Navy SEAL Commander: What's Making You Better Probably Isn't

The Grateful Podcast with Jack Wagoner episode 137

What if most of what you're doing to grow yourself isn't actually growing you?

Rich Diviney spent 20 years as a Navy SEAL commander. 13 deployments, 11 of them to Iraq and Afghanistan. He ran selection for one of the most elite SEAL commands in the world, deciding who was good enough to operate at the apex of human performance and who wasn't. He has written three books on optimal performance, trained leaders at Google, McKinsey, the 49ers, and McLaren, and built the SEALs' "Mind Gym" to teach operators how to train their attention as deliberately as their bodies.

In this conversation, he laid out almost everything most people are doing to grow themselves that isn't actually working. The gym isn't growing you if you don't dread it. Optimism alone is inert without action paired to it. Faith and confidence are not the same thing. The narcissism that gets you to elite places gets ripped away the moment you arrive. And when you stop pushing into real discomfort, you don't plateau. You start dying.

We go deep on what actually develops elite performers, why most leadership advice misses the layer beneath behavior, the neuroscience of the anterior mid-cingulate cortex, the trap of optimizing inside one domain, and why faith is belief without evidence and confidence is belief with evidence (and why both matter).

If you've ever felt like you're working hard at the wrong things, this one's for you.

⏰ TIMESTAMPS
0:00 — Cold open
1:45 — 21 years a SEAL. Where did this start?
2:15 — Twin brothers, Chuck Yeager, and the dream of flying jets
4:25 — Why he chose SEAL (the narcissism nobody admits)
7:30 — What replaces the narcissism once you arrive
8:21 — "Any narcissism that gets you to BUDS gets ripped away minute one"
11:24 — Victor Frankl, the choice point, and the duality of gratitude and ambition
15:30 — The neuroscience of feeling, thought, and action
17:07 — How founders and executives use this in everyday life
19:18 — Bob Proctor, paradigms, and the 97% of thoughts you repeat
22:00 — Driving, road rage, and the expectations we put on strangers
25:00 — "Don't be that guy" (the SEAL principle that travels)
27:30 — Sonder and radical empathy
30:33 — Why Simon Sinek's optimism alone doesn't work
32:37 — Realistic optimism, faith, and confidence
35:41 — Carl Sagan: faith is belief without evidence
38:06 — Trust is generative. What does that actually mean?
40:30 — The day I betrayed my own trust on a run
42:22 — The anterior mid-cingulate cortex (and the Andrew Huberman story)
43:54 — "When you stop growing, you start dying"
45:38 — Are you actually tickling the part of your brain that grows you?
47:38 — When your morning routine is making you weaker
50:14 — Looksmaxing, gym culture, and the trap of one domain
53:36 — A Maslow's hierarchy of hard things
55:30 — One question I should have asked

🔗 GUEST LINKS
Book: The Attributes - https://www.amazon.com/Attributes-Hidden-Drivers-Optimal-Performance/dp/0593133943
Website: https://theattributes.com
Instagram: @rich_diviney
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richdiviney

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Rich Devinny, welcome to the Grateful Podcast. Well, thank you, Jack. It's great to be here. So I'm glad we were to make it happen. 100%. Look, looking at your story, um, and you know, 2021 years in the military, 13 overseas deployments. Now you've written three books, you've been on a ton of podcasts, you've helped different companies and organizations in their hiring, their leadership. I'm curious, what was it about you as a kid before you joined uh at 20, before you went through BUDS at 22? Um, what led you down this career path?

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Yeah, you know, um interestingly, I ever since I was a little kid, like I mean, talking seven, eight years old, I want, well, I have a twin brother. My twin brother and I both wanted to be pilots. We wanted to fly, and we knew military was the, you know, military jets, right? That was the goal. Um, our favorite books growing up were Chuck Yeager's autobiography called Jaeger, which I recommend to anybody, and also The Right Stuff, which is a great book about the beginnings of the space program. So everything about our being wanted to kind of fly jets. Um, Air Force was obviously an option, but then you learn about Navy, and those guys land on ships, and we're like, well, there's no better, harder flying than landing on ships. Uh plus, if you go, if you join the Navy, you're always going to be on a coast somewhere. So that's a good deal. But um, so we always want to be Navy pilots, even before Top Gun came out. Um so with that bent, um, military was always kind of the plan. Uh it was late 80s, early 90s. I learned about the SEAL teams. There are very few things about the SEAL teams back then. Um certainly we weren't, you know, the SEALs weren't as well known by far as they are today. Uh, but I learned about them and I started reading about them. I said, well, these guys seem really cool. And so um, once I was in our I was in our ROTC program at Purdue University while I was going to college and came, you know, when the decision came, hey, do you want to try for, what do you want to try for? Um, I did not, I knew I could be a pilot, but I didn't want to wonder if I could be a SEAL. So I basically said, well, let me try for SEALs. And uh yeah, fortunately I got picked up and got picked up and also made it through training because that's a big one too. But uh yeah, that was the impetus of it. I felt like these guys were, they're the jack of all trades, but they were really born from the water. Everything about their inception and their operations was waterborne. And for me, I loved, I love everything about the ocean and and water and being underwater and all that stuff. So that was very cool for me.

SPEAKER_02 2:26

So, what was the why behind that? Because I can hear you talking about like the water and it being hard and difficult, and you didn't want to wonder what if afterward. But was it doing something that was hard? Is that what was attractive about it? Was it doing something that you nobody else you knew had done? What was the why behind putting yourself in those hard positions?

SPEAKER_01 2:47

Yeah, it's a great question. I think, I think I'd love to, I'd love to believe there was a uh there was uh at least an element of of um kind of uh good for good for mankind, serve people, you know, do, you know, be patriotic, serve my country, which I think there was. Uh however, I think to be honest, uh a lot of it, as was the case with most of us at that age who want to be SEALs, uh can I do something that very few people can do? There's a you know, I talk about in my attributes book, the attribute of narcissism, and I take away the stigma. I mean, obviously, narcissistic personality disorder, that's bad, but narcissism as an elemental attribute is just the desire to stand out and be recognized and feel be special, be unique. And um, and I think that that lives in every one of us. And I certainly am uh am able to concede that that was a huge part of it for any of us who wanted to go to SEAL training or be a pilot for that matter. I mean, any of us who want to do something distingu that distinguishes us as different, as special, as unique, there's a there's a drive there. And certainly that was part of it.

SPEAKER_02 3:47

Yeah, I think that a lot of greatness seems to come from this egocentric uh want to do something that nobody else has done before. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

And it doesn't have to be a bad thing. I mean, again, uh, you know, you look at athletes, professional athletes, uh, two of the attributes that are often most very predominant in all pro-athletes are competitiveness and narcissism, uh, because athletics is a very narcissistic endeavor. And I don't, and again, I don't want people to think of that in a bad way. It's just it's an endeavor that's very um focused on I want to be the best at something. I want to showcase that to others. Uh and that drives, that's a motivational factor. And of course, it can inspire others, which is the positive end of a lot of pro-athletics. It obviously it entertains, that's what athletics is all about, is to entertain, but it also inspires, which is nice. So, so the the the the the key, I think, is to not make all these words 100% pejorative. There's obviously, there's obviously bad narcissism, there's malignant narcissism, there's clinically bad narcissism. We see that every day, unfortunately, in our politics. But I know you and I won't get political, we don't need to, but there are um there's also there's also positive manifestations. The the desire, the drive to stand out and be unique can be in a way that helps and inspires others. Um so there's so we just have to, we have to, I think to be the best performers that we can, we have to recognize that in ourselves uh and and understand it and define it so we can actually maximize it and optimize it to the best of our ability in a in a in a healthy way, hopefully.

SPEAKER_02 5:23

So from my observation, narcissism is a great catalyst for doing something great, doing something difficult, doing something unique, such as you uh going to buds. Me when I uh moved to France uh at 16. I wanted to do something that nobody had done before, right? That was that was the motivation. I think for a lot of young people, doing something that is extraordinary, that is often the motivator. But what I've observed is that doesn't take you all the way. It only takes you so far. And at some point, you have to find another why, something deeper, something more service-based that takes you the rest of the way, that makes it uh something that can be more consistent in the long term that's less of a you're you're less prone to burnout, I guess. And reading your story, that seems to be your identity as a husband, as a father became your why after the narcissism kind of wore out. Yeah. What did it look like in between where maybe your narcissism, maybe the, oh, I've already accomplished the thing that I set out to do. I made it through buds. Uh, I am a seal. I did the thing that not many others have done before maybe you had like came into that identity as more of a family man. What was the in between like? Was it uncomfortable? Uh, and what did it look like like in your identity?

SPEAKER_01 6:43

That's a great one. I I I would say um, and you and it's a great point. Um, the well, first of all, I'll tell you this: the any any narcissism that gets you to the beaches of buds uh gets ripped away from you minute one of buds, because you are immediately placed in a position where you are not special at all and you are just miserable. And so, so one of the secrets to SEAL training is that idea that the yeah, it you know, all these stories and movies and TV, uh not for us, of course, because you know, back then it didn't we had a couple books, but anyway, this this this delusion of grandeur can certainly get you there. Uh, but as soon as you're there, you recognize very quickly, oh wait, this is not glamorous. This is not what I thought it would be. I always tell guys who want to be SEALs, the first thing I say is, hey, first of all, remember when you're doing the job, there's never any cool music playing. Okay, it always sucks. Doing the job, you know, you're in cold, dark water with sea life teeming around you and enemy hunting you. You might be jumping out of an airplane, but you're not, it's not fun skydiving. It's 20,000 feet, pitch black with gear and night vision into combat areas. So, so they will so that the that perfection will suck the fun. And climbing, you said you mentioned you love climbing. Yeah, you don't do fun climbing when you're you know opting in the SEAL teams, right? You do climbing to get you to, you do all that stuff just to get to a gunfight, right? So, so the the the that that grandeur is is ripped away from you. But I think what replaces it is uh, and this is prior to you know meeting my wife and and and starting a family. What replaces it is a desire to show up for your teammates and be there for your teammates. And so you you learn very quickly that the fulfillment comes from being able to do this work with people that you really respect, honor, love, and uh and and do it for them, you know, and be and be what you be the best you can be for them. Uh and so I think that's the healthy replacement that most the majority of guys go through. There are some guys who don't, um, in in whatever spec ops or military profession you choose, not just SEALs. But for the most, for the majority of us, it's replaced by this desire to do the best I can for those around me, those in my span of care. Um that's a different way to stand out, it's a different way to fulfill. So you're not, you're almost replacing that that that desire to be unique, you know, with a with a smaller one. I want to be unique by doing the best I can for these people. I want to show them that I'm worthy of their teammate. Uh I'm a I'm a worthy teammate to them. That's a very healthy replacement. And of course, you know, if you're lucky enough to to start a family, that's a whole different level. Um and then you have to start weighing what's more important because those family and military, you ask any military family, but family and military compete all the time. Uh and and it's not, it's it's just a way of the business. The military does it tries to do a great job of making sure that everything's balanced, but you just you can't. I mean, you know, the the the government, the military asks you to do things that are gonna take you away from your family for a long period of time, some cases forever. Uh so you just have to you have to recognize that.

SPEAKER_00 9:46

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 9:48

I recently read Victor Frankel's uh Man's Search for Meaning. Oh, yeah. And I I found a lot of overlap in what you've talked about and in that book, in the fact that a lot of times when you're doing the really hard thing, you almost identified more with your family and that type of identity as a dad, as a husband, than you did as a Navy SEAL, even when you were on a mission sometimes. Yeah. Um and it it's got me really thinking about the reason that I started this podcast in the first place, which uh I'll tell you a quick story. I was in France, I had like I was 16, I then turned 17, and I'd accomplished everything I set out to do when I was there. When I got there, I didn't know any French, I didn't know anybody in the country, and I was like realizing I was spending all of my money on travel and I wasn't earning anything, so I set three goals for myself. I wanted to be fluent in French, I wanted to make a bunch of friends, and I wanted to start a business. And by the end of the year, about like March um so school year, so by March the next year, I'd done all three of those things. I was about to be nationally certified for fluency in French. I had a great friend group and I had four employees for a YouTube automation company I'd built for my bedroom there. And I had this, I have this clear, distinct memory of standing in front of the mirror uh in my bedroom late at night, absolutely exhausted. Like I feel no better than when I first got here. And I realized I was real I had really speed run, speed ran this uh pattern of looking for fulfillment in the things outside of me and the achievement. And I realized then that I would have to it if I wanted to be fulfilled, if I wanted to be happy, it wasn't going to be anything outside of me. I had to live life through a grateful lens.

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:42

But I also couldn't stop chasing the things outside of me because I found meaning and purpose in the pursuit. So I developed what was called the duality of gratitude and ambition. That's been the basis of a lot of my work. And reading Victor Frankel, I noticed that he said he thought that he got through it, and the people that got through the Holocaust got through it because they had some type of meaning, some type of hope that they'd held on to, whether that was their family that they knew probably wasn't alive, or their wife that they never knew if they'd see again, but they they prayed to them. And I I thought about reading your story being a family man out there in very tough situations, how that must have grounded you in something a little bit deeper, something that you were grateful for in order to then pursue more. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:32

Does that resonate with you? It does. And I think you, first of all, you you you read the the the man's scripts for meeting, I think everybody should read. That's that's a book everybody should read. So so the fact that you read it, well, just your story puts you, you've already, you've already proven yourself to be ahead of the curve in some of the things you've done and and um and self uh self-awareness that you've gained even at just your young age. So I congratulate you on that. But you're what you're a hundred percent right. I think your uh your balance, you you put it, you put it one way. I think I put it the same way, which is I am, I'm, I am, I am always grateful but never satisfied. That's kind of how I look at right. So so you you can be grateful for everything and just maintain a sense of healthy dissatisfaction so that you're always looking to grow and learn. Um and then, yeah, and then really just trying to uh trying to understand that you in any of these moments of duress and challenge, you want to and can anchor yours anchor yourself on something outside of you. You know, the fulfillment can come inside from, you know, it needs to come from inside, but you can anchor yourself on things outside of you. But you know, and it can be your family, it certainly can be your family. That's a that's a real powerful one. I tell you though, in some of the most uh visceral kind of immediate moments in the SEAL teams, it was about the guy standing next to you. You know, you're gonna do what you have to do because you're gonna do it for the guy standing next to you. It can be that close that, you know, kind of in the book I talk about horizons, those horizons can be right in front of you. But you're still focused on something. You're still kind of using something as a grounding wire. Um, but that ability, we, you know, Victor Frankel talks about it. There's that choice point in between the thought. Actually, I guess it's the feeling and the thought. So, so our the the way it the way energy, the way impulses and information comes into our system, it comes first through senses, right? You know, sight, smell, sound, all that stuff. From the senses, it then goes into, it forms a um uh an emotion or a perception, I should say, perception. We have a perception about that sense in some way or fashion. From that perception develops a feeling, okay, and that feeling can be anything. Those first three things happen on, you know, I say unconsciously in our in our limbic brain. We don't have any control over that, okay? But the next thing that happens is our thought, and from the and after the thought, it's the action. That thought and action happen in our limb, in our in our frontal lobe, which means now we have control. And so what Victor talks about is a choice point. The choice point is in between the feeling and the thought. Can we, in fact, initiate a proactive positive thought rather than a reactive negative thought? And we can process those. And he talks about the fact that those who survived actually did that. Um, they don't let that feeling then control their thoughts, then control their actions. They actually take proactive charge of that choice point. So I think that's what you're talking about in the in essence. Um, and the good news is we all can do that. We all have the ability to do that.

SPEAKER_02 15:29

And so we're talking about this in really extreme cases, right? The Holocaust at war. How does this relate to somebody who's listening their everyday life? We have a lot of founders, we have a lot of executives, decision makers at companies that are listening to this. How can people take this information that is applicable in really extreme environments and use it in their everyday life?

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Well, I mean, it's a it's a one of the simplest ways to think about that is because you've heard you've heard it from almost everybody. We've you and I have probably experienced this where the day starts out poorly. This happens, that happens, you get in a spat with someone, whatever that. And then for the rest of the day, it just goes poorly. Example of you letting your emotions and feelings take over your thoughts and your actions because you're focused. So a very simple way to do that is when something happens in your life, it could be as benign as a traffic jam going into work. Um, are you going to let that affect the rest of your day or the rest of your moments, or can you actually take control and reframe that choice point? You can do this multiple times a day, every day, because we always have, every day we have certain things that happen to us and we get to choose. And again, to practice this, all you have to do to begin is to just start being more aware of your emotional state, being more aware of your feelings and what what what your feelings are doing to your mindset. Um, if you get pissed off in traffic while driving, it's important to be able to say, wait a second, why am I pissed off right now? Why why does that affect why does what that person did, he sped by me, okay, and my I'm suddenly I'm mad. Why is that why is that a thing? You know, what what you know you are literally letting someone, what's that old saying is if you if you wish if you wish uh hate and despair on your uh on your enemy or your or your um your opposition, it's it's this it's like drinking poison and hoping you're that the other guy will dry die, right? You're you're just poisoning your own your own biochemistry by doing that. So so we can practice this every day, all day. We can just every single every single moment be aware of what you're feeling and ask yourself, how is what I'm feeling affecting my thoughts and therefore my actions.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Hmm.

SPEAKER_02 17:40

It reminds me of uh are you familiar with Bob Proctor?

SPEAKER_01 17:43

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:44

I yes, I know the name, yes. Okay, I talk about him a lot because I've learned a lot of um my personal development journey through him and some of his programs. And uh he he talks about paradigms and how you know we have uh thoughts in our subconscious mind or in our conscious mind get in per impression into our subconscious mind that then become feelings that we then act upon that create the results in our life, that then creates a cycle, and those results can perpetuate those feelings that then create the the action. And I had uh an amazing therapist on, and he's been on twice now. His name's Trey Tucker. Uh, he just wrote a book called Tough Enough. I have it back here. And he talks about how there's different statistics, it's hard to measure, but we have about 93 to 97 percent of the same thoughts every day. Uh yeah, that's all 93 to 97% of our thoughts on a daily basis are the same as they were yesterday. And if we want to change those thoughts, it then uh end up affecting our emotions, which affect our actions, which affect our results, we have to consciously use the three to five percent that we do have control over, that we do change on a daily basis to consistently impression new thoughts and change our subconscious. And that is how over time we can change action. But listening to you, I find it really interesting that you say we have to start with why, as Simon Sinek would say, when we um when we want to change uh a thought or be aware of a thought, yeah, right, instead of instantly trying to change it and solve the problem. I I do think that one way that we might not always think about this uh instant gratification problem is that when we do have maybe a little bit of road rage, we just instantly try to, you know, snap decision, fix that problem. And people are really becoming fixers. But in order to effectively fix something, I think you do have to start with why. Yeah. Um, and uh, where did you first discover that importance? Where was do you have an example or a story in your life where you think that if you hadn't taken time to maybe think about why you were feeling the way you were, you wouldn't have actually provided an effective solution to the problem?

SPEAKER_01 20:04

Yeah, I mean to come up with an example would be tough because that that's uh that there's so many, but I will say this uh, and I just to just to give the audience a little bit of um uh uh a little bit more to work with. Sometimes the why can be difficult to figure out in the moment. Um and one of the things you can do is you can actually stair-step your way to the why by asking what first. This is this is the classic uh psychological thing of name it to tame it, you know, name your you know, naming your feelings to tame your feelings. Um, because what you're doing, what we have to understand what's going on neurologically is when we begin to feel a certain way, especially as our feelings get to be overwhelming, is and and fear is a great example, is this, but uh, but our limbic brain, the emotional part of our brain, is starting to come to the fore, and our limb our and our and our um our logical brain, our frontal lobe is starting to take a back seat, okay? Um, and so so in highly emotional states, just take fear as an example, what's happening is we are in autonomic or uh autonomic uh overload or or amygdala hijack. Our limbic brain has taken over. Our frontal lobe, conscious decision-making part of brain, has taken a full back seat and we are acting without thinking. One of the ways to stem that retreat of the foot of the frontal lobe is to actually begin to engage in conscious thinking. So a very simple technique is what am I feeling right now? Because as soon as you do that, you engage your conscious frontal lobe, you stem the retreat, you bring your back down to center, and you can say, okay, right now I'm feeling, okay, I say I'm feeling pissed off. Am I really pissed off? Am I angry? What am I, uh, I'm upset. I'm, you know, oh wait, maybe I'm just mad at myself because I I'm on the road and I made the I I I did actually change lanes without a turn signal, whatever that is. Okay. But but just by that process alone, can get your frontal lobe back into a position where you can then ask the why question. And that's when the real deep analysis starts. So so yeah, I could I don't know if I could give uh a a A specific example. I mean, I know I try to, I try to do this as often as possible. A lot of it now I've I've been able to relegate to uh almost an unconscious system, which is good. I've mastered it in a way. Um, but uh but yeah, if I get upset, the road is a great. I mean, I my wife would accuse me of being very impatient on the road. And I I I would concede that's the case. And so if I'm so if I'm driving and I feel myself like, for example, going fast or weaving around people, I can stop and say, okay, wait a second. What the hell am I doing right now? You know, why am I doing, you know, first of all, what am I feeling? And and then why am I behaving the way I am? Um and often that really gets me centered back again.

SPEAKER_02 22:37

So do you think, and this is like off the topic of that, do you think that sometimes you crave to maybe go fast or have some type of adrenaline on the road because your life used to be full of so much adrenaline? And nowadays, since you've maybe left the Navy, you don't feel that as much?

SPEAKER_01 22:56

Well, I would say yes, but I would say that the adrenaline, I the only way the reason why I might say it's not totally that case is because the adrenaline you get from Navy SEAL work the is is so far beyond the adrenal you get from driving on the road. And you'd have to drive really fast. Uh but I do think, yeah, there's a there's again, we all have our preferences, right? I I like to, when I drive, for example, I like to go a decent speed, not but not too fast, but I mean I I like to be I like to feel like I'm making progress, you know. Um and if I feel like there's someone who's impeding my progress, that will start to to trigger me, right? Um if I see you know, if you see oftentimes we get triggered by people we just see who don't behave the way we do, uh, because we generally expect people to behave the way we do. Um and one of the expectations, you know, just of being a Navy SEAL is everything, everything you do as a SEAL. There's a saying in the SEAL teams is don't be that guy. What don't be that guy means is you you're never someone who's going to hold back your teammates or the team in any way. Your everything you do, you are doing with complete cognition of how it's in support of the team and not holding people back. This obviously can people can see very simply where this uh where this applies to combat life, uh life and death stuff. But in very simple terms, this is if I'm getting on an airplane, okay, I am pre-thinking about where I'm going to put my bag in the overhead. So when I get to my seat, I am as fast and efficient as possible at putting my bag in the overhead and getting in my seat so that other people behind me can keep moving. Okay. That's a very simple example of don't be that guy. In the teams, that's like you get that. I mean, that is natural. You, everything you do is about being efficient so the person, the people around you aren't impeded. Okay. That is not a reasonable expectation to bring into the regular world. Okay, because there are a lot of people who don't think that way. And it's not their fault. Um, but there are a lot of people who just they don't have any cognition of what other people are experiencing. Go on any airplane and and you'll see that, okay. So, all that to say, I think part of our frustration in life, those feelings come from an expectation we're holding about others uh based on how we expect ourselves to behave or how we generally behave. And we have to, one of the, one of the tricks, I guess, um, or one of the drills is to recognize that to expect someone to behave like you, first of all, is unrealistic, even if you know them. Um, it's absolutely impossible if you don't know them, if they're a stranger on the road, okay? And and although by the way, you don't know the context of their behavior either, right? They might be going slow because you know they just got some bad news and they're feeling sad. Or, or you know what, they haven't been in a car for a while, they're a little nervous about the road. You know, how often is it that you you're getting frustrated with someone, a slow driver? You're like, gosh darn it, and you finally pass, and it's an old person, and you're like, ah, and you feel bad. You're like, that could have been my mom, right? And so why don't we feel that before our frustration happens, or as soon as, you know, anyway, all this to say we we have to, I think this type of mental gymnastics can be very healthy for our processes if we let it happen more often and we and and and if and and when able deliberately engage in it.

SPEAKER_02 26:09

Yeah, no, I I completely agree. And it to me, it's like radical empathy, which a lot of people would find uh I think a little bit contradictory to the often stereotypical image of a Navy SEAL or even just the military in general. But having spent time around that culture, uh, I know that that's not true. And like there it is a very, very empathetic put others first culture. Yeah. Um, and yeah, I do find that really interesting that you say that. It reminded me of a word, uh, a newer word called Sonder. Have you heard of it? Sonder, no, I haven't. So it's this new age word, like Gen Z word, that basically describes the fact that everybody has a life. And it sounds so simple, but if you're like in Times Square, for example, you look around and you're like, oh my god, every one of these people has a story. They have a full life, they have a family, they have a career. Who knows what might have happened?

SPEAKER_01 27:08

Yeah, and they're as important to themselves as you are to yourself. That's a really great thing. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Yeah, and I think that word, it's so cool and it is mind-boggling if you ever consciously um like use that exercise in a really crowded place, or if you find yourself maybe getting a little upset with someone else or um wanting to pass them on the road and you and you're annoyed. If you and uh it can't happen all the time, but if you can train yourself to try to think of their story, I think it's really effective in cultivating more empathy and just better connection in the world.

SPEAKER_01 27:48

I love that. Well, thank you for teaching me that because that's a great word. I'm gonna start using that more often because you're 100% right. That's what our nation needs now. Uh, is we need, I guess I guess I have to I guess more sonder, is that how you'd use the word? So uh I guess so. Yeah. Sonderness. Not not quite sure. Uh that's wonderful. That is that is, you know, if we if all of us can do more of that, not only would the world be a better place, but we'd all be happier. We really would. So yeah, it's a good one.

SPEAKER_02 28:16

Yeah. Um I I do think that just human connection in general is something I've become really passionate about recently. Um, and I think human connection with an optimistic lens and something I've heard you talk about, uh which is somewhat ironic given your um uh maybe it's not ironic. Um I'm open to hearing your explanation, but your association to an optimism, uh a bit of optimism with Simon Sinek. Yeah. And you've talked about how optimism isn't really an attribute that works alone. Right. It is something that uh is almost like is effective when it's paired or working together with other attributes. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:56

Uh why is that? Well, it's because optimism is wonderful. Uh if you take optimism singularly, optimism is is basically the ability to look uh upon a uh a situation or even an outlook in a positive way and and look at the positive sides of things. Um that is that is uh unique and precious and important. However, um it's it on its own is quite inert, okay? What you have to do is you have to pair it with some sort of action. It's an by the way, optimism is a is an intellectual, it's a it's an intellectual attribute, it's kind of inward attribute. You need to pair it with a with a more proactive attribute for it to have to actually have have some um agency. Uh so so for example, optimism with curiosity. Now you're talking. Now you're talking about something about someone who's going to search and and and and learn and discover with a positive mindset, right? That's what I do, I think. I try to do it. And then you can name optimism or optimism with adaptability. I'm going to adapt. I mean, this is adaptability as a adaptability is a reactive uh attribute. I'm I'm adjusting to a changing environment that's around me. Uh if I add optimism to it, now I'm gonna I'm gonna be I'm gonna be positive in my spin, okay? Um in the way I do that. So I'm gonna react and change, but I'm gonna do it with a positive spin. So um so all of it, so I think it's a it's a it's a beautiful attribute. Um if you're full, if you're so the problem with it staying on its own is you can you're at risk of being a little bit pie in the sky in terms of in terms of you're you're you know, I always talk about realistic optimism, which means I I'm going to, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be positive about the outcomes, understand that, hey, there might be obstacles, but I'll f I'll figure out a way through it, right? Versus, hey, everything's groovy, everything's cool, it's all it's all blue skies and and nothing's wrong. That's a it's a it's a more of an ignorant uh or or blind optimism, which you want to uh avoid. So so if you want to really actualize optimism, you need to pair it with an actual um active attribute so you don't get caught in this kind of pie in the sky type thinking. Is there a difference between realistic optimism and faith? Um yeah, well, there could be. Uh I think you know, faith. Um the way I so so there the the way I would describe so let's let's break this down a little bit. I'm glad you brought it up. Let's break down what I think where I think faith sits in the in the kind of this paradigm of of um of our beliefs. Um I think faith is belief without evidence. Okay, that's that's something Carl Sagan has has, I think, famously said. Faith is faith is belief without evidence. Um now, confidence is belief with evidence, okay? Um, so in other words, and and both are very important. I can I can embark upon a journey with faith. In other words, I don't know, I've never had any evidence that I'm gonna do okay or do whatever, but I have faith and I'm gonna that's gonna, that's going to propel me forward. As I move through that, I can build confidence because evidence starts to pile up. I think optimism can be sprinkled, realistic optimism can be sprinkled in anywhere. And I think realistic optimism can actually be a necessary accelerant to even a faith-based, uh, a faith-based start or movement. Um so I do think it's important. It's tough, it's tough to have true faith if you're pessimistic about what you're trying to be faithful for, right? I mean, so so I think there is a there is a synergy between faith and optimism. Um, there's also a synergy between confidence and optimism. Uh confidence, though, confidence will allow probably a little bit more pessimism just because you have evidence that can back up certain things, whether something failed or didn't. You know, you kind of you can lean against previous precedent to kind of figure out, you know, where you can be a little bit more pessimistic or optimistic, you know. And again, I would say pessimism also, we we don't want to understand pessimism certainly at extreme is is is not helpful, but there's also a a realistic pessimism that's very effective. In other words, um you you you maintain or lean upon a critical eye. You know, I used to, I used to even in the teams, there were always a couple dudes who were kind of just Debbie Downers. You know, they're they're just the they're just always the guys who are throwing wrenches into the, into the, you know, that that's not gonna work, this blah blah blah, right? Some of those guys lean towards the non-helpful. It's like, okay, just they're just doing it because they just they're just pessimistic, you know, they're just grumpy. But there are there were more more than average, uh more than often it was the guys who actually had a very skeptical eye that you could lean upon to make sure you were staying in check, you were staying grounded. So you'd actually leave, hey, I want to make sure I'm I'm passing this through. I'd sometimes pass plans through guys like this because I knew they would give me feedback that was pessimistic or critical that I wasn't seeing, and that's stuff I needed. And so there's a balance there that can be reached. But um, but yeah, I think long that's a long way to answer. But yes, I think optimistic realism, uh realistic optimism and optimism is is and can be and should be paired with faith. Uh, and that that that that helps with that accelerant. Okay. When you say faith, what do you mean? Um, I I mean I think I I I think quite literally I mean believing something without evidence. You know, in other words, there's no there's no evidential thing I could point at that's telling me that this is in fact the case. Um, but I have faith that it is. Now that could be anecdotal, but anecdotal, we're not talking about anecdotal things. We're talking about real true evidence that says, hey, this is something that's been tested, tried, and proven either by myself or whatever, and I know this to be true based on based on facts, based on solid facts or previous experience. Okay. Um when I went to BUDS, I had faith I would make it through. Okay. I had no evidence. No evidence. Now, as I began to make, as I began to move through the the weeks and months of BUDS, faith became confidence. Okay. And uh by the time that by a certain point, probably maybe after Hell Week, you know, I said, okay, I now have confidence I'm gonna make it through. Okay. It it turned from faith to confidence, but it was faith that got me started. So so yeah, it's just it's anything we we believe that we can't provide evidence for, I think falls into the category of faith.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

And faith can be utilitarian by turning into confidence?

SPEAKER_01 35:19

Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Um yeah, if you let it. Yeah, again, these are these are but but you can also, I mean, I think, I mean, faith can take you a long way. It really can. I mean, you can you can let it take it, you can let it take you as long as it possibly can. I mean, as Victor Frankel talks about this. I mean, that you know, you can you can make it through some very, very long, bad things for a long time just on faith alone. Faith, hope, you know, again, these these are words I'm I'm very, I'm very keen on entomology. No, etymology, right? Entomology is bugs. Etymology because um I'm keen on etymology because words do matter and specific definitions matter. But things like faith and hope are intertwined, even though the definitions might be different. Um so yeah, it can provide momentum. Um, but we all know, I mean, we also have we also have evidence and and proof that you know faith if if held on, yeah, you can, you know, you can you can hold on, hold on, hold on. If something comes in there and destroys that, man, it's tough to recover. It really is. Um and so uh so we have to be very careful about that too. So so yeah, I think it's it's it's it's a fascinating part of the human experience and very necessary part of the human experience.

SPEAKER_02 36:28

Yeah. I I wonder if faith is so hard to repair, because faith is in other words, trust that something's going to work out. And you know, trust, we always do say in interpersonal relationships, it's the hardest thing to gain and the easiest thing to lose. So it's almost just a trust in life, and it's the same thing. If life seemingly in your frame of mind wrongs you, it is hard and takes a long time to uh reset that mindset.

SPEAKER_01 36:59

It's a great point, and actually you're you're you're you're you're firing off some some some things in my head that I haven't thought of before, so I appreciate that. And I would say this, and we can we can let this we can go as far as we want on this, but just my one of the things that immediately pops into my head when we talk about trust and faith um is perhaps the difference is that trust in trust must involve another entity. Um in other words, life is a is an experience, it's an environment. So but but so there I can have faith in in s in life in an in an environment or an outcome or something like that. But trust starts to involve some other entity, right? And and that and we can have trust in that entity to to uh to to uh to to to provide, to give us, to, to allow us to do what we could can. I I don't know. I'm just I'm spitballing here. Now you you've gotten me on a creative track that I'm gonna now have to really think, which I appreciate. But uh but that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 37:58

I have a well on that I have a question about I I feel like you can trust yourself. And I I'll give an example of yesterday for for some reason, I don't know why, I have been more inconsistent with running recently. Yeah, I just think it hasn't been as much of my priority. And there was a period in my life where I ran six months straight at 5 a.m. every morning, the most dedicated I've ever been to something and through the snowy winters here in New Hampshire. And recently I just have not run as much. And so the other day, yesterday, I went on a run, and there used to be no question. I had trust in myself. I I would use that word and I'm curious to get your opinion on that. But I would uh have trust in myself that no matter what, I wouldn't stop.

SPEAKER_00 38:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:42

And yesterday, super hot outside, and I passed like the whatever two and a half mile mark, and I was dead. And I started to walk. Yeah. And I'm like, Jack, what are you doing? Uh and I almost felt as if I betrayed my own trust.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do you think about that? I'm right, by the way, I'm writing notes because I this you're you're bringing up stuff I have to research later. Um and the what I'm writing down is is there a difference between trust and confidence? That's what I just wrote down. Um because when you say trust in myself, the thing I think about is okay, is that trust in myself or is that confidence in myself? I I tend to my my my going in factor is trust is a generative act that is external to us. We're we we we we trust something outside of ourselves. That's what trust is always outside of ourselves. Whereas confidence is internal to ourselves. I know I can do this. Uh I know I am confident I will go for a run or finish the run or whatever. If I don't end up doing that, uh I I we we can we can call that what it is, but um, but you know, I don't I don't know. I have to I wrote it down, man. I gotta, I gotta, I gotta research it more.

SPEAKER_02 39:47

Well, what if our self and our body are separate entities and you try you train your body through um like repetition to then trust your body to do the hard thing. And so those are separate entities, the self and the body within itself, right? I think so.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

Again, you you might be onto something here. Uh you know, you get into etymology here, and uh yeah, you might I I I have train I have developed my body into a system so that I trust it to be able to run. I'm not gonna pass out on my at two and a half miles. I'll I trust it to be able to make it through. Um but then again, is that really trust is that confidence now? Because now I know now that I've I've built up the evidence. That's what I've done. So is that are we breathing into confidence? So where does trust fall into that factor? Um, maybe trust spans both faith and confidence somehow. Uh because it's a big, it's a big concept. But um interesting. But yeah, all worthwhile.

SPEAKER_02 40:45

I'm fascinated. And something that I've never been able to talk to someone about this, and now I'm excited. Um you and uh your friend Andrew Schuberman have talked about the anterior midsingulate cortex. Yes. Yeah. What is the anterior midsingulate cortex?

SPEAKER_01 41:00

Yeah, the anterior midsingulate cortex is a it's a part of the brain that neurologists discovered that that that activates um when we engage in something hard or that we don't want to do. Okay, so so so and and what they've discovered about this thing is that activates, uh, and when it activates, it does a couple things. First of all, it grows, okay, it it increases in size, and and they've they've begun to link that growth with A, um, the ability to do tough stuff more often, okay, and B with longevity. So, in other words, they've they've they've linked the activation with this. The people who activate it more often live longer, okay? Um, which is really, really cool. But what this really in that uh in essence tells us is that um our our physiology has been set up so that we are encouraged to do things outside of our comfort zone, to do things we might not want to do. Um, because because we are rewarded through both making those types of activities a little bit easier, um, but also living longer because of it. And so um so we need to tickle this thing pretty often. Um the good news is it's not hard to tickle it. There's a lot of stuff that we don't like to do, you know. Um as long as you it could be start the conversation that I'm hesitant to start, it could be could be do the do the thing that I've been putting off for a while. Um it could be an ice bath, it could be a long run, it could be whatever, it could be go to a SEAL training, you know. Um But if we if we if we are consistent in our ability to kind of step into that discomfort more proactively and more more often, that's that cortex will be will be will be tickled, it will grow, and it'll actually it'll actually uh help us live longer. I mean, we've we've heard the old adage that when you stop living, as soon as you stop growing, you start dying. We've heard that adage. Now that's been proven out, not only philosophically, but but experientially. People, you see, when people who who just suddenly have no purpose, have no have no challenge, have nothing to live for, they generally decline pretty rapidly. Um and so, but yet you see 90 plus year olds who are constantly working, they're constantly have something, and and they're just they're vibrant. They're they're happy until they drop, right? And that's what we want to strive for. But that's an example of tickling this thing. So yeah, the the challenge is whatever ages we are, whether you're you know, you're your age or I'm at my age, you know, or you know, you know, you're what what are you 19 now? I think. Yes. Yeah, you're 19, I'm 52. Um, or if it's a 70, 75-year-old or a 95-year-old, whatever age that is, always be growing, always be growing. So always look for that other challenge.

SPEAKER_02 43:40

So I guess in my running, to tie it back to that, I wasn't growing. So in a way, my running was dying. Did that um, I'm guessing previously, when I ran really consistently, I was growing my anterior mid cingulate cortex. When I stopped, did I did it start atrophying? Did it start declining?

SPEAKER_01 44:00

That's a good question. We'd have to save that for Andrew. I'd have to ask him that next time I talk to him. However, the qu the other next question you have to ask yourself is was it actually growing? Because was running consistently something you didn't want to do? I know, you know, the reason why I asked because I I run, I try to run a couple times a week. But my uh my one run is I do hill, I do a 50-pound weight vest and I do huge hills, right? That is something I don't like to do. Okay. That's something I have to step into every time. I was like, ugh, right. I I kind of dread it. Okay. My other run is a three and a half three and a half mile run in the woods here in Virginia Beach where I just go on a trail and I run in no headphones. I love that. That's just a pleasure for me. There's no, there's no challenge there. I mean that you know, I do it in a challenging way, but there's no like, I'm not stepping into my it's I'm not like, oh, I don't feel like doing this. Okay. Um, so so that so that that that that struggle has to exist. It has to be real for you to tickle that thing. Um and and again, that doesn't mean you shouldn't. I mean, running it can be for like it is for me in the woods, it's a very cathartic thing for me. You know, I love it because I can think. The hill stuff don't love very much, but I know that's for a specific reason in terms of keeping my fitness up. Um, so we just have to feel that. You know what, you know what, you know what's funny? What always I dread is the ice bath I do afterwards. Okay. I can't every time I get in that ice bath, I dread getting that ice bath. So so ice ice baths consistently for me are tickling that that cortex because I don't want to do it every time I have to get in that thing. So so yeah, you just have to make sure you're tickling that thing.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

I don't think I am enough right now because I since I got back from London, I have had a lot of concussions. Um, and so the doctors don't want me climbing much right now. Yeah. So not climbing as much, and I'm like, all right, I'm gonna go to the weight room, which I haven't done consistently since before well, like in high school when I was training really hard for baseball and soccer. And I so I'm like, you know, I'm lifting every morning right now. Yeah. Um, but lifting is something that just feels easy to me. Yeah, yeah. And I've noticed that uh I used to run every morning and then just climb in the evening. And now that I'm only I'm lifting in the mornings and I'll go for some walks during the day, but not running as much. I think my days have a I think I'm less focused, uh, I'm and I'm less productive in terms of doing the hard thing at the beginning of the day. Yeah. So I and I don't know, it might all be a psychological thing, but I I feel as though since I've stopped running as consistently in the mornings and I've just been lifting, which I mean, I I I love lifting. Uh and I feel like it's it's not that hard for me to, you know, uh increase, like it's not that hard for me to go to failure and like go to complete failure, right? Whereas in running, like that, it hurts my soul to do that. And I I think that that has a carryover into my work life and into just my life in general. Maybe I'm less likely to have an uncomfortable conversation with someone. I don't know. It's just on like if I can try to draw out of my life and objectively observe, I I think I see that pattern. Well, here's the good news.

SPEAKER_01 47:07

And and you're right, right. I I would say lifting again, it's every it's different for everybody, and I like lifting as well. However, when I do leg day, I can't stand it. That that is the lifting it just very hard, and I dread it because squats and deadlifts and stuff. Anyway, uh physical activity is just one domain inside of which we can practice this. And I think most people make the mistake of of using that domain exclusively, which that is a mistake. We should start looking at different domains. So the question you don't want to ask yourself is okay, what have I been putting off doing, and why is that? Make that list and then pick something on that list and start doing it. You're activating the same thing. Yeah, it could be, you know, I've I've put off writing the book or doing this or starting this new business or whatever. Make that list and pick something in different domains. And the more we can domain hop with this practice, the better off we'll be. Because if we just stick to one contest uh context, we're actually not, we've also stunted our growth. You know, the athletes who do this constantly within that context, great. But a lot of Division I athletes go to SEAL training and they quit the very first day or or within the first week. Um and it's not because they're not strong, it's not because they're not tough, it's not because they're not physically in shape. It's because they haven't trained themselves to actually step outside their comfort zone in those types of different domains, right? Um so uh so the the uh the ability to to to kind of hop around and and uh and be be creative in the different domains, that's when you're gonna get start getting the juice.

SPEAKER_02 48:35

So I really appreciate you saying that because I definitely am concerned somewhat with the hyper focus on physical activity in the physical domain, especially among young men, men of my age, where like there seems to be this overprioritization of like just gym culture and getting lean, getting fit, turning even into the looks maxing movement. I don't know how familiar you are with that. And I've always thought that there's something that just kind of icks me about gym culture in general. And I think that it's great for people to start prioritizing their health, but there's so much more to life. Life is so much more three-dimensional than just going to the gym as your accomplishment for the day, right? The health is just one pillar.

SPEAKER_01 49:21

Well, it's uh it's um, I'm gonna say this and some people are gonna disagree with me, but but that's okay. Um, first of all, I agree being healthy is is absolute of most importance. But but when we focus on just the physical domain for this stuff, it's actually an easy road. We're actually taking the easy physical stuff is easy to in in our in our first world society, to be able to say, you know what, I'm gonna start going to the gym and I'm gonna do that, that's an easy thing. You know, we can, we, you know, we're not picking the hardest thing. So so while I do support, again, physical health is important because we can we're not gonna be able to do any of this if we don't maintain our physical health. The the the next question is, okay, why? What's the reason? If I'm just going to the gym just so I can be looks maxing, so I can, you know, I can okay. I I'm not gonna I'm not gonna judge anybody before that, but you have to understand, okay, is that gonna fulfill you at the end of the day? What's the what's the fulfillment that comes from that? Um, but it's still you're still picking one domain, right? And and oh, by the way, the more often you do that, the less you're gonna be tickling that anterior mid-singular cortex because it doesn't, it it becomes less and less hard. It becomes a thing that you like to do, it becomes a habit, whatever. As soon as you're in that habit or thing you like to do range, you're not tickling that thing anymore. You're not stepping outside your comfort zone by going to the gym. Just because, oh no, I I I do it till failure. No, no, that's not, that doesn't count. You need to do something that really scares the shit out of you. You know, try that. Then you're tickling that thing. Okay. Um, and so I think you're right. Uh, we are in a, you know, you, you and my sons and everybody of that of that of your generation have grown up in this uh in this environment where social media has has put forth images so readily about what's what life is supposed to look like. You know, people, people, and they only see one version, you only see the the you only see the the one photo out of the hundred that were taken, and it's the best one. Okay. And so I don't blame any of you because we didn't have that when I was growing up. We didn't have that type of constant barrage. But we had, you know, we we had, you know, there's still there were still you still want to be in shape. You had the the Jean-Claude Van Damme's and the people who, you know, the Schwarzenegger's like, wow, that'd be good to look like that. But um, but it wasn't as in your face in a in a moment-by-moment uh nature as it is now. So so the the the challenge becomes, okay, can I can I put that aside? I don't want I'm not gonna judge my own progress, my own life on anybody else. So I'm gonna ask myself, okay, what is it that I actually want to do? What do I want to accomplish? What will fulfill me? Why do I want to be healthy? Why do I want to go to the gym? Um, what might my goals be? And then work from there. And that's gonna be a much better, more positive way to kind of progress. Uh herring is just gonna always be tough. It really is. There's always gonna be someone better, faster, stronger. Uh, so I just don't recommend it.

SPEAKER_02 51:58

So if you had to give kind of a Maslow's hierarchy of hard things, and like fitness is at the bottom, what what comes next that someone can do to continue to uh do the uncomfortable?

SPEAKER_01 52:10

Well, okay, that's a great question. I want to say fitness is not at the bottom for everybody. That Maslow's hierarchy is subjective. Um, you know, for the for the person who's trying to lose a massive amount of weight, who has developed habits and and a lifestyle that is is anti-health, fitness might be one of the hardest things they embark upon. Okay. Um for the introvert, starting the conversation with the person, the stranger might be the hardest thing. And fitness might be easy. The introvert, the the the introvert gym rat, fitness might be easy. Starting the conversation might be hard, right? So yeah, so the subjectivity of that question matters. We all have our own hierarchy of of of importance and difficulty. And so we have to figure that out for ourselves. Uh, and by doing that, you can start saying, okay, what again, it's not that hard. It's easy. I mean, we could sit here and say, okay, what do I do? For me, it'd be climbing. I mean, if I want to do something really outside my comfort zone, take me to a climbing wall, you know, or whatever, or or go scum it out and do it. You know, so yeah. Uh I just have to, and I'm not saying I wouldn't do it. It's just right now, as I look at those things, I'm pretty fulfilled with the challenges I have in my life right now. But if I if I ever felt myself like you, I I am, I am, my life is boring right now. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not really feeling it. I might be at the climbing gym and try that. Who knows? You know, so all right. I'll take you climbing.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

You can take me on one of your uh weighted vest hillruns.

SPEAKER_00 53:29

How's that? That's a deal.

SPEAKER_02 53:30

Yeah, that's a deal. Uh Rich, this has been absolutely phenomenal. I really, really appreciate your time. Uh you're so wise in so many ways, and I really do appreciate how intellectual and smart you are, and you've done so many things. I feel like I could have had a conversation for like five hours with you.

SPEAKER_01 53:50

Well, Jack, I appreciate that. I you're an impressive young man, so I appreciate uh the conversation. I appreciate you right reaching out. Let's definitely stay in touch. And um, and yeah, thanks for having me on.

SPEAKER_02 53:59

So before we end, I want to ask what is one question that you think that I didn't ask that I should have.

SPEAKER_00 54:07

Oh gosh. Um and what would your answer to it be?

SPEAKER_01 54:11

Uh what is the best music in the world? And the answer is heavy metal. So all right.

SPEAKER_02 54:20

We we're gonna have a whole podcast breaking that down because I fundamentally disagree. Uh there you go. Uh amazing, Rich. Uh, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 54:29

Where can people find you? Uh all right, best well, you can find the books on Amazon. So both books are on Amazon. Uh, our website, theattributes.com. So www.theattributes.com. All the stuff we do is there. Our assessment tool is there for attributes, all that stuff. You can check it out. And of course, yeah, I think we we connected on Instagram, I'm there too, uh, and LinkedIn.

SPEAKER_02 54:48

So amazing. Everybody, this has been the Grateful Podcast. Thank you. Thank you, everybody, for listening, watching, tuning into this episode of The Grateful Podcast with Rich DeVinny. Man, was this an incredible conversation. Rich and I just talked a little bit after the podcast. He just left the room, and I am now recording this and just so grateful for the opportunity to talk to him. Make sure to go check him out. Some of his other interviews. He's been on some of the biggest podcasts in the world with Chris Williamson, Ed Mulette, Lewis Howes. All the big boys have had him on their shows. So go check him out. He is doing incredible work for the world and really breaks many of the stereotypes that people have about Navy SEALs and people in the military in general, um, and stuff that I think that we should be open to. That these guys are so smart and empathetic, like we talked about. We have so much we can learn from them, even if we're not in the same extreme circumstances that they are. I have another amazing episode coming out next week and a few more incredible people uh I'm recording with this week. So I really am looking forward to you guys getting to see this, to those conversations. A lot of them are going to be in person. Thank you so much for being here on this amazing ride that is the Grateful Podcast. I look forward to seeing you next week. Stay grateful, stay hungry. This has been The Grateful Podcast. I'm your host, Jack Wagner. See you next week.