Jocko Podcast 333: Excuses and Rationalizations are Not Valid... And We Know That. W/ Dan Cnossen

2022-05-12T23:20:51Z

Underground Premium Content: https://www.jockounderground.com/subscribe Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @echocharles 0:00:00 - Opening 0:04:59 - Dan Cnossen 3:22:00 - How to stay on THE PATH. JOCKO UNDERGROUND Exclusive Episodes: https://www.jockounderground.com/subscribe Jocko Store Apparel: https://www.jockostore.com Jocko Fuel: https://jockofuel.com Origin Jeans and Clothes: https://originmaine.com/durable-goods/ Echelon Front: https://www.echelonfront.com 3:38:23 - Closing Gratitude.

AI summary of episode

And, you know, I had one of our admirals one time tell me, you know, we were having a talk, I had a book coming out and, you know, he said something along the lines of, you know, I was like, well, you know, this is not really the quiet professional for me to be doing this. Like I, I'm hearing the things that I'm, I'm like mad if, you know, you know, like the floors cold when I get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I'm like, oh, this is weird. You know, he comes out and, and I'm like, wow, was it, you know, he's like, like, shaking his head like this. Like, they didn't seem like a human, like, all this guy, I didn't, I didn't picture a person with, like, hopes and dreams and that can't believe they just did that and they, they joined the Navy and now they're quitting, like, oh gosh, what? That's a good place to be going because, you know, I rack head settled down a lot at this point, you know, kind of after the the debt defender group going into Saudar City, you know, Iraq had definitely settled down. And so he was at boot camp, like going through some basic like wickets to get reinstated in the Navy and he had a try to, and you know, I was like, When he said that about when he woke up, and did, you know, like no passage of time, like that, so I got a concussion, like a bad one. Climate is rocks, you want to jump in the water, whatever, like, like, I was like, you said, oh, maybe, you mentioned real quick, I said, well, you know, and you know you've got limited opportunities in the rest of your career, it's going to be, I mean, I wouldn't want to type a person that's like, I'm always happy I wasn't going to war. So when I was out there just training, I was just doing the work, doing the work, doing the work and now all of a sudden it's like, oh, I have these opportunities to like monetize or what, you know, just I can actually create opportunities to give talks in this kind of thing and that came my way. We dialed in our training specifically over the, you know, postwork up phase where you can kind of, you know, we're going to deploy and we're doing a lot of operations in training that we're going to mimic, we're mimicking what we felt. But as I said, you're either in a platoon or your adult platoon, and I'm going to be out of a platoon, people say, yeah, but, you know, as an officer, you progress through, you're going to be, even if this didn't happen, you'd be, you know, you'd be administrative, you do be doing some staff tours, and I remember being in Canada, I remember going for a run, I remember going for a lift, I remember eating, I remember sitting in the briefing, I remember going to the plywood hut, I remember sleeping one night. You know, I think what I saw in Buds with my class was no matter how gifted a person was, there was probably going to be something at some point that was going to challenge them and one of the one of my classmates, this individual from the Naval Academy who I had known for four years at this point, was just a stud in Buds and there was one day at the very end for whatever reason the obstacle course rope with the low wall, the one he had, the high low. So man, I think to the contrary of what you're kind of saying about like, oh, trying to monetize this and the professional is like, hey, man, this is things are going to help people. It was a really steep learning curve, but it was also like a learning curve that was steep, but also had like really nice steps on it where you, you know, this training operation, you'd learn this thing and then they'd figure this other thing out and then they'd do this other thing. And I'm just, like, this, that's just not, you know, so, okay, you know, I'm going to do this job the way in which you'd been doing it, even if you can stay in the community. I, I didn't have to go through all that stuff in the Navy, I got to me like, yeah, maybe you're smarter and I was like, no, in my mind, I was like, no, I was dumb. But I always give that advice, you know, if you, there's no sense in acting like you know what you're doing, because everybody, not only do they see through it, but they don't expect you to know everything. and I think they eventually got to a point where like, hey, if a guy had just gone to Iraq or Afghanistan and maybe he'd gone twice in a row and now they put him in a puttune where he's not going to go and it was a little, it did get more fair as time went on. And so I wasn't even, I can't even name, I can only name one guy that quit and he was my boat crew leader and he was my boat crew leader in hell week, but that's the only, everyone else was just like, gone, I just never even thought about him, never even, and I never had thoughts, like, oh, I, you know, this guy's my friend. And then the other thing that figured out was like, anytime you'd hear someone panicking on the radio, screaming, you're like, I want to know what any people over here and whatever. But you know, when you think when I hear this, when I any time I hear an external account, such as what you're talking about Jason saying happened, it's just, It's just a reminder to me how lucky I mean to be alive and I'll take life like this missing two legs any day over dying up on that hill any day. You know, I remember thinking when I was in hell week, I was like, oh, it's going to feel so good to go to sleep. You know, of how hard seal training is because to me, I was like, there was just two groups of people, me and my buddies and everyone else, and we didn't know them and they just went away It's, it's pretty simple, but sometimes you know, in the chaos, you just, you just get overwhelmed and then, and then just to prioritize and execute, that's a really important rule that, you know, there could be, I can see situations in training environments or in combat where you're getting overwhelmed by either too much going on or you're actually overwhelmed because there's, there's actually no seemingly viable course of action. But like the amount, like waking up after being in a coma for 10 days and then having just the insane medical issues, just insane medical issues, no legs, freaking abdomen blown apart, close to me bag, the thing going down your throat, not even allowed to drink one sip of water. But you're putting yourself in a situation where external factors, you know, peer relationships, this kind of thing can actually, although it could be conceived and construed as adding pressure, I think it actually made, you know, at these kind of, you're at your breaking point moments. I feel like I, I feel like when I was in the medically induced coma that maybe people's conversations around we were sinking in but I didn't know for a fact and and to be then told in a state. and we were talking about and he just said like he was laughing, he's like you just looked at him and like all right, These like, pre- or post- deployment leave, excursions, but my point, I just like being outside, and I like being active. It grabs you by like, by like a gentle kind of like handhold I was like, I was saying this the other day, like they didn't seem like human to me. And then they're starting like words that they like make it a point to like, bleep out so their channel doesn't get cancelled. And I mean, when you're talking, and we probably could do a nine hour podcast if we went back and got medical records, when you're talking about all the things that you were going through from the time you woke up in the hospital, like I'm a baby. First time I fast-rope, like hey, this seems like it's going to be fun. You know, it's good road in like what do you call like a script, the real elegant script. I mean, you know, I'm, in addition to realizing all the medical complications that I have, you're thinking, what is my life going to look like? It's not people think wrestling and boxing, they think it's like a primal thing that you're just going to be able to do. This isn't like a guy that, like sometimes you get a lateral transfer that has like what they did. But the knockout, like, where my body was limp only lasted for like, it was like a flash knockout. Because you know, there's like two guys that were like faster than you. Like, or like, I'll get like a springed ankle and I'll have to wear an ankle brace. But I remember getting on that day pass, you know, I'm actually long headed bin from like, from you showed up there until now, you're getting your first day pass. Again, you know, from you, I get a cut in my mouth and I'm like, like, can't he catch up for a week? And I got very, very lucky to kind of stumble on these things in my career so that by the time I was, you know, you know, I was an opportune commander and a task into commander. So I always say we always kind of talk about how like people now or it's been said that people now they're complaining about like dumb stuff. So it was almost like this weird, like now when I hear some of the statistics and you know more about it And that's why you know, some of the initial reports that we got back on the strand was, you know, is he going to make it? So I kind of stumbled into these things and other things throughout my career that now when I either learn about the physiological, the physiological things that happen in our body that also people use things like meditation to drive these same physiological things, I kind of got lucky and stumbled upon them.

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Episode transcript

[00:00:00] with echo Charles and me, juggle willink, good evening echo.
[00:00:06] Good evening.
[00:00:08] The rumors started in the morning.
[00:00:15] Some guys in Afghanistan got hit.
[00:00:20] There's some wounded guys.
[00:00:22] And you don't know who it is at first.
[00:00:26] You don't know what team.
[00:00:29] These coasts, west coasts.
[00:00:32] You're just wondering.
[00:00:36] Precime we know it's west coast guys.
[00:00:40] And you know the transition is happening.
[00:00:44] So you got two teams over there at the time.
[00:00:46] Team one and team seven.
[00:00:52] And now you know you got wounded guys and you're thinking of who, who do I know?
[00:00:58] And at this point, I kind of know everybody because I've been putting all these
[00:01:03] platoons through training for the last couple of years.
[00:01:05] So I know I'm gonna recognize names when they come through.
[00:01:13] And then you're waiting.
[00:01:17] And then we hear it's the one guy, it's only one guy.
[00:01:21] And that's good.
[00:01:22] You know, good.
[00:01:23] It's only one guy.
[00:01:24] How bad is he?
[00:01:27] And it doesn't sound good.
[00:01:31] And you're hearing reports is a massive ID.
[00:01:37] How bad.
[00:01:40] Real bad.
[00:01:41] How bad is real bad.
[00:01:45] Real bad.
[00:01:50] And then you start to ask that horrible question to yourself, is he gonna make it?
[00:01:57] And then you start getting reports back.
[00:02:03] They don't know if he's gonna make it.
[00:02:05] And that's not a good sign because team guys are usually positive thinkers who we think
[00:02:11] we can survive anything.
[00:02:14] So when you hear a team guy say, he doesn't know if someone's gonna make it.
[00:02:19] It doesn't usually bode well.
[00:02:26] And there's a weird strange silence around everyone's kind of waiting to hear.
[00:02:38] And quite frankly, everyone's waiting to hear a name.
[00:02:43] And waiting to hear the outcome.
[00:02:46] And wondering if we're gonna lose a brother.
[00:02:52] And finally, I get an actual call.
[00:02:57] The distant voice from one of my buddies over in Afghanistan.
[00:03:02] And I get the first hand report of what's going on.
[00:03:06] And yeah, confirmed massive ID.
[00:03:12] I get the name, Dan Knollson.
[00:03:15] He's one of the cartoon commanders that I just put through work up.
[00:03:21] Great guy, humble, tough, locked on.
[00:03:27] And I ask that question.
[00:03:31] You know, is he gonna make it?
[00:03:35] And the responses, you know, something along the lines of he lost both legs.
[00:03:41] And he's got massive trauma to his lower abdomen.
[00:03:47] He's like they have him stabilized, the guys did a great job.
[00:03:51] This is like a stall tactic.
[00:03:52] Not answering my question.
[00:03:53] Is he gonna make it?
[00:03:58] Then the answer comes again.
[00:04:02] I don't know.
[00:04:07] And you sit with that for a while because there's only one thing that's going to give you
[00:04:12] the answer.
[00:04:13] And that's time.
[00:04:15] We time will tell.
[00:04:19] And in this particular case, we were blessed because Dan Knollson did make it.
[00:04:27] He survived a massive ID that would have killed probably anyone.
[00:04:40] But somehow he was able to survive.
[00:04:42] And we can talk about that because we're lucky enough tonight to have the honor of
[00:04:47] having Dan with us here to share some of his experiences and his lessons learned from his
[00:04:55] life and from his time in the Seal teams.
[00:05:00] Dan, thanks for coming by, man.
[00:05:04] Thanks for joining us.
[00:05:05] Thanks, Chaka.
[00:05:06] Thanks for having me here.
[00:05:07] I was one of those weird days at the teams where I remember this when you got blown up.
[00:05:16] That this would happen.
[00:05:18] You guys would get wounded.
[00:05:19] You'd hear those rumors when you got to work.
[00:05:20] Someone saw a message traffic or someone talked to one of their friends.
[00:05:23] It would just get, you'd have so little information.
[00:05:27] And then as the day goes on, you sort of, the picture becomes more and more clear.
[00:05:34] And I really remember that well, you know, just because I was in trade at I'd already
[00:05:40] lost guys and was not looking forward to going to a funeral.
[00:05:47] So I'm freaking glad you're here, man.
[00:05:51] I'm glad you didn't have to go to that funeral.
[00:05:55] Let's start at the beginning, man.
[00:05:56] Let's start at where you came from and how you grew up and all that.
[00:06:00] Let's get to it.
[00:06:01] Sure, I'm born and raised in Kansas, fifth generation family farm.
[00:06:06] From 1874, I grew up roaming around outside.
[00:06:11] I had a baby gun.
[00:06:12] I got in a little bit of trouble with a baby gun shooting some targets.
[00:06:14] I shouldn't have even had.
[00:06:17] But really, I think grown up on a farm in Kansas, I developed a deep-seated love of just
[00:06:24] being outside.
[00:06:25] I think this comes into play later in my story.
[00:06:28] Were you a, was your family a farming family?
[00:06:30] Is that what you did they did for a living?
[00:06:32] Yes, my, it's on my maternal side of the family.
[00:06:35] My mom's father.
[00:06:37] His, so my grandfather, his grandfather came out.
[00:06:41] This is homestead act 1870s a few days.
[00:06:44] Farm the land, you get to keep it after a certain amount of time.
[00:06:48] And they built the limestone home, limestone barn, still stands today.
[00:06:52] That's where I was born and raised.
[00:06:54] I was a kid.
[00:06:55] I didn't think anything of it.
[00:06:56] Just where I grew up.
[00:06:57] But now I realize how special that was.
[00:06:59] Two hundred forty acres.
[00:07:02] And my grandfather had three daughters.
[00:07:04] I'm one of whom was my mother.
[00:07:05] And so the farming didn't get passed down.
[00:07:08] And I did not grow up as a farmer.
[00:07:11] But I certainly took advantage of the tractor rides.
[00:07:14] I didn't, what was your, what was your grandparents in the military at all?
[00:07:19] My dad's father was US Army World War II.
[00:07:23] And I don't know, he, he is no longer alive.
[00:07:26] But I don't know the extent of action that he saw, but he was in the European theater in
[00:07:30] the later part of the war.
[00:07:33] And what about your dad?
[00:07:34] My father served in the Marine Corps.
[00:07:36] He, in 1965, enlisted.
[00:07:40] He didn't get drafted.
[00:07:43] He chose to enlist in the, he chose to enlist in the Marine Corps.
[00:07:47] He did three tours.
[00:07:49] And the third, and my father is no longer alive as well to talk about some of the specifics.
[00:07:54] And as a kid, when I grew up, he didn't talk about the specifics.
[00:07:57] But generally speaking, he gave me a glimpse of life into the Marine Corps, into the military.
[00:08:03] And actually, I wanted to be a Marine in high school.
[00:08:07] My dad, at the end of his third tour, did one of these small teams where you're working
[00:08:14] with locals, kind of going village to village, four man teams.
[00:08:18] That's the last thing he did.
[00:08:19] And then he exited the Marine Corps in 1968 and was done.
[00:08:24] And he didn't, he didn't share much with you about that when he, not about combat.
[00:08:29] When I was a kid, I remember in our family room, we had some old storage items.
[00:08:34] And I was combing through this.
[00:08:36] This is as well.
[00:08:37] He was still alive.
[00:08:38] And I saw citations, Navy Commodation Medal, bronze, not, I'm certain, a purple heart.
[00:08:45] And he was under mortifier at one point and rendered life saving aid to a teammate, to
[00:08:53] another Marine.
[00:08:54] And so he's commended for that.
[00:08:56] But yeah, I don't have specifics.
[00:08:58] I also found some old letters that he had written, poem that were pretty interesting.
[00:09:03] Just to, you know, it's a glimpse into my father when he was 23, 24 years old, writing
[00:09:09] home from the old.
[00:09:10] What was he saying in the letters?
[00:09:11] He should have brought up a letter.
[00:09:12] I think there was some mention of R and R and probably don't need that.
[00:09:18] Go into this specific.
[00:09:19] I guess it depends who he was writing home.
[00:09:21] Yeah.
[00:09:22] I was like, what do you do when you got out of the Marine Corps in 1968?
[00:09:26] So he ended up going to business school in Cornell.
[00:09:30] He did have a degree from Iowa, the States from Iowa.
[00:09:34] So he had a college degree in listening the Marine Corps.
[00:09:37] 1968 gets out.
[00:09:38] He would have been 25 at that point, went to Cornell.
[00:09:41] And my mother listening the Marine Corps, even though he had a college degree.
[00:09:45] Yeah.
[00:09:46] Do you, are you tracking any, like, decision-making process on that?
[00:09:50] He just fired up for the Marine Corps?
[00:09:53] I think it was a little bit of rebellion against his father.
[00:09:57] And his father had said, if you're going to go in the military, do not go in the Marine
[00:10:01] Corps.
[00:10:02] Any service, not that one.
[00:10:05] Well, yeah, if his dad served in World War II, he might have had that impression that
[00:10:11] hey, you don't want to be the Marine, you know, being the, you know, storming beaches over
[00:10:14] in the Pacific.
[00:10:15] You want to have a more plush job, like storming the beaches in the, in the European
[00:10:20] theater?
[00:10:21] I don't know.
[00:10:22] It's just a, so you think he rebel a little bit of a rebellion.
[00:10:25] Rebellion, I think, and I think he probably wanted to be part of something special.
[00:10:32] And I think that is something I've seen growing up on a farm in Kansas.
[00:10:36] I think you have work ethic, but you also want to be part of something special.
[00:10:40] You like to be part of a team.
[00:10:42] And it's a continuation of that, going in the military.
[00:10:44] And so he gets done with business school, and then how do you meet your mom and end up
[00:10:49] in out there in Kansas on the 248th to, if a 40 acres of beauty?
[00:10:54] Yeah, my, my mother ended up in New York City.
[00:10:57] She was a secretary and in the office, there was a woman who introduced, and I, I, I need
[00:11:02] to talk to my mother about the specifics of how they got introduced.
[00:11:05] But on the first date, she didn't like my father as well as well as, would indicate, even
[00:11:09] the fact that later they got married.
[00:11:12] But, when I got on another date, I guess, and, and they eventually moved to New Orleans,
[00:11:16] they went into the Peace Corps.
[00:11:17] We're in Brazil for two years in the 1970s, and then they came back, settled on the farm.
[00:11:22] At this point, my grandfather hit, was retiring.
[00:11:25] So you're old on.
[00:11:26] We got to slow you roll a little bit.
[00:11:28] You can't just roll out Marine Corps, NOM, three tours, it's Peace Corps.
[00:11:34] That's kind of, that's the freaking dynamic you don't normally say.
[00:11:37] Yeah, yeah, I think, in addition to growing up with stories of the Marine Corps, I grew
[00:11:41] up with stories of life in Brazil.
[00:11:43] And this is in the 1970s and the Amazon Regents.
[00:11:46] It was very remote, primitive living.
[00:11:49] My mother was teaching, Brazilian kids with special needs, teaching them Portuguese.
[00:11:58] And my dad was somewhere in the realm of teaching business and skills to local community
[00:12:06] people.
[00:12:07] And how long were they down there for?
[00:12:08] Two years, two year or two or, and that's in the 70s.
[00:12:11] Yeah, what did your dad like start going a little bit hippie?
[00:12:15] Was, is that the scenario?
[00:12:17] Perhaps, but when I was, my only living memory of him was not as a hippie.
[00:12:21] But I think there may have been a stage there in 1970s, post Vietnam.
[00:12:26] It can happen.
[00:12:27] Uh-huh.
[00:12:28] Interesting.
[00:12:29] He's gonna be pissed if he just heard me say, he's like, I want to freaking hippie.
[00:12:32] I was helping out the locals.
[00:12:34] All right.
[00:12:35] So then they get married and at what point do they move back to Kansas?
[00:12:39] Around the time the Peace Corps tour ended and I think my grandfather was retiring, moving
[00:12:44] to the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri.
[00:12:46] This beautiful property, the home.
[00:12:50] It was there.
[00:12:51] I think my parents wanted to start a family, what better place?
[00:12:54] The land was being farmed by an associate of my fathers, a grandfather's.
[00:12:59] And so they settled and I think shortly thereafter had me in 1980.
[00:13:03] You're born in 1980?
[00:13:05] 1980.
[00:13:06] And then what's grown up like you're out there on the farm, you're getting trouble for
[00:13:10] shooting shit with your BB gun and stuff?
[00:13:12] Yeah, we had a section of woods.
[00:13:14] We called the Northeast Corner with a creek running through it and I would go and just play
[00:13:19] there, try to get lost.
[00:13:21] What'd you have for brothers and sisters?
[00:13:22] I have a younger sister.
[00:13:23] She's seven years my younger sister.
[00:13:25] Seven years.
[00:13:26] She is a nurse and when we get later into my story, I mean, she quit her job to move
[00:13:33] down to DC to take care of me.
[00:13:35] Oh, her a lot.
[00:13:37] So she's seven years your junior though.
[00:13:39] So you were kind of like an only child for a while.
[00:13:42] For a little while, I learned how to play by myself.
[00:13:46] I didn't have close neighbors.
[00:13:47] We have neighbors, but not necessarily with kids of my age.
[00:13:51] I learned how to entertain myself.
[00:13:53] And a lot of this was being outside.
[00:13:55] I did like to read as a kid, but in the daytime, I'm outside playing.
[00:14:00] We had some dogs, some cats, some pigeons that were in the barn that I was aiming
[00:14:05] at.
[00:14:06] You know, going on tractor rides, learning how to drive tractors, playing sports, that was
[00:14:12] my childhood.
[00:14:13] What sports were you playing?
[00:14:15] Started baseball, soccer, gravitated toward soccer.
[00:14:19] It turns out I'm not that great at team ball sports.
[00:14:22] However, the lessons that you can learn from team ball sports really come into play later.
[00:14:28] And so I'm very thankful that even though my calling as an athlete was not as a team ball
[00:14:32] sport player.
[00:14:34] And I was in combat.
[00:14:35] I tried wrestling in middle school.
[00:14:39] It was just awful.
[00:14:40] And then I had this idea of doing boxing.
[00:14:43] So it was my sophomore year in high school.
[00:14:47] I went to the local Topeka Golden Gloves gym and said, you know, I want to take some lessons.
[00:14:53] And so I remember my dad would drive me there and back.
[00:14:55] And eventually I started just driving myself.
[00:14:57] And I would go and train in the local boxing gym that resulted at one point in going
[00:15:03] to a competition in Kansas City.
[00:15:06] And Kansas City is a big deal when you're from a farm in Kansas.
[00:15:11] I went to this tournament in Kansas City.
[00:15:14] And I remember there were hundreds of people in the audience.
[00:15:18] It's kind of an a more underdeveloped area of Kansas City, if you will.
[00:15:23] And I remember seeing my opponents older brother was just laying waste to someone on a previous
[00:15:31] round.
[00:15:34] I was in just so nervous.
[00:15:35] I get in the ring.
[00:15:36] It was three rounds, very amateur in the first round.
[00:15:40] He just laid into me.
[00:15:42] And I had the standing eight count against me.
[00:15:44] The second round was fairly even in the third round.
[00:15:47] I actually gave him the standing eight count.
[00:15:50] But it wasn't enough because I just got whipped that first round.
[00:15:53] So I lost the fight.
[00:15:54] So I lost the fight.
[00:15:55] My dad was there watching.
[00:15:57] And afterwards we went and had some had a meal, had dinner.
[00:16:02] And I just remember him kind of said, it's okay.
[00:16:03] He did a good job.
[00:16:05] And that was my one and only competitive boxing match.
[00:16:09] The thing you've got to remember damn is wrestling.
[00:16:13] If you go quote, try wrestling, you're gonna get your ass kicked.
[00:16:18] It's not people think wrestling and boxing, they think it's like a primal thing that you're
[00:16:25] just going to be able to do.
[00:16:26] And there's all kinds of skills and all of the nuts though.
[00:16:29] This is I started to think that if all you know is winning, that's just not realistic.
[00:16:36] I've spent a lot more time in the not winning realm of winning realm.
[00:16:39] And I can tell you that when you're not winning, it forces you to adapt.
[00:16:44] It forces you to look at what you're doing, how can you be doing things better?
[00:16:48] Force as you to grow, challenges you.
[00:16:51] And I think there's a, if sport is just about character development, which I really think
[00:16:55] that's what it ultimately is about, then there's a lot to be learned from not winning.
[00:16:59] And it's, you need to seek out people who can beat you in order to get better.
[00:17:05] Yeah.
[00:17:06] So what did you play sports all through high school?
[00:17:09] I did soccer.
[00:17:10] What did you end up accelerating at any of them?
[00:17:13] I was a varsity soccer player defender because I didn't have good ball skills.
[00:17:16] Even as a freshman, I didn't always start.
[00:17:19] I was more of a bench rider, but I did, I wanted to varsity ladder as a freshman.
[00:17:23] It started starting as sophomore and then was a varsity player all four years.
[00:17:27] My last semester as a senior spring, a new house going to the Naval Academy.
[00:17:34] And we can get into the reasons of why I wanted to go there.
[00:17:36] But I knew I was going.
[00:17:38] And so I decided to join the track team distance running.
[00:17:41] I thought I got to show up to the Academy ready to go, ready to bust out of 1.5 mile
[00:17:46] run.
[00:17:47] Track had a two mile event, a one mile event.
[00:17:50] So I signed up.
[00:17:51] And it turns out in soccer, I was really good at running.
[00:17:54] But not so much kicking the ball or passing it.
[00:17:57] It's a defender.
[00:17:58] I just tried to kick the ball to one of my teammates who could actually do something with it.
[00:18:01] But in track, I was pretty good for one season track athlete.
[00:18:04] I ended up running a sub five minute mile.
[00:18:06] I had a, I don't know, a 1032 mile.
[00:18:10] And so I thought, endurance sports could, could have been my thing.
[00:18:12] I just wasn't exposed to it earlier.
[00:18:14] I certainly wasn't exposed to cross country skiing as a kid from a farm in Kansas.
[00:18:18] So you end up going to the Naval Academy.
[00:18:20] How did you get interested in going to the Naval Academy?
[00:18:23] I don't want to say that my father pushed me in that direction in no way whatsoever.
[00:18:28] I found out he wrote me a letter when I did get into the Naval Academy and he said that
[00:18:32] his childhood dream was to go to the Naval Academy, but he didn't have the grades and
[00:18:36] didn't even apply.
[00:18:39] But I didn't, I didn't choose to go to the military in the sense of it feeling like a
[00:18:44] decision.
[00:18:45] It just felt like this is what I'm supposed to do.
[00:18:48] It really did.
[00:18:49] I wanted to be a Marine.
[00:18:50] Did you apply to a West Point, too?
[00:18:51] I did.
[00:18:52] That was my Academy.
[00:18:53] West Point was my backup plan.
[00:18:54] Oh, my god.
[00:18:55] I got into the best one, the Naval Academy.
[00:18:58] So I, I just wanted to combine military service with continuing my education and I felt
[00:19:03] like as an officer, I would have leadership responsibilities and this would be, I had
[00:19:10] red books.
[00:19:11] Vietnam still fascinates me.
[00:19:13] And probably a large part of this is due to my father having been in the Vietnam
[00:19:17] war.
[00:19:21] But I would read anything I could get my hands on about special operations in Vietnam, infantry
[00:19:23] platoons, Marine Corps.
[00:19:25] It was very, very much keen on infantry, small unit tactics.
[00:19:31] I ended up signing up for the local US Naval Secrets program.
[00:19:36] There was a Naval Reserve unit into Pika Kansas.
[00:19:38] We drive there and it was kind of modeled after reserves in one week in the month you show
[00:19:42] up and you drill the summers between your academic years of high school.
[00:19:47] You get Navy training.
[00:19:48] It starts with boot camp in Great Lakes.
[00:19:50] So I went to Great Lakes.
[00:19:54] The summer before my junior year of high school.
[00:19:56] How old were you?
[00:19:57] I was 15, 15, 16, yeah, two weeks.
[00:20:01] Not an actual boot camp, but it's very much your in Great Lakes, your wearing Dunga
[00:20:05] Rees, your marching around, you're getting yelled at.
[00:20:08] I'm just in high school.
[00:20:10] Don't remember ever signing a waiver.
[00:20:12] But they had this training called seal training.
[00:20:15] I had to do one other training before that.
[00:20:18] So after that summer of going to Great Lakes for boot camp, I went to amphibious school in
[00:20:23] Virginia.
[00:20:24] Again, I'm 15 or 16.
[00:20:27] Because I had to knock out one of these before I could be eligible for seal training
[00:20:30] it out.
[00:20:31] In order to go to this seal camp, which is going to be the following year that I would be eligible
[00:20:34] the summer before my senior year.
[00:20:36] I have to take the the the bud's physical fitness test.
[00:20:40] I have to go to the center yard side stroke and push ups pull ups sit ups and 1.5 mile
[00:20:45] run.
[00:20:46] So I started training for it and I was horrible, horrible at swimming, just horrible.
[00:20:49] But I somehow got under the 12 minute time or whatever it had cut up barely.
[00:20:54] And so they put me out to Virginia Beach, little creek for this two week camp and it
[00:20:59] starts with what year is this?
[00:21:01] This would have been 97, 1997.
[00:21:04] So this is actually run by active duty team guys, putting these high school kids
[00:21:10] through this wash down version of hell week.
[00:21:14] We had a hell night and started off and I remember that was a continuous, there's a 24
[00:21:20] hour thing started sometime in the day and sometime the next day.
[00:21:24] Go through the night running with boats on your head and I remember at one point running
[00:21:29] with a boat on my head.
[00:21:30] I was on the left side of the boat and an active duty Navy seal is just yelling at me.
[00:21:36] Because I remember who it was, but I don't.
[00:21:39] I remember there was a chief black burn in the, the particular individual in this story
[00:21:43] is not chief black burn.
[00:21:46] I was slacking off and he just laid in the me about how I wasn't being a good teammate
[00:21:51] and I'll never forget that.
[00:21:53] It just cut right into me and I came back after that we got to shoot MP5s, we got to do
[00:22:00] the water obstacle course in Virginia Beach.
[00:22:02] It's just as a high school kid.
[00:22:03] I mean this is amazing.
[00:22:05] But truth be told, I didn't have perfect eyesight and I just was horrible in the water.
[00:22:11] So when I did get into the Naval Academy, my preference was for the Marine Corps.
[00:22:19] So all that who ya'll seal stuff did get you like totally brain washed.
[00:22:26] I was brain washed just sitting over here listening to you tell that if I would have been
[00:22:29] 15 would have been a done deal.
[00:22:32] It was, but I just didn't think.
[00:22:34] How bad was your eyesight?
[00:22:35] Chance.
[00:22:36] It needed to be correct.
[00:22:37] It wasn't within 2040, it wasn't certainly wasn't 2020.
[00:22:41] At this point I didn't know about corrective surgery.
[00:22:43] I didn't need that wasn't even a thing.
[00:22:46] I had the Naval Academy.
[00:22:47] I thought I can go in the Marine Corps infantry be a platoon leader or a company commander
[00:22:53] and so that's what I was leaning towards.
[00:22:55] I mean absolutely though when I went to the Naval Academy, the seal program was extremely
[00:23:00] intriguing to me.
[00:23:01] I just didn't think I would be eligible, why would you set yourself up just to be disappointed
[00:23:06] to check?
[00:23:07] So anything else from high school before you roll out?
[00:23:10] How are was it to get like all the congressional recommendation and all that stuff?
[00:23:15] You know I don't think it's that hard when you're applying to the Naval Academy from Kansas.
[00:23:18] Now it may be different now, but if I was applying in Virginia or California or Texas,
[00:23:24] Maryland, Virginia, the geographically proximate states, they're very competitive.
[00:23:30] What I had good grades, you know one thing I should say is by the time I was a freshman
[00:23:35] in high school, I was fortunate enough to have this goal of the Naval Academy inside me.
[00:23:39] I don't know how it got there, but it was there.
[00:23:43] And so it then becomes a matter of, well what do I need to do to get into this place?
[00:23:47] It's going to be really hard.
[00:23:49] Okay you got to have good grades check, I'll study and get good grades.
[00:23:54] You got to demonstrate some athletic talent.
[00:23:57] Okay well I'm already doing that.
[00:23:58] It's just that was easy for me.
[00:24:01] Leadership, okay well I'll try to be a sports team captain.
[00:24:04] I'll try to run for student government.
[00:24:06] I'll do the secrets.
[00:24:08] And that's kind of how I structured it.
[00:24:10] And so I think as my story unfolds, you'll see I tend to be a fairly goal oriented person,
[00:24:16] but this is something I think is very, it's very important but not to force the goals.
[00:24:22] But when I have these goals naturally, I feel like I can just be ignited because this is
[00:24:30] driving me forward.
[00:24:31] And that's what was happening as early as my freshman year.
[00:24:33] And that's why I think I'm very fortunate.
[00:24:35] Because if you make this decision, you want to go to a service academy in your senior
[00:24:38] year of high school, it's too late.
[00:24:40] You got to start the process in your junior year.
[00:24:42] You do have to get a nomination from either senator in your state or from your congressional
[00:24:48] representative.
[00:24:49] And they're in court, they're in communication with the academies and I think the academies
[00:24:53] kind of lean them towards the candidates that they are already identifying.
[00:24:58] And you have no, what did you hear about the Naval Academy for the first time you don't remember?
[00:25:03] Had to have been in a book.
[00:25:05] I mean I would just, I remember watching movies like Predator.
[00:25:09] Just, I'll come echo didn't end up with the Naval Academy.
[00:25:13] He just wants to spread it a lot more humor.
[00:25:16] Yeah, probably was reading some books on a platoon leader in the Marine Corps in Vietnam or
[00:25:22] something Naval Academy.
[00:25:23] I think how it actually happened was at one point I wanted to be a pilot, but then the
[00:25:28] eyesight thing, it's just, it's not happening, but to be a pilot, I mean, you start getting
[00:25:32] aware of the service academy because to be a pilot, you have to go to a commissioning
[00:25:37] source.
[00:25:38] Yeah.
[00:25:39] So when you show up at the Naval Academy for like plebesummer, you must be pretty
[00:25:44] used to this kind of crap because you've already been to boot camp.
[00:25:49] You've been head of a team as a legitimate beach for freaking crushing you.
[00:25:54] It really was not that big of a deal.
[00:25:57] And plebesummer is this six week indoctrination.
[00:26:01] It is not boot camp, but it is a service academy equivalent of boot camp.
[00:26:07] You're a class of about 1200 incoming freshman report in the middle of the summer, July
[00:26:14] for about a six week indoctrination into the military that occurs and ends before the academic
[00:26:22] year.
[00:26:23] On the note of the secret, I will say that at the end of my plebe, you're a freshman
[00:26:27] year at the Naval Academy, I was invited back to be the class leader.
[00:26:31] I did do that and that was just an awesome leadership opportunity.
[00:26:35] I could be the class leader of what of the incoming secret class of high school students.
[00:26:42] So as a now done with my plebe year at the Naval Academy, I'm the class OIC of this
[00:26:50] group of high school kids coming from all over the place, running through the same thing
[00:26:55] I had been through two years before at this point because the other summer was plebesummer.
[00:27:02] And how did you like the Naval Academy?
[00:27:06] Well, I like a love-hate relationship, right?
[00:27:10] Yeah, there's the saying, I hate this place.
[00:27:17] But in high school, I have friends, but I didn't have what I would call deep connections
[00:27:26] with the people that I was going to high school with.
[00:27:29] And I definitely had friends, but when I was in the Naval Academy for the first time,
[00:27:34] I'm finding people that I really see I to I with.
[00:27:39] I mean, really quite bonded in this way of looking at the world the same way.
[00:27:45] Like, just common interest, common personality, this kind of thing.
[00:27:50] But to a person, and we found each other, weren't in the same companies.
[00:27:54] They all wanted to be selected for seal training.
[00:27:56] All of them.
[00:27:57] Telling me, a couple of these individuals were recruited swimmers all American high school
[00:28:03] swimmers.
[00:28:04] Another varsity swimmers is freshman at the Naval Academy.
[00:28:09] One, actually two were really good boxers and found that out the hard way trying to
[00:28:14] spar with them a little bit in the ring.
[00:28:16] And then, you know, there was me farm kid from Kansas and, you know, I just was not comfortable
[00:28:22] in the water.
[00:28:24] The truth of it is, in pleapsummer, I excelled physically and anything that was on land.
[00:28:31] But any time we had to do something in the water and this is maybe two times a week,
[00:28:35] you have to demonstrate to the Navy that you can float that you can take off your camis,
[00:28:41] camouflage uniform when you're floating, and tie them and inflate them to help you float.
[00:28:47] You have to demonstrate that in the event that you fall off a ship that you're not a total
[00:28:51] liability that you can swim from one side of the pool to the other.
[00:28:55] This is what you're doing in pleapsummer.
[00:28:58] And on those particular days, we're marching, it's hot out.
[00:29:01] I would have knots of anxiety in my stomach.
[00:29:05] Pouple.
[00:29:07] Who's scared of failing or you scared of drowning?
[00:29:11] I was scared of the water.
[00:29:12] I just didn't have a lot of expo.
[00:29:13] Now, granted, I've gone to the seal, seek it at seal thing, but there wasn't, there was
[00:29:18] a little bit in the water and that stuff petrified me.
[00:29:20] So I mean, you know, and it given what I ended up doing, one could call in the question
[00:29:26] my career decision making skills, given that this reality when I went to the Navy,
[00:29:31] I was just very, very scared of the water.
[00:29:34] But by the end of this first year, I had met my circle of friends.
[00:29:37] They all wanted to pretty much do a person wanted to be selected for seal training.
[00:29:40] And so, these guys all in your same class, same class, so we're pleaps, freshman.
[00:29:46] And they're just down for the seals.
[00:29:48] Yeah.
[00:29:49] How long did it take for you to start thinking that in that direction as well?
[00:29:54] I would say by the end of my first year there, I know not only I wanted to be a Marine,
[00:29:58] and I wanted to be selected for seal program, but I knew that I needed to get in the water.
[00:30:01] It started training.
[00:30:02] Get parents.
[00:30:03] What about your eyesight?
[00:30:04] Had you now learned that you could get a corrective surgery?
[00:30:06] That year's class, 1999, was able to get PRK.
[00:30:11] So that was a game changer for me.
[00:30:13] And then it's like, okay, well.
[00:30:16] So you weren't the class of 1999?
[00:30:19] No, I was class of 2002, so that in the...
[00:30:21] So you watched the guys that were going to graduate 1999?
[00:30:25] Or that had graduated 1999?
[00:30:27] Yes, and they were going to go through a bunch of...
[00:30:28] They were going to buds, and for those listening, there are at the time 16 billets
[00:30:34] from the Naval Academy, graduating class to go to buds, seal training, and those
[00:30:41] those billets are split over multiple classes, but 16, graduate and get to go to buds.
[00:30:47] And that service selection happens around January of your senior year.
[00:30:51] So as a freshman in January, I'm seeing who gets picked.
[00:30:56] And I had just heard that some of these individuals had PRK to correct their vision.
[00:31:00] So that they may have had that done a year before or something, but this is a game changer
[00:31:06] for me.
[00:31:07] I just need to get better in the water, because I was awful.
[00:31:12] In addition to being scared of the water, borderline scared just could not swim.
[00:31:17] So do you start spending extra time in a pool, do someone grab you and coach you and
[00:31:21] mentor you, like how do you start getting through this?
[00:31:24] Well, I had a good buddy who became a team guy, and we just started training together.
[00:31:28] And yeah, I would figure it out myself.
[00:31:31] We work on job proof.
[00:31:32] We would work on swimming underwater, 25 meters, something like that.
[00:31:37] Working on the stroke, working.
[00:31:39] I also had this goal of trying to make the triathlon team, because that year, the senior
[00:31:44] class, out of those 16 bullets going to buds, I want to say five came from the triathlon team.
[00:31:51] Well, that's a team that could be good to make.
[00:31:53] It's not a varsity sport, so you don't have to be recruited to club sport.
[00:31:58] Let's get in the water and start training.
[00:32:00] That was a very good runner and good at cycling.
[00:32:02] So I thought I'll train for triathlon.
[00:32:04] And along with my friend, we started training.
[00:32:07] We would just go on these adventures, running or cycling with our fins strapped to a backpack
[00:32:12] out to Bay Ridge or into the Chesapeake and just then go fins swim and cold water, come
[00:32:18] back, get on the bike or run back to the academy.
[00:32:23] Just doing fun adventures like that, and it just started pushing my limits.
[00:32:27] What were you majoring?
[00:32:28] What'd you major in?
[00:32:29] I chose the major in English.
[00:32:30] The service academies are geared towards science and engineering.
[00:32:33] And they said, pleb your chemistry is a good identifier of whether you will do well in
[00:32:40] engineering and science if you want to major.
[00:32:43] And they call it group one and then group three is more of the humanities.
[00:32:47] At first semester chemistry, no problem.
[00:32:50] It was a repeat of my high school.
[00:32:53] But second semester chemistry was new stuff.
[00:32:56] It just was over my head.
[00:32:57] And so I thought I had a very influential English teacher in high school, Mr. Schulz.
[00:33:03] And in addition to my parents, really exposing me to reading and just I love, I still love
[00:33:09] to read a lot.
[00:33:12] This teacher really inspired me to want to be an English mate.
[00:33:16] If this is what you like to do, do it.
[00:33:19] And there's benefit from this.
[00:33:20] I thought you learn about people, you learn about situations, you develop inability to empathize
[00:33:27] or hopefully with other people.
[00:33:31] And communication skills as well.
[00:33:32] This is all very important in the military.
[00:33:34] So you decide that you're going to study English while you're at the Naval Academy.
[00:33:38] Correct.
[00:33:39] And are they what part of English are you studying?
[00:33:41] Like a mean that just seems kind of strange.
[00:33:44] It's English lit.
[00:33:45] It just was cold English.
[00:33:47] But really it's not.
[00:33:49] I mean, I think they had some writing classes.
[00:33:51] They're creative writing.
[00:33:52] This kind of thing.
[00:33:53] But really it's the study of literature.
[00:33:55] And my favorite class was a class on the Hemingway.
[00:33:58] And as a kid, I read Hemingway and I read a fair world of arms for whom the belt
[00:34:03] tools.
[00:34:04] And these are books very much about war and the wartime experience.
[00:34:10] So as you're going through at what point are you start to compete and you're starting
[00:34:16] to look at how I actually going to get selected?
[00:34:19] Because you know, you say there's 16 bullets.
[00:34:21] And that is as competitive as it gets to get one of those 16 bullets.
[00:34:27] What do you think you did that was able to make you stand out and actually get selected?
[00:34:31] I remember plebier.
[00:34:32] We were in an auditorium.
[00:34:33] I think this is during pleb summer when the whole class of 1200 people was assembled.
[00:34:37] And they're saying who wants to be an aviator 600 hands go up?
[00:34:41] Who wants to be on a 600 out of roughly 12.
[00:34:43] 1200.
[00:34:44] I'm estimating who wants to be on a ship.
[00:34:46] And you know, a few hundred who wants to be an avi seal and like 250 hands go up.
[00:34:52] Easy.
[00:34:53] But by the time it comes around to the junior year, we really got to start making things
[00:34:56] happen.
[00:34:58] I feel like there were maybe 60 or 70 in my class that were kind of very much gutting for
[00:35:02] this.
[00:35:03] You have to do a screener weekend in order to get ready for mini buds.
[00:35:07] Mini buds is a three week program prior to your senior academic year.
[00:35:13] So you'd go there to Coronado.
[00:35:15] Did you go to mini buds?
[00:35:16] I did.
[00:35:17] I had to do the screener weekend in the fall in my junior year.
[00:35:20] And in that year ranked based on a PFT physical fitness test, you go through
[00:35:26] about two days of just hazing essentially from the seniors, upper class who have gone to
[00:35:32] mini buds if that really called.
[00:35:34] Is that to do the band?
[00:35:36] And then from that if you survive.
[00:35:37] That is.
[00:35:38] Most badass to start with even a mini buds.
[00:35:41] When at the time, you know, you're revering.
[00:35:44] They've been to mini buds and some of them are going to go to buds.
[00:35:47] And if you get through all this, then you can go to mini buds and then ostensibly you're
[00:35:52] ranked out of that.
[00:35:53] And then it goes into your senior year, you do another fitness test like it's ranked.
[00:35:57] You do a peer evaluation.
[00:35:59] Who do you want to go to buds with?
[00:36:00] Who do you not want to go to buds with?
[00:36:01] So you've got selected to go to mini buds.
[00:36:04] I did.
[00:36:05] Yep.
[00:36:06] And how was mini buds?
[00:36:08] Yep.
[00:36:09] I thought I did well.
[00:36:10] It's three weeks long.
[00:36:11] Yeah.
[00:36:12] This is my first time going to Coronado, California.
[00:36:14] And I fell in love with the place being from Kansas.
[00:36:16] I was like this.
[00:36:18] This is awesome.
[00:36:19] We had the weekends off.
[00:36:20] I think we did a Hell Knight.
[00:36:22] Similar to the Secret Act thing I did, except now it's in Coronado as opposed to Little
[00:36:26] Creek Virginia.
[00:36:28] And then it was just exposure.
[00:36:29] In high school, I'd been shooting MPF, they let us shoot MPF5s.
[00:36:33] And I don't think we even did got to do anything that cool in mini buds.
[00:36:36] I think some of it was just going out to La Posta and doing some land navigation in the
[00:36:40] heat.
[00:36:42] But it was just a really good time with my buddies from the Naval Academy.
[00:36:46] And then after that, I got to go to Navy Dive School because I had done a screener for
[00:36:49] that.
[00:36:50] And that's in Panama City Florida.
[00:36:51] I think that really was helpful for me, given my insecurities in the water to go to
[00:36:56] Dive School five weeks in Panama City Florida, learning how to dive 28.
[00:37:03] How long was it five weeks?
[00:37:04] It was five weeks.
[00:37:05] So that's summer before my senior year.
[00:37:07] It was just for me, it was just the best summer.
[00:37:10] Many buds for three weeks, Dive School for five weeks come back senior year with a dive
[00:37:15] bubble, not that's, I mean, just in the school, that's kind of a big deal to have a dive
[00:37:20] bubble.
[00:37:21] You were kind of a bad ass.
[00:37:27] And you get done with all that.
[00:37:28] And now this is like September 2001, right?
[00:37:32] This is like September 11, 2001, it's going to go down right before or as you start your
[00:37:36] senior year.
[00:37:37] Yeah, I remember September, I'll never forget that day.
[00:37:40] I had a late morning class.
[00:37:43] And I went out for a run that morning and out outside of the campus, outside of the
[00:37:49] yard.
[00:37:51] And as a senior year allowed to do that, I came back to the gate and they wouldn't let
[00:37:57] me in.
[00:37:58] I didn't have my ID.
[00:37:59] You don't need to run with an ID.
[00:38:01] Why are they asking for my ID?
[00:38:03] And then I came to find out what had happened.
[00:38:05] I went back to the dorm where we all live, I changed into my uniform with the class and
[00:38:10] you're seeing the replays I didn't see it live.
[00:38:14] But things totally, totally changed.
[00:38:19] I mean, that day, the academy was on lockdown.
[00:38:22] We didn't know what was happening.
[00:38:23] We had heard the Pentagon have been attacked.
[00:38:26] Of course, the towers in New York.
[00:38:28] And for me, this some really drove home, this reality, if I get selected for seal training.
[00:38:37] And I'm not going to know until January, I'm going to be directly involved in the nations
[00:38:44] response to this.
[00:38:46] This is for real.
[00:38:47] Now we're at war.
[00:38:49] And there's a decision that anybody wanted to go to Buds has to make.
[00:38:54] It's the decision of what are you going to put in your second choice.
[00:39:00] And the theory amongst the majority of my friends, in fact, I think all of them was, well,
[00:39:04] if you want to demonstrate that you want to be a seal, you need to put ships as number
[00:39:09] two, because that's the best way to laterally transfer.
[00:39:13] You're going to have to go to Newport, Rhode Island for a surface war for our officer
[00:39:16] school.
[00:39:17] You'll do a tour in the fleet.
[00:39:18] And then you can put in your packaging and come to Buds two years later.
[00:39:22] For me, I was thinking about this long and hard.
[00:39:25] You're just trying to game.
[00:39:27] You want to get one of those billets, but you don't know if you will.
[00:39:29] It's very competitive.
[00:39:30] At this point, there's probably 45 guys that are up for this.
[00:39:33] And these guys are like varsity wrestlers, varsity swimmers.
[00:39:37] Yeah.
[00:39:38] Water pull-ups, water pull-ups, badasses.
[00:39:39] Yeah.
[00:39:40] Destroying the PST.
[00:39:41] They got a 4.0 GPA.
[00:39:44] It's like just studs.
[00:39:46] Yeah.
[00:39:47] So for me, I thought about this and I put the Marine Corps as number two.
[00:39:51] You have to go into an interview board.
[00:39:53] And this happens in the fall.
[00:39:55] And this board was happening after 9-11.
[00:39:58] And it's comprised of senior seal officers, mid-middle range seal officers.
[00:40:06] There's a couple of Lieutenant's at the Academy of the Time and then senior enlisted seals.
[00:40:11] So this isn't timid any.
[00:40:12] It's panel maybe eight to ten team guy officers and enlisted that you know, you just,
[00:40:18] you don't see a lot of tried-inset the Academy.
[00:40:20] So when you do, it's just intimidating.
[00:40:23] Dude, I, when I went to boot camp, there was blood and seal there.
[00:40:28] And like, I saw him years later, like probably two or three years later.
[00:40:34] He, he had gotten out and was going, coming back in.
[00:40:36] And so he was at boot camp, like going through some basic like wickets to get
[00:40:42] reinstated in the Navy and he had a try to, and you know,
[00:40:45] I was like, oh my god, it's a freaking real seal.
[00:40:48] And when I met him years later, totally good dude.
[00:40:52] But if you would ask me, what was the height and approximate weight of this guy that you saw
[00:40:59] that was a seal in boot camp?
[00:41:00] I would have said, oh, he was probably, let's call it probably six, five, two, 60.
[00:41:05] Because that's what he, in my mind, that's what he was.
[00:41:07] And I met him in real life and he was like, like, five, 11.
[00:41:11] You know, 190, you know.
[00:41:13] And that, that's legit.
[00:41:15] Like I legitimately thought that he was like that badass.
[00:41:19] And I was young, I mean, but still that, when you're, that, when you're young,
[00:41:23] you see that, that freaking chicken for the first time.
[00:41:26] We were like, oh damn, so you're going to this board with eight of these dudes.
[00:41:29] Yeah, I'm one in the highest ranking officers in O6, a seal captain.
[00:41:33] And I don't know anything about the ins and outs of the seal teams.
[00:41:37] But this is intimidating and everything seems to, you know, depend upon my performance
[00:41:45] right here right now in front of these people.
[00:41:48] And so I just remember standing outside the room that the guy in front of me is in there.
[00:41:51] You know, he comes out and, and I'm like, wow, was it, you know, he's like, like,
[00:41:56] shaking his head like this.
[00:41:57] So I go in there and, you know, they, they asked me, I think they were leading me down.
[00:42:05] So why are you an English major?
[00:42:06] Do you write, do you like poetry?
[00:42:09] Do you write poems?
[00:42:11] And I'm trying to say, well, you serve this as about learning of other people in understanding
[00:42:17] situations and developing communication skills.
[00:42:20] And I think that'll serve me really well in the community if I'm, if I have the honor
[00:42:24] of being selected.
[00:42:26] Then they said, you're second choice, you're not putting down service warfare.
[00:42:31] What's going on with that?
[00:42:33] And I said, well, we're at war.
[00:42:36] I'd rather be in the Marine Corps if I can't go to Buds.
[00:42:40] I'd rather lead a infantry platoon.
[00:42:43] At the time, I didn't know.
[00:42:44] I think looking back, it's probably the right answer.
[00:42:47] And I really did, I don't know if the Marines would have taken me.
[00:42:50] The room are also was, you put them as second.
[00:42:52] They're not going to take you.
[00:42:53] Yeah.
[00:42:54] I've heard that that's like a real catch 22 for guys at the academy because they want
[00:42:59] to go in the seal teams.
[00:43:00] But there's so few bullets, but if you put Marine Corps as number two of the Marines are
[00:43:04] like, are you kidding me?
[00:43:05] Your Marine Corps should be number one later.
[00:43:07] So that's a bummer.
[00:43:09] But that I've heard that as well.
[00:43:11] Yeah, and in truth be told, I think I'm not going to gain this.
[00:43:13] I'm just kind of rank my choices.
[00:43:15] And honestly, there's a lot of things that rather do than be on a ship.
[00:43:19] And so I'm either going to make it or not into Buds and maybe the Marines will take me
[00:43:24] maybe they won't.
[00:43:25] But I remember exiting the interview thinking, I have no idea how that would.
[00:43:29] Probably it felt like it was forever, but it's probably half an hour.
[00:43:32] And did you know nothing?
[00:43:33] I'm just sitting here like laughing.
[00:43:35] Did you know nothing about anything?
[00:43:37] I know they were in retro spec.
[00:43:40] They probably knew the people they wanted.
[00:43:43] And maybe a couple were on the fence.
[00:43:45] I don't know where I stacked in there, but they probably were just scrims.
[00:43:49] They probably laughed after after you leave their problems.
[00:43:51] Did you meet me these guys later in the teams?
[00:43:54] Absolutely.
[00:43:55] Did they debrief you at all?
[00:43:56] Did they even remember you?
[00:43:57] The company officer at the Academy was there and he's still in.
[00:44:01] And I have not asked him specifically about that.
[00:44:05] But I was ranked fine.
[00:44:07] I found out afterwards.
[00:44:09] So you were ranked fine.
[00:44:11] You find out in January.
[00:44:13] That's when you find out where you're going.
[00:44:16] That is, yes, there's a day called Service Selection Day.
[00:44:19] You're going to go into your company officers room.
[00:44:22] Every company, there are 30 companies at the Academy.
[00:44:25] The whole, every company is comprised of all four years.
[00:44:29] And that company has a company officer from either the actor duty, Navy, or Marine Corps,
[00:44:34] and then a company senior enlisted from the Navy, or Marine Corps.
[00:44:38] So you go into the company officer's office.
[00:44:40] And he's, or she is going to tell you what you've been assigned.
[00:44:45] And this is your fate.
[00:44:47] You don't get, this is what you're doing.
[00:44:49] This is not a debate.
[00:44:50] No, you don't get to say, well, this is what that.
[00:44:53] If you're assigned to a ship, later that night, you get to choose, and it's somewhat
[00:44:59] of a lottery system, I think it actually depends on class rank.
[00:45:03] You can choose what ship you want to go on.
[00:45:07] But you don't get to contest the fact that you're assigned Service Warfare.
[00:45:12] So I go in there and he's printing off a certificate that's going to tell me my fate.
[00:45:16] And his back is to me.
[00:45:17] I just remember, it's just, my heart is pounding.
[00:45:19] What did you think your chances were?
[00:45:22] It's tied about 50, 50, 50, 50.
[00:45:26] So I go in there.
[00:45:27] And the first thing he said, it was, don't worry, you're fine.
[00:45:29] What does that mean?
[00:45:32] You got what you wanted.
[00:45:35] So I remember just feeling absolute relief.
[00:45:38] And then about maybe five minutes later, it was late.
[00:45:44] I'm going to bud.
[00:45:46] Whoa.
[00:45:48] And now I'm already starting to feel this apprehension because hell week.
[00:45:54] Second phase.
[00:45:55] Water.
[00:45:56] I got to get ready.
[00:45:59] How many of your buddies didn't get picked up?
[00:46:03] Your good buddies.
[00:46:05] One of my, how was that?
[00:46:06] Oh, yeah.
[00:46:07] Relationship thing.
[00:46:08] Because you know, there's like two guys that were like faster than you.
[00:46:11] And there was another guy that was smarter than you.
[00:46:13] And another guy that was like a better wrestler.
[00:46:16] They're just going, yeah, by and large, most of my best friends got a bullet, but one
[00:46:22] of my best friends did not.
[00:46:25] And one of my other buddies who did the guy that was going on the adventures with, we
[00:46:29] came up to his room later that day.
[00:46:32] And he started crying in front of us, I won't forget that either.
[00:46:36] We all wanted this so bad.
[00:46:38] But I think it was more than necessarily the job.
[00:46:41] It was, this is what your buddies are doing.
[00:46:43] You want to be with your teammates.
[00:46:45] So yeah, it's a challenge and you're intrigued by that, but it's about teamwork.
[00:46:52] And he was crying and, man, I felt bad for him.
[00:46:55] And you know, going on to Buds wanting to stay in touch with him, not knowing how to navigate.
[00:47:02] How much do I tell about what I'm doing?
[00:47:05] Or do I try to protect his feelings and not rule it?
[00:47:07] You know, that's, you know, this or that, or whatever.
[00:47:11] But I am proud to say that later on when I went to a team, another friend of mine,
[00:47:16] we spoke to the Commanding Officer and who apparently had good rapport with the detailer.
[00:47:24] And we said there's this guy.
[00:47:27] The individual who did not get the billet that year.
[00:47:31] And he was able to lateral transfer.
[00:47:33] And he is the Commanding Officer of a team.
[00:47:36] A team.
[00:47:38] Right now.
[00:47:39] That's right.
[00:47:40] Yeah, I mean, for me, when I was a, when I was a passenger, a stoner and life,
[00:47:45] both of those guys didn't get picked up out of the academy.
[00:47:48] And they both had to go to the fleet and do the whole lat transfer thing.
[00:47:52] And you know, it's all just man, like you said, it's your fate is in the hands of all these different things.
[00:48:00] And you can push it and that's a great story.
[00:48:02] You know, it's a great story when guys actually stick with it and go to the fleet and do that lateral transfer thing.
[00:48:08] Oh, that's, that's a game I didn't have to play.
[00:48:13] Yeah, in many ways, you were smart.
[00:48:15] But I will say, I remember there was in the plea beer, the individual who did not get the billet who is now doing quite well in the teams.
[00:48:22] Who you know, he, in freshman year, we were talking about what are you going to decide for your major.
[00:48:30] You know, you don't have to declare until the springtime.
[00:48:32] I was, I want to do English and he goes, I think I'm thinking computer science.
[00:48:37] And so he, he just computer science and his grades were not the best.
[00:48:41] And so it's, for me, this was English was such a good choice.
[00:48:46] Much.
[00:48:47] You're close.
[00:48:48] I could, I happen to be someone who likes to read and I can maybe not always read all of the book.
[00:48:54] It's still right, a decent paper, focus on my math and science and engineering classes to try to get at least to be in those classes to try to have good grades.
[00:49:01] Because they are evaluating everything in part of that is your grades.
[00:49:06] So September 11 goes down, you get picked up, you're in your final prep.
[00:49:10] You must have been feeling decent about the water now that you passed Navy Dive School.
[00:49:14] Yes, I'm much more confident in the water.
[00:49:18] I felt like I had improved a lot and I knew that anything on land,
[00:49:25] I'm going to be just given the perspective of being borderline afraid of the water
[00:49:32] that I could use this to my advantage.
[00:49:36] I've overcome a fear.
[00:49:38] I'm used to being afraid of the water.
[00:49:41] There's actually a strength in that learning how to overcome something.
[00:49:45] What I did was I walked up to the water's edge just about every day there at the academy for four years
[00:49:52] and literally immersed myself in this environment that I am uncomfortable in.
[00:49:58] I had a distinct apprehension of jumping out of airplanes as well.
[00:50:09] So real stands for Sierra and land, see an air where not my thing.
[00:50:15] But the processes of overcoming this fear of the water serve, I think have served me quite well.
[00:50:21] And so there's this inner strength that can come from approaching situations that make you uncomfortable.
[00:50:31] And you get through this. You take it one small step at a time.
[00:50:34] Work on something. There's always something you can work on.
[00:50:36] Do one thing today. Do another thing tomorrow.
[00:50:40] Over time, this will accumulate and grow.
[00:50:43] Yeah, I've thought about that too.
[00:50:44] You're jumping out of airplanes. You're fast-ropping. You're repelling. You're diving.
[00:50:51] You're diving at night. All these things that are a little bit sketchy if you're not comfortable with them.
[00:50:55] And look, the first time you jump out of an airplane, even if like for me, I thought it was going to be fun.
[00:50:59] But it's still a little bit sketchy.
[00:51:00] First time I fast-rope, like hey, this seems like it's going to be fun.
[00:51:03] But it's still a little bit sketchy.
[00:51:04] First time you repel off the tower, seems like it's going to be fun.
[00:51:07] But it's still a little bit sketchy.
[00:51:08] Well, you're building up sort of the mental protocol to be in a fearful situation and just like proceed anyways,
[00:51:16] which I think is really good for the first time you're going into combat.
[00:51:19] Like, oh, okay, yeah, I know those little butterflies.
[00:51:22] No factor. I'm going to push through them.
[00:51:23] That's probably a pretty good reason just to do those things in the first place.
[00:51:28] Of course, you did it more than I did.
[00:51:32] Yeah, I think the first step here is acknowledging what's going on.
[00:51:35] Yeah, no, okay, this is the situation. I'm uncomfortable in the water.
[00:51:39] Okay, check. Let's come up with a plan of action now.
[00:51:43] But yeah, going into Buds, I remember graduated May 24, 2002 from the Naval Academy.
[00:51:51] And my report date at Naval Special Warfare Training Command Buds is late June 2002.
[00:51:58] So I had about a month off.
[00:51:59] We got to choose of the 16 of us who were going to go to Buds with and in what order.
[00:52:05] And it was split over three classes.
[00:52:07] And I was in the group that was going to go first.
[00:52:11] And so we weren't going to have the stories from.
[00:52:14] And I thought this is actually probably good.
[00:52:17] I was happy with the first first off the deck because we're not going to see
[00:52:21] Naval Academy classmates who are further along,
[00:52:25] who maybe can give some wisdom,
[00:52:27] but they're also through various stages.
[00:52:29] And I just, I'd rather just be the first one to go.
[00:52:32] And so that worked out well.
[00:52:33] There's a definite like the Naval Academy guys usually do well at Buds.
[00:52:38] And if they quit, they're just like hated by everyone.
[00:52:40] Because they took a billet.
[00:52:42] They took one of those 16 billets.
[00:52:44] And everyone just can't believe that you got this opportunity and freaking blew it.
[00:52:49] Like, I mean, the, in Lister Guys, like, I didn't care.
[00:52:52] I mean, when I was in Lister Guys, I wasn't care for somebody with quit.
[00:52:55] For whatever reason, I was like, whatever.
[00:52:56] But Naval Academy guys, they take that shit real first.
[00:53:00] No, there's some pressure, but I also think that can be an advantage.
[00:53:03] I went out to Coronado.
[00:53:06] We, the six, so there's actually, there's going to be six, five and five in those three groups.
[00:53:10] So I'm going to be going with six, five other classmates from the Naval Academy.
[00:53:14] We were packed into an apartment in Imperial Beach.
[00:53:17] Three bedrooms, two to a room, like $200 per person a month.
[00:53:22] I got it for rent.
[00:53:23] And there was no way I could come back to that apartment, having quit.
[00:53:29] No way.
[00:53:30] How could I, how could I do that?
[00:53:32] So you're putting yourself in a situation of your 16 quit?
[00:53:35] One.
[00:53:36] Yeah.
[00:53:37] Not in, not in my group.
[00:53:38] Yeah.
[00:53:39] But you're putting yourself in a situation where external factors, you know, peer relationships,
[00:53:47] this kind of thing can actually, although it could be conceived and construed as adding pressure,
[00:53:52] I think it actually made, you know, at these kind of, you're at your breaking point moments.
[00:53:58] This was maybe just a subliminal nudge in the direction of the do not, do not succumb,
[00:54:05] do not quit, push through, let's go.
[00:54:07] How was like so detached from people quitting?
[00:54:11] I didn't even understand what was happening.
[00:54:14] Like people were just quitting.
[00:54:15] I was like, I was saying this the other day, like they didn't seem like human to me.
[00:54:19] Like, they didn't seem like a human, like, all this guy, I didn't, I didn't picture a person with,
[00:54:24] like, hopes and dreams and that can't believe they just did that and they,
[00:54:27] they joined the Navy and now they're quitting, like, oh gosh, what?
[00:54:30] I was just like, oh, that this person just, a nonhuman thing that just like is moving on and they're
[00:54:35] not part of what we're doing.
[00:54:36] And so I wasn't even, I can't even name, I can only name one guy that quit and he was my
[00:54:41] boat crew leader and he was my boat crew leader in hell week, but that's the only, everyone else
[00:54:45] was just like, gone, I just never even thought about him, never even, and I never had thoughts,
[00:54:50] like, oh, I, you know, this guy's my friend.
[00:54:52] So I never thought like that.
[00:54:53] I was like, oh, we're just doing this.
[00:54:55] Oh, what do you want to say?
[00:54:56] Climate is rocks, you want to jump in the water, whatever, like, like, I was like, you said,
[00:55:01] oh, maybe, you mentioned real quick, I said, well, you know, I, I didn't have to go through all
[00:55:05] that stuff in the Navy, I got to me like, yeah, maybe you're smarter and I was like, no,
[00:55:08] in my mind, I was like, no, I was dumb.
[00:55:10] I was just like, oh, I'm going in the Navy, I want to be a seal.
[00:55:13] They told me to do something, I'm going to do it.
[00:55:15] Like, that was my attitude.
[00:55:17] So, and it might have been beneficial.
[00:55:19] It seems like it was beneficial, but it also disconnected me from even really any recognition.
[00:55:25] You know, of how hard seal training is because to me, I was like, there was just two groups
[00:55:32] of people, me and my buddies and everyone else, and we didn't know them and they just
[00:55:36] went away and then we were all going to the teams.
[00:55:39] It was like, oh, who yeah, we're going to the teams.
[00:55:41] So it was almost like this weird, like now when I hear some of the statistics and you know
[00:55:46] more about it and you know that guys that are, went to the Naval Academy and guys that
[00:55:53] were, you know, uh, uh, freaky and division one, squimmers and division one, wrestlers and
[00:55:58] division one football players and they all quit.
[00:56:01] And like, that didn't even, I just thought there was a bunch of guys that we just didn't
[00:56:04] want to be here and I do.
[00:56:05] So that was that kind of crazy.
[00:56:07] Yeah, I remember someone giving me advice, I collected along the way, three pieces of
[00:56:12] advice.
[00:56:13] Number one in how weak eat like it's your job.
[00:56:17] Don't ever let a eat no matter how hard you are.
[00:56:19] Eat eat eat eat.
[00:56:22] Second was give 70% effort 100% of the time trying not to have to ever give 100% but
[00:56:30] a good 70% effort 100% of the time sustainable.
[00:56:34] And then third was don't get close to anybody because you don't know if they're going
[00:56:39] to quit.
[00:56:40] I'm wondering if when you're boat crew leader quit, if that affected you.
[00:56:44] I hear I hear when it off, it sounds like it didn't, but you hear stories about when
[00:56:48] an officer quit three or four people go with that person.
[00:56:52] Yeah, I forget what my buddy gift went through how weak we, he was on here the other
[00:56:56] day and we were talking about and he just said like he was laughing, he's like you just
[00:56:59] looked at him and like all right, whatever and we just like carried on.
[00:57:02] He was like, yeah, no factor.
[00:57:04] I was too like, I was too crazy.
[00:57:06] I guess I was too just weird, I guess, or crazy or something.
[00:57:11] Did you have any challenges during but like when you got to pool comp, how was that?
[00:57:15] Did you have any challenges with the five and a half nautical mile swim or anything like
[00:57:20] that?
[00:57:21] You know, I think what I saw in Buds with my class was no matter how gifted a person was,
[00:57:27] there was probably going to be something at some point that was going to challenge them
[00:57:32] and one of the one of my classmates, this individual from the Naval Academy who I had known
[00:57:36] for four years at this point, was just a stud in Buds and there was one day at the very
[00:57:40] end for whatever reason the obstacle course rope with the low wall, the one he had, the
[00:57:47] high low.
[00:57:48] You send the rope and then kind of roll over.
[00:57:50] The rope was wet and he just had a really hard time.
[00:57:52] I hope.
[00:57:53] I'm not if he's listening, I hope he's not bringing up some bad memories.
[00:57:58] He's like, feet, yes, yes.
[00:57:59] For me, you know, I actually did quite well in pool week.
[00:58:01] I had maybe having gone to dive school.
[00:58:04] Yeah, I was going to have to have had to help to me and I remember in dive school, the first
[00:58:09] just feeling really uncomfortable breathing underwater, just was weird.
[00:58:14] But by the time second phase dive phase of Buds comes around, that was the double hose regulator
[00:58:20] was new because we were using a single hose and dive school.
[00:58:23] Oh, yeah, you know, in the Aqua Lung Aqua Master.
[00:58:27] Yeah, there was one evolution known, it's life-saving.
[00:58:34] I forget if that was pre or post-Hoh, I want to say it was pre-Hoh week, but I think it's
[00:58:38] pre- we had some large instructors who had weight belts on and they bring it in.
[00:58:46] I failed the first time.
[00:58:48] Did your world come crashing down?
[00:58:51] Yeah, he was just taking me under and the second time I failed and it was like the third
[00:58:58] time.
[00:58:59] I'm sitting in the line of your shame.
[00:59:02] Yeah, where you failed and now you have to, this is your chance.
[00:59:06] And I'm thinking, is this it?
[00:59:11] So I just really tried to focus on the procedure and trying to do it.
[00:59:16] And number one, like what I was failing was the fact that this instructor was underwater.
[00:59:21] So like number one thing is keep this person's head up of the water.
[00:59:25] I don't care if I'm drinking water, if I'm under water the whole time, his head needs
[00:59:28] to be above the water and the entire time.
[00:59:32] And I get to the wall and it was a pass.
[00:59:34] No, it was just like, well, take it.
[00:59:36] Yeah, and I hope I didn't come across like Buds was easy for me.
[00:59:41] Because I failed to run, I failed to swim, I failed pull comp and actually here's the
[00:59:48] funny thing.
[00:59:49] For life saving, I got so ready for life saving.
[00:59:51] I was like, I was like, hostel.
[00:59:53] I was like, oh, I'm gonna fight some dudes and it was like that back then.
[00:59:57] I don't feel like that when you went through.
[00:59:59] It sounds like it was.
[01:00:00] It was a fight.
[01:00:01] Like you're gonna fight this person.
[01:00:02] And so I was super amped up for that.
[01:00:05] I went out, got first in line and in pull comp, I failed pull comp on Friday and over the
[01:00:11] weekend, mean my buddy who's now an active duty master chief.
[01:00:15] He failed to.
[01:00:17] And we spent, I don't know how we did this.
[01:00:19] I don't know how this was legal.
[01:00:20] I don't know if it was legal.
[01:00:21] We spent the weekend in the dip tank with with charge to win in.
[01:00:26] He's, I don't know how we got him.
[01:00:27] And we just freaking pull comp to each other in four feet of water.
[01:00:32] Like we're standing outside the dip tank.
[01:00:33] I'm in the dip tank.
[01:00:34] He's standing there just ripping my face and we did that for the whole weekend.
[01:00:38] The whole weekend we did that.
[01:00:40] I got on Monday morning I went in there.
[01:00:43] The instructor came down and this instructor ended up being an abrol.
[01:00:46] He came down and as soon as I saw him coming down, I ripped off my own face mask and spit
[01:00:51] out my mouth piece like can bring it dude.
[01:00:54] And he sure enough he was like dude, this guy is obviously very confident and he messed
[01:00:59] me up.
[01:01:00] Like you know, pass.
[01:01:02] So I kind of would go a little bit extra on something.
[01:01:06] But I don't want to make it sound like it was easy for me because like I said, in fact,
[01:01:13] I failed to run.
[01:01:14] I failed to swim.
[01:01:15] Not like I can promise you I never won a run.
[01:01:17] I never won a swim.
[01:01:19] I never won an O course.
[01:01:20] I was like in the middle of everything.
[01:01:23] And that was about, that was about all I had to.
[01:01:26] Like when I failed to run it was because I didn't, I tried to pace myself.
[01:01:30] A little bit and failed.
[01:01:32] So my only way to pass a run was to run as hard as I possibly could the entire time.
[01:01:35] 100%.
[01:01:36] Yeah, not 70%.
[01:01:37] 100%.
[01:01:38] No, it was 100%.
[01:01:39] 100%.
[01:01:40] That's how I had to do it.
[01:01:41] Yeah.
[01:01:42] It's a run to pass a swim to pass everything.
[01:01:44] So your only big challenge though was life saving.
[01:01:49] Life saving.
[01:01:50] But there was a moment in the beginning stages of hell week where, and I can tell the story,
[01:01:57] I was at a decision point.
[01:02:03] At my, I would say my breaking point.
[01:02:05] And a lot of this was because we got frustration.
[01:02:07] Oh, they're going to get you from that frustration.
[01:02:10] Frustration with physical pain can be a really potent combination.
[01:02:15] And hell week starts on a Sunday.
[01:02:18] You know it's going to end Friday.
[01:02:20] You're going to not sleep once until some time on Wednesday.
[01:02:23] All these thoughts are going through my head.
[01:02:25] 70% of my clad 80% are going to quit.
[01:02:27] And I'm not going to make it.
[01:02:28] Am I going to be one of the ones who gets through all these looking around.
[01:02:31] You're in an isolation room waiting for this thing to start.
[01:02:34] Just all these thoughts going through your head.
[01:02:36] You know what I was thinking at that time?
[01:02:37] Just like, oh, wait, wait, wait.
[01:02:41] This is going to start.
[01:02:42] I want pizza.
[01:02:44] So you're having all these advanced thoughts.
[01:02:46] Yeah, I'm not going to be like just nothing.
[01:02:47] I'm like a freaking idiot.
[01:02:49] You know, I'm thinking all this stuff and you know, who knows he's going to quit?
[01:02:53] Don't get close to anybody.
[01:02:55] And we break out and it's just chaos and form up the longest amount.
[01:03:00] You go all the way down with the boats on your head to that bottom end of the silver strand,
[01:03:03] racing your tired.
[01:03:05] It's not comfortable.
[01:03:07] It means, but at this point it's like, I'm in this.
[01:03:12] I mean, you're in it.
[01:03:13] You're in it.
[01:03:14] And so all that anxiety and build up and apprehension has kind of dissipated because
[01:03:18] I'm just in this now.
[01:03:19] Performing up for the second race, this part of the longest mile with the logs, logs,
[01:03:26] or the section telephone poles and my team steps up to a government pickup truck, receiving
[01:03:32] our log and this thing was just insanely heavy.
[01:03:38] I don't know what was going on with it.
[01:03:39] It wasn't old misery.
[01:03:41] I don't know what was going on.
[01:03:43] It felt like it was water log.
[01:03:45] Yep, they could probably could have been waterlogged.
[01:03:47] And maybe the instructors knew, maybe they didn't.
[01:03:49] I don't know.
[01:03:50] They knew.
[01:03:52] And I just remember, we had one of the guys in the boat and I guarantee you every single
[01:03:58] person under that log.
[01:04:00] It remembers this log.
[01:04:02] It was just so heavy.
[01:04:04] I mean, and you know what a log is supposed to weigh.
[01:04:07] You've done this stuff before.
[01:04:08] I'm immediately grown.
[01:04:10] And there was a guy on the boat team.
[01:04:12] You'd been through, I think, three days of hell week before and two years before, gone
[01:04:17] to the fleet come back and immediately was saying, this log is a career ender.
[01:04:22] This is not good.
[01:04:26] So we received the brief, you know, log carried north, bust him, go.
[01:04:30] It races on and just all the teams in the class were just out of sight.
[01:04:35] You couldn't hear, see the second to last place team, even.
[01:04:39] This is bad.
[01:04:40] This is way.
[01:04:41] So you guys are so far back to last place team.
[01:04:44] I mean, like every the whole class is just gone.
[01:04:49] And we are all by ourselves at the last place.
[01:04:54] So of course, the instructors descended upon us like a pack of wolves, you know, with their
[01:04:58] mega phones and hurry up, step it out, move it out, let's go.
[01:05:02] And then there was this instructor in my face and this person had a unique ability to really
[01:05:08] get under my nerves.
[01:05:10] And he's telling me he's going to kick me out of the program.
[01:05:12] We need to step it out.
[01:05:14] I'm at the far left end of the log.
[01:05:15] Are you the boat crew leader?
[01:05:17] Yes, far left end of the log.
[01:05:20] We're the weight tends to collect and the person to my right.
[01:05:24] It just 10, you know, 10, 15, 20 minutes into this.
[01:05:27] I have no conception of time, but we're into this race now.
[01:05:31] We're in last place and it seemed like his arms.
[01:05:33] There just wasn't much.
[01:05:34] So you can feel the increase of the weight.
[01:05:36] And I'm at the far left end of the log.
[01:05:38] So it felt like I was carrying two people's worth of weight on the far left end of this
[01:05:42] log that was so heavy.
[01:05:45] I felt it literally felt like my arms were going to just rip out of the shoulder
[01:05:50] socks.
[01:05:51] My biceps were totally on fire.
[01:05:53] Every step, just horrendous.
[01:05:58] And I started just succumbing to self-doubt, frustration, thinking long-term thought.
[01:06:06] How am I going to, this is, I'm just a few hours into how we come.
[01:06:08] How am I going to make it like, to Friday?
[01:06:10] Friday seems impossible if our weight, and this log is destroying my body.
[01:06:15] This is not good.
[01:06:16] It's not good.
[01:06:17] I worked years to get to this point and things are just unraveling fast.
[01:06:22] It's not a good start to help.
[01:06:24] We're only a few hours in, middle of the night.
[01:06:27] And there was this moment where I remember looking up into the sky as we're struggling to
[01:06:33] advance this log forward through the soft sand in last place and just thinking, I can't
[01:06:38] do.
[01:06:39] This is just too much.
[01:06:40] It's frustrating because these instructors and they don't, you know, I just wanted to scream
[01:06:44] this isn't fair.
[01:06:45] This is not, this log is not the right kind of weight.
[01:06:49] It's not a fair race.
[01:06:51] But I couldn't say that.
[01:06:53] And they didn't know or let onto their knowledge that this log was too heavy.
[01:06:56] So at this critical point where I just had a frustration, I was just about to walk away.
[01:07:03] I remember, I just had this idea of like playing this game.
[01:07:09] And it's all in my mind.
[01:07:12] But I could quit, but first, you know, take a few more steps.
[01:07:15] I'd take those steps with that.
[01:07:18] Okay, you can just keep playing this game.
[01:07:21] Okay, take a few more steps.
[01:07:22] Okay, I've done that.
[01:07:23] Let's just keep playing this game.
[01:07:24] And so I just got to net rhythm and then I started yelling some encouragement to the
[01:07:29] team and let's go.
[01:07:31] Let's go.
[01:07:32] Let's go.
[01:07:33] And they probably want to be shut up.
[01:07:34] But this game, I learned a lesson like, okay, you got to, when you have these
[01:07:39] situations to push your your limit, you may have long-term goals.
[01:07:43] You know, I wanted to be a Navy seal, and I'll, it seemed like really far away.
[01:07:46] And as I, you know, think about this and unpack this experience, what I have learned
[01:07:52] is that a way to get your mind away from these long-term thoughts that can only be discouraging
[01:07:59] is to just focus on mechanics and procedure and process, support the law with my arms,
[01:08:04] advance it with my team one step at a time.
[01:08:06] That's all I need to be thinking about, right?
[01:08:07] I know, and just you learn that.
[01:08:09] I learned that in that night, right then and there in that rate.
[01:08:13] Yeah, of course we finished last place and we got hammered.
[01:08:17] But because, you know, it pays to be a winner and they want to drive home this lesson that
[01:08:22] losing in combat has severe consequences.
[01:08:24] You need to find ways to win.
[01:08:26] There's no way in hell we were going to win under this log.
[01:08:28] But that punishment occurred.
[01:08:30] The log was a way we were just, I don't know, doing air squads or bare-cr- whatever it was,
[01:08:35] it was better than being under that log and I knew that I just got through that.
[01:08:40] There was nothing, nothing this week that can be that bad.
[01:08:44] And nothing was that bad.
[01:08:46] And I remember laying in the surf zone, surf torture sessions, all I would need to do was
[01:08:52] just think, man, this is rest.
[01:08:54] At least I'm not under that log.
[01:08:56] My whole perspective, it changed.
[01:08:58] I got through it.
[01:08:59] I learned that lesson.
[01:09:00] I focused on one step at a time and advancing it in one, one, but this, I think every person
[01:09:08] who gets through hell week at some form, whether they process this consciously or not.
[01:09:13] But you have to break down long-term massive challenges into increments.
[01:09:19] Things that you can do right now that add up over time to get through a very difficult
[01:09:23] situation.
[01:09:24] That lesson was very valuable for me.
[01:09:28] No, that's a good one.
[01:09:30] Like I said, from my perspective, it was just like, I never even was thinking that far.
[01:09:36] So I was like, what, carry this log, cool, got it.
[01:09:40] Too much of a knuckle dragger to process these kind of big picture strategic thoughts about
[01:09:49] my life.
[01:09:50] Yeah, you know, maybe I'm prone to overthinking.
[01:09:53] And so there is something to be said for just doing it, not think, you know, just do
[01:09:59] what you got to do.
[01:10:01] You know, I remember thinking when I was in hell week, I was like, oh, it's going to feel
[01:10:04] so good to go to sleep.
[01:10:06] I was almost, like, my anticipation, I was going to feel so cool to stay awake for so long
[01:10:12] because I'm not now good.
[01:10:13] It's going to feel a fall asleep one.
[01:10:14] And a week, that's going to be so cool.
[01:10:15] It's going to feel so good to just like, laid down.
[01:10:17] And I was kind of excited about the prospect of having stayed awake for so long, but then
[01:10:22] I got to go to sleep.
[01:10:23] The only way you can get to get that much pleasure in sleeping is to stay awake for that
[01:10:30] long.
[01:10:31] Otherwise, it's just kind of a pain to go to sleep.
[01:10:32] It's like a waste of time.
[01:10:33] It feels like it's like bad.
[01:10:37] So thankfully, you made it through how many people started in your Buds class.
[01:10:41] Do you remember?
[01:10:42] Oh, we had when we classed up, I believe it was 196 that number sticks in my mind.
[01:10:48] It seems like a pretty, a little bit of a small number.
[01:10:50] It was classed up.
[01:10:51] So June of 2002, we classed up.
[01:10:55] Hell Week was laid August 2002, summer, hell week.
[01:11:00] So the Surf Torture Sessions weren't that bad.
[01:11:02] They just leave you in longer.
[01:11:03] But again, it's just rest.
[01:11:04] They had just got.
[01:11:06] And I believe we graduated 26 original, but we had rollbacks along the way.
[01:11:14] You get done.
[01:11:15] So those were your major challenges.
[01:11:16] Little bit of a lifestyle.
[01:11:17] Two big challenges.
[01:11:18] Yep.
[01:11:20] You get done.
[01:11:22] And you get assigned to a team.
[01:11:25] What team you end up going to?
[01:11:26] West Coast team team one.
[01:11:28] So you end up going to team one.
[01:11:29] Did you want to go to the West Coast?
[01:11:30] Yeah, I chose that.
[01:11:31] I had that cornado on your mind.
[01:11:33] Yeah, you know, being from Kansas, I've been East Coast at the Naval Academy.
[01:11:37] And you know, the thing is, when you get to a team, nobody cares that you went through
[01:11:44] hell week.
[01:11:45] Yep.
[01:11:46] Nobody cares.
[01:11:47] We'll be curious.
[01:11:48] As I've been working for years, they no longer matter.
[01:11:53] Did you get your Trident after SQT?
[01:11:54] Yes.
[01:11:55] So September 2003, I reported that West Coast team in October 2003.
[01:12:02] Is a new guy.
[01:12:03] So you show up and you get put right into a poll too?
[01:12:07] No.
[01:12:08] The policy at that team at that time was.
[01:12:10] And they were, the detailing was a little off in the sense that they were just a few
[01:12:16] months away and ended up doing a surge deployment.
[01:12:21] So to the team had to do a surge deployment to a rat.
[01:12:26] I think I kind of forget the particulars, but maybe more platoons were needed.
[01:12:30] Is this an O4?
[01:12:31] Yes.
[01:12:32] And you are a team one.
[01:12:33] Yes.
[01:12:34] And you went on deployment.
[01:12:35] Yes.
[01:12:36] In less than four months after arriving.
[01:12:38] You went on deployment in the, what time of year?
[01:12:43] Is it January 04? I believe there was some kind of a surge happening within the community.
[01:12:48] And so I got to that team.
[01:12:50] They were already well through their work up.
[01:12:52] And so the policy, there were several of us, junior officers who were just kind of
[01:12:57] floating around.
[01:12:59] And the policy was not to put the third officer in a platoon at that team at that time.
[01:13:03] So did you go on deployment?
[01:13:04] Yeah, I did.
[01:13:05] I did a platoot at the Pacific.
[01:13:06] Okay.
[01:13:07] Got to always at team 7 and team 1 relieved us.
[01:13:11] That's why.
[01:13:12] So if you were to go into Iraq, you would have high five with me in Iraq because I was
[01:13:16] getting ready to head home.
[01:13:17] I was not in that group.
[01:13:18] I was, I was bummed.
[01:13:19] You know, when you think at the Naval Academy that you've now been selected to go to
[01:13:25] Buds 9-11 just happened, this is for real.
[01:13:28] We're going to war.
[01:13:29] You go through Buds hell week, it's such land warfare, everything, SKT, you get to a team.
[01:13:37] You're deploying to war, I did not realize that some platoons deploy to non-combat environments
[01:13:45] even when there is combat going on.
[01:13:49] And that was a surprise to me.
[01:13:52] Not exactly what I expected, but I'm a new guy.
[01:13:56] And so you go where you're told.
[01:13:58] And a lot of people may not realize this, but platoons don't often get to control with
[01:14:03] a team.
[01:14:08] There's a strong element of chance in all this stuff.
[01:14:13] That's why the best thing you can do is get to a team deal.
[01:14:16] Good job.
[01:14:17] Do the best you can.
[01:14:18] Keep going on deployment.
[01:14:19] And hopefully you get in the right place at the right time.
[01:14:22] The better you do, the better reputation you have, the better chance you will have.
[01:14:27] But it's still only a chance.
[01:14:30] So did you do a full six months in the Pacific?
[01:14:34] It was nine months, oh dang.
[01:14:35] Nine months in the Pacific staged at a gwam, doing a lot of exercises with various countries.
[01:14:42] I mean, you got to do some cool training, which for me was actually new training, especially
[01:14:50] in terms of urban combat and movement through houses and amongst structures.
[01:14:57] So that was something I hadn't been exposed to because I hadn't done the work up.
[01:15:01] So getting to do that with a platoon with Simunition and this kind of thing was really
[01:15:05] good training, I thought.
[01:15:08] So you get done with that deployment.
[01:15:10] Now you get put as an assistant platoon.
[01:15:12] Correct.
[01:15:13] Yes.
[01:15:14] So this is now 2004 going to be deploying 2005.
[01:15:18] A system platoon commander same team.
[01:15:20] And how's this?
[01:15:23] Yep.
[01:15:24] This is an impotune commander, I'm still a new guy.
[01:15:27] You're in this position as a junior officer in my situation, not being prior and listed
[01:15:31] like you were that you're in terms of not only age but experience in the teams.
[01:15:38] You're just outranked, even though maybe technically on the uniform, there's a rank.
[01:15:45] So it's a difficult position to navigate sometimes.
[01:15:50] I think you want to go into this with some humility with asking questions.
[01:15:57] I found that junior officers in the team sometimes, and I think I can put myself in this
[01:16:02] category, try to cover up some of their insecurities, not knowing things, not having
[01:16:08] the experience by acting as if they do.
[01:16:11] No.
[01:16:12] That's in retrospect, you can see, you know that people can see through this, but at the
[01:16:18] time you don't necessarily realize that.
[01:16:21] And so maybe you're reluctant to ask advice or ask someone's opinion, but I actually learned
[01:16:29] that this is a wonderful opportunity to show someone that you value their opinion.
[01:16:34] You ask, hey, in the locker room where the cages are, how you set them up your kid.
[01:16:41] Just pick their brain.
[01:16:42] I mean, this is a good thing for anybody in your organization, when you're new, is ask
[01:16:47] the people who know what's going on.
[01:16:50] What do you recommend?
[01:16:51] And this creates a sense of buy-in, I think, the fact that you value their opinion, that's
[01:16:57] useful.
[01:16:58] So I tried to approach it from a position of humility, but as an assistant-putin commander,
[01:17:05] your primary responsibilities are learn tactics, learn small unit leadership, and then
[01:17:10] do administrative functions for the platoon and support the platoon commander.
[01:17:13] Yeah.
[01:17:14] I mean, even though I was a priori-listed guy, I mean, I still would ask.
[01:17:17] I was like, the team, like the guys, hey, how do you think we should do this?
[01:17:22] What do you think we should do?
[01:17:23] Where should we insert?
[01:17:24] What do you think about this platform over here?
[01:17:26] I would always do that, even if even when I was the more experienced, and sometimes even
[01:17:31] the most experienced, and I learned that from one of my platoon commanders who was a priori-listed
[01:17:35] guy who had more experienced than any of us, who asked us, hey, what do you think, how
[01:17:39] do you think we should do this?
[01:17:40] And that's, you know, I got to just steal his leadership techniques for when I was put
[01:17:46] in charge.
[01:17:47] But I always give that advice, you know, if you, there's no sense in acting like you
[01:17:52] know what you're doing, because everybody, not only do they see through it, but they
[01:17:55] don't expect you to know everything.
[01:17:56] They're like, hey, you've been here for three months, bro.
[01:17:59] We don't expect you to know how to run this drill or how to plan for this mission.
[01:18:02] It's okay.
[01:18:03] We do, and we can all work together to figure this out.
[01:18:09] Any standout memories from that work up getting ready to deploy?
[01:18:13] You know, my memories are of the people, and in particular, too, who are no longer here,
[01:18:23] and that's just something that I'll always take away from that platoon.
[01:18:29] One was killed in the extortion helicopter crash in another on an operation a few years ago.
[01:18:42] So that's, that's tough.
[01:18:43] I, you know, I really just, I think about those guys a lot.
[01:18:49] I would say one of my leadership failures in this phase was along the lines of being in
[01:18:58] that position of your younger.
[01:19:00] You don't have as much experience.
[01:19:02] You're falling into wanting to be one of the, one of the guys, one of the, you know,
[01:19:06] buddies.
[01:19:07] And, and I, I would say, you know, this is probably something that everybody deals with
[01:19:11] in, in, in the junior officer ranks of the teams.
[01:19:16] You want to be liked.
[01:19:18] You want to be, buddies, you know, going out in this kind of thing with the guys.
[01:19:22] And I, you know, I did that.
[01:19:23] And I don't have any regrets, but I think, for me, one of the hardest, I think, hardest
[01:19:32] positions I could have put myself was to be able to make a decision that's, that may
[01:19:35] be right, but not popular.
[01:19:37] Now I wasn't the platoon commander.
[01:19:39] But as an A O I C, it's pretty easy to get into that situation of like, okay, you're
[01:19:44] supposed to support the platoon commander, but yet you are buddies with the guys.
[01:19:49] It can be sort of like, in between a rock and a hard place, kind of a situation.
[01:19:52] I think that was a leadership takeaway that I have from that, that platoon.
[01:19:56] And we ended up deploying to the Pacific again.
[01:19:59] This was more directly located in one specific A, A, O. And it was doing foreign internal
[01:20:08] defense with post nation forces.
[01:20:10] And we were dispersed, kind of in a satellite model.
[01:20:14] And it was a long deployment.
[01:20:16] There's definitely some leadership challenges.
[01:20:18] Guys in the platoon, they want to go to Iraq, they want to go to Afghanistan at this
[01:20:22] point.
[01:20:23] But we're on this deployment to the Pacific theater.
[01:20:27] And so yeah, there's some leadership challenges for sure in that environment.
[01:20:31] Yeah, and for a while, the seal teams was rotating like so you do have your deployment
[01:20:37] in the Pacific and then go into Iraq or Afghanistan for another three months.
[01:20:42] But eventually people said, that's not a good movie there.
[01:20:45] And it really isn't.
[01:20:46] I mean, it really just doesn't make.
[01:20:50] It's like the fair fairy comes up with those kind of ideas because it's more fair to get.
[01:20:56] And you know, you feel you feel it.
[01:20:58] You know, you're like, well, this guy, these guys want to go get in the fight.
[01:21:02] So that seems like the fair thing to do.
[01:21:03] But unfortunately, it's the fair fairy doesn't always have the best ideas, even though
[01:21:08] it seems fair, it's not smart.
[01:21:09] Yeah.
[01:21:10] And the argument is, well, okay, six months is too long to be in combat so we can relieve
[01:21:17] in place and the people who really want to go to, you know, but then you're bringing in
[01:21:22] people that don't have AO expertise.
[01:21:24] And it's just, yeah, I agree.
[01:21:27] So at this point now, I've done two deployments as a junior officer.
[01:21:31] I have not been to Iraq or Afghanistan and people who I've gone through Buds with at this
[01:21:38] point have started deploying to Iraq or OEF in Afghanistan and they're going on combat operations.
[01:21:47] You know, the stuff that we trained, we trained to do all of it.
[01:21:51] But what really pushes your training in the ultimate test of your training applied overseas
[01:21:59] is what you could be doing in the state of things at that time was what you could be doing
[01:22:04] in Iraq or Afghanistan.
[01:22:06] And so, yeah, I was feeling, oh, to be honest, a bit frustrated because as a junior officer,
[01:22:12] you're going to get your AOIC deployment, your OIC deployment, in platoons.
[01:22:19] And if you're either in a platoon or you're not.
[01:22:22] And I've, when I first showed up at the team and I'm not in a platoon, that sucks.
[01:22:28] You're in a platoon or you're not.
[01:22:31] And you're going to get two platoons.
[01:22:34] And then maybe a task in it, commander tour, but okay, certainly not as quite as operational.
[01:22:42] So yeah, I got one more to go.
[01:22:45] And yeah, I was a little bit frustrated to be honest.
[01:22:48] And then now I don't want to come across as bitter.
[01:22:51] I'm just trying to be honest about how I felt at the time.
[01:22:54] Well, what kind of human beings try and go through all this shit to go to the seal teams?
[01:23:01] Guys that want to go to war.
[01:23:03] So when you do it nine months of deployment with no war and then you now you go in a six
[01:23:07] month of deployment, no war and you know you've got limited opportunities in the rest
[01:23:11] of your career, it's going to be, I mean, I wouldn't want to type a person that's like,
[01:23:19] I'm always happy I wasn't going to war.
[01:23:21] That's not the kind of guy you would want in the seal teams.
[01:23:23] I talk to firefighters and I talk to them and see, not that you're necessarily wanting
[01:23:30] there to be fire people's lives to be a risk.
[01:23:33] But given that there is one, you want to be the one who responds.
[01:23:38] And if you're not around people that feel that way, that's a problem.
[01:23:44] And I was proud to be around a group of people that buy and large want to go respond to
[01:23:50] that fire.
[01:23:51] So to speak in the teams.
[01:23:52] Yeah, and I think they eventually got to a point where like, hey, if a guy had just gone
[01:23:58] to Iraq or Afghanistan and maybe he'd gone twice in a row and now they put him in a
[01:24:02] puttune where he's not going to go and it was a little, it did get more fair as time went
[01:24:07] on.
[01:24:08] But this was only what?
[01:24:09] This was 2005.
[01:24:10] So it was like, you know, it's a tough one.
[01:24:14] Yeah, I come back from that deployment in 2006 and then I did a little bit of an overseas
[01:24:20] augmentation in Afghanistan and I did get to go there.
[01:24:24] Got to see some of the country, some of the area of operations.
[01:24:27] I came back from that and then I did what's called a disassociated tour.
[01:24:31] So you're not in a puttune.
[01:24:32] Again, in my estimation, you're either in a puttune or you're not.
[01:24:37] And if you're one of the people who's not, it's a distinct feeling.
[01:24:41] There's nothing like being in a puttune.
[01:24:42] It's one of the, I mean, I would do that job for 20 years.
[01:24:45] If I could.
[01:24:47] But so I'm a disassociated tour but supporting puttunes at the team on a deployment
[01:24:53] that.
[01:24:54] So you did another deployment.
[01:24:55] Another deployment of we, but at least you, so you've been to Afghanistan.
[01:24:59] And now you come back, you're doing a disassociated tour of some job where you're supporting
[01:25:04] the teams.
[01:25:05] We're doing some kind of like recon elements, I think.
[01:25:08] Generally speaking, yeah, intelligence collection and this kind of thing.
[01:25:11] So it was definitely a leadership.
[01:25:14] So I'm, I'm a officer in charge.
[01:25:17] And you're in charge of operational stuff that's going to help.
[01:25:20] Yeah, absolutely.
[01:25:21] Where did you deploy to?
[01:25:22] To Iraq.
[01:25:23] Okay.
[01:25:24] So that's also nice.
[01:25:25] Yeah.
[01:25:26] And I got to see the area.
[01:25:28] I did get to go out on some operations.
[01:25:31] But again, I'm not in the puttune.
[01:25:35] So it was, it was, it's just, you can chalk it up to experience.
[01:25:41] But again, I just can't help but think, okay, I don't have combat experience.
[01:25:47] And you know this, combat experience is the market of respect in the teams.
[01:25:52] Now I'm, that deployment goes to 2008.
[01:25:55] I've been in five years with a try-to.
[01:25:59] Six years into my career.
[01:26:00] And I don't have combat experience and it's not my fault.
[01:26:04] But this is something I felt like I had been training for and I just felt.
[01:26:11] And secure about it.
[01:26:12] Where were you when you and Iraq?
[01:26:14] Where'd you go?
[01:26:15] We're in the Western provinces there.
[01:26:16] Yeah.
[01:26:17] So near where you were in, in Ramadi.
[01:26:19] And we had, various, I think it was more like an outstation model at this point.
[01:26:24] Did you at least go like on some ops?
[01:26:26] Oh yeah.
[01:26:27] Yeah, yeah.
[01:26:28] Yeah, yeah.
[01:26:29] But no shots fired.
[01:26:30] I mean, I don't consider that combat.
[01:26:31] Not that, not that, I mean, some good operation, there may not be shots fired.
[01:26:37] It's just, I didn't have, and I wasn't in a leadership position.
[01:26:41] Yeah.
[01:26:42] Yeah.
[01:26:43] So, okay.
[01:26:44] So you come back from that deployment.
[01:26:45] Yes.
[01:26:46] So now you're one, two, three, three deployments deep.
[01:26:49] Yep.
[01:26:50] In an augmentation and I, how long was that augment?
[01:26:53] It was just two months.
[01:26:54] Yeah.
[01:26:55] And I got to do, I got to go to an outstation there.
[01:26:57] And that was, that was great.
[01:26:58] But I've now passed my service requirement.
[01:27:01] I could get out.
[01:27:03] You know, after graduating from the Nail Academy, you do five years.
[01:27:06] You can punch.
[01:27:07] That would just seem like so weak to me.
[01:27:12] Yeah, I honestly, I didn't even think about that to be honest.
[01:27:15] But as I look back, I'm, wow, yeah, I could, after that deployment, I could have just
[01:27:18] gotten out.
[01:27:19] And then things would have been different.
[01:27:22] Well, it's really hard, like we're talking about.
[01:27:26] It's really hard to look at your career and be like, okay, I'm just going to get
[01:27:29] out now.
[01:27:30] When you know you got friends that are fighting, you know that you have more to offer.
[01:27:34] So you're not getting out.
[01:27:36] No, and the one job that I have to do is put to a commander.
[01:27:42] In my opinion, if you don't do that, that's for me where I was in my mind, I don't do
[01:27:48] that job.
[01:27:49] I'm failing myself and everything that I've been through.
[01:27:52] That's the one critical tour that I'm going to do.
[01:27:56] Right.
[01:27:57] And so you go back to team one to do that.
[01:27:59] Yeah.
[01:28:00] So you get back to team one now you're a particular.
[01:28:04] Correct.
[01:28:05] And this is now, and I had been an officer in charge of the previous element.
[01:28:11] But for me, this was a very special assignment.
[01:28:13] I really was excited just to be a platoon leader in a seal platoon.
[01:28:20] Just felt like seven, eight, nine years of, like coming down to this two-year assignment.
[01:28:26] And you actually have some decent experience for being a platoon commander.
[01:28:31] I mean, you've done multiple deployments overseas.
[01:28:35] You're doing all right.
[01:28:36] This isn't like a guy that, like sometimes you get a lateral transfer that has like what
[01:28:40] they did.
[01:28:41] Sometimes they do no deployments.
[01:28:43] Sometimes a lateral transfer is really senior and they just get put into an OIC position.
[01:28:47] They have no experience.
[01:28:49] So you've been in the teams the whole time.
[01:28:52] And you've done multiple deployments.
[01:28:55] So you're feeling, you must've been feeling pretty good about being a platoon commander.
[01:28:58] Absolutely.
[01:28:59] Volunteer, I'm the person who's going to volunteer to go to the augmentation.
[01:29:04] I didn't need to do that.
[01:29:05] And that was after a deployment.
[01:29:06] You know, I pretty quickly after.
[01:29:08] I wanted to go.
[01:29:09] I wanted to get the experience.
[01:29:11] Would you go through an 18-month platoon workup cycle?
[01:29:14] And your deployment is where your deployment is.
[01:29:16] And you know, so six years may seem like a long time, but it's actually not a lot of different
[01:29:23] assignments.
[01:29:24] It's only three assignments really within that time.
[01:29:26] And what's going on with your family this whole time?
[01:29:28] Like you've been gone and what's happening with the family.
[01:29:33] So at this point, it's just my mom and sister.
[01:29:35] My sister now is she's in college in Kansas.
[01:29:39] My mother remarried after my father died in 1999.
[01:29:44] I was at the Naval Academy.
[01:29:46] And hopefully, how do we skip over that?
[01:29:49] What happened to your dad when you were at the Naval Academy?
[01:29:52] Well, he was out on a bike ride one day and was hit by a car.
[01:29:56] And this just happened out of the blue.
[01:29:59] I had been training for the triathlon team.
[01:30:02] And I think he had kind of taken a cycling.
[01:30:06] But it was one of these mornings that the Naval Academy were just getting ready to go to
[01:30:11] class.
[01:30:12] And I remember one of the upper class became by, and I was, I'm a sophomore at this
[01:30:17] point.
[01:30:18] And it's pretty, or I had just been home in Kansas because over the summer.
[01:30:22] And he said, the company officer wants you to see you.
[01:30:27] What did I do?
[01:30:28] There's probably, I'm sure there was something I had done in the recent memory that
[01:30:33] would leave me to believe, like, oh, man, I got caught.
[01:30:35] So I go in there and he told me the news.
[01:30:38] And it just was like the floor dropped out from under me.
[01:30:41] We had a, the company senior in Lester was a Marine Corps gunnery sergeant.
[01:30:46] And he knew he had met my father.
[01:30:48] Because at the end of pleaps summer, the parents get to come and see how things were,
[01:30:53] you know, you graduated pleaps summer.
[01:30:55] And so they talked about the Marine Corps.
[01:30:58] And this gun he was awesome.
[01:31:00] And he, he was very supportive.
[01:31:03] I got this happened on a Thursday.
[01:31:06] And the Naval Academy, and all of its generosity, told me, you can go home on emergency
[01:31:14] leave, you need to be back Thursday.
[01:31:17] The following week, one week.
[01:31:21] That still pisses me off.
[01:31:24] But I went home in the funeral and then came back and was in class a week later.
[01:31:30] And yeah, that's, so my mom ended up remarrying.
[01:31:35] I ended up being overseas when that happened.
[01:31:37] My sister is in nursing school in Ecanza's.
[01:31:43] And I'm single, ready to deploy, and ready to be a platoon commander.
[01:31:47] In 2008.
[01:31:48] So you're, you're in a platoon and going through work up.
[01:31:53] This is probably when I met you for the first time when you're working.
[01:31:56] Yes, you work up.
[01:31:57] You were training detachment, OIC.
[01:31:58] Yeah, we have good times.
[01:32:00] Yeah, and I first of all, I want to thank you for the training, specifically, Land
[01:32:06] Warfare.
[01:32:07] You know, I didn't get to stay on that deployment very long.
[01:32:10] But I'm of the firm opinion that training should be very difficult.
[01:32:15] And I think you really stepped it up.
[01:32:18] And so that probably saved lives.
[01:32:22] Jason Gardner, who was the, I guess he was the senior and listed guy when you guys were
[01:32:28] out there when you got hit.
[01:32:29] But he, he, he talks, he talked to me about it and like how everything went down and
[01:32:34] definitely, you know, his whole deployment.
[01:32:37] He has multiple stories where, you know, there was maneuver elements that they were able
[01:32:45] to act on and able to stop and blew on blues that could have easily happened that they
[01:32:50] didn't happen because they'd been through training that was really hard.
[01:32:53] So yeah, I was definitely my goal was to make the training hard so that guys were ready
[01:32:58] for combat.
[01:33:00] And, you know, it was, it was awesome to see.
[01:33:04] It was awesome to be able to watch guys develop and get really good and understand what
[01:33:11] their job was.
[01:33:12] It was a really steep learning curve, but it was also like a learning curve that was steep,
[01:33:17] but also had like really nice steps on it where you, you know, this training operation,
[01:33:21] you'd learn this thing and then they'd figure this other thing out and then they'd
[01:33:24] do this other thing.
[01:33:25] We'd put them in a different scenario and, and then you've got them in Mount and they're
[01:33:28] learning, you know, other steps.
[01:33:30] So by the time guys were getting done, they were really, really competent leaders and it
[01:33:36] was awesome to see.
[01:33:37] I remember you, you broke things down in a way that made sense in its simplicity.
[01:33:42] I remember one time you were, I think I don't know if we were one on one, but it was a very close
[01:33:46] conversation and you were just saying, listen, either you're online or you're in an
[01:33:52] out.
[01:33:53] I just, I think it was one on one.
[01:33:55] And it just, the way you said it just really hit on me.
[01:33:58] Yeah, okay.
[01:33:59] And then I've, I've fouled it away and that was a very valuable lesson for me.
[01:34:04] And it's a simple one.
[01:34:05] It's, it's pretty simple, but sometimes you know, in the chaos, you just, you just get overwhelmed
[01:34:10] and then, and then just to prioritize and execute, that's a really important rule that, you
[01:34:17] know, there could be, I can see situations in training environments or in combat where
[01:34:25] you're getting overwhelmed by either too much going on or you're actually overwhelmed
[01:34:30] because there's, there's actually no seemingly viable course of action.
[01:34:35] I think those are two different situations, but in the, the other, the one where, there's
[01:34:40] just so much going on, okay, you know, prioritize and execute and pick the most important
[01:34:44] thing or either delegated or act upon it yourself with the other situation.
[01:34:50] Yeah, there's, it just doesn't seem like there's any viable course of action.
[01:34:54] What can we even do to make this situation better?
[01:34:56] Just realize, there's always something you can do.
[01:34:58] Oh, there's never out of the fight.
[01:35:01] Even if you're going to continue doing what you're currently doing, that's an active
[01:35:05] choice, not a passive choice.
[01:35:07] And there's a difference there.
[01:35:08] Oh, yeah, there's a big difference.
[01:35:11] As you're going through that workup, how was like the relationships with your, with your
[01:35:15] platoon chief with your LPO?
[01:35:16] Did you guys have a good solid, you know, platoon from your perspective?
[01:35:21] Yeah, we did.
[01:35:22] And I think, I think that's why our platoon tasking, it was selected to go to Afghanistan
[01:35:26] because I think we did well.
[01:35:28] And when I say that platoons and tasking, it's not always to get the choose where they
[01:35:33] deploy, but there is a little bit of selection process going on within the team.
[01:35:37] And so I think I took it as a compliment that we were going to go on this deployment to
[01:35:41] Afghanistan.
[01:35:42] And the West Coast teams had not been deploying to that AO for a while.
[01:35:46] So it was going to be new.
[01:35:49] And we're going to be going to Iraq this time.
[01:35:51] And so we knew that the team, the platoon, that we would be replacing, were getting into
[01:35:56] it.
[01:35:57] My platoon chief was experienced.
[01:35:58] We had a prior-and-listed assistant officer in charge was really, really great.
[01:36:03] And one of the things I wanted to approach this position with in my mind was this leadership
[01:36:11] position was, if through the workup, I can ask the opinion of the enlisted members of the
[01:36:17] platoon and really show that I value their advice that that is going to create a sense
[01:36:23] of empowerment and buy-in, but also that their value is that their opinion is valued and that
[01:36:31] can create an atmosphere of innovation because you don't want to train fiateen leaders
[01:36:38] to just be responsive to doing what they're told.
[01:36:42] You want them to have initiative.
[01:36:45] And so in order to do that, you know, this is, hey, what do you think about this?
[01:36:49] What do you think about this?
[01:36:50] Just in the day-to-day.
[01:36:51] And I hope that that, you know, the ultimate barometer here is the opinion of the people in
[01:36:57] the platoon.
[01:36:58] And the other thing is when you're going through a platoon workup, you're trying to train
[01:37:03] yourself and you're trying to train everybody in their various job, but you also have
[01:37:08] to be training people to be able to step up.
[01:37:11] And that is one of the things, you're going through a training evolution, you have training
[01:37:15] detachment and structures evaluating you on your own leadership and tactical decisions,
[01:37:21] but you need to be able to step aside and say, okay, hey, you got this one.
[01:37:27] It's tough because you're, oh, are people to think I'm just ducking it out because I don't
[01:37:31] want to make a bad call, but you do need to have the ability to do one job above you.
[01:37:35] And I think those two things were what I worked on.
[01:37:40] And I think, especially the second one, you know, giving a system platoon commander the
[01:37:46] opportunity to take my position that that in hindsight was the right call.
[01:37:50] For sure. We would, we would do that too. You know, if we had a platoon commander or a platoon
[01:37:57] chief that was really running everything, they'd be the first person we put down in a training
[01:38:01] scenario just to let's see what's going to happen now. Now that we pulled this guy out,
[01:38:08] so you get done with this workup and now it's time to go on deployment. And like you
[01:38:13] said, you had been selected to go to Afghanistan and you end up going on the PDFs, right?
[01:38:22] The predouplement site survey. Yes. You know, we didn't go months in advance. So there
[01:38:32] was, as I recall, there was going out a few months early and then there was going out
[01:38:37] three weeks or so before your platoon. For whatever reason, I, we didn't go a few months
[01:38:43] or I don't know why, but the plan was for some of the key leaders in the task unit to go
[01:38:49] early, three weeks or so early. That's standard procedure. I remember thinking, you know, this
[01:38:54] is, this is just, is what you do. This is a very important deployment for me, given,
[01:39:02] and I remember thinking, you know, if I was only going to get one, if you can only have
[01:39:06] one really good deployment, well, this is the one I would choose. So it just kind of felt
[01:39:10] like things are lining up. Yeah, I'm going into that deployment. Like I said, it was Jason
[01:39:15] Gardner and his task unit task unit tried and, and they had, you know, Jason describes
[01:39:20] that as the most kinetic of his deployments. And he'd, a lot of deployments. And so those
[01:39:26] guys were, and you know, I was tracking those guys. I remember I said, I would sign my emails
[01:39:31] back and forth when they would tell me what they were doing. I would sign my emails to them,
[01:39:35] you know, Jaco spiritual advisor to task unit, try to, they got to kick out of that
[01:39:41] him and the task unit commander and stuff. But, you know, we were tracking, they were doing a
[01:39:45] lot of really kinetic operations. And yeah, definitely for the guys on the West Coast getting
[01:39:52] ready to go there at that time. That's a good place to be going because, you know, I rack
[01:39:59] head settled down a lot at this point, you know, kind of after the the debt defender group
[01:40:08] going into Saudar City, you know, Iraq had definitely settled down. So you guys were going to
[01:40:15] the, you know, the best show in town. Yeah. And I felt we were ready. Land warfare in the desert
[01:40:22] of California is pretty similar to the terrain and the geography of southern Afghanistan. And
[01:40:29] we had a hard land warfare training block. We dialed in our training specifically over the, you know,
[01:40:37] postwork up phase where you can kind of, you know, we're going to deploy and we're doing a lot of
[01:40:43] operations in training that we're going to mimic, we're mimicking what we felt. We're reading
[01:40:49] in the after action, which we knew these guys were getting into and we knew a specifically how they
[01:40:53] were going to the upper side. So we could tailor the training for that and we had done all that. So we
[01:40:56] were, we were ready ready to go. So you show up on the ground, how long you on the ground for
[01:41:03] before and when you hit the ground, they like, hey, we got one in the hopper right now. We're going to
[01:41:06] rock and roll. Yeah. So some operations are time sensitive. This is one that was not. It was shelved.
[01:41:13] And I think they wanted it, you know, in rightly so, they wanted to expose us to a not only the
[01:41:21] execution of the operation, but the planning process, the relevant players sitting on the briefing,
[01:41:26] and all of this is very valuable. Who we're going to talk to the air crew and all of that. So
[01:41:31] yet, they had one ready for us for the leadership element that had gone early and keeping in my
[01:41:36] most of the platoon and taskings is still back in San Diego at this point.
[01:41:41] So as soon as you show up on the ground, they like, all right, here's what we got in the books.
[01:41:45] We're going to, how long was it before you, from the time you got on the ground,
[01:41:50] do they hand you, like, hey, come, let's give you a brief, a general brief of what's happening.
[01:41:54] Let us give you a concept of operations of what we're about to go do.
[01:41:57] Yeah, I think this is where my memory gets a little fuzzy. I think just given what ended up happening.
[01:42:03] I feel like I was on the ground. Well, certainly no more than 48 hours. Yeah.
[01:42:08] So you show up, you're getting a brief. How many guys from your task unit are there?
[01:42:14] It's like three or four. I'd say six to eight. Six to eight. Yeah. And you guys all have,
[01:42:23] you get assigned probably jobs with, you know, the different sections or the different squads.
[01:42:28] Yes, they have. I was assigned to the platoon leader from one of the two platoons in
[01:42:33] country who you know from your task unit. Yep. Yep. And so we just go through, I remember
[01:42:41] they were planning, but in the final stages, and then I remember sitting on the brief,
[01:42:47] I remember going to the plywood, how it's kidding up. I remember going to the flight line,
[01:42:52] taking the trucks to the flight line. And are you thinking this time, hey, you have a good understanding
[01:42:58] of the operation? You know what we're going to do? You're going to get a good feel for it. Yeah, absolutely.
[01:43:02] And don't let my absence of memory right now, the details of where it happened,
[01:43:07] and affect the impression that I, I just think given what happened, and I don't remember where
[01:43:14] this happened. I don't remember the, I remember the generalities of the operation, of course,
[01:43:18] but the details escape me. What do you remember? I remember being in Canada, I remember going
[01:43:27] for a run, I remember going for a lift, I remember eating, I remember sitting in the briefing,
[01:43:32] I remember going to the plywood hut, I remember sleeping one night. I remember going to the fire pits
[01:43:43] before we launched for a chaplain-led ceremony, a ritual. You know, this is, this is, I think,
[01:43:55] evident of combat. You can, it's like you have bits and pieces of memory, Vax,
[01:43:59] and they can get assembled in different ways. And certainly when I talk about the operation and what
[01:44:04] happened, in order to get the complete picture, you'd have to talk to other people to my impression
[01:44:10] is my own impression. And I fully acknowledge that my memory may be distorted, but there are absolutely
[01:44:19] parts of this that I completely remember. And what is interesting to me, though, is that
[01:44:26] some of this pre-operational occurrences that they, I just don't really remember a lot of it.
[01:44:35] I don't know, I don't know why. Do you remember being on the helos going in? Yes,
[01:44:41] I remember sitting on the helo, you know, it's loud and you're on night vision goggles and
[01:44:46] ones really talk. I mean, you can hear the pilot chatter if you want to be on that frequency. And
[01:44:50] this seems probably about a 45 minute flight. I mean, the general operation was to conduct a
[01:44:54] target assault, a compound, a drug, a bizarre, I think at this time we were getting into the counter
[01:45:03] narcotics, you know, this is a funding source for Taliban. And this is in heavily controlled
[01:45:08] Taliban territory. There's bad dudes in this place. This is it's Taliban, controlled village,
[01:45:15] and there's going to be an assault. I'm not in the assault force element, but I'm going to be in the
[01:45:20] blocking force. And so I'd be shadowing the element that was pre pre assault detached from the
[01:45:26] main assault force. We would, you know, after disembarking the helo, copies, we flip a troll,
[01:45:31] undercover of quiet and darkness middle of the night. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah.
[01:45:37] And just going over the plan, you know, it was just to secure the top of a hill in the element
[01:45:42] that I was in. And so you're going to provide kind of like an Overwatch. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah,
[01:45:47] absolutely. As an assault is going down. Yeah. And all this is going to happen. The assault was
[01:45:51] going to happen either right before or right at first light to have a little bit more visual clarity.
[01:45:59] I think that that's really what they wanted to do. So you remember the helo is coming in.
[01:46:05] Yeah. I remember going to the flight line. I remember sitting on the helicopter. I remember that
[01:46:08] getting off the helicopter, you know, they're departing. You wait for, you know, it's quiet again.
[01:46:12] You start foot patrolling. It's kind of, you know, offset. So going through, I remember walking,
[01:46:19] you know, night vision goggles. So it's, I'm sure the technology's improved a lot, but back then it's
[01:46:25] green and black. And I remember, you know, the villages there look like they're from medieval
[01:46:31] times just with the mud brick. Seeing that, it's very quiet or just moving. And then, you know, the
[01:46:40] element that I was a part of detached from the main assault force proceed to the to that hill that
[01:46:45] overlook the target compound. We were going to, we needed to clear and hold that hill top. And there was
[01:46:50] from satellite imagery. We knew there was an old fort up there from back when the Russians were
[01:46:55] in Afghanistan. So we needed to clear and hold that structure. But it was very crumbled at this point
[01:47:01] and owned the high ground. And once we had done that, we could set up a commanding over watch position
[01:47:08] with, you know, heavy weapons in this kind of thing. So foot patrolling, we had detached from the
[01:47:15] main assault force element, foot patrolling to that hill. It's going to be about a 15, 20 minute hike
[01:47:21] to get to the top of the hills of fairly, it was not a mountain, but it was a large hill.
[01:47:25] I'm going single-fowl working that way up. And being led, we had a Navy explosive ordinance
[01:47:31] to disposal technician up there. And he was sweeping the ground, like, you know, as standard. But
[01:47:38] it was recognized that there's a strong possibility of improvised explosive devices. We'll have
[01:47:43] EOD upfront and have everybody else covering behind. And as we're working our way up, I remember
[01:47:53] I was shadowing with the between commander. And then we kind of had got our way up to the top. And
[01:48:04] I just started moving forward. And I've thought about this a lot. I certainly, you know,
[01:48:10] and I'll talk about it later. But you know, you can armchair quarterback everything. And I'm just
[01:48:16] detaching from who I was shadowing because it didn't seem, at this point, I'm not being
[01:48:21] value-added, but just standing there. And so I was going to take part. And moving forward,
[01:48:29] I was going step by step, hold a sudden. The next thing I know I'm on the ground. I want to say
[01:48:35] there was a flash a light. I didn't hear anything. I was on the ground. I didn't know what had happened.
[01:48:42] Now, this is where the experiences of combat can be different from one person to another. And if
[01:48:47] I would, to get a complete picture, you'd have to talk to everybody that was up there.
[01:48:51] All I remember is waking up coming to. I don't know how long I was out. I've talked to people
[01:48:57] on that operation who were down below. They said a massive mushroom cloud went off. And that for
[01:49:07] a long time, nobody was responding on the radio. And that they thought perhaps everybody
[01:49:14] up there was dead. All I remember is coming to. I was disoriented. It occurred to me,
[01:49:23] I must have stepped on a pressure plate. I remember that. And pressure plate below the ground,
[01:49:28] the bomb goes off. I didn't know what the bomb was, but it turns out I'm told
[01:49:35] 205 millimeter artillery shells wired together. The second one didn't go off the first one went off
[01:49:40] the order. So I mean, this can destroy everybody up there. Armored vehicle. But the second one
[01:49:47] didn't explode and yeah, low order. But I'm laying there. And I just remember thinking I need my teammates.
[01:49:58] It didn't occur to me that they were dead, but I didn't know if they were alive. I just knew I needed them.
[01:50:04] And I remember reaching up for my push to talk. I remember I got to get man down out of the
[01:50:11] radio. And I reached up for where it should be, but it's not there. I was thinking,
[01:50:17] this is not good. And nothing on my kids, is nothing's worth supposed to be. Only my arms seemed
[01:50:23] to work. I can't see anything. I think my helmet had been blasted off and that vision gone with it.
[01:50:28] I can't move. Only arms are working. And I'm laying there for a second. I just felt
[01:50:37] utterly helpless because I kind of do anything. You want to, you want to be doing something.
[01:50:41] I tried to find my push to talk. It's not there. In my memory, the next thing that happened,
[01:50:48] though, my teammates are on me. None of them had been injured. Bells wrong, yes.
[01:50:52] But nobody in capacity, we could not afford to have one other person in capacity to up there.
[01:51:00] Remote position elevated, I mean, just not a good situation to even have one person down, but two,
[01:51:06] really not. I mean, just, if not impossible to deal with. We had a medic up there, of course.
[01:51:13] Navy, exposed ordinance disposal is trying to just protect us at this point digging for other,
[01:51:19] sweeping and digging for other. Finding additional IDs, I'm told up there. There were several.
[01:51:23] In fact, we had been walking on them. None had gone off until I found one.
[01:51:30] But the medic, fortunately, you know, responded. It wasn't injured. Responded as you
[01:51:35] trained to do everybody responded as they were trained to do selflessly, quickly, to try to save my life.
[01:51:44] And I remember him putting on a turn-a-kit. You know, we practice putting these on and training,
[01:51:51] but you don't ever really crank it down like you do when you need to, to say, actually save
[01:51:58] someone's life and to actually cut off blood flow, a staunch blood flow. It's painful.
[01:52:05] Just cranking that thing down. I wasn't in pain from the blast. I wasn't shocked. But I do remember
[01:52:12] the turn-a-kit getting cranked down. But that wasn't enough. So we applied another one. And then another one.
[01:52:21] And another one. And another one. I'm told it was six total. Just cranking each one of them.
[01:52:26] I'm going to try to stop the blood flow to my lower body. And then I'm told that there was
[01:52:33] just this scramble going on. Unbeknownst to me, this is happening all external to my own
[01:52:40] inner world right now. But to get the helicopters that initially dropped us up,
[01:52:47] which according to the plan, we're going to go back to Candahart Airfield of 45 minutes flat away,
[01:52:54] touch down refuel on load in Army Special Forces team and some Afghan commando troops bringing
[01:53:00] these soldiers back to be a blocking force for when that target assault would commence.
[01:53:05] So the plan was already to bring the helicopters back, but this is now a major contingency that has to
[01:53:11] be responded to and time and fuel and everything is going to be of the essence. Now, I'm only
[01:53:16] hearing this after the fact again, but it's going to be a race against the clock to try to get me out of
[01:53:22] there because time is of the essence. And so the guys up above, they hadn't cleared the hilltop.
[01:53:27] So there's no way you can land or hover a helicopter up there. I mean, it's just too dangerous.
[01:53:33] So they gotta get me down off this hill that we had taken 20 minutes plus to climb.
[01:53:40] When we were good, not to mention now dragging someone. I, I, I seem to remember them
[01:53:46] carrying me and tripping and falling. I'm falling from a few feet in the air and it just,
[01:53:51] in addition to being just damaging to my body, it just will slow. They needed to go
[01:53:56] to the downman drag shoulder straps of my kit dragging me. And so this is where
[01:54:05] their, their grit comes into play and their fitness and their desire to save my life and why I'm
[01:54:10] eternally grateful to my teammates because they were having to drag me down a steep, dark, rocky hilltop
[01:54:18] switching off the dragon. And it's fatigueing to do that. Maybe one or two are going at a time
[01:54:23] in the rotating out. The medic is attending to me. And I remember that just, I was probably in and out
[01:54:29] of consciousness, but I don't recall that. I just recall this just happening in real time and
[01:54:35] with no interruptions. This, in people of acid, you think you're going to die or anything. No,
[01:54:40] I didn't, I just didn't. There was no space in my mind. No capacity to think those thoughts because
[01:54:48] I was consumed inundated by the pain, getting dragged over. It was sharp, gr gather rocks. And this,
[01:54:58] I talk about the pain of six turnic, it's getting applied or any physical pain, doing a marathon
[01:55:08] or running a, a, a a, a happy race with a log or something. It's just, it doesn't compare to that.
[01:55:13] This was excruciating and it was all I could do just to try to stay awake and stay awake and stay awake and stay awake
[01:55:22] and I think that was my desire to live that if I could stay awake that that is my
[01:55:33] struggle to live into not succumb and so that was what I was focused on and
[01:55:40] I thought I would live in this place where I was at the end.
[01:55:45] Whether my brain was saying that or not, that's what was happening.
[01:55:48] I wasn't thinking thoughts of you need to stay awake in order to live.
[01:55:52] It just was stay awake.
[01:55:54] And I think at this point it's getting very close to the helicopters in their fuel
[01:56:01] times fuel calculation.
[01:56:03] I'm told that I got loaded onto the helicopter really close to the ping of fuel mark.
[01:56:13] So I mean there was a lot that had to line up for that to happen and for me to get on that helicopter.
[01:56:20] I shook NYX hand.
[01:56:22] I remember that I absolutely remember that he got off the back.
[01:56:26] They were going to continue with the operation.
[01:56:28] The tail ramp goes up and then I remember there was a light in my face and then
[01:56:32] it was out.
[01:56:35] I don't remember anything after that.
[01:56:38] Yeah, the working with Jason now, he's talking me through this scenario a bunch of times that being said,
[01:56:46] I don't want to try and give his whole side of the story.
[01:56:50] But I mean just a couple key points.
[01:56:53] If we think a femoral bleed can kill you in a minute and a half two minutes and you had two of them wide open.
[01:57:00] And the guys were able to get in there and put enough turner kids on to stop that and keep you alive.
[01:57:05] Like that right there.
[01:57:06] The how quickly they must have done that is just a testament to the training and their determination to keep you alive.
[01:57:15] I know that there was Jason talks about one of the seals that got on his hands and knees with the EOD guy with their bayonets to start probing for
[01:57:27] the EOD's because they realized that the EOD's that were up there weren't magnetic so the sweeper wasn't finding them.
[01:57:33] So these two guys are on their hands and knees probing for a path to get you guys out of there.
[01:57:38] And then you know the OIC is getting all this stuff coordinated.
[01:57:43] And Jason usually when he talks about this, he'll mention the fact that and actually lay for him.
[01:57:49] I wrote about this same OIC when he was a.oIC, like calls me on the radio on a situation.
[01:57:56] And he's like, hey, this is what we've got right now. We got down guys. We got a Iraqi killed like he's talking to calm cool collected voice and that's exactly what Jason said.
[01:58:04] This massive explosion happened.
[01:58:07] And Jason gives him a second and finally he wants to know what's going on. He says, hey, what was that.
[01:58:12] And that OIC calm, cool and collected said, we've got a that was a big that was an IED.
[01:58:18] We've got a badly wounded guy.
[01:58:20] We're working through it at this time and then like Jason just let him work.
[01:58:24] But yeah, the all the things that fell into place from your own mentality to like stay awake to the medics and other guys get in turn.
[01:58:36] It gets on to guys on their hands and knees.
[01:58:38] Literally with their bayonets to try and find a way out of there and then the guys buddy carrying you and dragging you down.
[01:58:45] I mean, it's it's a miracle that you're sitting here.
[01:58:50] And the wounds were horrific.
[01:58:55] You know, it wasn't it didn't stop at your legs, right?
[01:58:58] This blast like torn your guts and everything else and just just absolutely horrendous.
[01:59:04] And that's why you know, some of the initial reports that we got back on the strand was, you know, is he going to make it?
[01:59:11] I don't know. And like I said in the beginning, when you hear a team guy say, I don't know.
[01:59:16] That's a that's a bad sign.
[01:59:19] So the out of the platoons and the task unit, they really did what they were supposed to do. They did what they were trained to do.
[01:59:27] They did what they planned to do, you know, and it's a testament to our training and the determination of our guys and how much they care about each other and what they'll do to try and, you know, save their, save their friends.
[01:59:40] Yeah, for any of them listening, I really just appreciate it.
[01:59:46] So I don't even know what to say. But you know, when you think when I hear this, when I any time I hear an external account, such as what you're talking about Jason saying happened, it's just,
[02:00:01] It's just a reminder to me how lucky I mean to be alive and I'll take life like this missing two legs any day over dying up on that hill any day.
[02:00:13] So the pilots as well. Thank you.
[02:00:17] Doctors, medical professionals, I mean, every step along the way, people respond to professionally bravely.
[02:00:24] I remember before deployment, we're reading the after action reports and the task unit in country at the time, which we were going to be replacing.
[02:00:33] We're doing the turnover off with they had in a situation where an Afghan soldier stepped on an IED as well.
[02:00:40] Two legs gone and as bad as it may sound to say that that was practice and practice in real life saving in the field.
[02:00:54] And I'm told that person later died of infection. They were able to keep him alive in the field later died of infection in an Afghan hospital.
[02:01:03] Because infection is a serious risk and that is another thing that I'm very thankful for getting dragged down that hill to not, I mean, through ages and ages worth of goat shit and dust to not have massive infections is a miracle.
[02:01:22] And yeah, I'm for many, many reasons I'm very, very grateful for the fact that I'm here and that I have what I have.
[02:01:30] When did you wake up?
[02:01:34] I woke up about 10 days later, give or take a day and I'm in what appears to be a hospital room with my mother's face about two feet away.
[02:01:50] And I can tell you, when you go to bed at night and you wake up in the morning, you have a general sense of the progression of time relative to taking a nap this afternoon when you wake up.
[02:02:06] When you are in a medically induced coma for about 10 days, you wake up and you don't have any sense of time progressing.
[02:02:14] My last memories were being dragged of a helicopter into a helicopter at night, being on foot patrol, being the top of this mountain.
[02:02:21] Now I wake up and I'm just all of a sudden in a hospital with my mom's face right there, I have no, how the hell did I get here? What the hell happened?
[02:02:30] Is what I'm thinking? What the hell happened?
[02:02:33] And so could you talk immediately? Did you look at your mom? What was that? What was that awakening like?
[02:02:46] Summant from the basement of the hospital Bethesda Naval Hospital. My mother and sister have been told what had happened. In those 10 days had come to DC. So they were there. My sister was up above near the ICU. She calls down to our mom drinking coffee. So she comes up and kids up in the gown. Just remember seeing her right there.
[02:03:07] And pretty quickly, I commented on the coffee breath was hitting me because I'm not a coffee drinker and her, she was so close to me. The coffee breath was just lasting.
[02:03:21] I'm not a fan of coffee breath either.
[02:03:24] But I remember no one was saying anything specific and my mind was off. I was on some heavy painkillers and my lower body was covered in blankets. I wasn't looking down that way. Maybe I knew but no one had said anything and I didn't know for a fact.
[02:03:43] And I do remember asking a medical professional to the right of my bed whether my, I am, are my legs gone and that I'm that person replying yes. And that's, that's tough to hear.
[02:03:57] It's tough to hear out of the blue. It's really tough to process and to think about.
[02:04:03] You do have no idea at that point or did you, you said you had to let us in. I feel like I, I feel like when I was in the medically induced coma that maybe people's conversations around we were sinking in but I didn't know for a fact and and to be then told in a state.
[02:04:22] I'm not completely lucid at this point but I can comprehend what that means and what that means for the future and that that is not the entirety of what's going on.
[02:04:34] Your legs are amputated above the knees. Your pelvis is shattered. You have a external fixator contraptions sticking out of you don't know how long that's going to be in.
[02:04:43] You have a couple bags attached to you one of which is a cost me bag and I didn't know what that was but once someone explained it to me. I'm thinking okay that's something people don't want to have normally a bladder to coming out of my bladder.
[02:04:58] My fingers are in.
[02:05:01] Casts and I had a burning fever and this I had a ng2 but my nose down my throat into my stomach I was going to surgery Monday Wednesday Friday there was one week I remember Monday Wednesday Thursday Friday surgery and these are surgeries that are at a minimum seven hours.
[02:05:19] Sometimes 10-12 there's 14 hours surgeries. I mean I was clocking 20-30 something hours a week of surgery time easy week after week after week and so my intestines weren't working and actually with all that I had going on.
[02:05:36] This ng2 up my nose down my throat to try to decompress my stomach because the intestines weren't working was the beta my existence because it was I wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything because my stomach wasn't functioning so I was fed and I traded by IV.
[02:05:52] So you can imagine how dry your throat gets you cannot drink a single sip of water. A lot of takes some ice chips but in order to talk to anybody I had to do gum to generate the saliva to do so and I had a lot of people coming in the room wanting to talk.
[02:06:06] I mean on the day that I woke up I'm told there were over 70 people in the visiting room creating a stressful environment for my mother. I wanted to rip that ng2 out but I knew they'd put the thing back in and I'd be awake when they put it in and I was awake at one point when they did put it in not because I ripped it out but it is not fun to have that thing inserted.
[02:06:27] And then yeah this fever this inexplicable fever we thought it was infection but it wasn't infection but I just had this burning fever but the worst part about that was that this fever combined with a bad mental reaction that I was having to the pain killer wasn't on the right kind of pain killer that worked with my mind.
[02:06:53] And so you can imagine a bad fever a bad reaction to the pain killers nightmares delirium all centered around afghanistan my last memories I remember one and these are these are as real as I'm talking to you right now these nightmares it's delirium I mean just it was I'm in this just like we're talking right now there's no ability to look from an outside perspective and say okay this isn't real you're going to get through this.
[02:07:22] You're going to wake up you're in it my platoon calling me a coward for being not on the deployment with them and this kind of thing being on a foot patrol getting dismembered by some kind of rack machine I mean just just awful stuff and so this is really the ground zero low point for me waking up in an ICU room finding out this is going on and then and then just struggling.
[02:07:51] How long is this sort of bottom time last for I was in the ICU for three weeks right off the bat I ended up going back there again, but three weeks not eating not drinking energy tube and week after week of surgery so it was a good 20 plus days of just really just hell I mean the there was a service member in the room I see room next to me was a helicopter probably been shot through the head I heard about him.
[02:08:20] Managed to land the helicopter and at one point he died while I was in the ICU.
[02:08:28] Only two visitors could come at a time you're hooked up to every contraption on earth monitoring your body your your body signals.
[02:08:38] They can't ever make the room dark your close to the nurse's station you can't sleep every hour they're checking you so I wasn't sleeping I remember if you took away.
[02:08:51] I was in a surgery time that it was an astonishingly long time that I had last slept and then when I could fall asleep it would just be the it would be delirium nightmares and one point.
[02:09:06] One of the most important thing about five or six in the morning I see you nurse who sees a lot I mean it's the combat ICU room in a hospital.
[02:09:22] I don't know which one of those nightmares that I've described this was, but there was
[02:09:28] just like a total bottom point.
[02:09:30] I was on to Lauderd, which is a very powerful opiate.
[02:09:34] They did shift me order morphine, and that was much better for not just pain management,
[02:09:39] but also for my psyche and everything.
[02:09:41] Then do you start like making a turning point and they wrap up some of the surgeries and
[02:09:51] is it like a slow crawl out of the pit?
[02:09:56] It is.
[02:09:57] In addition to dealing with some of the factors of disconnection from the platoon, and that was
[02:10:04] also going through my mind, there was progress and then there'd be setbacks.
[02:10:09] Let's say it's three steps forward, two steps back.
[02:10:11] You're just going to have to get used to this.
[02:10:13] If there's three steps forward, there probably like 33 steps back in the beginning, because
[02:10:17] it's just it seemed like that there would be setbacks.
[02:10:20] I alluded to the fact that I couldn't eat or drink for a few weeks.
[02:10:23] At one point I'm going to do the swallow test.
[02:10:25] This is a big step here.
[02:10:27] If I can eat some chocolate pudding and swallow it, I've passed and then I can maybe actually
[02:10:33] take some food and not have to be fed by IV.
[02:10:36] I took this chocolate pudding and I'm going to taste it really good.
[02:10:40] Had any food weeks.
[02:10:43] I just a couple minutes later, it all just comes back out and it fails.
[02:10:47] Back on the NG tube.
[02:10:50] IV.
[02:10:51] I had a routine surgery on my hand.
[02:10:55] My right hand was damaged and there needed to be a plate put in.
[02:11:01] I had a tendon that was damaged and so a very routine surgery.
[02:11:05] I'm actually out of the ICU at this point.
[02:11:08] I wake up from the surgery and I'm back in the ICU.
[02:11:11] What happened?
[02:11:12] Why am I here again?
[02:11:14] I got the admiral of the hospital on down coming through apologizing.
[02:11:19] Something bad happened in this surgery.
[02:11:21] What was it?
[02:11:22] Apparently, I had a normal amount of potassium in my system and the resident anesthesiologist.
[02:11:28] These are training hospitals.
[02:11:30] They're always training new military doctors.
[02:11:32] The resident anesthesiologist.
[02:11:34] Either messed up or just didn't take note of the amount of potassium in my system and
[02:11:39] it administered an anesthetic that releases potassium.
[02:11:44] My system in the middle of this very routine surgery flooded with potassium and my heart
[02:11:49] stopped.
[02:11:50] I'm told by the surgeon who responded brilliantly that she had to put the chest pedals
[02:11:58] on me and shock me back into function.
[02:12:02] I wake up from I basically died and had to be resuscitated in a routine surgery.
[02:12:07] After going through all of this weeks later, it's, I mean, to me that's unacceptable.
[02:12:13] You may think you're over the hill, but you're not.
[02:12:18] Anytime you go in a surgery, it's a risk.
[02:12:24] It seems hard to, and a lot of things have to fault the line to get you to survive coming
[02:12:30] off the battlefield, but it's like just the beginning.
[02:12:32] I mean, you know, I'm, in addition to realizing all the medical complications that I have,
[02:12:40] you're thinking, what is my life going to look like?
[02:12:43] How am I going to do basic things?
[02:12:45] Am I going to be a wheelchair?
[02:12:47] Am I even going to get out of this hospital?
[02:12:48] Am I going to get through surgery?
[02:12:50] Like, it's a walk again.
[02:12:53] How am I going to shower?
[02:12:54] Can I drive a car?
[02:12:58] Can I be in girls?
[02:13:03] This was my first combat deployment.
[02:13:05] This was the first operation within the deployment.
[02:13:08] My platoon wasn't even on the ground yet, and so it just felt like, you know, why me?
[02:13:15] I would tell myself, well, okay, let's just say, if someone had to, upon that whole
[02:13:20] had to step, like, you should want it to be you.
[02:13:23] You should say, I'm the one you can handle this.
[02:13:26] I survived, I can make a good life.
[02:13:29] Do I really feel that?
[02:13:30] I'm not just saying that.
[02:13:32] I want to believe that it should have been me if it had to happen to someone.
[02:13:36] Do I really believe that?
[02:13:37] How, you know, this job felt like my calling is, the only thing I ever wanted to do, really
[02:13:44] in my career.
[02:13:47] And it just seemed like it was gone.
[02:13:49] My identity was very much wrapped up in being a team guy.
[02:13:52] Yeah, okay, you can still stay in the teams, but guess what?
[02:13:56] I had a senior ranking officer come at one point in visit, and I'm trying to do physical
[02:14:01] therapy, and really was focused on my physical therapy, not talking to this individual
[02:14:05] so much.
[02:14:06] It's certainly not talking about career plans, and it was kind of saying, well, you
[02:14:09] can stay in the teams.
[02:14:10] We can send you to acquisition school.
[02:14:13] And I'm just, like, this, that's just not, you know, so, okay, you know, I'm going to
[02:14:22] do this job the way in which you'd been doing it, even if you can stay in the community.
[02:14:26] But as I said, you're either in a platoon or your adult platoon, and I'm going to be out
[02:14:29] of a platoon, people say, yeah, but, you know, as an officer, you progress through, you're
[02:14:33] going to be, even if this didn't happen, you'd be, you know, you'd be administrative, you
[02:14:37] do be doing some staff tours, and yeah, okay, this happened on the first operation within
[02:14:43] the deployment, it's, you don't get it.
[02:14:44] It's just, it's not the same.
[02:14:46] But most importantly, it was just, I'm not going to be on this deployment with my teammates.
[02:14:51] If this had to have happened to me, let it happen at the very end of the deployment, it was
[02:14:55] what I was thinking, but to be disconnected like that is tough.
[02:15:01] And so, in addition to a physical component, I think there was absolutely a mental challenge
[02:15:07] that I was also dealing with.
[02:15:10] What was the first, like, what was the first positive step or the positive like that you saw?
[02:15:17] I remember one day, and this is very basic, but they were saying, okay, we're going to work
[02:15:23] on getting you up out of bed.
[02:15:24] Yeah, I had this shattered pelvis.
[02:15:26] It was surgically fixed with two screws.
[02:15:28] I had this external fixator that is a contraption.
[02:15:33] The state in place for about a hundred days, they took it out surgically at one point, but
[02:15:37] that meant that I could not.
[02:15:38] Not an external fixator on your pelvis.
[02:15:41] It's drilled over a hundred days.
[02:15:43] Yeah, drilled into the, it's too cross bars extending out.
[02:15:46] You can't, I happen to be a stomach inside sleeper, and in addition to everything else going
[02:15:51] in part of the reason with a sleep, maybe, just that I couldn't turn, so I'm stuck on my
[02:15:56] back.
[02:15:58] And when this thing gets taken out surgically, they're okay, you're ready to get, we need
[02:16:04] to get you out of your back off of the bed because you could develop big bed sores in this
[02:16:08] kind of thing.
[02:16:10] But it's not going to be easy to balance.
[02:16:12] I'm like, why?
[02:16:13] I'm sitting out, it's not a big deal.
[02:16:14] I set up, like, two, one person on either side of me, sit me up out of the hospital bed,
[02:16:20] and they let go, and it was just fall back.
[02:16:22] It's because your abs were, or you just didn't know how to do it.
[02:16:25] I think the system of balance, I don't know if we have fluids that kind of dictate our
[02:16:31] balance, that just was gone after being bedridden for a hundred days.
[02:16:37] I mean, definitely I had to atrophied in strength, but I think just the whole system of balance
[02:16:42] was at last.
[02:16:43] So this is still not like a mask in first.
[02:16:45] That was a mask.
[02:16:46] But, but after a few efforts,
[02:16:49] I was able to hold it, and it was like doing a plank or something.
[02:16:55] You know, we were just shaking and you're folding and you're concentrating, but I was able
[02:16:58] to hold it for a little bit at time.
[02:17:00] And I felt, okay, I'm out of bed.
[02:17:02] Okay, that's awesome.
[02:17:03] At some point, this means I'm going to be able to transfer into a wheelchair now.
[02:17:06] And then when I get in this wheelchair, I'm going to be doing laps around this hospital.
[02:17:10] I'm going to do as much as video or fired up immediately.
[02:17:13] To get out, to get outside.
[02:17:16] I mean, that was actually one of the other challenges when I became an inpatient.
[02:17:21] It just didn't make sense to me.
[02:17:23] Why can't I just get into a courtyard?
[02:17:25] Just to get outside.
[02:17:26] If it's a sunny day, that would be awesome.
[02:17:29] I love being outside.
[02:17:30] I'm a outdoor or a reason for it.
[02:17:32] Is it infections?
[02:17:33] Or what is it?
[02:17:34] Well, the cynical interpretation is that when you're in an ICU forget about it, but when you're
[02:17:40] in the inpatient status, there's a nurse who's balancing now for patients total.
[02:17:46] I see you.
[02:17:47] It's one-on-one.
[02:17:48] You have undivoted attention from your nurse.
[02:17:51] But now you're getting juggled with a few other patients.
[02:17:55] And so I had a lot of, I still had some apparatus attached to the bed.
[02:18:00] And all of that would take a team of people not to mention the on duty nurse who then might
[02:18:07] not be able to attend to the other patients.
[02:18:09] So there was a logistic aspect to this that I think was challenging at the end of the day.
[02:18:14] I felt this means so much to me.
[02:18:16] Can't you just do that?
[02:18:17] I just want to get outside.
[02:18:19] And there was one that they're going to make it happen finally.
[02:18:22] This was after a while.
[02:18:23] I think longer than it should have been.
[02:18:25] But I don't want to be to reprimanding of them.
[02:18:31] They got out of the courtyard.
[02:18:32] It was a sunny day.
[02:18:33] It was kind of like the sun had come through.
[02:18:35] It was a very powerful moment for me.
[02:18:38] Just to be outside, my mom and sister were with me.
[02:18:41] And OK.
[02:18:42] I got outside.
[02:18:43] That's a step.
[02:18:45] Eventually you get into the wheelchair.
[02:18:47] And eventually I was able to start doing laps around the hospital, pushing myself.
[02:18:53] I want people to push me but to be able to just cover ground on my own is I think a basic human need
[02:19:04] that needs to be fulfilled.
[02:19:06] And when you're getting pushed in a wheelchair or on a bed by someone else, it's not the same thing.
[02:19:12] So it's about me getting a wheelchair and be able to move.
[02:19:19] So then when did you start making, what was the next big step that you took?
[02:19:25] Like you're now in a wheelchair, you're able to get yourself around.
[02:19:28] Yeah, I think the next step was there's going to be a day pass coming up.
[02:19:34] OK, a day pass means not the whole day but a couple hours.
[02:19:37] I'm going to get to go out of this hospital with my mother and sister out to dinner.
[02:19:43] I'll be in a wheelchair and it'll be about two hours.
[02:19:48] And you come back.
[02:19:49] In anticipation of this laying there in bed and thinking, wow, I'm going to leave this hospital.
[02:19:55] Well, second, I'll be like, that's going to be awesome.
[02:19:58] Oh, wait.
[02:19:59] People are going to look at me.
[02:20:01] I don't look right.
[02:20:02] I don't look normal.
[02:20:03] I look different.
[02:20:05] I'm used to being anonymous.
[02:20:09] Nothing, you know, don't stand out really.
[02:20:11] It's an average guy.
[02:20:13] Now I look different.
[02:20:15] Radically different.
[02:20:16] What are people going to stare at me?
[02:20:17] What's going to be like?
[02:20:19] And I was just thinking, you know, I'm going to have to get used to this is my future reality.
[02:20:26] Whether I'm in a wheelchair or whether I'm on prosthetic legs, you look different.
[02:20:30] And if you do not get used to this somehow, and eventually,
[02:20:34] you're going to be bitter for the rest of your life.
[02:20:38] So I started thinking along these lines of body image and stuff.
[02:20:43] Whenever I get these prosthetics and I don't have them yet.
[02:20:46] Whenever that is, I don't know when it's going to be.
[02:20:49] I'm going to boost them up a little bit.
[02:20:51] So I'm at the dollar.
[02:20:53] I was five nine and I was thinking six foot would be pretty good.
[02:20:57] If people are going to look at me, I might as well be taller.
[02:21:00] But I remember getting on that day pass, you know,
[02:21:02] I'm actually long headed bin from like, from you showed up there until now,
[02:21:07] you're getting your first day pass.
[02:21:09] I think it would say two solid months.
[02:21:12] Two months, which in the grant, you know, at the time it seemed like a long time in the grand scheme of things.
[02:21:17] Things were moving fairly rapidly.
[02:21:20] I had the bag still.
[02:21:23] I'm about to be discharged from Bethesda.
[02:21:26] About to be an outpatient.
[02:21:28] First I got to go to Walter Reed.
[02:21:30] That's what I'm going to do. The physical therapy. I got to be an inpatient there for a few days just to get in their system.
[02:21:35] Did the day pass?
[02:21:37] My mother and sister were being taken care of by special operations command.
[02:21:41] They had a program to provide housing, apartment out in town for the family of service members.
[02:21:48] And also for the service members for me, whenever I am allowed to be out of this hospital,
[02:21:53] this is a privilege and a really a luxury that
[02:21:56] is a very important thing.
[02:22:01] Army and Marine Corps soldiers, non-so-com, didn't have.
[02:22:04] At the time I didn't know any of this, but yeah, this was very fortunate for my mother and sister had a apartment out of town that I would be able to go to.
[02:22:11] So the next thing and this is just to get that discharge to become an outpatient.
[02:22:16] And then after that, it's, you're starting physical therapy.
[02:22:20] You're going to learn how to walk again.
[02:22:22] Roger that.
[02:22:24] You're going to learn how to walk.
[02:22:28] So now you start learning to walk.
[02:22:30] Yeah, and this is what you're an outpatient.
[02:22:32] So now you're living out and down.
[02:22:33] Living with my sister, our mother had gone back to Kansas to resume work.
[02:22:37] And, you know, she felt like things were in a good place, but she had been let go.
[02:22:41] Not allowed to go to the East Coast covered, long as you need.
[02:22:46] But, you know, I'm living with my sister.
[02:22:48] My sister was a nurse in the York City.
[02:22:50] I went to her job to come down and take care of me. And when I was in inpatient, other people are taking care of me.
[02:22:55] But they're absolutely where's was a phase where I was ready to be.
[02:22:58] Out of the hospital, I was no means ready to take care of myself and live out.
[02:23:02] I know where and I'm a single guy and so the fact that my sister did that is just so, so awesome.
[02:23:10] And she would drive me to the hospital every day from my physical therapy and it's now it's okay.
[02:23:16] You're going to get fitted for prosthetics.
[02:23:18] You're going to do physical therapy every day.
[02:23:21] That's working out.
[02:23:22] I'm going to be working out every day.
[02:23:24] This is a new sport.
[02:23:25] It's kind of how I thought about it.
[02:23:26] You've learned how to walk on these prosthetics.
[02:23:29] First, you're going to have short ones.
[02:23:30] They don't bend.
[02:23:31] Then you're going to have bending ones.
[02:23:32] Because I don't have knees.
[02:23:33] So the prosthetics are going to be my knee joint.
[02:23:36] It's going to be tough.
[02:23:37] You got as much time as you need.
[02:23:39] Every Monday through Friday, every day, you get two hours of physical therapy.
[02:23:44] I have a lot of other appointments with the various departments that I fell under, plastic surgery,
[02:23:48] orthopedic surgery, etc.
[02:23:51] So it was just hospital days.
[02:23:54] End up being in the hospital four to six hours, just about every day.
[02:23:57] As an outpatient coming in, driving there with my sister, coming back at the end of the day.
[02:24:03] Then how long was it before you were up on your normal, full-size prosthetics?
[02:24:11] Yeah, that was, so my goal was, okay, my platoon is coming back in March.
[02:24:18] If I could be on the knee prosthetics, the ones that bend.
[02:24:21] Even if I have crutches or it canes, that's okay.
[02:24:25] But just to be there on the flight, not in a wheelchair.
[02:24:28] If I can get up on the prosthetics.
[02:24:29] So first you have to go through the short legs.
[02:24:32] That was late January, I want to say.
[02:24:34] All of February, sort of, I've learned how to walk on the knees.
[02:24:37] Because they bend under you, it's really difficult.
[02:24:41] Keeping in mind that I'd atrophy a lot.
[02:24:42] You need a lot of hip strength and caution.
[02:24:45] Even now, this walking along distance, because they're heavy, it's fatiguing.
[02:24:49] But so you can imagine when you're really, really at this low point, it's very difficult.
[02:24:54] I would just be so tired at the end of the day.
[02:24:56] I had to, I remember thinking at the time, you got two hours of physical therapy.
[02:25:01] That's what's automatically provided.
[02:25:03] The physical therapists are working with other service members and they don't have time to
[02:25:07] be with you for four hours or five hours when I was thinking, okay, if I do twice the amount
[02:25:12] of physical therapy per day, I'll get out of here and half the time.
[02:25:16] The math doesn't work like that.
[02:25:19] But I also got to sit, when I got to Walter Reed physical therapy, I was surrounded by dozens
[02:25:26] of injured service members.
[02:25:29] And some of these people were missing three limbs, four limbs, four limbs, three limbs.
[02:25:35] I remember one day looking at the therapy mat next to me.
[02:25:40] It's pretty easy to look around and you can see a quadruple amputee here.
[02:25:46] In this case, a triple amputee, I don't know what was going on in his head, but he was
[02:25:50] working hard, right then and there to make his life better.
[02:25:54] And so once I got in that environment, it becomes competitive and it also provides a sense
[02:26:01] of perspective.
[02:26:02] I'm not saying that perspective just let me, okay, I feel better about myself because
[02:26:08] others have it worse, but it did allow me to really highlight the unique circumstances,
[02:26:17] the conditions that I should be thankful for.
[02:26:20] Just real, okay, I've got arms that work.
[02:26:22] I've got a brain that works.
[02:26:23] I can see, I can hear, I can talk, I'm not badly burnt, I'm not blinded, I'm alive.
[02:26:31] And we know people who are not here, I mean, their families would get anything for them
[02:26:39] to be in this situation, just be missing two legs, but to be alive.
[02:26:43] I know that.
[02:26:45] And so I'm going to be thankful for what I have, not focus on what I'm missing.
[02:26:51] That is really what that environment taught me.
[02:26:55] I want point, did you start saying to yourself, you're going to start doing wild shit again?
[02:27:02] I really like hiking and running, trail running, just get on the woods.
[02:27:08] I actually did a couple extreme high- and high-intz-side stupid hiking excursions, either
[02:27:15] before or after deployment, because that's when you get the most amount of time.
[02:27:20] These like, pre- or post- deployment leave, excursions, but my point, I just like being outside,
[02:27:25] and I like being active.
[02:27:27] And so I was definitely thinking, I want to run, and that's a good goal to have because
[02:27:31] in order to run, you need to be able to walk, so that kept me motivated.
[02:27:37] And I started, I got a hand cycle, and I'm in DC, right in the hand cycle.
[02:27:43] It's not a great one, but at least was able to start getting outside and just do it by myself
[02:27:49] on a bike show near the apartment where my sister and I were living.
[02:27:53] Were you able to meet the Paltoon when they came home?
[02:27:55] Yeah, yeah.
[02:27:56] So what was that like?
[02:27:58] So the generosity of someone affiliated with the hotel del Coronado put a room up for my
[02:28:07] sister and I had to go out to San Diego Coronado, stay at the hotel del Oceanfront.
[02:28:12] Well, I got the oceanfront room.
[02:28:14] She had the other one to dinner face the oceanfront.
[02:28:16] And then the Paltoon redeployment bird kept getting delayed.
[02:28:22] So I think this was supposed to be a couple of days.
[02:28:25] And it would be like a two week stay at the hotel del waiting.
[02:28:28] And I was at North Island on the flight line when they got off.
[02:28:32] I think I may have had one cane, but that was for me, at least, a very proud moment to just be
[02:28:41] at least be standing.
[02:28:42] And I don't know if any of them knew when they got off the bird that I was going to be there.
[02:28:46] I don't know what they were told, but I shook everybody's hand and then the festivities
[02:28:52] commenced.
[02:28:54] Yeah.
[02:28:55] So back to the hand cycle, you're starting to think about being able to do that.
[02:29:00] You're starting to push yourself.
[02:29:03] What was it like?
[02:29:04] Didn't you end up doing the New York City marathon at some point?
[02:29:07] Oh, I did.
[02:29:08] I did.
[02:29:09] This was on a hand cycle.
[02:29:10] And part of it was like hand cycle and then run the last stretch.
[02:29:15] I think I hand-cycled 16 miles, ran 10.
[02:29:18] And just getting out there like that and getting a sense of my athleticism, gaining a sense
[02:29:23] of my physicality was huge to realize that I can still be an athlete.
[02:29:29] There's this whole world of adaptive sports.
[02:29:31] Just about anything that you want to do or had done.
[02:29:35] You can do maybe in a different, maybe it's going to take your upper body to do it.
[02:29:38] Or maybe you're going to be doing a prosthetic, but that you can be an athlete.
[02:29:42] And then I heard about this thing called the Paralympics.
[02:29:47] And then that was very intriguing to me.
[02:29:49] What did you heard about it?
[02:29:51] Oh, I heard it's basically the Olympics for people with physical disabilities.
[02:29:56] And it's not the special Olympics.
[02:29:58] It's different.
[02:29:59] It's under the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee.
[02:30:01] It is competitive.
[02:30:05] It's difficult.
[02:30:07] You'll get world-class coaching.
[02:30:09] You can represent the country overseas.
[02:30:13] It is a direct representation of the United States overseas.
[02:30:16] And you can be part of a team.
[02:30:18] There's all these different sports out there.
[02:30:20] There's summer.
[02:30:21] It's just like the Olympics.
[02:30:22] Did you have any inkling of what you'd be trying to do in there?
[02:30:27] I was thinking something along the lines of running or cycling.
[02:30:30] I actually, there was a recruiter or liaison at Walter Reed.
[02:30:35] The clear place to find athletes for the Paralympic Committee.
[02:30:40] Walter Reed, you got a young, motivated soldier's Marines troops that are looking to get
[02:30:48] after it.
[02:30:49] Yeah.
[02:30:50] Yeah.
[02:30:51] And so they had a rock.
[02:30:52] They had a rock.
[02:30:53] Yeah, yeah.
[02:30:54] I was injured before Rob and maybe a year before something like that.
[02:30:58] Something like that.
[02:30:59] This environment fed off each other.
[02:31:02] Rob was just so fired up to get back after it.
[02:31:08] And there's some people not maybe being an athlete wasn't their thing.
[02:31:15] Some people want to get into a career.
[02:31:17] Some people are struggling.
[02:31:20] Some like Rob were just doing all sorts of impressive stuff.
[02:31:27] And I think you hear about someone before you, that was a double empathy above the knee.
[02:31:34] They did this and that.
[02:31:36] This is possible.
[02:31:38] And then it created, there's a competitive environment.
[02:31:41] Rob is a little bit after saw me running.
[02:31:44] And then he's like, I'm going to run, I'm going to run faster than Dan.
[02:31:47] This kind of thing.
[02:31:49] It just was a good environment.
[02:31:51] It makes me think if I had gone through this in a vacuum and a bubble would the outcome
[02:31:55] have been the same?
[02:31:57] Perhaps.
[02:31:58] I think it helped though to have that sense of perspective and to see what other people
[02:32:03] are dealing with.
[02:32:05] And in some cases, really struggling with.
[02:32:13] But military medicine can keep people alive these days in ways just not possible.
[02:32:22] And so you're seeing, I mean, it was not uncommon to see triple amputees quadruple amputees.
[02:32:28] And I think there was a bond in that environment that transcended your service, your rank,
[02:32:39] what you did in your service that is different than the bond I had in the teams.
[02:32:46] But it was very special.
[02:32:48] So the recruiters come from the parallel Olympics and they come scoping out at Walter Reed,
[02:32:53] looking for some motivated troops and want to get up.
[02:32:56] And one of these guys is to introduce himself to you or something?
[02:33:00] One of the recruiters, she asked, do I want to go to San Diego for sports camp?
[02:33:04] Yep, that sounds awesome.
[02:33:06] Tripped to San Diego.
[02:33:07] And I go out there, not really expecting anything, but really it's a tripped to San Diego.
[02:33:12] I'll get to do some adapt to sports sounds good.
[02:33:15] And the coach is from the Paralympic Nordic Schee Team, that's Cross-Country Scheeing,
[02:33:19] and byath on approach me and hey, you ever thought about doing byath on?
[02:33:24] I thought that was running and swimming.
[02:33:26] It's Cross-Country Scheeing with target shooting.
[02:33:30] That sounds pretty cool.
[02:33:32] Well, they had like a indoor ski irg there and like a little laser shooting station.
[02:33:38] Okay, this isn't on snow, but do you want to come to snow a few months?
[02:33:41] It's August, right?
[02:33:42] In November, late November, West Yellowstone, Montana, camp.
[02:33:47] Okay, I'm there.
[02:33:48] Now I still had a colossal me bag.
[02:33:49] I wasn't done with surgery.
[02:33:50] The one major surgery I still had remaining was to take away the colossal me bag.
[02:33:56] And this sounds awesome.
[02:33:59] I go out to West Yellowstone.
[02:34:00] I don't know how to dress as an amputee with my stumps.
[02:34:04] I don't know how to, I don't know the clothing.
[02:34:06] I don't have all that.
[02:34:07] I mean, this thing called a sit ski, which now, I mean, now at a higher level, if
[02:34:12] it's all carbon fiber, it's custom fit to me.
[02:34:14] It's lightweight, strong, but back then it was like a lawn chair on the two skis.
[02:34:19] And it was not a not an athletic device.
[02:34:23] But okay, cross-country skiing, all you got is two poles.
[02:34:26] You got to use your upper body, your arms, your core, your back.
[02:34:32] And you don't get to use your lower body.
[02:34:34] You're strapped into this thing.
[02:34:36] How are you going to stop?
[02:34:37] How are you going to turn?
[02:34:38] Okay, we've figured this out.
[02:34:39] My future teammates are just racing by me, because I, wow, they're fast.
[02:34:44] I don't know if I could ever get to that level, but at a minimum, just being outside,
[02:34:48] West Yellowstone Montana is one of my favorite places across country ski.
[02:34:52] It's near big skis.
[02:34:54] Just pine trees.
[02:34:55] You feel like you're in the woods.
[02:34:57] Yeah, the trails are machine-grumed.
[02:34:59] But once you're out, it's quiet.
[02:35:00] There was days, we were just getting, it was a good snow.
[02:35:03] This is late in the Vembers, not always consistent.
[02:35:05] But that you're fortunate for me, because if it would have been a dry year in canceled
[02:35:10] who knows, but it was dumping snow, which isn't always good for cross country skiing when
[02:35:15] you're trying to power through with your poles.
[02:35:16] But more than anything, I just had this connection with nature.
[02:35:22] That was so important.
[02:35:23] I'd been running on the prosthetics.
[02:35:25] I wasn't trail running.
[02:35:26] I was running out in the woods, hand cycling a little bit in DC to the car's honk at you.
[02:35:32] It's not a feeling of nature.
[02:35:34] This was just different.
[02:35:36] I really just wanted to keep doing it.
[02:35:40] So what happens?
[02:35:41] What's the course?
[02:35:42] Is that it?
[02:35:43] That ends up being what your first competitive sport is.
[02:35:46] Was that right?
[02:35:47] It's all I've done in the Paralympics.
[02:35:50] For me, it started because I just wanted to be in the woods.
[02:35:53] Then it was like, you could actually start doing this full-time training and get better.
[02:35:59] Just see where you can go.
[02:36:01] You'll make a Paralympic team get to go to the Paralympic winter games.
[02:36:04] I'm still an active duty.
[02:36:05] I'm still in the hospital.
[02:36:06] I saw this surgery.
[02:36:07] I got through the surgery.
[02:36:08] Big recovery.
[02:36:09] They cut open my core again to reconnect my intestinal system.
[02:36:16] I still have orders at Walter Reed.
[02:36:18] I got to get out of the Navy.
[02:36:21] I had a conversation with the head seal Admiral.
[02:36:23] He was like, well, we'll support you if you want to do this.
[02:36:26] Three years of training.
[02:36:27] I'm going to be a team for the Sochi Paralympics, a sign to you to Fort Carson Colorado,
[02:36:32] 10 Special Forces Group.
[02:36:34] I'll be training up in Winter Park.
[02:36:36] I had met a coach up there when I park and they got snow.
[02:36:40] They got training area.
[02:36:41] So I took orders.
[02:36:43] I mean, again, I'm very grateful to the NSW community for doing that.
[02:36:48] For me, I could have gotten out, but there was something special about still being in
[02:36:53] and still training for this sport to go represent the country.
[02:36:57] And so the way I saw it, I have orders to move out to Colorado into train.
[02:37:03] I'm going to train and train and train.
[02:37:06] I probably trained a little bit too much and maybe over-trained in that desire to kind
[02:37:12] of work through my injury and to show that I've overcome it.
[02:37:17] That's what that was for the Sochi.
[02:37:20] So how did that end up going?
[02:37:21] Yeah, I showed up there.
[02:37:23] A newer athlete, I've been doing the sport for three years, living in training in Colorado
[02:37:27] and now that I look back all that time, I'm just wondering why did someone who lost their
[02:37:36] legs and within two years move out to Colorado, didn't know anybody.
[02:37:39] I knew that local coach, just go straight and support that like 98% of my training was by
[02:37:45] myself.
[02:37:46] How are those?
[02:37:47] In the off-season cross-country skiers, roller ski, I had this mountain board apparatus,
[02:37:51] so I'm on the dirt roads out there and just training and training and training and probably
[02:37:57] working through some things, but it just felt good to be an athlete.
[02:38:00] I could train for this sport, be part of a team, follow a training, plan C progress, set
[02:38:07] long-term goals, work towards those long-term goals, put the skills and the training
[02:38:12] of the test overseas, represent the United States if I can make a parallel pick team.
[02:38:18] This seemed like a logical thing to do for me coming out of my time and the teams in the
[02:38:24] service.
[02:38:25] But I'm still in the service and I'm representing the Navy and all of that.
[02:38:29] I put a little bit of pressure on myself.
[02:38:31] I showed up at the, I did make the team for Sochi and we know now in retrospect that Russians
[02:38:37] were doing performance enhancing drugs.
[02:38:41] That's not necessarily verifiable, but I think plenty of people have come out and said
[02:38:46] that that was happening.
[02:38:47] Don't have the sample, but there was a very tough competition.
[02:38:53] The cross-country skiing is a tough sport.
[02:38:55] The distance is range from 15, 18 kilometer races down to sprints, but what, what, what
[02:39:00] did you do?
[02:39:02] I did six races at the Sochi Games and that's the standard.
[02:39:06] So the longest, so it would have been six races in cross-country three, 15 kilometer, 10 kilometer,
[02:39:15] and then 800 meter sprint.
[02:39:16] And then in Biaflan, 15 kilometer, 12.5 kilometer, 7.5 kilometer.
[02:39:22] These six races happen in like eight days.
[02:39:24] It's intense.
[02:39:25] You don't get a lot of recovery.
[02:39:27] And I was kind of in the tenth, 12th place area, 14th.
[02:39:32] The fields aren't as deep as in the Olympics, but they're still very competitive.
[02:39:36] And I made the sprint final that one and got six place and six out of six on the
[02:39:41] sprint final, but made it to the final.
[02:39:43] I exceeded Sochi to be honest a little bit disappointed because I think I had put too much
[02:39:48] pressure on myself.
[02:39:50] And you think you're over trying to?
[02:39:51] I think so.
[02:39:52] I was living at very high altitude and winter park Colorado, Frasier Colorado, living
[02:39:56] at a 8700 feet.
[02:39:58] It's altitude has pros and cons.
[02:40:01] A lot of people think it's a win-win.
[02:40:03] You're up at high altitude, training, front and front sport, but you do develop the red
[02:40:08] blood cells that improved efficiency in your transportation system internally.
[02:40:14] But you cannot train to the extent that you can at sea level.
[02:40:19] And so your neuromuscular system is not performing at the...
[02:40:25] So what's the best to do both?
[02:40:26] Yeah.
[02:40:27] Like the model to do down.
[02:40:28] Yeah, the model is live-high train low.
[02:40:31] If you have limited funds, you would be at sea level.
[02:40:35] In this case, where there's snow, but low altitude and you would let you would pressure
[02:40:39] as your house to be at like 10,000 feet.
[02:40:41] I'm assuming you're going to recover.
[02:40:42] You step up the door.
[02:40:43] Yeah.
[02:40:44] Yeah.
[02:40:45] And then when you spend a lot of time in your house and you go out and then you're
[02:40:49] at sea level, so you have the red blood cells from the altitude inside.
[02:40:53] And then now you're training fast and hard at a higher tempo, higher intensity than you
[02:40:58] can at altitude.
[02:41:00] So you make it to the Olympics.
[02:41:01] You come in 6th, 12th, 10th, whatever, and you're all kind of pissed at yourself because
[02:41:06] you think...
[02:41:07] Well, I think you know, as you look back, I mean, what was I expecting?
[02:41:11] I was new.
[02:41:12] I mean, you don't want to just be given to you.
[02:41:14] Yeah.
[02:41:15] Honestly, there's not as much reward if it was easy, but the other thing is I think
[02:41:20] I put too much focus on the end result that there's actually a different focus.
[02:41:26] The focus should just be on the process.
[02:41:30] Training, execution of the training plan, modifying as necessary, making adjustments at
[02:41:35] the end of every season based on what went well and what could have gone better.
[02:41:40] And that if I can make some changes to equipment, make some changes where I'm living,
[02:41:45] I moved to New England.
[02:41:48] So I'd be at a lower altitude and that if I can execute the process of training and preparation
[02:41:57] that, and then, of course, on race day, go a dig deep, go as hard as I can, in a smart way.
[02:42:05] At that point, you gotta be happy with what happens at that point.
[02:42:09] So I ended up training for the next cycle and these are four-year cycles.
[02:42:13] You moved to New England, go to school, right?
[02:42:15] Yeah, I used my GI Bill and I just, I had some friends from the teams who had gone to the
[02:42:22] Kennedy School of the Government and wanted to go there.
[02:42:25] It was one of your programs.
[02:42:26] I was very much still training.
[02:42:28] A little skeptical whether I could get in that, the training hours that I needed.
[02:42:33] I didn't know how demanding the academic program was going to be, but I found that with
[02:42:37] discipline and time management, go to bed early, wake up at my training zone, be 7 a.m.
[02:42:42] Go to class at 10, rest of the day.
[02:42:45] And then recover.
[02:42:46] And I often call a Rado prior to in the train up for the 2014 games through boredom and through
[02:42:53] just a desire to be training and thinking, this is like a bud's mental.
[02:42:57] More as better.
[02:42:58] Yeah, more as better.
[02:42:59] Train twice is hard.
[02:43:00] You're going to get twice as fast.
[02:43:01] It doesn't really work that way.
[02:43:03] You don't.
[02:43:04] Yeah.
[02:43:05] If you go there's days, you training has to be hard.
[02:43:10] But then you have to give, you obviously know that way.
[02:43:13] Well, I'm actually, obviously, may not know this.
[02:43:15] I'm not really the worst.
[02:43:17] Yeah.
[02:43:18] Echo is in full support of heavy rest.
[02:43:22] Make sure to recover.
[02:43:23] Yeah.
[02:43:24] So when you're going to school, you're training basically two hours a day.
[02:43:29] Yeah.
[02:43:30] And we're as in Colorado, I've been training like three to four at high altitude, not giving
[02:43:34] myself the recovery.
[02:43:36] And then you start getting dialed in.
[02:43:38] You got a good coach out there.
[02:43:39] It's helping you get dialed in on all of us.
[02:43:41] Well, a physiologist and it was a remote coaching.
[02:43:43] But yeah, I mean, looking like uploading workouts, getting feedback.
[02:43:48] And then in the winter, I was exploring, you know, okay, because it was 20.
[02:43:54] The first year I skeed, I did not skeet with the team.
[02:43:57] The next year, I needed to skeet with the team internationally to be able to qualify for
[02:44:01] the games in 2018.
[02:44:03] And I was working out, okay, like I can train up in Vermont.
[02:44:06] There's a really good center at Craftsbury Vermont from Nordic skiing.
[02:44:10] And there's a coach who will help me with biathlon.
[02:44:12] I can drive there if I take, you know, compress classes to be like Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.
[02:44:16] I can drive up Thursday afternoon, train Friday Saturday, Sunday Monday.
[02:44:21] And then there's a ski check in Boston.
[02:44:23] I can't do biathlon there.
[02:44:24] But if there's a lot, a ski check.
[02:44:25] I'm sorry, ski track.
[02:44:27] Oh, okay.
[02:44:28] Yeah.
[02:44:29] They make snow from the Charles River.
[02:44:31] And it's about a, like, 15 minute drive.
[02:44:34] So I can do a workout there.
[02:44:36] And I think this is possible.
[02:44:38] So I think I can be a student and train.
[02:44:42] And how hard was school?
[02:44:43] Was, was, was, was they pushing you hard?
[02:44:45] It was difficult if you did all the work.
[02:44:47] And if you did all the reading.
[02:44:48] And I mean, I don't know many people that can actually do all the reading.
[02:44:52] I was also training as a full-time athlete.
[02:44:54] Yeah.
[02:44:55] If you got it done is what I'm doing.
[02:44:56] Yeah.
[02:44:57] I got it done.
[02:44:58] And I got good grades.
[02:44:59] I think, I think they're not in the business of trying to separate people.
[02:45:03] Otherwise, you know, you're there.
[02:45:04] But then you go to, then you go to divinity school as well.
[02:45:08] So I was, I don't know.
[02:45:09] I had gone to the Kennedy School and I really liked being in class and learning from
[02:45:13] people and seeing new ideas.
[02:45:15] You don't have to agree with them.
[02:45:16] But it's, I gone to a military school for college.
[02:45:19] I just thought this is, this is a good opportunity.
[02:45:21] And I met some students from the Divinity School and they said, it's not, it's not what
[02:45:26] it sounds like.
[02:45:27] You can go to the ministry if you're inclined.
[02:45:29] But this is another program.
[02:45:34] It's just an academic study of religion or questions that religion is trying to answer.
[02:45:37] And so I thought, well, I'll apply.
[02:45:40] And I was accepted.
[02:45:42] I studied ethics there.
[02:45:44] And I got to take some classes through electives.
[02:45:48] This was a very, a wonderful program in the sense that it was broad.
[02:45:51] And I can kind of just take whatever interested me.
[02:45:53] I took some classes on Buddhism.
[02:45:55] And I'm not a Buddhist, but there was something in my exposure to that way of thinking
[02:46:02] that really resonated in the athlete in me, this idea that life is suffering and I can
[02:46:11] identify with that.
[02:46:12] Even when you are happy, you're suffering because you know that that happiness is not
[02:46:19] permanent.
[02:46:20] And that there's a way to, that this suffering comes ultimately from our desire and craving
[02:46:29] for happiness, that there's a way to end this suffering.
[02:46:34] And that is through a process.
[02:46:35] But the process can involve mindfulness and meditation.
[02:46:38] And so I was exposed to that.
[02:46:41] And I think when I was in the teams, I would have scoffed at this.
[02:46:45] But I was thinking, now I'm of the point where I am trying to get
[02:46:50] every tenth of a percent of performance that I can.
[02:46:55] And if this was the difference between getting fourth place and getting third, and I didn't
[02:47:01] do it, well, I just at least want to, I tried everything that could help me be a better human
[02:47:07] a better athlete.
[02:47:08] And in Biaflan, the reality is you're skiing hard.
[02:47:12] And you have to come into the range and you have to place five shots precisely with other
[02:47:17] athletes next to you shooting and an answer saying something, a crowd, your heart beating,
[02:47:24] maybe numb fingers from the cold pressure, knowing you need to hit the shots, that if
[02:47:31] you can cultivate an ability to be aware of your mind and be aware more quickly when
[02:47:37] your mind has drifted away from the task right in front of you, that that could be a competitive
[02:47:42] advantage, not to mention cultivating this ability to just focus and to focus on your breath
[02:47:49] or to have the ability to through breathing, re-center yourself.
[02:47:53] I think that this is actually something that I could have benefited from, highly when I was
[02:48:00] in the teams, the ability to be aware of where your mind is.
[02:48:06] It's almost like you're developing an outside view of your mind and you can see when
[02:48:09] it's gone away.
[02:48:10] And so I started developing this kind of practice just through some classes I took.
[02:48:15] And that kind of exposure was exactly why I did the Divinity School program.
[02:48:20] You know, I've been running into a lot of that stuff, you know, in the book Leadership
[02:48:26] Strategy and Tactics I talk about how my very first-putton, I was, we were doing gas oil
[02:48:32] platforms and I basically, we were online, no one's making a call and I kind of step back
[02:48:38] and looked around and made a call and got praised for it.
[02:48:43] You know, it's kind of expecting us a new guy to get told shut up, but it was like the
[02:48:48] initial idea in my head of taking a step back and attaching and being in a position mentally
[02:48:53] where you're looking around and you're not in the problem, but you're outside the problem.
[02:48:57] And that was really beneficial to me.
[02:48:59] And then, you know, I've come to find out, like, for instance, when you take a step back
[02:49:06] and you, well, when you're, when you're feel division opens up more broadly, it relaxes
[02:49:11] you.
[02:49:12] That's why when you go to the ocean and you look at the sunset, you feel relaxed.
[02:49:15] That's why when you stand on a mountain top and you look out over, you know, vast span
[02:49:19] of land, you feel more relaxed.
[02:49:21] Those things, those are physiological things that happen because as a, as a animal, if there
[02:49:27] is a movement in the jungle, like a tiger, you need to focus on that and it amps up your heart
[02:49:32] rate and it gets you ready to fight, put your adrenaline in your system, yet the opposite
[02:49:36] of that is when you, when you open up your field of vision, it becomes, it relaxes you.
[02:49:42] So kind of unintentionally, for me, as a young seal, I figured out, hey, if I take a step
[02:49:47] back and look around, I'm more relaxed.
[02:49:49] It was more of a byproduct, wasn't I was doing it two-lacks.
[02:49:52] And then the other thing that figured out was like, anytime you'd hear someone panicking
[02:49:56] on the radio, screaming, you're like, I want to know what any people over here and whatever.
[02:50:01] And so you'd make fun of that guy, we'd make fun of those people.
[02:50:03] And so I would always, when I was going to keep up my radio, I'd take a breath and it turns
[02:50:07] out that when you take a breath, that also comes to go.
[02:50:11] So I kind of stumbled into these things and other things throughout my career that now
[02:50:17] when I either learn about the physiological, the physiological things that happen in our
[02:50:22] body that also people use things like meditation to drive these same physiological things,
[02:50:29] I kind of got lucky and stumbled upon them.
[02:50:33] And just, you know, now I'm sort of starting to put two and two together now, as I get
[02:50:38] older and learn more about the world.
[02:50:41] These physiological things that I sort of stumbled upon, people go out and seek and figure
[02:50:47] out.
[02:50:48] And you know, same thing with like, you did to it.
[02:50:49] If you lose your temperature in your jiu-jitsu, you're going to lose.
[02:50:52] Like, if you start getting mad, you're going to lose.
[02:50:53] So I realized, how do I keep that in check?
[02:50:56] Oh, you know, same thing, take a breath, don't let don't get caught up in the moment.
[02:51:00] And I got very, very lucky to kind of stumble on these things in my career so that by
[02:51:07] the time I was, you know, you know, I was an opportune commander and a task into commander.
[02:51:11] I was like, oh, yeah, take a step back, look around and make sure you don't get caught
[02:51:14] up in the problem.
[02:51:16] Interesting stuff.
[02:51:17] Yeah, I think this is an opportunity.
[02:51:19] For me, it would be 10, 12 minutes a day and I just get in a quiet space, close my eyes
[02:51:27] and try to follow my breath.
[02:51:28] And I can use this opportunity to visualize a race, how I want the race to go.
[02:51:35] But also, some things that might go wrong during the race and how I want to react, miss
[02:51:41] a shot, sometimes the next shot is getting another shot.
[02:51:45] You take five shots on five targets.
[02:51:47] And you only get five shots.
[02:51:48] Five shots.
[02:51:49] If you miss it's a penalty lap or one minute penalty depending on the length of the
[02:51:53] race.
[02:51:54] And you do either two or four stages so that's either a 10 shot total race or a 20 shot
[02:51:59] total race.
[02:52:01] And I've noticed in the past that if I have a miss, the next shot is almost like an
[02:52:05] anger shot or a frustration shot instead of, so as an example, this could be an opportunity
[02:52:10] to visualize missing a shot.
[02:52:13] That doesn't mean I'm, it's going to predispose me to miss that shot.
[02:52:16] It just means I can work on having the response to a miss in the event that that happens.
[02:52:22] And the kind of response I want to have, which is, it's just the next shot.
[02:52:27] It's one shot at a time.
[02:52:28] It's just taking the next shot.
[02:52:30] But it's also a chance to track my breathing, which is very critical in shooting, the timing
[02:52:36] of your breath with the trigger squeeze and sideline.
[02:52:39] So what you notice is that your brain just goes all over the place when you're trying
[02:52:46] to focus in a calm, you are only doing that.
[02:52:50] You don't need to eat right now, you don't need to drink, you don't need to sleep, you
[02:52:55] don't need to talk to anybody, your socialize, you're just tracking your breath.
[02:53:00] And I can't even do it.
[02:53:02] My mind's going all over the place, but guess what happens during a race, my mind's going
[02:53:06] all over the place.
[02:53:07] So the quicker that I can notice when my mind is wandered and bring it back to the
[02:53:12] breath.
[02:53:13] The simple exercise to just notice when your mind has wandered and bring it back to the
[02:53:16] task in hand, this for a tactical leader, anyone in tactical environment or in athletic
[02:53:22] environment, I think this is gold and stuff.
[02:53:26] And it just takes a little bit of discipline doing it every day and just working on
[02:53:31] a stability to notice your mind, just notice where it's going.
[02:53:35] It's not a problem that it's drift.
[02:53:36] It's going to drift.
[02:53:37] It's just working on noticing that it's drifted a little bit quicker and then bring it
[02:53:41] back.
[02:53:43] So you work the breath, you work the skills, you're at the right altitude, you're training,
[02:53:51] you're going to school, you rolled into the 2018 Paralympic Games.
[02:53:56] You're ready to rock and roll.
[02:53:59] I think so in retrospect, I was very much ready to rock and roll.
[02:54:02] I, I didn't know those games.
[02:54:05] They were in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
[02:54:07] And I would be going as a full-time graduate student, but what that meant was that,
[02:54:11] just lucky for me, it lined up with spring break and I was going to skip a week
[02:54:15] of class.
[02:54:16] So I'd be gone for two weeks, total, but only miss one week of class.
[02:54:21] My spring break was competing in Korea.
[02:54:23] I didn't have any sense of pressure or expectation.
[02:54:26] My competitors aren't in graduate school.
[02:54:28] I don't know.
[02:54:29] No one expects me to do anything.
[02:54:30] I'm not one of the people that the media pre-pics to do well.
[02:54:34] I didn't have good results.
[02:54:36] I qualified, whatever.
[02:54:38] But I've been training, going up to Vermont.
[02:54:40] I was ready to go.
[02:54:40] I showed up.
[02:54:41] The plan was to do six races in that about eight days span, three by a thundery, cross country.
[02:54:47] The first race was the morning after the opening ceremony.
[02:54:50] Didn't go to the opening ceremony.
[02:54:52] I wanted to be arrested.
[02:54:54] The first race is a sprint by a thundery, which is a tough race because you don't have
[02:55:00] time to take that cool breath, extra to hit the, you know, you got to, because it's
[02:55:06] such a short ski race.
[02:55:07] It's a 7.5 kilometer ski race.
[02:55:09] You got to go hard and you got to shoot fast in your shots.
[02:55:12] It was a windy day.
[02:55:14] Not to mention of all the races to put first.
[02:55:17] I think that's the hardest one because you're amped up.
[02:55:21] And by a fun, I had a different optimal mental state than I do in cross country and
[02:55:25] cross country.
[02:55:26] I want to be just, it's like cycle, right?
[02:55:30] Yeah, I am going to, there's no holding back.
[02:55:32] Barry myself on this race.
[02:55:34] And then by a fun, if you have that added in sochi, the first race off the bat was the
[02:55:37] sprint by a fun.
[02:55:38] Like I came in way too hot and missed three shots out of the way too hot.
[02:55:43] But that was a learning point.
[02:55:44] And sochi also learned, do not look at the big screen.
[02:55:49] That has the real time race results.
[02:55:51] I'd ski by didn't look at it, see where I what?
[02:55:53] Don't do that.
[02:55:54] Listen to the announcer comes in one year out the other.
[02:55:56] Like I had learned a lot of lessons that I was going to rigidly try to apply.
[02:56:01] And just take one race at the time.
[02:56:04] Don't think about the next race.
[02:56:06] If a race goes bad, or if even five minutes ago something bad happened in this race,
[02:56:10] it's gone.
[02:56:11] The only thing you can do is affect right now.
[02:56:16] I can't affect five minutes ago.
[02:56:18] If I do things properly now, the future will be the way I want it to be.
[02:56:23] But I can't be, it doesn't know good to think about the future.
[02:56:26] All I can do is act right here and right now.
[02:56:29] What's right in front of me?
[02:56:30] If it's a hill, I'm going to attack the hill.
[02:56:32] I'm not going to be thinking about what's going to happen in three minutes when I hit
[02:56:35] the shooting range.
[02:56:36] That was kind of my mindset.
[02:56:38] This was informed by some of the classes I had taken and just I was going to apply this
[02:56:41] and just see how it goes.
[02:56:43] The first race, ski the first lap.
[02:56:47] We had good skis.
[02:56:48] It was a hilly course.
[02:56:49] This is a good advantage for me.
[02:56:50] Windy day went through.
[02:56:53] First shot hit, second hit, third shot hit, fourth shot hit, fifth shot hit.
[02:56:58] Get out, go.
[02:56:59] Buy past the penalty loop.
[02:57:00] All right, good start.
[02:57:02] Skid the second lap.
[02:57:04] It's about seven minutes per lap.
[02:57:06] Coming to the range.
[02:57:08] All right, I'm a shooter now.
[02:57:10] Let's go.
[02:57:11] Glasses up, get to the mat, lay down.
[02:57:14] Take the rifle.
[02:57:15] Check out the wind.
[02:57:16] It was windy, kind of gusting and swirling.
[02:57:19] For shot hit, second shot hit, third shot hit, fourth shot hit.
[02:57:24] Then I started, like, oh my god, I got hit the shot.
[02:57:26] My rhythm was off and I'm going to take a couple of breaths.
[02:57:32] I lined up the sights and squeezed off the round and I jerked the trigger and it was a miss.
[02:57:38] I got up just mat.
[02:57:41] So I skid into the penalty loop, skid it and then I exit the penalty loop and pretty
[02:57:44] quickly there's a coach there yelling like, hey everybody's miss.
[02:57:47] Like all the key players have missed.
[02:57:49] It's okay, clean slate, let's go.
[02:57:51] Either way, you go either way, but it's nice to know everybody's like the top guys
[02:57:57] have missed.
[02:57:58] So I went as hard as I could on that last lap and I remember coming into the finish line.
[02:58:02] You don't because it's individual starts, it's not head to head.
[02:58:05] It's like a time trial.
[02:58:06] You don't know, you have a general idea.
[02:58:08] I knew that probably, I mean, contention, but you don't know to the second where you are.
[02:58:14] You just have to find ways to push yourself knowing that every second counts and that last
[02:58:18] stretch going as hard as I could across the line and I had told myself, I'm not looking
[02:58:23] up at that screen to see the race results.
[02:58:25] I'm not doing it.
[02:58:26] I'm not doing it during the race and I'm not doing it after.
[02:58:28] So I crossed the line and know how I finished and I just go out and I like eating or recovery
[02:58:32] bar and someone is taking a few minutes later, taking off the timing ship and they said,
[02:58:38] I'm American one.
[02:58:40] I don't know who was it.
[02:58:41] I don't know, it's got a kind of a weird last name and my two other teammates in the
[02:58:46] race had pretty easy to pronounce names.
[02:58:49] Maybe that was me.
[02:58:52] It was seven seconds separation between first and second, a bellot rooosh and athlete
[02:58:57] got second place and that was unexpected.
[02:59:00] Gold medal.
[02:59:01] Gold medal out of the gate.
[02:59:04] Out of the gate.
[02:59:05] Good way to start the games.
[02:59:08] Then you kept rocking through the through the games.
[02:59:10] Yeah, it was tough races.
[02:59:11] The next day's race, I was going to one race at a time and the next race was a very difficult
[02:59:17] the 15 kilometer cross country race.
[02:59:20] Actually, on the first lap, had a great first lap and was right where you would want
[02:59:25] to be on the second lap.
[02:59:28] I didn't take it into account.
[02:59:29] It was warm.
[02:59:30] The sun was kind of degrading the tracks.
[02:59:32] I had done the first lap on this critical fast sweeping downhill left turn in the
[02:59:37] track, which kind of guides you around.
[02:59:39] You can be in the track or out of the track, but I had been in the track in a tuck.
[02:59:43] Low aerodynamic.
[02:59:44] The second lap, low aerodynamic.
[02:59:47] Same thing.
[02:59:48] I didn't take it into account.
[02:59:49] The tracks had degraded.
[02:59:50] Other skiers had gone through.
[02:59:51] They had created some exit channels.
[02:59:52] So I was in that tuck.
[02:59:53] I just, like, all, split out, totally wiped out.
[02:59:58] I got up and I had blood on my arm.
[03:00:00] I was racing to a t-shirt.
[03:00:01] It was so warm.
[03:00:02] This is the winner games.
[03:00:04] But none of my equipment was broken.
[03:00:05] I started skiing.
[03:00:07] I really was just thinking.
[03:00:11] It's not about quitting or any of that.
[03:00:13] I proven, it's about being a smart athlete.
[03:00:15] I got four races to go.
[03:00:17] This one is two laps.
[03:00:18] It's a five lap race.
[03:00:19] 15 kilometers.
[03:00:21] 35 or so more minutes.
[03:00:23] This really makes sense to go hard and get eight plays, ninth plays.
[03:00:27] I can try to work my way back into this.
[03:00:29] But, you know, this race is going to make me tired.
[03:00:32] I got four more to go.
[03:00:34] Maybe it's actually better to sit it out.
[03:00:38] To exit the course and just be done.
[03:00:40] It's a do not finish, did not finish course.
[03:00:44] But I just kind of skint like three quarters effort.
[03:00:47] I had lost all this momentum that would have carried me up and over the next hill.
[03:00:50] I'm like, you know, digging that, digging myself out of that hole.
[03:00:53] I just don't know if it makes sense.
[03:00:54] A coach was yelling, you're still on it.
[03:00:57] Go, go, go.
[03:00:58] I just kind of responded to the coach like an athlete and started going.
[03:01:03] And I'm like, well, let's just see what, you know, it's the games.
[03:01:05] I've trained years for this.
[03:01:06] Let's just go.
[03:01:07] See what happens.
[03:01:08] I got 35 minutes to work my way back into it.
[03:01:12] I got time.
[03:01:13] It's looking at it a different way.
[03:01:15] Instead of like, does it make sense to go hard for 35 minutes?
[03:01:18] Well, I got 35 minutes.
[03:01:19] Let's go.
[03:01:20] So I kind of, I was seeing my progress improve.
[03:01:23] You get lap splits.
[03:01:24] But again, you're just pushing yourself.
[03:01:26] My lap splits after every lap were getting a little bit better.
[03:01:29] And then on the last lap, it was kind of like five of us are kind of in it.
[03:01:34] They don't exactly know where you gotta go.
[03:01:36] And so I just, I went really hard and I crossed the line and I ended up getting second.
[03:01:41] But for me, I'm actually more proud of this race than the gold medal race because I think
[03:01:48] that in sports, it's all about character development.
[03:01:51] The sport in the race itself, the in the medal, none of that really matters.
[03:01:54] What matters is what the person that it's making you and you actually learn more from
[03:01:59] setbacks and okay, I got second place.
[03:02:01] Whatever place I got that day, it was about taking a fall despite all my training in the
[03:02:09] lead up.
[03:02:10] Sometimes you make mistakes or sometimes it's just things happen, right?
[03:02:15] It's about getting up and I had doubt, kind of was working its way into my mind.
[03:02:24] That's probably natural.
[03:02:26] But working through that doubt by doing what I trained to do, which is to push hard and
[03:02:31] go hard to the finish line.
[03:02:33] And so for me, this race is more meaningful in a internal way.
[03:02:39] Of course, the previous days race, I got to see the flag go up.
[03:02:42] That was very special too, but the cross country race the next day was more meaningful
[03:02:47] in that sense.
[03:02:49] And you end up with one gold, four silver and one bronze.
[03:02:54] Yes, I had, I was just in that really sweet spot of physical peak, mental peak, all lining
[03:03:05] up in a four year cycle, really like a seven year cycle, because I'm doing this, trying
[03:03:10] to train since 2011, 2012, moving out to Colorado.
[03:03:14] So timing that, and I was 37 years old, I felt like it's the blend of time in the sport,
[03:03:23] seven plus years plus not being over 40 like I am now, which helps with recovery, everything
[03:03:31] that it was just everything was lining up.
[03:03:34] And the course, note out, played into my strengths with Hill climbing.
[03:03:38] And you end up getting the best male athlete of the games.
[03:03:42] Is that all right?
[03:03:44] That's right.
[03:03:45] I think that's kind of like stud, so there you go, right?
[03:03:49] Well, I think you're supposed to say this, well, it's not about metals or awards, of course
[03:03:54] I'm proud of it.
[03:03:56] And that I performed like that.
[03:03:59] But I think it was a fair and clean field, and that I got to represent the United States
[03:04:09] overseas.
[03:04:11] And for me, this was just a time that I could, you know, all of this work, most of it was
[03:04:20] unseen.
[03:04:21] Yeah, you get on a podium ceremony or get voted the best male athlete.
[03:04:25] Nobody saw the hard work I was doing in Colorado back in the day on those dirt roads.
[03:04:31] And I'm by myself in the summer.
[03:04:34] And that's actually what I'm most proud of.
[03:04:37] And what is most meaningful for me was that it wasn't the end result of winning or getting
[03:04:44] second or whatever the race was all well.
[03:04:46] It was putting in the work and pushing myself and growing and
[03:04:55] reconnecting with nature and all of it, but really it was about the work in the training.
[03:05:01] So where are we at now?
[03:05:03] So that was 2018.
[03:05:05] Yeah, 2018, I did unexpectedly well.
[03:05:10] And then that opened up some opportunities that I didn't see coming or expect, but you
[03:05:18] know I had after my injury I stayed.
[03:05:20] I didn't talk about, I didn't talk about it.
[03:05:22] I have read about general Ulysses S. Grant serving in the Civil War and refusing to
[03:05:30] cash in on his service, not to write a memoir at the very end of his life he did because
[03:05:36] his wife was dying and he was broke.
[03:05:39] broke.
[03:05:40] He had been swindled and so he decided to write a memoir.
[03:05:44] I just, I didn't feel comfortable talking about injury.
[03:05:47] I didn't even have anybody asking me to talk about my injury.
[03:05:51] So it was pretty easy not to have to talk about it.
[03:05:54] So when I was out there just training, I was just doing the work, doing the work, doing
[03:05:57] the work and now all of a sudden it's like, oh, I have these opportunities to like monetize
[03:06:02] or what, you know, just I can actually create opportunities to give talks in this kind
[03:06:07] of thing and that came my way.
[03:06:11] And I had to do some soul searching.
[03:06:13] Is this right for me?
[03:06:15] For me, in where I'm at and what I want to do and I thought if I try it, it's a challenge
[03:06:24] because there's a couple things going on.
[03:06:25] If I'm going to be honest with myself, one, I'm not comfortable publicly speaking.
[03:06:31] Let's just be honest about it.
[03:06:33] I'm not comfortable.
[03:06:34] It's like getting in the water or trying to jump out of an airplane.
[03:06:37] It's in that realm.
[03:06:39] That really, and then the other thing is I just don't know, I mean, in the teens, we're
[03:06:45] getting told, you know, you'd be quite professional, just put it in the hard work.
[03:06:48] Don't seek glory, this kind of thing.
[03:06:50] So that was all going on.
[03:06:52] But okay, I'll try, I'll just at least try to develop a narrative and see how it goes.
[03:06:58] And I worked on that a lot and then I started giving some talks and that came about because
[03:07:03] I got some medals and it had those results.
[03:07:08] Those opportunities didn't exist even though I'm the same person with essentially the
[03:07:12] same background in 2014.
[03:07:15] Yeah, check.
[03:07:16] That's just how things work in this world.
[03:07:18] Yeah, and I mean, from my perspective, obviously, I look at it as not so much you taking
[03:07:25] the opportunity to monetize what you've been through.
[03:07:28] But to me, it's more important to go out there and share what you've been through because
[03:07:32] they can legitimately help out a lot of people.
[03:07:35] And, you know, I had one of our admirals one time tell me, you know, we were having
[03:07:42] a talk, I had a book coming out and, you know, he said something along the lines of, you
[03:07:48] know, I was like, well, you know, this is not really the quiet professional for me to be
[03:07:52] doing this.
[03:07:53] And he said something along the lines of, hey, we need to be quiet professionals, but
[03:07:56] that doesn't mean silent professionals and there's stories that should be told.
[03:07:59] And as far as I, my opinion is you have a story that should absolutely be told.
[03:08:03] And I mean, when you're talking, and we probably could do a nine hour podcast if we
[03:08:09] went back and got medical records, when you're talking about all the things that you
[03:08:12] were going through from the time you woke up in the hospital, like I'm a baby.
[03:08:19] Like I, I'm hearing the things that I'm, I'm like mad if, you know, you know, like the
[03:08:25] floors cold when I get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I'm like,
[03:08:28] oh, this is weird.
[03:08:29] You know what I mean?
[03:08:30] Like, or like, I'll get like a springed ankle and I'll have to wear an ankle brace.
[03:08:35] And I'll be like, take off the scarf. So I'm so mad about it. You know, I'm sitting here
[03:08:38] just thinking, man, the perspective that you have. And then you took it even one step
[03:08:44] further, like you're sitting there with a guy that's a triple amputee. And he's over
[03:08:50] there getting after it, trying to make his life better. So man, I think to the contrary
[03:08:55] of what you're kind of saying about like, oh, trying to monetize this and the professional
[03:08:59] is like, hey, man, this is things are going to help people. A lot of people that are in a tough
[03:09:04] spot. And also, you know, team guys that are going to go through tough situations and
[03:09:11] and just other veterans, just the human beings, man, life is hard. And for someone like
[03:09:18] you that's been through the hardest of situation and still be able to get up and
[03:09:23] every day keep getting after it, man, that's like that's you. I would actually tell you if you're
[03:09:30] not sharing this story. I think that's actually kind of wrong, bro, to be honest with you.
[03:09:35] Yeah. And that is the side of the fence I'm on right now is that it actually could be selfish
[03:09:41] of me to not tell my story to, to for some valorized concept of, you know, whatever, not
[03:09:50] cashier and or, but really this, the opportunity presented itself because of some success that
[03:09:57] I didn't have four years prior. But now there's some opportunities to talk my friend from the
[03:10:03] teams started this company, O2X that is doing awesome work. And there, I don't have any
[03:10:11] hold-ups of going and giving classes to firefighters and other public service professionals
[03:10:17] as part of the O2X team teaching principles of resilience or mental toughness, grit, whatever
[03:10:22] you want to call it. But also working on goal setting because in my own life setting goals is
[03:10:27] an athlete setting goals after my injury, setting goals at the Naval Academy, that'll really
[03:10:33] helped me. And it doesn't mean you have to have goals, but if you have a powerful long-term goal,
[03:10:37] that can be a very very potent force to help you get through difficult situations. But sometimes
[03:10:44] those long-term goals can be discouraging in the moment of intensity. And so you're teaching,
[03:10:50] you know, setting middle-term as an athlete year to year, I set performance goals based on various
[03:10:57] different categories of performance that do not entirely include physical training. It's a lot of
[03:11:03] nutrition sleep, mental skills in this kind of thing, tactical technical. And so also teaching them
[03:11:11] that in the moment of a tactical situation when chaos is just everywhere, that you can set micro goals,
[03:11:18] just to be aware of that, that this idea of you're never out of the fight, you just always
[03:11:24] something you can do one more step forward, something that can contribute positively, that this is
[03:11:30] very powerful. And also what you taught me, I teach them as well, prioritize and execute. What's the
[03:11:36] most important thing that you need to be focusing on right now, either act on it yourself or
[03:11:40] delegate it. And then what's the next most important thing? With improvement in experience and training,
[03:11:46] you can more quickly identify what is the most important thing to work on. But I just passing on
[03:11:51] those lessons learned to tactical athletes as part of O2-Exley. That's just a no-brainer. I love
[03:11:58] being part of the team to do that. Yeah, that's awesome. So are you training for 2022 now?
[03:12:03] Well, I competed recently in the 2022 Beijing Winter Games. And I came back with one gold medal
[03:12:12] as part of a team relay. And it again was a six race individual format with the very last day
[03:12:19] being a team event. And the first race off the bat was that same by Athlon. And so now I'm going in
[03:12:27] with, okay, I've had four years since 2018, I knew that going in there would be a, they would be a
[03:12:33] little bit more attention directed to whatever extent that would be. It would be more than
[03:12:39] per four, 2018, which was nothing. So that there's going to be maybe some more people want to
[03:12:43] do an interview or some media outlets or some maybe sponsorship opportunities, this kind of thing.
[03:12:49] And with that, I started to feel, okay, somebody sponsors you, they want you to get a medal.
[03:12:58] They want you to perform, this is a different situation. So going into 2014 brand new didn't know
[03:13:02] anything. Going into 2018, more experienced, but with no expectations, either externally or internally.
[03:13:10] Now, external expectations probably, even though no one's going to say that, but really some
[03:13:16] internal expectations, because I'm perceiving those external expectations, that was a different,
[03:13:21] a different, just, every, each one of the games I've been to is different in that sense. But of course,
[03:13:25] training just focus on what you can do, execute the training plan, working through getting,
[03:13:30] you know, positive communication with the coaches, working adjusting the training plan,
[03:13:35] COVID happened that didn't interrupt my personal training so much, but interrupted the competitive
[03:13:41] scene somewhat. And then this season, just doing a lot of altitude exposure training actually in
[03:13:49] Boseman, Montana with the team focusing on biathlon support at the range we have there. And showed
[03:13:56] up that first biathlon was, again, as usual, I'm just really amped up on that one, because the first race
[03:14:04] and just you've been training and the course in China was not as advantageous for my strengths as an
[03:14:10] athlete as it was in 2018, but it was going to be a crime, really slow snow, totally dehydrated snow.
[03:14:16] We were to walk. We were to walk. We were to snow, like, out of the dirt on the sides and stuff.
[03:14:20] Really windy place, just in like blowing, so they groom the course overnight or whenever they did it,
[03:14:25] and then you show up in the morning, but the wind was picking up, outlying snow and blowing
[03:14:29] out of the dirt. And so that was just the slowest stuff ever. So this is going to be some
[03:14:34] challenges. It's going to be grind. In that first race, we were competing against Chinese athletes.
[03:14:39] I hadn't seen that scene. I'm in the competitive circuit. And keeping in mind, I'm a sit skier.
[03:14:45] There is, I would say, a lot less technique in cross country, sit skiing than there is in cross
[03:14:51] country. Standing scenes were only maneuvering our poles. So there is, I think, an ability to rapidly
[03:14:57] develop athletes in my sport sitting as compared to in the standing discipline. But that first race,
[03:15:05] I'm very proud of it. I came in hit five shots, came in again for the second and final shooting stage,
[03:15:09] hit five shots. It was windy, ski hard, absolutely. When it's hard as I could on the last lap,
[03:15:15] because I was just off of third place. The last split I got was on the last lap, just having hit
[03:15:22] all 10 shots, your five seconds off third place. That is a motivating, I just was about,
[03:15:33] in where it altitude. I crossed the line and I don't done a lot of racing at 5,500 feet. Like,
[03:15:39] we were trained at it. But at a game's race at that altitude, when you're going absolutely as hard
[03:15:45] as you can, it's painful. And I finished that race in fourth place, but I can tell you that that was
[03:15:51] perhaps in my own estimation, the best race I've ever had. It doesn't matter what place it was.
[03:15:58] Of course, getting on the podium is nice, but it's about the execution of your own race.
[03:16:02] You do not control who else is out there. The second race, the next day was 18 kilometers.
[03:16:08] One of the better races I felt like I've ever executed in terms of pacing, six place.
[03:16:13] Then, race is number three and four. Then it goes so well. I sat one out. It was a name to the
[03:16:19] relay team. A relay team consisted of four legs. I was the third leg. At this point, my mentality
[03:16:26] is just take what I was given and try to gain a couple seconds or something. Pass it off to the
[03:16:30] anchor leg. We unexpectedly got first place. We beat some more favorite teams. I ended up getting to
[03:16:38] come home with the gold medal. I can tell you that that was a more special experience than an individual
[03:16:46] medal. Part of a team. To be part of a team. I felt it. I felt it during the race.
[03:16:54] The difference of an individual race versus a race where someone passed it off to you and you're
[03:17:00] going to pass it off to someone else and you don't want to let them down. They're counting on you.
[03:17:05] That's a different individual sport to have that team element is just awesome.
[03:17:12] Right on. I guess that brings us up to where we're at today. Is there anything else echo?
[03:17:20] Are you going to question? Probably a good place to wrap it up. Echo, are you going to questions?
[03:17:24] Yeah, we were talking before we started recording about your journey. You were asking pretty
[03:17:28] kind of hardcore about the tournament scenario. How it's laid out. Is that to indicate that you are considering
[03:17:36] doing you Jitsu? I was asking Jocco. Is this possible? Is it adaptive martial arts?
[03:17:45] Well, actually let me rephrase that. There is no, you would compete with other dudes and there is no.
[03:17:53] I've never seen, I've never seen like, oh, here's a bunch of guys without legs that are going to
[03:17:59] do Jitsu. It's no, you'll compete against other dudes because Jitsu itself is adaptive.
[03:18:05] You would figure out moves that work for you that you'd figure out how to do it. There's
[03:18:13] competitive wrestlers that have fought in the NCAAs that have one leg, no leg, no legs,
[03:18:19] and they just adapt their body to figure out how to win. And so, yeah, there's the sport itself
[03:18:27] is adaptive, but there would be no other special rules. I mean, you go to Jitsu competition,
[03:18:34] there'll be people that are blind. They do have one rule like in wrestling. If it's a blind
[03:18:38] wrestler, they have to, you have to maintain contact with them. But that's the only rule.
[03:18:41] That's wrestling too. Yeah, I don't even know if that's Jitsu or not.
[03:18:44] Yeah, but there's, we have friends that, I mean, I have friends that's paralyzed, you know,
[03:18:50] pretty much chest down. He does Jitsu too. That's awesome. And there's definitely, like I said,
[03:18:55] there's people with one leg. One of the greatest Jitsu players of all time, Jean Jacques Machado.
[03:19:00] He only has a few fingers on one of his hands and Jitsu grips are really important. We got another
[03:19:07] friend named Jeff Rial. Jeff Rial has one hand and he competes all the time and he just competes.
[03:19:12] He's no special category other than get some. Yeah, I'm here for a few days, so maybe I could
[03:19:18] come and take a class. One of the things I learned and I guess the ultimate thing I've learned
[03:19:23] as an athlete in Paralympic Sport for 10 years and the thing I was telling myself most recently
[03:19:30] in Beijing was it's not about results. It's not about how you feel today. It isn't no one cares
[03:19:40] where you came from. No one cares how old you are. No one cares what you look like. No one cares
[03:19:47] how much money you got. How many degrees you have. None of that matters. The only thing that matters
[03:19:52] is what you can do right here and right now. That's all that matters. And ultimately,
[03:19:57] your opponent is yourself. The voice inside you that's saying, I don't know if I can do this,
[03:20:05] the voice inside you that's saying don't go that hard. It's painful. That voice, that's actually
[03:20:10] what you're competing against. And I think in martial arts, it's probably perhaps even more
[03:20:16] true than in cross country skiing. Yeah, when he had Rob Jones, we did some math work with him.
[03:20:21] Yeah. See if you're given that little Jitsu bug. Remember Kyle Maynard? You know that? Yeah.
[03:20:26] No arms, no legs. Yeah. Right off. Yep. And he would train. And he had trained within before.
[03:20:31] He, that was long time. He might be even be a black boat right now. Thanks, cool. Yeah.
[03:20:38] So yeah, man. Jitsu, for everybody. Everybody. You, you know, we're going over three hours right now.
[03:20:45] Anything to do, anything else that we didn't cover, anything else you want to hit on?
[03:20:48] Thank you. Any final closing thoughts? Covered my life thoroughly. I've been there.
[03:20:52] I've been there. Unpacked my life and brought up a lot of memory. So I appreciate you providing this
[03:20:57] platform and for asking me to part of your podcast is an honor. Yeah. I don't know why it's taken
[03:21:02] so long. Hey, if people want to find you, it's DanConosson.com, right? Yes, I do have a website.
[03:21:09] That's that's where people can find you if they want to. You can go speak. You can go and help
[03:21:14] them out. They can find you on there. Yeah. You don't have any social media do you? No, I got on LinkedIn.
[03:21:20] But that's not social media. I'm not social media. I'm not a social. That's one line that I'm not
[03:21:27] ready to cross right now. Yeah. Well, right on. You got the website there and if you want to
[03:21:31] contact you, they can find you through there. Which is awesome. Yeah. Cool. Cool. Man, thanks for coming
[03:21:37] on. Thanks for sharing your lesson. Learned for sure. And, you know, more important. Thanks for
[03:21:44] what you did for the country. Thanks for what you did for the teams. Thanks for what you've done
[03:21:48] since representing America. That's awesome. And really, it's just, it's always an incredible example
[03:21:56] for me just knowing that you're out there and no matter what's happened, no matter what you've done,
[03:22:02] no matter what you've been through. I know for a fact you're still getting up and you're getting
[03:22:07] after it. And I appreciate being able to follow that example, man. Thank you. Thanks, Chaka.
[03:22:11] And with that Dan, can awesome. Has left the building. Echo Charles. Yes. What was your
[03:22:21] assessment? Okay. So, the first thing what I didn't even realize until a few minutes in is
[03:22:28] when Jason Gardner makes his speech one of his many about training works. And he tells the story.
[03:22:34] You've talked about this guy. Yeah. 100%. That was him. That's crazy. Yeah. Because to me,
[03:22:38] that's one of the better speeches, especially from Jason Gardner like that. That's a, that's
[03:22:41] a, that's what I look forward to. You know, because the way he says it and you're talking about
[03:22:45] the last number of, that's the master. Jason talks about the effectiveness of training and
[03:22:50] just for sure enough. And I didn't want to go through all the details and miss speak anything, but
[03:22:54] some of those details that I did cover for sure. But I'll tell you what, man. And I kind of talked
[03:23:01] about it. But like the amount, like waking up after being in a coma for 10 days and then having just
[03:23:09] the insane medical issues, just insane medical issues, no legs, freaking abdomen blown apart,
[03:23:18] close to me bag, the thing going down your throat, not even allowed to drink one sip of water.
[03:23:26] You know, like I get complain. I have a sore, like here's here's my complaint.
[03:23:29] Like, you know, you know, you're doing your Jitsu and you, and you cut your mouth.
[03:23:34] Sure. Like you cut your tongue. You get ripped. Yeah. You get cut some teeth. And then you can't
[03:23:39] like eat an acidic food for like a week. It's too. Like I'm complaining about this, right?
[03:23:46] And and Dan's over there for, for a hundred days or whatever, with a freaking tube down
[03:23:53] his throat. And he's not allowed to have one sip of water. So this is another one of those situations
[03:24:00] where you just think, man, so nothing to complain about. There's so nothing to complain about.
[03:24:07] And Dan just has a freaking awesome attitude. When he said that about when he woke up,
[03:24:12] and did, you know, like no passage of time, like that, so I got a concussion, like a bad one.
[03:24:18] The kind where you have Mnesia for a long time, like so basically it's like a super, super duper,
[03:24:23] duper, duper, mild version of that experience. So so you basically been through the same thing.
[03:24:29] It's a secondary link. So I, I, it was the NFL ball game. I hit this guy and then got knocked out.
[03:24:36] But the knockout, like, where my body was limp only lasted for like, it was like a flash knockout.
[03:24:41] So they helped me up and I was all like, we're, but everyone on my team saw me in new. I was like,
[03:24:46] how, yeah, out of it. So they pushed, they put me to the sideline. Apparently,
[03:24:50] I don't remember any of this part. So, but when I came to, I was just standing there in the sideline.
[03:24:56] And it was weird because just like how he said, but I had Mnesia too though. That was a weird thing.
[03:25:03] I didn't remember, and I don't even know where I was. Like the kind where I'm just outstanding here.
[03:25:07] You know? But it's so, like, especially as a little teenager, right, it's high school time.
[03:25:12] It's so scary because you don't, it's like, you don't know what's going on at all.
[03:25:18] And nothing is like making sense or whatever. So, man, I just kind of broke down and started crying.
[03:25:22] And my brother's like, then my brother's on the same team, obviously. He's like, kind of worried
[03:25:26] and stuff. He's calling the trainer or whatever the doctor. And they're asking me all these questions.
[03:25:30] And I'm like, I don't, I don't know anything. And it's weird. It's really freaky.
[03:25:34] Know that? You're in the hospital? Man, man, I was feeling, I was like, that is crazy, man.
[03:25:41] That's a crazy experience. The level of discomfort is like unimaginable. Right? Again,
[03:25:50] you know, from you, I get a cut in my mouth and I'm like, like, can't he catch up for a week?
[03:25:54] Whatever, he's just going to be staying. Right? And he's just, you know, lost his legs.
[03:26:01] Got the freaking tube down as the nose. Having heinous, real nightmares that he thinks are real.
[03:26:10] Yeah. Like, this is crazy. So, and then for him, I mean, can you, is there a nicer guy out there?
[03:26:18] You know, this is nice. It's a nice guy. Humble, like, just freaking incredible. So,
[03:26:26] he did say something. And he only said it real quick to and just continue to move on. But it
[03:26:31] was a, it told a lot of the story on his little, on his mindset. And when he said, oh, when he
[03:26:37] started, uh, I think we started sitting up. Right. And when he was considering, you know, before
[03:26:44] he went into rehab, he said, okay, this is like my new sport. Right? So, whoo, I see what you did there.
[03:26:49] And that's huge. That's a huge deal where you don't look at it as like, oh my gosh, I'm starting
[03:26:54] from like, I was at 10 and now I have to go all the way back to one. It's not that. It's like a new sport.
[03:27:00] It's like a new challenge that you can start from the year, almost like in a way, your original
[03:27:06] starting spot because it's new to this sport. Just a new, it's a new sport. Yeah. Yeah. And then boom,
[03:27:11] you kind of gamify it in that way where it's like, well, shoot, now I can sit up. Okay, now I can take
[03:27:15] some stuff. Okay, I can use this and it's like this, this sport. Yeah. And it makes sense too, because
[03:27:21] look at him. Paralympics no big deal. Yeah. Winning. That being said, you can gamify that stuff, but
[03:27:29] at the end of the day, you can't get out of the game. And, and that's why you have to have
[03:27:35] that, that like just incredible mindset to look at it. And, you know, when we had Jim
[03:27:43] Srollsley on and, you know, he had he had lost both legs in one arm and Vietnam. And that, that
[03:27:50] talk that he had with us after the podcast. When he was talking about Lewis, Pillar Jr. And he said that
[03:27:55] Lewis, Pillar Jr. Never accepted 100% what had happened to him. And, and he's like, and I did.
[03:28:03] And you could hear Dan talking about that today. You know, there's, you know, he said there was,
[03:28:09] there was times he's talking past tense. Like it, there was times where he would be like, oh,
[03:28:15] why did this happen to me? Oh, do I really think it was the, you know, he said this happened to me
[03:28:20] because I could take it. And then he said, I question myself, did I really do I really think that?
[03:28:25] And he was doing it in the past tense. So he got to a point and was like, okay, this is me,
[03:28:30] this is my life. And what am I going to do? I'm going to go freaking kick ass. I'm going to
[03:28:34] come in awesome athlete. I'm going to win a bunch of freaking Olympic medals. I mean, it's just just
[03:28:39] just awesome, awesome example as a human. So anyways, honored to have him on here. Dan, thanks for
[03:28:46] coming on brother. And, yeah, if you want to help out, if you want to support, if you want to support
[03:28:52] yourself, you can do it. It's true. But, but getting good fuel in your system. Yeah, improving your
[03:28:59] situation, whatever that may be. Yeah. Yeah. Physical is a big one and mental, by the way. So we have
[03:29:05] what discipline go energy drink. I've been drinking, I've been utilizing these a week. Oh, yeah,
[03:29:09] and it's only the second. Highly productive though. It's so hard. So far we got a big one. You know,
[03:29:13] I don't say, I don't run around saying I'm so busy all the time. I don't say I'm not busy, but I will say
[03:29:20] this week. I'm a little bit busy. It'll be busy. Good. Good. So yeah, let me just go on a tough time. Yeah.
[03:29:25] Uh, jockelfuel.com get get some bulk. That's a big one. Yeah. That's such a good little. It's almost
[03:29:32] like a trick. It is like a trick that you can have something that tastes delicious and it's good for you.
[03:29:38] You know, and it's providing you the protein that you need to get stronger. You know, the
[03:29:41] expression, uh, if something seems too good to be true, probably is. Yeah. This one is not that. That's that.
[03:29:46] That's not true. That's actually too good and true. It's good and true. Yeah. And I said it before
[03:29:51] I'll say it again. That man, it's not especially if you're on the path you're lifting.
[03:29:55] Lifting is a big one, but if you're if you're really working out and you're trying to get that
[03:29:59] additional protein, it's hard to get they required recommended amount of protein. So I don't think you
[03:30:04] think. So add to that one. Yeah. Easy now. How do you got that trick? Easy. No. Uh, jockelfuel.com. You can
[03:30:12] also get the drinks out. Wah, Wah. You can check out the vitamin shop. They've got everything in there, too.
[03:30:19] So appreciate that. Go get it. You also as far as supporting yourself this podcast and America.
[03:30:26] If you're going to get get some jeans if you haven't already, go origin.usa.com. This is where you can
[03:30:31] get your American made jeans. Yeah. Yeah. It's real simple. You know, oh, like, oh, it's cool
[03:30:38] to American made. And then you, oh, yeah. And actually you're helping defeat communism and tyrannical
[03:30:43] leaders in the world. So you want them new pair of jeans. Great. Get them for more on gnausa.com. That's
[03:30:50] that's a positive move. If you want to help stop out tyrannical leadership in the world that's
[03:30:56] enslaving a bunch of people, you can also go to horge.usa.com. You can get jiu jitsu stuff. Sounded like
[03:31:01] Dan was jiu jitsu curious. He was really at the base real. I was out. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
[03:31:10] Right as I was coming in. Well, he would made it a point and he was he was he was a really interested
[03:31:16] to know how how do the tournaments, how the tournament set up. Yeah. Like, do you have this, you have
[03:31:19] that and you're right. Like, right, we didn't, you came in and we had to kind of record. But I didn't
[03:31:24] realize that. Yeah. They don't have, they don't have like a adaptive division. Yeah. Jiu jitsu is a
[03:31:29] dancer. You just go. You adapt. Yeah. You figured out and by the way, like, what's your weight class?
[03:31:34] Because Dan probably, if he had legs, would probably be 170. Yeah. So he's going to be in with some
[03:31:42] 120, eight pounders. I've known you. It was actually weight is, but he's definitely going to be
[03:31:46] for his size and strength upper body is going to be forced to be reckoned with. Yeah. But there,
[03:31:51] and there are, I want to say a lot, or there's not a lot, but it's not a rarity to be like, to
[03:31:58] see a guy with one leg, no legs, competing in Jiu jitsu and winning. So there are like very
[03:32:05] definitive, adaptive techniques that go in and are very effective in there. So yeah. To train
[03:32:12] that Jiu jitsu. To train that Jiu jitsu is for everybody. That's the best thing about online.
[03:32:16] That Jiu jitsu is for everybody. Where is it? Where do you get there from? I just said it today.
[03:32:20] No, it's not. You said it right there with a little bit of an accent. No, you know why? Because
[03:32:24] everybody, you can separate it into two words and you have a little pun, right? Everybody. Yeah.
[03:32:30] And everybody. Back in the day, okay, remember Stuart Cooper. Yeah. So he did a video with
[03:32:36] Hobbs and Mora. And that's what it was called. Jiu jitsu for everybody. And that's how he signed
[03:32:41] it kind of like, I'm sorry. That was my favorite. So I'm talking about his video. Brazilian
[03:32:46] Portuguese accent comes out from my youth. It's too. Also, Jockel Stork, you want to represent
[03:32:52] way around the past. This one equals freedom shirts and hats and hoodies. Some good stuff to say good
[03:32:57] and also some creative designs. If you want to know in every month as a subscription,
[03:33:02] look at the last shirt. Lockership that came out the last one. Even though everybody must,
[03:33:08] no, no, there's one. Yeah, but that's not the one. That's pretty much a virtual one. Yeah. What's
[03:33:13] the most recent one? A good high level problems. Oh, dang.
[03:33:20] You know, it's good road in like what do you call like a script, the real elegant script. Yeah,
[03:33:27] with the logos. You got to do it. Why is it say high level problems? Because like, you know,
[03:33:33] you know, what do you call the aristocrats? Right? That's all. Look. I don't know.
[03:33:39] I'm just saying now here. You want to know the layers? Okay. So I always say we always kind of
[03:33:47] talk about how like people now or it's been said that people now they're complaining about like
[03:33:53] dumb stuff. Right. Everyone's offended or all this world problems. First world problems. Yeah.
[03:33:58] Yeah. That's like the thing is sure it can be viewed as bad, especially when you compare it to real
[03:34:03] problems, quote unquote real problems. But it's only natural to have these problems. And if
[03:34:08] their problems, they still need to be solved. Most of them can be solved with attitude. Of course,
[03:34:13] rather than, you know, killing a bunch of people. It's essentially, no, no, it means first world
[03:34:21] problems need to be solved just like any other problem. No matter how easy or hard, but they still
[03:34:27] exist. But you still have to have the same attitude. You got to have that. Good attitude. The same
[03:34:32] good attitude. It's just a higher level could quote unquote higher level. Yeah. All right. So there you go,
[03:34:38] sure locker. Get some of that. Subscribe to the podcast. Jocelyn around dot com. We've been rolling
[03:34:45] out some jocelyn around pretty interesting. Yeah. Topics coming out there talking about various
[03:34:51] things on earth and answering a lot of questions. Jocelyn around dot com. If you want to help us
[03:34:55] with our own little platform that we've got going just in case we get banned. Just in case we get
[03:35:00] censored. Yeah. What else? Band censored. Yeah. More. Bannis censored. Cazzled. Canceled.
[03:35:08] Canceled. Whatever. I mean, I don't think, well, then again, I don't know nowadays. Because
[03:35:15] remember, YouTube, you could say pretty much whatever as far as actual words. Like, you know how
[03:35:21] they're swearing on YouTube. Yeah. That was never a thing. No. And then they're starting
[03:35:25] like words that they like make it a point to like, bleep out so their channel doesn't get cancelled.
[03:35:31] Like, there's people I listen to and they like cut out the words. I've heard that. But the words
[03:35:36] that you're talking about are words like COVID. Have you ever heard podcasts like that when they're
[03:35:42] saying the word COVID and they edited out? Yeah. Yeah. Or hat or like half the word. It's weird. So
[03:35:48] that just makes me kind of weird. It doesn't make me nervous, but it makes me think like,
[03:35:53] wait a second, why are they doing that? Because they might have got cancelled or demonetized
[03:35:56] it. That's why we have joc on around.com. Because we can't control these other platforms.
[03:36:01] But we we, meaning all of us, we all control joc on around.com. So if you want to support that
[03:36:07] check it out. Check out YouTube, by the way. Hopefully we, you can watch this episode. Even though
[03:36:11] I just said COVID with no frame of reference whatsoever. I just said the word twice now.
[03:36:17] Three times. I think. So hopefully you can see us on there. Subscribe to it. Check out the origin
[03:36:22] USA channel as well. If you want to know what's happening there. Psychological for it. Don't
[03:36:29] forget about type Dakota Meyer. Making cool stuff to hang in your wall. It's flipsidecampus.com.
[03:36:33] I've written a bunch of books. Check them out. We got Esslom front leadership consulting.
[03:36:39] Inside of Esslom front, we have the extreme ownership of Academy. And this is guidance on the life.
[03:36:47] Guidance on life. How do interact with other human beings, which is what you're doing?
[03:36:51] That's what we all do. We have to do it. Whether it's just the person that you live with,
[03:36:57] mom, dad, brother, sister, husband, wife, whether it's your land lady across the hallway.
[03:37:04] You got to build a relationship with her. So you don't get e-faked. So if you want to help
[03:37:11] learn to build relationships, help have a better life. Go to extreme ownership.com.
[03:37:16] For the Academy, if you want to help service members active and retired their families,
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[03:37:30] Dot org. If you want to donate, or you want to get involved, and don't forget about heroes. And horses.com.
[03:37:36] Mike, I think, getting people out into the wilderness. For sure. Echo and I. We're both on Twitter.
[03:37:41] We're on the gram. We're on the Facebook. But listen, fair warning. Better watch out for that
[03:37:48] aggro algorithm because it's looking to grab you right by the throat pull you back in. Actually,
[03:37:53] it doesn't grab you by the throat. It grabs you by like, by like a gentle kind of like
[03:37:57] handhold and it kind of lowers you in there. It's not aggressive. By the, uh, uh, what's the
[03:38:02] br- a big dilla? Yeah. I don't know. It grabs you by the, by the gray matter, by the gray matter.
[03:38:08] It just eases you into the algorithm. Next thing you know, you look up and you use wasted 17 minutes
[03:38:13] of your life looking at a bunch of stupid things. So watch out for that. Uh, thanks once again to
[03:38:20] Dan Khanawson for coming on and thanks Dan for everything you've done.
[03:38:25] Everything you've done for America for the teams and the way you represent America in the Olympics.
[03:38:31] Awesome. And like I said, it's, it's awesome for for me to think that no matter what,
[03:38:39] no matter what's going on in your world, you're out there getting after it. That is an example
[03:38:44] for all of us to follow. And thanks to all the service men and women who have paid the price of
[03:38:51] freedom in blood. We are only here because of your sacrifice. And we thank you for it. And thanks to
[03:38:59] all the work done by our police non-forcement firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers,
[03:39:05] correction officers, board of patrol, secret service, and all first responders out there.
[03:39:11] You also sacrifice so that we can be safe and we are grateful for what you do
[03:39:17] and to everyone else out there. Whatever, whatever excuse you have, whatever justification you
[03:39:25] make up in your head, whatever rationalization you allow to go on in your mind to stop it.
[03:39:32] To stop it. The excuses and the justifications and the rationalizations are not valid. And we know that.
[03:39:44] We know that because of guys like Dan Khanawson who face incredible challenges,
[03:39:51] but he doesn't make excuses and takes action. He overcomes, he drives on so let's all of us
[03:40:00] be more like Dan and go out there every day and get after it. And until next time,
[03:40:09] Zekko and Joko out.