Episode 31 — Jordan Salinas: How a Hero Is Built

Jordan Salinas became a national name after the 2026 In-N-Out shooting in Twin Falls, Idaho. But this episode isn’t really about the shooting. It’s about the five years before it.

After the 2021 Boise Towne Square Mall shooting, Jordan saw something in himself he wanted to change. So he made a decision, made a plan, trained, and did the work.

Then life handed him one hell of a test.

In Episode 31 of The Man in Motion Podcast, Jordan Salinas: How a Hero Is Built, Bob looks at awareness, change, discipline, and what it takes to become the person you say you want to be.

Because recognizing that something needs to change isn’t the answer.

It’s where the work starts.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

At some point in their lives, many men look at themselves and they don't like what they see.

SPEAKER_01 0:06

They realize something has to change. They're not the man they want to be. And then they sit there and they stay there.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

And they say they want to change, but they never do. I'm going to look at one specific man today.

SPEAKER_01 0:25

Gentleman's name is Jordan Salinas. You might recognize the name, he might not. He's been all over the news lately. Jordan Salinas is a hero, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_00 0:39

And I think in many people's opinion. Because one afternoon, at an In N Out Burger in Idaho, life handed him one hell of a test. And I gotta tell you, Jordan fucking showed up.

SPEAKER_01 0:59

Welcome to episode 31, Jordan Salinas, How a Hero Is Built. I'm Bob. This is a show about what it means to be a man in today's world. Navigating life with purpose, clarity, and strength. No hype, no hacks, no fixing yourself, just awareness, grounded thinking, and choosing direction while you're already in motion ever forward. Let's get to it. So I'm gonna give you a little history on the incident. Uh just just so you're up to speed in case you're not aware of this event. Um recently, um at uh where the heck was it?

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Twin Falls, Idaho.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

Uh in Twin Falls, Idaho, on August 1st, uh someone, and I'm not going to give this person a name because they're a freaking animal, and I don't think we should glorify these animals that do this shit. Um picked up a couple of guns, went to an in a newly opened In N Out burger in uh Twin Falls, Idaho, and opened fire.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

He killed four people. I believe it was four. Um yeah, killed four people, uh, injured ten.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

And police aren't really sure of the motive. They don't at least as of the recording of this, I haven't read a motive. I haven't seen anything like that released. But when this happened, Jordan Salinas, who had been, I'm assuming, waiting in line at the drive-thru, uh, was in his car with his girlfriend. They had been horseback riding that day, got out of his car, ran towards danger, pulled his gun, and along with, I believe it was two off-duty police officers, returned fire and drove the attacker away. The attacker was hit during the exchange of gunfire. Um, and then later the attacker took his own life. Now, I'm I'm not minimizing the part that the off-duty police officers play because they are definitely a part of this. But Jordan Salinas is just a regular dude. He's he's a nurse, he's a healthcare worker. He's not that's not his job. It's not his place to go running towards danger and pulling his legally owned and carried firearm and placing himself in harm's way to protect those around him. It's pretty fucking heroic. Now I don't I don't know Jordan. I've never met him. I don't I I wouldn't even know how to go about beginning to contact him, to interview him or anything, which I totally would. So, Jordan, if this finds its way to you, please reach out to me and I would love to have you on the show.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

But he he did it because it was the right thing.

SPEAKER_01 4:22

So I realized while I was editing this that I didn't make a good enough point about something. I want to be very clear on this. Uh, during this whole incident, there were three heroes, three people that stepped up when they didn't really have to. And we spent a lot of time talking about Jordan Salinas in this episode, but there were two other people that that stepped in. One was an off-duty police officer, and the other one I've read different reports about what he was. Some say he was also an off-duty police officer. I've read another report that said he was uh a former police officer. But both of these gentlemen, along with Jordan, were were very involved in in the incident and were instrumental just as much as Jordan was in in saving those lives. And these men are heroes too. But I don't know their stories. Um, I don't know much about them. Obviously, they're they're they're peace officers, so their their personal information is not out there, at least not as much. So I don't I don't want anyone to misconstrue the fact that I'm saying Jordan Sleeness did this single-handedly. He didn't. He was definitely part of a team, but he is he's the part of the team we're looking at today. So I just just wanted to make sure that was clear. I I have a lot of respect and I have just as much admiration for those other two gentlemen that stepped up and did what they did because they stepped into harm's way the same as Jordan did. So I just I just wanted to clear that up, make make certain that I I I properly expressed that because I it it felt like as I was editing this, I'd given the uh the other two gentlemen the short end of the stick on this, and and I wanted to be very clear on that. That's not that's not where I want this episode to be today. I want to I want to look at something, I want to go back because as it turns out, this was actually the second uh mass shooting incident in Jordan's area back in 2021. It was October 25th, at the Boise Town Square Mall in Boise, Idaho. Another shooter, uh, and again, I'm not gonna give this animal a name because he doesn't deserve one, um, pulled out a gun, killed a mall security officer, a shopper. Uh, the mall security officer's name was Joe Acre, I believe it's pronounced. And the shopper was Robert uh Roberto Padilla Aguiles. Aguales? I'm sorry, I'm terrible with names. And injured four other people, including a Boise uh police officer. This animal exchanged gunfire with police while fleeing, and later, same as the in-and-out shooter, killed himself um with a gunshot.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

But the reason I bring this up is because this shooting affected Jordan in in some way.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Um and and I've seen differing reports. Some reports say he was in the mall, some say he wasn't. Um I I couldn't tell you. I'm working off of what's available on the internet and through news outlets.

SPEAKER_00 7:35

But the incident made Jordan think about his brother, who uses a wheelchair and could not, would not be able to just run from the danger. Um and this spurred Jordan.

SPEAKER_01 7:54

He he recognized that if something happened, he couldn't protect himself, he couldn't protect his brother, he couldn't protect helpless people. So Jordan decides to start taking some gun classes, start practicing with his pistols. And and again, Jordan's a healthcare worker. He he's a full-time caregiver for his brother who's wheelchair bound. But it was enough that that he started seriously training. He recognized, and this isn't about guns. I'm not telling you to go train with guns, I'm not telling you to, you know, go out in into the desert as Jordan did and and you know, practice scenarios and things like that. That's not what I'm saying. But Jordan recognized something about himself that he didn't like, something that scared him, something that he couldn't live with within himself.

SPEAKER_00 8:59

And then he came up with a plan and he executed the plan. And in executing that plan, made the changes in his life that that he felt he needed. And unlike most of us, life handed him one hell of a dramatic way to take a test.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

And I I think these animals that that do these mass shootings are disgusting and they're weak and they're sad and they're they're broken people. Every single one of them, they're broken people. And I I feel for the individuals because they're so moved to a place of dysfunction that they feel like they have to inflict pain and fear on others before they end themselves.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

But just because you're hurting doesn't mean you have the right to make other people hurt. But back to the point. Jordan recognized that he was incapable of defending himself, his brother, and others around him.

SPEAKER_01 10:16

So October 25th, 2021 to August 1st, 2026, that's nearly five years. Five years where Jordan says, from what I'm gathering from these reports, that Jordan spent one to two days a week, a couple hours a day, handling his firearms, attending training classes, doing range work with his pistols, with his rifles, and in doing so built within himself a capability to address the lack that he saw.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Pretty sensational story. And again, I I think Mr. Salinas is the only way I can say it, a fucking hero. He made a plan. He did the work. He built himself into someone different. So what's stopping the rest of us? What is stopping the rest of us?

SPEAKER_01 11:30

If he can change himself into someone that runs towards gunfire, which I can tell you as a United States Marine, that's a hard thing to learn. That takes some pretty extreme stress and training to turn you into the type of man that runs towards gunfire, not away from it.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Why can't we do the same? And I'm not talking about firearms training now. Why is it when we see something in ourselves that we don't like that we struggle to just make simple changes? We say it's hard to to change.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

And it is.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

But anything worth doing is hard. Anything worth the cost of entry is going to be hard. If it was easy, everyone would have done it alright. You know, guys, I I talk a lot about awareness of your thoughts and your feelings and who you are, and you know, taking stock of your life.

SPEAKER_01 13:01

That's just the beginning. This is just the beginning. This is where the work fucking starts. It's this is not the answer.

SPEAKER_00 13:10

Awareness is where you start writing the answer to the question. You don't understand what the fucking question is. How do you change it? How do you answer it? For Jordan, the question was, do you want to be the guy who has to watch his brother in a wheelchair get shot? And again, pretty extreme. For me, the latest question I worked on was, do I want to be the guy that's 300 pounds?

SPEAKER_01 13:46

Because I was. One year ago, today, as of this recording, recording this on August 10th. August 10th of last year, I was 300 pounds.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

As I sit here today before you, I'm 228. Change is not easy. But you have to ask yourself, is it harder than staying where you are? Maybe it's not wait, maybe it's you're unhappy with your life, or you're unhappy with your job, or you don't understand your feelings, or you don't.

SPEAKER_01 14:30

I don't know, guys. There's a billion things. Show me someone who's not unhappy with some portion of their life, and I'll show you someone who's blissfully unaware. Because we always want better. That's how we're built. Men are built to always improve. Improve your house, improve your life, improve your family's lives. It's what we do. It's who we are. It's wired into us from back in the fucking caveman days. Where Thag would sit there and he'd want a bigger stick so he could poke the saber-toothed tiger from further away so he could eat it without getting hurt, feed his wife and kids.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Or a better cave, one that didn't leak.

SPEAKER_01 15:16

Or you know, then they it's how we figured out how to build houses. We wanted better. Wanted better. It's how we figured out how to cook food. So we wanted better. You know, all most innovation is because we want better. Why do we stop at wanting better for ourselves?

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Change is scary. Change is hard, change sucks. But if you're not changing, you're dead. Life doesn't give us the opportunity to just sit here and be this unmoving, unchangeable monolith. So when I talk about awareness, I think I think Jordan is is a very model of it.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

He became aware of something in his life that that he didn't like. And he made a a big change that a lot of people made fun of him for over the years. Go look at his his uh social media posts. He he talks a lot about it over the years. And and he's gotten some ridicule and he's lost friends over it, I'm sure. But he made the change.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

He made a change that he felt he needed. And because of that change, when the test showed up, he had the answer.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

And I pray for most of you that you don't get something so dramatic, something so big, something so terrible for so many people. Because I don't I don't want this to gloss over the fact that that more than just the four people who were killed, more than just the ten that were injured, the the presumably hundreds that are around a busy shopping mall area on a Saturday afternoon, all their lives are changed irrevocably because one person saw something within himself and he couldn't stand it, and he chose to hurt others.

SPEAKER_00 17:41

But at the same time, another man seeing this recognized that this was his test, this was his time, this is what he had changed for. It's a hell of a story, guys. And it's a hell of a parable. So the next time you're sitting there saying, I need to change this, the next time you're saying, I'm unhappy with myself, the next time you're saying, I don't like this. Ask yourself this one question. Is this version of me the version that's going to pass the test when the day comes? Think about that. Just just think about that. That's it for today. Take what's useful. Leave what's not. Choose and keep moving. Ever forward.