The Resilient Mind - Ex-Undercover Cop Reveals Why We All Wear Masks - Tegan Broadwater

Episode Date: October 16, 2026

What would it take to walk into a world that isn’t yours, earn the trust of people who would kill you if they knew who you really were, and do it while your family lives just minutes away, completely unaware?Tegan Broadwater did exactly that. A former jazz musician turned Fort Worth police officer, he spent nearly two years undercover infiltrating a violent Crip gang, an operation that sent 51 people to prison. But this conversation goes beyond the operation. It’s about what living a double life revealed about identity, trust, and the masks every one of us wears without realizing it.Tegan shares why authenticity became his most important survival tool, how he discovered he had more in common with the men he was sent to arrest than he ever expected, and the moral toll of befriending people he ultimately helped put away. He also explains how gang loyalty mirrors corporate leadership, and why he now believes mentorship and second chances succeed where punishment fails.This is a conversation about reinvention, human nature, and the difference between who we pretend to be and who we really are.Connect with Tegan Broadwater:🌐 Website: https://www.teganbroadwater.comExplore tools from past guests of the podcast. Some links below are affiliate links, meaning we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you:💓 HeartMath: https://www.heartmath.com/resilient🧠 Muse: https://choosemuse.com/resilientmind🌿 Brain Ritual: https://www.brainritual.com/THERESILIENTMIND🌍 The Resilient Mind Podcast is a proud member of 1% for the Planet — building resilient minds and a resilient planet. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

That's when I decided, hey, I'm going to go do this myself. What was going through your mind in the first days of that operation? The poor people who were in that neighborhood who were not playing gangster were essentially held hostage by this kind of behavior. I think as a consensus, most of us would agree that if you are a murderer, then we don't have anything in common. What did you learn about how trust is actually built between human beings? Well, trust is an interesting one because,

again, you're kind of trying to bond over a common goal. So I would say an undercover operations, this is one of those things where I can compare on a surface level, but not on as deep of a level. What does it do to a person when they genuinely stay down to mortality? How does it reshape the way you think about life? What would it take for you to walk into a world that isn't yours? Earn the trust of people who would kill you if they knew who you really are

and do it while your family is a few minutes down the road, completely unaware of the danger you are in every single day. My guest today did exactly that. Tegan Broadwater started his career as a professional musician. Then he cut his hair, changed his life, and went undercover for the FBI, infiltrating the Crips gang in his own city for nearly two years. The operation became one of the most successful gang-related cases.

But what Tegan is here is not to talk about the operation itself, but goes beyond that. It's about what living a double life tarting, what it revealed about identity, trust, human nature, and how we all wear masks in ways we don't even realize. Tegan, welcome to the resilient mind. Honor to be here, Simba. Good to see you, ma'am. Take us back to the beginning of this story. You were a professional musician, and at some point you made the most dramatic pivot imaginable. What happened and what made you go undercover? Well, being a musician is, uh, a life of its own and as a youngster was an easy thing to adopt.

I wanted to be a professional musician since a, you know, fourth grade or whatever, and then was playing in professional capacity as a teenager, went to music school, was touring, and started recognizing what I would refer to as burnout on the road and just getting tired of playing, you know, regional tours and had a son in 95 and decided. I decided, man, this is kind of my sign that things have turned and my priorities have changed. And being gone is just inappropriate, you know, just something I didn't want to do is be gone. So at that point, since I was following my dreams and put in all this time, I mean, I was 13 years in. And it established myself as making a living, doing music.

The world was my oyster. It was kind of the advantage that I had over a lot of people that try to pivot, because thinking that I I was going to quit and do something else had never been anything I'd fathomed before. So it just so happened that when I was off the road, I had a gig that I played with some guys locally that drew a pretty big crowd that included several cops. They used to come out and scope the band out. So I had some conversations with those guys. They were good dudes.

And they said, man, you should think about police work. And I thought, seriously? I mean, it was, it was absurd. But I kept thinking, well, that would be exciting. And having come from a world of the creative arts and music in particular, I was the minority in almost every music project that I played in. So I was traveling to, you know, neighborhoods that would be considered quite dangerous. But as just an ignorant kid who had friends in the band who were just, you know,

30-year-old black dudes that just happened to live there. That's where we rehearsed. You know, I didn't think anything of it. So I felt like I had kind of a cultural indoctrination already and got along with a lot of different people from a lot of different walks. You know, when in music school I was spending time in dorms with artists, you know, everybody going through their collegiate experimental phases and everything. And I was always the clean cat. And I did some drinking, but I never really messed with any of that stuff. But it was fascinating to me to talk to people who had done that.

And so I just felt like I kind of had an ability to be a chameleon in my social. circles and just appreciated everybody from where they came from and learned from lots of different people. And when I started actually considering police work, that's the first thing that came to mind was, man, I really feel like I could work undercover successfully. I didn't know what that meant yet. But I, you know, I put it in my application. First, I cut my hair and had my driver's license picture retaken so they couldn't see what kind of cat was coming in there. But they They brought me in on the first shot. I applied to three different departments, the first one that reached out, it's the one I stuck to,

and it happened to be one that, you know, that kept me the closest to home and kind of started working my way in there, just leveraging every bit of resources that I had going up the chain to try to politic for learning how to do dynamic entries and write search warrants, do some small time undercover buys on a local level while I was in patrol. and was able to get SWAT certified and learn all these fascinating things that weren't available to people at the time. And we essentially got to the point where in my second, third year, I guess, third year in patrol, I was starting to do some undercover buys during shift and then would write the paper, have the judge sign it. And then the next night, we would get everybody when they got off shift, everybody would stay for overtime and gear up and a bunch of old dated SWAT gear.

and we'd go hit these teeny little dope houses in the same hood that everybody worked and start, you know, learning how that process worked. And it wasn't a move to eradicate, you know, the drugs, but it was a learning process for me. And I was learning what types of people were dealing drugs and what types of people it took in order to combat this because we were kind of supplementing what a narcotics unit would do, which ultimately I ended up finally getting in. but, you know, I'm a, you know, six-foot-one white-stiff, you know, so it, and they kept having this perception that they needed somebody that could blend in with the particular environment where most of the problems were, where the narcotic problems or gang problems were. And so the only choice I had was, was to just prove that I could do it anywhere. And I worked in a predominantly black and Hispanic area of town and was able to move and

groove and learned how to get a lot better at that kind of stuff. And by the time I hit narcotics, I had as much or more experience as some of the guys that were in that unit. And that's kind of how I just kind of launched into it in general. That's not really how Operation Fishbowl started. But that's kind of that trajectory that seems like such a 180. And going undercover isn't just a career move. It's agreeing to become someone else in a world where stakes are very high. And the stakes are basically your life. What was going through your mind in the first days of that operation? And when did reality actually hit you? So, you know, by then I'd gotten kind of good at it and Fishbowl was predicated upon a particular area, a six block square area of a bad part of town where they'd had

just an inundation of murders and assaults and the poor people who were in that neighborhood who were not playing gangster were essentially held hostage, you know, by this kind of behavior. So the city council and chief of police got together and spared no expense and they tried doing all these jumpouts and writing warrants and just pulling everybody they could find over trying to do intel to no avail. Nobody could figure out how to do it. So that's when I decided, hey, I'm going to go do this myself. If I could get in and infiltrate these guys, that would be a great way to take this operation down. And I thought I could probably do this within about three months, just gauging how. big it is. I've already been targeting a lot of these gang members and brought it up to two different

people separately. It got the same kind of response. But I brought it up to a long time in form of mine. It's just as I was just kind of brainstorming the idea over a glass of whiskey. And he just busted out laughing. He almost just spit it through his nose at the thought of it because, you know, here I am saying, hey, I like to go in and infiltrate the crypts. He's like, are you nuts? What time are we going? You know, so he was still ready. He was still ready. So it was kind of, it was kind of an insane objective, but I had been around that neighborhood enough to know how badly the neighborhood needed to be rescued. And that was really my motivation. So yes, I recognized the danger. However, the caveat was until after the thing was done, I didn't realize how much danger.

You know, I'd had experience and worked my way through some stuff, never done anything that long term. And I even approached my wife and, you know, everybody got, we got it approved. My sergeant kind of shielded me from the rest of the team. And I told my wife, said, look, I'd really like to do this. I think it could be a really meaningful thing. And I told her about the area of town. Probably going to be two or three months, you know, so it could be kind of serious. You know, I'm going to be at work every day, you know, doing whatever. She bought in. She was really concerned, but super supportive. And obviously, the thing started blowing up into all kinds of other things. But going in and thinking about the danger is the quickest way to get you killed.

You almost have to keep in point of mind what your purpose is there, which in the beginning was only to salvage that neighborhood and free the – you know, he had grandparents there that had been there, you know, for 50, 60 years in the same house, and then they're raising their grandkids. And then you've got prostitutes at the one end and lookouts with radios and everything and shootings happening. And it was just, it was a complete nightmare for these people who just want to be left alone and try to live their life. And they're struggling enough as it is because it's a socioeconomically disadvantaged neighborhood already. You know, so these people can't just up and move. They're stuck there. And then you're putting more kids in that environment, which just perpetuates the whole thing. So really, it's kind of, I don't know if it's a dude thing, you know, guys tend to be able to compartmentalize things a lot better.

but for me it was really kind of compartmentalizing the work I was at work I was doing something I had an objective that I felt like was noble and so I kind of ignored the danger there obviously you're on edge there's an edge to it I think even if I was a Crip and going up to other Crips and trying to do all this stuff there's an edge because it's you know it's an illegal kind of a whether you're selling guns or moving dope or whatever you're doing you're you're always ultra cautious because, you know, you're looking at somebody pulling a gun or sending you to prison. So I kind of had to ignore that, and I associate it with jumping out of an airplane. And, you know, on your first jump, you have to, once you're take the step out, you're kind of flying already. So you just have to figure out the parachute, you know? So really, once I started, I started. And then the rest of it was just staying myopic on the purpose the whole time so that I didn't let the little things kind of shift my. focus. You mentioned in our conversation prior today that your character was in a dramatic departure

from yourself. It was actually more essentially you. What does that tell us about authenticity as a survival tool? That's a great question. And it was a survival tool for me. And this is just a super obvious example of it because I was having to go undercover and try to infiltrate these these cats. And I thought, the more of a front I put on, the more of this backstory I have to memorize, the less I'm going to be able to concentrate on the moment and improvise the things that I need to be able to improvise on. My brain can't be moving in five different ways. I need to have my story high and tight, not worried about what I'm going to say unless something happens that I didn't plan for. So if you leave everything to chance, then you're improvising all the time and you're more than likely going to slip up.

So my personality was, and I thought it was appropriate at the time anyway, since like I said, I had, you know, I had experiences in so many of these different cultures with different kinds of people that I felt like I'm going to fit in anyway. I just, I tried to picture myself as, okay, if Tegan were actually going to try to start some kind of dope enterprise and come in and build some kind of, you know, giant operation, how would he do it? And obviously I never would. That's the part that I had to get around. But the rest of it, you know, I got to, I changed my name a little bit. You know, went from Tegan to T. Cad. T. Cadell was my name. Everybody called me T. And so I thought, well, that's easy. I can still answer to that. I'm not going to say anything weird. And, and a lot of the questions that you get suspicious people, you know, you can just bounce that off because you're not likely to be giving a story anyway. But when you talk about authenticity, it's an interesting thing because, really, again, you have to look at the purpose and look at the different masks that we do wear. And you talked about this a little bit, right, is that all of us, to a certain extent, in different situations, are putting on a mask for the situation. The only real authentic self that we own is our own, and we are literally the only person that knows everything about who we are. You don't present yourself the same way to your mother as you do to your homeboys.

You don't go to your teachers and express an idea the same way that you would, you know, to your sibling that you're trying to mentor or something. I mean, you change the way. If you're trying to get a job, tell me how many people sit down in a job interview and don't have a mask on, right? So it's for as long as your purpose is genuine. The fact is, we all have it. So this one was also an extraordinary example of making sure that it. If I had a nefarious intent behind it, I would make a really good bad guy. I just happened to, you know, want to fight for the side of justice.

And so I trusted myself to be able to do that. But it does make you recognize how easy it would be for people to take on and off that mask and understand that there's more to each person that you're dealing with than what you're faced with. You have to recognize that there's some things that you're going to have to work through. if you really want to get to know this person and feel like you're being trusted authentically instead of tentatively on a business level, which could still get you killed quicker. You know, you start getting to know these guys and spending time with them. I would go down on weekends and play madden with them and bring a pack of 40s,

and we would talk about this and that. I was spending time trying to put in some more bring their openness to understanding us as people a little bit more instead of just doing everything on a business level. And I think I succeeded in that to a large degree, which is why it was so successful and why it was so tumultuous at the end, too, when everybody has to come out, you know, and I have to take the mask off and then we have to face one another under completely different circumstances. You know, it feels dishonest. But again, you just have to focus on the fact that you are, it is what has to happen in order to salvage this neighborhood full of victims. And when you are deep inside the operation, living, hanging out, playing madden, you've discovered something that surprised you, that you had far more in common with these men than you expected. What did you find out? And how did it shift the way you see people? We might normally write off.

And this was one of the more significant, impactful things that did happen is, look, everybody has biases. You know, some people dislike other people because of their culture or because of their culture because of their background, because of their belief system, because they're political. But most of us in the middle have an appreciation for somebody that comes up and we're willing to listen and learn and we give them an opportunity. I think as a consensus, most of us would agree that if you are a murderer, then we don't have anything in common. You know, you pick the gang life and all you're doing is illicit business and torturing these poor people that are just trying to make it and, you know, forcing them to work. around this and that and shooting up houses, shooting people, you know, having, it's one of those things where we would all agree, we probably have nothing in common with those fools. And what I found

as I began to spend more time with these cats is that outside of business, which was specifically what I was doing, you know, I'd go down to visit in order to build some relationships and some rapport, I was finding that the conversation had nothing to do with business and therefore had everything to do with talking about normal things. I mean, these guys were, you know, 24, 25-year-old gangbangers, Crips specifically. And we found ourselves arguing over who the Cowboys are playing. Or are you allowed to be an Eagles fan if you were not born there or just because they won or they want me to go introduce with some chicks in the west side of town where I was from or, you know, just sharing sips. You know, what do you like, you know, and talking smack over Madden? And then you

feel like, I can totally hang with this cat. This guy's, you know, he has a sociopathic tendency that needs to be dealt with, right? There's a screw that needs to be manipulated. But outside of that, it was remarkable how personable some of these guys are. And I'm not speaking for all of them, because we ended up rounding up 40, excuse me, 51 of these people. So I'm not saying every single one didn't just take, you know, take me as, is that kind of a, it left me with that kind of impression, and some of them were dangerous to the extent that I just really kind of hope they would never steal out a day again. But that wasn't for me to judge. I found, though, that it was profound. And I think a lot of us, especially in this day and age, and especially in America,

per my experience, will judge people so quickly. And even the open-minded people have a lot more to learn. So I think it's important that we learn how to try to put forth an effort to communicate a little bit more deeply and learn about other people because I think it would enlighten not only other people, but it would enlighten our own lives, you know, to getting to know and learn from some of these people and understand, you know, just understanding the backgrounds and why decisions were made that put this person in the situation doesn't mean that they shouldn't go to jail, but it helps you to understand why they did certain things. things, and in turn, helps you to recognize instances where you can try to help prevent someone

from making that same mistake yourself, even though you're not the one that did it. You just, you had a great opportunity to learn how that works and how that, you know, falls into place to where everyone around these people that are, you know, slinging rounds everywhere are affected. And I would imagine that trust is everything in undercover work. You have to earn it from people whose survival instinct is to trust no one. What did you learn about how trust is actually built between human beings and how does that apply outside gang operation? Well, trust is an interesting one because, again, you're kind of trying to bond over a common goal. So I would say an undercover operations, this is one of those things where I can compare on a surface level but not on as deep of a level, is that if you can, you have to have some kind of common goal.

That's where trust begins, where you can say, look, We have a lot of differences, but we can agree on this. That's the place to start. So even when there was discord and I would, you know, come down the blocks and get out and they say, what the hell you doing? If it's somebody that didn't recognize me, then, you know, I wasn't trying to just have some kind of a banter with them and try to convince them who I was or whatever. I would be dismissive and tell them what I'm trying to do.

I said, look, I'm here building. I'm probably at a level that you're not even able to reach. And that's fine. but if you're not interested in making money, I'm building something here, so I will just move on. And that, in turn, framed the conversation around, hey, we're both here to try to make money and do business, right? It was less about let's address that suspicion. They're trying to throw that frame on me, and I'm just kicking it right back, saying, well, I have just as much reason to suspect you. Because I was supposed to, I was purporting myself as some kind of a big dealer that got busted by the, that had my supplier was busted by the feds in South Texas.

and had come up, you know, try to work with these guys. So that was my cover anyway. But I should, you know, I was like, I don't have to explain myself any more than that because you guys know how this business goes. So you try to find and latch on to something that is more common. And then that was, you know, then once you discover that, hey, we also have Madden in common or watching the NFL in common or, you know, all that stuff. That's kind of how trust is built also as rapport.

And I think really when it gets into person, I think it really is more important to be somebody that is willing to give time and effort into somebody else. I think that's where, you know, with the expectation of getting nothing back, I think that's where you really open doors to trust. Obviously, there's a lot of things that have to happen. You have people under certain circumstances who are going to be suspicious of you trying to get their trust regardless, whether it's business or just somebody you met in the grocery store. You have people with different types of personalities and archetypes that are going to be put by any kind of approach that you have unless it's truly genuine. And where you find that genuine thing is in something common, I think. And I've heard like people struggling to fit in.

So they go into a different environment, want to make friends in a different business, and they just can't figure out how to fit into like a group. What did you learn about fitting in to a society that was drastically different from who you were as a person? I still think it's framing because I think I taught them as much that I could fit in by finding some of that commonality as much as they were learning about me. I obviously was the odd ball out, right? I'm coming in. I was older than those guys pretending to be close to their age. But, you know, I think they had to learn that too. And I think that's the only reason it succeeded is I finally started breaking through to some of these guys talking about things that were what normal human beings would talk about and talking about.

and talk about struggles. And somebody talked about they just broke up their girlfriend. And that's why they want to meet somebody on the West Side. And I said, well, let me talk to some people, man. You know, tell me about yourself. And then we'd learn about one another. So I think that's kind of where it came from. And I think I just came in with a high degree of confidence and some empathy.

And some of that empathy was just a open, willing spirit to truly learn about these folks. It wasn't all nefarious on my part either, trying to just figure out what their backgrounds are so I could idea them or whatever. Some of that is. Like I said, this example is just kind of an exaggerated example of what we do in everyday life. But I think that's really where it comes from. And you said you're near-death experiences during this period. Without getting into the specifics of anything you're not comfortable sharing, what does it do to a person when they genuinely stare down to mortality? How does it reshape the way you think about life?

That was a big one because I've had, you know, three significant experiences where I was staring down the black hole of the end of life. And it instantly changes your perspective, even more into the same way that I was leaning and finding empathy and understanding a little bit more about these people and why they were who they were. it started making me emotionally so because it just it just makes you realize that the little frivolous things that we harp on a lot of these things like you said that you're trying to establish relationships or you're just off put by certain people because of certain things once you realize that you are nothing and that this could go away in a second it it triggered me emotionally which is interesting because I I guess we all have to try to think about avoiding making decisions on emotion, but the emotion also triggers a certain way to think

in literal terms about people, or analytical terms about people, too, when you have stared down death. It just, when you figure out your mortality and figure out, like, that's great, I came in with confidence and everything's, you know, turning out great. All of a sudden, everything changes. It's like, okay, well, if all of this falls apart, yesterday, I thought it was going to be the worst possible thing that could ever happen. But in the grand scheme, none of this matters almost. I mean, this is just, it almost makes you hyper focus on the things that you thought were important in the beginning. It makes you recognize even more how valuable other people are as opposed to just your own life. And I think that's really the key to life in general is, you know, people learn

at different times of their lives that, you know, when you really want to find success and have, It's when you are giving of yourself to other people without that expectation of reciprocation. And when you figure that out, it's pretty rewarding. And almost dying or dying and coming back is a quick way to see it out. And did the operation end up lasting two to three months or was it longer? Obviously, it was longer. And my wife wasn't super happy about that, but she was immensely supportive through the whole thing. because, you know, one thing leads to the next.

And then you find out that, you know, their rival set is over here, but they're working together when they sell dope. And then they fight each other when they're doing other things. And then so all of a sudden I'm moving out of this little six by six block area. And I'm finding these people that are doing a couple hundred thousand dollars of business every week. And I'm thinking, you know, I've built this far. I'm not going to give up now. I mean, now I'm figuring out that this thing doesn't have its own little machine.

head. It's coming from a bigger source, and I just worked my way up the chain and had a lot of help and support. Obviously, we got to the point where I was unable to come up with the funds that I needed in order to be this big-time guy that I kept purporting myself to be, and that's when the FBI picked up the case, sent me out as, you know, sent me back out as the sole undercover and then gave me resources that were fabulous for me because, you know, I'd been talking a big game, and now I can pull up in a range rover and, you know, spent 20 grand and it was a normal thing, you know, as opposed to just talking a big game. So at some point, too, about a third of the way through, I was able to kind of move up a level.

And that helped me expand the operation into the other parts of the neighborhood. My assumption is that staying in that state for a month can be very stressful. You're working under pressure consistently, things can go wrong. How did you manage that stress, that anxiety throughout the operation? There are a number of ways to do it. I mean, I had a support system, which was fantastic. Obviously, you know, my wife knows who I am. And when I start acting out of character doing things,

and I don't mean like some persona, I just mean acting out of character, forgetting things, you know, not doing the types of things that I would do on a normal basis that she recognizes it right away and could kind of, you know, keep me focused on that. Again, it's, it also is a matter of purposeful. refocusing yourself because these types of things can everything that happens to you of this kind of significance makes you overthink what could possibly happen. And by actually having a plan, you know, when I go in and I'm doing this deal and we're locking ourselves in this burglar bar cage

and then they shut the house up and it's me and six other dudes. I'm just thinking I need to have this plan A, B, and C down because again, when I need to improvise, those things need to be set so that I have the brain power to actually improvise when I need to. The problem is you start thinking about those things ahead of time and everyone's brain will take a lot of those ideas and create scenarios of stress that haven't even happened yet. And so I'm actually forced to plan all these things, but then consciously tell my mind, look, you are perpetuating something that hasn't happened. And I think, you know, most, most human anxiety and stress are about, subjects or occurrences that have not actually happened. And this is something that you could easily

get caught up in if you're not making a conscious effort to back off. Because your brain, when it's something this intense, wants to shut off and say, I'm going to give you an easy way out of this one, because it doesn't sound like a super smart thing to do. When you're in that kind of situation and you know you have to keep going, you have to remind your own brain to go back and say, I'm not going to stress about these things because I need to be rest assured that I have plan A and B, already set up and then I'm confident now to go forward and ensure that I'm not going to allow something else to happen, you know, but I can't lay awake the night before fretting about it. It's just going to put me at a further disadvantage.

But I think a lot of us struggle with that. A lot of our anxieties about anticipating something that either hasn't happened yet or probably will never happen, but we're just worried about how things will roll out what other people were thinking and, you know, how is this going to turn out for me or whatever. So that's what I had to do, just make serious concerted efforts. And then when I got off track, which I did plenty still, my wife would knock me upside the head and bring me back to reality. And so when the operation ended and you could finally step out of that situation, what was that like? That was surprising because, you know, one, I was starting to just get used to it.

You know, after that long, you just kind of feel like it's your life. I'm out there seven days a week just doing the stuff. by myself on a daily basis, you know, they're getting a call at one in the morning and just get up out of bed and go run and start doing deals. It was, I was left kind of, I wouldn't say it was rogue, but I was left alone to the extent that one boss thought the FBI was managing me and the FBI assumed my other boss was managing me and I was doing all kinds of stuff. And I thought it was best for me because, you know, the standard way law enforcement does is not, it's too foreseeable for other guys to be in a hot minute. So ultimately, when I was told this is where it's going to end,

it was by the assistant U.S. attorney that was working this case. They said, you got another week to wrap this up. And I put in, you know, no holds barred to try to get to the end of this thing and at least get a couple knocks on the, on the, my head of the snake, you know, my big king's pen guy. And we started, you know, we got 250 law enforcement people in a giant gymnasium at a junior high, you know, from all different, everything from ATF to FBI, the SWAT teams from local, you know, counties. And everybody was coordinating this giant thing in order to go out at 6 a.m. This one morning and round up these 51 people that I, you know, created cases on. And it was still intense at that moment, but it also, by the time they started rounding everybody up and phones

were going off and everybody's putting pins on the board saying, this guy's down, we collected this, we got to figure out where this guy is, we got these teams launched. It was kind of, it was surreal for me because I'd never really worked under those kind of circumstances. It was such a giant operation, but it also completely, at soon as that was over, I was crushed. It was, it was so surreal, actually, because one, I felt like it was a, it was a, I felt like it was over and, you know, I could have probably just kept trying to go forever. I mean, you know, find me in South America somewhere chasing whatever. I just, I'd never fathomed after this long. But moreover, I came to realize that I was now going to watch these guys that several of whom I'd befriended go down,

and I now had zero control over what happened to them, other than promising them that I would testify, the ones I liked, mind you, you know, the handful of, There's probably 10, 12 of these guys that I said, look, I will testify in your behalf because I actually know you're a cool dude and I think you have social redeeming value and I'll be willing to testify for you, you know, and most of them were given me birds, you know, because again, this is me establishing trust over this long and then all of a sudden saying, hey, guess what? I'm really not who you thought I was. Even though in my mind, as you and I now know, I was kind of myself. I was just playing a role, but everything else was genuine because I was

myself. I was still Teigen, really, talking to these same conversations, getting to know them. So my connection felt more personal. Theirs, they were, they felt betrayed, reasonably so. Once I actually did testify for a couple of them, I think if several started coming forward and allowed me to do that. But the biggest disappointment was, I mean, it was emotionally draining and sad. and I felt guilty and proud at the same time, and I just felt sick, and all of it was just such a mess that I just had to, again, kind of remind myself, well, I did it again.

It was just tough for me because if it were left up to me to say, hey, how do these guys need to be sentenced? I could have done that better than any jury could because I'd spent so much time with these dudes. But I didn't get to see that. I saw a lot of them go down for significant time that, man, I would have loved to seeing them get a break, but it's kind of out of my hands at that point. So I had to just kind of watch the thing

crumble. It was all the success, but I had to kind of watch certain things happen where I really felt like I had a connection. It's almost like getting broken up with and then watching something tragic happened to your partner, you know. So it was, it was really emotionally taxing. And I think it's so fascinating because, like, you created real connections with these individuals, as said by how you felt when some of them were taken into custody. And I think that also highlights sometimes, and I'm just thinking in relationships where we might be in a situation, we're happy that it has ended, but we have so many mixed feelings about that.

Yeah. And so did you have a process of dealing, processing, feeling those mixed feelings of pride and guilt and stress, how did you process everything that was going on? Man, I probably needed a better way to deal with it because I really, I really didn't have a system to decompress or, you know, kind of deal with the feelings. I'm going to have conversations with my wife. You know, obviously we're best friends so I can express what I'm feeling and she's a great listener. But again, I just, you know, there's nothing to solve when you know that these people are going to get handled the way they're handled. That's it. I mean, that's just it. It's more about understanding the success. And so again, all, again, all, could do is, again, try to focus on the fact that now, guess what this neighborhood looks like? You know, we go back to this expansive thing that blew up and you have all these suppliers, all these murderers, and we ended up solving nine cold case murders because we, you know, we found out these guys when they're telling on each other, I said, I don't, I don't care about

dope or whatever, you know, you guys are gangbangers. Give me something legit, you know, and then they would say, well, you know, so-and-so murdered so-and-so at the stop and shop, or whatever, And so we, you know, that's where I'm finding out a lot of these guys had some murderous tendencies that I was spending a lot of time with my back, you know, to them. But it's just the purpose. And ultimately, really what refreshed my entire attitude about the whole thing was when at first, as the undercover, you get kind of no credit. I mean, that's what you're an undercover. You're not supposed to, you know, come out and make yourself known and take credit because that's what you do. But eventually a couple of guys had nominated me for an award and spilled the beans about who the actual undercover was in this thing.

Because it was a giant deal, newspapers and newscasts, but everybody was, you know, an FBI agent that was handling my case would come in and speak or the gang unit leader would come out and make a speech or the chief of police or whatever, you know, which was fine. I mean, that's the way of design. But once these guys brought me my name into the mix, then the same thing started happening on my end. And people started reaching out about movies and you should write a book and all this kind of stuff. And I was just like, man, I mean, this is absolutely not why you do this work, you know. And then I had a friend who said, you should reach out to this organization that is right at right at the edge of where you were working the whole time, which to me blew my mind because I didn't even know about it at the time, which freaks me out to this day. This guy had taken over two old dope houses and bought them and turned. them into an after-school mentorship program where they mentor children of incarcerated parents.

And it actually services that part of the city that I'd just taken all these fathers out of. Because once we started doing these debriefs and interviewing these guys, we would find dudes that had two and three kids in the course of a year with three different mothers. They didn't, it's like, this is his name. I don't know. I can't remember the middle name of this kid or whatever. and I was just thinking, man, this is insane that you have these kids and you don't even really know who they are. And that's when it struck me.

I said, this is why you write a book because what I, what the epiphany was that I took care of one part of the solution. And what I did was absolutely necessary. But I did it for no reason if then these kids who are now fatherless and we know how that goes on an average, you know, in an average situation, especially in gang-ridden neighborhoods. If you don't do anything to salvage the kids, then some other guys have to come in there 20 years and round up another 50 people. What good is that?

That's just picking up the mess as the cycle of violence continues. So seeing this and seeing it at work and watching these kids come in and learn manners how to look you in the eye, these kids that don't have a dad. So you get like a seven-year-old kid that's learning how to do a firm grip handshake, Look the person in the eye, you know, and they're also getting tutored on their homework.

They're learning music. They're learning art and all that stuff. But they put a particularly heavy emphasis on their conduct at school, which is really important. Again, your behavior, if you're paying attention and trying hard, you know, the rest will take care of itself. So learning everything from table manners to, you know, how to shake a man's hand and be confident and how to do a job interview, it turns out that these people were going with these program, graduating high school, going to college, getting a degree, coming back and working for that same org. I mean, that's success. So then I thought, this is really what I want to do. And that's, that's what inspired me to even write the book. And we donate all the profits from the book to

charities that mentor children of incarcerated parents to that same degree. Because really, that's the closed, that's closing the end that was left kind of open is, you know, you've got to arrest these guys. But then you've got to arrest these guys. But then you've got to to make sure that it doesn't happen again by, you know, intervening and taking care of these kids. There are other programs also that deal with people in prison, and I think those are absolutely valuable. I just had to kind of pick a route. And I think the more provable success rate comes from somebody that you're picking up at age six versus somebody that's spent time in prison and they're 39 and still have an issue. I absolutely feel like both need the same amount of attention.

I just think the success rate dealing with these kids super early is really important. You said something that stayed with me, that once you realize your goals should be set for the sake of other people, if there's a mistake, it feels less self-punishing. It feels more like stumbles along the way of doing good. I love that profound reframe because we usually think of goals is, what do I want, what do I want, what do I want? How do you arrive at that and how does it change, how someone handles how they're. and or failure. Man, yeah, again, it's almost disassociation. I mean, failure on behalf of your effort to help someone else is just, you don't have to be

self-deprecating, you know, to feel like, oh, man, I'm failing and what do people think about me, whatever, because your focus is not on yourself, it's on someone else. And if you're truly determined to help that person, it helps you disassociate a little bit with those failures. I was one of those kids that grew up with plenty of anxiety and used to have to perform it. You know, when I was in music school, you know, come in and do a jury or whatever into 12 peers. I'd practice something up to where I could play it blindfolded and backwards. And then as soon as they'd hand out the sheet music and I'd sit down, I'd just go draw a blank.

And had a counselor, I actually saw a counselor for this because I was like, dude, I'm going to feel cool and I'm really good at this, but I can't prove it. I mean, this is going to be a problem that follows me forever, and it could have been. But this person said, I want you to play this piece of music that you flipped out over because of, you know, in front of all these peers. And I played it, knowing that they don't know any different. You know, they don't know if I'm making a mistake in music or what. And they said, okay, now do me, do me this. Who's your favorite, you know, musician? And I would tell them who it was.

And then they said, okay, now play it like they would play it. How would they do it differently than you? And I was like, hmm. And I did it, but I was like, dude, it sounded great. But it was still me. I was just disassociating my. I was not staring at myself in the spotlight. That's why I felt like, you know, the whole time I'm just like staring at myself.

And I'm thinking everyone else is staring at me. I got this giant spotlight. But when you start thinking outside yourself, even in that type of mentality, it really helps. And then once you can, you know, put that together with the fact that you're trying to work outside of yourself. and appreciate other people's lives and plights and try to help them along. I mean, especially, you know, I'm an old guy now. So I have all these different experiences that I could share with other people that could be really helpful.

And so you have to be willing to do that. And in making mistakes there, I found it was just so much easier to just say, oh, man, what a drag. And move on and keep pushing forward because you just, you don't take it personally anymore in a way that is so negative. You take it personally in a way that makes you. you make a more fervent effort toward reaching that person or helping that person. Reinvention is a theme that has run through your life.

Musician, FBI, working with these kids, for someone who's listening, who feels locked in in who they are right now and can't imagine starting over, what do you want them to know about what is possible? Well, yeah, I'm the reinventer of reinventers. I just, I'm a... I sort of thought it was a weird of like. like that. Turns out my dad and my dad's dad were all like that. At first I thought it was fickle. You know, it was a professional musician. Hey, this is your dreams coming true. And then I cut on my

hair, do cop work. And then I quit after 13 years there and stepped off and started a company. And I had no business doing that either, but started a company that's been in business now for 19 years. And then step back into the music and start writing music and collaborating. And then, you know, after my book, I started writing and I've been hired as a writer. And I write for, you know, professional entities now. And it's, it's really just about the mixture of knowing that the better I am, the more valuable I can be. And when that's sincerely the way you think, like, I can actually be valuable to someone else because I know how rewarding that is, then I think that's really how to think about it. Because obviously, you know, you're early in

life. If you're 23 and you're trying to make a pivot, dude, please do, because every, Everybody's trying to figure it out until they're, you know, whenever. But I also find a lot of people stumble when they're like, man, now I'm 33. So now it's late because everyone else is trying to figure it out in their 20s. And now I'm at capping that is the worst idea. When I quit a musician, being a musician that was I was 27, 8, and then was 40 years old when I decided to just up and quit law enforcement. After all this stuff, I just decided to quit, not retire,

quit. I was, you know, I had a long way to go. I did 13 years. I was like, bah, I got, I have to do something else. And I was 40 years old. And I also had no experience running a business. So I just, I dove into it. I just, I have a real tendency to be super myopic in things. And if you're willing to put in the work, not everybody needs to be an entrepreneur, but who cares? I mean, it's still a pivot is a pivot. If you're willing to dive into something and learn, you know, then that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, it's excitement of learning it, knowing that it's going to be something that you add to yourself that you can share with other people. I mean, even my writing makes me learn about other people and from other people every day, because I have to have material to come up with in my mind to have an idea about where I stand on it and then try to articulate it in a way that I feel is creative and valuable to other people and then write it. So, I mean, I feel like I'm growing as a person every day. and I'm old. So, you know, when I've done, I'm done.

Death will surprise me. I've already proven that, you know. So when it happens, it happens. But I'm still going to be like trying new things and trying to leverage the things that I do for the better good. You know, I'm fortunate now that I make money, you know, through my business to where I can do other things and try to build those things up. But I'm telling you, when I dove off out of law enforcement at 40 years old, it was against the rules to do any kind of security or particular. protection work or investigations, anything like that outside of the police department because they thought it was a conflict of interest. So I just had to say, all right, well, I quit and then learn how to get a license and start a company with zero dollars and, I mean, zero, starting with nothing and just figured out. But again, all I did was jump out of the plane again. So there you are. Please do it because it's, nothing is more exciting. And like said, when you, when you fail and you mix your success with the fact. that you are also making yourself more valuable to other people, it will also help you disassociate

a lot of those failures because you're just going to keep going and going and going. And the most successful people I've met have failed a ton of times, as have I. So, you know, it doesn't mean it's an easy thing to do. It just means you just know it's part of the deal. There's ebbs and flows. You know, well, everything's good. You just know some bad's coming. And eventually you're like, man, when it comes, I knew it was coming.

That's fine. Just keep moving. So I hope your listeners at every age will realize that it's absolutely attainable to just quit what you're doing now and start something brand new. And it's a stressful time to be thinking about what you're going to do to make a living these days. But just do something that you love and go hard at it. Put in the work. And you'll always love your plight. That's the deal.

What have all your experiences torture about what it actually means to be resilient? Well, I think I think resilience comes with the fire, man. I mean, because you're not super resilient. You're forced to be resilient in most cases. I think once you find that you're resilient and you are able to take a, like a, what's the word I'm looking for? A process. You know, you can apply a process. This is how I'm going to handle this and I have a way to build back out of it.

Even without that, you're resilient. because you have the choice to go on or quit. And being resilient just means, you know, at some point, you know, you're going to fail at everything and then eventually you can't eat. So everybody has it in them to be resilient. And the more failures you experience, the better at resilience you become. I think that's really, and I know I'm speaking to an expert. So forgive me if I'm saying anything counter to what you preach, because I know you're an expert in this. But I think everyone's going to experience failure and you learn through failures how to mitigate it each time, even if it's under different circumstances.

The circumstances eventually don't matter because you start to handle them different. And it's just a matter of pointing your North Star and remembering why the hell am I doing this in the first place. And that could be the reason why somebody decides to pivot is that they hit a failure and they decide, you know what? This is actually teaching me something. And it is that I don't want to get back on this horse. that's okay too. But being resilient doesn't have to mean you keep getting back on the same horse. It also can mean you're going to pick a different horse to get onto, but you're still going to get on something. So I think you just have to live through it. You know, if we're talking to somebody now that's 17,

they're just going to experience it. And if they're able to be mentored to the extent that they learn how to mitigate it and come up with a good process that helps them focus on a purpose behind doing the different things that they do, Man, what a great advantage that would be. I mean, I could teach myself all kinds of stuff, but this isn't something that you have to be old to attain. It just has to be something that typically when you're not mentored and taught specific things, that you're going to be able to teach yourself because everyone's going to experience it. For the listeners who want to connect with you, who want to get your book, where can they find you? I appreciate that. Yeah, Tegan Broadwater.com is probably the easiest place because that's got my company, my book, you know, the podcast, it's got all the, everything on there that you would need to link.

The book is on Amazon. It's Life in the Fish Bowl. And my name is spelled T-E-G-A-N. But it should probably pull it up anyway. But Teganbroadwater.com is where you can find all that stuff in one little spot. And what is the one key takeaway you're hoping listeners leave this conversation with? Man, quit taking it so seriously and start seeing outside of yourself. That's really what it is, you know, make it about somebody else.

you're nobody's as great as you think and nobody's as great as they think so once you realize that like hey we're all just man loosen up and and quit taking it so seriously and then and start looking outside yourself for things to do i hope people would take that from this tegan thank you for sharing your story your perspective such an wonderful story and a life experience man thank you it's an honor to be with you man i appreciate all the things that you do i think resilience is super important. So, you know, you spreading that word is awesome. You've had some great guests on here and you're a leader yourself. So I appreciate you having me on. Thank you for listening. Continue strengthening your mind by subscribing and listening to our other episodes.