U.S Marine Corps Veteran, author and Leadership Instructor - Rob Jones

Joining the podcast this week is U.S Marine Corps veteran, author and Leadership Instructor Rob Jones. 

No three words better define Rob Jones’ journey. When an IED blast in Afghanistan took both his legs it could have taken everything else—his purpose, his identity, his will to go on. It didn’t. Instead, those three words became a battle cry to rebuild a life that the enemy had tried to destroy.

Put Your Legs On, is the unflinching story of what happened after that explosion—the surgeries, the hallucinations, the brutal recovery, and the slow, determined steps to become whole again. With the help of his family, Marines, and those who survived before him, Rob discovers that hope doesn’t end with loss. It starts there.

What follows is an extraordinary ascent: relearning how to walk, competing as a Paralympic rower for Team USA, cycling across America, and running 31 marathons in 31 days. Told with honesty, grit, and engaging humor, this is a memoir about resilience, purpose, and a warrior spirit that refuses to quit.

Robs book is available from amazon and you can follow him on Instagram by searching for @robnjonesjourney

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Uh good evening, good morning, or good afternoon. Uh it's Layton from the We Happy Few History in your Doorstep podcast uh with another episode. And I have with me uh a Marine Corps veteran and leadership instructor Ecalon Front as well as an author, uh Rob Jones. How are you? Good to see you, man. How are you doing? Yeah, you too. I mean, just first you know, see first of all, I want to say, I mean, we were chatting about this earlier. I'm just so glad to finally nail you down. I mean, we've this has been in the works for a long, long time. Yeah. Um, and I think in the end I've just had to hit go on this one and execute again. Say again. Just execute. Absolutely, yeah. Well, yeah, we're gonna go that extreme. It's a cool military way of saying just do it. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, that's well, military. Yeah, corporate way, corporate way, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But no, thank you, Rob. Um, amazing to have you on. I mean, my god live, your book, uh, put your legs on. Unbelievable, by the way. Um absolutely inspirational, your story as well, and just reading it. And obviously uh I want to you know jump into quite a few things in there, just just there's a few things that really stood out to me. Uh well, hopefully it was an enjoyable and fun read too. Uh it was, it was fascinating, um, absolutely fascinating. And and I think what stood out for me is, and I can I feel like I can see it in your social media posts as well, is your drive um that you are so driven um in everything that you do. Uh and I find that really inspiring. And obviously we will we'll come into you know, even where you that that drive became where it's just so evident. Um just I suppose the first things first for me is uh obviously, you know, knowing your background. Um, I know you're a marine veteran. I mean, like my God, you know, like every Marine Corps individual I know, every friend I know, Marine Corps, it's it's yeah, there is some form of representation of their past. Yeah. Anyway, you know, in the background, when I talk to them from my good friend Freddie Joe to Paco to Neil Father, Mike Francis, um, if you've ever met those two, if not, I need to introduce you to those guys. Yeah, um, it it's at the core of their soul, you could say. It's it's it's a big part of their lives. And and I take it, is it the same with yourself as well?

SPEAKER_02 2:25

Yeah, one of the funny things I've said before is that when you go to boot camp, you know how your DNA uh is made up of what what are all the I don't forget all the letters on your DNA, like L, like your double helix is made up of L, P, G, N, all these different letters. And then uh, but when you go to boot camp, it all gets replaced with USMC, USMC, USMC. Yeah. And it's a joke, but you know, um it's it's true too. It becomes a very big part of you, you get changed all the way down to your DNA when you go to boot camp.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's like I'm not I'm clearly not American, I'm British, and I I I feel like it it's there's a very good PR team behind the Marine Corps as well. Um, even I'm I'm passionate about the Marine Corps in in some weird way. As I said to you before, the you know, we started recording. Um everyone wanted a Marine Corps PT jump, but the green one, the zippy one was the most popular one, the zip, the zip jacket. Um, and we couldn't buy them. We had to ask a marine to buy them.

SPEAKER_02 3:30

Um it's got a it's got a unique culture, and it's got they they rely upon that culture and the mindset of Marine to do their recruiting, and so they have a little bit of a different uh uh recruiting strategy, and it's less about what you can get out of joining the Marine Corps uh in terms of tangible things, and more basically what you're getting is you get the opportunity to be a Marine.

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:58

And and it's it tends it seems to work.

SPEAKER_00 4:01

I mean, it does. I I think you're absolutely right. And and and I think it's a saying, isn't it? You weren't a Marine, you are a Marine. It's it's the Marine veteran. You you you I think it's the same in the Royal Marines as well in in the UK, is they're very passionate about um passionate about that. And I met a para, yeah, uh a British paratrooper on on Friday and we were chatting. It was just a random meet. We just um and and we were chok chatting about um how the paratroopers and the marines in the UK not to uh uh you know look down at the other infantry units in the British Armed Forces, but there's just something they're very proud about what they've achieved and what they represent. And I feel like that's definitely the same in the Marine Corps as well. Um in everything, you know, as I said earlier, you know, from you know, my friends um Mike Francis and Neil Father, who uh you know do a podcast called Tales from the Corps, and it's all about looking at you know people's experiences in the Marines as well as other people as well. They've come across who they feel like they want to talk to, my friend uh you know, Mitch Hackle Bell again, you know, he was a pilot, uh, you know, but again, it's it's he is it's so ingrained in his DNA that uh you know it it's a very proud of their service as well, regardless of what uh MOS uh they were as well. You know, and then I I it's it's it's great to see. And I think certainly from a British perspective, other than say that I don't want to speak for everyone. I feel if I am speaking out of turn for other you know, people who are listening, I I'm in the Air Force and people aren't as a cord with Spree, it's it's yeah, then there's no tattoos on everyone of uh you know the globe and anchor, you know. It's yeah, I don't know if that's just a British thing or it's more I think, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:44

I mean, I've heard that. Um my wife is from England and her I remember her mom and her stepdad came over one time, and one of his takeaways was he noticed that there's a greater just from his perspective, he said that these seem like there is a lot of more deference and greater uh appreciation for veterans over here than uh in the UK. Yeah. I I don't know how to explain that, uh, to be honest with you. I don't I don't I know a little bit about British culture, but I don't know that you know, I'm not I never I didn't grow up in it, but I can confirm that uh over here people love veterans and greatly appreciate veterans.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

So yeah, no, I I I I definitely don't disagree. I haven't been to the States myself a few times, um, even when working is you know, we're we're I hate to start in a hotel, going somewhere, you know, as with Air Force, you know what that's what we do. Uh yeah, yeah. But you're in the lifting uniform, you know, when we're doing a layover um and and shaking your hands in the lift. You wouldn't get that in the UK. Thank you for your service.

SPEAKER_02 6:47

Maybe I you know, I think I think that British people probably also appreciate their veterans to a great degree. It's just maybe they're just not so outwardly spoken about it. Maybe they're maybe I I think in America people are probably just feel generally feel more comfortable to go up to somebody and shake their hand and say that. And maybe British people, maybe they're just a little bit more reserved in the in their you know, in their gratitude.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

Maybe they still feel it though, I bet. Yeah, of course. I mean, have you obviously other than you know, at some point in your career, um, have you been to the UK outside of that, outside of your sporting achievements?

SPEAKER_02 7:22

Obviously, yeah, I mean, like I said, my wife's from England, so we go over there. Um I'll usually make one trip a year. She usually makes one or two, and then her family comes over once or twice a year as well. I have to ask, where in England do you go? Uh she grew up in a town called Aylesbury, which is right outside of London. I do not um and then when I met her, she was living in a place called Henley on Thames. Okay, yeah. So I spent the vast majority of my time going there. I would when we were dating, we dated long distance for four years. I grew over there probably three or four times a year for a couple weeks at a time, and that's where we were always, you know, based out of was Henley. Gorgeous place as well.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

Um yeah, great. Stunning and Aylesbury is is finally left is where I did my basic training, just outside Aylesbury.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

Oh, no kidding.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

Oh, yeah, yeah, up uh RF Halton. It's just up there, yeah. So I know, although I don't know the town too much, because obviously I was gonna, you know, briefly and and but yeah, so yeah, no very well. Yeah, Buckenhamshire. Uh I would say Buckenhamshire, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Aylesbury Bucks. That's right, yeah, and yeah, Henry Henry's stunning as well. Absolutely stunning. Um so go back to the Marine Corps, going back to you, why the Marines, why why did you join? What's the why behind it then? Because you were in college, if that's right.

SPEAKER_02 8:37

Yeah, I was in college and not doing very well in college. I was kind of basically failing. I was trying to be a computer scientist, and I just wasn't, I just wasn't a good student, to be frank. Um, and I got to a point where I realized that I was failing my two primary CS classes and I wasn't gonna graduate in four years, and I just I just didn't feel good about myself. And my friend, my best friend at the time, he had just joined the Marine Corps. Um, and I was remember I was talking to him and he said it was the best decision he ever made. And I went, hmm, interesting. And so I, you know, went to the website, seemed interesting. So then I went and read this book. Uh I went to the library and researched the Marine Corps, and I found this book called Brotherhood of Heroes about the Battle of Pele Lu. And it was an incredible story of courage, selflessness, uh, brotherhood. And I realized that that's what I was missing in my life. I was missing those things or things like that. So I figured if I wanted to go get those things, I should probably join the Marine Corps and then try and go to war and experience all those things. And so that's so I went down to the recruiter's office, I think the next day, after I finished the book, and just said, I you know, I want to join the Marine Corps, and he gave him the easiest recruiting job he'd ever had. And he just I think I was went down to MEPS, which is where you signed your contract, maybe that weekend or something, and I was in the Marine Corps, and then I called my parents and tell them to tell them what I did.

SPEAKER_00 10:07

How how long then before you signed the dotted line to start in boot camp? How long did you have?

SPEAKER_02 10:12

I joined a program called the delayed entry program. Uh so I was gonna be a 92, what's called a 92-day reservist. So basically I finished that year in college, went to boot camp that summer, finished my last year in college, and then I went back to uh to finish my the rest of my you know basic training, which was Marine Combat Training and Combat Engineer School, and then I just went to uh my reserve unit. Wow. I have Paris Island or San Diego?

SPEAKER_00 10:43

Everybody east of the Mississippi goes to Paris Island, so I went there. How was that? Was it also you you must have watched Full Metal Jacket, Jawhead? How was that experience, you know, yourself in terms of differentiating from what you saw on screen? I mean, did that yeah, what was it was it much of a difference?

SPEAKER_02 11:02

I had you know similar, but pretty different. I mean, they can't hit you anymore. So it made it, you know, a lot less threatening. And I think you I realized the worst they were going to be able to do to me was scream in my face and make me do punish me with you know physical, um, physical training or just push-ups and and all that stuff would end eventually. I don't know. And boot camp was definitely the hardest thing I'd ever done at that point, but looking back on it, it was pretty easy. You just scream as loud as you can, move as fast as you can, and then just you know, put out physically until you are exhausted, and that's all you got to do. And there's sure there's certain things you have to technical things you have to be able to do, like you have to be able to shoot a rifle well, you have to pass some tests, academic tests, uh, you have to be able to pass a swim, you know, all these things. There's stuff like that too. But the ins and outs of boot camp are just are very and just realize it's it's all a big game. It's all a big game. You're never gonna be fast enough, you're never gonna be strong enough, you're never gonna be good enough. And every all those little things that they say you're if you if oh if you if you're just fast enough, we'll stop, then it's just not true. They're just gonna punish you until until they run out of time, then you're gonna move on to the next thing.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

Yeah, and I that's uh that's an excellent explanation of just I think booting.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

It's funny too. It's funny too because uh my sister-in-law joined the British Army to be in the band, and she messaged me and she asked me for any advice on you know going to boot camp. We told her a bunch of advice that was relevant to Marine Corps boot camp, uh not knowing that you know British Army boot camp was gonna be significantly different from that. Like they lived in barracks and stuff, and you know, they had access to their cell phones and all sorts of things. But I went, oh, so basically none of the advice I really gave her was all that useful. Like they're gonna be, you know, they're gonna scream at you, they're gonna punish you, and she's like, Oh, I don't I don't know that she had that experience, but I think it's changed a lot.

SPEAKER_00 13:09

Yeah, I think cell phones was you know, they're not what they are today when I went through count the years now. It's 24 years ago when I went through it, you know, they would that was a very new thing, so it wasn't smartphones, it was text messages, and I don't think we put text messages down when we were out that that had to stay with our belongings.

SPEAKER_02 13:25

Um, if I remember they took them away, and just the fact that the seawood lived in a uh a barracks room. We've had a squad bait with 90 90 uh you know just bunk beds in it. Just a long time a squad bait.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

What is a squad base? Sorry, I've heard this phrase. I should have asked.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

It's a big long room with a bunch of bunks. That's all it is. That's all it is. Squad bay. Yeah, it's you know, uh you know, a bunk bed, right? Yeah, you know a rack. You've seen a rack. Well, you've seen full metal jacket, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:53

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a squad bay.

SPEAKER_00 13:54

That's the squad bait, got you, yeah, yeah, yeah. I've always wondered, I would I wasn't sure whether that was just like what you said, like a barracks type thing, or if it was like like an area where you guys just sorted out your kit, which it is in a way, but away from your bed. And that I make a lot of sense now. And yeah, that's probably a question I should have asked some of the other guys. I know, and now I'm doing it on this, um, and I feel like it's it. Um, it's it's yeah, you're right. We were in barracks, and you you said 90 guys. Yeah, 90 recruits. Wow. Okay, yeah. Although they were what I want to say 60 to a flight, I want to say around that, but that was spread over four rooms in a in what we call a barrack block. So very different, and not bank beds either. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 14:36

Um yeah, so I'm I'm not I'm not saying anything against it, I'm just saying I it's funny because I had experience and she asked me for the advice, and I just gave her all this stuff that she probably wasn't able to put into use.

SPEAKER_00 14:48

No, I know. Well, even now they've got duvets, I hate to say it. They have duvets. Nice little blanket. Yeah, we didn't get to do bed packs, like, and honestly, we we had to fold them all in. Like if you Google British Army or British Forces bedpacks is like these woolen but you know, blankets you had to sort of tighten up as squares.

SPEAKER_02 15:05

Yeah, we just have like a green double-sized wool blanket. I didn't even sleep under it because I'd wanted but didn't want to mess up my rack, so I just slept on top.

SPEAKER_00 15:12

Same yeah, same yeah. Just tightened it up in the morning. Yeah, I think pillows, I can't remember what it's the pillows, I think I didn't even slept on those properly. I think I took the covers off and just slept on the bed pillows until you know, and just put those. I'm sure I did that. I'm trying to remember. No, you've got me thinking now. Um, but yeah, you try to you learn this, though, don't you, as you go into basic the little tricks. You mean some people might pass it down from previous, you know, uh other intakes ahead of you. Little some might steal you wrong, but you do learn the little things, you know. We we cordoned off, you know, the you know, the latrines, you know, the toilets, the sinks, because we didn't want them touched so we could only focus on uh the least amount of work necessary for the next day as well. So we did stuff like that. And and little tricks like that.

SPEAKER_02 15:54

Yeah, but the drone instructors have seen so many platoons, they know all your little tricks. And then so if you sleep on top of your rack, they just go over to it and yank it out, flip it over.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

So, you know, they they know they're not gonna let you get off easy. No, no, no, they don't, you know, and like you, I mean, they shouted us, they obviously didn't knock us around because with the Air Force, you know, you know, we don't get that in the hotels, they don't do any basic training, you know, can get us ready for that. Um, but the worst thing they probably did for us is just throw your shoes out the window. Um and there was a TV series on at the time called Bad Lads Army. I don't know if you guys have heard of that. Um, and it's basically bad lads, put them in the army, put them through basic training. So they'd say things to us, and they had literally quoting from this show. I think one of the uh recruits that we had, um, little Scottish guy got told that you know, if he bucks up again, he's gonna have a pencil rammed down his ear and she will stamp on it. And she was very, you know, she told us afterwards that she got that from a TV show uh that was all at the time. Um she felt very bad about saying it. But that's about as bad as getting, you know, yeah, kit out the window. Uh or if you're uh my mistake when you know coming back um and it's a couple of guys ahead of me and they just wanna just turn around and goes, Oh, you don't want to work in there? Why, why, why, what's happening? says, Yeah, you don't want to. And that my kit had been just literally pulled out of my locker and thrown across my bed. Only because my key, I never took my key to my padlock with me, but obviously we had to lock them up. I used to put it under my pillow. Obviously, they'd gone look in, unlocked my personal locker, found my spare key, use that to unlock my kit locker, and they just pulled everything out.

SPEAKER_02 17:25

Oh man, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:27

But that's as bad as it got, you know. It's yeah, yeah, you know, they'd flip a bed again, but I don't think they can do that now. But so moving on, obviously, combat engineering. So, yeah, we could talk about basic training, you know, for for a while here, but true. Where did where did your career take you then in the Marine Corps once you'd finished your training?

SPEAKER_02 17:46

Um, so my reserve unit when I was at combat engineer school was calling for volunteers to go to Iraq in 2008. And so, yeah, like I said earlier, I wanted to go to war, so I volunteered for the platoon. Um, but when we got to Iraq in Habania, things had calmed down a lot. So we spent the vast majority of our time using our metal detectors to find uh old weapons caches so that we could go out there and get rid of them, and then you know, the the local people could start to get back to normal you know way of life where they don't have to worry about you know bombs being buried in this guy's backyard over there. So that's what we were trying to do is help them return to normalcy or a new normal. And so sort of unsat, you know, we did good work, but sort of unsatisfying because I wanted to see combat and I wanted to fight bad guys. Um, but luckily, shortly after we got back, my company was sent another volunteer platoon to our uh Afghanistan, and I volunteered again for that one. And Afghanistan at the time was picking back up. And so my primary role in Afghanistan when we finally got to combat was essentially finding safe routes through areas that we were pretty sure there was going to be IEDs in there. Yeah. So going over a bridge or through a doorway, any kind of terrain where you're kind of channelized into an area, the the Taliban would like to put IEDs there. So I would have to go through first with my handheld metal detector and just try and find the safe. I was just trying to find the safe path. I wasn't necessarily trying to find IEDs. Yeah. Those two things go hand in hand with each other. Um but yeah, the goal was just to find a safe path.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

And we obviously you're an engineer, so but we wouldn't so going from what you were saying then, sounds like you weren't as part of say an engine, you know, an engineer in uh engineer company or platoon. You sounds like you're part of an infantry platoon.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

Yeah, engineers, combat engineers uh in my role would get attached to infantry units. So we would just live with them and go out on all the patrols. So we'd basically be the subject matter expert for finding IEDs, essentially. Yeah. In the same way you have a radio man that is you know an expert on radio, we were the experts on finding IEDs. So it'd be one, you know, one uh one platoon of combat engineers would serve an entire battalion of Marines. So that would be a squad per company, so 13 Marines per company of Marines.

SPEAKER_00 20:16

Oh wow, okay.

SPEAKER_02 20:17

So a fire team per platoon.

SPEAKER_00 20:19

Yeah, sound very similar to how the I would say the British Army um they had dog handlers with them um from the headcore and the RF police. So obviously, I I think they had obviously you had the when you're talking about metal detector of the Vallon, is that right? Yeah, the Valen Melotch, the Valen Gizmo, yeah. So I think, but they not necessarily engineers as such. I think they were different in terms of they were part of um from the British side, if I remember rightly, just from my experience when I was um in the they were with the EOD team, and so they'd be they'd be with them. I'm trying to remember off the top of my head now. Um, but certainly I think they the infanteers were trained as the as the point man, the valin man, as they call them. Right. Not so they'd have a potentially they'd have a dog handler as well. Uh I'd have to speak to somebody about that. But yeah, there's certainly a dog handler. Uh yeah. Well, no, really interesting. I mean, and how was that for you? Where where were you operating in Afghanistan?

SPEAKER_02 21:14

Uh we were a place called Sangan, which we had just taken over from the Royal Marines in the British Army. Wow. Okay. Um, yeah, so we moved in in order to take that area over from them. And yeah, I got the opportunity to work with some uh British soldiers, some Royal Marines, and they were awesome. And they, you know, I think they hung around for a little bit while we, you know, ripped with them, and then once we were ready to take over completely, they they headed out, I think. Um yeah, we were in a place called Sangan, and it was pretty it basically had been controlled by the Taliban for several years up to that point. And so we were it was our job to clear them out uh and use the clear clear hold build strategy to. start building relationships with the uh the local Taliban.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

I know, yeah. It's Sangin. Yes. Wow. Sangin, as you guys like. That is a hotbed. I mean, my God, alive. I mean, that is even I know that, I mean, just because of I think the Royal Irish were there. I want to say Musikala.

SPEAKER_02 22:16

I want to say 2005, 2006, which was Yeah, we did Musik Musak Musakala, Musikala as well. We did two weeks in Musikala and then uh moved over to Sangin after that. And yeah, all that whole area, um I forget all the names of the towns and everything. It's been a while, but that whole Hellman province area was um yeah one of the the areas with more fighting in it than a lot of other places. I mean there's fighting going on everywhere. But uh I got taken out pretty early on so I didn't get to experience a lot of the harder combat that was going on for uh 37 but yeah it was pretty fun.

SPEAKER_00 22:52

What year what were you sorry what year were you in Afghanistan if you don't mind me asking 2010 during the summertime. Oh wow so fighting season as well yeah yeah definitely yeah I I know what you mean I know what you mean I think 2009 was very uh like a kinetic tour as well I mean I was there winter uh 2011 and uh when I was on R and R I bought a book uh called Dead Men Risen about the Welsh Guards in 2009 and this tour and I'm reading this book and I'm thinking oh my god I'm going to all these places and it was just IED central but thankfully you know what the work had been done it it it sort of resolved that but it's just it's to read that yeah it's I probably shouldn't have read that book while I was you know while I was there it's probably the worst thing I could have read but I mean yeah maybe yeah it was just it was it was yeah probably you want to be able to live in a little bit of denial about about what might happen to you absolutely yeah you know you're right and I think that's you know that that sort of mindset. I mean but for you what you you've you're very inspirational. I like I love your drive and I think that's the thing I've got from your book is you were there you were getting combat and and how was that for you?

SPEAKER_02 24:01

Was it before the incident how how was it that experience for you if you don't mind me asking is it what you imagined it is it or was it the firefights uh they weren't quite as intense as I was expecting I mean the vast majority of the firefights I was in um the Taliban was shooting at us from you know a mile away and the bullets were going over our head I didn't really feel like I was in a ton of danger. Now later on in that deployment the other guys that were still there they were doing fighting in corn in cornfields where the Taliban would be in the cornfield and they were also in the cornfield so they were doing a lot more intense fighting you know after I left but there was yeah there was you know a handful of firefights I got to be in uh I got to do some shooting. But yeah I mean it wasn't quite as in nowhere near as intense as what I read about Brotherhood of Heroes or I would have liked to have seen a little bit more intense combat before I uh before I got wounded. Like running across an airfield with Japanese airfield yeah you know maybe bullets you know flying all around me a couple times. Maybe actually getting to kill an enemy would have been you know fun but you know that's just how it goes.

SPEAKER_00 25:08

No absolutely and and and I suppose are you you are you okay leading you know leading up you know what happened you know when you became injured you okay talking about that?

SPEAKER_02 25:16

Yeah like I said I mean um my job was to find IEDs and we were on this big push where essentially we were just doing a series of pushes where we would just move and take over different swaths of area and then uh you know re-refit retool wait a little bit then keep pushing up so we were on maybe our second one and in the early afternoon of that day one of our our point men stepped on an IED and and luckily it didn't uh it didn't work right something something in it was broken so just the blasting cap exploded but as you know where they put one IED there's usually going to be two or three and so essentially that became an area that we were about 100% sure there was going to be another IED in there somewhere and so I just started got my metal detector out and started trying to find the safe path and you know one second I'm up here with my metal detector and the next second I'm on my back uh screaming for screaming for my life so it's just instant instantaneous like tele like being teleported. Really I don't have any memory but besides here and then here you know yeah wow I mean I I was knocked unconscious I think but then I you know woke up about 20 seconds later or something like that. And how long before the guys obviously they've got to clear a path to get to you haven't they had to clear a path so it probably took them about I imagine the path they cleared was pretty hasty um but yeah I would say I I have no real semblance of time but minute and a half couple minutes probably before were they able to you know safely get to me and start putting tourniquets on me and give me a shot of morphine and then you know they called in the Cassie back and took me to a tank tank went and met a helicopter and after that I was uh taken to the hospital. Then they put me unconscious again I then then I didn't wake up for another 48 hours. That's when you were back in Germany. That's when I get to Germany yeah and woke up and then that you know that's when I found out the more specifics about my injury like I knew my legs had been severely damaged. I was going to lose some parts of them I knew that they were gone I didn't know how high um but then that's what you know that's where I found out above the knee and you know it's basically the most relevant information I found out there was the level of my injuries. And how long were you in Germany then before they could you know I take it just to stabilize you and then yeah I think just stabilize and get you on the first flight back to America I don't I I think I was less there less than 24 hours 12 hours or something like that. Yeah that's incredible. Yeah no it's amazing that you can be that severely injured and then be back home in four days.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Yeah and I think that's something I think the medicine in in Afghanistan was insane in terms of you know developing it for the civilian world as well.

SPEAKER_02 28:01

Yeah the doctors are amazing uh the things they learned about how to treat traumatic injuries and set people up for prosthetics and everything like that was incredible. The technology that came out of it you know the with in terms of prosthetic legs and prosthetic limbs was incredible. I was also I I also benefited from the fact that my injury was you know pretty straightforward they just needed to amputate at a certain level and that's all you know I didn't have a lot of uh additional yeah injuries besides just the legs so yeah I was fortunate no yeah no absolutely and and and it's also what I found in your book is you you had this drive like immediately to uh you set yourself goals I felt like you know or you know you you always had these goals to achieve and I love that you know and you know you you've had this catastrophic uh injury and it it it hasn't held you back it's it just pushed you for forward.

SPEAKER_00 29:03

And I think reading that your book this thing I wanted to ask you was where did that drive come from? You you know everything was a challenge but you you wanted to meet it head on and and you did. And and it it's it's yeah it's inspi it's it's it's inspiring. It's what where did that drive yeah was it always there or was it just the circumstances? Is it what was it passed from family?

SPEAKER_02 29:30

Yeah I mean maybe part of it was there genetically in terms of being able to accept things and move on a little bit easier or and and maybe the ability to just do things I didn't want to have to do. Maybe there's a little bit of that but I think primarily where it came from was I learned in the Marine Corps that when you have a mission you just keep moving forward until you accomplish the mission. And I I was able to to recognize after I got wounded that I still had a I'm not dead. I made it to the hospital I'm gonna keep breathing on my my heart's gonna keep beating and so therefore my life will continue and I still have a mission which is to I want to have a good life. So I just once I recognized that then all these possibilities opened up for me and I just started picking things to try and I I you know you you're lucky you get a a pathway pretty quickly is given is illuminated and given to you uh early on because it's it you you have to recover so and they had a a system in place to recover double above the MBT so I just got plugged into that system uh pretty quickly so I immediately had a pathway uh towards I was doing something I was being busy I was I so this is what I need to do in order to continue on uh so I was very fortunate in that now then I I went into that that pathway and I started trying to figure out how I can take it to the next level and how I can make myself even better from within that uh eventually but yeah I was very fortunate that I had a a pathway early on and just I recognized that I still have a mission and I'm I need to still have a good life and I need to figure out how to do that.

SPEAKER_00 31:08

No it's phenomenal mate yeah absolutely and I think you know it will you were still in comms with your the Marine Corps at all when that came up on the horizon, you know um and and the the drive to be there, you know, you knew your limitations, you know obviously getting there that you wanted to rest so you could enjoy the next day.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

So you you even knew your limitations as well so you weren't exhausting you know that you know and you weren't put you know hindering your supposed you know what you had you know because you were still uh learning to walk and and you um you knew prosthetic so you knew your limitations and so you could maximize the next day and yeah you know I had a lot I was able to factor in the the need to uh the need to rest and not push myself to the absolute limit and to the point that I couldn't go in and essentially train the next day. You can't just go in and and and destroy yourself every single day. You have to be measured in the way that you uh recover and I just try to I just tried to treat it like as if I was an athlete and that's what an athlete would do. You wouldn't go in there and deadlift a thousand pounds every single day because it's not sustainable and you won't actually get stronger and better. Yeah so you got to titrate it. And then yeah having that goal of being able to go to the the Marine Corps ball and see my buddies and and show them that I was going to be okay and that was a really important goal to me. So it was another thing that pushed me forward and made me want to uh come in and stay longer and push myself even harder.

unknown 32:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:39

And do you still keep in touch with those guys? Yeah you know we don't talk every day or anything but from time to time. Yeah yeah in the same way that most men you know stay in touch you know talk to them once a year. Yeah once a year or something like that once every two years. Yeah. Hey how's it going? Good all right see you in two years. See you later yeah yeah that's exactly it I haven't spoken to my profession for about six months um you know when that yeah no I agree and that's it and I I think then you know going from there and obviously you were in the Paralympics yeah what 18 months later uh yeah what July of 2010 September 2012 so a little over two years I guess yeah two years and you've got a sporting background because that's a hell of an achievement by the way not really uh well I played sports as a kid but no not really I mean I worked out a lot in the Marine Corps but you know when I went on my first appointment I found this website called Jim Jones G O I M J O N E S there they were the reason I found the website is because their trainers trained the actors for the 300 movie. They made them all chiseled and everything. Yeah so I was just really fortunate that I found that website because the guy that was writing a lot of the content he was right named Mark Twight um he was he was a former climber and he was writing about training and how and how you can connect the your mindset to physical training. And so I I read like everything that I could read on that website. And so that's kind of what imbued me with a little bit of at least a little bit of technical or uh philosophical knowledge about how to be an athlete and how to approach it. I'd never really done it in that way before um but I at least knew all these you know academic philosophical things about what you know how athletes need to train. And so when it came time for me to be an athlete I kind of had that prerequisite knowledge so that I could apply it.

SPEAKER_00 34:43

And what what inspired you to do that then?

SPEAKER_02 34:46

Is it I take it a challenge or sort of I just wanted to find you know I I I found out about the Paralympics because I was just looking for ways that I could still work out in the gym hard um I found about the Paralympics I saw they had rowing I knew rowing was a hard exercise and then it just a lot of things had to fall into place where uh a Navy veteran that was running a disabled rowing program down the road came into the clinic one day and I met him and I expressed interest in rowing because I had learned about it and he said well you should come and join my program and try it out and I went okay awesome I did and then he knew a a young lady that was wanting to go to the Paralympics that was a double bug in the MBT and we met and we you know um got along and we rode well together and then it just so happened that she was able to go and and she wanted to go and so a lot of things fell into place uh at the right time that I've retired and I had needed something to do and so I figured Paralympics are coming up so I should try and go to the Paralympics.

SPEAKER_00 35:46

Amazing that that's phenomenal I mean people spend a life wanting to you know go to some you know something like that. Yeah I think it again it goes back to that drive that you have and and to sort of always pushing yourself to the next um the next challenge and and my God and how did you do in the Paralympics by the way we yeah we won bronze.

SPEAKER_02 36:09

If we had another year to train maybe we would have won gold but you know I didn't figure out that I wanted to go to the Paralympics until a certain time and then uh yeah if I could do anything I would have just uh started training for it two weeks after I woke up in the hospital but uh you know I didn't you know you only figure things out as you as you figure things out um but yeah it was it was amazing the bet I mean the best thing that came out of it was I met my wife there she was rowing for uh Great Britain she won a gold medal in a different uh you know boat category and uh we hit it off uh when we when we met in a casino bar after after the competition was over and we stayed in touch and ended up dating for four years and she uh finally moved over and we got married.

SPEAKER_00 36:52

That's phenomenal absolutely phenomenal incident is it's it's I don't want to say defined your life but it's it's it's it's taken you to places that may have not have happened. Yeah and by pursuing things other things happen. Yeah and I think I think that's the great thing and I think it can happen in in any sort of medium and then obviously with yourself you took what you had and you turned it into a positive and and you just all these little goals. Every time I'm reading your book you know even you've got the what you call it the little terrorist in your head I mean you know who's trying to pull you down because that can hinder a lot of people but yeah yourself and and push you on and saying you're not going to defeat me next day you know and you're always next thing it's the shorties to the yes I want to try the new prosthetics with the the the bendy knee and and how that helps you.

SPEAKER_02 37:42

It's the Marine Corps ball it's yeah Rowan and then and then it's good to have always have something that you're working towards um that's what spurs you on something that's important though is is you know better so and something that can help other people is even better. So there's a little there was a little bit of turmoil with me in my rec in all this because I'm and you read about it in the book uh the Paralympics wasn't really super fulfilling for me even though it was great experience and everything and I was successful in it it wasn't fulfilling because I was doing it for me more than anything else and bike ride across the country same thing. It was a great accomplishment and but it was still more about me and then finally with the month of marathons I was doing it for other people and even though it was really hard and really um incredibly challenging I enjoyed the entire thing because because I finally had I finally recognized that I needed to be doing something for other people uh not just myself yeah and and you can have a goal that's about other people that's what gives you strength and that's what that's how you can keep stacking it up and and and but even if you know have something that you're working on even if you can't figure out what it needs to be just work on something.

SPEAKER_00 39:00

Yeah I I I couldn't say it my better myself. I mean my God yeah you're you're right I think you know you you're you're right it's I suppose if you're just doing it for yourself constantly it's probably gonna feel quite empty at certain point and you're gonna get bored as well. Um but doing it for other people is what can I do next?

SPEAKER_02 39:19

You know and and so for the month of marathons and what brought you around to that and and who were you yeah I don't know if you've no I don't know if you've noticed this in the UK but in the beginning of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan all veterans in America were kind of seen as noble strong indomitable heroes. But by the time 2015 2016 rolled around all veterans were essentially broken heroes. I mean name me uh a war of a movie with veterans in it where the veteran character like a movie or a TV show or a news story or a song where the veteran character every single one of them is just hope essentially hopelessly haunted by what ways they've seen and constantly the cusp of implosion like name me a movie or a TV show where the veteran character isn't that and you just you basically can't I don't I don't think I can think of one no uh besides the news stories that I'm in with the month of marathons. It's basically that's the angle that everybody was taking and while it is a true thing that can happen it wasn't it wasn't me and it wasn't my friends and it wasn't the vast veterans and I didn't like the fact that that was the only story people were hearing. I didn't like it. And so I figured what I needed to do was um change that perception back uh to or do what I could to change that perception back to what I thought it should be. And the only way I could figure on doing that was to create my own story and the story I figured I should create was a guy that ran all these marathons because that was something that I was interested in doing too. So I I figured out a way to uh link together something that I was already interested in wanting to do and uh a way I could help other people. And that's the key. I mean that's the bet that's the best you can do if if you can link those two things together that's awesome. Always opt towards ways you can help other people but if you can link those two things together that's even better.

SPEAKER_00 41:17

Oh absolutely I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more and and again I you know here on the podcast another podcast is sort of in my research for this that you know everyone wants to do a mouse run. I do but I know I I I I'm not a runner I'm more of a I say sprinter from my rugby background is is running long distances you know and have you always been a long distance runner or was that something new for you?

SPEAKER_02 41:40

Is that something I was good at running ever since I was a kid. I was always one of the fastest kids in my class I was always pretty talented at the uh three mile run in the Marine Corps with not that much training. So I come I think one of the things I realized in my recovery was I had a natural talent for running. I was I was doing the 18 minute 5K as a double above knee amputee when I was training for triathlons. So I recognized that and so then and then when um when I had that realization about what this you know taking control of this narrative uh I had just recently remembered that I'm a pretty decent runner. I had natural talent for it and I had run a marathon during my in the last year and I went oh what if I link those two things and I also had heard about a couple people that were running a bunch of back-to-back marathons in various places and I went oh that would be that could be something I could do and I would run it in a bunch of different cities so that as many eyeballs would be on it as possible. So yeah I always kind of had a I never really ran that that much long distance until after I was wounded but I was always kind of an had a natural talent for running.

SPEAKER_00 42:46

And then and then the the idea of doing them back to back to back to back. Times 31.

SPEAKER_02 42:51

Yeah I mean I want to do something that was that what that people would essentially see and look think was crazy. Or they would think it wasn't possible. No it's not crazy because I was successful. No you didn't absolutely since I was successful I'm a genius.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

Oh absolutely if I failed then I would have been crazy. Yeah and that's how many people then have done it since you then have you been you know have people done it since well as a double above MBT I don't think so anyone or even anyone there's plenty of able bodied people that have done that many back to back marathons.

SPEAKER_02 43:20

Well I don't know I don't know about plenty but there's not an insignificant number of people that have done you know similar things um so yeah I don't I don't I mean I I don't have no idea I know I know that there have been any double above me amputees that have done it. Hopefully you know somebody sees your story even now and can take something from that and do it because you've done that's kind of the purpose too yeah is is creating a story out there getting a story out there for anybody that that they can see and and go, oh well here's a guy that lost both of his legs and then did all these things maybe I can do it too. Yeah and I

SPEAKER_00 44:00

And I I took this again. You read a book called The Tribe. I want to say Sebastian Young. Yeah, I've read it. Sebastian Younger. Yeah, yeah, it it's it's obviously, you know, I've heard uh you s speak about this on another podcast. Um the wounded uh the is it the wounded veteran and that that part, you know, where it's all about taking personal uh uh accountability for the podcast name?

SPEAKER_02 44:24

Oh no no the um the is it the book you read in the is it the tribe the book the tribe I know that tribe is a book that I have read and I probably would have talked about it. I don't know if I'm remembering the exact um moment in time and I think it's all about um the notes now that I made earlier.

SPEAKER_00 44:42

Um it's all about the the wounded um the wounded veteran, I want to say, where it's all about, you know, you have to help yourself as well.

SPEAKER_02 44:51

You can have all the help given to you, but you've also got to help yourself in in that recovery and well yeah, people are gonna live your life for you. Yeah. Yes. Oh, yeah. Maybe what I was talking about was I realized that the physical therapist wanted me to be successful and they were giving me all these things to do and wanted to help me, but at the end of the day, they went back to their life, I went back to my life.

SPEAKER_00 45:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:10

So if I didn't want to do the physical therapy that day, they would go, okay. Yeah. And then, but and it doesn't really affect them. No. Because they go back to their life. So they're not gonna do it for me, they can't do it for me. And so if I wanted it to be done, I had to be the one to do it.

unknown 45:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:27

As much as they did want to help me. Exactly that, you know, and and if you're not gonna help yourself, then it's no skin off their nose. And again, it's going back to you know, in your book, you were you're getting up at six o'clock every morning, and you would, you know, you can't.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

Yeah, something like that. Yeah. Therapy started at seven, I think, for me. And you wanted extra sessions. I think I was out of there at two or three. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:46

Yeah. And you would, you know, you would you wanted the extra sessions, you wanted more.

SPEAKER_02 45:50

You I just stayed. I mean, I only got the one hour session with my physical therapist, and I just stayed and I just did my own thing, or she would just keep giving me if she had other patients, yeah, uh, they would just keep saying I would say, All right, I'm done with that, what should I do now? And they'd go, all right, go do this drill over there. Go walk over there and do it. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:08

Yeah, go over there. Leave me alone.

SPEAKER_02 46:09

And I just stayed. Eventually, I just tried to become a little bit more self-sustaining. But yeah, I would just Yeah. There's no reason I needed to leave.

SPEAKER_00 46:16

No, and and I I think that's it again, because you could sit in your bed, and it's just like this is definitely a question down the line and and and binge watch Seinfeld or read books. 24 out of the book. 24, yeah, 24, yeah, 24. Um, and you could have done that, easily have done that, and and and you know, drank, you know, ate crab food and and crap, you know, drinks, and but you didn't. You were there to I want to do this. I you know, you had goals.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:40

And and sitting in your bed, you're not going to achieve those goals. So again, it sort of all feeds into this this drive you have. And yeah, brilliant. It it really is. It's just you've seen everything as and you know, there's goals, and I love that. And I know I keep on. Yeah, it just boils down to the fact that I wanted to do it.

SPEAKER_02 46:57

Yeah, that's really all it is. If you want to do it, then you'll do it. If you don't want to do it, then you won't. That's on you. And luckily, I had a good reason. I had a reason that made me want to do it. And a lot of people don't have that.

SPEAKER_00 47:07

No. No, that's amazing. And how did you so moving on to obviously I know we're coming up close to an hour, how did you come on working for Eclon Front then? And and then Jocko, how did that come about?

SPEAKER_02 47:20

Yeah, um, so I went on Jocko's podcast when I was preparing for the month of marathons. He was gracious enough to have me on, and then so I went on the podcast and he had me on again afterwards. And also during afterwards, um, I started getting asked to come and speak at various things. The speakers bureau reached out to me and asked me if I would be on their you know, roll of speakers, and I said sure. And I haven't really done that much speaking, but slowly and surely I figured out how to get better and better at it. Um until eventually, you know, I was okay, I was doing okay. Um, but when in uh 2021 or something like that, I think 2020 somewhere in there, uh, my friend Jason Gardner, which he was another instructor at Echelon Front, he invited me to do something that we call Battlefield Review, where we go out to Battle of Gettysburg and we go through the battle and learn the leadership lessons there and how to apply it to our lives. And so he invited me out there, and I went and did Battlefield as an attendee. And uh the only thing I really had to talk about on a from a professional standpoint was trying to be a motivational speaker and doing all the speaking. And at one point, Leif, uh, the co-founder of Echelon Front, he and co-author of you know, Extreme Ownership, he came up to me and he was asking me some questions about, you know, how do you get events? Do you your does your speakers bureau do anything? And I said, No, they don't do much. And he said, Well, why don't you, you know, come over and see, you know, check out what we're doing, see if you might be a good fit at Echelon Front. And I went, uh, well, if you're gonna offer me the dream job, then I'm gonna say, I'm gonna take you up on that. I'm gonna say yes. So, you know, they got me plugged in with the operations team and they started sending me out to some events that other instructors were doing so I could just see what they were doing and see if I thought it might be a good fit. And then I said, Yes, I want to do it. And they said, All right, let's see if you can do it. So they started sending me out, and I started it's a process in which you get increasingly more opportunity to speak until eventually they decide whether or not you would you would be a good fit as an instructor. And luckily and fortunately enough for me, they said I would be I'd be a good fit for the team. Um, and they brought me out as a full-time instructor. And I've been, I think this is gonna be I'm in my in my fourth year, and it's the best job ever.

SPEAKER_00 49:38

And do you think that feeds into going back what you said earlier about helping others as well?

SPEAKER_02 49:44

Yeah, you know, I've I every time I get to go on and do an event and I teach a workshop or I do a keynote afterwards, I just sit there and I just absolutely cannot believe that I get to be an instructor at Echelon Front because there's so many people that would want to do it. And it's like me, me, really. Uh, and I'm just so thankful and so uh feel so much gratitude that I get the opportunity to be on the team. Um I'm like, well, how did that how did I get to be the one that got the opportunity? And you know, not to blow, you know, you know, toot my own horn or anything, but I did, I guess that became it came about because I just tried to do things, I tried to help people, and I did, I picked really, really hard things to do in a as a way of helping other people, and because of that, opportunities came my way. And I didn't I didn't sit there and and pre-plan it or anything. I didn't go, oh, you know what I'm gonna do is go to the Paralympics and then ride my bike across the country, and then that's gonna create this opportunity and that opportunity, and then maybe one day Jocko and Leif won't mean I didn't I didn't do that, I just did the thing because I knew it was the right thing to do. And if you do that, then yeah, good good things are probably gonna start happening for you. Opportunities are gonna present themselves. So just do the right thing for the right reasons, and in the end, you will you'll get ahead.

SPEAKER_00 51:10

I couldn't disagree, I couldn't agree more with with that. And I think you're right. It's just yeah, I think that's wonderful. Uh, you know, and yeah, I'm trying to think of the right words, and I'm trying to I don't want to get them wrong, but yeah, I I think what you said is wonderfully said, you know, you you be you know, you said it you know really well.

SPEAKER_02 51:29

And and same thing with my wife. I mean, I I joined the Marine Corps, I I did something uh that most people probably wouldn't want to do. I took on the job of finding an ID as I got wounded, decided to go to the Paralympics, um, met my wife, and now I have a beautiful, awesome, amazing family that I and uh so and it's the same exact thing. I I just did things that I thought were the right thing and it worked out for me.

SPEAKER_00 51:55

Absolutely. And going back to your leadership courses, then do you see the change in people, you know, your attendees, or you know, um, do you see do you see do you notice a difference in them from say day one to um uh I don't know how many you know days your course is?

SPEAKER_02 52:10

Yeah, well it's it's it's it's usually like a day, maybe two days at a time. But and then sometimes you might come back with the same client several times. Um, but yeah, I definitely, I mean, even over the course of a day, I see the the difference where they haven't heard anything about leadership, they don't know what extreme ownership is, and by the end of it, they are starting to see how effective it's going to be in their life if they start taking ownership of their life and extreme ownership of all their problems and everything that affects their mission. Um and yeah, you know, people will reach out to me and say, I was having this problem, and I applied extreme ownership, and now you know I'm doing a lot better. Uh, we have a conference that we call Muster. It's two days, and after day one, uh a few people get the opportunity to sit down with instructors. I just got an email from a guy. He, you know, I we talked about his problem he was having on day one. I gave him a little bit of advice, a little bit of guidance, and then he went out and took that and ran with it. And he just, you know, he just emailed me just now saying, you know, everything's getting I'm on a good pathway with solving this problem. So yeah, we see major differences. There's people come up to us all the time saying extreme ownership saved their life, saved their marriage, saved their job, saved their company. Um allowed them to lose hundreds of pounds, all these different things. It's all just extreme ownership, and it's all just taking complete responsibility for for your life and and what affects your mission in life. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 53:38

That is absolutely that's why I have the best job ever, man. I get to help people. And I I love that about you. And I you know, it it's it's not about you. It's about everyone else and helping everyone else. And uh, you know, you got yourself to a position, I think the drive immediately, you know, it it's really evident in your book. Um and and I I have to say I laughed as well in your introduction. Um I think you know, I don't know when you your brother, you know, um you know, uh it's like calling you Lieutenant Dan. I mean the fact you included that, you know, you sort of made light of it and and the fact that you're able to do that as well. I chuckled because I thought, man, this guy he's definitely military, by the way. So, you know, the only military guy would say that kind of joke. Um yeah and uh you know, but you know, the the the the the you know the introduction from your mother, or sorry, the forward from your mother as well was was beautiful. It was just wow, just everything about her is is is gold. Next step, next thing. What's next? What's next? What's next?

SPEAKER_02 54:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:36

So what is next? What is next?

SPEAKER_02 54:40

I don't know. I don't have anything uh big planned. I mean, honestly, if I could just keep what I have rolling along and just making steady improvement of what I've got already, um that would be amazing if I could just keep raising my family and and growing my family and making that better and just keep improving as an instructor at Ashland Front, keep building that come uh help helping that team and and company build and grow and the message grow. If I could just keep doing that, that'd be that'd be awesome.

SPEAKER_00 55:11

That's brilliant. And obviously, as we obviously come to the hour because I don't take too much of your time. Again, going back to your book, you do a lot of reading, you do a lot of watching TV. How do you unwind now? Or what was your favorite book, or what kind of books do you read, what kind of TV shows do you watch?

SPEAKER_02 55:27

I mostly listen to books at this point. Um, because with you know, with kids, you have a little bit less time to just sit down and read. But if I'm working out in the gym, or you know, if I'm playing, pushing my daughter on the swing or doing the dishes or fold laundry or things like that, I can have a book in one year or a podcast in one year or something like that. Um yeah, we usually I like to fish, I like to work out, I like to just do things that my kids are interested in, spend time with them. My wife and I like to spend time uh you know doing stuff outside, camping. Uh, you know, we'll watch shows at night sometimes to unwind in that way. Um there's not tons of unwinding that occurs because we're usually done with the kids around eight and then we go to bed at nine. So there's not tons of unwinding time. So you have to say just kind of be comfortable being wound. Um, but also just be able to find enjoyment in the fact that you're spending time with your family, which is the most important thing you can do. And just even though sometimes it's not easy to uh it's not easy time, is uh you just have to be able to be comfortable and be happy in the and every moment of that.

SPEAKER_00 56:38

That's amazing, Rob. Thank you so much. That is beautiful. And then if people obviously I just obviously I've taken an hour of your time, and my god, that's no worries. Um if you want to get a copy of Rob's book, I am gonna do a giveaway for our patrons for putting your legs away. Um, I'll do a giveaway, you know, um, for our patrons. Um and Rob, thank you so much for your yeah. I'll have to thank Ben for this, you know, uh for this and you know.

SPEAKER_02 57:01

You'll be happy to know that finally made it happen.

SPEAKER_00 57:04

Absolutely. And and and you obviously going back, you mentioned, you know, brotherhoods of heat brotherhood of heroes. Have you ever been to Peleliu? Do you ever get you know, quick one, do you ever got the chance to go to Peleliu? No, that'd be cool to go. I don't know how you've been uh do they let people go there? I do. They do. They do. That'd be awesome. I'll have to send you. Did I send you a sledge figure? I can't remember if I did or not.

SPEAKER_02 57:23

Yeah, you did, yeah, yeah, I got it. It's on my uh it's on my son's uh dresser right now.

SPEAKER_00 57:27

Uh I got some sand from Peleliu, by the way, if you want some. Oh, that's awesome, man. That's cool. Again, I'll have to hook you up with these guys, uh, tales from the core, uh, Neil Father. Uh, they went there with Scott Gibson completed. Akak Haldane. Oh, cool. And they went to me some sand. So yeah, I have Akak. Gee. Akak, Akak Haldane. Yeah, he's a good guy. Yeah. The core lost development. Canadian, though, is Canadian. He is Canadian. Really?

SPEAKER_02 57:51

I didn't I didn't remember that. That's that's good. That's fine.

SPEAKER_00 57:54

Canadians are awesome. I'll tell him that, mate. He's a good lad. I know a lot of the Canadian Canadian. He's a good one, he is. He is a good Canadian. Um no, Rob, thank you for the. Oh, the actor, the actor, the actor. Oh, the ACAC, the actor, yeah, Scott. Yeah, okay. I want to say Massachusetts. Yeah, that's that would have surprised me that, yeah, but uh it's not surprising. I went to college with a Medal of Honor recipient. Oh, what was his name? For a football program from his college. Oh, there's a but anyway, that's another thing. Yes, but mate, Rob, thank you so much for this. Um, I'll get this you know put um released uh for our patrons hopefully tomorrow, and then obviously I'll put in general least, you know, a day or two afterwards. But uh, thank you so much for your time. And I I really loved I love reading your book, it's inspirational, and I've loved talking to you. I was really, really nervous, I'll be honest with you. Um but no, it it's the time's flowing by, and I just want to thank you so much for your time.

SPEAKER_02 58:48

Thanks, man. I appreciate you having me on. It's been great talking to you. We'll talk to you soon. I'll see you later.

SPEAKER_00 58:54

See you after.