The Write Path #46 - "Let's Get Spi-RITUAL," with Author Ryan Reichert!!!

Ryan is a professional speaker, mindset trainer, executive coach, best-selling author, and podcaster based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  He served 23 years in the U.S. Army, retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel after forty-two months in combat and a leadership role as a Foreign Service Director.  Ryan’s passion is helping others. He is a recovery advocate who overcame alcohol addiction, and his personal journey informs a compassionate, accountable approach to coaching.  Today his mission is clear: to guide others toward faith, purpose, and transformation—cultivating confidence, restoring hope, and unlocking potential in leaders who are ready to live their best lives.

His website:  https://ourprotectordevelopment.com/

Welcome to the Write Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. This isn't the place for the Chat GPT experts or the AI buffs to churn out soulless content with no heart.  This is the place where authors share their journeys, explore their creativity, examine the "Why?" behind it all and come together to celebrate each other. This is the podcast for authors, about authors, and by an author, where the truth still counts and words still have power. Join Us!  You have a story to tell!

Contact us on all our social media platforms and email us at thewritepathpodcast@gmail.com  

This is the place where authors know that every page... is a step forward. Let's move forward together, let's move forward today. Listen now.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Right Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. Folks, this is the place. This is the podcast for authors. It's about authors. It's done by an author. This is the place where we share our journeys. This is the place where we explore our creativity. And most importantly, we examine the why behind all of it. Our guest today is a gentleman that I know very well. I have had the absolute blessing of uh being able to interview him on three other podcasts. And today we are talking about a totally different topic about his brand new book that's coming out. Uh, folks, I cannot wait to get into this and learn more about this guy that I consider to be a friend of mine, and I know you're gonna love him. Uh, he is a retired Army Lieutenant Colonel. He's the father of two fabulous daughters. He's a born again Christian, he's a motivational speaker and has appeared on the TED X Duluth stage. Uh that's going to be coming out really soon. He's a servant leader, and uh today we're gonna talk about the fact that he's also an author uh of several books, but uh most recently, Let's Get Spiritual. His uh newest release just came out, and folks, uh, I'm really looking forward to hearing about it. Please welcome to the show Ryan Reichert. Ryan, how are you doing, brother?

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Hey Rory, so great to be back, and uh just like uh a couple brothers from other mothers. It's so it's so good to see you. It's so good to hear that deep voice of yours again, and uh know that from a completely different lens, uh, we're coming uh into this one. So uh thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Yeah, no, I appreciate it. It it it is, it's unique when you can have somebody on four different podcasts, and every time you're talking about something totally different, that's just a really cool place to be. Um, tell everybody a little bit about who is Ryan Rickert and you know, kind of what has led you to this particular project of uh let's get spiritual.

SPEAKER_01 1:51

Yeah, I'll I'll give the most condensed version, just knowing that the let's get spiritual is is the important part, the six steps to transform your life or our lives, depending on how we want to go with it. But yeah, I'm a small town boy, Hoople, North Dakota. I love propping up Tatertown, USA, where I grew up uh starting in circa 1978. It it basically is the foundation that allows me to tell the stories I tell, and it wasn't easy. I was uh born and raised Irish Catholic. So for those who really know me, know that I'm a recovering alcoholic and addict, and that's just a little joke for those of us that are Irish Catholic. And uh I was somebody who uh went to the University of North Dakota, joined the United States Army, like Royce said, served 23 years, retired as lieutenant colonel. I finally found uh the Lord in my sobriety, uh just about two and a half years ago now, and realizing that I had a lot of work to still do in life, uh coming up on almost uh you know half a century uh on this this great earth. And uh it was uh separation, divorce, estrangement from those two beautiful children, and then the loss of a Fortune 500 job in retirement just a few years ago, all while I was sober, uh, and uh basically realizing that I was gonna build our protector development, which is a book series today. It is a coaching and consulting firm. Uh, we have the media side of the house with our healer, our protector, which is our podcast, uh, and now uh nonprofit as well. And it just continues to go on and on, just truly being blessed in his mercy, his grace, and love that I know today, where I believed in a previous life, early on life, that uh he was more punishing and things were much darker. And so I just am so blessed. Yeah, four times. It's hard to believe. Uh, this is uh our fourth encounter together. We've formed kind of quite the relationship at this point, and uh it's something completely new. Uh let's get spiritual, the six steps to transform your life. I like to say our lives, I guess when I'm talking uh about it, because it really is that. And uh it's a standalone, but at the same time, I kind of say it's the book end in a series. Uh, you know, we have God only knows when the devil comes to your second chance of life that really ramps you through uh divorce, broken heart, estrangement, and then kind of coming out of the ashes uh post-Fortune 500 job loss. And then the Icarus effect is the one in the middle, the highs and lows of our emotions. Uh, we all have feelings. I think I'm want to adjust that and change it to men have feelings too, because with the consulting and coaching business, it's really become coaching other men and so forth. And the Icarus effect is that is you know, basically becoming a man. And at 45, I finally became a man and started to tell the truth and everything that I do and realize that's how you know I've been gifted all these, and it's not me, it's it's it's him. I'm just the one, the vessel that it comes through and it gets put down on paper. But uh, so all glory to God and and these beautiful gifts, the books, and then now, yeah, helping other men uh you know become who they're really supposed to be. And it's just us talking about it, having meaningful conversations, like you and I have had them multiple times here, and you garner that strength. So it was funny because I'm sure you're gonna ask this, so I'm just gonna jump on it. Like, where did let's get spiritual come from, right? And uh it was uh I hopped in the truck, Olivia Newton John was on the radio, you know, singing let's get physical. And for whatever reason, I think I was coming from church and I was like, that's it, because I really struggled with the title. I was like one day at a time, uh, you know, which there's a number of one day at a time, so I would have had to come up with a catchy uh subtitle and so forth. But um, yeah, she was singing. I was like going through my normal, like, what's the title gonna be? And it's like, no, it's let's get spiritual. And uh the six-step method to transform our lives is is basically uh a lot of what I talk about in TEDx Duluth. It's uh us smiling, step one, it's uh step two and three is your pleas and your thank yous, and four and five is excuse me, I'm sorry, and then six is just repeat. And and we do that back and forth throughout our day. You go out and do this now when you encounter the world, and the next person does it, and we just literally transform our lives through that. And uh that's the fastest version of all this, but uh, I know we're gonna get deeper into things.

SPEAKER_00 6:49

Well, I mean, you've written uh you've written some different things, you know. Uh you've got a lot of different interests, you have uh plenty of different skills and talents that you've developed over the years. Uh, so nothing surprises me. Um, I had you on one of my other podcasts and we did a very deep dive into faith, you know, on that one. And um, I think that might have actually been the one where we met each other uh was on that one first, uh, over on Wake Up the Lions. But um, so I know that you're a spiritual man, and I know that this is something that you uh kind of either rediscovered or discovered, you know, later on in your life. Uh, I'm a little curious about that, if you don't mind me asking, uh, since it does kind of lead right into the book here. Were you uh raised that way spiritually and whatnot, or is that something that you found later in life, you know, maybe uh after a causality type thing?

SPEAKER_01 7:34

Right. No, I I mean when I think of calling myself, you know, a spiritual man, person, whatever I am. Uh I was born and raised Catholic, and the joke, you know, it just is that. So it was a great foundation. I just but I couldn't see it. Too many rules, and you know, it's uh it's kind of like the joke of going there. And if you ever had a buddy come to church with you, it's like, boy, I didn't know we were gonna sit down, shut up, you know, fight, fight, fight, rah, rah, rah, kind of thing, and uh between kneeling and you know, different things and and so forth, and different rules and different, you know, no, whatever's so for me uh today I look at it as a fantastic foundation, growing up Catholic, but I I couldn't see it that way. It's because I had to go to church or we had to go to catechism, or we I had to be an altar boy, or had to swing in the church choir. It wasn't like I get to, it's you know, this where you're gonna establish this great blessing in that foundation. And so when I got married, uh I married a Lutheran. So to me, I was like, sweet, this is like Catholic light. This is so much. I don't have to go to like a tourist to literally be married into the Lutheran church. Like, this is awesome. And uh I think of you know, uh Pastor H and we showed up, I think, two or three times to his house, and my former spouse went with his wife. I I went with him and we watched like football, and then you know, we talked a little bit about you know, hey, this is what it's probably gonna be like for you, but you were raised Catholic, so I know you got a great foundation, and you know, all this, and and you're probably pretty disciplined, and no no no no no and so we fast forward uh a lot of it where I wasn't well no let me let me slow down. I found myself in Afghanistan in 2004, and some things happened um that I kind of cursed the Lord and in what had happened, and I couldn't really understand why certain things would happen to people or just in life. And I think maybe I struggled uh really living that that life that I kind of had learned and then married into a lesser, and then it was like, but what does it matter if this stuff like this is gonna happen? You know, why do bad things happen to good people, right? And we then finally had children when I came back from Afghanistan, and you know, they were baptized because that's what we're supposed to do, and you know, that's what for I guess parents and church and all the different things, and I just really I didn't I didn't really understand it, I didn't have a good understanding of what my faith practices should look like and and truly what spirituality is for me today, and that gets that point of you know what woke me up to it, and and it was just you know looking at the seven deadly sins and where you know I was part of all seven of them in my life and waking up to going, you know, you really need to change how you live life and who you are. Like you might believe you're somebody who you know served our country and I mean I had 23 years of nationalism from that side of it. I was certainly very proud of, you know, it said United States Army on my chest, you know, had the flag on one shoulder and why I was doing it, right? And the other side of it though, I was uh not kind. I wasn't someone that practiced those six steps. I I didn't emulate the the father I am today for my two beautiful young ladies, uh, that one day will have men in their lives and uh you know will look to their husbands one day for guidance and strength. And uh I kind of, you know, I don't like to use the word failure because failure is only when you don't get back up again. And so like the lesson that I learned in you know the relationship that I once had, that I believed it would have forever, and you know, I obviously squandered certain sides of it, but at the same time I look today at whom I become and uh only through my faith practice, my spirituality, knowing that he is loving, that he will redeem every good thing that he put inside of you if you're willing to surrender and give it all. And that's still at times hard, especially in entrepreneurship. I want to have the reins, and it's it's it's almost like you know, like what should a book look like? It's like this cover, like this certainly isn't the first cover. And do I 100% is this a you know, like Ryan approved, Ryan certified? No, this is like how many times are we gonna change it before it's good enough? And uh let's publish this book and allow people to utilize it because that's what it's all about is having people go, all right, cool, I can get behind this, I can fill out these practices each day. And it I get this, like I see how this worked for you. I mean, it took me 18 months to come up with all of that, and now it's you know dissolved into a daily practice with multiple different things you go through. And if you do it for 90 days, everybody that's been doing it before this was published that I was kind of practicing it with, um, it is a it is approved, and uh they're living some amazing lives, just like uh, you know, I greatly appreciate you running down the highlight reel. But I mean, I have bad days too, right? Like I just don't want to turn them into bad weeks, bad months, bad years, bad life. And I think that's how I lived before. And today, you know, it looks like last, you know, this is what Thursday night's last night teaching, seventh grade boys, small group leader at church. That's uh non-negotiable, right? Uh Saturdays or Sundays serving at church again, getting as much of the good Lord as I can, you know, heading to AA meetings a couple times a week, and and then the rest of the time filling it with meaningful conversations, just like we've had multiple times. You just you start to realize that you need to have those daily doses of people like-minded, where you just however many months it's been, even though we're like, oh, it's been years, and uh we're like, oh, it's so good to see you. What have you been up to? Oh, this, this, this, this, this, this, this. No way, it's only been a couple months, like, really. And that's what's so cool because I finally get to do all these things. I get to be a small group leader, I get to serve at church, you know, like I get to go to my AA meetings, I get to be a business owner today and a podcaster and an author and a speaker. Where at times before I was like, oh, I have to go to work today, and I wasn't serving my community, I wasn't being the father and husband that I needed to be, kind of thing. And you realize uh I think back to the first book, the the subtitle, right? Second chance at life. I mean, I never knew I'd get this second chance, so I I just I I'm not ever gonna test it. Is there a third chance kind of thing? We're we're we're just like we're gonna go with I got my second chance, I know how I'm supposed to live my life today, and uh I know you need to rest too. We were just talking about that before I hit record about being sick in this season of getting ready to publish the book and going down for a week. You know, never been sick for a week in my life, you know. You figure you should have some type of you know, real thing wrong with you if you're sick that long. And I think it was probably just the relief of holding all like this. Was the last piece of it to share right now with the series of books with the world, even though I know we got more in the hopper and all that great stuff, but it's uh it's like this is a this is enough for everybody to to latch on to and get to have have some of that that that you share, you know, just like you with all your podcasts.

SPEAKER_00 16:03

The uh yeah, thanks for that. I appreciate it. The um this book, uh, when you were describing it to me um beforehand, when we were in our pre-interview, you were kind of showing it to me, holding it up. It's uh it's a bit of an action plan. Um the plan that's in the book, I'm a little curious here, is that is that plan that you came up with to put into the book to help others, is that based on the plan you followed to get to where you are today?

SPEAKER_01 16:27

It it is uh yeah, each little it I think back because we gotta go all the way back to 2023 when all this started. And uh yeah, I mean I guess I could show somebody what it looks like. I mean, I don't know if we can see it. It basically is our protection development spiritual practices, and it it takes you through I start this at night because I believe if you go to bed on the right side of the bed, you're gonna wake up on the right side of the bed. And then if you wake up on the right side of the bed, you're able to get you know off on your right foot, first foot, whatever you want to call it, and uh so forth. But so it starts off with a mantra, not today, Satan, not today. So I always start it at night before I give my prayer and gratitude as I'm laying in bed, not tonight, Satan, not tonight, and just kind of just so grateful for the day. I'm so grateful for just awakening. I just think all the time today as I lay in bed before I'm like, oh boy, get up and go work out for four o'clock in the morning. And uh time's all relative, so it doesn't matter if you if you get up at four in the morning, you get up at eight in the morning, ten, doesn't matter because you probably stay up 16 hours, and so I just just think about it. I go to bed that much earlier than you do, and uh, no big deal. It's not a competition, and so realizing what this looked like is that's kind of how it started was when I sobered up, I was just I was grateful I was alive every day because before I'd be hungover or sick, like really sick, and it was like, wow, this is what it's like to wake up and not feel like somebody beats you up, like with a baseball bat every morning. And um, so that's kind of how it started. And then where it went into like the real practices of like the three daily wins, which is your physical win, your mental win, your spiritual win, was May. Now she's four, she was probably a year and a half uh when it started. Was I was super depressed, right? Sober, but depressed. And uh she's like, dude, I'm gonna go if it on the floor if you don't take me out. So I'm like, because I wasn't physically fit anymore at that point. I gained 50 pounds and all these things uh into my retirement and so forth. And so I just started walking around the neighborhood, the neighborhood. Literally, I say that the apartment building, like it probably took a month before I walked around the neighborhood, which is like three blocks. And uh, so that was our physical one. That's how our physical win started. And I just would write down every day, like you know, how many times I walked or you know, pulled out my phone and was like, oh, the health app, you can get steps. How many steps am I roughly getting? You know, probably went from like a thousand steps a day, which is so sad. But you know, hey, if you're not doing anything, you're literally just feeling sorry for yourself on the couch, and I get that, been there. Um, that's probably what it looked like to now, like 15,000 steps a day, just knowing that you know, my goal is to one day, you know, run a marathon again, and we're we're finally into the I'd say it's more like yogging, uh, like kind of thing, like uh a lot of walking and uh a little bit of jogging. Yeah, and so it's uh the goal though is to start because I was an ultra marathon runner many years ago, and you know, enough injuries and enough uh feeling sorry for yourself. You stop that once we stop, it's so hard to start again, just to you know, so it's like that's where we're at. We're we're you know, longer walks with the dog and you know certain things, lifting weights, swimming, all that. And that's kind of in there, it's like you can check it off, or you can have other pick pick something. You know, I know a lot of guys I talk to in different groups that I'm in, especially aging ourselves possibly, but pickleball is a huge like everyone's like, Do you play pickleball? You play pickleball. I'm like, no, it's not really my jam, but uh, I can I can see it. I I can see getting into it one day. Uh and then yeah, the mental win, read, write, create, learn, and then spiritual win, pre-meditate, study, grow, or whatever you want it to look like. So it looks like for me, an hour and a half in the gym, treadmill, uh, so forth, walking the dog four times a day. Uh, that's my physical win. Uh, mental win is reading my Bible and then uh meditating. And a lot of people always are like, What do you mean by meditate? I'm like, just sitting in silence. Like, that sounds boring, and like that's the point because in that silence, it's it's so hard to do at first, really hard. Like, start with just a minute, you know, like a minute will seem like an hour. And then once you actually start to realize you're like, holy cows, I came up with solving world hunger now at the 30-minute mark of my silence, only through all of that. I mean, that's that's how I get my downloads for like the next like chapter in a book or the next idea for a chapter in a book. Is I literally drive in silence these days. This has been going on for months, no radio, no nothing. But I'm like, holy cows, like when did that like you know, grow out of nowhere kind of thing? And people in the car will be like, dude, that's been there for like a hundred years, like you've never noticed that. And I was like, I guess I had the radio on, and or I was talking on the phone, and you just you don't realize what we don't pay attention to when we have all this noise, and and it could be the radio, it could be you every time you get in the car, you call your best friend, which is great. You're having but you're probably repeating yourself almost every day by the third minute of your conversation with your best friend. Um, you can only talk about how amazing the Vikings are so many times. Uh kind of thing. Oh, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 22:02

Forgot you were a Viking fan.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Oh well, I live in Minnesota. I and uh I told people when I moved here and got my license that I would support the Vikings. Um, I don't know. Being a fan, that might be a little rough, but uh yeah, I undeniable belief and faith, I would say at this point. If you tell me you're a Vikings fan, I I really want to get to know your your faith uh and belief side of the house because uh every Sunday or Saturday or Monday or whatever day they play, and then throughout the offseason, you're worrying about who they're picking up and all these things, and I'm like, you know, oh for oh for how many, you know, at this point.

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Uh so right, exactly. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, that's funny.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

It takes you through all of the practices and it really gets you uh prompts, there's scripture and daily quotes that kind of align you. Uh, for some are positive, some are deep, some could possibly you go like, whoa, that's a kind of a negative scripture, possibly, or a little, you know, scripture can have a little darkness to it. And then the quote could also as well. And it's it's just for you to it's later in the you know, you're in the 70 to 90 day range, where it's to get you where you should be thinking more of your feelings and your emotions, and does that steer your ship on a daily basis? Like uh what I mean by this example, I always kind of preach uh growth over comfort, you know, discipline over feelings, kind of and and it's it is this piece, right? If your alarm goes off in the morning, your first thought is like, I don't want to get up out of bed, it's warm, it's comfortable. And if your first thing is to feed the dog, walk the dog, it's 25 below, uh, you know, going outside, and then you come back inside, you're warm again, and you're like, okay, I now have to leave to go to the gym. So I'm gonna do this to myself twice at whatever time it is today, it's dark out, and you got that little guy right here going, You're gonna just lay in bed, enjoy this.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

Just go back to bed.

SPEAKER_01 24:11

Yeah, yeah, you're just like cool, and then the next thing you know, you sleep for two more hours and you feel like crap, right? And then you you shame, beat yourself, guilt, and you're like, then you for me, I'm somebody. If I don't 54321, jump out of bed, walk me, head to the gym, I will yeah, sleep till whenever, and I won't work out. Like I could have windows throughout the day, like a meeting could get canceled and so forth, and I could run to the gym. I'm like, nope, didn't get in before nine o'clock. I'm not doing it now. And it's just this crazy way of talking yourself out of most people when they have struggle in their life, and you can look at mine and go, like, wow, you took a lot of losses between 2022 and yesterday. Um how do you win? And that's that's the whole point of these daily wins. You get to control those. So you win three times before you go to work or before you have your cup of coffee, before you engage with other human beings. And so, like, you show up as a winner to the kind of the hard things, the things you can't control in life, like your co-workers. You you can't you can't control them, unfortunately. And so, if there's somebody who shows up not in the best, you know, they don't bring their best self most days. What are you gonna do? Right? I mean, you could get a different job, and and that's a whole nother uh episode, I guess, right? Um, kind of thing, right? But but that to me is what helped me get through all those months of really the struggles and the losses where I was able to check off, and it's we're just human, right? So we love we create comfort, and some people are like, I don't do checklists because then I'd have to check them off. And and I'm like, I need a checklist because if I don't check something off, I'll go into a anxiety spiral of like, what did I do today? Did I accomplish anything? No, I lost, lost, lost, lost, lost. But now I know, like, all right, look at mine. I'm like, cool, like, let's get spiritual says my three daily wins. Oh, look at that. I checked all three of those off. My 10 things I'm grateful for. I filled it all out and super, super easy. Like anybody can fill out 10 things to be grateful for. I mean, probably list 75 right now, and I wouldn't even get to the real good ones when you just start to go like right off the bat. Like, I think of you know, your senses, you know, can you see, can you smell, can you taste, can you hear, can you touch? All right, well, that was just five, and we're not even we're we're not even leaving this kind of thing. And and you start to see, like, we're on a computer, so that means there's electricity, and in this world digital world of Wi-Fi, we have a connection to the outside world. I'd go on and on, and like you know, I have 25 pencils. I don't know why I'd need 25 of these pencils, but I guess that's how many I have. So I have 25 things to be grateful for because I'm not gonna run out of pencils. You just you just find things to be grateful for, and then the cool thing about it is giving it a way to keep it. And and what is what does that mean? Is like to be of service to others and share with others, like you get to keep being happy, joyous, and free. You get to not have the weight of the world. I was on your shoulders, and that's really what it comes down to is just being able to truly be free. That's the that's what I've learned today. Like the jobs and the titles that made me feel like I was so rich, right? Financially rich. But I was in a prison. I you know, I like I said before, I had to go to work at XY and I had to do this. Like when you get to kind of own for me, like own the morning and that having that freedom to say that from a business standpoint, I'm my business isn't gonna start till 9 a.m. I mean, boy, like I can I can do a lot of things between before 9 a.m. And it's like just free. And that that's my spirituality today, realizing that that is I mean, it's like being a gajillionaire or whatever that equates to for somebody out there that needs to have a number to, you know, you finally realize that time, time, and and that freedom of that time is the ultimate riches. It uh nice wild.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Nice. The uh I mean the book has an action plan outline, so there's uh checklist to keep you guided, um, sort of a direction you'd provided uh that you get to help choose. It's accountability by checking the boxes and saying, hey, here's a proof that I did something. You know, I'm curious. Uh whenever we write books, uh, I think we're always writing them to somebody or for somebody. And so with this, the way you put it together, who are you writing this book to or for?

SPEAKER_01 29:09

I mean, when you you lay it out so nice the way you asked it, I just it's me three years ago, four years ago, five, anything before I realized that I the structure, right? 23 years in the military, I had from five in the morning till well, it was just I was 24-7. And so there was kind of just like this an action plan. And there's actually part of it, your three daily wins, there's an after-action review every day. And what that AAR or what an action after review is, for those who don't know, is basically your sustains, your improves, and actions you're gonna take in those areas, right? So it's great. If you checked everything off, you're happy, you know, sustain. Hey, let's just do this day over again tomorrow. Uh, but there's probably an improve. Like, I can look at my physical this morning, and I didn't bring like my book with me to be like, okay, my Thursday workout looks like this. So like I probably slacked off a little bit the the weights that I chose today uh when it came to back advice. And so I was like, oh, I think last week I was you know doing 35 pounds uh kind of thing. And so uh I'll do 35 pounds again because I think it was, and uh, I had done 40 pounds last week, so I I I kind of shaved five pounds there, like and I was like, Oh yeah, this is this is good, okay. I'm stronger than I you know felt last week, whatever, maybe. And sure enough, why wouldn't it be easier? They're five pounds less each, and so it's kind of going back to improve. It's like, well, make sure you bring your book with you, like and don't run across the street. And uh, it's just like I think the pre-combat and checks, pre-combat inspections that we used to do. I still need to do those today, uh, when it comes to leaving the house, uh, even though you know I could have run ran back, uh, but it's cold out, so I was like, no, I don't need to run back outside again. And uh, and then those actions we need to take in it uh throughout the day, different pieces of it really comes down to you know what areas really, and a lot of the time I find myself it's in that mental and that spiritual side where uh the physical, you know, pretty pretty normal uh piece of it, but I can find myself you know that human comfort zone will come back in and it it does. I'll I'll I'll be like, oh, that 20 minutes was good enough. Uh, you know, it wasn't 30. So you know, train to time, train a standard. What is it? Is it a time? So the standard is the time, or is it reps and so forth? And um, but yeah, when I think about myself, it's it's not being in the military anymore. I need this, like I use like I still use this today, you know, 850 days into my sobriety journey, I realize that this is just a holistic living you know, pieces all the habits that we need to have in our life that allow us the like the health basically to give us the longevity. Granted, I don't know if I get tomorrow kind of thing, but I know today I want to live in such a way that like my health is you know the next most important thing in it because this vessel has an expiration date if I live it any other way than the best way possible. And today we have such unbelievable, you know, it's like hey, eat a healthy diet and drink water and do these things, and it's like okay, I don't do any of that. Well, what do you expect? You're gonna, you know, I think back, I probably was living my body when I retired, you know, four odd years ago now from the military. I was like 70 years old, my body was right, and it was just because I hadn't over probably the last five years didn't live a very healthy lifestyle. And realizing all those compounding years had the effect of you know many terrible things. And then now today to go like wow, like you improve yourself over time and space and live like there's a reason why people write books about health. There's a why spirituality, why there's habits, and you just just do them today, and you know, when tomorrow shows up, then do them again tomorrow, and and so forth. And you'd be amazed, you know, almost almost lost the 50 pounds I gained, you know, in those 18 months after retirement. We're we're down to our like last few pounds here. So that's pretty awesome. And uh people are like, oh my goodness, like you look bigger, you know, but you lost like that much. I'm like, yeah, well, muscle does way more than fat. Uh it's just kind of the the norm. And uh I love that answer. Oh yeah, yeah. And so so you realize that it's like, wow, that was possible. And to me, I was like fearful that I was gonna be stuck at that. I have a picture that it's on my fridge. I I want to burn it every time I look at it, and that why it's on the fridge is because yeah, it was uh it doesn't even look like me when people see it, uh you know, like just squared off all the way down to your, you know, like no what whatever chin or whatever you want to call it, the jawline. And uh I had a goatee at the time, which my girls you know didn't like and and so forth, and I was probably doing it because you know, just get a rise out of them. And uh yeah, today it's just trying to do better, trying to be a better example of uh you know what we should be doing to just be somewhat of service in society, and uh yeah, the biggest thing with let's get spiritual is that it it it it kind of just takes you through it. So I don't know who I heard it from. Let's talk about making decisions. I mean it was Tony Robbins uh sitting in one of his and uh you know simplifying your life to you know, hey, you don't need to have 30 t-shirts and 20 pairs of jeans and 10 sneakers and all these things because you're complicating your decision making in life, basically, you know, simplify it as much as possible. And for me, where I was I was probably overthinking before, like, you know, how's this look? How's that look? I gotta look a certain way. What's Rory think about my sweater, you know, so on and so forth, and and everything else. And so, how do we simplify it as much as possible to really give you you buy back your time and you also um don't get analysis paralysis on decisions that have no real true outcome, I guess. That uh, I mean, you could talk about feelings and emotions. Oh, I feel good when I when I look like this, and that that is true, sure. But how long did it take you to make the decisions you needed to to feel that way? Oh, like an hour, and I'm like, okay, so not that it has to be about money, but it just that seems to get people's attention, right? How much you can pay an hour? I make like $500 an hour. I'm like, are you willing to like pay five hundred dollars like to feel the way you do? Absolutely not, that's ridiculous, and be like, okay, well, you just solve your own equation there on simplifying your wardrobe and to have that feeling, right? Because if you know that that outfit makes you feel good, like I have pretty much I think this in three other colors, and the pants that I have on, you just come in two colors, and I'm like, every time I'm like, man, I look good today. That feel feeling accomplished, it uh cost me a dollar twenty-five, you know, kind of because that's how long it took me to change hangers and put the clothes on. So I get it. I sound like an alien at times when it comes to some of these things, but it's because I used to spend a lot of time, a lot of that freedom trying to make a decision that, you know, like, hey, this this I got purple underwear. Should I wear purple underwear? I don't have purple socks on, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And uh, for those out there that are Vikings fans, like, yeah, absolutely, I got purple socks with purple underwear with a purple undershirt, right? Let's go.

SPEAKER_00 37:21

It's not gonna help. It's not gonna help. It's just not gonna help. I love it. No, it honestly, I mean, it sounds like you know, you're uh you're an efficiency expert in a lot of ways, you know, with a lot of things that you've done, a lot of things that you teach. Um, and again, I've known you for a while, so I've seen a lot of these pieces. Seems like you really did uh more than than some of these other projects you've done, which are all great, but you've taken so many pieces of you and and really taken like all the best parts, put them into this book, and said, Here's here's how you need to move forward. Here's everything I can give you to move forward. Does that sound kind of accurate? Is that how you feel about the book?

SPEAKER_01 37:57

Yeah, no, I love how you have that ability to sum things up in such a great way. It uh it's truly that when I because to me today it it's it's not about me anymore. Before it was always about me, it had to be about me. Today it's now like it. I this one this project took the longest. I mean, this project's been working on it a year where the first couple books like it was cool because it just came, you know, got downloaded on a piece of paper, sent to somebody. We like it, we'll we'll publish it, you know, kind of with you. And this one was uh took a writing coach uh to help me with it, kind of, you know, and go like it's good, but it could be so much better. And going like, Margaret, we're gonna check it right, you know, like just getting upset about that, right? And uh the refinement. And then now today, when I've reread it and then rework it myself, I think all the guys that helped along the way. I mean, that's the coolest thing. When I look in the acknowledgements and the amount of people uh that it took to have the, you know, it's just so cool. Just a shout out and gratitude to the and I and I just say because there's many of them the the Lisa's, the Kazas, the Mike's, the Ryan's not this Ryan, other Ryan's uh you know, Tanya's Brady's Marks, uh there's four four marks, Andy's times two, the God Squad, Step Brothers, Mission Project Crew, coaches to coaches, mom, dad, Jim, Roxanne, Steve, Amy, Randy, Joe, Spencer, Justin, you know, it goes on and on. Rory, uh, you know, just all the people that you just go, like, wow, what it took for this to come together. Because there were certain pieces of it that, yeah, it worked great for me, but I'm like, okay, like, does it work for Rory? Does it work for a Steve? Does it work? And it's like, hey, can you try this out for size? Like, I mean, I gave it to a group of like 20 people because a lot of people were going like, I really struggle with meditation. What does that even like? What does it mean to meditate? And so I was like, if you just do this, do these practices for like 30 days and and like let me know if if you're still going, like, what? And they all came back and was like, you know, I can, I'm up to five minutes, five minutes of of unadulterated silence, right? And and they're like, my life is amazing. And I'm like, okay, cool. Uh go to a silent retreat for four days. Uh, take two of these and get back to me in the morning. Uh, because for me, that's what really opened my eyes up to was like starting at like extended periods of silence more and more. And and I love a challenge, right? Anybody that challenges me, I'm like, let's go. I can I can hang. And uh four days of silence. That was uh, you know, so uh back in November of last year, uh interviewed a modern monk and talking about like his childhood, you know, growing up with his father being like the head guru and and being the the young boy, and then now today he's like you know the head guru, and realizing uh once you can dominate the silence, uh it's it's it's just you your body heals. It's like fasting, it's it's it's healing from the inside out and where you really connect with the universe, right? You connect to something far, far outside of yourself, and you can really just see things in such a different, vibrant like before when I started to think about life and places I've been, I'm always like, man, that was a dark place, and and so forth. And it was like, no, that was me, like being in that place. That was the darkness. Now when I go back to places that I believe were dark, I'm just like, man, there's like they put new lights in here. Like, what what's going on? And you realize that it is um this modern monk talks about, you know, uh, we create our own mirror reflection. Actually, life is a window, and only through our mistakes does it start to cloud or our traumas, and it it it turns into a mirror. So all we can see is our inadequacies, our fears, those anxieties, the not good enough, the coulda, woulda, shoulda's, all these different things. And then the next thing you know, that's all we see, and that's that darkness that creeps in, that reflection, as opposed to let's work on our traumas, let's try to meditate, let's try to talk about these things with others. And you start to clean off and it becomes the window again. So, like you're five years old, you know, you just got an ice cream cone and you know, a puppy dog, and all these great, wonderful things again, and you're like, holy cows, life is amazing. And that's kind of the the saying, and you know, I don't know if it's jelly roll that talks about the windshield is is bigger for a reason than the rear view mirror is you just got to keep looking forward, and I've learned that now is any time that I want to let darkness creep out. Also, I have to do is start looking back behind into my past and and letting it kind of creep into today. And those are the things that I've really, you know, not that you're running from them anymore. I was I was running from them before I've faced them, I'm not afraid of them anymore. And I know they don't do me any good letting them come around along for the ride or carrying them in my rucksack like I used to. It just kind of slowed me down, and that's where I think possibly you as well, you see how you can speed actually time up in a good way, not in like a let's get through life way, but where when you're not carrying so much, you it's it's just you attract, and then you have people that help you that have done it before you, and then they can they can just do it like this like it's like you know, hey Rory, like I know you did this, like you mind like helping me? Yeah, I got it like an hour this afternoon, you want to do it? And we like knock out something that would have taken a year before because you just continue to go down the wrong road, and uh you're carrying. All this weight of decades for me, it was decades of trauma that I was bringing with me. And unfortunately, uh, so many people had to be a part of that. And uh, you know, now I'm just a living amends that uh here in my life, uh, you're probably somebody that believes in me. And uh, you know, you other what the rocks say, you know, you love what the rocks cooking, you like what the rocks smell what the rock's cooking, what does it was? It's like, yeah, it's good, it smells good these days. It's it's so much better. Uh just because it's uh it's it's just great, and it's it's so good to see you again. And uh thank you.

SPEAKER_00 44:38

You too, brother. Um I got one last question for you, but before we do that, uh tell everybody where they can reach you. Best way to contact you, best way to find all your works, including the new one. Let's get spiritual.

SPEAKER_01 44:49

Yeah, uh, our Protector Development.com will get you all the books, the podcasts, the courses. You want to hop on a call and just have a meaningful conversation? You know, I know it's always scary, like, oh, he's a coach, he's gonna want me to work with him and stuff like that. I just want to meet people that want to have meaningful conversations. The rest works itself out. And then uh, if you love social media, I still don't love it, but uh, I know that's how we communicate. And uh Ryan T. Rikert or Army RT1978 on any of the social medias, and we'll be able to link up that way.

SPEAKER_00 45:24

Excellent. All right, man. Uh, last question. I ask everybody this. I can't wait to hear this answer. Uh, you're someone who has put a couple of books out now. And you know, you you described you know your process on this last one, you know, and how it was sort of above and beyond, you know, everything you did. A lot of folks who listen to this program are aspiring authors too. And so the question I like to sort of end with is um, what's your best advice for authors who are out there who want to be where you are and are not quite where you are yet?

SPEAKER_01 45:51

Uh go to whatever part of the book that says how to contact said author. So let's see here. What's this say on my let's see if I'm preaching, if I'm preaching in the choir or if I'm actually uh uh let's see here. Oh, published by our protector development. Uh let's see, and then it's uh www.rprotector development.com. Contact Ryan. And uh so if if if someone's published a book and uh you know whatever, uh reach out to them. We we actually help people write books uh at our protector development today. Uh so that uh is our protector development publishing. That's that's the first one. And uh I just uh let's talk, let's have a good time. No uh doesn't knock a cost you anything to reach out to me and uh hop on the phone together and just I would say this uh if you want to be an author, start. If you want to publish your book, publish your book, just do just do it. It's kind of like uh Nike, right? It's and then say just do it. And that's what I realized is my first two books that I wrote. Boy, if I'm gonna rewrite them, basically, I believe, in a different kind of lens, per se, because I'm gonna take the best tools, but it's gonna have this flair on it, not the hey, you want to ride through the valley at dawn with me kind of thing. Like, we don't need to do that again. Let's let's do it from a different lens. And uh just knowing that not everybody uh gets a second chance. So I you know, I don't want to have that uh second chance flavor to kind of some of those lessons in the first book. And uh some guys are already men, which is so cool. So it's uh a couple of guys out there looking at uh you know having a cohort or group project together of you know our journeys, you know, we all got here a different way. What does it look like though from today now versus we don't need the past, we need what does it look like to sustain it? Because that's sometimes the hardest thing is sustaining something. We don't realize uh that in that comfort, uh, you know, complacency, boy, I tell you, it creeps in hard. And so you got to have the right circles. But I love it. Uh, I think everybody should tell their story. I'm I'm definitely on my girls to uh start writing their books and their portions of kind of what was this like uh to go through so they can help other teenagers or whatever, you know. I guess Lauren's 20 now. So whatever this for them looks like, because you know, there's so many others going through it. It's not easy. You know, your parents uh are going through a separation, divorce, and don't talk to each other and and different things, like what is that like? And then your life to be kind of turned upside down, and what's the future you know gonna be? It's gonna be so much better than you could ever imagine once you make a decision on whichever way you're gonna go. But uh yeah, write your book. Beautiful, write your book.

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Beautiful. All right, I love that. You know, I knew I was gonna get some kind of answer from you. I had no idea that you'd gotten into helping folks doing the books, so I was like, you know what? All right, perfect. All right, folks, you heard it. You heard it here. Um, the uh author of Let's Get Spiritual, uh, which is out now. Go check it out, Ryan Rikert. Ryan, thanks for coming on again, man. It was great touching base with you, and you are always an interview that is just worth listening to, brother. You always are. Thanks for being here today.

SPEAKER_01 49:20

Thank you, sir.

SPEAKER_00 49:21

All right, folks, that's been another great episode of the Right Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. Uh, folks, this is the place where authors know that every single page is a step forward, and it's a step forward towards finding the right path. Until next time.