Jocko Podcast 118 w/ Dan Crenshaw - Always Find A Mission

2018-03-21T18:28:52Z

Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @dancrenshawTX @echocharles 0:00:00 - Opening 0:03:25 - Dan Crenshaw 0:26:06 - Getting Hit with an IED. 0:44:06 - The next mission: Politics. 1:04:38 - Support:  JockoStore stuff, Super Krill Oil and Joint Warfare and Discipline Pre-Mission, THE MUSTER 005 in DC. Origin Brand Apparel and Jocko Gi, with Jocko White Tea,  Onnit Fitness stuff, and Psychological Warfare (on iTunes). Extreme Ownership (book), Way of The Warrior Kid 2: Marc's Mission, The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual, and Jocko Soap. 1:51:50 - Closing Gratitude.

AI summary of episode

It all, it all gets thrown out the window, because it's, it's only about single file, what has been cleared, what hasn't been cleared, and you could, you could, you could veer from that a little bit depending on what area you're in and can to harm, more mountainous areas, less IEDs, but even then, I've got a story, you know, these guys, some of our guys take a, take a point, take a, on the high ground, then a little hilltop, I mean, just in the middle of nowhere, I mean, middle of, no, I can't emphasize this enough, it is the middle of nowhere, right, and they sit down and this pop goes off, it was a blasting cap that went low order, which means it didn't blow up the main charge, like a 15, 20 pound charge, it would have killed all three of them right then and there, and I mean, I want to say that again, middle of nowhere, there was no reason for there to the IED right there, but there was, this was out in the mountains, and this wasn't even in the, you know, the southern Canterhard district, which is, which is truly just a minefield everywhere, you know, so, you know, the Canterna emphasized how bad the threat is there, and even even taking, even taking a small high ground position behind a rock, you know, this is what the kind of things we ran into, and so that was that deployment, it was a lot of fun, but it was, it was a hard one for us, you know, on month six, that's six months since June 15th, 2012, I was hit by an IED blast by one of these, you know, again, there everywhere, it was, it was the one day we spent in Helman Province, so we went to Helman on an, on an elastment admission to support some marine special operations forces out there, and as, as the early, you know, we always fly in about the middle of the night, we do that so that the enemy can't arm the IED, so the IEDs are everywhere, but they're not always armed, and if they, if they keep them armed, they run out of batteries, and they don't work anymore, so they, so there's, there's a little bit of tactical consideration there, but, you know, and as the early morning hours come and the daylight starts to hit, we start to move around, and we start to clear out this one compound, and hadn't been totally clear jet, and one of my Afghan interpreters was responding to a call, runs in front of me, and completely gets dismembered by about 15 pounds of explosives underneath them, and all I know is I got hit with something, and it feels like you get hit by a truck wall, a bunch of guys in the truck are shooting you with a shotgun, that's sort of what it feels like, and, you know, my immediate reaction was feel my legs, right, so I, I feel my legs and everything's still there, you know, I know something is wrong. Distance from the IED, a couple feet, I mean it's so, I mean, because I would, I would, I'd lia, a few feet, what were you and me are probably, is about, you know, just across the table, and, you know, lots of pain, pain everywhere, but not my eyes, so I was completely blinded, but, you know, totally under the assumption that I just had dirt in my eyes, and, I remained under this assumption that there was really nothing wrong with my eyes for, frankly, for weeks to come, and we'll talk about that, but, you know, I was, I, I didn't lose consciousness, and knew what was happening, I could hear the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, everybody thinks that when somebody gets their legs blown off their screaming like the movies, it's just never the case, it's a very different, like, visceral sound of pain, and it's, and I've heard it many times now, because, you know, this, this happened to us a couple times, and, um, so I heard that, I knew, I knew that rockmon had been hit, because I could hear him, and, um, you know, one of our, one of my teammates tells a story where he, he got hit with a, with a foot, and a building next door, I mean, and it was, and that's how they knew something had gone terribly wrong, and, uh, you know, the medics come to me, there's nothing they can do for me, they, they sort of just wrap up my eyes, they know something's wrong, I really don't, frankly, I just, I keep assuming there's just dirt in my eyes, and that'll be fine, and, uh, eventually, we get taken out of there, and I was able to get up and walk to the heel, because, you know, you know, let somebody carry it when they've got a firefight to finish, and we get on, and, uh, as soon as the medics on the helicopter see me, they, they put me out right away, and I don't wake up for days. Yeah, because that we're doing entire clearance operations through villages, you know, where we're going house to house, or shaken hands, a little bit of shaken hands, it's a little bit of on security, you know, either defending ourselves or going on the offensive, it depends on the situation, but, you know, we round everybody up, we talked to them, you know, we meet with village elders, so it's, it's, it's, it's a little bit of your, your, I guess, your more typical and conventional warfare tactics, so we're trying to meet and greet the population while also, you know, being prepared for battle. I mean, everything's a mess in this eye, and, you know, we'll get him some decent glasses so we can kind of live his life, but he's, he's pretty much permanently disabled, and I just didn't listen, I don't even remember these conversations, like I think I blocked him out, and, you know, it's, because the first surgery was, we've got to remove the cataract, okay, that went well, all right, we removed the cataract great, you know, and the next step is to put a lens in plants, in your eye, like, like anybody normally would, when they have cataract surgery, that's just the normal thing to do. Yeah, I mean, that's obviously when I hear this story, I think Orion Joe who's with me in reminding you, and he got shot in the face, and, you know, it was a similar situation where, you know, clearly his, his eye, one eye was gone, but his other eye appeared to be intact, and he could actually see after he got wounded, then he got put into a, you know, he could see what was happening and, and walked into the Kazovak vehicle, but, you know, they put him into a medically induced coma, and when he woke up, he couldn't see. They just want to ask you a question that you know, that you're going to have an answer to or or maybe they're just new or maybe they know you from extreme ownership and you know, I know you wrote this cool book. And, um, you know, we, we prayed, and we, I, and I look back on it, and, and again, that, you know, we call itself deception, but it was really the strength to stay sane, and, and, and believe that I was actually going to see again, and, and I truly believe that was God's strength is working through me, it was allowing me to, to believe in something impossible, um, because otherwise I would have gone nuts, because people sometimes ask me, what's it like not knowing if you're ever going to see again? And, you know, and that's a guy that was still like, and he also still wanted to come back and get back with his platoon, and was telling me, you know, don't worry, I can smell the enemy, and I'll know where to shoot. And then it was the same type of thing that they were telling you, they were telling him, which is, look, there was some nerve damage, we're not sure, and his attitude was very similar of like, well, it'll be okay, and, you know, it'll come back, but, you know, what didn't take very long before the doctors were like, no, it's, it's not coming back. It was, because they're in their minds, they're like, well, if we do this surgery and his retina doesn't detach, like we think it might, he'll still have, you know, crappy vision, you know, because his corny is all destroyed. And I think this is that super important not to forget or not to like miss interpret where you know, you just, the quote, you just said like you're morning routines and not going to be the solution to your problems kind of thing. No, let's, but we'll, you know, like, I'll drink a whole thing like the, you know, the mugs that we have to travel that they're three ounces. You know, if we care about protecting Americans and protecting the, you know, the, the sanctity of the seal teams and and pushing the right policies from the defense level, then, you know, elected politics is where do I can do it from? Even though the, you know, the Harris County Republican Party has publicly denounced these so-called Slates because they send out these voter guides and, you know, they've denounced them but people don't always know. And you know, you know, there's the, that two mile run you're doing how weak it's like Tuesday or so, if how weak and it's a time, you went through a long time. Like they know what they want the kids to, they know the values that they want the kids to have, but they're not sure how to give them the values. And then, and then it's just, you know, refitting your eye with the right eye wearing, you know, like, glasses and contacts, so I can actually get back to normal life and in frankly, that took years. You know, Tim Tim always says like, oh, you know, he's been out of the Jiu Jitsu for a long time. Right when you heard it, you were like, you know, you want to cut it at this point, not the little, like we just rolled into a conversation. So, yeah, the fact that you were able to recover is awesome, awesome, and, you know, it's, it shows, it should show people that, you know, even though you had a great attitude, the threat of, of never being able to see again was very, very real, very, very, very real. I think I was swollen, um, might have been muscle atrophy from being, you know, medically induced coma for so long, because I've been there, been that way for five or six days, but really couldn't move, um, and just wrapped up really tight, because I mean, as you can see the scarring a little bit, um, I was just, it was kind of been through a meat grinder a little bit, and, um, I was also, I was hallucinating wildly, so, I, everything I saw was Afghanistan. So, in charge of about 50 personnel, mix of seals, intelligence specialists, um, all sorts of, uh, really great people that, you know, as you know, support the teams and intelligence matters. And I know you're like, like, most good human beings, you feel uncomfortable saying, hey, give me some money. No, because hey, you know we're putting 12,000 on this first run and if you sell, if you, you know we'll put some more but if you can sell 20,000 books, that's, that's going to be that's a huge success. Well, not us, but the people that, the people that passed got to not know, but the people that didn't pass, which was half the class, had to go and just run another four mile time run right then to see if they could then pass it. And, you know, because you want people to get to know you and you need to be out there with folks. And, um, eventually got back to Maryland, um, on a, on one of our medical flights, and, you know, my wife was there waiting for me, and, you know, we began how that conversation about, okay, what's the next surgery? You know, we've, we've seen multiple guys get, get blown up and usually our partners, our Afghan partners who are patrolling with us, because, you know, maybe they're, they're just not as careful or maybe the equipment they're using to detect IEDs in the ground, they weren't using it properly, whatever the case may be, or maybe just because it's bad luck and they're just everywhere. yeah, you know, it's I was coming home from Ramadi and I wanted to make sure you guys were ready to ready for the worst possible case scenarios, you know. So that's cool about the immersion camp or some of us nothing is going to be sore because maybe it'll be sore for a little while and then we're just going to cruise a little bit exercise to brain more and then the body is going to go back and do whatever you like. And then you know, he says, you know, because I'm fair, I'm gonna go ahead and let you do this time run again. You know, so to me if you're going to do 20 reps squats, brass, 20 reps, brass, 20 reps until you're like that's kind of boring and have you ever done it before? I mean, you just can't, you know, these people don't speak in terms of like, this is what we think happens in the White House.

Most common words

Episode transcript

[00:00:00] This is Jocopotcast number 18.
[00:00:04] With echo Charles and me, Jocco Willink.
[00:00:07] Good evening, echo.
[00:00:08] Good evening.
[00:00:12] I need a mission.
[00:00:16] We all need a mission.
[00:00:20] That's what life should be is a mission.
[00:00:24] That's what gives your life, purpose and focus and drive and ultimately
[00:00:34] satisfaction.
[00:00:37] Now, that mission can be the job you work at.
[00:00:42] It can be providing for your family or it can be getting better at you,
[00:00:46] Jitsu or stronger at Olympic lifting or starting a business that you want to grow and
[00:00:52] build and take over the world.
[00:00:57] And sometimes people ask me what to do if they don't know what their mission is
[00:01:02] or what their mission should be.
[00:01:07] And I tell them if they're in that situation to go help someone.
[00:01:14] Go help someone else make that your mission.
[00:01:17] Because that will make you better.
[00:01:19] And it'll make the world better.
[00:01:23] And eventually from that, you'll see what your mission is.
[00:01:30] Now, I was lucky.
[00:01:35] Because from a young age, I had a mission.
[00:01:41] I wanted to be some kind of commando.
[00:01:44] And eventually I ended up pairing about the seal teams and decided that that was
[00:01:53] the best place for me.
[00:01:57] And that's where I went.
[00:02:00] And once I got to the seal teams, I had a new mission.
[00:02:05] Which was to prepare for war and that's what we did.
[00:02:08] And then eventually war came.
[00:02:18] And then that was the mission to take the fight to the enemy, to close with and destroy them
[00:02:25] through close combat.
[00:02:27] And that's what we did.
[00:02:28] But eventually for me and for everyone in the military, it ends.
[00:02:45] Maybe because of retirement or maybe because of family obligations or maybe
[00:02:50] for medical reasons, but for every warrior eventually the war ends.
[00:03:00] And that career ends and that mission ends.
[00:03:06] And I've talked a lot on this podcast about how important it is to find a new mission.
[00:03:12] Once the war is over for you and you've done your part, you have to find a new mission.
[00:03:26] Well, tonight we have a guest on who pursued much the same mission as me
[00:03:34] for as long as he could and who has now found a new mission that he is on.
[00:03:45] So Dan Crenshaw, welcome to the podcast.
[00:03:50] Thanks, Jack Oates, pleasure to be here with you.
[00:03:52] We're a lot of thanks for coming on.
[00:03:55] And let's just start at the beginning a little bit for people that don't know who you are.
[00:04:01] Let's talk a little bit about, I guess we'll talk about Katie Texas and at the same time,
[00:04:07] also include Ecuador and Colombia about your childhood.
[00:04:12] Absolutely.
[00:04:14] Well, like you said, I grew up in Katie Texas.
[00:04:17] I've had six generations of Texan flowing through me, my dad's side of the family.
[00:04:23] And my dad was in the oil and gas industry our whole lives.
[00:04:26] So when you hear the things about Ecuador and Colombia and even Egypt and Scotland, that's
[00:04:32] those are all the places we lived over the years because of his career.
[00:04:38] Everybody in the oil and gas industry in Texas knows that.
[00:04:41] It's a pretty common theme.
[00:04:44] I like to talk about some of the challenges that I went through from an early age.
[00:04:49] And what drove me, maybe drove my that that passed that mental capacity that you need
[00:04:56] to become a seal.
[00:04:57] And that started with my mother and my mother got diagnosed with breast cancer and I was five
[00:05:04] years old and she fought it hard for five years and she never quit, she never complained.
[00:05:10] I never saw it and if she did, I never saw it and she just took care of me and my brother.
[00:05:16] Every day, right up until the end.
[00:05:19] And she eventually lost that battle when I was 10 years old, 1994.
[00:05:23] But she instilled in me, you know, what I think are American and Texas values of integrity,
[00:05:32] respect and just never quit, never quit no matter what and don't feel sorry for yourself.
[00:05:40] Because she never did, she truly never did.
[00:05:42] And she asked where she told me before she died that I would sort of great heights.
[00:05:48] And I don't know what that meant at the time.
[00:05:49] But I think we know now. And not long after that, you know, when I could start reading books
[00:05:56] and and grab the first Navy seal, Dick Marcinto novel, Rogue Warrior,
[00:06:04] that I could your book wasn't out yet.
[00:06:06] Draco otherwise.
[00:06:07] Maybe I'll.
[00:06:08] Yeah, Rogue Warrior that that that came out when I was already in.
[00:06:12] Yeah, and the matter fact, it came out right as I showed up at the teams.
[00:06:16] It I'm pretty sure that's right when it came out. And obviously it created some turmoil in the
[00:06:22] teams, but it was pretty interesting, especially because I knew guys that had work for Dick Marcinto.
[00:06:27] And that was pretty interesting to talk to them. And to be totally frank with you, most of the
[00:06:33] guys that worked for Dick Marcinto loved him. And as a matter fact, one of the couple of the guys
[00:06:39] that I respect, I met, there's one guy as a matter fact that that I work for.
[00:06:44] And this was a couple years later. It's a matter fact it was around 1994, because I was in a
[00:06:49] seal puto and I was talking to this guy that had worked for Dick Marcinto. And I said,
[00:06:54] hey, you know how was Dick Marcinto? How was it to work for him?
[00:06:58] He looked at me as a best CEO ever. Yeah. And this was from a guy that I have utmost respect for.
[00:07:03] So I thought that was pretty cool. Even though, you know, his book, you know, the book is,
[00:07:08] it's, I'd say it's a Hollywood-ish book. Yeah. And, and, you know, the statement in there that
[00:07:14] everyone always laughs about in the teams is the statement that every seal on his team could bench
[00:07:19] press 500 pounds. Right. Right. The number came to growing. We're not going, we're not even going
[00:07:24] to make it real listening. We're not going to make it real listening. We're not going to make it real
[00:07:27] listening. We're just going straight to 500 pounds everyone on the team. Right. And that's just
[00:07:32] a patently untrue. And what sucks is when you do that with that thing, well, then people start
[00:07:38] looking at the book and go to what is true and what is not. Right. So, and although, from the way
[00:07:42] it's been described to me, the events in that book, a lot of them are compiled. So, like this little
[00:07:48] thing happened on a training event, this thing happened on a training event, this thing happened
[00:07:51] on a training event, but they'd all be compiled into one big story. And yeah. So it's kind of like a
[00:07:55] Hollywood. Yeah. It's a book. It's a nonfiction-ish story. 10-year-old bandcredsch, I didn't know that.
[00:08:02] You was like, I'm going to bench 500 pounds. No problem. Yeah. You know, I wouldn't be here without
[00:08:09] that series of books. Frankly, you know, I probably still have two eyes, but nobody's
[00:08:14] used to eyes. That's a luxury. We'll get to that in a little bit. So, yeah, I mean, that,
[00:08:22] you know, once you've once that and you know this, most seals operate this way, or at least they
[00:08:28] have the same story of, yeah, it was just from a young age. I had a mission. I knew what it was
[00:08:35] and every decision I made from, from then until the moment I got into Buds was just prepared for that.
[00:08:42] Now, when you, did you, I know you lived overseas? Where did you go to high school?
[00:08:48] So, most of high school in Colombia. Okay. Yeah. And, uh, did you play sports down there?
[00:08:52] I played soccer. Okay. Yeah. Because you were in Colombia. Yeah. So, you're in the place of
[00:08:55] kind of like what they had. You're in a place of soccer. It was that or volleyball.
[00:09:00] Yeah. It was like a play volleyball. And then, if you applied from college from Colombia,
[00:09:06] yeah. And okay, this is, this is kind of an important question because a lot of people
[00:09:10] asked me this question all the time. You were definitely wanted to be a seal. What made you make the
[00:09:14] decision between going to college and you ended up going to Tufts? Yeah. And then in most of
[00:09:20] in Massachusetts. So, at some point you said to yourself, okay, I could enlist tomorrow and go to
[00:09:27] boot camp and, you know, be a seal within the year. Or I can go to college for four years and, you know,
[00:09:36] then apply and I'll be in an, on officer in a leadership position. I could ask that question all
[00:09:41] time. For me, when I was 18 years old, the answer was real easy. Like, oh, I can be a seal within a year.
[00:09:48] Sign me up. Yeah. And, and that's what I did. And for you, you obviously took a different approach.
[00:09:54] And people asked me all the time, which one is better. And I, I tell them that there's advantages
[00:09:58] and disadvantages to both of them. But what made you decide you're going to go officer style from the
[00:10:02] get go? Maybe, you know, along with my mission of being a seal, my whole life,
[00:10:08] the similar mission of I wanted a college degree as well. I wanted to knock that out.
[00:10:14] And, and then, you know, I wasn't well informed enough to really speak about the
[00:10:19] difference between officer and enlisted back then. Like, I am now. But I did want a leadership role.
[00:10:24] It was important to me based on what I'd read and based on the movies I'd seen that I
[00:10:29] wasn't a leadership role. Did you see Navy seals? Was that obviously? That's like,
[00:10:34] if that's a late babbling's answer to why you came a seal straight up. Yeah. Yeah, totally seals,
[00:10:38] Charlie Sheen gets on it. Yeah. So, I bet I didn't just see it. You know, we had it on all the time.
[00:10:47] Okay, this movie ever. Yeah, you know, it's so a combination of wanting a leadership role.
[00:10:53] Maybe knowing to, you know, was I really ready at age 18? You know, I know I wanted it.
[00:10:59] But I have also, I also wanted to be prepared. Yeah. And it was able to think ahead enough to know
[00:11:04] that maybe I can't swim all that great just yet. We might need some more practice. Yeah.
[00:11:09] But it was mostly like, it was mostly, I'm going to go to college first. That's then my life path.
[00:11:16] That's what I'm going to do. And so that's what I did. And yeah, and then I bet Tufts University,
[00:11:22] mostly because of its international relations program. That was my focus. It was foreign affairs,
[00:11:28] international relations, politics, and I did a minor in physics just because why not? Yeah.
[00:11:35] Because that sounds like fun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you, you speak Spanish obviously from growing up
[00:11:41] in Columbia too. So you are you fluent in Spanish? Pretty fluent. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:11:44] Yeah. Now it's got a little rusty, but we're, we can get. And you did ROTC at,
[00:11:48] yes, was there any seals there? Like prior seals that were instructors or anything like that?
[00:11:54] No. I, well, no, there was at Harvard. So a lot of these guys doing master's programs while we're
[00:12:00] doing ROTC. They're not attached to the unit, but I did have the opportunity to work with some guys.
[00:12:04] And you know, just get that mentorship. This is the kind of work out you might want to be doing.
[00:12:11] I mean, just the basics because you just have no idea. Yeah. I'm into it. Do you think
[00:12:15] kids over prepare for Buds now? I think it depends on the kid. I often mentor guys who want to go
[00:12:24] through and you know, that sometimes they do focus a little bit too much on, especially things
[00:12:29] they're good at. Yeah. Like I'm running 10 miles a day. It's going to like a five minute
[00:12:33] pace. Some like stop running. Never run again. Yeah. You're good at that. Move on to the next thing.
[00:12:39] You know, focus on your weaknesses. Guys just don't understand the little, little basics. I don't know
[00:12:43] if they over train. I haven't worked with enough to really know. I talked to people and they
[00:12:48] send me messages all the time and they're on this two year training program to get ready for Buds.
[00:12:55] And I'm like, hey, train for two months and then go, no, it's not that hard. If you played a
[00:13:01] sport in college or you played a sport in high school and you can run like you'll get in good
[00:13:06] shape there and it's going to be a challenge. But waiting around, especially when there's a war
[00:13:10] going on that you don't really want to miss. Yeah. Like that's a big deal to me. You know, and I tell
[00:13:14] these guys, this war's not going to last forever. And you know, I showed up at the team in 1991,
[00:13:20] just missed the first call for it. And it's, you know, I didn't shoot my weapon at the enemy for 13
[00:13:27] years. And that's a long, dry, hard 13 years. And so, yeah, you don't miss out on that. No, you don't.
[00:13:35] One of my old team guy buddies. It was like 1971 and and he, the V, thought the V at
[00:13:43] NOMOR was going to end and he's down at the Marine Corps recruiter saying, I want to be a door
[00:13:47] cutter, he we. It's interesting that there's, you know, you always hear about the protesters
[00:13:53] and whatnot. But there's kids that want to fight. Oh, yeah. We do have a, there's a warrior class
[00:14:02] in, in America that I think we should be proud of and it'd be proud to be a part of because
[00:14:06] it's a, for good people with good values and they want to do the right thing for the country.
[00:14:10] So you show up at butts. So you get to be good done with college, college is college, right?
[00:14:16] Is there anything particularly you want to say about college? No. Okay. Well, cool.
[00:14:20] Because I'll particularly want to hear about it.
[00:14:22] Yeah, college happened. Yeah, college happened. And so you show up at butts and any issues at butts?
[00:14:32] Yeah. You know, I started my, I started with class two, six, one. About Tuesday afternoon of my first
[00:14:39] hell week, my stress fracture developed into a pretty noticeable fracture. And I got the old
[00:14:46] question, are you hurt? Or are you injured, Mr. Crenshaw? And you really want to be injured because
[00:14:51] you better not just be hurt because then you're just quitting. And I was, I was injured.
[00:14:56] I was pretty substantially. I mean, you know, I mean, stress fractures are pretty normal,
[00:15:02] injury and, and buds. Okay. So you, so when I'm sitting there talking about people don't prep
[00:15:06] enough, you're like, actually, you should prep more. Do you think you could run more for pairing for
[00:15:10] butts? I would have, I ran plenty. I would have, I would have focused a little bit more on
[00:15:15] strength and conditioning. You know, something I just didn't know how to do back then. Because
[00:15:21] what happens in butts is, I mean, you're going to go to failure. You're going to go to failure
[00:15:25] no matter what. And it's going to happen on the hour, every hour, maybe every 10 minutes, all the time.
[00:15:30] So the guys who overprepared, they, they, they can't understand why they're failing so much.
[00:15:35] Right? And that, that messes with their heads. Maybe that's what you mean by overprepared.
[00:15:40] Because that's what I mean by. Like, I think, I think guys get too confident in their abilities.
[00:15:45] And they just don't understand why they're hitting a wall all the time. Whereas like,
[00:15:50] guys like me or just like, I just, I just, I expected to suck. So it's really not a surprise.
[00:15:55] Or just going to keep trying, no matter what. And just never quit. And an, an, an quitting is never an
[00:15:59] option. The other problem is if you overprepared, it, it, it may be it becomes an option. This isn't
[00:16:04] the case for everybody. But I see some of the best in shape guys quit because it was just,
[00:16:09] they were like, maybe it was an option for them. Like, maybe I'll make it, maybe I won't. But if you,
[00:16:13] you should never go into buds thinking that way. And that's why a lot of guys who make it through,
[00:16:19] I think have this story that, well, I wanted to do it since I was 10 years old. So it was just never an
[00:16:23] option for me to ever quit. So yeah, you do need to prepare enough to make sure your, your muscles
[00:16:29] when they do fail aren't putting all the strain on your joints and your knees. And that's what happened to me
[00:16:34] because it just happened over time and over time and you're limping a certain way. And that just
[00:16:39] causes a fracture eventually because there's too much pressure being put on your bones. So,
[00:16:43] you know, or I just had a week genetics. Yeah, it's like, one story. Or it'll likely, yeah, it's
[00:16:48] here. So I, it's like I rolled back. I came back again with 264. And you know, you know,
[00:16:53] there's the, that two mile run you're doing how weak it's like Tuesday or so, if how weak and it's a
[00:16:59] time, you went through a long time. Well, it's like a Tuesday or something. It's a time to run. And if you,
[00:17:04] and if you get in the top five, you don't have to do it again. And then everybody else has to do it all
[00:17:09] over again. And you get to rest under a boat and, you know, eat sand or whatever they let you do.
[00:17:15] Much on that sand over there. And you know, my first, how weak I was dead last. I mean, just
[00:17:22] way be like not even close, right? Because I was limping the whole time. And my second, how weak,
[00:17:27] I was, I was first placed by maybe five minutes, you know, and maybe because I knew what the
[00:17:32] game was, but everybody does actually, the work gets around. You know, it's, but it was, it was,
[00:17:38] it was a message, maybe to myself of like, we're gonna, we're gonna not only do this, but we're gonna
[00:17:44] crush it. And I'm gonna feel good about it. I'm gonna rest under that boat and eat my sand.
[00:17:49] Well, everybody else is running. At the, at the, at the, at the frankly, it was really cold. So I kind of
[00:17:53] wish I'd been running at the time. But whatever I want. The closest story I have to that is we got
[00:18:00] done with a four mile time run. And when we got done, the people that failed and I didn't fail,
[00:18:06] but there was a bunch of people that failed. And the instructor who is a really a perfect instructor
[00:18:13] meaning that his attitude and the way he cared himself was epic for Buds. And he was the senior chief of
[00:18:21] the phase, it was dive phase. And the guy's come across and he's collecting the guys that fail,
[00:18:26] which was probably at least half the class. And then you know, he says, you know, because I'm fair,
[00:18:32] I'm gonna go ahead and let you do this time run again. Get on the line, ready, go. And everyone
[00:18:36] had to run another four mile time run. Right. Well, not us, but the people that, the people that
[00:18:40] passed got to not know, but the people that didn't pass, which was half the class,
[00:18:44] had to go and just run another four mile time run right then to see if they could then pass it.
[00:18:48] Yeah, but she's going to pass. You have to put out as hard as you possibly could for a
[00:18:57] four mile time run, which I actually had to do every time. I failed to run and I failed one run
[00:19:01] in Buds. I I paced myself. I said, oh, you know what, I'll just pace myself. I'm not going to put
[00:19:06] out as hard as I as a kind. I'll save a little bit for later. And that didn't work. I failed,
[00:19:11] because I'm not a fast runner. And so from then on, it was just a sprint as hard as I could go
[00:19:15] for the whole damn time. Unlike you, I didn't win any races, good buds. So you get done with
[00:19:24] and you show up. So now it's 2000 what year is it? This is 2007. Okay. Yeah, 2007. Yeah,
[00:19:32] finishing Buds 2007 in the moving NSQT. That's right. Life Babin, putting me through
[00:19:37] Jatsi. Nice. You know, I was I was I was I was indoctrinated early on. Yeah. Yeah, it's awesome.
[00:19:48] And then from there, you rolled to Team 3, Team 3. I was Team 3 with Felusion 2008 and then
[00:19:55] back in Mormati in 2010 with try to put in, you know, you're a little true. You know, going back
[00:20:01] to late for running that course. It was interesting because what that course used to be was almost
[00:20:06] like an administrator course. Hey, here's how you write e-viles and they had a little tiny bit of
[00:20:11] dashings of of tactics in it, but it was here's how you write e-viles. Here's how you write
[00:20:17] navy messages and just that kind of stuff. Yeah. And you know, we knew that these kids needed to
[00:20:23] train because in Ramaadiah had guys that were first platoon, guys out ground force commanders. Yeah.
[00:20:28] And we wanted to make sure these guys knew what to do on the battlefield and it was awesome
[00:20:33] that life went there and started rehashing that program and did a great job because it was very
[00:20:37] valuable. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. So then you got done with that. Then you showed up at Team 3.
[00:20:44] And you went right on deployment. Right. I mean, Team 3 was already on deployment. So they just
[00:20:49] deployed, you know, and you know how that goes. It's the cycle of graduates. So we met up with Team 3.
[00:20:55] I was in Felusion for a little while. I was down in Bosor for a few months and actually stayed
[00:21:00] on deployment to meet up with Team 5 and and help them transition, you know, as we were setting
[00:21:07] up another debt out there in Bosor. Great, great first deployment and learned a lot.
[00:21:14] Got to work a little bit and then came back to Iraq in 2010. And another great deployment for me
[00:21:21] because I was able to take over a Splatoon Commander when my platoon OIC had to go to
[00:21:26] relieve another platoon OIC. So, you know, we were going through the entire targeting cycle,
[00:21:32] working with multiple Iraqi partners throughout Ramad, and throughout all of Alambar. We got to
[00:21:37] operate throughout the entire province, even a little bit in Baghdad. So just an amazing experience
[00:21:43] for a young J.O. who wouldn't normally be putting that position and working with some of the best
[00:21:48] people I've ever met. You know, we talked about before. I won't name names on the podcast. But,
[00:21:54] you know, well, your OIC was a great guy that got moved. That's why he got moved. And obviously,
[00:21:58] they had confidence in you to to move you up into the platoon commander position, which is an
[00:22:04] interesting thing. I had a group of business people and they, there was a guy that kept saying,
[00:22:11] well, no one can take my place, you know, and then he was surprised that he wasn't getting promoted.
[00:22:16] And, you know, explained to people, if you don't have a person below you in the chain of command,
[00:22:22] or two or three people below you in the chain of command, that can take your job. Well, then you're
[00:22:25] going to have to stay in your job and you're not going to get promoted. So that's proof that your OIC,
[00:22:31] like I said, who's a great guy actually, he's supposed to come on the podcast at some point. But he's a
[00:22:35] great guy and he had groomed you and taught you everything he could do and made you ready and trusted
[00:22:43] you to say when the boss came to him and said, hey, I got a fire guy. I'm going to move you
[00:22:47] over to Afghanistan is your A OIC ready to take over and he could confidently say, yes, he is. And that's
[00:22:53] that's awesome. And that shows that he was a great leader to to kind of prepare you properly for that
[00:23:01] situation. That's a good point. I mean, that is part of leadership and management. It's making sure that
[00:23:05] below you and above you is squared away. Yeah, but I would put it. And I would do that when I was
[00:23:11] running training, I would always kill theoretically or what is it virtually kill the two or
[00:23:18] many years. You all of us. Yeah, and sometimes I'd kill all of you. Yeah, I remember.
[00:23:24] Yeah, there'd be some some some buddy carries happening for extended distances. Yeah, I was a little bit
[00:23:33] I was a little bit crazy at that point. And you know, I was a good training. Yeah, yeah,
[00:23:38] you know, it's I was coming home from Ramadi and I wanted to make sure you guys were ready to
[00:23:43] ready for the worst possible case scenarios, you know. So then you get so you do that,
[00:23:50] you finish out that deployment. That was a solid deployment. You were running a bunch of stuff.
[00:23:54] That sounds like a good deal. And then what did you do when you came back? So it came back
[00:23:59] moved over to support activity one. And as you know, they run intelligence support operations
[00:24:05] for the seal teams. It's a fairly normal transition to make as an officer. And for a lot of
[00:24:11] this guys too. But with that ended up what really, what that translated into is back on deployment
[00:24:16] 2012 with my platoon again, seal team three, trial of the platoon, and can do hard province. So
[00:24:23] on that deployment, this was one of our more kinetic deployments. I mean, it's Afghanistan,
[00:24:28] it's can do hard, there's IEDs everywhere. I mean, everywhere. I mean to the point where, you know,
[00:24:34] our TTPs or, you know, our, our, our, our, our HIPs. So these are our standard operating procedures.
[00:24:40] We're, hey, we're on patrol. We're getting shot at. Don't even move. Don't even go, look for cover.
[00:24:45] Because as soon as you move, you hit an IED. I mean, they're, they're just, they're that
[00:24:50] prevalent throughout the entire ground, not just on pathways, not just in doorways, in the most
[00:24:55] random of places. These guys are just burying these things at a whim, you know. And then it's,
[00:25:01] but it's chaos out there. And we know they're not that great at shooting at us. So would rather just take it.
[00:25:06] So I'm going to take a moment just to emphasize what you just said, because it's really important
[00:25:11] and not everyone will understand it the way you, the way you, uh, went over it quickly, almost from
[00:25:16] a tactical mindset. So I just want everyone to understand what he's, what he's saying is when at this
[00:25:21] point, the IEDs were so bad that if you started getting shot at by the enemy, the obvious and
[00:25:30] common and practice that everyone in the world instinctively and by training has is you immediately
[00:25:37] hit the ground and seek cover. And you get behind a log, you get behind a piece of terrain, you find
[00:25:42] somewhere to hide from the bullets that are coming at you. And what Dan saying is during this deployment,
[00:25:48] the IED threat was so high that when the enemy started shooting at them, instead of finding
[00:25:53] cover to hide from the bullets, they would rather just stay put, probably take a knee, but not
[00:26:00] dive behind something because they likely, there was a likely chance that there was an IED there.
[00:26:05] Yep, that's that's crazy. It is. You know, we've, we've seen multiple guys get, get blown up
[00:26:13] and usually our partners, our Afghan partners who are patrolling with us, because, you know,
[00:26:19] maybe they're, they're just not as careful or maybe the equipment they're using to detect IEDs in
[00:26:25] the ground, they weren't using it properly, whatever the case may be, or maybe just because it's
[00:26:28] bad luck and they're just everywhere. You know, it's, and there's more, you had more Afghan
[00:26:34] partners than Americans. Oh, by far, we would sometimes go in operations with about 100
[00:26:39] Afghans and maybe 12, 15 seals. Yeah, because that we're doing entire clearance operations
[00:26:45] through villages, you know, where we're going house to house, or shaken hands, a little bit of
[00:26:50] shaken hands, it's a little bit of on security, you know, either defending ourselves or going on
[00:26:55] the offensive, it depends on the situation, but, you know, we round everybody up, we talked to them,
[00:27:01] you know, we meet with village elders, so it's, it's, it's, it's a little bit of your,
[00:27:06] your, I guess, your more typical and conventional warfare tactics, so we're trying to meet and
[00:27:11] greet the population while also, you know, being prepared for battle. And, and, but the hardest
[00:27:19] part of that was certainly the IED threat, you know, only single file lines, everything we ever learned
[00:27:23] and training of different formations and, you know, staggered, actual on whatever it is, it doesn't
[00:27:31] apply. It all, it all gets thrown out the window, because it's, it's only about single file,
[00:27:36] what has been cleared, what hasn't been cleared, and you could, you could, you could
[00:27:39] veer from that a little bit depending on what area you're in and can to harm, more mountainous
[00:27:43] areas, less IEDs, but even then, I've got a story, you know, these guys, some of our guys take a,
[00:27:49] take a point, take a, on the high ground, then a little hilltop, I mean, just in the middle of nowhere,
[00:27:55] I mean, middle of, no, I can't emphasize this enough, it is the middle of nowhere, right, and they
[00:28:00] sit down and this pop goes off, it was a blasting cap that went low order, which means it didn't
[00:28:06] blow up the main charge, like a 15, 20 pound charge, it would have killed all three of them right
[00:28:11] then and there, and I mean, I want to say that again, middle of nowhere, there was no reason for
[00:28:16] there to the IED right there, but there was, this was out in the mountains, and this wasn't even
[00:28:21] in the, you know, the southern Canterhard district, which is, which is truly just a minefield everywhere,
[00:28:27] you know, so, you know, the Canterna emphasized how bad the threat is there, and even even
[00:28:32] taking, even taking a small high ground position behind a rock, you know, this is what the kind
[00:28:38] of things we ran into, and so that was that deployment, it was a lot of fun, but it was, it was a
[00:28:46] hard one for us, you know, on month six, that's six months since June 15th, 2012, I was hit by an IED
[00:28:56] blast by one of these, you know, again, there everywhere, it was, it was the one day we spent in
[00:29:01] Helman Province, so we went to Helman on an, on an elastment admission to support some marine
[00:29:07] special operations forces out there, and as, as the early, you know, we always fly in about the
[00:29:14] middle of the night, we do that so that the enemy can't arm the IED, so the IEDs are everywhere,
[00:29:19] but they're not always armed, and if they, if they keep them armed, they run out of batteries,
[00:29:24] and they don't work anymore, so they, so there's, there's a little bit of tactical consideration there,
[00:29:29] but, you know, and as the early morning hours come and the daylight starts to hit, we start to move
[00:29:36] around, and we start to clear out this one compound, and hadn't been totally clear jet, and one
[00:29:42] of my Afghan interpreters was responding to a call, runs in front of me, and completely gets
[00:29:49] dismembered by about 15 pounds of explosives underneath them, and all I know is I got hit with
[00:29:54] something, and it feels like you get hit by a truck wall, a bunch of guys in the truck are shooting
[00:30:00] you with a shotgun, that's sort of what it feels like, and, you know, my immediate reaction was
[00:30:07] feel my legs, right, so I, I feel my legs and everything's still there, you know, I know
[00:30:13] something is wrong. Distance from the IED, a couple feet, I mean it's so, I mean, because
[00:30:18] I would, I would, I'd lia, a few feet, what were you and me are probably, is about, you know, just
[00:30:24] across the table, and, you know, lots of pain, pain everywhere, but not my eyes, so I was completely
[00:30:31] blinded, but, you know, totally under the assumption that I just had dirt in my eyes, and,
[00:30:36] I remained under this assumption that there was really nothing wrong with my eyes for, frankly,
[00:30:41] for weeks to come, and we'll talk about that, but, you know, I was, I, I didn't lose consciousness,
[00:30:47] and knew what was happening, I could hear the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,
[00:30:50] everybody thinks that when somebody gets their legs blown off their screaming like the movies,
[00:30:54] it's just never the case, it's a very different, like, visceral sound of pain,
[00:30:59] and it's, and I've heard it many times now, because, you know, this, this happened to
[00:31:04] us a couple times, and, um, so I heard that, I knew, I knew that rockmon had been hit,
[00:31:10] because I could hear him, and, um, you know, one of our, one of my teammates tells a story where
[00:31:15] he, he got hit with a, with a foot, and a building next door, I mean, and it was, and that's how they
[00:31:22] knew something had gone terribly wrong, and, uh, you know, the medics come to me, there's nothing
[00:31:28] they can do for me, they, they sort of just wrap up my eyes, they know something's wrong, I really
[00:31:33] don't, frankly, I just, I keep assuming there's just dirt in my eyes, and that'll be fine,
[00:31:38] and, uh, eventually, we get taken out of there, and I was able to get up and walk to the
[00:31:43] heel, because, you know, you know, let somebody carry it when they've got a firefight to finish,
[00:31:48] and we get on, and, uh, as soon as the medics on the helicopter see me, they, they put me out right
[00:31:53] away, and I don't wake up for days. So, when I do wake up, um, in Germany, they, they told me my
[00:32:00] ride-eye had been removed, and, uh, I'd probably never see again on my left eye, but there's a chance,
[00:32:06] and again, kind of self-deception kicks in, I'm like, so you're saying there's a chance,
[00:32:09] we'll be fine. Just get the surgery done, get me on a plane to, to back to Maryland, the
[00:32:16] Walter Reed Ospo, where these surgeons are, and let's do this, and they're like, it's going to be a
[00:32:20] day or two, I argue, we argue, you know, that, that's how it goes for the next couple of days. I can't really
[00:32:25] move, I can't get up to use the bathroom, my body is completely swollen and, and, and, and,
[00:32:31] and shredded, really, I mean, there's no real permanent injuries to the rest of my body, but it's,
[00:32:36] it's in such a state that, like, I just just shockwave from the blast. I think shock, and I was,
[00:32:42] I had a ton of shrapnel just throughout. I think I was swollen, um, might have been muscle
[00:32:47] atrophy from being, you know, medically induced coma for so long, because I've been there,
[00:32:51] been that way for five or six days, but really couldn't move, um, and just wrapped up really tight,
[00:32:58] because I mean, as you can see the scarring a little bit, um, I was just, it was kind of been
[00:33:04] through a meat grinder a little bit, and, um, I was also, I was hallucinating wildly, so,
[00:33:10] I, everything I saw was Afghanistan. I was lucid, I understood what was around me, but all I could
[00:33:16] see was an Afghan guy sitting next to me, or an Afghan village. It was, it's, it's almost like
[00:33:22] Phantom Pain, but with your eyes, and there's a medical term for it that I can't remember,
[00:33:26] um, but it was, it just an odd and terrifying experience, because it wasn't, I knew it wasn't
[00:33:35] real, but it's just everything I saw. And, um, eventually got back to Maryland, um, on a,
[00:33:42] on one of our medical flights, and, you know, my wife was there waiting for me, and, you know,
[00:33:48] we began how that conversation about, okay, what's the next surgery? Because I had to remove the
[00:33:51] cataract. I mean, that was, that was the issue. There was a lot of shrapnel in my left eye,
[00:33:55] the eye that was still there, and, you know, the issue was, could we, can we safely remove the
[00:34:01] cataract, and will he ever see again? And if you do, if we do do that, what's, what are his
[00:34:05] chances really, of having decent vision? And, um, you know, we, we prayed, and we, I, and I look back
[00:34:13] on it, and, and again, that, you know, we call itself deception, but it was really the strength to
[00:34:18] stay sane, and, and, and believe that I was actually going to see again, and, and I truly
[00:34:24] believe that was God's strength is working through me, it was allowing me to, to believe in
[00:34:29] something impossible, um, because otherwise I would have gone nuts, because people sometimes ask me,
[00:34:33] what's it like not knowing if you're ever going to see again? And I always answer, I, I don't know.
[00:34:39] I don't know what that's like, because it was never, that was never my mental state. My mental
[00:34:43] state was always, it'll happen, it's just a matter of time, and then I can finally get back to my
[00:34:48] mental state. You know, the issue for me was like, when are we going to do this? You guys told me six weeks, all right, let's
[00:34:53] schedule it. And, you know, it was insanity. Yeah, I mean, that's obviously when I hear this story,
[00:35:00] I think Orion Joe who's with me in reminding you, and he got shot in the face, and, you know,
[00:35:06] it was a similar situation where, you know, clearly his, his eye, one eye was gone, but his
[00:35:13] other eye appeared to be intact, and he could actually see after he got wounded, then he got put into a,
[00:35:21] you know, he could see what was happening and, and walked into the Kazovak vehicle, but,
[00:35:29] you know, they put him into a medically induced coma, and when he woke up, he couldn't see.
[00:35:33] And then it was the same type of thing that they were telling you, they were telling him,
[00:35:39] which is, look, there was some nerve damage, we're not sure, and his attitude was very similar
[00:35:45] of like, well, it'll be okay, and, you know, it'll come back, but, you know, what didn't take
[00:35:51] very long before the doctors were like, no, it's, it's not coming back. And I forget the timeline,
[00:35:59] you know, I forget the timeline, because it's kind of a, kind of a blur together.
[00:36:05] But, yeah, for him, it was, he had a great attitude, but, you know, at the end,
[00:36:15] didn't happen. And, you know, and that's a guy that was still like, and he also still wanted to come back
[00:36:22] and get back with his platoon, and was telling me, you know, don't worry, I can smell the enemy,
[00:36:27] and I'll know where to shoot. Let me back, sir. So, yeah, the fact that you were able to recover is
[00:36:36] awesome, awesome, and, you know, it's, it shows, it should show people that, you know, even though
[00:36:44] you had a great attitude, the threat of, of never being able to see again was very, very real, very,
[00:36:51] very, very real. Oh, yeah, and it truly was, I mean, we had miracles occur in the operating room,
[00:36:56] multiple occasions, and doctors were just amazed that not only could I see again, but see well again.
[00:37:03] It was, because they're in their minds, they're like, well, if we do this surgery and his retina
[00:37:08] doesn't detach, like we think it might, he'll still have, you know, crappy vision, you know,
[00:37:14] because his corny is all destroyed. I mean, everything's a mess in this eye, and, you know, we'll
[00:37:19] get him some decent glasses so we can kind of live his life, but he's, he's pretty much permanently
[00:37:23] disabled, and I just didn't listen, I don't even remember these conversations, like I think I
[00:37:28] blocked him out, and, you know, it's, because the first surgery was, we've got to remove the
[00:37:32] cataract, okay, that went well, all right, we removed the cataract great, you know, and the next step
[00:37:37] is to put a lens in plants, in your eye, like, like anybody normally would, when they have
[00:37:41] cataract surgery, that's just the normal thing to do. We ended up never doing that, because it's
[00:37:46] kind of like replacing a window pane on a normal eye, but if the frame of the window is completely
[00:37:51] destroyed, then you have to sew the window pane to curtains, and that's never a good policy.
[00:37:55] So, they eventually refuse to do that on me, even though I was demanding it constantly,
[00:38:01] but because I wanted to see again, I wanted to get back, and I don't want to have a big
[00:38:04] thick glasses, which is what I have to wear now, or this specialized contact, but then another
[00:38:10] problem occurred, which is a whole, in my retina, that was expanding. And again, it's kind of a normal,
[00:38:16] you know, if you're over 50, this might be a normal thing that occurs, and then you have a pretty
[00:38:22] routine surgery to get rid of it and to stop it, but for me, it was incredibly fragile,
[00:38:27] but we had to do it. So I went blind again for six weeks, recovering from this surgery, so
[00:38:32] and I was truly living in darkness for a long time. You know, and not always, I think God
[00:38:37] wasn't hallucinating the entire time, that stopped after about week one, just or just after my major
[00:38:44] surgery, my first major surgery, but I won't blind again. And another miracle happened because
[00:38:50] they truly thought I wasn't going to make it through that surgery either. So, after, when they,
[00:38:54] when you were blind again for six weeks, going into that, did they tell you, okay, you're going to
[00:38:59] be blind for a period of time, and take time for you? Yeah, just because of the recovery process,
[00:39:03] you, they put a gas bubble in your eye so that it puts pressure on the back of your retina,
[00:39:08] and you have to be faced down for six weeks. It's just the weirdest. What the hell did you do for six
[00:39:13] weeks? Like, it's down. I bet. I got one of those massage chairs. Uh-huh. We're, you know,
[00:39:18] you plant your face down. I had audio books going all day long. It was great. Yeah, and by great,
[00:39:25] I mean, not great at all. Yeah, by great, you mean awesome. Yeah, yeah, start sucks and
[00:39:35] I'm sure you, you, you had to stay faced down all the time. Are you, um, and that six
[00:39:39] weeks goes by, and then they eventually remove the gas bubble and dissipates. Yeah, so there's
[00:39:44] eventually a point where you're like, okay, it's gone now. I can, I'm allowed, I'm allowed to look
[00:39:48] straight again. And then, and then it's just, you know, refitting your eye with the right eye
[00:39:53] wearing, you know, like, glasses and contacts, so I can actually get back to normal life and
[00:39:57] in frankly, that took years. Uh, it, you know, it's, eventually, I'll just, I'll skip to the end.
[00:40:04] About two and a half years in, I finally got, got a referred by the Navy to an outside clinic that
[00:40:11] does these, these amazing contacts, um, there's only one company in the world that does it. And I
[00:40:17] can see 2020 with it. Now, not up close, you know, my vision's complicated because I have a
[00:40:21] cataract, but, but I actually see 2020 vision at distance, which is, I mean, just not even close to
[00:40:28] what they thought was possible. So, um, and, and despite all that, I mean, I, before that two and a half
[00:40:33] year mark, I still had decent enough contacts to survive. I mean, they just weren't comfortable,
[00:40:37] they've kind of drove me crazy. And, um, you know, well, I cared about was getting back to the team.
[00:40:42] I was almost going back to Team 3. The, uh, the command wouldn't let that happen in the end.
[00:40:47] There's because I couldn't get the medical waiver to do it. So, I stayed at what was now
[00:40:52] called Special Reconnaissance Team 1. Again, we do Intel support for the SEAL teams,
[00:40:56] and, uh, did the troop commander there. So, in charge of about 50 personnel, mix of seals,
[00:41:02] intelligence specialists, um, all sorts of, uh, really great people that, you know, as you know,
[00:41:07] support the teams and intelligence matters. And, the point to Bahrain, uh, worked with
[00:41:13] joint special operations task force out there, um, working, you know, all throughout the
[00:41:18] Persian Gulf, uh, working on classified programs there, working in Lebanon as well, and, uh,
[00:41:24] coming back from that, uh, told I had to eventually get out. I mean, I had to start the medical
[00:41:31] retirement process. But before, before I did, I, I truly, I wanted to serve again. I mean, it was,
[00:41:37] it was extremely important to me. So, this deployment to Bahrain was about 2014. By the time I was
[00:41:42] really told, I had to medically retire. It was around 2016. But, you know, this process takes up to a year.
[00:41:48] And I asked that I, you know, be able to serve again in some capacity. Let my, let my, the specialties
[00:41:53] that I'd, that I'd acquired over the years at SRT1, be put to use in the Pacific, so they'd
[00:42:01] deploy me to Korea for my last deployment at the end of 2016. And as soon as I got home from that,
[00:42:06] I was, I was medically retired and, uh, had to find my next mission. You know, like you, you talked
[00:42:10] about the, the earlier on of the podcast. I mean, it's, it life truly is about mission. And,
[00:42:17] you know, I'm getting to politics now running for Congress and in Houston, Texas for the
[00:42:22] second district. And I, I talk about this a lot and from a, from a political philosophy standpoint,
[00:42:29] if you don't give people a mission or you don't encourage people to find their purpose and their
[00:42:34] dignity, you, you have a failing society. Uh, it's so important. And you're not, you know, even,
[00:42:41] even think tanks talk about this like American enterprise institute. Like our policies need to promote
[00:42:47] a sense of mission for people. And help people understand that they have value in this world. They're
[00:42:51] here on this earth for a reason. And if you're not constantly seeking out what that value is that you
[00:42:56] contribute to society, you're not doing your job. And we need to help you do your job if, if, if, if
[00:43:02] need be, but you, but you do have value and you, and you, and you must find that purpose in life.
[00:43:07] Um, and, and guys like us, I think can't survive without that constant mission. And, uh,
[00:43:14] well, we see it all the time with, with all vets when they, and I, I talk about this all the time.
[00:43:18] The vets that get out that have a note, a new, another mission. They focus on that mission. And they
[00:43:23] go kick ass. The vets that get out and don't know what they're going to do that flounder around
[00:43:28] without a direction. Those are the guys that end up in trouble because they don't have a mission.
[00:43:33] So they go and drink a beer, then they have another beer. And then the, they could get prescribed
[00:43:38] pain medicine for their back, which hurts, which sucks. And, and they go down this bad road.
[00:43:43] And I believe a lot of it is because, you know, they just need that next mission. But you got done with,
[00:43:50] so 2016, you didn't roll right into politics. You rolled to, you went back to college.
[00:43:56] Right. So no, in such an politics. And that become 2016. Did that become, you, you looked at
[00:44:01] what you're going to do next and you said, okay, well, how else can I serve, how else can I move forward?
[00:44:06] What's my next mission going to be in you decide you're going to go back to school?
[00:44:09] Back to school for, I knew it was going to stay in public service. So I knew my next mission was
[00:44:14] going to still be government. I wasn't exactly sure what. I knew I wanted to do, I wanted to
[00:44:19] be able to implement policy, strategy, and take that tactical experience. Because I had, you know,
[00:44:25] because I built an understanding of what policy and D.C. looks like on the ground.
[00:44:31] And actually because the reason I was hurt that day in 2012 was because of an Obama
[00:44:37] administration's policy of always wanting boots on the ground, battle of damage assessments for
[00:44:44] any, any close air support. So because earlier in that day, Marines had called in close air
[00:44:49] support on a compound that were taking fire from. For some reason, they wanted guys to walk
[00:44:53] across mine fields and go take pictures of it. Right. That's not good policy. Now, it's not a
[00:44:58] victimhood story. Don't get me wrong. I mean, there was a battle going on. We wanted to go. I don't
[00:45:02] care really what the reason is. But from a policy perspective, that's that's concerning. That,
[00:45:08] that kind of pressure is being put on our two star and our, and that's what drove that mission.
[00:45:14] That doesn't make a whole lot of sense. So it's great to see somebody like General Madison
[00:45:18] right now who says the opposite. Well, I will not waste my troops time with these kind of things.
[00:45:22] And he's on record. You know, after we drop the mother of all bombs while back. So on record
[00:45:27] saying, I will not waste my troops time going to count the dead bodies out there. That's just
[00:45:30] good policy. So, you know, I wanted to take that experience to Washington. The National
[00:45:40] Next Step is get the right education. So the Harvard Kennedy School, government is where I
[00:45:44] went. Got a master's degree in public administration. Focus in more on national security issues,
[00:45:48] economic issues, and a little bit of political US politics. How long was that school?
[00:45:55] I just did a year when you're a program. And, you know, it was kind of the accelerated executive
[00:46:01] style program that you can apply to. If you're, if you're older and you actually have some,
[00:46:05] some life experience. What's the intensity level with that? Uh, it is tenses you make it. I took,
[00:46:11] I took about four extra credits more than I needed to. So I was busy. Because I, you know,
[00:46:17] it's, it's not like going to college where you're just getting through it. I think, uh,
[00:46:20] I would highly recommend anybody. You know, you do a master's degree later on in life. You're
[00:46:24] really going to get the most you can out of it. Because you care about learning you're there for a
[00:46:28] reason because you have purpose. And, and you know, why you're there. So I got a lot out of it,
[00:46:33] honestly. And it was, it was quite, it was really an amazing year. I mean, you hear from the greatest
[00:46:37] people. I, you know, Bush's Deputy National Security Advisor teaching us. Um, I had, uh,
[00:46:43] you know, the, the premier experts on counter proliferation policy, uh, teaching us in class. I had
[00:46:48] Reagan's chief economic advisor as my economics professor. I mean, you just can't, you know,
[00:46:54] these people don't speak in terms of like, this is what we think happens in the White House.
[00:46:58] Or no, they're like, when I was in the White House, this is how it got done. I mean, that's the kind of
[00:47:02] the level of instruction that you're getting. So I was really happy to, to, to get that education.
[00:47:08] And it, it, it's truly applies to it's as, in the, in my current role is as running for office.
[00:47:14] Um, I'm glad it was there. But what I hadn't necessarily thought about running for office,
[00:47:18] even after I graduated, uh, I was looking at more policy jobs, you know, because I didn't,
[00:47:23] I don't have the political connections. I don't have the background and money and the donor
[00:47:26] networks to really, to, to jump off on a campaign, uh, right away. We thought about it in the long-term
[00:47:32] sense, for sure, but, uh, but not in the short term. And, uh, I was working with Pete Sessions,
[00:47:38] Congressman Pete Sessions, and Capitol Hill for a while, getting legislative experience there.
[00:47:41] And, um, working doing some consulting, uh, and, uh, eventually came to a head where I was about
[00:47:50] taking a job, either doing counter-opens, a master's instruction policy for the Department of Defense,
[00:47:54] or go run for office because my Congressman Ted Poe had just announced retirement.
[00:47:59] And we prayed about it. We thought about it. We, uh, had the right backing from, you know, some
[00:48:06] well-connected people that I think God just put in front of us at the right time, and my wife and I
[00:48:12] went for it. You know, she was, uh, she was all in, who was all in, and, uh, and that was it. I mean,
[00:48:18] I've already, I've already, I've already come back to Texas by this point to the health with Hurricane
[00:48:22] Harvey reconstruction. It was out volunteer and we're, my whole hometown of Katie. My parents didn't
[00:48:27] flood. They were, they were, they've been living in spring, which is just North of Katie,
[00:48:31] from past 13, 14 years, but, you know, neighbors needed help. Neighbors still need help. Um, it's,
[00:48:37] it's still pretty devastated in Houston. And, you know, that, I think the decision became easy,
[00:48:43] that we knew this was the right choice. Like, this was the right mission. If I cared about
[00:48:47] nuclear proliferation policy, what better place to affect it from Congress,
[00:48:51] to care about helping flood victims, no better place than elected office. Um, if you care about
[00:48:56] border security, you know, which Texans do, no better place than public office. You know, if we
[00:49:00] care about protecting Americans and protecting the, you know, the, the sanctity of the seal teams and
[00:49:06] and pushing the right policies from the defense level, then, you know, elected politics is
[00:49:11] where do I can do it from? And, and so the decision was easy. It was, there's the right choice for us.
[00:49:17] We knew we were doing it for the right reasons. We know we are still doing it for the right reasons.
[00:49:21] And we're not going to quit. So with all those things that you said that are real positive about
[00:49:30] having a political career, you must have also been looking at the, the nightmare, gut check, just
[00:49:38] mud slinging that you're going to have to go, or that's going to be thrown at you and all that.
[00:49:43] And, and your family getting, the microscope on them and watched all the time and no privacy and
[00:49:48] all that, how did you weigh those things out? And did you think about those things as well?
[00:49:53] Absolutely. Uh, and it's, it's, by far the most concerning thing about politics. I mean, if anything
[00:50:00] drives, drives you out, it's, it's that, you know, and frankly, the experience has been too bad.
[00:50:06] Yeah, I mean, I get a tack for silly things here and there. I've got a, you know, one of, one of
[00:50:11] my opponents, what, what I would call one of his cronies, there's, there's, there's these corrupt, um,
[00:50:18] they call them the Slates in Harris County, which is Harris County is Houston. Um, and these
[00:50:25] three Slates are essentially three political maelors that go out and they, they, they target senior
[00:50:31] citizens especially. And they make it sound like there's these, these, these conservative review type of
[00:50:38] magazines, you know, these, something with authority behind it, but really they're not. Really
[00:50:42] they're paid a play and it's just one author and they pick who they like based on what kind of money
[00:50:47] they were able to get out of the deal and then they trash everybody else. So, you know, they put
[00:50:51] mine it, they put my bio on there, it doesn't say anything about who I actually am, it just says,
[00:50:55] I'm homeless and don't have a job and we're like to be, I mean, it's, it's absurd, right? And
[00:51:00] most people read it and they think this, this, this can't be serious. So, and actually got me a lot of
[00:51:05] votes because people would look me up after that and say, oh, well, this is, this is who this guy is.
[00:51:10] Maybe I will vote for him after all. But, but unfortunately that's politics and that's, that's
[00:51:14] the world we live in. Even though the, you know, the Harris County Republican Party has publicly
[00:51:19] denounced these so-called Slates because they send out these voter guides and, you know,
[00:51:24] they've denounced them but people don't always know. People aren't, you know, sometimes a lot of
[00:51:28] a folks still rely on those. So, that you're battling this kind of corruption, you're battling this
[00:51:32] establishment. I mean, you know, we always talk about the establishment in politics and I never
[00:51:36] really knew what that meant. I think until I saw behind the curtain and now I truly understand.
[00:51:41] And it's this class of politically connected people and the, and the donor class that really
[00:51:47] just stick together. And it's nothing to do with policy or doing the right thing for the American
[00:51:51] people. It's just how much money do you have? That's all that matters. And it's not, it's not all
[00:51:55] that matters. We made it into the runoff after last week's election, which was March 6. I was nine
[00:52:01] candidates in my primary and on an election day, I came out far and away first place. We've beat out
[00:52:10] overall in the election. I was second place but we beat out. So, just to again explain that a little bit,
[00:52:17] for people that aren't paying attention to election, you are in the, in the fight, you're going
[00:52:22] to get some nine other candidates going into the election. Obviously, there's some people that vote
[00:52:27] early through mail voting and they just vote early and you were behind there. But then as your
[00:52:35] campaign picked up and people started to actually see who you are when people came to vote on election
[00:52:40] day, you, you won election day, but you didn't win all the votes combined because of people that
[00:52:46] had voted early and got it correct. But it shows the trajectory and the momentum of what you're doing.
[00:52:52] We've got some great momentum that we're excited about and indeed even put in paint a broader
[00:52:57] picture. We started this late November and the election was March 6. That's a very little time
[00:53:03] for anybody to get a campaign together. So, and we're going up against one of my opponents,
[00:53:08] that's probably all of ended up spending when the numbers come in between $6 and $7 million,
[00:53:13] which is a record for self-funding for a campaign like this. Another opponent, similar, very high
[00:53:20] spending, very much self-funded and it was already a state representative, so had some kind of
[00:53:24] campaign machine in place. You're trying to catch up. You're trying to build a campaign team
[00:53:30] and a message within almost no time at all and no money whatsoever. That's not an easy task.
[00:53:37] Only a couple months. Usually you start like a year out if you're going to run for Congress.
[00:53:42] But that just wasn't the case here because Ted Poe announced retirement about mid-November.
[00:53:47] So, we had a lot to overcome. We built that momentum quickly. We worked hard.
[00:53:53] We worked hard. We got the message out. It's meant as many people as we could and you know, it worked.
[00:53:59] We snuck by, it was not got to that third-place spot because as you said, so we were behind
[00:54:04] during early voting and mail-in voting because that stuff happened so early. There was just no way
[00:54:10] from my momentum to catch up in time. But by election day, we were far and away first place and
[00:54:15] were able to sneak into the runoff. So, now we're in the runoff and that's May 22nd. So we got another
[00:54:21] two months to really prepare and get our message out there and I think we're excited about it.
[00:54:27] I think it's going to go well. So you talked about this a little bit. You talked about money.
[00:54:34] Money. And as disturbing as it is, what's driving so much of who wins these elections
[00:54:41] is who has the most money? Because that's how you get the advertising. That's how you get the
[00:54:44] mailers. That's how you get the word out there. I mean, if you don't have the money to pay for
[00:54:48] advertising, then no one knows who you're, and you don't get any votes. So as disturbing as that is,
[00:54:53] without money, you have a real hard time. I mean, you've done an amazing job with the
[00:55:00] limited amount. I mean, how much money did you go into that last election? We spending.
[00:55:04] Ended up spending total about $200,000. So we were outspent in a 30 over 30 into one.
[00:55:12] Easily. And I would say more if you count what everybody else, you know,
[00:55:17] the first and second place also spent against me. I mean, you know, it's something to be proud of.
[00:55:24] So I think we can win. It is $200,000 and you win up against somebody that spent $6 million.
[00:55:30] And yeah, like I said, unfortunately, money drives so much of these elections. And that's why you end up with
[00:55:37] those people that, I mean, I know you can't well, technically or possibly, but you're not supposed
[00:55:44] to be able to buy an election, right? Right. But I mean, the first thing that you talk about that
[00:55:50] spent $6 million without that money, I mean, where would it be? It was a female, right?
[00:55:55] Where would she have been without spending that money? I mean, I'm assuming she wouldn't have been
[00:55:58] anywhere. No. So she was able to buy herself at least third place. Right. And maybe if she had
[00:56:03] another more money, she would have been able to buy herself first place. That's a scary thought.
[00:56:08] It is. I mean, you know, I don't like the way campaign finance works. I don't think you should
[00:56:14] be able to sell fund that much for a race. And you know, I understand that there's some good
[00:56:19] arguments to make that you can sell fund, you know, over what the individual limit is.
[00:56:24] But to that extent, I mean, it's, you know, it truly creates a donor class of politicians.
[00:56:30] And like that's just, I don't think that's what we want as American people. And it's up, but it's
[00:56:36] up to voters in the end to decide. It's up to voters to see through that. And, you know, I always
[00:56:40] encourage, just go out and do your research. You know, just do enough to go on the websites of each
[00:56:44] candidate and get a filter where they are watched them. Watch their videos. See how they speak. See how
[00:56:49] they would represent you. See how they would articulate your values. You know, we put up YouTube
[00:56:54] videos all the time. You can always watch me in interviews. You know, we're coming or listen to podcasts,
[00:57:00] listen to Jocca's podcast. And, you know, because you want people to get to know you and you need
[00:57:06] to be out there with folks. You need to be meeting people everywhere you go. And that's how we want,
[00:57:11] you know, that's how we built that connection with the voter. That's how we built momentum,
[00:57:16] just getting out and meeting people and inspiring them and connecting with them. That's, that's,
[00:57:21] that's still works. And we proved that. That's one of the things that you did while your opponents
[00:57:26] were spending a bunch of money. You put on your running shoes. Yeah. And ran through your entire district.
[00:57:32] Right. I did, uh, limp a lot of the way, too, because, uh, we talked about over preparing. Well,
[00:57:37] sometimes you can under prepare. And, uh, when you're running a campaign, there's not a lot of
[00:57:42] time to get your running in. And so I started that 100 mile run and, um, it was going well.
[00:57:47] You know, so I want to back up a little bit. We, we playing this a while out. It was going to be five
[00:57:51] days. We're going to cross the whole district. Really show that dedication. I want to, I want to,
[00:57:56] get on the ground. I want to show the dedication to every inch of this district. And, um, with,
[00:58:00] with whatever publicity we get out of it, we're going to use it for good cause. And we, we set up a
[00:58:04] gofundme account. It's still active if you want to donate to it. Let's gofundme.com slash rebuild
[00:58:09] Houston with Dan Crenshaw. And that money goes to three particular volunteer groups that I was
[00:58:15] able to identify and vet that are still out there every day rebuilding people's homes. Because
[00:58:20] that, I mean, that is still going on. I always try to let everybody know if you're a contractor.
[00:58:23] If you've got any expertise, please come volunteer in Houston. We are backed up into, you know,
[00:58:28] it is, it is tough to find a contractor these days. Even if people have the money to pay for it,
[00:58:33] they still can't get any availability. The demand is so high that the prices have gone way
[00:58:37] through the roof. We need more people there nationwide. So, you know, police come to Houston.
[00:58:42] There's a work for you and there's good work. There's a lot left to do when people need it.
[00:58:47] So, in these volunteer groups are out doing it, you know, for $57,000, between $57,000,
[00:58:52] they can rebuild a whole home because all their labor is free. It's volunteers. And they
[00:58:56] do a great job and they're working a lot of these neighborhoods where individuals just can't
[00:59:00] do with themselves. And it was, it was just great to see that. A lot of church affiliated groups
[00:59:06] always out there helping. And, you know, it makes you proud to be a tax and it makes you proud to be an
[00:59:11] American. So, we finished that run, you know, by day three, it was certainly limping through most of it.
[00:59:17] It changed out my shoes, day five, we're running pretty well again, but it was tough.
[00:59:22] And it was fun. It was great. It was a great experience. You see people honking at you,
[00:59:27] maybe because you're in their way, maybe because, maybe because they're supporting you. I don't know.
[00:59:32] But, I mean, it was just, it was pretty credible experience to see the supporters out there to see,
[00:59:39] just, you know, it was, it was great. We went, and that was, that was when early voting started.
[00:59:45] It was, we voted on day one of that run. And, and, and, and, and, you know, two weeks later on election
[00:59:52] day, we, we wrapped it up and it was, it was a good night. It was a, we're on pins and needles.
[00:59:56] It was until 2 a.m. that we knew that we'd actually come into second place by 155 votes.
[01:00:03] So, you think anybody says their vote doesn't count, doesn't matter. That's wrong.
[01:00:07] It, it truly matters. I mean, every single vote matter, I can't think every volunteer enough.
[01:00:13] Can't think every supporter enough. Because a lot of people went out and they maybe got 10 votes
[01:00:17] here and there, maybe a hundred votes here and there. You know, individuals were able to do that
[01:00:21] and put us over the top because they believed in the message. They believed in our candidacy.
[01:00:25] And it was just, you know, it's humbling. And it's, it's almost, you feel a weight of
[01:00:30] responsibility when people put their trust in you like that as you should feel it because you
[01:00:34] don't want to disappoint them. You know, you can't let your supporters down and I truly
[01:00:39] feel that way about every vote. So what's, so what's next right now?
[01:00:45] We're the runoff. The runoff. It's just me and Kevin Roberts. And just, you know, it's
[01:00:52] May 22nd early voting starts again a couple weeks before that and it's a lot of the same.
[01:00:56] You know, we, we stick to the basics. We professionalize our organization. We ask for more money.
[01:01:02] Please donate a crenchoffacommer.com and we, and we, and we, so that's actually real though. Like
[01:01:08] you kind of, you kind of joke about it. And I know you're like, like, most good human beings,
[01:01:14] you feel uncomfortable saying, hey, give me some money. But the reality is,
[01:01:19] for you to take this to the next level that you need, you need money. And so when you say that
[01:01:25] kind of jokingly that the reality is, if you don't get that money, it's going to be really
[01:01:29] hard to swing an upset. Right. And so, so that's what's the, what's the website?
[01:01:34] It's crenchoffacongerist.com. CR-E-N-S-H-A-W-F-O-R-Congerist.com. You can donate there. You can check out the
[01:01:41] can you see there. You know, CR interviews, your YouTube videos, or commercials, my bio, everything.
[01:01:46] It's all in one spot. Follow us on Facebook. We've got a pretty exciting social media presence.
[01:01:51] That's how we get a lot of our word out because, you know, it's cheap and it hits the right people.
[01:01:56] So, crenchoffacongerist.com. And you know, that money, we spend it wisely. It doesn't go to
[01:02:01] anything silly. It's, you know, we need it to send mail to voters, you know, to get our message out.
[01:02:06] We need to put out radio ads. We need it to buy t-shirts for volunteers and to buy yard signs so that
[01:02:12] people can put them in their yards and create that upwelling of support where everybody's got
[01:02:17] a damn crenchoff sign. You know, that's how we do it. And it's, but it's, we work our butts off.
[01:02:23] I promise you that we work for, we work for every vote out there. And I actually believe that's how
[01:02:29] it should be. And that's how it would be in Congress. Yeah. That's awesome. And I know you're on a kind of
[01:02:37] a time schedule today. And I know you got some other things that you want to do here while you're
[01:02:42] out here in sunny, sunny, San Diego, which isn't too sunny today. But I think we just hit everything
[01:02:49] of how people can best support your cause. And obviously, I'm in crenchoffer Congress on Twitter,
[01:02:58] your Dan Krenchau, Texas TX, correct. So at Dan Krenchau TX, and then on Facebook, it's pretty easy to
[01:03:08] find you. Uh, there's just Dan Krenchau. Dan Krenchau for Congress. Yeah.
[01:03:13] Pretty easy. Yeah. I just searched Dan Krenchau and you pop right up. So that's, uh, that's it. Well,
[01:03:21] you know, obviously, I just want to say before you take off, thanks for your service, thanks for
[01:03:26] your sacrifice for this great country. Thanks for what you've done for what you're doing. And thank
[01:03:34] you for what you are going to do. And appreciate everything. I appreciate that, Jaco. You know,
[01:03:40] the services and over, you know, we, we find our purpose. We find our new mission and this is it for
[01:03:46] me. You know, it's, it's helping Texans. It's given Texans a representative. I think they can be proud of.
[01:03:52] We're so often just disgruntled and ashamed of our politicians. And we don't really think they're
[01:03:57] working on our behalf because we don't always elect people who truly put service before self. And,
[01:04:04] and, you know, part of this campaign is convincing those that we do have a future. And we do have
[01:04:10] a future of leaders that will attract people to conservative values and, um, and keep those values
[01:04:17] alive and, and, and again, give us a leader that we can be proud of. Awesome. Well, I think they'll
[01:04:22] definitely find that with you. Thanks for coming on and it's honored to be here. Until you come back
[01:04:29] on, once you get the W, once you get the win, come back on and you can explain to us where you're going
[01:04:35] from there. Absolutely. So how we did it. Get out and vote. May 22nd everybody. Thanks, Dan. Thanks for coming
[01:04:40] on. Thank you. So Dan has left the studio, but he's also left some very good ways to support him
[01:04:52] and what he's doing. And echo Charles, speaking of support, yeah. Maybe you could tell the troops
[01:05:03] how they can support this cause. Sure. If they want, if they want. And while they're supporting
[01:05:12] this cause, also support themselves. Which is important. If they want, you know. Do you
[01:05:17] what I just said? Yeah, very important. I said important. Yeah, you said it correct. Yeah.
[01:05:22] Two T's and now on. Normally there's no T's in it for me. Yeah. Yeah. Important.
[01:05:28] Kind of like the British accent, sometimes they don't say the T's too, and sometimes the same
[01:05:31] really solid, you know. Like they say. This is not back to reality. They don't say the T.
[01:05:39] Reality or reality. And then the last back to support. Yeah, if you want to support.
[01:05:47] Support your joints. This is how you support your joints. If you're an already.
[01:05:53] Jocquoise supplements. Good supplements. Crill oil. Super crill. Jocquoise super
[01:05:58] crill oil and joint warfare. Some of them is for your joints maintain them. Also, discipline.
[01:06:08] Pre-workout. Pre-mission. Cognitive, enhancer plus physical.
[01:06:15] Enhancer. Force multiplier. For a small supply. Yeah, there's layers. Yeah, actually. Yeah.
[01:06:22] You know, it's like a blend. It's a good blend. Yeah. I am running low on the crill oil. I did not take my
[01:06:28] own advice for the description. Subscription. Yeah. So it to manually get some more. But hey, man,
[01:06:36] that's life sometimes. If you want to get on the subscription thing,
[01:06:41] re up every what is it month. Right? Because it's a month supply. You can pay. Yeah, yeah,
[01:06:45] however much you take. And that's the smart way to do it. Totally is joint warfare too.
[01:06:50] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, fully. It's the one. I think the combo is the best way to go for sure.
[01:06:55] Recommend the combo. Nonetheless, you get them at originmain.com. Good way to support and support
[01:07:01] yourself as a big one. Also, at originmain.com, there are guise and rash guards for you.
[01:07:06] Jiu Jitsu journey. If you have chosen or will choose to go on that Jiu Jitsu journey. There's
[01:07:13] no reason why not. You should go on the Jiu Jitsu. Yeah. And if you're going to ask what if I'm
[01:07:18] small, big, large overweight under the younger young, the answer is start Jiu Jitsu. Yeah. How
[01:07:26] do you get in shape for Jiu Jitsu? Yeah. That's what you do. Yeah. You know, Tim Tim always says like,
[01:07:33] oh, you know, he's been out of the Jiu Jitsu for a long time. Tim Ford. Yeah. And he'll be able to go.
[01:07:37] Okay. Yeah. I'm going to get back in shape. Take a, you're looking at the wrong lane. Yeah,
[01:07:43] you go back to Jiu Jitsu. Did you just get your inshate? Yeah. You'll be, you'll be fine.
[01:07:47] You're going to suffer a little bit. But might even suffer a lot. It's hard. You got to be hard
[01:07:53] mentally for a guy like Timbo because he's a purple belt. Yeah. And so he's going to come and
[01:07:59] get beat by some white belts. I mean, not white belts. Buy some blue belts. Yeah. So blue belts.
[01:08:03] Because you know, some blue belts, they bring it. Yeah. And they can keep bringing it.
[01:08:07] So she's bringing it. They've been in there. Yeah. Khabish. Yeah. Yes. So Tim would be like,
[01:08:12] come back and then, and it adds that level of anxiety. Because you know, when you feel
[01:08:16] yourself, gal, well, you probably don't know this. But if you feel yourself gasating and you're
[01:08:19] like, you know, I was going to gas now, you're really gasating now that anxiety goes up and
[01:08:22] you get some more. That's how it is. He wants to avoid all that stuff. That's what I think. But,
[01:08:27] you know, that's when you put all these weird expectations and yourself, that's my opinion
[01:08:30] and the Jiu Jitsu. So just going to Jiu Jitsu and learn Jiu Jitsu and when you do, you're going to
[01:08:35] want a G. If you do G, because you can do no G as well. But when you choose a G, I recommend.
[01:08:44] You recommend. I think there's only one recommendation. I agree. In all seriousness, there's only one
[01:08:50] recommendation. Yeah. And I've been through a lot of G. I have a lot of G. Experience. Yeah. We'll say
[01:08:56] a significant amount of G experience. And the origin G has proven legitimately to be the best one
[01:09:02] kind of by far too. Yeah. There's just one that I used to use. It's to those good. It was fine.
[01:09:08] And it was like good. Yeah. There's a difference though. There's a difference between this G's
[01:09:12] good. Yeah. I think you get an origin G. Yeah. Right. Yeah. You know, it's funny. Like, you know,
[01:09:17] how like when you get a new G in a Raskard or whatever. And you're kind of fired up with a
[01:09:20] little train because you got your new G. Yeah. I think you're kid with the new G. Yeah. You know,
[01:09:23] it's that. It's that faster. That feeling didn't wear off like for a while. Did you feel that
[01:09:29] like when we rolled, when we were both wearing new origin G's? I did refired up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[01:09:34] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because I did you think maybe it was going to be the day.
[01:09:36] Oh, brother, I could I always think it's going to be the day always. Yeah. Dang.
[01:09:45] Because maybe one day they're willing to do it. I always think it's going to be the day, too.
[01:09:48] Maybe it's not up. Maybe it will. I don't know. Could be the day. Yeah.
[01:09:53] Anyway, origin main.com get your G there. When you choose to get a G, there's compression gear to
[01:10:00] Raskard. If you do no G, there's Raskard's there too. All made in America. Yeah. I was going to say
[01:10:04] all made in America. Yeah. Which is like it's no big deal. No, it's a huge deal. Yeah. It's a huge deal.
[01:10:09] Made in America in Maine in our factory by awesome workers. And it's not the kind where
[01:10:16] by crafts crafts people crafts crafts crafts crafts crafts person crafts people. People man there. Some of the
[01:10:22] more females. Yeah. But their craftsman. Yeah. Men doesn't mean your man. Yeah.
[01:10:27] Me, your human. Yeah. As far as I know. Like modern man like man kind. Yeah. Yeah. There you go.
[01:10:36] So craftsman kind craftsman kind. Nonetheless, all made in America. Yes. And that is a big deal.
[01:10:43] And it's not the kind where it's like, yeah. Let's import all their things or whatever. And then
[01:10:47] we'll quote unquote make it in America where you tick the one check box. It's like, yeah,
[01:10:51] technically it's made. It's not that kind. It's the kind where they grow the cotton in America.
[01:10:58] What do they do after they grow the cotton? They harvest the cotton. They do. Well, they can die
[01:11:03] the cotton. And they weave the cotton. Yeah. There's all bunch of steps all done in America. Yeah.
[01:11:08] But the land of the cotton because it's not just cotton. It's an athletic. That's one of the
[01:11:13] problems with the old geese. They're all made just with with cotton. They're like crap. Yeah. And
[01:11:20] then why would you not get modern technology? Well, why? Because they don't have, they don't
[01:11:26] do you do you do to where they're making the geese? Yeah. Now. So like little issues that come up
[01:11:31] in you just just little or big ones or whatever one they come up in. I'll do it. I don't know.
[01:11:35] You put an origin ge in the dryer. It's dry like quick. Yeah. And because it's not all cotton.
[01:11:43] Yeah. Because if you remember it in the teams cotton kills. Sure. Cotton kills because it gets wet
[01:11:49] and then it's heavy and makes it cold. Yeah. It doesn't dry quick enough. Yeah. You get the blend going.
[01:11:57] Then you're good to go. There's all kinds of different leaves too, which is cool.
[01:12:00] Now let's go to origimain.com. You can check out with whichever one you want. If you want something
[01:12:04] get something also what you want to do is go to the immersion camp if you want. So do you
[01:12:15] do the immersion camp? It's not like a training camp for ADCC. No. It's an educational experience.
[01:12:21] Like you immerse yourself in that you can modulate to the level of your personal commitment
[01:12:29] to getting after it. Yes. So some people will be there and they're going to be really soar every day.
[01:12:37] Yeah. Because they're going to be getting after it. Some people are going to be brain. Their
[01:12:41] brain is going to be more sore than their body because they're going to be more looking at it
[01:12:44] from the education that they're going to have a learning new moves and techniques. Yeah. So that's
[01:12:50] cool about the immersion camp or some of us nothing is going to be sore because maybe it'll be
[01:12:56] sore for a little while and then we're just going to cruise a little bit exercise to brain more
[01:12:59] and then the body is going to go back and do whatever you like. Yeah. And there's a lot to go around
[01:13:03] and it's going to fun too. That's the thing. Yeah. What's cool to hang out with just a bunch of people
[01:13:07] that are going to get you for seven days. Yeah. And then they get like five tons of labs.
[01:13:13] And you don't have to stay there the whole time. Yeah. There's a first part in a second part.
[01:13:17] You know, it's like the first few days and then you can do this the second few days and then you can
[01:13:23] do all them if you want. So August 26 through September 2nd. We're going to be there.
[01:13:28] You know who else is going? No big deal. Dave Burke. Yeah. Yeah. Dave Burke got the bug.
[01:13:34] Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. He's got the bug. Yeah. He'll call me for just like verbal advice. Oh he's
[01:13:39] do you be texting me about about like guard passage? Yeah. Like position. Some like a really?
[01:13:46] Hey, let's do it. Let's communicate about guard passing via text. Yeah. Amen. How do you
[01:13:51] catch the people with? Well, Americana. Yeah. And it's an interesting conversation because
[01:13:58] you know he says, oh well, the Americana's like what I use the most right now. And I told him
[01:14:04] like the Americana is actually not a really effective move. Right. Against any one that has trained
[01:14:10] for a little bit. Purple belt you're not going to you might catch an ablube belt in an Americana.
[01:14:15] Purple belt probably not going to happen. I did catch a black belt in Americana the other day.
[01:14:20] And it was like shame. Right. Like I got caught with the Americana. Yeah. And this this particular
[01:14:26] black belt was like shame. He hung his head and shame. He was like he got some Americana. Yeah. But
[01:14:32] I explained a Dave. The reason that the Americana is effective for him right now, the most effective
[01:14:39] I'm like is it the first submission that you learned? Yes, it is. So he's practiced at the
[01:14:44] most and he's figured out all the little nuanced things that you have to do right in order to make
[01:14:50] the move of a move work and the Americana work. So he's figured out some of those things
[01:14:56] because he's tried it a bunch even when he missed it he learned something. He didn't even know
[01:15:00] he learned something but he learned something. So he keeps trying and he got good with these.
[01:15:06] So he's good at the Americana. He's not going to get his people to know how to defend it yet,
[01:15:09] which is going to be a problematic. So you got it. You got to that's what happens. But isn't that
[01:15:15] part of the whole learning process though? Because I think they I mean remember when I'm
[01:15:20] assuming you had similar experience where you were sure you do Americana and you get them and
[01:15:24] you did certain moves for years. Like like for when I first started my first good move was the
[01:15:31] Ezekiel. In fact, I used to call it the Ezekiel. The Ezekiel. That's what I thought it was.
[01:15:38] That was what I wanted to call it. But it was I learned it like one of the first submissions I
[01:15:42] looked and then I just tried it all the time and I got pretty good at it. Then you realize that
[01:15:45] it's not that hard to defend the Ezekiel. Eventually when you start going against better
[01:15:47] guys. So then you got to move to the I think the next move that I actually started doing a lot of
[01:15:51] was the camera and I spent a couple of years at that camera and then I spent a couple of years at
[01:15:55] Crucifix. Then I spent a couple of years at the straight foot lock. And then you know so
[01:16:00] and you know just get a little bit of those position. Yeah that's how. But gave Burke
[01:16:05] back to my point. He's coming. He's coming to the camp. Yeah. And you know what else is I will see
[01:16:11] else. We'll see if we'll see if we'll see if life. Yeah. I hope we all have to work. Sure.
[01:16:17] Yeah. I blocked this off though. Yeah. Just sweet. Yeah that's really good fun. Yeah cool.
[01:16:22] Go man. If you could make that make that. What's the date on them again? August 26 through
[01:16:28] September 2nd. Oh yeah and if you want it if you do want to come you can go to origin main.com
[01:16:32] and you go to the merchant camp and you can sign up. Yeah you can come and hang out. It's a good
[01:16:36] lobster if you like lobster. Yeah. Yeah. He likes steak. Yeah. Hang out and Maine. Visit our factory.
[01:16:43] Yeah. Which is awesome. I think you can go like paddling, stand up, stand up, stand up,
[01:16:49] paddle and unloading and stuff. Yeah. All kinds of stuff. Yeah. Also good way to support yourself.
[01:16:56] If you choose to vary up your work up. Make it a little less boring. You always make it sound like
[01:17:02] I do these boring workouts. Yeah. And I just realize I'm taking that abuse for quite some time.
[01:17:07] Oh. My workouts are not boring. Yeah. In a fact they're boring and and hard. So they're hard.
[01:17:12] Yeah. So here's the thing where what boring is like just a complete matter of opinion. You know,
[01:17:19] so to me if you're going to do 20 reps squats, brass, 20 reps, brass, 20 reps until you're like
[01:17:30] that's kind of boring and have you ever done it before? Yes. You've done that one. Not your exact
[01:17:38] one. But yeah, I did do 20 reps. Watch some in fact. Yeah. You've done 20 reps squats that you can only
[01:17:44] squat 10 times. Well, that's physically impossible. But no. Yes. It is if you can only do 10 times.
[01:17:50] You can only do 10 times. No. You can do 20 times. You can do 20 times. You can do 20 times. No.
[01:17:54] That's it. That's not how it works. No. All right. Right. Hey, look. Take my word for it. You can
[01:17:59] physically do it 10 times mentally do it 20 times. Okay. You do it. So you imagine you do 20 times. Okay.
[01:18:05] It's a look. You can physically do it 10 times. I guess technically you're right. And I want to
[01:18:12] listen. I don't want to split hairs, but you're still not right. If you can do it 10 times,
[01:18:17] but you can do it 20 times because look, if you can do something 20 times, you can do it 10 times.
[01:18:20] So yes. But what you're saying is something that you, you know, max out at 10 times. The
[01:18:26] weight you use to max out at 10 times. You do it 20 times physically impossible.
[01:18:30] 10 times. 10 times. Well, apparently for echo. Oh, man. See. Anyway, back to the workout. Maybe that's
[01:18:37] where that skinny knee is gone. No, baby. No, baby. Anyway, if you want to very up the workout,
[01:18:50] go to on it.com slash jockel. Get some cool kettlebells. Yeah. Get some battle ropes. Get a
[01:18:56] maze. Get two maces. Have you won an alight on one boom? When you light them more interesting.
[01:19:01] I use them. So my workouts are interesting. All right. Well, there you go. Yeah,
[01:19:06] the interesting workout. Well, do it that way. That's what I would would what he said.
[01:19:11] Suggest. Okay. Anyway, go there. On it.com. Good stuff in there. Don't get addicted to the website
[01:19:18] because there's a lot of good information too on there. Because you could. Unless also
[01:19:23] good way to support when you get the books that jockel sometimes reviews on this podcast. I
[01:19:29] organized or we organized them on jockelbidcast.com. Click on the top. So the books from the
[01:19:34] episode, I got all the books listed there, including little articles that, you know, how
[01:19:39] sometimes you'll cover article. All list those on there too. How much research would you have to
[01:19:45] do if you knew nothing about this podcast or me? How much research would you have to do to figure out
[01:19:52] that we read books on the podcast and that they're all on jockelpodcast.com. The reason I
[01:20:01] ask this is because I've had people ask me on social media like a week ago, like on Twitter,
[01:20:09] do you like to read? Yeah. Right. Like that's a great. You don't have to dig very deep to
[01:20:16] know that answer. Yeah. Right. Do you like to read? Right. That this is a really low level
[01:20:25] question that doesn't take a whole lot of research to figure out. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I guess
[01:20:31] is that laziness or is it like, hey, this guy seems pretty accessible. I'm just going to ask him
[01:20:35] here he is. I wonder if he's got likes to read. I don't think the likelihood of it being laziness
[01:20:40] because obviously it's going to be different for different people but the likelihood of it being
[01:20:44] laziness is pretty low. I think I don't think it's laziness at all. I think it would be a mix
[01:20:50] or one of these things. Yeah. They just want to ask you a question that you know,
[01:20:57] that you're going to have an answer to or or maybe they're just new or maybe they know you
[01:21:02] from extreme ownership and you know, I know you wrote this cool book. Hey, do you like to read in general?
[01:21:09] Kind of maybe they're going to listen to your some big crush being too judgmental. Yeah. If you're
[01:21:15] jumping to that conclusion that it's laziness. Yeah. You like to read like we literally have a podcast
[01:21:22] about books that we read and and then people say, do you have a list of books? Do you
[01:21:28] have any books you recommend? Yeah. Do you have a book list? Do you have a reading list? These
[01:21:35] are all things I could ask on a regular basis. Is this kind of like the time I ask you, hey,
[01:21:39] do you know, an of any gun ranges? You said, yeah, Google going Google and search gunaries.
[01:21:44] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I feel the same tone. Here's the thing you never
[01:21:50] to really know a when people are coming in the game. You don't know what their deal is or where they're
[01:21:55] coming from. So yeah, like maybe or maybe maybe they just heard you on Tim Ferriss or Joe Rogan
[01:22:01] and was like, boom, this guy's super interesting. Let me go straight to him and start talking
[01:22:05] on kind of thing or start asking questions rather than going on the internet. Let me research
[01:22:10] who this guy is and what he likes and doesn't like to do with such a test. Am I am I lazy
[01:22:16] in the fact that when I want to know something, I'll Google it. No, that's not easy. Okay. I don't
[01:22:21] yeah, I don't think so. As opposed to what? I don't know saying going to school and studying
[01:22:30] it first. I guess it's not a good idea. You know, alternative nonetheless, if you are feeling
[01:22:38] not lazy, actually this has nothing to do with laziness because this is more a convenience that
[01:22:43] I think would be beneficial or I thought would be beneficial for people who are looking for the
[01:22:48] books that you cover and ways to get them. That's why I organized these books on talk about
[01:22:52] yes, I'll call the website. So yeah, they're all there by and by chance they're kind of in order
[01:22:58] of preference in order of the way you almost the way you should read them. Maybe I'd have to shift
[01:23:03] some of them now. Yeah. I should put them in a different order because there's some books that I
[01:23:07] read again. I was like man, I should be at this would be near the top. I mean about faces is number
[01:23:11] is number one. Right. You should read that book first. Yeah. People ask me that all the time.
[01:23:16] What's your favorite? I've already read extreme ownership. Is there another book you recommend?
[01:23:20] I read well and I've read all your books. What books did I read next about Facebook? I don't
[01:23:25] know, David Hacworth. Yeah. That's like you're right. No one. Yeah. So anyways. Yeah. Make sense. I mean,
[01:23:31] I organized them by episode. Yeah. And most recent episode. Right. With book. But if you go back to
[01:23:36] episode one, which there's no book, but two, there's a book. And if you go in that order of reading,
[01:23:41] that's a good progression to get people to book. Oh, okay. Okay. Properly. I assume. Gotcha. So if you
[01:23:46] if you if you want to read your book, Jockel's book list in order of importance. In order importance,
[01:23:51] you go in chronological order, pur pod. Yes. With books. That's recommended. Not all podcast
[01:23:57] of books. That's right. That's right. Cool. Well, there it is. Again, just click on the books and
[01:24:01] boom, take a seat there, boom. Click through there, get your book. Easy way. Good way to support
[01:24:08] takes it Amazon. All good. Continue shopping if you feel the need to like if you're
[01:24:11] shopping for that. I'll end 10 today. Not let already pass. What's the next one? Easter.
[01:24:16] Mm. Carry on. Easter gifts. Sure. Good. Those chocolate Easter bunnies and the eggs. You know,
[01:24:24] how you you go Easter egg hunting. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, my kids do. Sure. Well, my young
[01:24:31] just kid does. Yeah. There you go. So if you can shop for that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Make sense. You know,
[01:24:36] they're older. After a while, you kind of figured out kind of still fun. No, can't be.
[01:24:41] Nonetheless, click through that. It's a good way to support. Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't
[01:24:46] already. Leave a review. If you're in the mood, leave a review. Here's the thing. I'm not saying,
[01:24:51] hey, leave a review. I'm not saying to leave a review, but I think sometimes people they want to
[01:24:56] leave a review, but they don't like think about it. You know? Mm. And then one, let's say I get
[01:25:02] reminded like, oh, shoot. I want to leave a review and I get reminded like, boom, then I'm going to
[01:25:06] leave a review. That's a good one. I read all the reviews. Yeah. And I've read them on the podcast
[01:25:12] before when they're really funny or I've coded them on social media. Yeah. So there's that, too. Yeah.
[01:25:18] If you read an awesome review, well, it doesn't have to be awesome, but if it's funny or it's good
[01:25:24] or it's creative. That's what I should have said. It's a creative review. There's been some really
[01:25:31] good ones. Everything with Amazon reviews for tea and books and there's a lot of people that get
[01:25:37] accurate. I think it colorful. For sure. Honestly colorful. They put the main thing is layers.
[01:25:42] There's a lot of layers. Yeah. Yeah. That's something for real good at the layers. Very impressed with
[01:25:46] that on many levels. See what you did. Nonetheless, subscribe if you, you know, if you want to support
[01:25:54] that way, that's a good way. Thanks for the people who have subscribed. That's a good deal.
[01:25:59] It's much appreciated. Big deal. Also in YouTube, subscribe to that. If you want, if you like the
[01:26:03] video version of this podcast or if you want watch and or share excerpts of this podcast.
[01:26:09] Three minutes, one minute sometimes. Do you haven't made any one minute ones? Six minutes.
[01:26:14] Sometimes. You should make some one minute ones. Okay. That'd be good. The one you just made is good.
[01:26:20] Thanks. The time is running out. Yeah. That's like a Woody code. Did we settle on hands in a
[01:26:26] hands? I think it's called it hands. Exerp and hands extras, which means that echo has gone and put
[01:26:33] his cinematic flare. No. Oh, say, I put some music on it and I put some text on it. There it is.
[01:26:40] It's in the madhouse. It's in hands. A little bit of soft. It's in the madhouse. Yeah. All right. Well,
[01:26:45] there it is. There's some of those on there. That video as well. By the way, no big deal. I, when I got to the gym
[01:26:51] today, Carl, he says, hey, I saw you on a world star. That's what you made it. We made it straight up.
[01:27:04] Yeah. Popular culture. Yeah. Popular culture. We're on a world star. World star.
[01:27:10] If you don't know what world star is, it originally was for fights. That's what I knew it for.
[01:27:15] Yeah. That's how I think that's how it gained. Yeah. I think you, it was for like, it was for
[01:27:20] it was for like music videos. I think hip hop music videos and stuff like that. Then you get, you know,
[01:27:25] I used stuff. I would watch it because they because people would film street fights. I like to
[01:27:29] watch street fights. Sure. Learn a lot from street fights. And what's funny is it became such a
[01:27:33] popular culture thing that when people would be recording the fights that they're going to
[01:27:37] then put on world star, they would be saying world star during the fight. Someone be filming
[01:27:43] and saying, world star, this is going on world star. Well, now guess what's on world star. That
[01:27:47] goes video. We made it. Jockels on the way star. World star. Dang. That's good. Nonetheless,
[01:27:55] cross cultural boundaries. Yeah. Okay. World star. Well, star. Maybe it happened. You did 100%.
[01:28:04] Yeah. YouTube. You know, so. People who don't star. Thanks for putting me on there. Yeah. That was good.
[01:28:09] That is good. Awesome. So yeah. YouTube. Good one. Good way to support. Also,
[01:28:14] Jockels store. It's called Jockels store. Obviously. Jockels store.com. Obviously. That's where you can get
[01:28:23] shirts, t-shirts. Some travel mugs on there. Some rash guards. More rash guards. This is like
[01:28:28] Jockel gear rash guards. So compared to how would you compare them to the origin? Because actually
[01:28:34] they're made. They're similar. Yeah. They're similar. They're in Jockel. They're more like geared
[01:28:38] tour light toward like Jockel. Well, let's. Yeah. Let's say this. That from a, from a visual perspective,
[01:28:48] there's a way that Jockel gear looks and there's a way that origin gear looks. There's some areas
[01:28:54] that overlap. There's some areas that don't overlap. Some of the, let's call them color combinations
[01:29:01] that my brother Pete Roberts puts together. They wouldn't be allowed in the Jockel store. Yeah.
[01:29:06] They wouldn't be Jockel gear. And there's some things that Jockel gear does that wouldn't be appropriate
[01:29:12] for origin because origin is a little bit in the other direction. Sure. The overlapping areas are
[01:29:20] good. But if you want your gear made in America is one place to get it done right. That's our factory
[01:29:28] up in Maine. True story. So yeah, bone making it rash guards there as well. Some patches.
[01:29:34] Those are restocked. A lot of people were hitting me up. That's why for patches. Yeah. It's weird that
[01:29:39] people have to hit you up that you just don't pay attention to the stock and say, wow, I love running low.
[01:29:43] I should be order more. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's not that important to you. No, no, no, it's important.
[01:29:48] So I got to handle on it and I think I've a solid system where you know, we're going to run into
[01:29:54] way less of that. If any of that. Okay. That's good. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
[01:29:57] Unless the women's stuff on there are some hats because it doesn't mean a lot to me. Yeah.
[01:30:01] Just I'm saying that's cool. So maybe I should be more. I should do a better job of
[01:30:05] expressing how important it is to me for people if they want patches to be able to get one.
[01:30:10] Yeah. Maybe I haven't. I obviously haven't done a good job. Yeah. It's your fault. It's your fault. It is.
[01:30:16] So yeah, Dracolster.com. That's a good good way to support. Also, psychological warfare. If you
[01:30:21] know what that is, that's an album. An album. Not a music album. It's a to
[01:30:26] soak and word spoken word with tracks, jockel tracks. And each track is designated, formulated,
[01:30:35] engineered. It's engineered is what it is to help you through little points of weakness that you
[01:30:42] might run into on your campaign against weakness. Like if you want to skip, I always say if you
[01:30:50] want to skip the workout, if you're like, hey, I'm too tired. I don't feel like it. I don't feel like it.
[01:30:56] I start with Alan because that's essentially why this whole thing exists because that
[01:31:02] that was the issue that was the genesis of this album. Yeah. Was echo questioning how
[01:31:10] he could overcome these moments a week. Or how I do and then I kind of answered one of them
[01:31:14] and he said, we do record those things. Yeah. You know what's funny is that I asked you that
[01:31:18] before and it wasn't that specific question, but it was essentially that question and be like,
[01:31:22] hey, what do you do? And then you like he kind of gave me a look in more like as if your feelings
[01:31:27] don't matter kind of thing. You basically pull the jockel. No, it doesn't matter if I got a
[01:31:31] little bit of this kind of thing. I got to ask this somewhere, you know, someone said, hey,
[01:31:34] can you tell us a little bit more about your morning routine? Like what you,
[01:31:38] like it's so you know, you can't. I know you got to barely, but can you tell us more about your
[01:31:41] morning routine? I was like, yeah, I listen. My morning routine is extremely, extremely important.
[01:31:48] So yours, yours, the steps of the jockel morning routine. First of all, you set your alarm clock.
[01:31:54] You set all your alarm clocks. You set the first one at 430. You set the next one at 435. You set
[01:32:00] the next one at 440 and you have your backups. By the way, you don't set your backups at the same
[01:32:05] time because you don't want to be fumbling around with three alarm clocks in the morning. It's good
[01:32:09] tip. I said, then you get done with that. Then when the alarm clock goes off, you get up. You get out
[01:32:14] of bed. Then you go and it's important that you get your toothbrush out. It's enough brush.
[01:32:19] And then I use 46 brush strokes on each side of my mouth. And no more no less. And then I spit
[01:32:28] three times into this piece of mouth. Oh my god. Here's the more routine dude. You get up and you go.
[01:32:33] Yeah. Yeah. Well, then again. No, I know. Right. You know. Yeah. I know. But it's like
[01:32:39] the reality is, is someone going to write down my morning routine. Then fall the exact same thing.
[01:32:44] And would that be good for him? Maybe. I don't know. Well, here's the morning routine then.
[01:32:48] Get up and go. Get up and get up. Yeah. But here's like some people they they focus on. And
[01:32:56] this can be beneficial from from what I hear. They focus on or they identify certain things they do
[01:33:02] in a morning routine that helps them that like set some up. No, I mean, you're whatever.
[01:33:06] It's a very morning routine. And I actually wrote about in the in the field manual. It's like
[01:33:10] the morning routine starts the night before. Yeah. Yeah. The morning routine starts when you
[01:33:15] get your gear ready because you want to be fumbling around in the morning. Don't wait. Don't
[01:33:20] set yourself up to fumble around what things in the morning. Right. That's just a bad thing. Don't do that.
[01:33:25] So you you do have your gear ready. You know, for me, I'm very systematic in pretty much
[01:33:31] the way I'm saying. Yeah. And so you know, I have like all my workout gear is in the bathroom on
[01:33:37] hangers. You know, pair shorts shirt on each hanger. There's six of them. They're all the same.
[01:33:42] There's no thought process that's needed. They're all matching. And I have the same kind of socks,
[01:33:48] all my socks are the same. I do have black socks and white socks, but one drawer is just completely
[01:33:55] white socks all the same. You grab those and put those on. Boom. You brush your teeth, boom.
[01:34:00] You take you. I take my supplements in the morning and at night, but I take my my cereal oil and my
[01:34:06] my joint warfare. Boom. And then I go hit it. How much water do you drink? It's it's I drink when I'm thirsty.
[01:34:13] I drink and then if I'm I don't measure it. So you don't be like, okay, no, mix. Yeah, I drink when I'm
[01:34:18] thirsty. You want to hungry. But if you drink water when you thirsty, you're already 2% dehydrated.
[01:34:25] Okay. Well, I drink about 3% more than this. All right. There you go. So you 1% over hydrated or hydrated.
[01:34:35] Within. No, let's, but we'll, you know, like, I'll drink a whole thing like the, you know, the
[01:34:40] mugs that we have to travel that they're three ounces. By the way, I'll drink a whole thing at that.
[01:34:44] Just routine. That's kind of the routine. But was it like in the morning? Yeah. You like you pound it?
[01:34:49] Sure. If you want to call it pound it. Why do you drink it? Because you want to stay hydrated.
[01:34:55] Yeah, but get the water back in there, man. Get, get it. It's good for you. Water is good for you.
[01:35:00] By the way. Yeah. No doubt better than sold out in the morning. You're trick a coke in the morning. No.
[01:35:04] Bro, it's like, hey, where's we did these monster masses in the back and the derbs.
[01:35:11] So my son was doing a monster bash with us when he was like six or six. Well, what's the, what's the
[01:35:15] monster masses like you? Oh, you do rope climbs that you do a sprint. Okay. I work out. When I'm
[01:35:19] the, you do pull ups and then you, and they put little things in there sometimes. So one of the
[01:35:24] things that they had to do was drink a coke through a straw. So you're like doing pull ups in a rope
[01:35:30] time and then you got a coke. You told me. Yeah. And so he, I think that was the first time you
[01:35:35] ever tried soda. Yeah. And he's like, yeah, he's nasty. It's, well, there's, if you're not
[01:35:41] having a warning soda though. Yeah. But what, there's two elements to drinking a soda,
[01:35:47] especially for the first time is, okay, it tastes weird. Sweet sugary and carbonated. Yeah. The
[01:35:51] carbonated will burn your mind. It feels like it's burning them out. Yeah. So like it. Yeah. You can't do that.
[01:35:56] You can. That's not right in the middle of the workout, too. Yeah. Come through that. Well,
[01:35:59] you keep in mind. You just described your morning routine. You answered the question that they
[01:36:03] were at. I know. I know. I don't think that's why I said, look, I'm not trying to be negative against
[01:36:07] morning routines. Yeah. And there's pretty much what I do. But the, the reason is I think people think,
[01:36:15] oh, if I have, if I knew you're morning routine, then I'd know what the secret is. Yeah. So like,
[01:36:19] hey, man, the secret is get up and go do something. That's secret. Yeah. I'm not going to,
[01:36:24] here's the deal. Here's the deal. I'm not going to sell you my morning routine. It's the solution.
[01:36:28] Your promise. Now, I will say that if you fumble around in the morning, it's going to cause
[01:36:33] you problems throughout the day. So don't fumble around the morning. Set your set your life up correctly.
[01:36:37] So that you're not fumbling around. That's good. I'm not going to sell you my morning routine as
[01:36:43] the solution to your problems. Yes. I'm not going to do that. But I will say that if you do have a good
[01:36:50] system that you go through in the morning, it will set up your day correctly. Yeah. That's why I think
[01:36:56] people ask what people want it. And I get it. Okay. I'm not trying to be like a jerk, right? I'm not
[01:37:00] sure that negative. I got some kind of making fun of what you're making fun of. I'm making fun of
[01:37:04] morning routines a little bit. But at the same time, I have one and I stick to it. Yeah. But I think
[01:37:09] what I say is the thing. That's the thing. I don't actually have something and I stick to it. Like,
[01:37:13] I do this is what is I follow the functional thing that works in your stick to it. Yeah. And I
[01:37:18] stick to it. So that's that. But I do, I didn't like design my morning routine. I didn't see
[01:37:25] it. I'm going to design this program. No, it's like, I know what works. It's functional. And that's
[01:37:29] what I do. I do things that work. Yeah. And everyone else wants to know what works. Okay. Well,
[01:37:33] there's not everyone figured out on their own what works. That's what he's the thing.
[01:37:37] You're morning routine. You're ultimately right. And I think this is that super important not
[01:37:42] to forget or not to like miss interpret where you know, you just, the quote, you just said like
[01:37:48] you're morning routines and not going to be the solution to your problems kind of thing. I think
[01:37:52] that's what people do think. I think that that here someone with a level height in my opinion,
[01:37:56] I don't, I don't know. But this is what it seems like where someone with a level head and they
[01:38:01] want to look for just that just just set one thing that's going to help them just a little bit.
[01:38:06] Yeah. So they're going to be like, hey, let me, let me formulate a good morning routine. I
[01:38:09] don't know that much about effective routines. So let me look into that. Just as a little helper,
[01:38:14] not the solution to my problems, which I think some people may kind of miss, no, you're right.
[01:38:19] And that's why, like I said, I'm not belittling the idea that a morning routine is helpful because
[01:38:25] it certainly is. It might add some, some tiny bit of help to your day, if you're doing the right thing.
[01:38:35] Some benefits. Thank you. It might benefit your day, which is positive. Will it cure your overall
[01:38:42] problems of life? No, but you know what? It's a good place to start. That's why we say wake up early,
[01:38:47] right? Yeah. That's part of the interview. Part of the part of the routine. So yeah. But even how you,
[01:38:51] I guess I am being a jerk. Yeah, but here's the thing. It seems like, let me just, let me just,
[01:38:56] like, yeah, get on a good morning routine. That's a good idea. I like it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not trying
[01:39:01] to make fun of it. I was, but I'm not anymore. It seems like you're making fun of it for people,
[01:39:06] because this is what it may be sounded like when someone asks you. What's your morning routine?
[01:39:10] It sounds like you're kind of with this presumption, like you're presuming or assuming that
[01:39:16] they think it's going to solve all their problems. That's kind of what I'm making or jerk. Yes,
[01:39:20] but in that very specific direction. Like if someone says, hey, look, I'm always looking for
[01:39:25] things to benefit my day, my effectiveness, you know, I do this and do that. And I found that this
[01:39:31] even helps a little bit here. And hey, what's your morning routine? Maybe I can incorporate one
[01:39:34] or more. Oh, yeah. If you're a two-million to mine, that'll give me a little bit of help, too.
[01:39:38] I don't think you would have came off like that. Definitely. Definitely that would have been a very
[01:39:41] good question. Yes. Oh, yeah. Here's what I do. Yeah. So there you go. So you didn't how you
[01:39:45] said the question, like you were kind of impersonating the hypothetical question. What's your
[01:39:51] morning routine? Like making them sound like you're not going to be. Yes. Sorry. Sorry,
[01:39:55] sorry, everyone. No, not so good. So good. We got to the bottom of it. You know, you're drinking water.
[01:40:01] Another drink you can drink is you can drink something called Jocco White Tea. Sure. It's available
[01:40:06] on Amazon. Now, this is the only tea available. Not only in America, but in the world that comes
[01:40:14] within 8,000 pound deadlift guarantee. So there's no other tea. I know there's some out there that
[01:40:21] are better, they say 6,000. They say they can get you 6,000 pound deadlift. Yeah. There's I've seen
[01:40:26] I've seen 7,200. Right? 7,200. 7,200. Some teas. Some white teas say they'll get you 7,200.
[01:40:33] There's only one white tea that'll get you the guaranteed 8,000 pound deadlift. Good.
[01:40:40] There's some layers on the tea, which I kind of remember last time, but I went in or interrupt
[01:40:45] you. You're talking is first episode of this podcast. Absolute first one. Oh, yeah. I think the only
[01:40:53] one that doesn't start with this is Ducco podcast. That's because you had a different vision
[01:40:58] of the podcast. The time with no, we, yeah. Nonetheless, it started with you were thinking,
[01:41:05] I think this podcast is gonna be 100% cruising. That's what it felt like. That first one,
[01:41:11] that's what it felt like. Yeah. No, in your mind. Yeah. In my mind. If you listen,
[01:41:16] yeah, now you were in good sea. I was not, you know, I was not ready to cruise. I came in there with a
[01:41:20] game plan. Yeah. And the game plan did not take cruise on it. The game plan said, get after.
[01:41:24] Well, it was fun. You shut it down so quick. Right when you heard it, you were like, you know,
[01:41:29] you want to cut it at this point, not the little, like we just rolled into a conversation. Yeah.
[01:41:35] But here's the thing with that conversation. As far as the layers go, we talk about white tea.
[01:41:40] Yeah. You called it chai. Yeah. No, because I was trying to remember what kind of tea that was.
[01:41:43] I don't know about the tea, especially back then. Nonetheless, you were always on the pomegranate.
[01:41:48] Yeah. That started when I was in the dirt. So anyway, so anyways, you can get that. You can get it on
[01:41:55] Amazon and then you can start deadlifting properly. Yeah. There's some books that you can get.
[01:42:03] Way the warrior kid. I get questions all the time about how you should raise your kids.
[01:42:09] Mm-hmm. And not just how to raise them, because they people know how to raise them, but they,
[01:42:13] but they, not how to raise them, but how to raise them. Like they know what they want the kids to,
[01:42:18] they know the values that they want the kids to have, but they're not sure how to give them the values.
[01:42:22] Right. They don't know how to do that. So it, real simple, get them this book. Way the warrior kid.
[01:42:28] That's, you know, discipline, eating habits, working out, dealing with bullies, how to study
[01:42:33] all those things are in there. These are the things you want. Not just your kid, but the children
[01:42:38] of the world to have these type of qualities. And now on top of that, we have way the warrior
[01:42:47] kid, too, which is called marksmission, talks about some important lessons, controlling your temper,
[01:42:54] overcoming fear of failure, working hard, saving money, being frugal, dealing with verbal abuse,
[01:43:02] helping other people, starting businesses. Yeah. I said that. Mm-hmm. And
[01:43:09] becoming a leader. Again, all the, there's no human being that would look at the lessons from
[01:43:15] way of the warrior kid and say, I don't want my kid to have that quality. No, the qualities are in there.
[01:43:24] So there's that. And if you want a good example of a warrior kid, check out IrishOx Ranch.com,
[01:43:32] where you can get soap that's handmade by young Aiden. Who's 12 years old, but he has a business,
[01:43:38] no big deal. He's making soap. Yeah. Was it just a goat milk soap? Yeah, that soap's actually good.
[01:43:44] Like to use. Oh, for sure. For sure. It's face it. You know how you have your friend and, you know,
[01:43:51] his wife makes soap on the weekend. Oh, yeah. You've sympathy purchase scenario. Yeah, you know,
[01:43:55] and you've got some sympathy purchase. And it's beautiful. It has the little packaging. And then you
[01:44:00] say, all right, it's soap. Let me go ahead and use some soap and you're like,
[01:44:03] brother, this isn't like usable soap. This is the novelty decorative item. It was a cool little
[01:44:07] educational experience because he asked me, you know, he was making soap. And he's, and he reached out to me,
[01:44:13] his dad is a farmer also a firefighter, but he's a farmer. Anyways, his dad and I were connected.
[01:44:20] I'd buy meat from his dad and, you know, he said, oh, my son wants to get in touch with you. But
[01:44:26] so as we're going through the process, he sends me like his label for the soap. Yeah. And,
[01:44:31] you know, it looked nice, but I'm going back with those needs to be in OCR standard. Yeah. And
[01:44:38] so anyways, yeah, it's cool little learning process. And yeah, you can get that soap. You can
[01:44:43] support a kid. That's a warrior kid. And the jocco soap motto, which I give aid, no credit for.
[01:44:49] Sorry, you're a good kid, but you didn't think of this. It took the, it took the master
[01:44:55] for marketing mind or jocco to come up with the motto for jocco soap, which is,
[01:45:00] stay clean. It's good. And you know, there's some layers on that too, right? I like it.
[01:45:07] What's the layer? Motorhead song. Oh, all right. There you go. And you like motorhead.
[01:45:11] And I, and a huge fan of motorhead. And you don't do any drug. So there's, there's kind of
[01:45:16] the reason that whenever I talk to people or people talk to me on the through social media or email
[01:45:22] and they've had a drug problem or an alcohol problem. And I always kind of sign off like, hey, stay clean.
[01:45:30] Stay clean. So because that's also what Lemmy from Motorhead was saying, stay clean. Like,
[01:45:36] don't let this kill you. Now Lemmy from Motorhead was a rare dude who did a lot of drugs now
[01:45:41] call and somehow was able to survive very well up to up to when he died drinking incredible amounts
[01:45:47] of jackdannels. Yeah, those some legit layers. But he always would say don't do it. He's a guy
[01:45:55] that would say don't do it. It's don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do what people do. Don't do drugs.
[01:46:00] Yeah. Stay clean. Stay clean. There you go. In addition to that, we got another book called
[01:46:07] the Discipline equals Freedom Field Manual. And if this is, this is a good point. If you know
[01:46:11] someone that's off the path, right? Like people go off the path in life. And it doesn't take,
[01:46:18] we talked about this last time. It doesn't take, but one step off the path when you're on a slippery slope.
[01:46:23] It's a slippery slope when you step off the path. So if you know someone that
[01:46:28] has taken a step off the path and they're starting to slide down, get them this book to get them
[01:46:33] on the path, the right path. And there's also a chance that the person that stepped off the path
[01:46:42] is you. So get the field manual. It's got the thoughts and actions that are required to be on the right
[01:46:51] path. Make yourself better, faster, stronger, smarter. Anything else? More physically fit.
[01:47:03] And healthier. The audio version that is on iTunes, Amazon, music, Google Play, other MP3 platforms.
[01:47:12] It's not unautable because then you can't have it as an album with tracks, which we obviously
[01:47:16] support. Extreme ownership. First book, I wrote with my brother, Lave Babin. Over a million copies sold.
[01:47:23] That's a lot of copies sold. That's a lot of copies sold. You know how many copies they told us
[01:47:28] would be successful? Because we didn't know anything about the publishing world.
[01:47:32] Wait, what do you mean? When we were getting, when the book was getting ready to come out
[01:47:37] and I would talk to the publisher, Lave and I were talking to the publisher.
[01:47:42] And he says, you know if this is a successful book then you know, it'll really be, it'll be good to see
[01:47:46] blah blah blah. So they like the standard like a certain amount. That's especially when you
[01:47:51] confess it. No, so I said, hey, what? I don't know anything about this. What is considered to be a
[01:47:56] successful book? You know what the number was? 20,000 books. You go to hell. No, because hey,
[01:48:03] you know we're putting 12,000 on this first run and if you sell, if you, you know we'll put
[01:48:07] some more but if you can sell 20,000 books, that's, that's going to be that's a huge success.
[01:48:11] And we will be proud. So here we are. We're one million. It's pretty cool. Yeah. Good job,
[01:48:18] Lave Babin. Good job. Good job both. Yeah. Lave tells a story that we got home from Ramadhi
[01:48:26] and the only time I ever told him anything positive was when we got home, we'd been home for like two
[01:48:30] weeks and I told him the Delta put in a commander. Hey, good job over there. So yeah, we're keep,
[01:48:39] I like to keep it real. Yeah, man. And actually, you know what the good job over there seems real
[01:48:44] simple, but I'm sure in that context, he was probably the most loaded. Yeah. Good job. Anyone's ever heard.
[01:48:50] Yeah. Yeah. I believe you're correct. Beyond the books and beyond the podcast, also,
[01:48:57] Ashalon front speaking of Lave and me, this is our leadership and management consulting company.
[01:49:02] This is the thing, every, this is a bold statement, right? Every problem in every organization is
[01:49:09] leadership problem. That's a bold statement to make. Yeah. And I'll say again, every problem in every
[01:49:16] organization is a leadership problem. So if there's a problem in an organization, the problem,
[01:49:22] it boils down to leadership on some level. So what we do is we fix the leadership and there,
[01:49:28] but by we fix your problems. It's me. It's Lave Babin. It's J. P. Denel. It's Dave Burke. Good deal.
[01:49:36] Dave Burke. If you want to get in touch with us to have us come out and work with your company,
[01:49:42] get your leadership aligned. Go to info at echelon front dot com or you email info at echelon front dot com or
[01:49:52] you can go to the website echelon front dot com. And of course, we are approaching the monster. V
[01:49:58] leadership seven or the learn you learn tactics of leadership. You learn strategies of leadership.
[01:50:05] You learn pragmatic techniques. You can execute as a leader that will make you and your team win.
[01:50:15] We already expanded the floor. So we expanded the floor as much as we could already because the
[01:50:20] ticket sales are going quickly. And so we've got both places that we're doing the monster. We've
[01:50:30] got them expanded as much as we can. It doesn't matter. They're both, both from we're going to sell
[01:50:34] out. Doing two this year only. Washington, D.C. May 17th and 18th and San Francisco October 17th
[01:50:41] and 18th. The whole team will be there and we will be with you if you come. We'll be hanging out.
[01:50:48] We'll be answering questions. We'll be talking. We'll be eating lunch. We'll be hanging out,
[01:50:53] working out with all of you that come. There's no green room. There's no backstage
[01:51:00] where where life is sitting back there in the backstage with cucumbers on his eyes to relax. That's
[01:51:07] not happening. No. We're hanging out all of us. So you can register for that at extreme ownership.com.
[01:51:16] We'll see you there. And until the monster, you can find us by interacting and conversing and
[01:51:24] cruising with us on the interwebs on Twitter on Instagram and on that Facebook. Echo is at Echo
[01:51:37] Charles and I am at Jocca Willink and once again, Dan Crenshaw is at Crenshaw for congress.com.
[01:51:47] His Twitter is at Dan Crenshaw TX and his Facebook is Dan Crenshaw. And I'd like to thank everyone
[01:51:59] for listening. Thanks to all the men and women in uniform across the globe with sword in hand
[01:52:05] and heart at the ready to fight and die for what we hold sacred and to police law enforcement
[01:52:14] firefighters, paramedics and all first responders. Thanks for being prepared. And thanks for being
[01:52:22] there when we call you in our time and need and to everyone else out there. Thank you for listening
[01:52:30] and thank you for sharing and thank you for supporting. But more important. Thanks for finding your
[01:52:36] mission and executing your mission. Whether it's your job or your business or a charity or your
[01:52:43] family or whatever your mission is, thanks for getting out there and getting after it.
[01:52:50] And so until next time, this is Dan Crenshaw and Echo and Jocco out.