the end. He that plants thorns must never expect to gather roses. Oh, that's a good one.

He that plants thorns must never expect to gather roses. Yeah, to me, I think immediately of how you, what you say, right? You're running around talking smack about other people, like keep your mouth shut. He who lives wickedly always lives in fear. Yep, ain't that the truth. He who lives wickedly always lives in fear. Needless to say, the other end of that spectrum, if you're doing good things, you don't have to be afraid. He who seeks trouble never misses it. Ain't that the truth?

You know, I don't know if you saw this clip. Echo and I were talking and I was talking about the bus shit been happening thing by Theo. With Theo Vaughn, when Connor McGregor got in trouble for throwing a hand truck at the bus and and Theo Vaughan did a little rant this is this is the first time I ever saw Theo Vaughan and he was saying that you know everyone's all surprised that that he threw a that he threw the hand truck at the bus and he's like bus shit's happening bus shit's been happening people are surprised now you go down to the greyhound what are you going to see you see people copping pills selling pills adults drinking similac and I just kind of said you know that's

really, really true. People get surprised when bus shit happens, but bus shit's been happening. So guess what? If you're looking for trouble, you're going to find it. You're going out at one o'clock in the morning in the streets and you're surprised when you get into a fight or you're surprised when someone tries to harass you and you end up in a scrap and you end up in jail. You're surprised about that because you're drunk. It's like, no, if you're seeking trouble, you're going to find it. Next. He that boasts of his ancestors. ancestors confesseth that he hath no virtue of his own. Hmm.

Yeah. He that boasteth of his own ancestors confesseth that he has no virtue of his own. Yep. When you call back to your, uh, your, your ancestors about why you're proud, like, hmm, might want to check you, might want to check yourself. he that gets money before he gets wit will be but a short while master of it so if you get money like young maybe you win the lottery at 22 it's going to be a short time that you're going to have that money he that grasps at too much holds nothing fast can't hold on to too much the little

prioritize and execute hint here right we're trying to do too many things at once trying to hold on too many things at the same time, you're not going to hold on any of them. He that is too secure is not safe. Apply this to your kids, right? You can keep your kids 100% safe, but you'll end up with a kid that is not safe. You might say, oh, I don't want my kids to, they might get hurt doing jiu-jitsu. Yeah, they might get hurt doing jih Tijuana. They'll get hurt a lot worse getting beat down in the school system.

So, and it's the same with us, right? There's a, there's just, there's just way too many ways to go through life without any risk whatsoever. And if that's how you go through life, you won't be in a good situation. You won't be in a good situation. He that sings on Friday, weeps on Sunday. Yeah.

Got to put that party animal in check. He that will not be counseled cannot be helped. That's an ego. He jests at scars who never felt a wound. It really is easy to open your mouth. and make pointed comments about someone and a situation that they're going through when you've never gone through it yourself.

It's always better just to keep your mouth shut. It really is. It really is better just to keep your mouth shut. You know, something negative to say to someone, like, why? What are you going to get from it? And what are the chances that when you make a comment to them, you find out the real story, end up being an idiot? Next, he who waits for dead men,

shoes may go long enough barefoot. Bro, you got to make it yourself. You got to do it yourself. You can't be waiting for somebody else. You can't wait for the dead men's shoes. You got to go out and make some shoes yourself. He who fears to suffer suffers from fear. Write that one now.

Yeah, you're going to suffer. You're going to suffer. You're going to work hard. You're going to be on the mat suffering. You're going to be in the gym suffering. You're going to be in the in the classroom suffering But if you don't do that if you don't step out You're gonna be in fear

You're gonna be in fear all the time He who stumbles twice over the stone over one stone deserves to break his shins Yeah Fool me once That's on that's on me Ful me twice that's on you Ful me once that's on you Fool me twice that's on me that's a similar one

He who thinks he knows the most knows the least. Keep your ego on check. He who is so full of himself is quite empty. Bam. Hell is full of the ungrateful. His shield is turned the wrong way. That's the whole proverb.

His shield is turned the wrong way. What does that mean? That means you're looking at all these other things that are attacking you. The problem is you. You are the problem. You're the person. You got to watch out for.

I used to brief the young seal officers that were in the junior officer training course. And one of the things I was I'd put up a, I'd put up a picture of like al-Qaeda, AMZ. I'd put up like all the Hamas, Hezbo, I'd put, I like pictures of all of them. And I'd say, who's your, who's your worst enemy? And everyone would make their guesses. And the next one would just be you. The next slide would be you. You're your worst enemy.

You, if you have, have. Much more potential to hurt yourself than any of those terrorist organizations out there. Guaranteed. Guaranteed. So you might just have your shield turn the wrong way. You might just have your spear pointed at the wrong person. It's going back to that thing I said about telling yourself the truth. Yeah.

Point that spear of truth at yourself. If a fool has success, it ruins him. Check. If fools went not to market, bad wares would not be sold. If one, two, and three, say you are an ass, put on the ears. So we've got a bunch of people saying you're a jackass. You might want to put on the ears of the jackass and actually listen to what they're saying. This goes into the reading the comments type thing.

Because some people are, or like, I don't care what other people think, listening to other people's opinions. I get it. I get it. And the reason I get it is because you're going to have people that are negative. Of course, you're going to have some haters out there. You're going to have people that don't agree with you. And that's fine to an extent. But if you start getting one, two, and three, and five and ten, now you're going, wait a second.

Maybe it's me. This is feedback. Yes, we call this feedback. We call this the feedback loop. It's sort of like when you're a boss and no one that you bring on the team seems to work out well, Hmm. Do you think the problem is all the people you've been hiring for the last five years? Or do you think that you suck as a leader?

Or you don't get promoted once. Okay. What about five times in a row? You might, you just might be the problem. So, listen, do you need to react to every single opinion that you get from other people? No. But do you need to pay attention to it? Yeah.

And there can be a certain point where you say, this might be on me. Next. If thy hand be an alliance mouth, get it out as fast as thou canst. You know what's interesting about that one is it's like situational awareness, right? We get in situational awareness scenarios where we're not paying attention to our freaking hand is in the lion's mouth. And once you recognize that your hand is in the lion's mouth, we can get it out. So financially, right? You start seeing like, oh, I'm having a little trouble right now.

Oh, stop your spending. Or, oh, you know, I'm freaking hung over for the fifth day in a row. Oh, I'm in a bad situation. Get your hand out of the lion's mouth as fast as you canst. Let's wrap. We got a bunch more of these things to cover. Let's wrap this up for today with this one right here. We are bound to forgive an enemy.

We are not bound to trust him. Again, going back to this theme of forgiveness, which we started with a little bit. Yeah, you got to forgive your enemy. But this doesn't mean you need to trust your enemy 100%, right? There's a big difference. And that's up down and across the chain of command. And by the way, this applies to yourself as well. Because just because you forgive yourself, you make a mistake,

just because you forgive yourself doesn't mean you're not vigilant anymore. It doesn't mean you don't trust yourself anymore. And this is one of those things where recognizing, that you're not as aware of yourself as you should be is of utmost importance. And I go back to the situation that happened with me with my friend Gris died. And so 1993 and the assistant platoon commander we had, Alden Lee Gris are just a great dude. And I was very, very good friends with him.

Like, very good friends. Just an awesome guy. charismatic funny quarterback from the naval academy gregarious leader just a great guy and we got along incredibly well had a lot of fun and he was killed he was killed in a he was murdered in a terrible situation right in coronado california awful and so when he died you know i was very uh so obviously i was really broken up and really sad. And as the way I was acting was about me, that I had lost my buddy.

And I was sad and I was gonna miss him. And one of my other very close friends, actually was my actual best friend and roommate at the time who knew me, who had gone through seal training with and done multiple platoons with and he pulled me aside and he was like, hey,

you're not the only person that lost Gris. And he was, I knew exactly what he was saying and he was 100% right. And I realized at that moment, oh, you, you cannot trust yourself 100% that you're doing

the right thing all the time. And so that's an important thing to keep in mind. I talked about, you know, forgiveness and forgiving yourself. We're bound to forgive an enemy. We're not bound to trust him. And I apply that to myself as well. Like I'm, I've made mistakes, obviously made mistakes, forgive myself, but I'm not like, oh, I forgave myself, and now it's okay.

Now it's okay to do this. It's like knowing that you can go to confession on a Wednesday or on a Sunday and being Like, well, you know, I'll just, I can do this sin right now and I'll just confess later. I'll be all good to go. No, it doesn't work like that. So you have to keep in mind. You have to, you can forgive yourself. You can forgive your enemy.

But that doesn't mean you abandoned any, for lack of a better word, any suspicion. Any little bit of paranoia. You need a little bit of paranoia about yourself. I'm paranoid about myself. I'm paranoid about myself. when I was in the SEAL teams, I was very paranoid about recheck my gear,

make sure I have everything, reprogram those radios, make sure they're good to go. Like everything was, there was a little bit of paranoia that was fueled by a lack of trust. And when my buddy told me, hey, you're not the only person that lost Gris,

it, it planted a little seed of mistrust in my soul that I know from that day on, I need to make sure that I see myself properly. And I see myself from other people's perspectives. Because other people's perspectives are going to be different than mine. And if the only person that's I'm seeing,

the only person perspective I'm seeing is mine, guess what that makes me? Self-centered loser. So we're bound to forgive an enemy. We're not bound to trust him. You have to forgive yourself, but that doesn't mean that you stop paying attention and you stop putting yourself in check and you stop assessing to see what you're doing, how you're doing it, and where it's taking you. So with that, we'll save the rest of this for the next podcast. And in the meantime, we can't really, we can't ever stop.

We can't ever trust ourselves 100%. We can't ever stop being a little bit paranoid. Just like we have to continue to push ourselves. We have to continue to stay vigilant in all aspects. That means we're working out. That means we're training. That means we're getting after it. And you know what that means?

That means we need some fuel. And in this case, we're talking about jaco fuel. So check out joccofuel.com. What's going on at jaco fuel right now? Kerry, what do we need? What do we got coming out? Anything special? So when this podcast comes out, we should have two new flavors of hydrate powder out,

which is going to be pretty sick. Island orange and tropical. Tropical punch. I have them both. I mean, it got a little early. And they're good to go. Yeah. Freaking tasty.

Different people like different flavors. And those are really good. They're really good. They're really good. Delicious. Gives you the just tropic vibes all day. For sure. The tropical punch and the orange.

tasty. When's the coffee and donuts coming out? Coffee and donuts is coming out in beginning of May. Okay. So that'll be a coffee and donuts flavor protein powder for the people. Yeah. It's very concerning, right? I know there's a lot of concern, a lot of debate, you know, is it is it the right thing to do for Jocka to come out with the donut flavored freaking protein drink? The answer is yes, right? The answer is yes. We ultimately, got to the point because listen, I put myself into a box, I painted myself into a corner where I can never actually have a donut again for the rest of my life. No way. With as much shit I've talked about donuts, with as much negativity that I've thrown donuts ways, there's no way I can never

have a donut again. I can't put one in my mouth. It would, it would be wrong, morally wrong. but coffee and donut flavor look am I anti-dunut flavor no bro let's face it I'm not anti-dunuch let's face it I'm pro donut flavor but it's not something that we took lightly so ultimately we got to the point where donut and coffee which is a tasty flavor we went with it so that's coming we got some we get some coffee and donut flavored milk protein powder going your way. Got a little 95 milligrams of caffeine in that one too. Oh,

did you put the caffeine in it? Yep. That's the coffee part. Oh, really? Yes, sir. Are you sure about that? Positive. Oh, 100%.

100%. Okay. Right on. That's cool. I know that when we made the sweet cream coffee RTD, we once again, we were like, well, do we put caffeine in it or not? Ultimately, the answer was yes. People are drinking coffee for a reason, especially people love that morning.

Little protein, 30 grams of protein plus the caffeine. on the sweet cream coffee. That's breakfast deluxe. Right there. Easy. Yeah, easy. So we got that coming. Joccofuel.com.

You can check that out. You guys know what we got. We got hydrate. We got protein. We got energy. God, this energy drink is good. So good and good for you.

Have you moved off the 50-50 tactical tea or are you still going hard? I'm pretty consistent on the 50-50 tactical tea, the iced tea lemonade. The iced tea lemonade. The iced tea lemonade is definitely my go-to flavor. As you can see, I'm kind of doubling up right now because I got the pink lemonade right here as well. Do you have two open flavors.

I got too, because I was kind of going back and forth. But, yeah, definitely the iced tea lemonade is my go-to, but all the flavors taste good. Now, now look, back in the day, when the only person that was judging the flavors was me, it's a lesson learned, right? Your own perspective, right? There's only one perspective we were looking at. Mine. And if you had the early version of the go energy drink,

chances are you didn't like it. Now, you might have liked the way it made you feel. You might have liked the health benefits to it. You might have liked the fact that it wasn't going to turn you into a diabetic, but you probably didn't like the taste. That's because it was based on me. So we opened up our perspectives. We got a lot,

now we have like the full tasting profiles and everything like that. But you'll find one. You'll like them all. You'll probably love three of them. I'm fully on the blue razz train. Oh, you're on the blue razz train right now? Everything blue razz, man. Oh, really?

The hydrate, too? Hydrate pre-workout, yeah, all day. Check. Go. How often are you taking pre-workout? I'm a regular user. Just regular user, daily? Not every day.

Not every day. But on my big days, you know, like leg day, we're doing some pre-workout. But I do about a half a scoop. You know, I'm not going crazy with it. But I use it when I need it. And when I need it, boy, it's good to have. It is good to have. Like you got that day where maybe you didn't get the right sleep,

maybe you were expended a bunch of energy the day before doing whatever. Like, like maybe you rolled that jih Tzu and you're just kind of full body doms. Having that pre-workout in the, in the chamber, if needed is freaking good to go. Because it, you will 100% feel it. Oh, yeah. And it gets you, I like the way it's not, it's, I like the way, it's sort of like being a frog boiled in water where you don't really like you take and you're

like okay cool and the next thing you know you're halfway through your workout and you're just getting after it and you're like oh that's right yeah get some I got to be a guinea pig for ashley and jaco fuel she's you know one of our um formulators and she she sent me a little sample of a new pre-work out that they're working on that one's extreme and I took that and I gave her some feedback on that one. It has the same thing as the regular one where the big jump for the Jocko Fuel Pre-Workout for me is the mental. It's actually like the mental focus.

I feel like I get really zeroed in, which is awesome because I'm not distracted by my phone or finding the right song or I'm in the zone. And I was giving Ashley some feedback on that new formula. It's the same except, are you familiar with mind muscle? connection. Proceed. So this is where in a workout, you're really thinking about the muscle that you're training. This is like thinking about the growth of my muscle at this time.

Right. To make it grow more. Yeah. So I'm in the middle of the lift. Did you have a spiritual moment? I did. I did. Straight out.

I was connected to the source momentarily during a lift after that pre-workout that actually let me try and it was outstanding. So looking forward to that one. Jack. What else we got? We got greens. Somebody posted the other day, a little picture of a little kid

just getting on the greens train. That's how you know? That's how you know, it tastes good. That became some of our best taste testers is like the entire Jocko Fuel fam of kids. Yeah. Like Joe Masses kids,

like they're drinking mowk like nine mocks a day or whatever. So this stuff tastes good. Greens. All the joint health stuff that you got, check out joccofuel. You can also get it at Walmart, which is really convenient, man. You can roll into a Walmart. Wawa, vitamin shop, G&C, military commissaries, Afees, Hanford, Dash George

Maryland, Wakefern, ShopRite, H.E.B. down in Tejas. They're not playing around either. You go a whole wall down there of Jocko Fuel. Meyer up in the Midwest, same thing, wall of Jocko Fuel. Wegmans, Harris Teeter, Publix down in Florida, crushing. By the way, everyone in Florida, what up? Appreciate the support. down there just clearing shelves.

Y'all are down there clearing shelves in Publix. So that's awesome. Much appreciated. Lifetime fitness, shields, small gyms everywhere, jujitsu gyms, whatever kind of gym you got if you want,

Jock Fuel and there email J.Fsales at joccofuel.com. We'll get you taken care of. Also, you need some clothing when you train jujitsu. You could use ghee. You could use no ghee. Either way, we got you covered at originuisa.com.

We got the training gear. We got jeans. We got boots. We got T-shirts. We got joggers. We got everything that you need. Hoodies, the whole nine yards. And guess what?

If you're concerned about the tariffs and the way that's going to impact your shopping habits, well, don't worry because at origin USA, everything is 100% made in America. There's not tariffs going on anything because it's all American. The cotton is American. The buttons are American. The everything's American.

The zippers are American. Everything's 100% American made. They're not made in the sweatshop. overseas that's ruining the environment and enslaving children. We're not doing that. We haven't been doing that. American made origin USA.com. Go get some.

Support freedom. Support America. That's what we got going on. We've also got Jocko Store, the Jocco Store at jocco store.com, where you can get your discipline equals freedom gear. You want to represent good being on the path with t-shirts, trucker hats, hoodies, beanies. You can get it at jocco store.com.

And we also have the shirt locker, which is a little subscription scenario where Echo Charles makes a new shirt every month. Bro, look at you just go and just got Echo script. Yeah, bro. You just got to memorize. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because just so everyone knows, there is no script. No.

Like Echo just says the same, just like I do. Like we're saying what we say and you've been listening and you're just rolling it out. 100%. Subscription scenario. Subscription scenario. That's what we're doing. Check. Yeah.

Interesting, good shirts, cool designs. Check that out at jaco store.com. Right on. Also, primalbeef.com, Coloradocraftbeef.com. We got steaks for you. Tasty steaks. Go tune into the steaks at Colorado Creef beef. Coloradocraftbeef.com.

Primalbeef.com. We got you covered. Hot dogs. Burgers. Jerky. Beef sticks. Colorado. Kraft beef has beef tallow.

We've been cooking in that. Now, you know what that is? Oh, yeah. Yeah, we've been cooking. I haven't been putting on my face. Like some people are prostrated up putting the tallow on their favor. You heard of this? I have heard of this.

Yeah, yeah, I haven't done that. That's not really my thing. I've never really put anything on my face or my whatever. You know, like, that's not my jam. But cooking in it, like you throw some, you need to cook something up. You need to throw some of them dogs in there. Throw that tallow in there. Never mind the other crap you can put in there.

No, you're good to go. go put that beef tallow in there i'm a cooking with butter person yeah i throw butter in there it tastes better you put beef tallow in there game changer gtg oh man taste it tastes it's incredible so check that out colorado craftbeef dot com also subscribe to the podcast also check out jocco underground dot com that is where we do a lot of q and a we answer your questions it costs eight dollars and eighteen cents a month if you can't afford that then it's okay just email assistance at jocco underground dot com because we want to have a platform that we don't have to worry about getting censored or whatever.

That's why we made that. So check out jocco underground.com. Also, we got a YouTube channel. We got psychological warfare. We got a bunch of books. I've written a bunch of books. Final Spin, which is a novel. I've written a bunch of leadership books.

And I've written a bunch of kids books. Way the Warrior Kid, one, two, three, four, five. Go and get those kids. Go get those kids books for your neighbors, for your nephews, for your own kids. the neighbors kids just get these kids on the path man they need it in this day and age and finally extreme ownership dichotomy leadership written a bunch of books check them out also we have a leadership consultancy we solve problems through leadership it's called echelon

front echelon front that name is from being on the front there's several different echelons of leadership inside the military and at the highest end you got the the commander Chief and then you got the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and it goes right on down the chain And those are leaders sure but we're talking about the leaders leadership where the rubber meets the road the front echelon So check out echelonfront.com you want to come to one of our events our next event is in San Antonio, Texas It's coming up in like a couple weeks I think we have a few seats left April 29th through May 1st if you want to come and check that out You want to check out one of our Battlefield events

our council events, our field training exercises. We got you covered. Go to Eshalomfront.com. Or if you need us to come inside your company and check out what is happening and help you get aligned with your leadership, echelonfront.com. We also have online training, an online training academy.

It's the Extreme Ownership Academy. And if you want to learn these leadership skills for life, go to Extreme Ownership.com, take some of our classes. There's some free, at least go take the free classes. At least do that. And there's no like big upsell at the end. No, no, it's not like that.

Just free, free information, free knowledge. Go check it out. Extremeownership.com. Also, if you want to help service members active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help Gold Star families,

check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an amazing charity organization. If you want to donate or you want to get involved, go to America's Mighty Warriors.org. Also check out Heroes and Horses.org and Jimmy May's organization

beyond the brotherhood. And if you want to connect with us, you can check out jaco.com. And on social media, I'm at jocco. Willink. Kerry is at Kerry Helton. Just be careful because when you go in there, you enter into the algorithm, bro, it'll grab hold of you and you'll ruin your whole life, basically, or wasted at a minimum.

So just be careful. Don't let the algorithm get you. And thanks for listening. And also, thanks to all the men and women out there. right now wearing the cloth of the nation thank you for your sacrifice and sacrificing your freedoms in order to defend our freedoms also thanks to our police law enforcement firefighters paramedics emts dispatchers correctional officers border patrol secret service and all other first responders thank you for your sacrifices to protect us here at home and everyone else

out there, we can all be susceptible to arrogance and vice and villainy. But we also have the power to control those flaws and those shortfalls. And a good way to make that happen is to keep these temptations and their consequences of these temptations. Keep in front of mind. Think about them. If you don't think about them, that's when you get caught. If you don't pay attention to them, that's when they sneak up on you.

And things like these proverbs that we covered today can help you stay. And that's all we've got for tonight. And until next time, this is Kerry and Jocko. Out.