Jocko Podcast - 509: The Need to Lead: Lessons from Dogfights, Dunker Drills, and Ego Checks. With Dave Berke.

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

>Join Jocko Underground<Dave Burke breaks down why humility, detachment, and rejecting perfection are the foundation of true leadership. Jocko adds his perspective from the SEAL Teams to reveal what separates leaders who win from those who fail.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko Podcast number 509 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good. In the Battle of Ramadi, 2006, every single operation conducted by coalition forces was critical. It was an all-hands-on deck. Violent insurgents controlled two-thirds of the city, regularly launching complex-coordinated attacks on friendly forces. Every day, American service men and women were wounded or killed. To overcome the enemy or even to survive, we needed to work together.

Soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines brought their specialized equipment, skills, and warfighting ability to the fight. During that battle, I was the commander of SEAL Team 3's task unit bruiser. For a small unit, we had a relatively powerful and unique capability. Highly trained snipers, forceful breaches, aggressive machine gunners, crafty point, men and elite combat medics. But in order to maximize our effectiveness in this battle, we had to integrate with the conventional units of the Army and the Marine Corps. These were the circumstances in which I met Dave Burke.

He was a distinguished graduate of the rigorous Marine Corps basic school. He finished at the top of his class in flight school and became a naval aviator based on his stellar performance during flight training. he was selected to become a fighter pilot as a Marine Corps single-seat F-A-18 fighter pilot He was selected to attend the top gun school after the terrorist attacks of September 11th He flew countless combat missions as a pilot and landed hundreds of times on that tiny patch of steel in the ocean Called an aircraft carrier the Marine Corps then chose major Burke to return to top gun as an instructor where he was eventually selected to be the lead instructor at the top gun school.

But I didn't know any of this about Dave Burke when I met him in 2006, and I wouldn't find out about any of it for years. He didn't mention a hint of this impressive pedigree when we met. Instead, he simply said, I'm Dave from Anglico. We're here to help you guys out however we can, and we certainly needed his help. And that right there. Here's an excerpt from the forward, which was written by me for a new book, which is called The Need to Lead, a Top Gun Instructors Lessons on How Leadership Solves Every Challenge, and is written by my friend, my co-worker, and my brother in arms from the Battle of Ramadi, Dave Burke, and he is joining us to discuss his book and some of the lessons from his experiences,

flying fighter jets, supporting troops on the ground, serving in ground combat, and of course, leading Marines. Dave, thanks for joining us. It's good to be here. Yeah, man. I guess that I am somewhat to blame for this book. Is that a fact? That's valid.

Yeah, I was encouraging you to write it. You and I would talk about, we'd be at events, we'd talk about leadership, and you would give your perspective on something. And I eventually said, hey, man, you know, you should write a book. And you eventually complied with that. And I kind of regretted giving you that advice after I got the first draft of the first chapter

or whatever it was. Because you wrote like a military after action report. You wrote like someone who was a Marine Corps officer for 24 years. Not a lot of, not a lot of, not a lot. lot of emotion in your writing. So, you know, we had a bunch of conversations about that. And man, it got better and better each iteration. So glad you wrote it. It's fantastic. It's, it's way better than I could have hoped for it to be. And here we are. What methodology did you use when you were writing it? Were you like an hour a day guy like

I am? I started like that. And to be honest with you, it didn't work. At least, not for a while because I'd get these fits and starts like if I had stuff on my mind I wanted to write I'd sometimes write two three hours at a time other times I sit there and I'd write for 15 minutes and I'm like this is just garbage so I didn't have the same discipline approach and you would give me your advice on how to do it and I tried to do that and then other times when I got into it I was able to like I'm going to bang out an hour every day and it got easier to do that over time oh yeah that makes sense that makes sense you kind of have to escape gravitational pull and once you get in your groove that's probably a really good point yeah i never really

thought of that before so in the beginning were you hunkering down and like all right i just got to try and write this thing you probably got caught did you get caught up in like rereading what you wrote and being like oh this actually sucks i got to do it again or not really no constantly yeah absolutely um i knew like i wasn't i never thought of myself like as a good writer i know it wasn't like a naturally good writer. But I didn't I totally underestimated how hard it would be to write this book the way that it was written and also just do what you said, which was just tell the story. In fact, I've gone out of my way most of my time to like, I'm not going to waste my time with the details. Here's the chronological, you know, the sequence of events and here's the outcome, like an after

action report. So I didn't really know how else to write and it was really evident at the beginning. Yeah. People learn through stories. I mean, that's why. That's why that's the best methodology for teaching, right? Totally storytelling. And so, yeah, the first copy I got, the first iterations that you. And what's cool about computers is you can see all these drafts. Like we have the original drafts of extreme ownership and they're awful. They're just awful.

Like we didn't know what we're doing. We wrote it in the third person. Did you know that? We wrote it in the third person. So it was like we were talking about, you know, Laif, you know, I was talking about Jocco Willing then did this. And it's like, bro, that's not how you convey a story. is by telling them the third person, but that's what we did.

How did you feel when you first got a copy in the hand in your hands for the first time? Yeah, were you pumped? I was, I mean, I was pretty stoked because, not just because the time it took into it, but I'd be honest with you,

like, this is not something ever thought I would do, ever. So when I, you had a book, it's got, you know, your stories and your name on it. It's kind of cool. I mean, it's super cool. It also was a,

it also meant like, hey, I was done. Like, I got it, to a place where the editors, the publishers, people like you. And I gave this to, you know, like, hey, you got to read my book. Is this any good? That meant it got to a place that it was good enough for the, to get out to the world. The cover of the book has some, what is it, five jets flying through the sky.

It's got an F-22, an F-18, and F-35. What am I missing? F-16. There you go. It's got all your jets on there. It does indeed. You feel good about that, don't you? That part is pretty cool.

They snuck that in there. Did you advise them on that? No. Yeah, you did. I did not, man. It was somebody had a cool idea of, of, hey, we want to put, you know, we want to, it was some top gun reference. We want to put some planes in the cover. And when they mentioned that, I'm like, okay, well, can I get them all on there?

So I contributed to that. But it was somebody else's idea of using that. And then they gave me an example and had like, like, like, Russian airplanes on there. I'm like, okay, well, we're going to do this. We're going to do it. Let's do it. Then this is how we should do it. Yeah.

My wife's friend, Maggie, was in town. And so I ended up in preparation. for this podcast watching the original top gun and yeah i can that's that was your inspiration so i can see where you got it from indeed how often do you watch that do you watch that once a year with your son or anything like that i don't have a there's no tradition of watching it but i'll tell you like there's opportunity it comes on here and there like it's just it's out there you'll see it's i don't i don't have like a date where i watch it with my kids but they all have you sat there next to them on the couch and watch Top Gun.

Totally. 100%. How fired up is your son? When the start of those movies are just kind of cool. They're just, you know, the music and the buildup and then it goes right into carrier flying. So it's hard not to think it's awesome. Yeah. It's super fun.

Have you ever seen that like the actual recruiting numbers that the Navy did from Top Gun? I don't think of it. It's got to be epic. I mean, I've never seen the numbers like officially. The number of times I've heard someone tell the story about it.

And I don't care who you're like, if you're flying airplanes in the military right now, I mean, whether you were 14 like I was at the time or you weren't even born, that movie has led a lot of people down the path to join the military. Oh, yeah. Which is awesome. Cool. Let's get into the book here. Obviously, I'm not going to read the whole thing.

And you did the audiobook. I did. Recorded the audio book. And so you can get the audio book. The problem with the audiobooks, look, I'm a, I'm a fan of audiobooks. But this is the kind of book where get the audio book cool, but you're going to want to like highlight. You're going to want to put little tags on there on little sections you want to refer back to. Get that first edition, right?

Are you going to sign books if it's not first edition in the future? We're just going to be walk away. So yeah, the book comes out October 21st. It's available for pre-order right now. So pre-order the book. Meanwhile, we're going to go through some of it right now. And again, I'm just going to kind of hit some of the highlights of the book and then we'll get into it. This is you, your final mission as a top gun student right here.

And let's see how it goes. Tally one, I grunted through the strain of the G's. Within seconds, I'd spotted the lone F5E tiger, a tiny aircraft covered in chameleon, brown camouflage paint, which was, from my vantage, was the size of a thumbtack and had all but vantage against. the desert floor below. This was the exact same plane used in the 1986 movie Top Gun that gave Maverick and his wingman goose similar problems. Only this wasn't a Hollywood set. This plane was maneuvering for the kill against me.

Showtime 11 is engaged. I alerted to my wingman. Resigned. I knew I had no choice but to maintain a turning fight with the F5, abandoning the plan to stay out in front of my larger formation. Fortunately compared to the dominant F.A. 18 Hornet I controlled the tiger was a mediocre machine and I and one I expected to dispose of quickly I'll end this in one turn and get back to business I thought as I maneuvered

for a shot but my misplaced confidence was soon demolished by a magnificent countermaneuver by the supposedly inferior enemy dashing any hopes of a quick kill despite my expectations my adversary was exceedingly worthy and it was clear a prolonged fight was unfolding for a moment I considered ignoring the voice in my head telling me this wasn't going well showtime 11 is offensive would have been the ideal call announcing to the formation that I was about to dispose of the meager tiger and return to my rightful place at the tip of the spear I was anything but in fact the pilot at the controls of the F5 moved in a way I had never seen and made it impossible to kill so I accepted so I accepted reality detached from my initial frustrations and took on a new role

My job now was to tie up the bandit in a close-in dog fight, allowing my wingman the opportunity to shoot at him so we could try and get back to the formation. Around and around the tiger and I went plummeting toward the earth. Showtime 12, Fox 2, my wingman called out mercifully announcing that he launched a simulated missile against the tiger. Terminate, terminate. The tiger, which I eventually learned was flown by a top gun graduate called his theoretical demise. My wingman and we had been in an actual dog my wingman had we been in an actual dog fight Landed what should what would have been a direct hit Showtime 11 terminate I acknowledged the successful I'll be it hypothetical kill and was relieved that my wingman had at last ended this unplanned

Engagement now we could return to the larger mission So there you go you're flying this big formation you get in this dog fight you think you're gonna kick this guy's ass really quickly it doesn't happen. It takes some time. Your wingman has to come in and save you. And now you've got to go get back to this formation that you're in charge of. But your formation had left you behind. They were on their own. And you end up being able to catch them and you end up as tail and Charlie, meaning you're just bringing up the rear. And they go and accomplish this mission and you don't fire a shot at the actual target you're going after. And yet, the whole thing is a big success and the mission got accomplished and your team had dominated and you go on to say that the

final mission proved to be a perfect case study for many of the key lessons taught at Top Gun. Nothing ever happened the way I anticipated. Missions never went as briefed. Chaos reigned everywhere. And though I expected my skills in the cockpit to be the main determinant, flight leadership was absolutely the most important factor in my success. So there you go. Your opening story, that opening story right there, which I found very interesting.

And you talk about the fact that you expected that what your job, you know, as a badass top gun, freaking maverick pilot up there, that you're going to win the day. Yeah. And you talk about that in the book and get the books. You can get all these details. But it doesn't matter. Like what you did was a tiny fraction of what it took to get the mission done. And interestingly, cover and move.

is completely, that's what we're talking about here. Like, not only did your wingman have to cover and move with you, but you guys had to cover and move for the rest of the formation. So that law of combat is very clear in this example. Prioritize and execute. Once again, you had to prioritize getting that guy away from the rest of the formation so that they could carry on and execute the mission. And then clearly decentralized command,

you're not giving orders anymore. The team is out there executing the mission. and you're over here, you know, messing around with this, this, uh, tiger. So the principles of combat leadership and simple, you know, clearly that one's, you have a simple plan going into it that the people know to execute. So you got all those bases covered. This was sort of, uh, like almost a eureka moment of, oh, yeah. Yeah.

I'm, this isn't about me. I mean, I can picture that. I think that was, you have these moments. moments in your career that dispel these like not just myths but I think images and we've talked about this on this podcast all the time like there's this image of leadership which is like all right I'm in charge everybody just listen to what I'm going to say I'm going to get up on the podium and I'm going to brief the team they're all going to be super fired up and I'm going to I'm going to lead them to victory and it looks so cool it's like this amazing image and when I was the flight lead

for this mission I'm like that's what I'm doing I'm a student top gun it's a graduation exercise I'm leading it and I'm going to lead the team to victory. And that whole thing just gets blown up. And like, there's a bunch of stuff's not in the book, but like, you know, we brief, we take off, we get ready, we kind of rally. We get in our formation. The bad guys take off.

Like, okay, everybody's ready. We make this big announcement. And then, like, we start. And I bet you like that was like 90 seconds into a 30 minute, 40 minute flight, but this whole thing falls apart. And at the time, you're just like, this whole thing gets shadowed. in your head.

And so there's all the detail that's inside the book, but part of it was like walking back to the debrief, like thinking, this was a disaster. And in the end, it was like, this thing was a total success. This thing was a total success.

Except I didn't do all the things I thought I was supposed to be doing. And the reason it was a success because of all the four things you just said. Because a cover and move, simple, prioritize, execute, and decentralized command. But this was the moment that dispelled the myth of, like,

leadership is that you're doing everything. Leadership is you're out in front. Leadership is you're the one. when the team is following you. And in fact, if you're doing it well, it's all the exact opposite. Is there out in front and doing all this thing? So it was a really strong visual lesson.

I mean, you literally, when you say Taylor, I'm like, I can still, in my minds, I like see the four jets that I was following, like 15 miles in front of me. I can see little silhouettes. I can see them on radar. I'm like, spent the whole day just like chasing down my team. That's out there just getting after it

and killing everybody and dropping bombs and doing all the things they're supposed to do. And I was just like cruising them behind them. And that at the time was like, you feel kind of like a failure until you get to the outcome. Like, oh my God, they totally like crushed it. The team just totally dominated.

Sure. Roger. You go in a little bit of your, some of your past here. You talk about your, once you saw the movie Top Gun, you're like, that's what I'm gonna do. And your mom, props to mom. She said, someone's gotta do it. Might as well be you.

And then you go into this mode of, hey, and everything that you're doing is just, just focused on becoming a pilot, becoming a, and you were up by Marine Corps base, so Marine Corps pilots seemed like the logical one. You just followed the required steps. Graduate high school, go to college, go to Marine Corps Officer Canada school,

get commissioned, and then it's the basic school. You say for the next two years, I was trained, evaluated, and ranked against my student pilot peers. We competed in head to head to be selected for the same incredibly precise goal, the chance to fly Hornet, off of a carrier. So flying hair is off of a carrier is off of a carrier.

Again, you and I talked about this before you, how hard it is to land on a carrier. We're going to get into that story at some point because this is a huge deal. It's kind of crazy that you would volunteer a human being, not just you necessarily, Dave Burke, but it's kind of crazy you think about, hey, what you're going to do is you're going to volunteer

for this job. where you're going to do this insanely dangerous thing over and over and over again for a 25-year career. When you think about that, like, hey, here's what you're going to do. We're going to give you this insanely difficult thing that requires all kinds of mental and physical skills. And it's insanely dangerous. And that's what you're volunteering to do for 25 years of your life. It's kind of a crazy thing. Yeah.

Eventually, you're assigned to a single-seat carrier-based F-18 squadron station in Southern California. The exact one I told my mom about a decade earlier mission accomplished. You say or so, I assume. In a profession where being technically outstanding was the norm, what made a truly great pilot was how well they could lead. And again, I'm reading the introduction of this book. and what you're kind of setting up is that being a pilot and being a Marine Corps pilot isn't just about being a pilot. There's something that's, as you just mentioned, more important.

What makes a truly great pilot is leading. And then you go on to say that there's all kinds of issues you've got to deal with, right, as a pilot, complex formations, bad weather, enemy weapons, like all those things are hard. And this is what's interesting. the attributes required to successfully lead a flight are the same ones that allow someone to lead anywhere. And as a fighter pilot, you realized that flying is leadership.

That's the, I would say it were, my guess is that recognition of that must have been, you know what, I could, we're talking about like the idea of writing a book when you started to recognize, oh yeah, these things that I did in the cockpit are the same things that I did over here when I was leading Marines.

That must have been, again, a little bit of a eureka moment. Yeah, 100%. And certainly backtracking from the beginning, like when you're a little kid wanting to be a pilot, and then when you're going through all the training and stuff, they're not really talking about flight leadership. They're just talking about, can you do the things inside the cockpit

and make the airplane do what it wants? Like, can you be a pilot? So you spent all these years just like thinking that's what flying is. and you've got to be good at this skill and that skill. And you learn all sorts of how to navigate, how to drop bombs, how to fly in formation, how to fly at night. All these stuff you learn. And then at the end, they're like, okay, you're done.

You graduated. You have your wings. You're a qualified pilot. You have completed the syllabus. You are officially a pilot and like almost overnight. Like the next day you show up in a regular squadron and you're thinking, oh, I'm good. I know how to do it. And they're like, hey, everybody is good at flying an airplane.

Nobody cares about that here. Like it's so assumed that nobody's going to give. give you any props for being what your grades were in flight. Nobody cares. They want to know how can you lead. And so then you have this discovery of what flying really is about. And then at one point you, you, and it took me a while, and you make the link of like, it's all, leadership is just leadership. And you get so wrapped up in the cockpit sometimes of thinking that this setting is so different, this environment is so different, this scenario is so hard to relate to that it must be different and it's not it's exactly exactly the same

um fast forward a little bit while the title of this book the need to lead invokes the classic top gun movie quote echo charles what do you approve disapprove i'm totally approved 100% how can't 1986 is back coming back strong big time the need to lead invokes the classic top gun movie quote it is who thought of the title need to lead is that you the idea came from two different people that I totally resisted initially I'm like that's just I'm not doing that I remember you resisted you presented it to me yeah as like a course of action you did not want to follow you like hey I'm hearing this but I just that's too I think that's too too too much yeah well how did they sway your mind who thought of it um it's two different people I was doing some edits with and and the phrase

inside the book, like, had been through it like, you need to lead your way through this. Or what's needed here is leadership. Like the connection of needing to lead was all, it's all throughout the book. The whole book is like, you need to lead here, you know, or some variation of that. And two friends that I was working with both at the same time, like separately. And I thought, the fact that it happened that they weren't coordinating with each other and they both said it. I'm like, wow, I heard the exact same thing yesterday from my buddy who said that.

I knew there was something inside there and they were like, people were gonna love it. And in my mind, I'm like, I get fine for using top gun quotes. I can't use a top gun quote. Once I made the link between it's a cool reference and it's also 100% true, I very quickly

jumped on board with that idea. Chuck. The need to lead invokes the classic top gun movie quote, it's undeniable truth. I experience it as a Marine Corps officer, fighter pilot, ground combat leader, husband and father. This book's purpose is not only to help the reader be a better leader,

but also to understand that leadership is a universal requirement for success, no matter the environment. It is intended for anyone who seeks every day to improve themselves as a human being and to improve their team. Every person needs to lead in order to succeed. And then you ask the question.

So how do we develop these necessary skills? You kind of give a little background on how we all started working together, because you talk a little bit about you and me and Laif being on the ground in the Battle of Vermonti, what I opened up this thing with, and what we were doing there, and then how we kind of reconnected again, and you jumped into Ashlandfront and what Ashlandfront is. And, you know, you go through, I think this is the first person, well, this isn't in any of my books. you go through the four core beliefs that underline

our organizational leadership philosophies at Ashland Front. So the first one, everyone is a leader. Tell me about that one. I mean, you cannot make it more straightforward. And, you know, I, man, I could talk for a long time about what I learned about being a part of Eschlam Front. And it's super obvious that, you know, I'm a leadership instructor, so I'm teaching with,

and I'm working with clients, helping him solve problems, but the biggest part of that experience is what I have learned and what we as a team have learned about ourselves and about our company and about what we do over time. And, you know, I can't pinpoint the first time you said it. I can't look back and define a moment where that hit me. But the idea that you have had from the beginning is that every single person's in a leadership role. Every person is a leader. And it's, yeah, you can go back and look at like a PowerPoint slide that I had from 2007 and it'll say decentralized command everybody leads so it's like but but what's interesting is I bet there is the moment that you

might have hard time pinning down is like at some point you know you probably heard me say that a hundred times and then one time you went oh oh I know what he's talking about yeah like that kind of and I think that's how this stuff happens I think that's how these lessons form twos is Listen, every now that something happens, it's just like, you know, a lightning strike. But a lot of the times you've got to reflect back on these things and what it means. And one of the things I noticed, especially when we're working with clients, is, oh, we're bringing in this company to talk about leadership as, you know, the things that we teach. And people like, oh, I'm not leadership. That's my boss or my supervisor or that's the vice president or whatever.

And all these frontline individual contributors are thinking, oh, this doesn't apply to me. You're like, no, no, no, this is for, this is for all of us. This is for everybody. These are universal things that we all need to understand. And at some point you realize, like, it's foundational to echelon front is what we teach. It's not based on your, like, position in the org. It's for everybody. Every single person is a leader.

And that's almost something that we, people, you can almost take that for granted. It's like, no, this is a core belief. Like, this is central to what we are and what we do. And it has to be written down. It has to be explained. and when people hear that they go, oh man, like their whole demeanor changes, their whole point of view,

when they're listening and participating, they're realizing this isn't about somebody else, this is about them. That is a powerful thing. Yeah, and there's something to be said about what I think, when I think that Eureka moment comes for people, is when they start to see the principles

in the context of what they're doing. You know, like I said, you might have heard me say that a hundred times before you were like, oh, wait a second, when I was that flight, Even though I was the guy in charge those other people leave. Oh, and it's like it crystallizes in people's minds

Getting the context around the principles and that's why I think this book is very powerful because it contextualizes the principles Into stories where you go oh and it just it brings it one step closer brings the principles one step closer to someone Being able to self contextualize Yeah, what the principle is because if you don't feel it it or see it in your world. It's very hard to understand it from a detached perspective. We go, oh, yeah, oh, yeah, everybody leads.

You're kind of like, oh, yeah, okay, that's cute or whatever. But when you actually go, oh, wait a second, I'm on a construction site and my foreman didn't show up and my next in the line started stepping up and other people started doing their jobs and making things happen. Oh, yeah. Oh, oh. Or they didn't do that, in which case nobody led, in which case nothing got done. So I think that's a powerful thing in in the book and it's quite frankly that's sort of the same

format as extreme ownership in the dichotomy of leadership and leadership strategy and tactics like oh here's a principle and here's a story that's going to help you contextualize it and and and unfortunately you can't like I can't just convey it the context to you 100%. He just can't do it. You can't do it. people have to open their minds enough to put it in their own context and make it work. But the more angles they can hear something from, the better chance they have of being able to apply it in their own lives. And I think that's why having all these books is great because it might, you know, Echo might not understand one story that you told, but he might really understand one that Laf told it. And he goes, okay, now I get it. Or vice versa.

So I think that's what you're doing here in the book. which is awesome. Next leadership principle, leadership exists in every capacity. Yeah, we spent time thinking about that too is the obvious case when we're at Eschleon Front working with a client is business leadership. A company calls us and we work with them and there are partners and we're working through their challenges.

We're training their people. We're dealing with whatever issues they have. And it's so front and center that you're talking about your professional life. And of course it applies it. We know that. But we've noticed this for a long time at Eschleon Front, and I started to pay more attention to it as it happened more often, was people would,

they'd have so much gratitude for what the book Extreme Ownership did and what Echon Front did to help them in their business. And then they go, hey, but can I ask you, can I ask you a different question? And you're like, yeah, what's up? And they would tell a version of a challenge, and they'd say, hey, this is great. You know, my team has been really good with this.

You know, we've been doing decentralized command. It's been really helpful. They've been stepping up. And then they would say, but, and they'd tell a story like, you know, my kids really, they're really giving me a run for my money. They're really not. And all of a sudden, the question they'd be asking what they're really struggling was, was how does this work outside of work?

Because they were doing great in their professional lives, and they walk on their front door and things would kind of start to fall apart. And they'd be frustrated. And what we were able to recognize, but that you've known, we know, we know is like, hey, these things that you're supposed to do, these things apply everywhere. There's no uniqueness to the environment. It's certainly combat leadership or principles for business and life. But the things that you do to be successful with your team apply in every aspect of your life.

Now, it could be much harder to do at home. We know there's challenges inside there about detaching from your kids and all the frustration that goes along with that. But the principles are the same. And it really, as you were just talking about a minute ago about how you have to have that moment of you recognize it for yourself, when you make the recognition, that oh my gosh this is what I need to be doing in my personal life in my family life and the positive benefit that has that to me it was even more powerful when it was at work because it was in this

environment that was giving the biggest challenges and to be quite frank about the people they cared about the most so you see the linkage like hey this isn't just being successful in your corporate life it's every aspect of life at home at work in your communities and within yourself easier said than done but it's undeniable truth those principles they're They play everywhere. Yep. Whether it's a sports team, whether it's your family. Like another funny example that we'll get is I'll get someone that will ask me,

you know, well, you know, I actually run a nonprofit. And so it's different. It's like, oh, oh, well, you know, I can't fire them. Oh, oh. So when you're in a profit company, you know, you can just fire everybody. Oh, they didn't want you. They didn't do what I wanted them to do. So I just fired them all.

It's like, no, you don't do that in any organization. Oh, in the SEAL teams, you can just fire someone. Oh, really? You can just get rid of someone immediately. No, you got to walk them through. You got to give them the documentation. You got to do the same thing. And so these leadership principles, family, non-profit, sports team.

You know, well, I work with, you know, 10-year-old kids. And when I, you know, when I tell them to do something, they don't do it. Freaking, it's, you know, I just, what am I supposed to do? It's like, oh, we yell at them more. Right. Or bark orders at them and demand that they respect you because you're older. them and you're the coach you know like like you can do that and you're going to get the results you know that you're going to get you know there'll be three kids that are scared to you there'll be

two kids that quit that be one you know one family member dad that comes and talks to you look why are you yelling my kids another family member will come and you need to yell at them more but you're not getting what you want from the team because you haven't established the culture correctly so yes it doesn't matter what organization you're in. Family, team, non-profit, for-profit, military, first responder, a, what's it, potluck supper leader? Remember on the office?

What was it? The office they'd have the party committee, right? There's a lot of drama around that party committee on the office. Leadership exists in every capacity, and it's the same principles. And are there, are there nuances? Of course there's nuances. Of course there's nuances.

Of course, it's going to be a little bit different. But the differences are in your use of the tools, not in the tools themselves. But once you know the tools, then you got to work on learning how to use the tools for sure. I wrote about that in leadership strategy and tactics. It's like woodworking tools. Hey, you got to use a saw a little bit differently on a piece of pine than you do on a piece of oak. it's the same tool

but you got to use it a little bit differently. So that's what we're doing. Next one. Every problem we face is a leadership problem. Yeah, I mean, you talk about core of why the book is what it is and why we say what we say is,

I mean, there's so much human nature involved here that when you run into a problem, everything inside you's going to try to attribute to something else. Oh, that's that other person. That's the economy or that was the weather or the list is infinite of all the reasons why certain things have happened a certain way. And I think when you look at problems and you attribute them to things that are like beyond your control, two things happen. One is like you feel good for a minute because you're like, oh, cool, this isn't my fault.

This is a good feeling. Like obviously it doesn't last very long. But there's a little bit of satisfaction of like, oh, this problem, not my problem. Nothing I can really do about that. and it's something I can't control and there's some comfort that sits inside there and then of course the next thing that happens is that the problem persists

which is the worst because that immediate gratification of attributing the problem to something external actually doesn't help you and so that feeling you get comes and goes very quickly and what it's replaced with is the reality of that problem is there forever

which sucks but if you change that point of view and like if you look at everything through the lens of leadership, like every problem, even problems with the weather, even problems with the economy, even problems with how other people are interacting, if you go, oh, those are all leadership problems. It stings a little bit like, oh, dang, that means it's me. I mean, it's the way I've communicated. I'm the leader. I'm the problem. Yeah, it's my problem, right? And it stings for just a split second to have that recognition of, oh, this isn't those,

this is a reflection of me. And what's that, what happens right after that is you are presented with the answer. And that's the best part about it. Because the answer, if every problem is a leadership problem, then by definition, the answer is leadership. And that is the most liberating, that is the best feeling in the world because you go, oh, here's 30 things I can now do differently. Here's different ways I can behave, different ways I can communicate, different ways of using that tool. And if you look at it like that, then all of a sudden, these problems beyond your control becomes, they become solvable problems. And then people go, oh, I just led my way through this, that problem got better, my life got better. And it is just a core belief of you got to look at

problem is a leadership problem and if you do leadership will be presented a solution which is what you want fourth component leadership is a skill yeah that ironically sometimes is the hardest one to to it's a hurdle to get over sometimes because you know we live in a world where if you if you admire someone and people do it to you all the time they put jocco's my leadership role model and oftentimes it's like must be nice you know to be born with all the all these amazing things that he's got and just, you know, you can put some up on a pedestal and think that somehow like,

you were born with all these skills. You were just naturally from birth, all the things that we teach, detached, humble, building good relationships and all the thing, we admire those things. I mean, they're very easy to look up and aspire to, but sometimes you gotta look at it and go, well, how did that person get to be able to do those things?

And what you realize is like, we're all in the same boat. We're all born with the same, for the most part. same tendencies, the same natural actions, the same natural behaviors. Now, we know this like with any skill, like there's some people, like people are pretty musical. Put a, put an instrument in front of some kids, they're better than others. Some kids are athletic. They're good at certain sports.

But if you look at leadership as a skill, learning to play an instrument, learning to play a sport, it doesn't matter what your talent is. You can have zero talent. If you practice it, you're going to get better. And we teach the skill of leadership, the behaviors and actions and the mindset, that you can apply, and if you apply them, you will get better. And if you look at it as a skill,

it means you can improve. And all of a sudden, that person you put up on a pedestal of thinking, boy, they were just, I wish I could be like that, but I can't because they were born. Like, no, that's a normal human being. That person learned those skills, which means you can learn them too,

which means you can become a good leader as well. Yeah. Yeah. It would be crazy to say, oh, just this person just pick up a guitar and now they can play guitar. Like, it doesn't work. Now, like you said,

there can be a person that can, they have really good, ears for tone and they can they can start to pick out notes and be like oh I recognize that song that is a that is a type of person but like they're going to have to practice it they're just not born with it being able to play guitar and it's the exact same thing with leadership it is a skill you can definitely get better in but you got to focus on it um that was all from the introduction by the way getting into the part one of the book which is the mindsets of a good leader

Chapter 1, every problem is a leadership problem. We roll right into Ramadi Iraq Foot Patrol May of 2006. Going to the book. A massive torrent of enemy machine gun fire erupted from the west over my right shoulder. Dozens of bullets buzzed just above my head. Tracers ripped past me, their telltale orange hue still visible despite the daylight as they strafed the air. They forced me down and to my left in a prone position, flat on my stomach, the source of bullets directly behind me.

Almost in unison, the same thing happened from the east as tracer flashes and bullets cracked over the top of me from the opposite direction. With waves of bullets criss-crossing directly above and beside me, I was the meaty part of a crossfire sandwich. In an instant, I lost control the situation and I was no longer able to do anything. Because I had done nothing to that point, I was now exposed. the stellar Marine he was, Mo constantly mirrored my movements, so he was right there when I needed him and the radios. Having followed my cues that day, Moe was now in the exact predicament I was,

exposed in an open area, pinned to the ground, and unable to move. My inaction had put him in danger. Doc was already 30 feet ahead of me. He had pushed further up after the initial volley to get to a more advantageous and protected location. Now he was safe, position. Now he was safe, position. behind a huge tree and kneeling in a small irrigation ditch that gave him cover from enemy fire. He was frantically gesturing and screaming for me to move to his position. The hell did you get your guys into? Well, this is like the beginning of chapter one, and it sets the theme for every chapter, which is maybe one of the hardest parts for me was to write this book was there are no hero storage in this book.

there's no story about me doing something right. And it was just forcing myself to look back on the things that I learned, the lessons I wanted to teach, and they all came from like really bad decisions. And, you know, the precursor of this giant, I would call it a firefight, but I wasn't doing anything. I was just laying there. It was pretty brutal.

And by the way, I read an excerpt, like get the book and you'll get the full story. Totally. But the precursor to that was like a mortar attack. And you know this as well as I do. We do move them into contact. And like, there was always a mortar attack. And I convinced myself that, you know, that mortar attack, which the mortgage probably landed hundreds of meters away,

which might as well have been miles away. It was just kind of almost in my mind, meaningless. Is I had been presented a few minutes earlier in this situation that when we had taken this incoming fire, albeit like indirect and inaccurate, what I should have done was like, I don't know, basic leadership stuff. Like called him in the airplane,

talk to the platoon leader. like done things. And what I did was nothing. And there's a bunch of detail about why I did nothing. But all of it was like, there's nothing I can do about this mortar attack, right? Like we always get mortared. So there's nothing to do. And so if there's nothing to do, you do nothing, which is the worst thing to do, which is a terrible thing.

And here I am, like, doing nothing. And then that situation deteriorates. And by the time I come to the conclusion, like, oh, this is a really bad situation. I should do something, it's too late. I'm pinned down. There's more detail in that, obviously, but it was bad. In fact, I'm lucky to be here talking about it, how bad that situation was.

And I just remember laying there just swelling with regret. Like, why didn't, I just asking myself, like, why didn't I do anything? And in retrospect, it's because I knew this was a problem I couldn't control. I was sure of it. So I didn't do anything. And that means the problem got infinitely worse, way more dangerous. And that I was not putting other people at risk. So the takeaway from that was like,

dude, like if you're dealt with a problem, lead your way through it. There's no guarantee that you're going to control every aspect of the outcome. That's not even the point. But doing nothing

ended up being almost like costing me in a couple of people that are lives. I'm lucky to be able to tell the story and I wrote about it. But every problem is a leadership problem and you've got to lead your way through it if you want to be successful. I had one of the elements in Ramadi

was going out. and going out to like northern rheumadi and taking a like a rural presence patrol and they were kind of showing me their route and um you know i said hey well looks like you're going to go you know across this big open area and he's like well yeah you know um if we would try and skirt this it would take a really long time and blah blah blah and plus it's not that good of terrain so we think the best thing to do is just go across this open area and i said okay i said yeah you know what i said do me a favor Like when you get to that open area, keep some guys in the tree line and, you know, the other guys can maneuver across. That way, if they get contacted, you'll have guys, you'll be able to cover and move out of that situation.

And sure enough, the exact thing happened. And sure enough, they had really good suppressive fire and were able to get the guys out of the middle of the field. But very similar thing, but that's, that's the preemptive ownership, which you talk about in the book, they're like, okay, wait a second, as a leader going into the situation, what can I control? Do I need to get every one of my guys in a exposed area right now? No, I don't actually have to do that. I can, there's no rules. I can leave guys back over here.

I can put some guys on this little berm, get a little high ground, be able to cover for their movement. Unless you just say, well, if we get mortars, because that group actually started with a mortar attack. You know, well, we're going to get mortars, nothing you can really do about it. Well, maybe there's a little bit you can do. Yeah, there definitely is.

And that story is like the first in the book. And it was a hurdle for me as I first started writing. And at some point, I just kind of just cleared the hurdle. And like, all right, this is what it's going to be. It's just I have to write a story about something I'm not proud of. I'm kind of embarrassed by. It was a huge mistake. But that's where I learned the lesson.

Or to your point earlier, that's where that lesson really stuck in my, like, okay, that's when it really crystallized or solidified. And I had to recognize I was going to write a book that just tells a bunch of stories that I'm kind of an idiot. And it sucks. But that's the moment. that I that really and from that moment on in my life I can tell you I reflect back on that constantly when something happens I don't make that mistaken I lead I don't always do the right thing but but but I I am able to recognize yeah better than sucking mud yeah well that's yeah so

good time so how to give us real quick two liner and how you got out of it okay maybe a 12 dude so I'm laying on the ground I'm looking at Mo my radio operator his look at looking at me and I go through like 50 different iterations of what I should do and everyone as I calculate I'm like you're gonna die can't put your head up can't move like you we were like you could not move and as the as the bullets are hitting in the dirt between us you can feel you know this like you can feel bullets movement like shifting around volume of fire you can feel where it's going it's going left going right going up and it started to shift towards me and I would say it probably got like three feet I'm like okay this is it and I I

I'm 100% sure I'm going to die and I kind of drift off, I start, I start laughing a little bit. Like, oh my God, like that, like that kind of laugh. Like, you got to be kidding me, man. I'm kind of chuckling and I say it out loud. As it shifts to my left arm, the bullets, you could feel it shift up maybe two or three feet. And what I equate, if you can picture how far away these guys probably were shooting at us,

the guy holding the machine gun, like, probably leaned back like two or three inches. And it raised the trajectory of the bullet, a foot or two based on the distance, went up directly over my head and then started hitting the dirt to my right. And there is no explanation other than it's clearly beyond my control that that happened. And I looked at Mo. He kind of looks at me. I look up at Doc and I'm like we and we both got up and ran the probably 20, 30 feet that was there, dove into this ditch. There is no reason I that there is no reason I should be here telling the story other than the divine intervention of those bullets and that shooter lifting the trajectory up and over my body,

giving me another 10 seconds to get to cover, which I did. By the time I'm in the ditch, I'm laying on my back, mo's on top of me, we're like bare hugging each other, bullets going directly over the top of him, missing him by, you know, a foot or so.

That time frame window I can't account for other than beyond my control, man. Well, I can actually completely attribute it. That's freaking poor muzzle controlled by the enemy machine gunner. Because, you know, when you shoot a machine gunner, when you shoot a machine gun, it starts to go up.

And so that guy just had poor, and even when you're a really good machine gunner, it's like you lean into it, but it's really hard, even for the best machine gunner to keep that thing like completely dialed. You know, it's gonna, it's just, it's just,

you kind of have to let it go in order to force it back down. So you got that little benefit of his poor muscle control at that moment. I'm glad he was so bad. Fast forward a little bit, getting to the principle here, the lesson, we need to lead.

Even when circumstances feel completely beyond our control, we still must act. Only then will we be positioned to exert our influence, which will drive us closer to determining the outcome. By leading, we can overcome the feeling of victimization and instead understand the range of obstinance within our power. By taking control of our preparation, reaction, and response to problems, we become a leader. When we reframe our mindset and see situations through the lens of leadership, we understand that things don't have to remain as they are.

We can anticipate the challenges we may face, assess what our options are to solve them, and then take action and execute. It can be scary to accept the responsibility of leadership because our actions or inaction may endanger others and worsen the situation. But good leaders, those who choose to step up and act are rewarded with the most critical component, the solution. Yeah. And we were recently talking about this fact that there's,

you say that things don't have to remain as they are. And there are things that are going to remain as they are. And usually that the number of things that are going to remain as they are that you cannot change. Usually that's a pretty small number of things. But the other things, you know, you don't have to accept that. Just don't accept it. Like we're just not doing that. Now look, does that, can you change the,

terrain? No, you can't change the terrain. The mountain's going to be the mountain. But do you have to go over the mountain? No, you don't have to. You can go around it. You can call for fire on the other side of the mountain. There's a bunch of other ways to solve that problems. And then, so then, like I said, like extreme ownership and the dichotomy of leadership, we now roll into like a business example, which is so such a good move because I think that the combat examples, because there's so much, such high consequences, they really make you feel it. But in the business examples, allow people to get the context

that applies closer to their world so they can see it more clearly. So they feel it from the combat example, but they see it in their own world from the business example, which is a pretty epic way to convey a principle. This one starts off with, and I don't know if you recognize this when you do this,

but a lot of your real world application, your business, from someone in the scene. This one starts off with, they don't care. And it's just classic, you know, you talk to some leader and like, oh, what's going on with your team? They don't care. What's wrong with you?

They don't care. It's just a classic quote to start off with. And I'm sure there's millions of people that read this. Oh, yeah. I know exactly who he's talking about. Fast forward a little bit. I was working with a utilities company based in the Midwest that had hired us to train their team.

They were sizable, had a good reputation by industry standards. This being a company town. their local workforce was robust. Many employees were second and third generation, and some had been with a company for decades. These were hardworking folks doing unappreciated work that literally kept the lights on. Over the past three years, accident rates had started to creep up.

It was an unsettling shift after the previous 10 years had been the safest on record. Senior management noticed the unfortunate trend and wanted to stop it before it got worse than the recent near fatal incident that had occurred. A newer young employee was fortunate to have survived to fall that led to a broken bones and a stint in the hospital. Thus, I found myself in front of Ken, a manager who had a few incidents happen on his watch and was struggling with team morale.

This new generation is all the same. They're on their phones constantly. They show up and expect things to magically happen. It's nuts. Ken continued, don't get me started on their work ethic. They don't care about anything. And again, what is he, what is Ken doing in that scenario? It's them. It's they. And it has nothing to do with him. And what you are able to convey to him in the story is actually, Ken, it's not about what problems they have. It's a leadership problem.

And you help them solve it. And that's what this book is filled with. Next chapter. Humility is the most important attribute as a leader. This possibly is my favorite chapter in the book. It's definitely has, I think, my favorite line. the book so starts off with this word two the number two and you go on to explain that that's how many pilot slots there are because when you when you join the Marine Corps or the any military branch

you just don't say hey I want to be an F-18 fighter pilot here to put me in the program no you got to jump through so many hoops and wickets to get there and you're in a class of what 250 50 people 250 people and there's two slots two slots to be a fighter pilot a fighter pilot or just a pilot just go to flight school oh my god just to get into flight school do the wickets you and I sat down one night we were having lunch or something but I remember we were talking about the wickets that you got to get through to be a fighter pilot an f18 single seat fighter pilot the Marine Corps those are some freaking wickets and you're like well you know the seals have a lot I go no no there's not as many wickets there's just not there's just not there The wickets are insane to get to the slot that you're in. And some luck because sometimes it's like, oh, yeah, there's no slots. We don't need any F-18 pilots right now. You're going to fly this other aircraft. That's the way it is.

So you, you know, you join the Marine Corps, which what do you get when you join the Marine Corps? What's the guarantee that what can they guarantee you when you join the Marine Corps? You're going to be a Marine. That's what you're going to get. And if that ain't enough for you, we don't really need you. So you break it down. You go to OCS. You go to the basic school.

Well, 250 lieutenants have broken into six platoons, roughly 40 people. There's some people that have, I guess they have like a flight contract. So they get guaranteed, hey, you're going to be a Marine and you're going to be a pilot of some kind. You're going to at least go to go to flight school. Oh, that's right. You're at least going to get a flight school. That's kind of like my contract to join the Navy was you, you're going to get, was you're not going to be a seal. It wasn't even you're going to go to buds.

It was a contract guarantee that you're going to get to take the test. to go to buds. Yes. That was the guarantee. That doesn't mean shit, by the way. That's what that is. So some guys had that. You weren't one of those people.

So you were just straight up, hey, I'm going in the Marine Corps to be an officer. Yes. No other stipulations around your contract. None. That's freaking ridiculous. So TBS, you're assessing three different categories. The three different categories are military skills, physical fitness, and leadership. So the military skills is like cleaning, rifle,

shooting, right? Radio frequencies into it. You kind of go through some of that stuff. So it's military stuff. The next one's physical training. Obviously, we know what that is. Obstacle course, combat conditioning course, endurance course.

These are things that you're going to get graded on. And then the final one is leadership acumen. And the way they judge this is you get put in leadership positions. And you might be in charge of a four-person team. You might be in charge of a 250-person company, but you're going to be in charge. And then they're going to grade you. And everything that you're doing is getting graded all the time.

And this is the environment you're in. And by the way, you were working at Target like six months prior. Totally. You're working at freaking Target as a stock boy. Yep. So, and you have no guarantee whatsoever, which is freaking crazy as far as I'm concerned. So you're getting judged. And then you also talk about this, part of the leadership grade.

At TBS, a unique element of our leadership grade came compliments of our peers, twice during the course, each lieutenant filled out an evaluation and assigned a score to every other member in the platoon. This grade directly affected our overall leadership standing. I knew this subjective ranking was part of our assessment, and I wasn't concerned at all. In fact, I was looking forward to my first peer review debrief from Cub. This is your, what, company commander? This guy, Cub. He was going to be impressed, and I waited his praise.

I can't wait to see what they say about me. I thought as I walked into Cub's office. So, again, just to set this up, you're doing a peer evaluation. And as you do this peer evaluation, you're thinking about, well, this is just to be another bonus for you. I know what my ranking is. So I'm excited. Because your ranking is what at this point? Eight out of 250.

So you're eight out of 250. This could be a nice little bump. Cub began by telling me that my grades were excellent, that I currently ranked among the top of the entire company and that he felt as though I'd make a fine Marine one day. As anticipated, I felt great. I want to read you what I think is the best summary of what your platoon thinks, he said. Keep it coming, I thought. Lieutenant Burke would be one of the best Marines in the platoon if he didn't already think he was. So there you go.

That's my favorite line from the book. That had to sting. Totally blindsided too. Totally. Totally blindsided. Self-awareness. Was zero. Zero.

Zero. If you could have like a negative, if you could like have a negative score of like you were on the opposite, like that's where I was. God. That is a scary thing. And, you know, from the aviation world,

like not knowing that you're off track or not knowing that you're off course or not knowing that you're losing altitude. Like not knowing that you're losing speed. Those are, those are kiss of death. All of them. Every one of this. You're 100% right. And I look back and like,

I mean, you and I've known each other for a long time. We've known each other really well. I am 21 in this. Like this 21, just picture 21 year old Dave Burke. And the, the concept of self-awareness wasn't even in my head. Just the concept of it. So forget about like being realistic. It was so far when he said that, I mean, you could not have been more blindsided and shocked.

And it was like, Like my ear started ringing like I started swimming I like it was it was brutal for me It was awful. Yeah, that's it's such a difficult thing that self-awareness thing because it's horrible because you don't know it's happening like you're just completely unaware I've always been very suspect of myself you know like oh and even you know leadership strategy and tactics Same thing happened with me where my platoon's like my platoon chiefs like hey dude. you're ostracizing yourself from the platoon. And I'm kind of like, what are you talking about? Dude, I'm hardcore.

What do you do? What are you crazy? Like, what do we, what are we talking about here? And that's what makes it so difficult when people get caught in this vacuum where they have no self-awareness. And it's very, very sad to watch and very disturbing. And you go on to talk about it here. Self-awareness can be a bitter pill. For the first time in my life, I realized my ego had become a problem.

And it was time to become better acquainted. with the word humility. I needed to reassess what it meant to be part of the team, putting myself and my wins aside and putting others first. And you can go on to say quickly, my behavior change instead of being frustrated with the poor performers,

because you go get the books, you can get all these details. Like you were the guy that was like, oh, you don't know how to do this? Cool. Good luck on the test. Yeah. Instead of being like,

oh, you don't know how to do this, let me help you. In my mind, your losses were my wins. You know what I mean? Like, and I, what I took on? was this like almost like I was the judge of whether you belong here. So we went and did some skill, some exercise. And you weren't as good as me.

I'm like, oh, you're not a very good. You must not be very good. You might not even belong here. And I had this air of judgment of like, if you didn't meet my personal standard, you were unsat. And it was like my little running mates, my boys, like we were tight. We were all the squared away guys. And instead of looking at it like, oh, that person's struggling needs some help.

I was just like, oh, that person doesn't. doesn't belong here. And like I said, like, it's so hard, it's so embarrassing to write. This is who I was. This is how I thought that was my behavior. Thank God. Cub, Cub Mary and sits down as like,

and slaps me across the face. I'm like, hey man, you have to change the way you see the world and yourself in it. And had I not had that conversation, I don't know where I would have gone, but it would not have been good. On podcast five. I read a counseling that I gave to a young seal lieutenant

and it was awful just like the most straightforward counseling listen your ego's giant no one likes you in the whole nine yards he got fired like he eventually got fired he did despite me just telling him the exact same thing he just thought oh well it looks like jaco's wrong too like everyone's just wrong you know I have a bad fitness report bad evaluation, I'm getting bad feedback from the training detachment. They're all obviously wrong.

Oh, now, Jocco wants to talk to me. Oh, Jocco's wrong too. You know what I mean? Like, it's crazy people. But the lack of self-awareness was epic. And this is when, you know, this would be like you're losing altitude and your instruments are going, you're losing altitude and you're losing altitude and you're losing altitude and you're just like, uh, I don't think that instrument is right.

And then whatever the secondary backup instrument says, you know, you're danger, danger, danger. And like, oh, that thing's wrong too. And then finally your wingman says, Dave, pull up, pull up, pull up. And you go, dude, what's wrong with him? What an idiot. Just ignoring it all.

But luckily, like I said, you say quickly my behavior change. Instead of being frustrated with poor performers, I try to find ways to help them. I would carry a heavier weapon on patrol if someone couldn't manage it. I cleaned extra gear. After a week in the field, if my squad was falling behind, I reviewed questions to prepare someone unsure of the material for a test. So you became a team player. Two months later, fast forward a little bit, two months later, the second round of peer reviews reflected that I was more humble, likable, and a better teammate.

The change in me had been measured and noticeable and not just by others. I felt better about how I conducted myself as a Marine. There was a tremendous satisfaction in being of service to someone other than myself. And that shift in attitude ended up giving me more than I could have anticipated. There is no greater pride than seeing someone. you've helped succeed. A few weeks before graduation, every lieutenant in Alpha Company lined up according to rank to select their MOS as the eighth Marine to step up to the board.

Cubs shook my hand, looked me in the eye, and said, congratulations, Lieutenant Burke. You've earned your shot at the cockpit of an F-18 Hornet. You're going to Pensacola to start flight training. I'd pulled the second pilot billet for my class. I was two of two. And the reason that is you were number eight. But not everybody wants to be a pilot. Some of the guys are head air slots or whatever.

Like thank God the math, you know, of the 250, I don't know what the final math was. It's still some crazy number. But there are plenty guys are already going and puny guys shockingly didn't want. They wanted to be infantry officers or whatever. So and, you know, they fail the, the flight physical. They don't have the eyes. You know, there's a weeding out process. But ultimately, even the two is a small number.

It's like to get that second slot was was a huge day from me. Who got the first slot? Dave. DC Anderson, Dave Anderson, my roommate, who, shockingly, two guys in the company, the first two guys were me and my roommate, Dave Anderson. Was he, what number was he? Was he number one, two, three, four?

I mean, a little memory, but like, he was probably like five, something great. Like he was just a couple ahead of me at the time, you know? And I remember there's a little, I didn't write about it in the book, but there's still like three weeks of TBS after you get your spot, and my rank like plummeted from like eight down to like 24.

or something like that because I'm like, oh, I got that hair slot, you know. The complacency chapter is next, but ultimately, like, when I got that, like, it was a huge burden lifted and I might not have put quite the same effort in. So I still finish as like a, you know, distinguished graduate, but I was like eight, like, and he was like fifth and both of us kind of like tapered off a little bit at the end there. I got mine. I got mine. Lots of lessons for a 21-year-old day, Burke, but in the day.

It's kind of funny, and you picture you sitting around and as a stock in Target. It's actually pretty impressive that you, like when you go to, uh, the military indoctrination courses, whether it's boot camp or OCS, whatever, there's like people in there that they were in the junior RTC program in high school or they were a prior enlisted guy. Like there's some people that have, or they're, you know, 24 years old. They have a couple more years of experience. So that's pretty, uh, impressive to do that well as a freaking target stock boy. A lesson when our ego, when our ego gets out of control. our leadership suffers, you must recognize the sound of your own ego and keep it in check.

Hear what it is telling you and actively choose to disregard what it says. When you refuse to listen to your ego, you not only subjugate your selfish interests, but also prioritize the team's well-being ahead of your own. And that's certainly contrary to many people that will tell you to look out for number one. And if you look out for number one, that'll work for a little while. Right. Like it did for you in the beginning of OCS. You were like helping your friends.

They were helping you a little bit and like you guys were dominating. But then it caught up with you. 100%. Don't let that happen. You have a little balance assessment exercise from Eschalon Fent here. It's pretty impressive to see. And your real world application. And again, you start with some quotes here.

This quote you start with is, I'm just being honest. If they can't handle the truth, that's on them. Once again. when it's a good little a little filter for us as leaders is when we hear the word they the words they or them when you're saying that it's just a little indicator you might want to check yourself you might be a little off track there um next chapter complacency is a killer and as you said this is the next chapter naval air station found out and this one there was something that i really liked about this chapter too because Well, we'll get to it, but this is another great chapter. Naval Air Station, Fallon, Nevada, Top Gun, Training Range, May 2005. So are you a Top Gun student in this one, or you know, I'm the senior, I'm the training officer. I'm the senior instructor at Top Gun.

Oh, that's right. I got mixed up because this is when you're, but you're going to scrap, right? Yes. I'm going to scrap with the guy, this is the commanding officer of the top gun. Viper. Trim Downing. Is that Viper? He's equivalent of Viper?

That's him in the movie. Echo, are you tracking? Yes. Yeah. Because there's Viper and then Jester. Yeah. But Jester's, Jester's an instructor.

Yeah. This is Viper. This is the man. I thought. Fast forward a little bit. My opponent was Tom Downing the commanding officer, CEO of Top Gun, call sign trim. He was the stuff of legend, a three-time instructor and my current boss and closest mentor. He enjoyed one of the best reputations in all of naval aviation.

Working for and with him was something I didn't take for granted. Now you go through like you kind of set this up and I'll fast forward a little bit Fights on we both barked into the radio as we scream past each other and oh it was on and that's the way you guys set up your fights you go at each other right and then is it a mutual fun or is it When you pass each other fights on it's set up there's a bunch of different ones this one was it's designed to be neutral we we don't want to You don't want to give an advantage because you're trying to assess a perfectly neutral start so you set it up where it's gonna be the same altitude the same speed. Everything is the same.

So when you say fights on, you are starting at a level playing field. So the outcome is like there is no, oh, he was faster. It's a neutral start. What aircraft is he flying? We're both in F-18. Oh, okay.

So this is like, this is a scrap. This is as man in the box is it ever going to get. Check, full scrap. I slammed both throttles forward to full after burner. Get some. 8.1 G's maximum performance.

Get that. Giant vapor clouds. exploding. Dude, okay, when I was like preparing for this podcast, I had this in mind. I'm going to do it. 8.1G maximum performance. Giant vapor clouds exploding. Keep the blood where you need it most in your head. Jet speed G, bank angle, altitude airspeed, micro adjustments, change in angle, horizon, stick pressure. I wanted this win. Swung around. High assback merge. When again. Fire. Engines. Two dragons. each other up see where I'm going with this I just like pulled out like keywords and it's freaking epic so get the book everybody there you go there's your clip for a book advertisement

my advantage grew so you explain like the little things that are going on yeah my advantage grew stomped full left rudder slam the stick to the left redefinition this is another thing this is a term that I love from aviation that I learned from you more speed offensive I set my jet up for the loop extra speed attack position approach the apex I looked back over my shoulder so all that those like freaking power words bro freaking hype now I'm going to read a little bit knowing his exact location would help me reorient my nose as I came back around the other side of the loop and aligned my gun sight he wasn't there I flashed over the other shoulder.

Not there either. My head shot back and forth once more. Trim had vanished. I craned my neck as far as it would bend looking directly behind me, verifying that the impossible hadn't happened. Only it had. There was Trim,

perched precisely 1,000 feet behind me as if attached to my plane like a glider by a tether, latching him into the tail textbook position to finish the fight the nose of his hornet presenting a view i'd seen many many times before but didn't want today he was in the gun envelope as i brought my jet up after the last merge he had looped along with me reversed his flight path and turned tightly inside the arc i had flown through the sky bringing his jet to rest in the only place he could shoot me game over trim old school fighter pilot legend part-time comedian and father figure to every instructor at top gun keyed the microphone he didn't gloat he wasn't calling his shot verifying his accuracy or announcing me dead like standard radio protocol dictated all i heard was laughter and it was awful Come on.

That's freaking epic, dude. Humility, right? You know, you, so, so very humbling situation. You get to the debrief with Trim. And, oh, this was good. He says, don't chalk it up to me being better than you. Don't let that be your excuse. I didn't do anything you couldn't have done.

You just didn't consider all the possibilities or you would have entered that last turn differently. Instead of max performing the jet like you had the entire day, you were a little lazy. You just floated over the top of that loop. You could have done more with it, but you were content with what you had because 99.9% of the time, what you had would have been enough to win. It's pretty rare given how good we've gotten, but that can be the difference. Be unrelenting.

Leave nothing to chance ever. Coax every inch out of that jet. It could save your life. life. I know that next time you will be prepared for that. He closed by bellowing the signature line he used any time he expected more from someone. Come on, man.

And that was that. What a freaking story of complacency. Now when he said that to you, are you like, bro, I was doing the best I could, or are you like, oh, no, he's freaking knows 100%. I did not push it the way I should have. Yeah. This is the only chapter in the book. Well, every chapter is, like I said,

you want to read embarrassing stories about Dave by this book? Because every chapter is like, this guy's an idiot. This one was really, really important that I got the details right because there's so much detail in these dog fights. And he and I are so close. He's close. I send him the chapter and like, please read this, edit it and make sure it's right

because I really want to capture. I can't use all the words he used in the book because kids might read this book. But ultimately, I'm catching the sentiment. And he kind of walked me through that. And we reminisced about it a little bit. He remembers it well, too, because it was a pretty epic fight. And he and I had a really, really good relationship.

There was, I don't mean this in an arrogant way. There's nothing he said that I didn't already know. He was just like, I, I'm like, I'm still doing this. I am the training officer at Top Gunn. I am the most senior pilot. I am flying more than anyone. I'm as I'm the I is the best I will ever be at dog fighting an airplane that at the peak and I'm I'm still learning the same lesson I've been been taught since I was like five years old like so there's a sense of frustration but not a sense of resistance of the accuracy of what he was saying and I just I'm like gosh damn and that's why he's like come all man like yeah you know better yeah but to his point I had been doing this so long and would gotten so comfortable that as I start that last loop,

I'm like, I know what's going to happen. I know what's going to happen. And to be quite honest, if it was anybody else, it would have happened exactly how I thought, but not him. And so part of it is him like, dude, come on, man.

And there's obviously a bunch more detail in there, but I didn't push back and resist. It was 100% true. Yeah, it's very, very similar to Jiu-Jitsu, right? And like, there's those moments like wrestling, coaches are really into this like they'll say you keep wrestling right like you keep wrestling

and if echo and I are going and like we're in a scramble and there's movement and there's movement and there's movement there's like the minutes one of us backs off just a slight little tiny bit the other person's going to get the upper hand and you know like wrestling coach is like you've got to keep wrestling until you get the thing you want and it sounds like that one like you're like oh I'm in a position where I'm pretty much good to go and then boom you get caught yeah And you, it's funny because you were reading my words. I'm hearing it's so cool to listen to you read it. But before you started going into the book, you were talking about the idea of the moment, like, I forgot the word you used like crystallizing or coalescing or the awareness that you have.

I had learned complacency a thousand times. I probably taught other people complacency a thousand times. This was the one of all the times I learned it. This is the one that stuck. This is where it stuck. This is the moment I'm like and it's not because I'd never heard it before or didn't know. I was subjected to it. It was because this is the one that stuck in that moment.

And this was the easiest one to write about because it's like, it's a lesson I'd heard a thousand times. I heard the word complacency a thousand times in my life. This is the one that stuck. Yeah. And this is like when I was reading this, you know, you and I were talking before here, record today. You're like, dude, I don't know if this is a good book or not.

Like, I can't tell. And I understand that, I understand that thought pattern of like, well, you know, you wrote it. it's hard to judge something right but when i was reading that chapter i was like oh hell yeah this is a good book like this that's a great that's a great freaking story and it's written great and the characters are great it's like you know you can just picture when you got to that part the nice little setup with like he didn't follow the protocol he didn't say terminate he just was laughing and i can just oh man that's like the perf there was a time there was a guy uh

when we would do sim munition fighting and there was a guy who was one of the SEAL cadre this was when I wasn't a SEAL team two and one of the cadre instructor was this freaking awesome guy and he was we would do sim munition against him

he would always be opt for because he was in the cadre and we called him simi timmy because he like you could tell he liked like the simunition but like we'd be clearing a house or something and you'd hear him like cackling. You'd hear him like laughing like he knew we were coming

and you'd hear him laughing and you're like oh damn or like you see two guys go into a room and then you'd hear like a bunch of ammunition fire and then you'd hear him laughing and you'd be like yo this is gonna suck. So props to Simmy Timmy wherever you are these days we appreciate the good training and props to trim keeping it real.

A lesson. Complacency must be resisted at all times. Real world application. Again you begin with a quote Joe's in the hospital. The room went dead silent. As someone made the announcement, the ambulance got him there in record time, but we don't know what's going on just yet.

It's not good. And here you are working with an energy company. And it's like, you know, I'm not going to go into the whole story, get the book, but, you know, one of the things that gets said quickly, relatively quickly is, looks like it was a freak accident. And guess what?

Can you do anything about a freak accident? Not really. Can you do anything about an accident? Sure, you can put protocols about the freak accident. You're kind of like not, maybe not all that responsible anymore. But let's not play that game. Yeah. So this next one, chapter four, detachment is a superpower.

Naval Air Station, Pensacola, water survival training. Which way is up? how much time do I have being upside down feels disorienting on dry land underwater it's wholly unnatural I tried to get free but it was taking longer than I thought it would relax as much as as much as I craved being out of this contraption nothing was going to change the fact that I was still submerged my movements became erratic time raced my heart rate did the same I flailed around the confined metal box as spooked as a bird trying to escape the clutches of something grabbing it everything about my movements telegraphed panic in theory all I had to do

is tilt my head down toward my waist to locate and unhook a simple metal buckle from there a few faint wiggles of my shoulder would have released the straps that were keeping me attached once loose I could have gently let momentum carry me for a few feet deeper under the cockpit so I could swim free kick a little to the side and glide to the surface with ease but rather than following the slow and methodical technique we were shown I reached up in a panic, grabbed the top of the cockpit railing, pulled my way harder than I needed, and smashed my helmet into the rail. It shifted violently on my head, covering my eyes, and cracked the bridge of my nose, shrouding me in darkness. So there you go, a little helo. Is that

Helodunker or is that a cockpit dunker or is that a cockpit dunker? That's the deal. That's a cockpit dumper right before the helodunker. Yeah. And wasn't going well. Did not go well. uh water is such an incredible educator and really you know this is one of those things where you hope that guys in seal training make the connection the way that you pass because you go through things that are 10 times or if not 20 times worse than this thing right here in seal training it's freaking ridiculous and what you learn is like if you freak out you 100 percent are going to fail. Like there's no,

you will fail. Yep. And you do that shit over and over and over again. And what you have to do is learn to go, take a breath, relax,

and detach. And that's what, that's just, the importance of that is crazy. The crazy thing is, though, my point in saying all that is, it's no guarantee

that a seal takes that mess methodology and applies it to shit going crazy on the ground or someone yelling and screaming at him or their freaking spouse you know raising their voice of them like all these things where you could apply the same protocol but you never got taught like hey by the way the way the what you have to do when you're underwater You got to do the same thing when you're getting in an argument with your platoon chief or you're getting an command an argument with your platoon commander like we just the same thing it's the same thing it's the same thing you You're not going to improve your situation if you freak out.

It's not going to happen. Do they ever refer back to this when they were teaching you like, hey, you're going to have multiple bogeys. You're going to be panic. Did they ever refer back to this or is it also disconnected like it is in the single teams? Yeah, this one is everybody does this. So there's this like common understanding and appreciation of this. The thing that's crazy about this story is like that Dilbert Dunker is what they call it. It's just the single place cockpit dunker.

it didn't even count. Like it was like they called it an exposure event. Like you couldn't actually even fail it. Even if you failed it, you couldn't quote unquote fail. Now, what you could do is draw a lot of attention to yourself, which I did. And that's part of the rest of it. But this thing was like kind of like irrelevant by the time I got there, like aged out. It'd been in 30, 40 years and they were getting rid of it.

And so they let us do it, but it wasn't like scored. And I still screwed it up. And something I've always always liked when you and I talked. talk just kind of war stories and history is the uniqueness for the seals and special operations and uniqueness for the carrier and aviation is the water. It just, there's nothing else like it. It's the great equalizer that is an environment that you cannot replicate. And how you behave underwater is a great barometer of like how well you can do the things

you just said. And this one was like, oh, this is going to be fun. I can't wait. I saw this in the movies. It's in an officer and a gentleman. This can be super cool. It doesn't count. It's all cool.

And like 10 seconds in when I'm like freaking out. So much so then, you know, I was, my, my nose got like bludied a little bit. Like, it was a thing. And like the divers see this kid like, whoa, this, hey, pay attention to this kid. Watch this kid. Watch this guy. So things got sideways pretty quick. The water is the, I don't think there's a better teacher in the world.

And the world's where we came from, the water's the best teacher. It will, it will cause you. problems if you don't handle it correctly. Officer and a gentleman. Did you see that prior to going in? Totally. Did that come out? That's pre-top gun, right?

That's like, I think it's 70s. Yeah, it's definitely pre-top gun. But we all knew it was the guys, you know, guy went to Pensacola to fly jets. So we all, we'd all seen that movie. That's a good movie. Echo Charles, you've seen an officer and a gentleman? Yeah, one else super little.

Yeah, you got to see it again. I think it actually, uh, what's that expression? It kind of keeps up or whatever. What's the expression? Oh yeah, it holds up. It holds up. Yeah, it holds up. Yeah, check that one out.

Officer and a gentleman. The thing, the reason that I think Seals know about officer and gentleman is because the term DOR is heavy in that movie. I want you. A deal or mayonnaise. DOR. But otherwise, you would never use that term in the civilian world. It's not even a thing.

But in Buds, it's a DOR. It's drop on request. You know, you're quitting. So, yeah, that's what they, at OCS, it's, it's, it's a DOR. That's what, that's what quitting was. So that, that, that's in the, in the vernacular. The movie's in the vernacular. Especially you want to, you'll be a fly jets.

My grandmother wants to fly jets. And like, the guy was a Marine gunnery sergeant, so we all had a little connection to that for sure. Um, my, my point and the part of the book is taking that protocol from the water. And it's the, it's the, it's the, it's the, it's the, kind of most mechanical and obvious form of detachment. But taking that and then being able to apply it to the rest of your life is the point that you're trying to make in this book.

And it's a very obvious example. If you freak out underwater, if you get wrapped up in the emotions of it, if you get wrapped up in the panic of it, you are going to die or at least fail. And the same exact emotions that you can feel or maybe. not the same exact emotions, sometimes the same emotions, sometimes sort of adjacent emotions, anger, frustration, those similar emotions will cause you the same problems from a leadership perspective. And that's why we have to learn to detach from our emotions and detach from our ego. And that's exactly what we say here in the lesson. When we can't detach from our ego,

emotions and point of view, the team suffers. So the physical, and for me, for me, I got to see it. It was a physical detachment. Like I didn't connect the water piece of it. I connected it to, and I told the story in leadership strategy and tactics, like being on a skirmish line and like no one making any decisions and taking a step back and looking around and going, oh, okay, cool. It was for me a physical detachment. And then when I saw other people physically detach and see them be able to open up their field of view and do a better job of leading, that's where I really saw it for the first time. And I kind of post that connected it back to, well, man, when you're in the water and the seal

teams, you learn to relax. And by the time you're skydiving, skydiving is the same thing. Like if you freak out when your parachute doesn't work, you start to panic. Dude, you're not going to survive. You're going to freaking die. So this idea of taking what happens in the physical world that forces you to detach because when you're detaching from your emotions, you can't see those. When you're attaching from your ego, you can't see that.

but you have to learn to identify those things and then detach from them. And that's what, you know, that's the critical point in your book. And you actually outline some of the red flags that people need to have that let people know that, look, it's not a physical thing, but there's some physical indications that you might get like, and you've got the list here, grinding your teeth, clenching your fists, raising your voice. That probably should be number one. Getting warm. By the way, there's also some people that when they get mad, they stop talking.

Or they start getting quieter, but even more than that, they're just not going to, like, just I'm not going to respond to that. You know, so they just sit there. So if you're not talking anymore, oh, that could be your emotions. Getting warm, flushed, red-faced. Yep, that can happen. Withdrawing from a conversation, there you have it. Whatever you identify in yourself that marks the first escalation of those emotions. So getting to know yourself well enough that.

when you start losing your temper or becoming wrapped up in your emotions or becoming wrapped up in your ego? For me, one thing I like about the ego one is a lot of times your ego, the insult to your ego isn't, oftentimes isn't a direct assault in the moment, right? Sometimes it's like, oh, Dave sends me an email, hey, Jonco, I looked at your plan and there's a couple things that I don't think are gonna work well.

Like you're not yelling at me, we're not in each other's face. You just sent me an email, right? But I have time to go, what the hell is Dave talking? But I have time to go, tell us Dave's talking, who do you think he is? Look, I'm the freaking CEO of this company. His ideas don't even actually matter. You know what I'm saying?

Like you can go through all those things, and you go, hold on a second, oh, oh, I see what this is. This is my ego. And I love those moments where I'm able to go, oh, oh, what could this be? What could this negative feeling I'm feeling right now? Could this be that,

that little nasty thing. Yes. So recognizing that, you have, sometimes you have a little bit more time to recognize that it's your ego. Sometimes your emotions catch people just way off guard.

And they've lost their minds. They've yelled and screamed. And it's like, whoa, okay. Well, hold on a second here. Sometimes you got to, so you've got to be more proactive in learning what those things are so that you don't get caught by them.

Yeah. And you talk about seeing it other people. I think the cool part about, you go from the Dilbert Dunker, you're by yourself in this little cockpit muckup underwater. The next thing you're in this fake helicopter and there's eight of you.

And that's one was like, I'm looking on them like, holy cow. Like people, they all reacted. Some guys are totally good to go, but the guys that were not, I mean, they're a full blown freak out on this thing and you can see that and you're like, whoa. So a lot of that was just the observing

how other people are reacting in the same environment as you. And I go through in a bunch of detail, but part of that helodunker is like, dude, that dude is completely losing his mind right now underwater. And you can see that. I mean, like, oh man.

you got it you got to you got to detach you got to step away from that thing or it's going to it's going to run you into the ground can I tell a quick can I tell a quick uh adjacent story so my platoon is going to Fallon back in the day and we're going up to do a bunch of you know CSR missions and call for fire and cast and all that stuff and my platoon commander has the idea of like hey if I can get the guys backseat rides in the F-18s they'll understand what it's like on the ground, blah, blah, blah. Good call. So in order to do that, we have to go to Merrimar,

and we have to get training, right? So we go through, I don't remember if we did the, I think we did do, no, we didn't do the Dilbert Dunker, but we did ejection sheet training. Totally. Dilbert's probably long gone by then, but yeah, the water survival stuff is all there in Miramar. So we did the thing where you sit in a,

in a flight seat, and you pull the freaking ejection handle. We do that. We do the helo dunker. did. And the first thing we did in the morning was we went to classes. But the classes were kind of like, oh, you got to go classes. But in order to get in the cockpit, you got to do the ejection seat thing and you got to do the dunker thing. Well, one of my friends will call him Zulu, which was his nickname, the Zulu cat. He shows up late, like whatever he, partying or whatever he shows up late. He misses the classes. Well, in the classes, you learned how to breathe.

Like you learn how to push the blood up into your head when you're doing, when you're flying in G's. And so he missed those classes. And we didn't, you know, we didn't think anything of it. We're just like, oh, whatever. You know, like he shows up late. We're now in the dunker and he gets the call. So he has the piece of paper so he can go in the aircraft. And we get up there.

He went on an on an F-18 ride. And he just passed out the whole time. He just didn't know how to breathe. And so he's just like passing out. And he was like, hey, do you remember it? He's like, no. He's just the little video of him. just passing out over and over again.

Every time they hit, geez, he was just passing out. Go to those classes. It's one of the rare cases where it's like, hey, you might want to be in that class. Real world application, once again, starts with a quote. If I hear about one more discount, I'm going to lose it. Mary was a sales manager, a large commercial flooring firm that we had been consulting with for several months.

Sales had recently increased and their business looked solid. but lately some conflicts had developed between the sales team and the rest of the firm Mary was not happy and didn't hold back boom so we get some information there about some mistakes that Mary made and how we can proceed in a better direction um let's cover one more chapter today uh this is chapter five and this was another chapter uh you know so now that I'm Now that I'm like reassessing these chapters, freaking good lessons, really good lessons. I'm going to have to reassess, which if I force rank these chapters, I'm going to have to reassess my force ranking.

This one's called perfection is a lie. And it says, wave off, wave off. The landing signal officer LSO snapped at me in a frustrated voice bordering on disgust. A wave off is an unsafe landing pass that needs to be discontinued. His words rattled around in my head as I reflexively accelerated my F-18 in response to the call and started my climb up and past the aircraft carrier dumbfounded. I hadn't even started the final descent of my very first landing and the LSO was already sending me away to try it again. Did that just happen?

I silently asked myself as I wrestled to regain my composure. So that's the opening. After that, you give like a little what it means. What the how the, all this crazy ass situation that it is land in one of these things. It's freaking nuts. And you go through a bunch of that and you're talking about how you get to this point.

You've got a little graph in here of the ball and what that looks like. Is this your first time landing on an aircraft carrier? here? No, I had already been to the boat in training in the T-45. I had done, I don't know, 12 or some, some day number of landings. I'd already been to the carrier. In what aircraft? The T-4 trainer, T-45 was a jet trainer. It was in flight school. It was the last thing you do in flight school before you finish flight training. Now, is that like, is it kind of like training wheels? Is it an easier aircraft to fly or is it the same difficulty? It's not any, it's, it may be even a little bit

Harder than the horn it's really once you get figured out it's pretty easy jet to fly but the T45 is a pretty What's what I'm gonna? Very forgiving airplane. So it's really well positioned for a student taken to the boat to the first time T45 is a really good airplane for a student by himself and I'd already done that in in flight school before I finished flight And that's like 12 times 10 or 12 day landings I'd already on a on an aircraft on a regular buyer like full up full up round normal carrier landings I'd already done it had that check in the block do you just land and then? and take off again? Yeah, you do. Or are you at sea for a little while? No, like my recollection in my T-45, like I flew out on, like on one day, got six, went home, went at the next day, got six, went home and I was done.

Never spent the night in the ship, just did six landings, went back to the beach, as they say, did it two days in a row and I was good to go. Because that's like, sometimes when a student is really jacked up, they'll do something like make them wear an orange helmet or something like that. This seems like an orange helmet situation. One is a little bit different because you got, you have to do day and nights. You just spend the night, you're spending several days on the, on the carrier The day stuff in the training command is mostly just out and back.

But if you had to land on the aircraft and hang out, they'd see you getting out of your T-45 and they're like kind of, you're just a red helmet. Oh my God. Totally. So now, is this your first time landing an F-18 on the carrier? Yes. This is it.

Your first go. First landing attempt of my very first carrier approach in the F-18. And you get the wave off. I'm like halfway through the approach. She's like, go away. Come back. Do it again. Okay, you circle back around, going to the book here.

Another approach, six seconds. Crap, too much power. I was floating. Three seconds. No way this can be salvaged. The ball was shooting off the top of the lens, and you explain what all that means. Barely visible, then, bam. My plane forcefully rebounded off the flight deck and right back into the air.

Bolter, bolter, bolter, the LSO said in a not so subtle mocking voice, extending the O sound and laying on the snark nice and thick. This was all in an effort to tell me what I was already, what was already so completely obvious. Although a boulter is a safe pass, my jet didn't come to a stop. I missed the wires and had to come around yet again. Oh my God, not again.

My mind went berserk. So a boulter's not, a boulter is safe. Yeah, there's nothing too crazy about a boulter. You just got a little high. You miss the four wires. You hit the landing, you hit the deck and you go back up. It's not, it's not the most dangerous thing in the world. It's just a little high.

Do you know that you miss the wires? Yeah. There's no, they don't need to say bolter. Because you're not like, oh, I wonder if I'm going to stop. Like you stopped. The second you touch the deck and you're getting in the wires, it's instantaneous. So the bolter is like, it's just kind of laying it on. And the way that they're like, bolter, bolter, bolter.

Like, like, and it's on the prime radio, everybody in the world hears it. It's just kind of like, they're just like laughing at you, basically. God. Hey, how do your wheels, do your wheels go over the wires? Well, I mean, it depends on how you are. But yeah, if you miss all four wires, your tires will, will land just past that fourth wire. And you just hit the ground and bounce right back up. But when you do successfully land, you're, you just go right over the top.

Correct. You're like rolling over the cables. Yep, that's right. So now this ain't good. What part of what part of this was your own like personal humiliation and what part of it was real humiliation? In other words, are they like, oh my God, what a piece of shit? No. Are they just like, hey, this guy's a new guy.

Hey, whatever. Bolt. They're making fun of you a little bit. But in your mind is it, it's a hundred percent internal. It's a hundred like there is. Listen, landing a horn on the boat is especially the first time is dead serious. They're not even messing around. They have nothing but your best interest in mind.

And so even these calls, like, I'm probably in my own mind. Like, I'm magnifying them dramatically. And I talk about it in the book later, like, what even happened on these two? Like, to them, they're like, dude, this is, yeah, you're in training, bro. Like, this is, it's okay. But in my mind, I'm like, my life is over. My life is over. And keep in mind, 14-year-old Dave Brooks,

like, I'm gonna land planes on boats. I do all the wickets you talked about. I'm on the last, the, it's, and I mean literally, this is the last, I had done every other flight there was, I will have two days of the carrier, and I'm done. And all I want to do is go to a boat squadron. So up to this point, like, all right, everything's good.

Just prove to us you can land on a boat and you're gonna get to the go to that, your childhood dream is gonna come true. And I'm like, out of the gate over to what's the attrition rate of people that can't get a board and I'm using that expression because I don't like that expression that expression that expression echo Charles is like there's sometimes some people they cannot land on an aircraft carrier 100% and what's the percentage it's how it's

it's it's higher in flight school like I don't know what the number is but plenty of dudes wash out of flight school because of the boat and guys that have done everything right until the very end can't land on a boat they go fly C-1 30s they go fly helicopters or they just get washed out of aviation altogether. It's not a big number, but it's, it's plenty of guys. Like, I remember when I went to the boat in training in my class of probably eight, two guys didn't finish. And that's like, damn, it's not, 25%.

And not to mention, like, it's the very, it's the last thing you, so the amount of training has gone into that. In the Hornet, it's a little bit lower. The interesting about the Hornet for the Marine Corps, unlike the Navy, is that most of the Hornet squads than Marine Corps are not boat squadrons. So if it turns out like being around the carrier isn't quite your thing, you can be a really good Hornet pilot in a land-based non-carrier squadron. No factor. That's not what I wanted.

I wanted to be in a boat squadron. So this, this is a built, this is, how many boat squadrons are there? At the time that were four in all of the Marine Corps. How many are there now? Maybe, maybe two. Two. It's a small, it's, it's, it's, that is kind of like, you talk about, wickening. Rickets.

Marine Carriers squad. That's like that's that's there's nothing more narrow. Yeah. That's it. Golden. What is it? What's the blue angel? Very different.

I meant from like training to get to the squadron you want to go to and top gun blue are very different. But like the wickets of what squad you want to end up in like you talk about splitting hairs like the squadron right next to that squadron is a single seat land base squadron. Like who what? the margin for that is just like immeasurably small. It's a wicket that you could barely account for.

And it is weird, you know, as we talked about the fact that, you know, everyone's got different skills and like someone has good musical ears and someone else has a good, good reaction time that they're born. So they're a little bit better at baseball or whatever. You can go down the list of these things. And then the same thing happens in the SEAL teams where someone makes it through buds. And they, there's some skill that they just, they just can't do. Maybe it's shooting a pistol. Maybe it's like one out of every probably 300 people. Yeah.

Just can't get qualified on the weapons. And that's, you can't be a seal if you can't shoot a weapon. Or there's like close quarters combat where you go through that for the first time. That has an attrition rate. And sometimes it's like, you know, someone to get rolled once. But if you get rolled, if you get rolled once and then you have to get rolled again, like, are you really, is this really, this is the right job for you? Yeah.

But it's probably not the right job for you. Yeah. So occasionally someone that goes through every wicket. and suffers all the suffering, but they just don't have that last little thing to get the job done. All right, so let's pick this up now. You're going to go on your third approach

or you're getting ready to start your third approach and you say, emotion tried to overtake me. By the way, this could have been the detachment chapter, right? I mean, I was like, this is a really good detain. And I was kind of bummed that the detachment chapter was already over because you clearly,

had to freaking reset your brain. Emotion tried to take over, emotion tried to overtake me. I was at the same time, angry, embarrassed, frustrated, and full of doubt. If I didn't pull it together immediately, I'd seal my fate. I calculated I needed six perfect passes

to get me out of this hole. And I mean perfect. Another bolter or wave off would spell doom. Is that in your head? Totally. much like I needed to stop overreacting to my current emotions I also had to stop overreacting to the movement of the ball I had to be smoother on the throttles more subtle more the more erratic I was the more the LSO would see I wasn't cut out for carrier life what was the LSO actually thinking like oh new guy he'll get it dialed but in your mind that guy's not for care of your life totally the ship was no place for Rade nerves, unpredictable reactions are subpar flying. It was a place for perfection.

And I was going to show that I could deliver it starting right now. I relaxed. Man, I wish you would put it, I should have caught this. You should have put detached there. I detached. And once again, my downwind checks were complete. Fastward a little bit. 233. Hornet ball 3.9.

Roger Ball. Caden started. Don't overreact. Here comes the ramp. Six seconds, three seconds. Bam. Tug. And I just read some keywords because I like these keywords.

I'm getting from this book. And then it's time to get fuel. And you went through almost an exact repeat of the previous. And you start doing this over and over again. You do three more landings. And you get done. What else? What I miss there?

You got it. That's it. I get my next six or seven, whatever, what the number was. And I finish my what in my mind is like my day requirements. Day time requirements are done. Now, is it worth saying right now, what were you doing to make sure that you made that happen? Yeah, I mean, there's a, there's, I mean, it's very obvious. You've noticed it like each chapter is, the principle doesn't like live by itself.

And so, you know, the, the ego chapter is connected to the complacency chapter, connected to the, you know, the, the, the, the, the attachment connected to this concept of perfection. in my mind, I am so afraid of revealing my inability to be what I think is required for the ship, which is essentially as close to perfection as possible, that what I tell myself is like, hey, just calm down, which is in some sense a really good thing. The point that I make in my head is like, if it's a little bit low or a little bit high, like it's okay. Don't, don't like overreact to that because then it's going to get really erratic. So just be smoother, be a little more calm.

be a little more subtle in my corrections. And I tell me like, that's the, that's the answer here. Because before I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, all over the place. I'm so high or so out of the norm. The LSO is like, hey, dude, go away. You're unsafe. Try this again. I'm like, not this time.

I'm going to be much more smooth and subtle and much less reactive to the deviations. So you end up, it's time for a little bit of a debrief. And you say, I was met by the lone senior LSO, Chip. which is your call sign. Chip, that was not the performance I expected from you. He said without so much as a greeting, handshake or customary, welcome aboard that acknowledges a career milestone.

Is that a real thing? You land on the boat. The first thing they'd say is welcome aboard. Is that after you do it six times and like you're qualified or is it just like the first time you do it? The first time you get out of the jet on a carrier. It's like that had never happened to me before. Oh, because you're going to get it.

You're getting out of the jet for the first time on a carrier. You're aboard the ship. You get out of a carrier. out of your jet and you're on a carrier, you're going to like a ready room or a state room. Like, this is my first time I've ever set foot on a boat. Damn. And, you know, the customary thing is like, welcome aboard.

And it's kind of like, it's a little thing. Like, hey, hey, you're here. Good job. But you don't get that. I don't get that. Fast forward a little bit. You were low. He agreed emphatically.

What I can't figure out is why would you keep the ball low all day? As soon as you see that ball drop below the datums, what does it tell you? So explain to me what was happening. You explained in the book, but just give me, I don't want to reach your whole book. Short version is like, so as I'm, the ball is always moving up and down. It's never like perfectly steady. It's constantly moving, a little bit, hopefully. And what I was seeing was like as the ball went low, like a tiny, like, and you can see perceptibly, like, pretty small amount of, I'm like barely low.

I'm like, oh, that's fine, right? Like what's a quarter of a of a of a datum low? It's you know, it's almost imperceptible. And in your mind is it if you're if you're a little bit low? Yeah. You're going to hit. You're going to land. You're going to be fine.

Yeah. Whereas a little bit a little bit, a little bit of either thing is totally fine in your brain, right? And what you're thinking is like, so here's the thing. If the ball is in the middle, they called a centered ball, you're going to go right into the, right, the target wires like just before the three wire. If it's a tiny bit high, you might still get the three. And if it's sort of high, you'll still get the four. And if it's a little bit low, you'll get the two. So you've got some wiggle room there.

And I explain it's not a lot, but you've got some. And you can be pretty precise in it. I had gotten to a place where I was like, if I take a little low and I overreact and it goes really high, that's like, I'm erratic. And I'm inconsistent. And that's, then I'm going to miss again. I'm going to go around again for the third time. So when I see that low, I'm like, I'll just. kind of ride that thing a little bit.

And I, and if you kind of just stabilize it and keep it from dropping, you know, you're a little low. Okay, a little low. And that's, those are all the things in my head, like don't overreact, which is also like, don't let them see that you're freaking out. Just be cool, be calm. And what I did is like,

be cool, be perfect. Yeah, and don't, because if I move it, that means I was, I'm revealing that I'm making correction, which is I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to show that I was off. And, um, I kind of like just accepted it. He goes on to tell you, bolters will happen.

It's no big deal, especially at this point of your career. But if you get in the habit of dragging in that low, pretending it's okay, not making constant adjustments one way, and then the other, one day you'll meet the ramp. And then he delivered the kicker. And do you think I wouldn't see that you were low? He stopped talking, letting that sink in. Why did I think I could hide that from him?

I think I was fooling. After he knew his point had landed, he continued. Chip, there is no perfect pass. After hundreds of practice passes at the field, you know that. You've been to the ship before. You know that. You are making adjustments and corrections to your errors all the time. In fact, the sooner you accept your deviations, the faster you'll fix them, and the better

you will get. I'm not looking for perfect. I'm just looking for correct. The worst thing you can do is hide from making them, especially at the ship. I mean, it's so, it's so painful hearing you read my words and recounting that story. And you can, you're doing, you're being nice in terms of, you picture that he's like, Chip, what are you doing? Like, he's so mad at me. He's so, like, annoyed at me.

Yeah, I'm being me. You're being, you're being you. You can picture this guy. He's like, dude, what did you think? I wasn't going to see it. Like, he's so frustrated because he's telling me something that he knows I know. And he's like, bro, did you think in your second first day in the Hornet ever, I wouldn't, the guy who's waived thousands and thousands and thousands of landing.

Like, you're going to sneak this by me? So he's kind of looking to me like credulous and just like it's such a hard thing to have to recount because his debrief to me was just like he's so disappointed that I thought I was doing the right thing when deep down I knew that I wasn't and he's like what are you doing and it's that whole point of like if I'm a if and I'm talking like in my mind like I'm just a tiny bit low it's like nobody sees this don't it and don't do anything just leave it and he's looking to me like are you are Are you kidding me? Did you actually think as a student in your first trip of the carrier?

You're so smooth and so like, it's like, what's wrong with you? Just, just fly the way I taught you out of fly. And he was just, he was so, it was like, you know, like when your dad is, not like he wasn't mad. He was disappointed in, in my own stupidity. Having to recount that story at that stage in my career is like really hard lesson to have to admit because he's looking like, you, he's like, he could not believe how dumb. And it just passed after pass.

Like seven in a row, the same thing. But they weren't unsafe like, I'm gonna hit the ship. So they didn't, he just kind of watched me like, he's probably leading those ones like, this idiot's gonna do it again, isn't he? Boom, same thing, boom, same thing, boom, same thing. And I'm like, oh, they don't see it.

I'm so good to go. I saved, I salvaged it. And clearly the exact opposite. When I went to OCS, you know, you get into the chow hall and they're like, don't look at your meal, right? They're like, don't look at your food. They're called it squaring your meal.

you look straight ahead and you put your fork down and you grab whatever you can in your peripheral vision then you bring it up to you did did you that OCS what? No different thing yeah we definitely stared at our food oh shit so they called it squaring your meals and you went you had to look straight ahead and you could move your fork at a 90 degree angle out from your head

and then 90 degree angle down to your plate get food on it through your peripheral vision bring it straight up in front of you and then bring it straight back to your mouth and they're yelling at us this is like literally day one of OCS Yes. And so we're sitting down to eat and they're yelling, you know, don't look at your food. And I'm sitting there.

I'm going, dude, there's no way they're going to be able to tell that I look down at my food because I got to see what I'm putting on my fork, you know? So I just like, which my eyes only just like glanced out. And I mean, I might as well have just shot off a red star cluster. These freaking de-eyes were all over me. And I was like, oh, damn. And then fast forward 13 weeks or 12 weeks. Now I'm one of the student, uh, whatever officer leader guys.

And sure enough, like, they might as well shoot off a red star cluster. And that kind of reminds me of this story. You're thinking you're all like sneaky. So smooth. Yeah. Lesson here is perfection doesn't exist. So don't demand it. One thing I loved about this is so and you and I had a discussion about this before.

The landing grades on a aircraft carrier. There's one that's called cut pass. And this is an unsafe pass with unacceptable deviations. This is like you probably are you getting written. up for that? Yeah, that's like cut pass is very rare. You have a cut pass. There's a decent chance you're going to get kicked off the ship. It's that bad. It's like you're going to die if we don't intervene and you can't do that. The next one is a wave off, which is an unsafe pass that needs to be discontinued. So yep, you're on the wrong approach or whatever, too fast, too slow, something

like that. The next one is no grade. And this is a pass with larger deviations, poor corrections, or no response to LSO calls. So that's called no grade, meaning like that's not Good. Not good. Then you have a bolter, which we discussed, a safe pass where the jet doesn't come to a stop. And then you have fare, which is a pass with some safe deviations and appropriate corrections.

And the best grade that you can possibly get that they will give you is an okay. And an okay is a pass with only minor deviations because no matter how perfect you think they are, they're all going to have minor deviations. So perfection is a lie. And that is the lesson for this one. Close out with this one today. This is the real world application. And once again, you start with a quote.

Did you think you were starting with quotes every time or just something? It didn't until you, it didn't, it was not a design technique. It's just me recalling, okay, what was this conversation? And it's always like them like just blorting something angry. Like that's the start of the conversation of my mind. Each time it's them completely violating the principle in one sentence. That's the opener each time. That's why it works so well.

And here's this example. These small mistakes are killing us. It has to stop, Mitchell said. Every time it's something else. I can't believe this keeps happening. This is like, again, just the opposite of the application or the principal. Go on to say here, is it really possible to be perfect? I finally asked.

And do you think they hear that when you say that? Mitchell thought for a moment. That's not really what I'm saying, but I see what you mean, he said. You're building some intricate stuff here. Each build looks so unique and requires different materials and finishes, so is uniform perfection really possible? Mitchell didn't respond, so I continued. As of now, what happens when they do make a mistake? What are your debriefs like?

How do you improve once those mistakes are discovered? And do your employees say something? Or are they more likely? to hide it. He was speechless. And to get the rest of the story, you need to get the book. We'll cover the rest.

That's the first five chapters. We have 10 chapters, 10 principles that you talk about in the book. Good place to stop for today. And like I said, these are the lessons, the first five chapters, these are the lessons about the mindset of a leader.

And what it is, every problem is a leadership problem. Humility is the most important attribute. Complacency is a killer. Detachment is a superpower. Perfection is a lie. The next part of the book is the actions of a leader. And we'll get into those next time.

Thanks for writing that, man. I'm really glad you wrote it. Especially now that, you know, we were kind of talking about this earlier today. When I was originally doing the podcast, I would, you know, I'd read a book at home, prep it, you know, outline or, highlight the stuff that I'm going to read. And it would be like, oh, this is a, this is a, I wouldn't ever think to myself, this is powerful, you know. But then I'd get on the podcast and I have the headset on and you're hearing yourself

read and you're like in the moment. You're like, sometimes it's like heart wrenching stuff or super powerful stuff. And that's definitely I, but as time went on, I got better and better at judging like, oh yeah, this is a really powerful moment or, hey, this is going to be heavy on the podcast or stuff like that. And this one, same thing. I was like, oh, this is a good one right here. Oh, this is powerful.

And so, yeah, I think people are going to, people are definitely going to like reading this book. So awesome job writing it. If you're listening, order the book, The Need to Lead by Dave Burke, the forward. Incredible forward. Incredible. Yeah, written by Jocko Willing from what I understand. Pretty amazing. They're going to help you.

It's going to help your ability to lead. It's going to help your brain. You're going to become better. We're not just helping our brains, though, Echo Charles. I help my brain today with a go. I see Dave Burke's about done with that go that he's got going on there. Need to fuel our brain. Need to fuel our bodies.

Fuel our recovery. Yeah. You like that one? Fueling your recovery. Big time. That just might have become a new thing. Fuel your recovery. Yeah.

We got protein. Joccofuel.com. Check it out. Whether you need protein, whether you need joint supplements, Whether you need energy, whether you need hydration, we got you covered. Check out joccofuel.com if you want to get engaged in that activity. That's my recommendation.

Did I tell you about my, um, did I tell you about my little, uh, thing? Check this out. Don't think so. Check this out. I figured something out. There's, uh, there's various companies right now that are making protein ice cream. Familiar? There are a couple different brands out there

I believe the one I'm currently engaging is something called protein pints. Okay. So what I figured out is take a milk cookie. Okay. And you put protein pints in between bulk cookie to two milk cookies. Ice cream sandwich.

Bro. Protein all day. Yeah, with like 38 grams or something of protein. Yeah. It's a legit evolution. Yeah. And it's really. You notice how

you know like certain flavors when you put them together they're just you're just next level yeah yeah it's what he called the sum is greater than the parts yeah yes that's a situation so get yourself some protein ice cream of some kind and then get a couple malt cookies stack them up bro all my wife was looking at me I was having it for breakfast because there's no it's just there's no is there something wrong with you hey if you have a protein ice cream sandwich it was With milk cookies for breakfast, are you a bad person? Like if I straight up busted you having a chocolate chip cookie with some freaking briars vanilla between it in the morning,

I'd be like, bro, you got issues. It's different. Yeah, you're right. But all day I can get away with this, right? Breakfast, like 10 o'clock? It's bold. 9.30? But hey, man, sounds good to me 100%.

I'm down. Check out the Jocco fuel cookies. Check out the protein, the mulk. This is the stuff. You can get it all over the place. Walmart. Hy-V., H-E-B. My, all kinds of different.

stores check it out or check out joccofuel.com we got you covered we got the good stuff also origin usa.com we are making jeans boots hoodies t-shirts pants because it's not just it's not just jeans no you ever see me on stage at uh echelon front yeah yeah from time to tell yeah guess what i'm wearing origin pants yeah yeah do they look do they look good to go they're good to go squared away square it away Professional. But not over the top. Yeah. Doing a lot, but not too much.

Not too little. Look at that guy. So all this stuff is 100% American made. Check it out. OriginUSA.com. Get some. Yeah, it's true. Also, Jocko is a store.

Dave Burke happens to be representing, by the way. Called jocco store.com. So we can represent. Another shirt I don't have. Discipline equals. By the way, just kind of FYI, when you make anything with runes on it and you don't give it to me,

you're freaking out of line. Violation. Okay. All right. Good tip. Yeah, I kind of, that makes sense to me completely. But yeah, it's a good one. Anyway, yeah, discipline equals freedom when we're representing, you know, that's where we can get our stuff. Some, uh, some new stuff. Get after it. Stand by to get some.

New stuff? Yeah, new stuff. We've had that stuff. No, I know, but they're new. Yeah, new, anyway. Look at you. Coming up. Getting nuts. Give me like a week or so, you know, they'll be ready. Yeah. Also, shirt locker is what Dave's wearing new design every month. This is the current month. I think this is this month's one, right?

Just came in? I think so. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, cool designs. Jocco seems to like them, apparently. But anyway, it's all on jocco store.com. You can get it. Check those out.

Books, obviously, there's a book called The Need to Lead, Dave Burke. It is officially live October 21st, 2025, 10 years after the book Extreme Ownership came out. So, and it's actually 10 years to the day that I left Ramadi. So that's just coincidence. But I don't think it's coincidence that it's releasing 10 years after extreme ownership. That's planned. So check out the book. Get the first a dish.

You know, not having a first of dish is just lame. So order the first a dish. I want this book to crush because there's a lot of good messages in it. So check it out. Also, I've written a bunch of books about leadership. You can check those out as well. And a bunch of kids books. One series of kids' books getting turned into a movie.

Yeah. How much of the movie have you seen, Echo Charles? Well, half, roughly. Half of the draft. What's your judgment? So far, so good. In fact, it was so good I told you this that I didn't want to watch the other half because it was so good. Yeah.

And I like to, you know, I like to get the whole brunt of the whole deal. You want the whole thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You saw enough of it to see yourself in it, though. Yes, sir. How did you feel about that? Because it kind of like, you know, you know, you were kind of like sitting in your, in the couch. Yeah.

And then you kind of sat up. You know, you kind of like, there it was, bro. Freaking hype was, hype level was real. I look, all the people who made that movie really did a good job on that part. All parts really, but, you know, that was a stand-up part for me, for my experience. Oh, Chuck. Dave Burke, you've seen a half. I have.

I've seen a bunch of assessments. It's, I cannot wait. It's so good. Well, in the meantime, because that movie's not going to be out for a while, because that's the way the world works. Just like the publishing industry with books. Like, when were you done with this book? This is years. Yeah.

A year old? Like, you were done with it a year ago? This book was completed a year ago. Yeah. So that's the way it works. That's the way the industry works. The same thing with the movie. But you don't have to wait for the movie for your kids.

You can get them these books right now and have that impact. Also, Eschelon Front. the lessons that we talked about today leadership lessons this is what we do for a living we teach leadership we teach those leadership skills that we talked about and we do it inside all kinds of organizations from literally the biggest organizations in the world to little tiny organizations and teams around the world so if you need help inside your organization with problems that you have those problems are leadership problems we will help you solve them go to ashlandfront dot com we can also help you with your skill set online

We have an online training platform, Extreme Ownership.com. So where we teach these skills and we teach them via an online training protocol. So check that out as well. Also, if you want to help service members active and retired, you want to help out their families, Gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. 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. Micah Fink got his program up in Montana helping veterans straighten out their souls. And then Jimmy May's organization, beyond the brotherhood. org. Check that one out. Ramadi Reunion20.com. This is important. So if you were in Ramadi when the 1-1-A-D was there, if you were an attachment,

if you were actively underneath the 1-1-A-D, if you serve you. there in any capacity or your family member served there if you're a Gold Star family, everybody would love for you to show up in Texas, January 16th and 17th, 2026. It is the 20th anniversary of that battle and the 1-1-A-D is hosting a massive reunion down in Texas. So check out Ramadi reunion 20.com and register because we got to figure out how many hotel rooms to book and all that kind of stuff. And General McFarland, who was our leader there, is leading this charge as well. So please, if you have a family member that fought in Ramadi in 06, then let them know.

We're trying to spread the word. We want to see you all down there. I think we got several hundred right now, but I want to see everybody. So check that out, Ramadi Reunion.20.com. Also, if you want to connect with us, Dave, he's on Twitter X. He's on Instagram. at David R. Burke. And for us,

check out jocco.com and on social media. I'm at Jocco Willink. Echoes at Echo Charles. Just be careful because there's a damn algorithm that's trying to crush your soul and steal your mind. Don't let that happen.

Thanks to all of our uniformed services Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps. Thanks for... Well, thanks for feeling the need to lead. And then stepping up and doing it and protecting our way of life. Also, thanks to our police law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, as well as all other first responders. Thanks for stepping up as well and leading in order to protect us here on the home front.

And for everyone else out there, here's one more quote from Dave Burke's book. It says, if self-assessment had a nemesis, it would be the ego. the ego does not suppose any problem might lie within, but instead seeks to place blame externally. Shoving the ego aside, we can successfully ask ourselves what is truly going on. Where is my responsibility and ownership in this situation? Can I be doing something differently? How can I improve? Where am I out of balance?

How can I be of service to my fellow Marines instead of thinking, I'm? am superior to them all the questions we must ask ourselves get stifled when our egos take over and without that brutally honest self-assessment failure becomes imminent end quote so that's what we got to do keep our egos in check and keep trying to improve and that's all we've got for tonight and until next time this is dave and echo and jaco out