Rain Brings Growth Podcast

Episode 57 | Bryan “Bam” Marshall | From Iraq to Entrepreneurship: Escaping the Rat Race

• Matthew

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Episode 57 of the Rain Brings Growth Podcast features Bryan “Bam” Marshall — a Marine Corps veteran, entrepreneur, adrenaline junkie, and the host of the Wild Chaos Podcast.

In this episode, Bam dives deep into his wild upbringing in upstate New York, growing up hunting, fishing, and hustling from a young age before joining the Marines after 9/11. From intense Iraq deployments and military brotherhood to life after the service, entrepreneurship, podcasting, and escaping the “rat race,” this conversation is packed with raw stories, hard truths, and nonstop laughs.

Matt and Bam also talk about fatherhood, chasing freedom, building businesses from scratch, taking risks, and why the journey matters more than the destination. If you’re someone who feels trapped in the system, struggles with fear of taking the leap, or just loves hearing authentic conversations from men who’ve lived through chaos and growth — this episode is for you.

Follow Bam on Instagram: @bambam0069

Follow Wild Chaos Podcast: @wildchaospodcast

Episode 57 is available now on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all major streaming platforms.

#RainBringsGrowth #WildChaosPodcast #BryanMarshall #BamMarshall #MarineCorps #VeteranPodcast #EntrepreneurMindset #Fatherhood #MensMentalHealth #PodcastClip #GrowthMindset #MilitaryStories

SPEAKER_00

We just had a sound expert come over yesterday, and this whole entire time Chrissy's been editing and doing all of our podcasts on the free Da Vinci fucking app. And this guy's like, wait. These are all done on the f the free program. She's like, I guess. Like, we did I didn't know we needed to update one or the the pro version. He's like, What's the difference? Massive difference. Really? Massive difference. Night and day. And uh, because it has the now it has the AI sound diffuser in it. So you dude, you could have kids screaming, dogs barking. You just click a button, boom, takes it all out.

SPEAKER_01

Really?

SPEAKER_00

You could put a you could do an interview at the park, full middle of the day, and you hit a button, and it just beep, everything out.

SPEAKER_01

No matter what your mics are.

SPEAKER_00

He said he's went through and set them up. There's certain settings that we do it to help.

SPEAKER_01

Where instead of everything recording on just one um track, it'll give me a multi-track.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. Do everything on multi-tracks.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I don't, I've never done that. So I download the Autopod app or the Autopod AI, which they charge you. I haven't got charged yet because it's a free month, but then it'll go in and it'll just like do all your cuts for you like in two minutes. Yep.

SPEAKER_00

And I'm like, like a three-hour podcast does like takes like 10 minutes.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. You guys use that?

SPEAKER_00

I don't know if it's that version, but she Christy has one now. Because she live edits, like nothing's changed there, but now she can do it to where we all the cameras are recorded on their own file, and then all audio is so she can literally something happens in that yours. She can I can turn your whole because mine stays consistent. That's the problem with podcasts, is every guess is different.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So this will balance everything out, keeps me the same, and she could bring the guests either up to me or down to me.

SPEAKER_01

So yeah, that is a hard part because yeah, you'll get some soft talkers or I've realized that what just watching some of my videos, I'm like, man, I have like no energy in my videos. Me too.

SPEAKER_00

That's what I'm trying to like coach TJ right now on because you have it. You so does TJ too, as far as personality. But every time I look at TJ's clips, he's like this.

SPEAKER_01

Who's TJ?

SPEAKER_00

Webb. Cop shot six times. Oh, okay. And so, dude, he's got it, he's got great people on, but then every I look at him in the first three seconds of every video is like this. And I'm like, bro, you look like you're sleeping to your guests. Like I immediately because you look boring.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So that's where it's like, oh, when I talk, like I try to reiterate what PS say because then that's a clip. Dude, you don't get it also. I don't know if you've done gotten to that point yet, but like it's switching me. I'm like, everything I'm saying is for a clip. That's how every question I ask is for a clip. That's that, those are viral. Like, oh, then so and so shit on him. Like, he shit on the person, bing, boom, viral. Like, that's you, that's how you yeah, everything you talk is like a hook. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01

That makes sense.

SPEAKER_00

That's that's how it works, or it's uh it's not like I want to do it, but that's just the internet. Like, that's yeah. So that's one of those little things where it's like, tell me about the time that you almost died, and then people are like, I want to know how this guy almost died. Just that those those engaging initial questions that that helps a lot. But yeah, just having that energy, that's that's the difference between you look at some of these big podcasters and then but then also you see some other ones and they're millions of views, and they're like, So, and they're reading off an iPad the whole time. I'm like, Okay, so it's just it's just consistent. Whoever you are, just be it and fucking don't change.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Cool, dude.

SPEAKER_00

Well, what do we want to talk about?

SPEAKER_01

Um, I'm gonna kill that. I think my wife is a lot of things. Yeah, dude, after I went on your podcast, I made a lot of changes in here. I was like, alright, I gotta set this shit up.

SPEAKER_00

You should see it now. We've changed everything even more.

SPEAKER_01

You have like lighting and shit? Everything's mounted up now, so everything's off the floor. I like to get that because it's so tight in here, and this still is used as like our main entryway for the garage.

SPEAKER_00

So that was my thing. It wasn't yours is consistent. Ours was always we always had to move shit and move it back, and here's easy. That's why I was like, dude, I found that guy and I was like, bro, come over and just send him a picture. I'm like, can you just make this clean? And he was like, Yeah, and came over. He's like, I took a picture and mount this, this, and this. I mean, a list of everything to buy. I bought it all and came over and installed it all. And yeah, it's now it's just turnkey. It's so nice. There's no sorry, that protein shake that I have. So I bring a flosser, dude. I'd be I eat a ton of that nut butter or that almond butter. Oh yeah. And it's got those little balls in it, and they always get stuck in my teeth. Like mid-episode, I'm like Yeah, in the mic the whole entire time. I'm like, oh god, I gotta stop doing that.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Cool. Yeah, I don't know. I I just wanted to hear your story and then we'll just get some stuff in the way and talk about brotherhood and all that good stuff.

SPEAKER_00

Let's do it. I almost wore my Bam shirt. I almost wore the black shit. I think I would.

SPEAKER_01

I was like, well, I got my oh, you're not the same size as me. You're bigger than me. A little bit. But cool, man. Well, thanks for coming on. I appreciate it. It's been uh it's been such a cool journey just watching you and then Kyle making the introduction and then going on your podcast, and then just the whole bam nation and and just the brotherhood. It's been awesome, dude. So I really appreciate you coming on here.

SPEAKER_00

Absolutely, dude. It's the least I can do. You came on mine and you were like, yo, when I get you on yours, and I was like, any time, so here we are.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that's awesome. Oh, yeah, it worked out. I needed someone, and uh, you were available, and it was godsend, appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00

So, yeah, here we are. Yeah, man. I'm proud of you, dude. This is a great setup, great studio.

SPEAKER_01

Thanks, dude. Yeah, I I used to just do like eBay stuff out of here, and then it was just it really was a catch-all for all my stuff and uh the fridge and whatever ever in here, and then one day I was like, Well, we should do a podcast. And I don't know where that came from. That came out of left field, for sure. Like, because I'm not a public speaker, I don't like being very public, as you know, with my story. Like, I just you know, I have my circle of friends, and that's it. And then they didn't even know my story or anything, and I was like, All right, let's do a podcast. And my wife, bless her heart, she's been she's been you know, all over the place with my ideas, between like wanting to leave the prison and start a podcast. Like, that's a good wife, though, man.

SPEAKER_00

That's a good wife. Not I'm very fortunate with mine. She has chased me through every stupid ass journey that I've like, well, I want to start this. I want to be, you know. Yeah, and she's like, all right, she's never there's been a couple where she maybe let's let's sit on this one and just let it simmer and yeah, and marinate for a little bit. Thank God. But yeah, man, it's it's great to have an awesome wife that will chase us and follow us through all the crazy adventures. Because then if not, man, we're stuck sitting in a cubicle, a nine to five for a whole entire life. Oh, you know, you gotta provide for your family. Well, you gotta look out for to your mind's like, fuck it, we'll figure it out. Like, let's bro, let's build the airplane on the way up to the ground and we'll figure it out. If not, fuck, start over again, do it again.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's the worst thing that happens. You have to go back to your job that you had.

SPEAKER_00

No, that's not an option.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that isn't that's not an option.

SPEAKER_00

No, I know, but I'm just saying, like, that should scare you enough to never give up on going back to the nine to five.

SPEAKER_01

Right.

SPEAKER_00

100%.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

That's that's but that's I tell people all the time, they're like, Man, how do you how do you do it as like an entrepreneur? Isn't it terrifying? Yeah, it's terrifying. And you use that terror to net to fear the ever going back. Like, dude, I walked to the gym the other day and it was you know four o'clock, just crossing victory road, because I walk in, you know, to the gym behind the house, and dude, that traffic was backed up for three miles. And I was like, that that right here, that's what will keep me from never going back to a nine to five. Ever is sitting in traffic, wasting my life working for somebody else, sitting in traffic in the morning, all day working for somebody else, and then I got to sit in traffic to come home and see my family. Fuck that's what terrifies me. Fuck that. Like, that's the type of shit people are like, oh yeah, that's what doesn't sound like much, but when you've been out of the system and you work for yourself and you've built everything that you've built on your own, and I'm not saying we are rich or successful by any chance. We just I don't work for the man, yeah, and that's enough for me. And that terrifies the shit. And I was looking at all these people like, dude, I'm going to the gym in the middle of the day, and you're sitting in traffic trying to get home. Like, fuck that. That's what that sucks to me. That's that is hell. Going to work, checking in, asking for time off, and that's what keeps my me motivated to never quit to go back to that rat race. Living in the rat race terrifies me, dude.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, yeah. The matrix is real, dude. When you hear about the matrix and you're like, oh, and then whatever, but you get out of it and you're like, holy shit, this is completely different.

SPEAKER_00

It's the same with the public school system. And I know not everybody has the ability to do it, but it's the exact same feeling when you pull your kids out of the system, and then year two, year three, you're like, huh, okay, that's not. I'm glad we're not going through that. That's weird. My kids don't think like that. Oh, wait, we're not what what the hell does that mean? Like, you're not you, and then you start seeing, like, oh, it's just clones and it's the same. Copy, paste, repeat, even in the public school system with the kids, and you're seeing your kids developing in a whole different way. You're like, okay, we we made the right decision. Takes a little bit to you know, the fear, the anxiety, that you're if you're doing it or for the right reasons, or should we be making this leap? Dude, just give it to God and jump, man. Like, yeah, God take the wheel. Here we go, and we're gonna figure it out one way or another. And if it doesn't work out, pivot.

SPEAKER_01

Right.

SPEAKER_00

That's the biggest thing. That's just pivot. Don't don't. Oh, I gotta go back to work. Nope. That's quitting, and that is failure in my book. That is you giving up is when you go out to go back to work. I'll never I'll be homeless on the streets. My wife and I shook on that one. We will be bums on the streets before I ever go back to work for somebody. I just this just doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, can't do it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, once you get out of the rat race and you just see like all the pain and and suffering that other people are going through, and they just think that's normal, and you're like, no, brother.

SPEAKER_00

No, dude, there's a whole lot let me show you the dark side or the bright side. You should say, like, look, this whole world out here. You're gonna be scared shitless. You don't know when your next paycheck's gonna come. If you're gonna be struggling next month on whatever reasons, the the the stress and the pressure of building a business, having to support your family, dude, is terrifying, but it does not outweigh the fear for me of going to work and having to ask somebody for time off. Hey, can I take my kids here? Like, I just I kill I'm not wired like that. That is not not for me. Yeah, terrifies me.

SPEAKER_01

It's wild. Cool, dude. Well, let's just start about like where are you from?

SPEAKER_00

Originally I'm from upstate New York on the Thousand Islands River. So, where the Thousand Islands dressing actually is from. That's from my hometown. That's like a little claim to fame. Um, grew up great childhood, just wild, crazy boy shit on the river, just hunting, fishing, spearing. I mean, dude, we just grew up like just the most hillbilly-ass kids you ever could imagine. Like it was just the greatest time. I my my family, we've been on an island for I think like a hundred over 150 years is you know, throughout the generations of have um been on this island. It's called Grindstone Island, right on the St. Lawrence River. So I got to grow up on one of the cleanest, clearest rivers that the this country has to offer. I mean, we would just, as kids, I mean, do we would plan we would plan camping trips all week? My brother and I were like the masterminds, and we'd okay, this is where we're gonna meet. You're bringing this, we'll bring this. So we'd have all plan, and you know, before the cell phone, social media days, and sure as shit, Friday'd come along, everybody go to the winds and then you know, to their homes. Okay, five o'clock, every meet at the dock, and dude, the kids would just start getting showing up. We're either riding their bikes, parents dropping them off. You'd have a sleeping bag and a little backpack full of whatever. Do we would just take off on a river? My my my dad would go, we'd fill two tanks of fuel up if we needed them. Dude, we're looking I look back at it now. I'm like, it's such a different time. I mean, I'm 12, 13 years old on this river, which people die every year on, boating accidents or whatever. It's actually a pretty treacherous river, at least in our area, because a lot of shoals and underwater, you know, features that you can definitely lose a lower unit on on a boat. Dude, we would just take off. We would just go and we'd find an island that nobody was on and camp for the weekend. And we'd, you know, my mom would just pack us all the duck and goose. You'd open up a frozen bag full of duck breasts, pour a bottle of uh Italian dressing in it, zip it back up. By the time we were ready for dinner that night be defrosted. We'd put it on sticks and roasting duck breasts. And so that's how I grew up. It was just it was the greatest childhood, and you know, growing up on in that area. It just there's so much to do. So I think that's what helped also start a little bit of my like entrepreneurship in those early days because my brother and I, we have these bullhead back, they're called bullhead, they're like little mini catfish back home, but you can only catch them right as the ice is going out. And because as soon as the water warms up, their meat gets really mushy. So all the restaurants for like a four to five week period, they'll take as many as you can get. And my brother and I built like a little reputation because we were always the first ones out catching them. So they would start calling the house, be like, Hey, can we get you know five dozen bullheads? And my dad would be like, Hey, the restaurants are calling. And my brother, we would be out until the sun would be coming up because you catch them at night. So my mom would drop us off right after dark, and there was a little payphone at the pizza shop, and we would go until we were at a bait or at a room in buckets, and we'd call my mom, it'd be two or three in the morning, she'd roll down, we'd load all these bullhead up in buckets in the back of the truck. We had a big pond in our yard, kind of like a catch pond. We built these cages and we just dump all the bullhead in there, they'd flush themselves out in clean water. And dude, I'd call restaurants, and my brother and I were making you know, it's the most money I think I've ever made in my life. Like, as a it it for how much work we were doing. I mean, we had stacks. I bought every because I come from a pretty poor family. Sounds like we had a lot being on an island and everything, but it's just generationally passed down. But my parents, I mean, my I think my dad's made 30 grand his whole entire life until he retired. Like, you know, just they but we made do and we're given a lot of opportunities. But uh, so yeah, we've learned that and I'd go catch worms. I'm slinging worms in little containers, and so it was just it was just a great place to grow up. You either loved it or hated it. If you were into what it provided, it was the greatest environment. But if you were just the kids that weren't into that, it was miserable for them, and I can see that. But yeah, and then you know, through high school, I played college ball or college ball, I played high school ball.

SPEAKER_01

What'd you play?

SPEAKER_00

Football, tight end defensive end, and was really talented at it. I was should have gone and played, but I mean, pretty much getting looked at by a lot of the schools in the Northeast. Got invited to all the combines in camps. So I was on that track to go play D1 ball, and then uh the war broke out. 9-11 happened, and I kind of knew myself. I was always kind of an idiot, always the you know, the class clown, the jock. So I got pushed through. I was just, you know, the star player. No, he's good, he's good, he's good. So I at least had this epiphany as a young idiot where I was like, man, I'm gonna go to college and I'm flunking out of this bitch. Like, I've never applied myself in high school. I'm not gonna apply myself now. I just I knew it. Then the war broke out, and I was like, mmm, that's my out because my town, even though it's a postcard town, it's a little tourist town in the summertime, it's a black hole. Like people never leave. And so then it's just the same people dating the same people. It's just a cycle, right? Like my dad, I went to school with my teachers that were in class with my dad, or that were teachers for my dad, were now my teachers, which wasn't a good scenario because my dad was absolute hellion when he was a kid, so a lot of that trickled into us, my brother and I. But uh, so when the war broke, I was like, Oh, this is my out. I got this is this is how I get out of here. And so yeah, I joined the Marines and uh 2000 and right at the end of 2003, actually the first week of 2004, I shipped off for boot camp and never looked back.

SPEAKER_01

Did anybody else in your family join the military?

SPEAKER_00

My uncle served, but there was a 20-year age gap between my dad and then his older brother, so they weren't really tight, but I'd heard some stories and stuff, but no, I was I was for you know, from what I know, the first that has gone and served. And and so, but I I believe my uncle served, but uh, they weren't ever tight. I never really got to sit and talk to him about any of that. But yeah, no, from from what I know, I either the first or I was the second.

SPEAKER_01

So what made you want to choose the Marines?

SPEAKER_00

Honestly, dude, this is a hilarious story. I was trying to, I was gonna go into the Coast Guard because there's two stations 30 minutes in each direction of my house. There's one on Lake Ontario, then there's one down on the St. Lawrence River, and we're kind of in the middle. And then we'd run into these guys, and dude, in the wintertime, they're playing Xbox, they got these little hovercrafts, and um, it's the skatest job ever. I'm like, oh, dude, I'm just gonna get paid to chill on the river. And then in upstate New York, since it's such a frozen tundra in the wintertime, it's considered a hardship station for the Coast Guard, I guess. Like everyone wants to go to Miami and the Keys and California and coast. Nobody's like, hey, ship me to the St. Lawrence River in upstate New York. And so when I was talking to the coasties at that time, they're like, if you want to come here, you're gonna get it. Like, you put it on your wish list, you're getting it. I was like, all right, cool. And so I had practice or something going on, and I sent my girlfriend to the recruiting station, which was all the recruiting stations like in one building, and you'd walk down the hallway. Dude, some fucking Marine being a Marine was like, What's up? Like, what are you doing here? She's like, I'm here to pick up paperwork for my boyfriend. He's like, Who's your boyfriend? Let me talk to him, give me his number. No, yeah, he uh he had that conversation. He's like, Listen, bro, Coast Guard's kind of cool, I guess. He's like, if you want to just travel, bank chicks, travel the world, fuck shit. Like, list all this stuff. And I'm 18 years old. I'm like, yeah, that's exactly what I do. He's like, Marines is it then? And he's like, he's like, bro, look at the uniforms, look at the uniforms, all these guys. They're a bunch of dorks. And I'm like, yeah, they do look like dorks. He's like, look at the dress blues. Anywhere you go, you're you're the man. I'm like, give me the paperwork. And so, yeah, dude, I signed up and and off I went. I had no idea, didn't do any research on the Marine Corps. I was like, Yeah, cool, let's do this. Like, I want to out of here, I want to go defend my country. And I was like, Cool, like, let's I want to do this. I want to shoot machine guns and full auto grenade launchers, everything, then rockets, like everything that an 18, 19-year-old kid wants to do. And so, yeah, he sold me on it.

SPEAKER_01

And that was right after 9-11.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so I joined 2004. So, I mean, I was in high school for 2000, you know, 9-11, but the war is just starting to kick off, Iraq was just happening, and that was obviously a big factor of really helped me decide to go Marine Corps. I was on vacation actually with that girlfriend at the time and her family, and I'll never forget, dude, this is like ingrained in my DNA. There was a reporter calling in from like the front line of this battle. I don't remember where it was or you know, where they were pushing through. And all you could hear the reporter over the news report was just him screaming, like, all right, we're taking contact. And he had to have been now knowing what I know now. He had to have been sitting in a Humvee because all you can hear was the mod deuce, which is you know, the full auto 50 cal at the time. I didn't know then. You just hear he's trying to report, and you can hear the brass and the links falling on the roof and the hood, and they're coming on the end. You could hear all of this. I didn't know what it was at the time, but I'm like, I'm just watching the news, like, holy fuck, this dot dot. And you hear people screaming, they're like, shit, fine. I'm just like, and then literally like two weeks later, my girlfriend goes to pick up the paperwork, talk to the Marine. So I already had like this hard-on for war. Like, I got a little taste. I was like, damn, that sounded insane. And then it just it was just like a sequence of events that just worked out perfect for that recruiter. And I'm like, yeah, absolutely. And so yeah, I ended up joining, went in, and ended up becoming a machine gunner, and uh, I was a vehicle operator for my actual MOS was amphibious assault vehicles, the tanks that go in and out of the water. Pretty much what separate us from the army. And yeah, you have a full auto grenade launcher on it, which you can shoot like 96 grenades in seconds, and then a mod dude's 50 cal machine gun. And so those were our two main primary weapons on the vehicle, and yeah, it's it was just it was the greatest time. It was the greatest plus worst time of my life. But yeah, I would I highly recommend, you know, if you you know, the military to guys that are looking to change their lives and get their shit on point is a great route. And so yeah, it was it was you know, we obviously I want to defend my country. 9-11, being a New Yorker myself, watching you know, the World Trade Center's hit. My buddy's dad actually had an office in the World Trade Center and left that morning to come home when they got hit. So he was above where the planes actually hit. So my buddy, I watched my buddy in class, we watched the second plane hit the tower. My dude, my buddy was losing it. You know, it's not like you could just call your dad back then on a cell phone, and so I think it wasn't until the end of the day that he ended up getting contact and found out that his dad was alive. So that kind of was like, holy shit, and then oh, it's there's the Muslims and they're all bad people, and we all bought into that red pill. And you know, I was like, Yeah, I gotta go defend my country and signed up and off I went, man. And I've never looked back. It just started my whole entire journey to where we are here.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, dude. What was your what was your Marine Corps basic training like?

SPEAKER_00

Dude, it was the greatest and worst time of my life. Like I boot camp, Marine Corps. Boot camp, at least then, was so fucking hilarious looking back at it now of just the games that they play and how you get messed with. Like, I've told this story before, but people don't believe me. My rack mate will 100% vouch for this. My rackmate's actually one of my best friends to this day. He's a U.S. Marshal, travels the world doing some really cool shit. But uh, I didn't know how to clean my rifle until after I graduated boot camp because I was that recruit that just I couldn't just keep my mouth shut. I couldn't just look away. I always had to like I was always squaring off to the drill, like look at this we had this tiny little black staff sergeant drill instructor, and he had these big, the biggest chiclet teeth you've ever seen in your life. And he would just be walking and he'd and look at me really quick, and I'd always be looking down at him because he was tiny. He'd be like, You fucking eyeballed me, Marshall. And I'd be like, Yes, sir. He'd be like, come with me. And he would, I just couldn't ever say no because I couldn't let him win. You know, I just I've had that mindset my whole life, like, you staring at me. I'm like, fuck yeah, I'm staring at you, you know, like in my head, but I'm like, yes, sir. And so he just haze the shit out of me. So it became this game. Every time you would prepare for rifle maintenance, you got to pull your wall locker out. You got this little mat you lay out, and they they go by the numbers, they break down on M16 by the piece. Didn't know any of it, didn't know how to take. So my rack mate would literally undo his combo, set his up, undo my. So he, as everybody's getting ready to start learning their rifles, they would just haze me the whole entire time. So it got to the point where it's just game, they'd be like, prepare for rifle maintenance, and I would just start getting undressed, and I'd go to the quarter deck where they'd haze the shit out of you. And it just got to where they'd walk out and be like, haze yourself, bitch. And I just sit there like hazing myself, and then they'd turn their back on me and I'd just be like behind them, and I wouldn't be doing anything, and all the recruits would be like laughing. So it was just a huge game the whole entire time. Like, I just took boot camp as a massive game and it was hilarious. Yeah, we ended up getting caught. This is, I don't know if I've ever told this story. We ended up getting caught. It was right before we're graduating. I'm talking a week out from graduating boot camp. We're getting ready to do the crucible, which is like your big final exercise. You go through this whole thing, it's the like the to, and then you come out of it and you, you know, it's this big ceremony and all this other shit. Anyways, they give us all MREs, but they they make us field rat or you know, field strip our MREs so that you don't get like the poppy pound cakes, they don't let you have peanut butter. They take out all the good shit and just leave like the meal and a cracker, and that's what you get to live off of. Well, in the squad bay at boot camp, we're putting all this in MR and empty MRE boxes, and we had to like walk out cases of all the good shit, the candies, the the Skittles, the peanut MMs, all the stuff that you know normal Marines get. You can't get it at boot camp. And so that night I was my I'm dead asleep, and my boy wakes me up, and he's like, hey, and I'm on the top rack. Like, I open my eyes and he goes, ah, and breeze in my face, and I'm like, I sit, I'm like, what is that? He's like, Skittles. I'm like, from where? And he goes, I went out to the dumpster and got some. I'm like, I jump out of my bed. I'm like, let's go. So we we get dressed, like we're taking the trash out because they made two recruits carry a trash can. You had to have like a yellow glow strap, you know, like the reflective strap. Yeah, then you had to have a little flashlight, they call them a moon beam or some shit boot camp. So we dress the nine like we're on fire watch, taking the trash out. And so we slide open the dumpster and he goes to get it. I shove his ass and he goes falling into the dumpster and he starts throwing out. And well, where these drill instructors really messed up is they made us organize everything in these boxes. So one box was all like Skittles and like little charm. We call them lucky charms, like a little square candy that tastes like shit, but it's just it's flavor, right? Yeah, so every then there was a box of brownies and pound cakes, everything was separated. So he's just ripping open boxes and we're filling this trash can up, dude. Within like 20 minutes, the whole squad base awake, like everybody's awake. We gorge ourselves. Imagine like um Peter Pan, you know, on the table full of food and everyone just stuffing their like Rufio, you know, like in that scene. The whole entire, literally almost the whole entire platoon, including the including the guide, squad leaders, stuffing their faces all night. So we pick everything up, run all the trash back out. Everyone's just like, oh, like sugar high, like haven't had any sweets or anything the whole entire freaking three months of boot camp. Internal instructor comes out in the morning, and there's a there's a Skittle laying on the floor, and that dude walks out and goes, It's like the dude straight to the Skittle and picks the Skittle up, and he's like, Who the fuck? It starts going crazy. And this this kid, this recruit, which wasn't even like one of our own recruits that came through boot camp with us, he was a drop from another platoon and then picked up with us like three quarters of the way through. So nobody liked him. He was a little piece of shit kid, rats out the whole entire platoon, bro. It was it was a shit show, shit show. And then they were like, if anybody touches him, you're all gonna pay. We they hazed the dog shit out of us, bro. They were all throwing up, everyone's puking up brownies and Skittles, and it was just dude, it was horrible. So worth it. I 100% would have done it again, but yeah, it was one of those things, but like that's how it was at boot camp. Everything I did, I just tried to make it fun. Like everybody's miserable and suffering, and I'm over here just talking shit and making, you know, fucking with dude stuff, tying things to their boot laces together and like watching them. I was just I was that dude at boot camp that just it's never gonna break. I was always gonna be who I was, but I was just gonna enjoy it, make the best out of it. It was it was a lot of fun, man. I I enjoyed it, but it was it was the it was a great time. Not at the time, it's probably like going through you know, when you're going to go be a CEO and you gotta go through all the bullshit and get pepper sprayed, and you're like, dude, this is miserable, but then afterward, they're fun stories. Like, that's how boot camp is at the time, absolutely miserable. But afterward, you sit back and laugh, you're like, dude, what in the hell did we do? Like the fact that this even happens is hilarious.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, the only opportunity I ever got with like the drill instructors was when I went through the cert academy, like their SWAT for the prison.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, because honestly, the CO post academy, it's like it's more classwork than really anything else. I think they might have changed it now to more Archon and like ground tactics, but even then, like you see some of the people that graduate and you're like, but like the Cert Academy was definitely there was we started out with 25 people and only 10 people graduated. What? Yeah, no shit. It's like a 10-day and some people that are in the military, they said like it it's pretty close to like what a condensed version of boot camp would be able to have to get in like 10 days.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So like they the first three days they just try and get you to drop like flies. Like they want to see who actually and you can tell like when the drill instructors like don't like someone, they know they're not gonna they can just smell it. Uh-huh. And they just keep poking at this guy and poking at him and poking at him and just making them, and then he'll quit. But some of them don't quit, and then they're like, All right, they get some respect, but for sure. But that's about the only time. But yeah, just like after we're done now, I'm thinking back and I'm like, man, that sucked. But it was so it was so fun. Yeah, it was like the that's like hunting too. Like the worst hunts are the best hunts.

SPEAKER_00

Hunting the most memorable. But at that time, and you're packing out and you're looking at your map, and you're fucking five miles still to the trunk. You're like, Yeah, what the shit, you know? And then you think you're gonna die, and then you get to the trunk and you drop that pack and you got a giant elk on it, bowl on your back, you're like, uh, I'd do that again. Like, it was so worth it. But that whole entire journey is miserable until you get to the end line and you know, the finish line, you're like, all right, that was that was worth it. It was great. You know, you get a bunch of stories and friends and memories out of it.

SPEAKER_01

So that's what you can say, really, about anything in life is that like the journey is what makes it. It's not just 100%. It's not when you get the thing, you're like, okay, well, now what?

SPEAKER_00

Well, it's like the dog that you know, the dog that catches the car. Yeah, you know, it's its whole life you're chasing, you're excited, and it's it's a thrill. Then once you get it, you're like, oh fuck, okay. Like, then you get to look back, like, man, this was so much fun. And until you get to the finish line, that's how it is on a lot of things that I've I've realized over life. Like the the the most enjoyable parts, the memorable parts were getting to the goal or getting to that finish line. And then it's like, okay, cool, okay, I'm here. Like, damn. Then, but you always talk, you know what talk about. I did it. It was like, Did you remember this time? Do you remember when we were in the middle of this? Like, those are the memories, and that's what you're gonna hang on to for forever to get to get to your goal. And it's great to accomplish goals, yeah, obviously. But yeah, I enjoy the process a hundred percent. You know, it's always miserable. You might not see it at the time, you're cold, wet, starving, miserable. You're you got jungle rod on your boots, and you know, you're just like, bro, kill me. But then, you know, afterwards, you're like, Do you remember that one time that guy fell in that hole and almost drowned? And everybody's laughing about it. Yeah, and you forget about it, it just becomes you know, part of the story.

SPEAKER_01

When you were in the Marines, was that when they still had drill instructors that could do more stuff than they can now? I know, I know like Heg Seth had something like last November, he talked about them going back to like the 1990s standards and drill instructors could actually like get in your face and actually do stuff so soft.

SPEAKER_00

I'm not saying my drill instructors were like beating us or anything because there was way worse generations ahead of me. But no, dude, I got punched a couple times. I had, dude, my drill instructor walked up. He said something, and I don't know why, but I went, What? Just I don't know if it was in the mo I didn't even know if it was him talking, dude. And by the time I registered, I went, and I turned and he was in my face, and he just blah like palm punched me, and I tripped over a foot locker and I fall and land right on the back of my head, dude. It rung my bell, wasn't even the slap, that just like caught me off guard, but I smacked my head on the concrete. And uh, dude, I had a drill instructor. I'm standing in the chow hall line and I'm in the back, and I didn't know this drill instructor was behind my buddy and I we're kind of like bullshit, and I kind of like tap him. You're supposed to be standing with your you know, add attention, you know, thumbs and everything here, all that stupid shit. Well, I wasn't, and he took his campaign cover off and he fucking chopped my fingers with it, like some 007, you know, that you used to throw the hat. He chopped my fingers and I went and I looked. I thought this dude legit cut my fingers off. It hurt so bad. I went, I just had to take a second to realize all my my my appendages were still there. He whacked the shit out of me, dude. I thought he fucking cut all my fingers off, but it wasn't too brutal. We were kind of catching the tail end of like the hazing, because I think a the year before us or six months before us, one recruit ended up passing away. Like, dude, I don't know if it was hazing, but it was like it was talk of boot camp, so they were toning it down. We still got some hands-on, but it wasn't anything major. No, like it wasn't like full metal jacket days where they're beating the shit out of you, but they were still a little hands-on at that point, but I'm sure it's gotten way softer after we went through. I think my generation of those GWAT vets, the whole Iraq, Afghan, we were the last good era of veterans in the in the military, at least for the Marine Corps. It's a lot's changed now, which it is what it is. I don't I have buddies that are that are retiring that we were in. They're like, dude, oh, this is it's miserable compared to how we what we had it for, as far as just all these kids now know all their rights. They go straight to the chap when they're submitting you know grievances warnings and stuff on people, and they're like, it's not the same core anymore, it's pretty lame. So, as far as it comes to like training, and I'm a huge advocate on hazing in a way because it bit my platoon when we deployed, we were hazed so bad, dude. So bad. If you would even looked at our platoon wrong from anybody else, dude, you had 60 dudes on your ass quicker than anything, bro. Like, we were so tight because we were so trauma bonded from being hazed so bad that it just brought us together. So when we deployed, dude, every you can just read somebody's mind by just watching their body language. We were that tight of a unit unit. So I see the benefits of it too. Where was it did they go a little far a lot of times? 100%, but it just like I said, dude, it was all part of that story and the journey, and and having a dude laughs afterward, like, yeah, remember when they did that to us, and you just gotta make the best out of it. But it was pretty rough for a while for sure.

SPEAKER_01

Well, later on, you realize too that everything they do is for a reason. Oh, I think a lot of it, even if it's just to make sure you're not a pussy.

SPEAKER_00

I think a lot of it, these guys were like sadistic assholes that just got back from Iraq, they were they did the push, they did the invasion, they're all juiced out of their mind. They had lost half their unit to like a V-bid. So these dudes did not know how to process any of the shit. And then when they came back, we were in the fleet just running amok, like Lord of the Flies, bro. Like just running around with spears and fucking just killing everything in sight. And then, so we didn't have any leadership for six, seven months in the Marine Corps, all these troops. We literally like just they just released a platoon of cats just fucking to the winds. And these guys get back from Iraq, had their asses handed to them, dude. Half the battalion's got purple hearts, like all these dudes are just war dogs, and then they come back to us as platoon of just young kids that we think we're all salty because we've been in the fleet for six months with zero supervision, running amok. Yeah, so it was like two worlds colliding, and we were like, Oh my god, we didn't know what how to process any of it. So, yeah, our world got turned upside down pretty bad because I don't think those guys even knew one how to process it because they're the the initial wave of guys coming back. So, dude, we went to a battalion purple heart ceremony, and it took like four hours. There were tables lined of awards and purple hearts, and these dudes fought their asses off for a long time, and then they come back to a bunch of belligerent assholes don't want to listen to them, so they needed to get us in check real quick, and they did. Yeah, yeah, it was rough for a while. So, but I I get it, you know. I ended up being those guys when we got back, we got our boots, and then it was just it's just a tradition of making life hell and starting it all over and getting getting them ready for war.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, where'd you get stationed at?

SPEAKER_00

I was fortunate, man. I got I was on Pendleton the whole entire time. So I'm a I'm a I'm a Paris Island Marine, but fortunately I got stationed right on the beach in Pendleton, right? In SoCal. So sounds horrible, but at the same time, dude, it's like a Friday afternoon. You're cleaning a 50 cal machine gun and you're like watching women in bikinis, and you can smell the barbecue, and you hear the waves crashing, and it's like 75 degrees out, you're like, yeah, just busting russ off of a bolt for no reason because the major's sitting in his office and nobody wants to leave before the major. And so that's where it's torture. And then, but obviously, when you get in a good platoon and it's a Friday afternoon and you're like, yo, get the fuck out of here. You know, that's that's how I was as a leader. I'm like, yo, it's like 10 o'clock on a Friday, go home. What do we got? Nothing, go home. Don't answer your phones. And so I just cut guys out. So it ended up paying off when obviously I picked up rank and did my time. But yeah, as a troop, like a young troop stationed on the beach, sounds great until it's a Friday afternoon and you're cleaning weapons or washing out a vehicle and the beach is calling your name, and it could get pretty rough.

SPEAKER_01

How long were you in before you went on your first deployment?

SPEAKER_00

Joined in oh five. So by the time all training, everything was done, probably close to eight months to a less than a year. We were we were over, we were on our way out. So I'd say probably up close to a year. That's with them coming back, picking up the platoon, building our platoon, and then we have to go through six months of training um workups is usually the tempo, and then so six months, and then obviously off to a deployment.

SPEAKER_01

So you went straight into the Marines right out of high school then?

SPEAKER_00

I took a little time that winter, so I joined that. I graduated, and I wanted one last Christmas in New Year's with my family, and then so January hit. I was in I was off to boot camp January 12th or January 10th.

SPEAKER_01

So you're 1920 on your first appointment.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I turned I turned 20. Actually, so I was 18. Yeah, I think I turned 20 and then I turned 21 on my second deployment because I did two back-to-backs, and I had two birthdays in a row on while deployed. So yeah, I was 19 when I deployed. Where was your first deployment to? Both both my deployments are to Iraq. So I was really fortunate. I got to do a Mew, which is a Marine Corps expeditionary unit. So right now, anywhere in the world, I think there's at least two Mews that are you have a Mediterranean Mew Mew, which is your East Coast guys, and they hit like um Spain, the whole Mediterranean region. So it's uh it's an aircraft carrier, and then they have the battleship, and then they have an LSD, which is a smaller ship, and that's where all like your grunts, recon, tanks, all like the combat dudes they put on one ship. Then you have a submarine that's with you as well that you only see maybe a couple times on your deployment, and they just float around anywhere in the world. So if there's a conflict that happens and embassies getting overrun, there's a battalion of Marines that they can that have all the naval backing that could be anywhere in the world within, I don't know, they say like 72 to 96 hours or whatever it may be. So normally when there's not a war going on, you're just hitting countries. You hit Australia, then you're off to like Singapore, then Hong Kong, then Dubai, then the Philippines. And so you're just, dude, you're literally they just pull up to a port. No, we're gonna be in Singapore tomorrow. See you guys in five days, and they just turn the Marines out for five days, and then you're just party like a rock star. So we got to hop and hit all these cool countries, dude. I've been to Australia five or six different times, like in the Marine Corps, um, and all those other places I was listing. And so we're hitting all these places, and then from there, we went into we know at the Suez Canal, so we got to go up the Suez Canal into the Red Sea, I believe that is, and then so we we hit we launched off the back of our ships, went into Egypt, training Egypt for a month, training the Egyptians and some Jordanians there. That was really cool. Then it's called Operation Bright Star. You could actually Google it. They have this like podium set up for the prince or emirants or whatever of Egypt at the time, and they come, so we train with the Egyptian military for a month, and then at the end, we do this huge exercise where everybody goes back onto the ships and we do this giant mock amphibious assault from ship to shore, and you got the the Egyptians in their little harrier jets, and then all the Egyptians getting little zodiacs, and they're like falling out of the boat and almost drowning. It's such a shit show. Like these guys, it's like watching literally, like just it's the funniest thing ever. And so we do all that at the end, and then we go back through the Suez Canal, and then that's where we went into Kuwait. We put went off the coast of Kuwait, and then from Kuwait launched our vehicles off the back of the ships, drove up in. We were in Kuwait for a couple weeks, climatizing, and then we push into Iraq, and then Iraq. We went up into um, they called it the El Embar Providence, which was like the triangle of death at that time. It was like Ramadi, Haqlania. I think um the Hadithah dam was in there. So we had our little region that we operated out of. I did both my deployments in that region, and so it wasn't anything super crazy that we were getting into. A lot of fun shit. I mean, dude, it was just being in a war zone, even if you're in or out of the action every single day, dude. It's just it's the most fascinating thing to try to process as this young kid, you know. Like, here we are, and you have the concept that oh, we're gonna go defend our country, and then you find out you're actually going to war, but then you're told you are, you're told you're not. We're going, we're not. This goes on for a month or two. So by the time they're like, where it's official, everyone's like, Yeah, okay, we'll believe when we see it, you know, it gets to that point. Yeah, then one day you're just like, Holy shit, we're here, like we're in Kuwait, and it's 500 degrees, and it's the brightest environment, it's miserable. You're like, fuck, that's what it's gonna be like, you know, and then you push into Iraq and you're in a convoy for like five days driving your vehicles up. That shit sucks because everything's breaking down and you're shitting in MRE bags, like my buddy shit in a fucking Gatorade bottle, literally put it up right onto his ass and because we can't move. You're dude, you're in operating, like you're not that's what people don't ever think about. Like when you're in the middle of a mission and you're in a war zone, yo, I gotta shit. Can we take it? It doesn't work like that. So my crewman's like, dude, I'm gonna shoot my pants. I'm like, just fucking shit your pants in. I don't know what you want me to do. Like, I can't just stop our vehicle. And yeah, he ended up shitting in a Gatorade bottle. It was one of the most oppressive things that I've witnessed. And so, um, but just stuff like that, you know, you just don't think of it, you're like, God, poor guy. So, but yeah, we finally got to our AO, and you know, we were operating out of houses the whole entire time. Well, we have our vehicles, which is really nice because it's like a little rolling hotel. Not a lot of guys get that luxury of having all of your amenity amenities on your own vehicle, you know, power inverter. We had little DVD players and seven cubes that had food in them and stuff, you know. So we call it poggy bait, all the fat kid treats, you know, because MREs and field trays get nasty after a bit, you know, you're just sick of eating that crap. So it's nice to have real, you know, flavor and food. So yeah, but it was we did two, I did two deployments, both of them were really interesting. We did a lot of crazy shit as far as learning a lot. Like, you know, we were our main mission was like all hearts and minds of just getting to know people, patrolling all day, every day, just to show a presence. We were at that phase. So my first deployment, we which was was really cool at the time. Now it doesn't mean shit anymore, but we were we were in charge of we were in a little town called Heat or Hit, and at a big train station and stuff there. We were living at a train station, and this was the very first election in Iraq. So it was a big like for us at that time, it's like, man, we're making a difference. Like we're they're finally starting to vote. And so we had to, they had these jars of ink. And if once the Iraqi voted, we had to like put their finger in this jar and it dyed their finger like this dark brown. Like you could always so like the whole entire town, everybody's walking around for a month with all these dyed fingers. You could tell they voted. Obviously, that doesn't mean shit anymore. Now that whole country went right back to where it was, but uh, so yeah, it was just cool. And then Saddam was hung, I think, on my second appointment. I was in Iraq, either my first or second appointment when he was hung, and so is like, you know, to be in Iraq and we're making a difference and all that bullshit at that time. But um, yeah, dude, like being deployed is just fascinating. I mean, you're going in people's homes like in the middle of the night and you know, expecting them to like not be pissed off. And I I look at things so much different now and how we were treating people there at the time, and it's just a different mindset, you know, young and dumb. And I drank the red Kool-Aid, took the red pill at that time and thought we were making a difference. And and so, you know, I'm conflicted now looking back on the shit we were doing overseas and why we were even there. But yeah, but at the same time, dude, it was some of the greatest stories and memories of my life. Just, you know, fuck around with people and Going in homes and finding caches. It was almost imagining an Easter egg hunt for weapons every day. You know, we had metal detectors. We're in these palm groves, and there's these aqueduct systems that have been there for a thousand years. And very fascinating. I wish I could go back now and look at it from an an adult, like a grown, mature mind, and just look at how beautiful it really is. Because we're on the Euphrates River, which is biblical. And so, you know, you have these little towns and villages that have been there from the beginning of time. And so it's it's really it was cool to look back on it now and see that we are part of you know this ancient culture that's never evolved, hardly ever. And so to be able to go in there and and be part of that and to eat their food and be a part of their culture is it was a great experience, man. I I I got a lot from it, you know, and the memories and the friends, and yeah, it was just it was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_01

Who was your favorite foreign military to train with?

SPEAKER_00

The Aussies, the Australians, dude, they're fucking crazy, bro. Like bat that and the Brits, they zero fucks, like zero. They're just light it on fire, blow it up, shoot it. It they just don't care. They're they're they're a lot of fun. Wild too, and they they they vibe really well with Marines, especially our units, because we were just bat, we were out of control. Like when I say we were Lord of the Flies, legit, just out of control. Nobody, nobody can wrangle us. So then they would take us, take us to these other units. They're like, these fucking grays are the greatest. Like, we love Marines because we were just dude, zero fucks on everything we did. So, yeah, I'd say the the Aussies and the Brits were a lot of fun. They're they're interesting dudes, just wild. We ended up partying. I partied with um Norwegian sailors in Singapore, and these dudes were tatted like face, throats to hands, and they're all in the navy. Like, you guys are and they have no tattoo regulations, anything, hair regulations. They're like Norwegian sailors or Swedish, they were Swedish. I ended up going on a Norwegian sub while we were there. We met a bunch of Norwegian mariners, submarine guys, whatever. They ended up taking us on their sub, dude. It was really cool. Got to go on and spend a whole day on there, and they were showing us everything they do, like the engines in those subs. You know, like uh like a those big drain pans that you could slide underneath a vehicle, and they're like the big metal ones that got a couple inch lip on them. Imagine those, like the size of your house. The engine sat on those in like a saline water. So the engine actually floated. They weren't the engine wasn't mounted to anything. So all of it was tubes, and then it it sat on these, it almost looked like a drain pan, and they floated on a really dense. Um, at least this is what they're explaining. They could have totally just been bullshitting us, but a really dense, like uh salt water, you know, I don't know the term for it, a saline, saline water or whatever. But uh, yeah, so there was no vibration, it didn't put off any noise or anything, we just hum. So they they walked us through, they walked us to the bow of the sub where the torpedo, dude, the torpedo tubes are the size of this your room, like this big, fucking massive. Like they it was insane. Guys were sleeping in them, they had little beds and stuff. They're like, this is the best place to sleep, you can't roll out of it, you know. And so um, but yeah, it was just cool. I got to experience a lot of different cool shit with different militaries throughout my time.

SPEAKER_01

I would have never really thought about the Australia for like a military don't. I mean, I always think of Australia because they don't allow guns or anything for their civilians and anything else like that, right? And then Australia is just a crazy country too. When you start looking into like how Australia came to be.

SPEAKER_00

If there's one country that I I've said it for years, if there's one country that if I couldn't live in the US that I would go to right now, it'd be Australia.

SPEAKER_01

Really? Oh my god, dude.

SPEAKER_00

It's they got some crazy animals, like like the spiders and shit. Dude, we had the oh my god, we this is funny. We're sleeping on the ground, we're training in the outback in the bush, like legit. And then they give us this brief, and they're like, if you see this, it'll kill you. If you touch this, it'll kill you. If this bites you, it'll kill you. If you if this bites you, you got five minutes. If that don't touch this plant, like, dude, it's like three hours of this. And I'm like, so fucking nothing. Like the dirt, can I touch the dirt? Like, that's what it came down to, and everyone's like, we're all gonna die. And so we're just dude, they would march our asses all day. We would walk for two and a half hours to a grenade range, get to a grenade range, throw one grenade, which is the gayest shit ever. Like, it's not even fun throwing a grenade, there's no explode, you just, you know, and then we're walking two and a half hours back through the like the hundred-degree jungles in Australia. And so one night we're sleeping on the ground, and my buddy's on fire watch, and he's kind of sitting behind me, and we're just bullshitting, and I kind of just fall asleep. God is my witness, bro. I hear this pterodactyl, just creature screeching at night. And I'm laying on the ground and I opened my eyes, dude, and this biggest fucking bat thing was just floating, like screeching. Everybody's like, What is that? Like, you got all these marines that are like tripping out, bro. You'd be laying on the ground and this thing would run across your face, like, and it had weight to it, and you're just freaking out.

SPEAKER_02

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00

Dude, I went to the bathroom one night with my boy, because you have to have battle buddies everywhere you go, and there were like these little wooden shacks, and I walk in, and I'm like, you know, because you don't walk anywhere without a flashlight in Australia because you're gonna die. And I like pointed in the bathroom, I'm like looking because I'm afraid like some snake or spider is gonna be in the toilet. And I shine up, dude. There were these. I've actually had my kids look them up and they found them. They're like these spiders, but they got these giant, like claw things. They look like these like cave-dwelling spider-looking creatures. I ended up just shitting in the woods, dude. I was like, nope, not even doing it middle of the night. I don't even care if I wipe my ass. I'm not going in that place. Like everything in Australia, dude, was miserable, but it's a great, it's such an incredible time. Like the people were great. Dude, we were partying. We me and all my buddies, once we got done with training, they gave us like three days of libo. And we were in Darwin. And uh just being the belligerent Marines we were, we all went and bought these rugby jerseys. And I bought this trophy at this restaurant, or not a restaurant, at a um it was like a souvenir store. And so we're walking around Darwin, which is if anybody's been to like Oceanside California, it's just like a little beach town. There's like 15 of us, like, oh hey, oh, like we're all just young Marines, like we're all appreciated, we all have rugby jerseys on, and we're telling everyone, we're going to all these bars, like, we just won the rugby tournament, we just won a rugby tour, getting all these free drinks and shit. And then, like, halfway through the night, dude, this this human being that's like the size of a wall puts his hand on my shoulder, like crushes me in one of it. And I like look up at him, he's like, Who the fuck are you guys? And we're like, Oh, we're all rugby players. He's like, You're not rugby players. He's like, We're rugby players. And I look behind him, and there's like nine just gorilla human beings, like three Samoan dudes, like just their calf muscles were all just I'll never forget looking at these dudes' legs were just tree trunks, and they were like, You motherfuckers, like, you ain't rugby players were like, nah, nah, we're not. They're like, You're gonna party like them, dude. They took us under their wing and we partied in that town with these, like, these guys just won some big tournament. They took us under their wing and we raged for like two days with this rugby team. It was the greatest time ever. So they ended up just taking us in. They're like, You fucking Marines are out of control, like telling everybody you guys are rugby players for free drinks. It worked until they caught on. But yeah, Australia's a blast, man. I've been to Darwin, Perth, Sydney a few times, Brisbane. Where else? I know I'm missing one, but yeah, it's it's an incredible place. But every everywhere's different, a different terrain, different environment. It's really cool. I love Australia.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's wild. I like to go there with the kids. It seems like it's a cool spot.

SPEAKER_00

I want to go back.

SPEAKER_01

Big long ass flight. I'd have to get my kids some Nyquil for sure. Yeah, bro.

SPEAKER_00

When I flew there, I was like on a I went literally from my buddy's wedding. We were on a I went on like a five-day binger. It was bad, bro. I probably should have died. Literally flew from my buddy's wedding, wasted. I don't even remember, flying to San Diego, went in my house, unpacked my suitcase, packed my suitcase, and drove to San Diego, got on a flight, dude. So I was like coming off a five-day binder and slept, and I was hitting on the stewardess from from LAX to I think Australia was whatever the longest flight was, dude. There's a smoke show stewardess at the time, and I'm trying to hit on her, and it was working. And so she ends up coming into grabbing me like an hour into the flight. She's like, Hey, you need to come with me. I'm like, Oh bro, I'm about to freaking mile high club. Yeah, my dream's coming true. Like, I don't even know. I'm sweating, dude. I'm drenched because I'm like coming off of just wasted for the last five days. She had moved this guy, had a whole middle row because you know on those giant flights, you have you know your your side rows, and then there's a whole like six middle seats. And she moved one dude and gave me the whole middle row, and I flipped all the armrests up on it and slept almost the entire flight. Oh, that's awesome. It was so dope, dude. It was like the perfect. I'm like, Oh, thank god. Better than a mile high club. 100%, 100% like 14-hour flight. I slept like 12 of it, just passed out. So yeah, that's sick. It was pretty nice. How long did you do in the military then? I did eight years. I did eight years, and it was I wanted to career it, but toward the end, things were changing, it just wasn't for me anymore. I started to not like the Marine Corps, I started to have animosity toward it, and like I said it kind of earlier in the whole, you know, your own life. I'm one of those people. If you're you can't bitch about your life, like if you've have a miserable job or you're not happy with something, like shut the fuck up and change it. I've been like that my whole entire life. If you just if you just get up voluntarily and go to your shitty job every day, I don't feel bad for you. And I started becoming one of those people, and so I had an aha moment, right? I was actually re-enlisting to go Marsock. I went to go special forces in it. I got accepted into the I had my dates, everything was ready to go. I ended up getting selected for staff sergeant. And at that time, they came out with a Marine Corps order that they weren't taking any E5s and above for MarsOc, they were already too heavy, staff heavy on them. And so um they pulled my package, they're like, sorry, dude, they're not accepting anybody that's a sergeant and above. And I just gotten selected the staff sergeant. And so I went home that night and Britt and I were dating at the time, and I was like, I think I'm done. I think I'm gonna get out of the Marine Corps. And she's like, What are you gonna do? And I literally told her, I was like, I'll flip burgers in and out if I have to. Like, I'm I'm done with it. If I can't do what I want to do, I hate I I don't like it anymore. And so yeah, I made the decision. I went into my career planner and grabbed my re-enlistment package that I'd already turned in because I was I wanted to career it, you know, I was just gonna excelled really quick through, even though I I wasn't a fan of it. It was the marine military, it was very easy, like as long as you're not I can run, I can shoot, I could PT, so it's wasn't like a challenge of getting a promoter or anything. And so I just it wasn't for me. I didn't like it anymore. And so I made the decision, and so yeah, I started my checkout process and didn't tell anybody and just faded away. Did my own thing. I had dudes calling me for like months afterwards, like, bro, I've been seeing you forever. I'm like, I'm fucking out, bro. Yeah, like and they're like, What? And there was no ceremony or anything. I'm like, I didn't tell anybody, I just stopped coming one day. Yeah, and that was it for me. It was and that's where a lot of people get kind of tied up and shit. They're they're doing everything for everybody else. Like, I didn't join the military for you. I mean, I know everybody who fight for my brother in my country, like I did for me. Yeah, this is this was my journey, it was it's my life. And so, yeah, I was like, I'm done. I don't need to, I don't need us going away. I don't need plaques and the whole little shadow bot. I don't get any of that shit. I don't, I don't, I didn't care. And so yeah, yeah, got out, made the decision and didn't know what I was gonna do. And right as I was transitioning and in my process of getting out, I got approached to go on a contract and do some overseas private security, and I was like, well shit, fuck, there it is. So that was a good opportunity. So I transitioned, I got out, and then immediately it was right back in Afghanistan again, contracting over there. And so yeah, it was kind of made transitioning out of the military a little bit easier for me, but I didn't give a shit what it was. I was I'll figure it out at that time.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, and you met your your wife then during while you were in the military? Yeah. How'd you meet her?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, that's a hilarious story. I actually met my wife when I was running from the cops, and so yeah, yep. I uh was in the middle of a divorce, nasty divorce, and I was moving out to a buddy's house, and uh I turned down this wrong street, and it was gridlock traffic, and I was just like fuck, I was already irritated, and you know, I'm dude moving my shit to another town, and I don't even know where I'm at. Well, I had a big lifted truck at the time, and there was like this concrete medium, like a foot and a half, two foot concrete medium, and I was just sitting here. I'm like, dude, this traffic's not even moving. I'm gonna be sitting here for 45 minutes before I can get to the light to turn around. I was like, fuck this. So I just start mobbing over this concrete. I'm just gonna make a U-turn, but I just had to go over like a you know, those middle concrete dividers. Yeah, it wasn't high, but it wasn't low. It was low, it was high enough where a car couldn't get over it. And so I start mobbing over this thing, and I didn't know there's three cops literally sitting behind me in their cars. I don't know if their station was down there or there was a shift change, but there's three cops right behind me. As soon as my tire goes over it, whoop whoop, they start lighting me up, and I look and I'm like, yeah, fuck that. So I just go over this. I knew they couldn't get to me, and it's not like they can just flip their lights on and just move traffic. They're literally in gridlock traffic on a side road. So I take off, I mob, I run through these bushes, I go into the shopping center, fly out to the other side of it, I come out on the main road and I just dip. And I'm like, okay, I know I got a few minutes on these guys unless they're radio. That's what I was worried about is I'm radio ahead. So I'm hauling ass, dude. I come up to this red light, and I'm like, fuck, look, look. And at this time, I had a motorcycle, like I was a stunt rider, like I ran from cops all the time. So I knew scion TCs, you know, the little Scion TC car. Every hot chick in Southern California drove a scion TC at that time. So as I'm running from the cops, I see the scion coming up. And it was like a natural program to me. Like when on my motorcycle, like you'd always look in scions, Volkswagens. There are always hot chicks in these cars. So I pull up, dude. There's this smoke show, like blonde with pink and brown hair, like Neapolitan hair, and she had like pink dice or fucking handcuffs hanging from the seat or her rear view mirror. And I was just like, damn, okay, pretty fucking hot. And so I rolled my window down. I had a pit bull at the time. My service dog that he ended up becoming my service dog, and uh he wanted to kill everything. So I was like, What's that? What's that? What's that? And he like jumps up and hangs out the window and got her attention. And yeah, I told her to roll her window down at a stoplight. I'm like, yo, I'm new here. You should let me take you out. And she's like, All right, and like starts trying to tell me her life story. I was like, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I'll get all that later. What's your number? She gives me her number and I dip. Yeah, I texted her and fucked it. We went on a date a couple days later, and 17 years later, here we are.

SPEAKER_01

So you used to run from the cops though?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, on your motorcycle? No, I was on my bike. Oh, did I used to run from the cops? Oh, all the fucking time. All the time. I ran for all the time.

SPEAKER_01

What was your first time running from the cops like?

SPEAKER_00

Terrifying. Terrifying, bro. I was on the 76th. So anybody knows Oceanside, Fallbrook, Vista area. There's the the back road that connects Oceanside to I think the 15th freeway, if I remember, it's been a while. But there was this windy ass road, and there used to be this giant cup of Joe um coffee stand. It was like the like a big giant cup of coffee. And it's it's all they removed it. Anyways, I'm freaking dude doing like 120 on in like a 40. And uh, and I blow by this motorcycle cop. And those were the only ones that scared me. I knew I could outrun any car. Like, there, there's no way in hell, I don't care who you are, you weren't catching me on my bike in a car. Motorcycle cops, so those dudes are legit. And I blow by the he lights me up as he's going by, dude. I just downshift and I just pin it. And I there was this at one point, there's this huge sweeping bend. They redid the whole highway now, but there used to be this big sweeping bend. Dude, I'm hitting this thing like 120, like almost dragging me, and I'll never forget like looking because I could see back across and I could see his lights coming. I'm like, fuck, I'm so done. I was like, don't panic, don't panic, don't panic, don't panic, don't panic, don't panic the whole entire time because I knew if I was gonna panic, you're gonna go down. And I had enough time where I slammed my brakes on. So that big cup of Joe station, I was like, I'm gonna hide behind it. Dude, I come pulling in there doing like a hundred and just blow right by it. Like I couldn't even stop. Down shift, take back off, dude. I ran my ass off, ended up somehow. I don't know if he gave up or I just was had enough on him that you know he wasn't gonna catch me. Dude, my adrenaline was the highest it has ever been. Like I was hooked, hooked from running from cops at that. I also ran from cops my whole entire life as a kid, like growing up, we'd like paintball, cop car. Like, we were just I running from cops for me was like not in like a serious way I'm going to jail, but we I never would stop for cops. Yeah, and so yeah, dude, it just became a thing. I was doing a a wheelie on the freeway one night. We were coming back from this bike night down a Vista, and I'm just full 12 o'clock with it's like it's like midnight, one in the morning. I'm just like my high beam straight in the sky. I got like six bikes around me, and I'm coming up on this car and I'm watching this car, I'm like, that's a cop, like 100%. Yeah, so I put my bike down, dude. And when my spotlight goes or my headlights go foom, CHP, dude. He just boop hits all the lights. Right as I came down, there was an exit. He lights it up because he's in front of me. Dude, I just and barely make this off ramp. Oh, shoot down, go into this industrial area, hide there for like 30 minutes, change. I always kept a hoodie in my hardtail, like I so I swap my hoodie up thinking he's gonna see my hoodie. And uh I sit there for like 30 minutes. My boys are calling me. They're like, yo, dude, he he went down the on-ramp backwards, so he's looking for you. So I wait and uh yeah, I wait like 30 minutes, dude. I'm like, fuck this. Like, I'm just gonna all or nothing. I got got on the freeway, just pinned up. I had a souped up bike. Like, dude, my bike was stupid fast. And uh yeah, I think I did like 150 all the way from Vista to like Oceanside. I made it there in just a couple of minutes and I wasn't stopping for nothing. But yeah, I ran all the time. I never got caught. Only time I ever should have run, and I didn't know it. This is the worst speeding ticket I've ever got. I've actually never told the story. I got 155 and a 50 on my bike. Yeah, that was so stupid, dude. Uh, that one that was that was ridiculous. But yeah, I was racing a car and this I didn't know there was a motorcycle cop behind us, and we got a stoplight. I was racing a Cadillac CT all souped up. My bike was souped up, and this guy's like, Wanna roll? And I'm like, Yup. Meanwhile, there's a bike cop sitting right behind us, and uh we take off. We're in like a like a subdivision like kind of area. He takes off, and uh, we're racing, and dude, that was one of the fastest cars I have ever gone against. And we we come around this kind of bend, and there's a light and it turns yellow, and I'm like, oh hell no. And I just grabbed brakes because I was not gonna make it, and he kept going. I end up stopping like a quarter of the way in the intersection, like backing my bike up. But as I'm backing out of the intersection, dude, this cop on his bike, rear tire locked up, just goes sliding by me, like screaming, jumps off his bike, draws his pistol. He's like, Get the fuck out of the ground. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, what's wrong? What's wrong? Acting like I wasn't just you know in this neighborhood doing 150 miles an hour. And he's like, get on the ground. I'm like, I'm not getting on the ground. Like, what did I do? He's like, get the fuck out of the ground. So I get on the ground, and all my buddies are pulling up behind me. And uh he took all of our keys and he wrote me the first ticket, which was 155, and he knocked off 10 miles an hour, went down the line of everybody, and just wrote everybody a ticket. And uh, I was the only one that got off of it. I ended up hiring this dude. His name was Mr. Ticket. He was down in San Diego. Any of the OG bike riders down there at that time know Mr. Ticket. You'd fax him your ticket and he'd go fight it for you for 100 bucks. So I told, dude, my ticket was like six grand. And they and and I was gonna have to voluntarily impound my bike, bring it in to give it to him because the good this cop was like, You're lucky, I'm going to my daughter's recital, like chewing my eyes. He's like, I got other, I got better fucking things to do and deal with you idiots. Like, she's like, I'm just writing you a ticket. I'm like, Oh, okay, cool, I'll just get a ticket. Yeah, 155. So it was like a six thousand dollar ticket plus a minimum, I want to say it was 15 or 30 day impound. And it was a couple hundred bucks a day to impound my bike. I'm like, dude, I'm I can't afford this. Like, I'm I'm done. So all my buddies were like, no, dude, like I'm gonna fight it, da da da da da, or I'm just gonna pay it and go on. And I was like, hell no, I'm gonna I'm gonna hire this dude. And so I hired him, paid him a hundred bucks. He went to court, appealed everything, paid him another 100 bucks, and he ended up, dude, this dude dug up because the cops said on the ticket that he paced me at 155. It was my pacing speed, and then those bike cops had a governor on them at 130. So he had that they had to prove how are you pacing at 150 if your bike governance at 130? So then they got him for falsifying his documents, and I they threw my whole entire case out. So I got away, I got, and all my buddies had to pay fat fines because they wanted to fight it themselves. Jeez, uh-huh. Damn. Uh-huh. It's like a better call saw guy. 100% it was. You'd fax him, you'd fax him your thing at the time. I'd email now, I would imagine, or a picture. But yeah, I'd have to like go find a fax machine, learn how to use a fax machine, like copy my copy my ticket, throw it in there to them, and yeah, they'd you send you an email, like, all right, we'll take care of it. And yeah, they went and fought it in 2K. It was a hundred bucks. Every time you went to Corfray, it was a hundred bucks.

SPEAKER_01

Nice.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So the bike, the bike days are those are long gone for now. But yeah, the motorcycle days were wild.

SPEAKER_01

You have a lot of wild stories, dude. I mean, it's a it's a good name for your podcast, Wild Chaos, you know, because you're you're living it or you lived it. I don't know what you're doing. Still am, bro. I don't know if you're running for the cops now, but that's that's wild, dude. So you went to the private security or what was it, private military or private security. Yeah. So was that just like for for higher end officials that you would just be like their one-on-one security?

SPEAKER_00

Um, kind of. I've worked a bunch of different ones, but uh in Afghan, it was embassy security. And so we were just doing everything in and around the embassy at that time. Um, living out of town in these like little old mansions that were built for like General Karzai's generals at the time and his higher ups. We're we were working in along with like, you know, the CIA and Blackwater and all these cool dudes. It was fun, man. I mean, it was the shittiest job I've ever had. It was probably the worst job I've ever worked as far as health conditions. Like all of us had dysentery. I mean, you got Afghanis that are dealing with your food and they don't, you know, they wash their hands, they wipe their ass with their hands. So it's yeah, everybody's sick. The the living conditions were horrible. But yeah, I ended up that's the only job I've ever been fired from. I ended up getting fired after a while. I beat the shit out of my boss there. And they sent me home and led me to start the entrepreneur world after that. You know, I started an executive security company here stateside, grew that into a massive company for an old retired army ranger guy, and then just kind of just been grinding ever since. But yeah, Afghan was interesting, dude. It was that place is dirty. At least Kabul is just it's such a beautiful country. The mountains are unbelievable. Like we got to go and explore on you know on the civilian side. I'm using air quotes on that, like civilian military side. It is just the most beautiful country, but it's just run like shit. You know, obviously we know how the Middle East is, but they have so many opportunities and resources to turn that place around. Dude, my buddies, you know, I had a couple buddies that I was there with, and they're huge snowboarders. Like we're all mountain guys, and we're like, bro, you imagine the ski resorts here, like it'd be the greatest ever. I mean, just the biggest mountains full of snow, and it's like, no, board it, but you'll probably get your head cut off and end up on Alges or television at some point. But yeah, it's like these people I see them hiking, they're like, We're hiking from Pakistan through Afghanistan. And I'm like, you're an idiot. Like, yeah, like you got the whole world to go hike your little dumbass off, and you're gonna go hike in a war-stricken country that absolutely hate Westerners. Like, how about it?

SPEAKER_01

What at what point did you have kids throughout this whole thing?

SPEAKER_00

Met my wife and had Christie, sh had Christy right away. And um, so I was immediately thrown into the girl dad situation, which really didn't give a shit about at that time. Like, cool kids, cool, whatever. Six years later, find out we're pregnant, having our youngest, so hoping it was gonna be a boy. Like, everybody's like, dude, you're gonna have a little bam bam, like it's gonna be your little mini me. Find out I'm having another girl, and I'm just like, fuck, dude, this is sucks. I didn't want a kid in the first place, and I got two girls, like I was just not in it. Way different mindset then. I was battling a ton of demons and just piece of shit. And so, um, yeah, started living the dad life, and I was checked out for quite a while. Like, I was not a present dad. I was, you know, not anywhere as remotely close to who I am today with my kids, and uh, and so yeah, then it just I did the whole girl dad life, and it just slowly starts chipping away at you and over the years, and so yeah, it's just it's been one of those most incredible gifts that have ever been blessed with is to have two girls, and now I have two really incredible kids that my whole entire world is just built around in life and business and everything else is literally built around them and my family, and it's changed my life for the best. And I'm so I got my shit together and stopped chasing everything in the world to hide and run from whatever I was, and so yeah, it's really shifted things as far as perspective on life and emotions and just everything that come along with having a house full of women that are fucking crazy all day, every day.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I feel you there, man. If you don't mind me asking, like what were those some of those demons? Like, was it just PTSD from the wars and stuff?

SPEAKER_00

Or dude, I don't know. Honestly, it's battled a huge, huge anger issue. I don't I don't know, you know. I've never sat and gotten buried to the roots of it. I think a lot of it was just me running from just myself, trying to always look and find and try to seek the next high, try to see, okay, this isn't working. I you know, I just I just ran from my responsibilities, ran from just being a good person and you know, just was really selfish and inconsiderate for a really long time, and then you know, and then eventually start waking up and realizing, hey, like it's just more than just making money, and here you go, you guys are happy and fed. Like that's it's it's realizing that I'm now passing on all the generational bullshit that was passed on to me. And I have all these other issues, we have all these problems with our parents. We we want to talk on all these, you know, the boomers and oh, I got all this trauma. But it's like, who who are we to talk on anything if we're not gonna change and break those links ourselves? And so that was a huge eye-opener for me. Like, man, I I wanna I want to be on my deathbed one day, and I want my kids standing by me going, you know what, dad? Fucking rocked it, dude. Like everything that you could have done, we did it. We did it all. Like, that's that's a dad that I want to be. I don't want to be on my deathbed alone one day in some old folks home rotting away because your kids don't love you, like it's it's just how it is. And I understand there's there's medical issues and people have to put people in certain situations, but dude, I couldn't even imagine not having my kids in my life, and so but who I was at that time was pushing them away, especially as these young, fragile, young girls that I'm trying to raise, almost in this militaristic marine way, you know, and so it doesn't work like that. And I had to really check myself and and my wife just putting me in check like, hey, are you raising Marines or are you raising daughters? And so that's where I really had to take that step back and learn to shut the fuck up and listen to them. Learn that, hey, they are emotional, sensitive little little creatures that they're not going to change because you want them to change. And yeah, just really becoming more of a present dad and uh an engaged dad and being there, not just coming in, what doing going through the motions? Hey, yeah, what's up? Cool, you see your kids a few minutes a day, then they're off to bed, and then they're off to school the next morning. So, yeah, it was just me really like, okay, like this the whole point of life or for my life is to bring these kids into it. Why am I not going to give them every single thing that I am able to teach them and instill in them as far as integrity and morals and values and respect and everything else that makes a good person a good person? I wasn't doing any of that. I was just okay, cool. Yeah, I'm the dad, I'm I'm the provider, I'm the protector, but what else am I doing? There's there's so much more than that. There's they especially for boys and girls. As far as kids, like it's cool. You you you you make you make a bunch of money and you're a tough guy. That doesn't mean shit to your children. And so it just had to waking up and realizing like there's way more to life than being an angry piece of shit every day you come home. And that how that was a lot to do with work and my environment and everything that I was building. It was wasn't for the right reasons. And so, yeah, take a big step back and check myself and cool. I want to, I wanna, I wanna be in my kids' life, I want them in my life, I want to have a relationship with them. I want grandkids one day that my my kids are excited to they're yours, here you go, dump them off. Like that's that to me is the meaning of life, man. If it's not, then why are we having kids and being miserable?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, no, that's awesome. Do you think that everything changed then once you got out of the private contracting, like out of that whole military kind of background?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, yeah, it took years after that. It wasn't an immediate switch for me. It it was years of my wife not quitting on praying for me and to soften my heart. I just had this callous, dark, angry, hateful heart for a long time. But in and then when we'd have these moments, she'd sit me down and be like, Why? What reason do you have right now? What reason what is going on in your life right at this moment for you to be this angry? She's like, Your kids are healthy, you got a roof over their head, there's food in the fridge, they go to a warm bed at night. What the fuck is going on in your life that is so miserable that you need to treat everybody around you like this? And it took me uh answering that question. It's like didn't have a good enough reason.

SPEAKER_01

That's a good spouse to be able to call you on your shit.

SPEAKER_00

Hunt, you have to be. If you're not, if you're a spouse and your husband or wife aren't allowing you to call them on them, you need to have a come to Jesus moment on with that conversation. And it hasn't always been easy. I mean, dude, I'm not an easy person to get along with I'm a very type A, like it's all gas, snowbreak on everything. And so for my wife, this tiny little woman to step up and be like, yo, motherfucker, like, no, this isn't how the atmosphere is off in our house, the vibe's off in our house because of you. Why? Why? Because I'm scrolling and then I'm I'm pissed off because I see our political environment. I I'm watching some other dude that I think is successful buying a boat, buying a truck, and boy, my what was me. Just that mindset, and then you know, eventually changing everything and realizing cool, that dude's got a brand new boat and ATVs, but he's also fucking $400,000 in debt. I'm not, you know, there's always a there's always the other side to it. Okay, cool. You see a picture on social media, does that mean he's his kids actually love him? Then you meet these guys and they never mention their wives, they never mention their kids. It's always business and money and success. And it's then you start realizing, like, okay, what do I have? Like, look at your prime example, bro. You have a kid with a disability. I'm sorry, I don't know if you put that on the internet or not, but you have a kid with a disability. Like, what a blessing that God has put that on you guys to know that the patience and everything that He's prepared you for through corrections, through the struggles, every your childhood learning to deal and cope with people. There's not a lot of people that can handle that. And so it's like, okay, cool. You know what? You could sit back and play the woe is me and do this. Fucking sucks. I hate my life. I got a kid with a disability. What, why, why, why? And I'm sure we all go through those phases of whatever it is, but then you're like, okay, cool. This is the life we're in. Hey, I gotta lock every single damn door in this house. I gotta have everything's gotta have double, triple locks. We got this kid's a little Spider-Man. We found them hanging from the ceiling fan, doing whatever. It's just life. Now you it's just cool, dude. And this is how it is, and this is what God has provided you with. Like, uh, what's the best out of it? Instead of going into it, like, fuck, fuck, me, me, oh wow, I want everything better. Hey, man, how do I make this better? Cool. You know what? I do have a blessing with this kid because you know what? This is the patience that it's putting on me and building me to the better man that I am. And that's how I had to look at everything. And until that happened, there wasn't much change in me. And so, yeah, just slowly, little by little, man. Girls obviously help soften an old, an old calloused heart. There's no, there's no not being softened by some daughters. And so that's that's why I think God truly blessed me with having two girls and incredible ones that are completely opposite of each other. So I have so many different versions of these young, sensitive women that I got to deal with and learn.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I think having gratitude is just such a big change in everybody's life. Like, once you can start being grateful for even all the trauma that you might have gone through as a kid or anything, like I feel like that all the time. And then you get the the victim mentality of like poor me, and then you can like switch that to being grateful that you went through all that because now you're a stronger person that can deal with things that are coming up that you don't even know what's coming up. So you've been through these things now, and you just gotta turn that hateful into grateful, and now it's like 500%. It's like, why what does what does poor me get you?

SPEAKER_00

Miserable, bro.

SPEAKER_01

And wherever you point the blame fingers, who you give the power to, so now you're like, okay, maybe I did have a bad childhood. So what? Nobody cares about your past until you do something with your life. Boo hoo. You know what I'm saying? Like, like nobody would care about David Goggins' story if he didn't do something with his life. You know what I mean? Anybody, anybody like that.

SPEAKER_00

100%. And that that that was the gratitude is one of the most powerful things, man, that I have ever changed in my life. And you just turning the negative into something grateful. It was cool, dude. We I just had to replace some an engine at my I have a truck paid off. It's great, you know. It's I could go and get a new truck. I don't want to, but I bought spent 13 grand on a new freaking engine on this thing. It sucks, but it's my wife goes, Okay, we have and I'm just like, Oh god, here it comes, you know, immediately like they're gonna drop this on a motor. She goes, but we have the funds to be able to do it, my love. And I'm like, You're right, yeah, okay. I have the ability to just pay this off. I know I'm not getting a new truck, I'm not getting any more debt and a new payment and starting all over again. Cool, it sucks paying this, but I have the means to be able to do that. Okay, cool. Thank you, God. Yeah, thank you for being able to provide me with the ability to just pay for this so I don't have to get myself into more credit and debt and everything that goes on. So, okay, cool. There's the there's the lighting to it. So even though I've blew an engine on an old truck and got to replace it, yeah, that sucks. But okay, cool. We have the ability to do it. All right, I get it. You know, just those types of things. And I know that's probably not a great example for everybody because it is what it is, but for me, it's just like, okay, like those would be things that would set me off. Now I'm pissed off and it ruins my whole week because all in the back of my head, I gotta drop all this, okay, gotta move this here, okay. I gotta cancel this. And you know, that's how I would just dwell on shit. But it's like, okay, cool. You know what? It'll work out. It always does, it always works out, and it's you just gotta keep continuing and keep growing with it, keep being grateful and watch how everything just starts sitting in traffic, you know, like sitting in traffic the other day, trying to get on the damn freeway from Eagles a nightmare. Yeah, sitting there, and I'm like, I just I sit and I take a big breath. Like, I you know, I'm sitting with my wife, I think we're going to deliver bread. And I just sigh and she's like, What's wrong? And I'm like, nothing. I get to spend extra time with you.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And she's like, see? I'm like, you know, see, but I get that I instead of me fucking Californians ruining our state, you know. I'm like, you know what? I got my wife sitting next to me, she's my best friend, or it could be your kid, buddy, whatever. That's more time I get to spend with her. Okay, cool. Added an extra 15 minutes on that I get to spend with my wife sitting in traffic. Boo fucking who, yeah, right? But instead of roaring road rage, you know, flipping people off because they're not paying attention. Like, why? You know, what the our life is so short. Our span on this planet is a blip on a radar. You do not have them time to be going through life angry and miserable and just just a grumpy piece of shit that nobody wants to be around. What is going on in your life that is that bad?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Sometimes I'll I'll see those videos of like coal miners barefoot under the underground, you know, doing this shit and they're just trying to provide for the family. I'm like, and I'm bitching because I have to make a couple reels today, you know? You know? Or like when I worked in the prison and there's people that'll never see outside the gate. And I'm like, mm-and and I've had inmates tell me, like, your worst day on the streets is my best day I would ever possibly be able to have. Because I will never be able to leave here, you know. And I'm like, damn, all right.

SPEAKER_00

100% gratitude, man. Well, what is there to be grateful? What do you have to be grateful for? I don't have anything. I thought guys, nothing to be grateful for. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

I went through that with one of my family members, yeah. And I was like, just be grateful. What do I have to be? I was like, well, your kids woke up this morning. They don't have cancer, they're not in a bed because they're medical.

SPEAKER_00

You live in one of the greatest countries.

SPEAKER_01

You made it, you made it to work. Your car didn't break on the way to work. Like, like all these little things that went right today are so much more than what's one little thing that you're just dwelling on. 100%. You can either, it's like half obviously it's like the half full, half empty. Which one you want to focus on is gonna be right. You can be you can focus on the negative and you're gonna be negative, or you can focus on the positive. That's honestly like why I stopped even looking into politics because I can't control those things.

SPEAKER_00

You can't, bro.

SPEAKER_01

I can't control politics, I can't control a sports team that people obsess their lives over, and I'm like, why am I gonna spend these hours and just endless energy on things that I can't control? Yep. I'm watching I mean, I used to watch like a shit ton of fantasy football, and and I didn't even like football, but everybody at work, that was like the normal thing to do. For sure. So then I got on like the teams, and then I would do all that, and then I'd get red zone, and I'd watch eight hours plus on Sunday, and then you know, you got Thursday night, Monday night, and I'm like 14, 15 hours a week that I could be building my life, I'm worrying about somebody else's number and name on their back. Like, why am why am I doing this? And this is you know, 16 weeks times 16, whatever. Like, I'm losing a shit ton of time that I could be building, and I was like, I can't do this anymore. And then other people are just like always listening to AM radio and listening to like all the political shit. And I'm like, what are you? Of course, it's just like weight loss. If you're gonna be bringing in all this fatty foods into your body, you're gonna be fat. If you listen to all this negative shit, you're gonna be negative.

SPEAKER_00

What we watch, what we eat, and what we listen to affect is exactly what we become. And if you're listening to those shit music, you're listening to the news, watching politics, eating like shit, that's that's how it is. But instead, if you're surrounding yourself with people that are speaking positivity all single day, if you're around people that are trying to better themselves and help you better yourself, if you're you know, lit le reading scripture, reading your Bible, listening, whatever it may be, it'll change your perspective on everything. It's like, yeah, bro, like I I know a good buddy of mine who lost his son a few years ago to cancer. I kind of took the kid in and you know, did a lot of real fun stuff with him and did instead of just lost his son, okay. I'm gonna live. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, Mason's gonna live on forever through the dad, and him doing all the stuff he wants to do. He turned that most traumatic thing I probably can ever imagine going through as a parent. And now he's like, he's he's building his whole entire life around who his son was, and to be able to live forever, it's like okay, like that's you can't sit here and woe is me your whole entire life. And where are you? Where is it gonna get you? It's not gonna open doors for you, nobody wants to be around you, it just it ruins everything, and then in cancer attracts cancer, so then before you know it, your whole circle is full of people bitching. That's that's a phase of my life that I've been in for a while. If you if I'm around people and they're just negative and everything's negative, uh this and this run, gone. I cut those people out of my life faster than anybody. I don't care how good of friends they were with me. If every time I call them and it's just negative shit, I don't then it's just putting on you. It's just you're hearing it every single time you call them. Like, you know what? Or family. Oh, oh, don't get me started on family, bro. I've cut all my family out, like gone forever. Like, yeah, yeah, I'm a hundred percent advocate. If you deal with shitty family members, you're an idiot. There's no bro, first off, fuck family. They'll turn on you in a heartbeat, they'll stab you, they'll kill you, they'll rob you. Family means nothing. Your family as an adult, it's what's under your roof. Like, I don't look at my siblings, my relative. That's not family to me. I don't get, I don't care about the cool. People grow up in very tight communities with family. I understand all of that. My family is my wife and kids. That is my family. That is my life, that is the world that I've created, and I'm trying to build that legacy. I'm not passing on my dad's legacy or my mom's legacy. I don't give a shit what they created. It's what I'm starting now as a man of my family creating that. And that's what I worry about my family. Not my relatives. I don't care who what rel who's fighting, and none of that. I don't know anything that goes on in any relative and my parents, my sister. I know zero of what goes on in their life because I don't give a fuck. I worry about my in that no drama. I'm not getting pulled into anything that's going on. Nobody, I don't know anything. I'm cool with it because that's what my focus is. And I talk to people like, oh dude, my sister, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. My parents. Why? Why talk to them? Hey, if you don't change your shit, I don't need you around my kids. And if they don't want to adjust to how you're raising your family, they don't need to be involved in it. I to I use people all the time, oh my, my, the grandparents don't respect our our rules. Then why the fuck are you giving the grandparents the grandkids?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

If you're gonna sit and lay the ground rules down for your children and the parents think that they're cut them out. I don't, I don't like, there's no need for that. I I'm one of those people. No way, dude. If you're not going to adapt to how my family is and how I'm building what we're going after, I don't need it. Get out of the way. Like you're just you're an anchor at this point. Gone. Yeah, gone forever. Like, cut them out, remove them. There's no point, dude. Family, I don't know. I know people are torn on family, but I'm one of those people I am 100% advocate. Your family is who's under your roof. And so many people are so worried about catering to other family members, and if they're gonna offend them, and well, do we need to bring this? If you're living a life like that, what is the point?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah, there people just worry too much about the whole family, and blood's thicker than water, and honestly, like in the whole like blood stains start, yeah, starting like my social media business and everything else like that. Like, I've got more love from random strangers I've never even met every time than friends and family every time all day long.

SPEAKER_00

My parents have yet to ever order a loaf of bread from my pick my kids. They're their grandma has yet to ever support them having a business. Why the fuck do I need to keep somebody in my life like that? If you're that ignorant that you can't support your but online, you mean to tell me on Facebook, you're the greatest grandma on the planet. You've never even taken a chance to come out, fly and see your grandkids. I don't even expect because I know my parents, you know, they grew up not very much. You can't order a loaf of bread, you can't even just call them to see how they're doing, how their business is going.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

If you're not gonna make as the the children, us, we should not have to make the effort to have a relationship with our parents. And my kids should not have to make a relationship an effort to have a relationship with their grandparents. As a grandparent, you should be doing everything in your power to fix any relationship and to build any relationship with your kids or grandkids. That's not my job to have my kids try to mend a relationship with grandparents. Like, absolutely not. And if you're if they're not gonna do that, cool. Hey, you know what? You guys can have a relationship with your grandparents, but as far as us and the adults in this, we're gonna give them their time.

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_00

And if they want to come around one day, cool. If you want to live an old miserable life and alone and not knowing how incredible your grandkids are, that's on you, not me.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, at the end of the day, it's on them to figure that out. It's not like for you to beg them to come be in their life. I I don't beg anything for anybody, dude.

SPEAKER_00

If you have to, you're you're in the wrong crowd. And it should not, you shouldn't beg your family for anything.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Ever. I'm a huge advocate on that, man. I that whole blood sticker than water bullshit is the stupidest crap you could ever ever fall into.

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_00

Cause like I said, blood stains. And like you said, random, random ass stranger I didn't even know existed on this planet will support me before my family does, and you want me to have a relationship with you? I don't see your likes, I don't see your views, I don't see your name coming through anything. Fuck you.

SPEAKER_01

Well, it's interesting because like you'll see their views on like the stories, but they never like or comment. And then I make that correlation too of like there's always gonna be people watching your reactions, even though they might not say anything, but they're watching.

SPEAKER_00

Dude, you always hear it. You always hear your friends and family become your biggest haters. Always hear that shit. Like, and you're like, no, no, dude. Yeah, bro. Some dudes that I would I would put the best friend badge on. They don't watch, they don't support, they don't do anything to threaten. What it comes down to, what I truly feel that it comes down to is people watch you say you're gonna do something, and then you're doing it. And no, what is it like three percent of people actually follow through with goals that then when they that that write them down? It's some minute number. Like three percent of people actually execute on goals once they write them down. Yeah, but people watch you and they watch that you're changing, they watch you're better in yourself, they watch that you're growing something, and they it's just this human nature where now all of a sudden they're like, Oh, he's doing he's better. I'm not better than anybody, I'm just doing what I need to do to not be owned by the system anymore. Or I'm doing what I have to do to provide for my family or to help teach them things. And if and you're hating on that, like you can't just like, follow, reshare, support, download. Yeah, it costs zero money to support your friends online. But for some reason, motherfuckers forget about that. It doesn't, oh dude, I love to donate, I love the support. Reshare my shit. Yeah, that's all you have to do. Just reshare. Oh, well, you I thought you were big time now, bro. You know, you'll hear it all. Yeah, but they'll you'll never hear. Oh, amen, my bad.

SPEAKER_01

Alex Ramosi has one of the best things where he's like, they want you to do good, but they don't want you better than them.

SPEAKER_00

That's what it comes down to. I have buddies that have podcasts, dude. I don't hear from them anymore, anymore, ever. Nothing. Now that I've we're on a path that we're on, ghost. I'm like, why are you threatened, dude? Like, I've been supporting your podcast for six, seven years. It's because I caught you two. We're not enemies. Yeah, nothing's changed. We're not even in the same genre. But now that you just see growth, now, like now you don't support me. Yeah, make it not make sense. So you want to know who your true friends are? Start a business. Start a goal, start a fitness journey. You'll see who your true friends are at the end of it every time.

SPEAKER_01

Stop drinking.

SPEAKER_00

Stop. That's one of the quickest ones. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

That's one where I seen the most drop off. I was like, oh, you just don't drink, but you don't drink anymore. I'm like, I can still hang out with you. Yeah, you just don't drink it. I was like, okay, so we were just partying friends.

SPEAKER_00

100%. That's the mindset, though. That cool. Bye. Yeah. That that's that mindset of that person, that's the last person you want in your life. There's no, there's if you're trying to better yourself and become the best version of you, cancer. Cut it all out. Those are the people, those people suck, man.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So speaking of your podcast, what was it that made you guys want to start his podcast?

SPEAKER_00

Dude, I talked about it for so long, and then I was working for this comp a VC group doing all their marketing for this venture capital group. And I'd hired a buddy of mine that um was just following me around filming everything. And everywhere we go, I'd run into these wild ass people, and they'd start telling me these crazy ass, chaotic stories. He's like, dude, you just attract the crazies, man. Like everywhere we go, we get into a situation. Every time I'm like, Yeah, well, my what that's my life, dude. And uh he's like, You gotta start a podcast and just start talking to people. And I'm like, man, I've thought about it for a while, but I just I don't even know where to start. He's like, Listen, I'll do everything. You just bring the guests and let's just do it. And I go home and tell the wife, she's like, You're an idiot if you don't take this opportunity. I'm like, all right, cool. So I'm like, yeah, dude, let's do it. So Wild Chaos used to be an apparel brand that I started with an old buddy a long time ago, and just life took us in a couple different directions and let it fade away. So I'm going through all the process, I'm like, well, I gotta start a whole new business, like file everything. Like, this sucks. And I'm like, Well, I've been sitting on Wild Chaos for all these years, it's been dormant. I'm like, why don't I just bring it back to life? Like, can't fail the same company twice, you know. I got like that's gotta be an accomplishment if you do. And so, yeah, I just launched Wild Chaos, already had it, and uh started doing it with my boy, and you know, we were just grinding it out and not having a clue what we were doing. And I think we got to like episode 28 or 29, something like that. And he comes to me, he's like, dude, I'm so busy. Like, fortunately for him, unfortunately for me, like his personal marketing business was taken off, which is great, right? I can't fault him for it. And uh, we weren't, you know, you're not making any money as in a podcast starting off. I mean, I mean, at least I wasn't. And uh, so he tells me one day, he's like, dude, I'm booked for like the next two months. Like, I don't know how we're gonna record. And I'm like, Well, that's not gonna work for me. So I go home and I tell the wife, I'm like, Hey, kind of screwed. And I was already kind of like, All right, like, this isn't gonna sustain forever because I'd only have like one or two days a month to film, so I'm knocking out like four or five podcasts in a day, which was miserable. But hey, it was how I had to get done. And so, yeah, I went home, told the wife, she's like, Well, I guess we're gonna have to bring it in-house. And so, yeah, we built out our whole entire loft and didn't have a clue what we were doing. I told my 16-year-old daughter at the time, I'm like, Hey, get on YouTube. You're you either go get a job being a barista or whatever the fuck you're gonna do at 16, or you can learn a really cool skill and be the producer of this podcast. And I was like, I know you've never even listened to a podcast, but figure it out. And dude, she got on YouTube and started learning. If you go to uh Kyle Nations was our her very first episode, you go to his and dude, it's god awful. Like the whole thing's orange. I think his audio is off, and we got the whole thing on just my audio. Like the lighting's god-awful, the coloring is just atrocious. But it like, dude, she's 16 and I didn't give a shit. And I told her, I was like, hey, when we get to our hundredth episode or hit her two year mark, like, I want to be dialed, so you got you got time. Like, I'm not, I am not an easy person to work for or work with because I have my standards, and when I expect things done, I want them done. And so I'd give her little goals, and dude, I just put a ton of pressure on her, and she just gets on and learns and reaches out to resources. And so, yeah, she's 17 now, about turn 18, and she's crushing it. I mean, do she does everything from start to finish? So I get to, you know, do a podcast with my daughter as the producer, and so to watch her learn and work with incredible experts in her field, and you know, being able to mentor her and learn along the way has been really, really cool to watch. And then obviously sitting down and letting people share their stories has been extremely impactful. I mean, we got an episode right now, it's going viral and in Reno, and uh, so it's cool to watch her work go viral and make an impact in people's lives. And I mean, dude, there's just the the chief of police was just fired after our episode went live, and so crazy shit. But she this the C I don't personally I could care less, right? Of the success of me, it's now watching my daughter being able to reap and to watch what a business that's growing, and and it's not like this was handed to her because shh, oh man, we've gone some rounds and uh some come to Jesus moments on things, and you know, so she's she's been in the trenches with me this whole entire journey. But to the fact that she just sits up there and just googles, like learning how to learn Da Vinci and the edits, and I'm very, very impressed with her, and it's it's been an absolute blessing to have her because it makes a huge difference of being able to, I don't have to do all the after post-production allows me to be able to you know find new guests and go that route. But yeah, it's it's been really cool, man. We've we've done a lot and talked some crazy ass stories in people's life, and yeah, it's it's it's it's awesome. I really enjoy it.

SPEAKER_01

What was the reason you wanted to start? Like, did you have a vision like you wanted to go full-time eventually with it, or was it just kind of like you wanted just to have kind of another thing you're doing? Because you were working full-time at the point when you started it, right?

SPEAKER_00

So I just I love talking to people, and I picked this skill up from 12 years of having a charity with wounded vets and taking these guys one-on-one on these adventures, and bro, the majority of them, especially in the early days, were so like I want to just I'm using this term lightly, shell-shocked. They were so closed off, very angry, didn't want to talk, wouldn't open up. So I had to learn how to open people up because I'd be sitting in a ground blind with somebody for a week and some angry, pissed-off vet. And I'm like, Oh, this is gonna be fucking fun. Like, I'm giving up time for my family, I'm gonna make this the best time as possible. So I I really developed this skill of being able to just bullshit with people and yo, tell me about this. You got a kid? No shit, how old? Oh, me too. You know, just finding a way to mirror and match and get people to open up. So it just it almost built a skill that I didn't realize I was doing all these years. So then, even just like listening to my daughter, she's like, Dad, I don't know. I just that guy, man, I need to open right up, tell you his whole life story. And I'm like, Yeah, because people just want to be heard. And if you just can figure that out and just have a conversation with them, so yeah, it just it works. And I think now, realistically, looking of where our growth and this, you know, where we're going with it, this has potential of you know being something massive. Like, I I know guys that have no offense, but they got some really shitty podcasts that have been around for a long time and they they crush it, they make a really good living, they got great views, they have great sponsors. And I'm like, okay, if these dudes can do that, I have a way wilder personality and stories to be able to tell, and then just a different platform. Like, I'm not going like a specific niche, and which everybody fought me on, dude. I talked to all my homies that had podcasts and have done all this. They're like, You gotta get a niche, you gotta get a niche. And I fought it. I was like, Damn, I don't think I need a niche. Like, I don't, I don't know. Like, I just I don't want to talk about the same shit every time. Yeah, I don't want a hunting podcast where I gotta hear the hundredth dude arrow this bull. You know, like I just I don't care. I I wanna I wanna talk to you. I want to talk to what's like being in corrections. I want to talk to a teacher that's discovering pedophilia in the Boise school district. I want to have a cop on that got shot six times. Like, what's that like? So yeah, I was like, you know what? Fuck everybody. I'm gonna just I'm building my business. This is for me and my daughter. I'm gonna do however I want. And so I just buckled down and it's like, you know what? I'm just gonna talk to anybody and everybody. If people don't want to listen, then okay, cool. Then then probably not built for a podcast. Yeah. Fortunately, after about a year, people started listening, and you know, it just slowly started rising, and here we are, you know. So it's been pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01

How'd you go through that when you didn't have as much growth as you wanted to and just kept grinding? That shit sucks.

SPEAKER_00

That shit sucks, dude. I I've I think I've sent you the picture of my my buzz sprout for that first year, and I I tell everybody this anybody, it's not even just podcasting. It's this is just life in general of starting any business, any adventure, especially online. You have to give yourself two years, two years minimum. So if you're hey, I'm gonna launch a podcast, you go two years in ahead and you put a mark in your calendar, and that's when you start worrying about tightening things up, worrying about money, worrying about where you need to level up. It's just it's that's where most people I feel really lose track of it because they're like, I'm gonna launch a podcast and I'm gonna have 20,000 downloads a month in six months. The fuck you are maybe some people get lucky, right? Some people are very fortunate with it. That was not my case, dude. I mean, dude, I have episodes that have like 400 downloads on them, and I'm like, you know, and you're grinding, you're in here, you're sweating your ass off, you have no idea what you're doing, you're learning all this stuff. You put it on an episode and you get 200 people to watch it, and you're just like, and that's when people quit. That's when everybody quits, is in that two-year mark. Nobody makes it to the two-year mark. And that's where I told my daughter, I was like, two years. I don't care about numbers, I don't care where our downloads are. I'm not even looking at we still don't have any sponsors, but I don't even give a shit about sponsors. I don't care about anything except for just getting to the two-year mark. That's our goal. Make it to two years. And then as soon as we hit our two year mark, cool, dial this. I want our lighting fixed, let's get audio disc. That's when we really started. We're always constantly leveling up. You have to, but that's it wasn't two years until two years. And then do we hit our two-year mark? I look back at our our year downloads, and it's like, I think we're doing like 4,000 downloads or whatever uh a month. Dude, we hit our two-year mark, dude. We're doing almost 100k a month now. And it's like, okay, if I would have quit when you look at that Spotify and you see that line, it doesn't even move for over from February when we launched to February of our first full year. There is not one dupe on the radar. Not one. It is flatlined for a year. That shit sucks. It's it it you know, okay. I'm wasting money, I'm wasting my time. Am I chasing the wrong thing? Okay, am I doing it? Am I even talented enough to even do this podcast? Like, we're not growing little by little, and then all of a sudden, one day, bloop, there's the pulse. Oh shit, we got 8,000 downloads this month. Like, holy shit. And I'm then you're celebrating with your kid, you know. And we were celebrating way before 8,000 downloads, but you know, just using that number, and then it's like, oh shit, we broke 8,500 this month. Oh shit, we're 9,000 this month, and then it's just like okay, but then it just starts working, but it wasn't until two years in, and that's where everything. If you're gonna start a bakery, you're gonna start your social. We'll just talk social media because everybody wants to be a YouTuber or social media influencer. Two years. You look at all these people that are super cringe, you're like, God, dude, look at this. Why the when anybody watches? You look back, I guarantee you about the year and a half, two-year mark is when they start getting that shit. Now, don't get me wrong, people some randoms will go viral and immediately jump that wave and write it. Cool. The majority of people are not like that, and that's where I say, like, cool, you want to be a social media influencer? Two years. You want to be a YouTuber, two years. Like, because nobody knows you even exist. You're you're you're putting your your little tiny pinhead mark on the globe, and you want everybody to find you, it just little by little. But that's how I explain to my daughter. I'm like, okay, cool. We got 400 downloads this week or this month or whatever it may be. Next week, we got 500. And then we have to have we got six, 550. It's just you're constantly, and then there's other ones where you drop, you're like, Oh, we're heading the wrong direction. Like, what are we doing wrong? And you want to go into panic mode, but you just got to trust the process, and you're gonna have those lulls and mountain peaks and valleys, and that you're gonna find yourself in. But it's just you just being consistent and just constantly just do it. If you're gonna commit to a commit for two solid years and watch what happens, and at that two-year mark, cool. Re-re-evaluate, start changing things if you have to, start leveling up and changing a little, whatever, whatever it may be in that is built around your business. But yeah, man, that's where everybody quits is before that two-year mark because it's frustrating, dude. You're in here and you're putting hours in your scheduling guests, you're putting money into the shit. You you got equipment and cameras and mics. Like, this shit ain't cheap. Yeah, and then you're like, okay, like when do I get my investment back on this? And you're not, you you can't look at it like that. If you're if you're going into like, oh, I'm gonna get this, we're gonna be this, we're gonna be the next big thing. Clear all of that. Set it in your head, two-year goal. I'm gonna grind my ass off for two solid years, and then we'll worry about momentum, worry about numbers, worry about the following. I I just apparel, social media, anything, anything that I've ever built, anything I've ever been involved in. When I take on new companies and help them like consulting and trying to get them going, I'm like, dude, they'll set me these goals. Like, what are your guys' goals? We want to hit this in our first year. I'm like, dude, fuck no. You could hit that. I'm gonna need a million dollars to get there. Yeah, you're in marketing to put people on you, put you on the map. Two years.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Hard work should be the goal rather than like an actual dollar amount because the man that enjoys walking is gonna walk further than you know, like whatever that saying is. I was really thankful that I was able to meet you because I was messing up on so many different levels on the podcast. Like, I I didn't even know what a download was because I was strictly just YouTube. And everybody's like talking about downloads, and I'm like, Where are these? They're just streaming, and then I was like, Oh, I'm not on spot. I was on sp like I think I was on Spotify or anything until shoot, probably like 30, 40, no, at least 40 episodes in.

SPEAKER_00

Good, good, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And then and then I was like, oh, okay. And then it was like just adding little things like you know, it's stupid stuff you wouldn't even think about. But if you're not thinking about it, they're not thinking about it, like putting it like in this captions of we're on YouTube, we're on all these other places to and I'm like, oh my gosh, dude. It was like so long. And and if I wouldn't have surrounded myself or even met somebody else or reached out and and thankfully that you were able to share your wisdom with me, because I don't know what I'd be doing right now. And I've I've got to those points too where I'm just looking at like the downloads and the stuff, and I'm like, man, what am I what am I doing this for, you know? Because it's not it's not monetized or anything, but then I think about my own story and my childhood, and I was like thinking that I was gonna die without ever telling my story, and I'm like, yeah, it's bigger than just money, dude. Like, you gotta let other people tell their story. And I think like once I had a once I had like a come to Jesus meeting with my myself, and it was like, stop chasing money and start just focusing on the other person, you know.

SPEAKER_00

That's the problem. If you're if you're chasing the money, you're gonna build this business, you're gonna you money is the money's obviously the end goal. We everybody needs it to function and live and to live your life. Can't do that was a battle for me in Wild Chaos because you know, even now we hit incredible numbers. I'm like, fuck, man, like like we need to be making more off of this platform. And then I started thinking to myself, I'm like, okay, like do I though? Because then the more money now, okay, cool. I pick up a sponsor. Now I have to film ads for them. Now I have to now I'm working. That was the whole point of really building this is to one, show my daughter hard work. Hey, this is what we're gonna accomplish. We're gonna we're locking in, we're never quitting this. So it's good, it has to work. If you just in that mindset, if I do not quit at this, one day it's gonna work. And at the same time, I'm like, I'm now I'm like, okay, we need to make money, I need to do this, this. It's the journey, man. It's like, okay, if you're going into it and that's what you're built around, you've already lost the battle because that if that's your motive and that's your mentality, you're you're missing all the little shit to build that foundation of a solid business. I want one day, dude. It could be two, three years from now. That company comes along and we have numbers. I'm gonna give them that number and be like, cool, this is this is what our value is, this is what our worth is, and they'll know it because of everything. It's like constantly tweaking, constantly bettering yourself. It's just you just want to come non-stop growth. People get caught up in the numbers, the money, the money, the money, and that dude, the money is the root of all evil. If you're yeah, if you're chasing money, you're not having fun. I've never every time I have chased the dollar sign, gotta do you just become obsessed, and that's everything built around, dude. It just brings out the evil, it brings out the negative. But if you're like, man, I'm gonna come into this, we're gonna have the time of our life, and if it fucking sticks, it sticks. And then guess what? You now you're turning a business and having a blast doing it. It's I wanted to build something that I can do with my daughter that was fun, not we're gonna do this, we're gonna be rich, and just we're gonna be the next John Ryan. Like, never in my life do I ever want to come in with that mentality. It was like, let's kids gonna grind this for two years minimum. I realistically, it's that three to five year mark, is when you know, brand new business I feel personally starts getting momentum. But that two-year mark is when I'm like, okay, we're dialed now. Proof of concept. Proof of concept. Let's let's, you know, I tell my daughter, because you know, we're long-range shooters, and I'm like, hey, two years when I want to start dialing. We're gonna fine tune, we're gonna bring the grouping in. We're gonna, I want center punch. Every single episode is gonna be a center punch on a target. Then we then let's start talking, turning on the subscriptions, going after bigger companies to see if they want to sponsor whatever it may be. But I was like, till then I don't give a shit. I want to learn, I want to enjoy this. We got a lot of learning to do. Like, there's so uh dude, everything like I don't know what the fuck any of this was when I started this.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, what a TASCAM is, and yeah, I was gonna ask you what's some of the unseen struggles of being a podcast host and just owning a podcast that people don't look at, they just might look at like, oh, it must be nice, bam. You're making a living just talking to people, you know, dude.

SPEAKER_00

This well, one running a business with a 16-year-old child isn't easy because I can't just be like, yo, you're fired. Hey, I need a new person in here. I'm like, oh my god, like you know, and so you know, obviously running a business with your kid isn't easy, but at the same time, it's very rewarding once her and I found our groove. It's just lots of little things. There's always, dude, there's a plug could go over a cable that goes over your sound cable that's not giving you a static in your mic, and then you're chasing this for a month and you don't know where this noise is coming from, and then people are complaining because the volume's too low and volume's too high. There's so much finding the sweet spot because you're trying to appeal to the masses of everybody. You know, it's just lots of little stuff, just tech things that you, you know, if you're not a tech person, which my daughter and I are not, she is now, just learning, but constantly just being on it. I mean, just getting people in. What's the next episode? You know, like I'm not a Sean Ryan, I'm not Joe Rogan have millions of dollars in sponsorship a year where I'm nitpicking every guest, and you know, oh, we'll pass on him and we'll fly him now. I'm like, okay, he wants to come on, get him on. Yeah, let's get him on the calendar. You know, like you know how it is, and especially in the earlier days, it's like anybody and everybody that wants to be a guest, you're like, absolutely come have a conversation. So there's just lots of just stress, and obviously the social media side of things. It's not only are you running a podcast, now you're having to build a whole entire image, everything off social media. You got to feed that machine. To me, that's my personal biggest battle is social media. I hate social media, it is the devil. All of my world and businesses are built in it, so I'm in just consumed by it all day. But that's my next biggest relief is hire. I got a young kid that I'm gonna talk to soon. And uh talk paying this kid just to take over and just schedule. Just so I don't ever have to open an app again. Like, that's that's the goal I'm trying to get to. I don't care about anything else in life right now. My main goal is just to get off social because you're just in it all day and you're scheduling, and you know, you put so much time sometimes into these reels and clips, and then they'll get a hundred views on them. You're like, what the fuck? Like, and then you throw out something where like this is lamb, I'll throw it on a Saturday, and you look and it's got 2.1 million views. You're like, what the there's so once you really get the concept that it doesn't matter what you put out, you just gotta put it out and be consistent with it. That was a big one for me because I would spend hours trying to get the right clip and the right hook. And I'm like, you know what? I finally got to the point at the two-year mark. I'm like, I don't give a shit. I'm just gonna throw all the shit at the wall, and some of it's gonna stick. It sticks, it does, it doesn't. I don't care. We're still growing, we still have growth. As long as I see growth, cool. I I'm not I'm happy with that as long as we do a little bit better than the previous month, and sometimes you don't. There's you, you know, you go the opposite way, and you go into panic mode, and you're like, Well, see how next month is, maybe it'll pick back up. I just got out of like an eight-week lull, dude. We've been crushed for eight weeks, like dead, dead, no movement, uh, dude. We monetizing this dog shit. Like, what can you do? Like, I'm not gonna chase it. The old version of me, I would have gone a straight panic mode. I would have been buried in the reels and edits and trying to push, push, push, push content just to get our numbers back up. I was like, Yeah, fuck it'll pick back up when it does. Unfortunately, it was eight weeks, but that's just it, it's how it is. I went through one last year, and once you're in this a while, you'll see. There'll be times where you're putting out episodes where like, yeah, it wasn't a conversation, and then they're just you're gonna get it's gonna rip. And then you put it on out an episode, and you're like, Oh man, this one is going viral and it tanks. Yeah, once you accept that concept in the in the podcast world, you're like, all right, yeah, it is what it's up to God. I'm just gonna put it out. The people like it, they like it. If they don't, they don't have to listen. And then every episode, though, you're gaining a couple of followers, die hard listeners, and then you get in more, and then you get more. And so when you have those shitty episodes, you have this foundation of incredible listeners that are no matter what, they're just there to support because they love the show, they love you as a host, whatever it may be. Yeah, you just gotta keep going. But there's all those little, little crap mics and equipment you're trying to figure out and updated gear and all the time. It's just so it's all little stuff, you know. So but it makes it fun. Takes up a lot of bandwidth.

SPEAKER_01

Dude, and then you got like the you guys got the sourdough company, and then you also started Bam Nation, yeah, which is really awesome for men because stuff just you know, I feel like men are really lonely nowadays and stuff like that. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that's been a cool one, man. I'm glad that you're part of it. And so it just obviously Bam Nation is very new. I don't even open it, you know, we're not even accepting anybody in this life. Very seldom you see a new person jump in. Um, but I'm just trying to create a true community for men that's built for men, like no politics, no group chat bullshit. Like, I want I want it to be a platform that it grows into one day. So I I don't want guys in Bam Nation 24-7 because there's no different of you being in there than being on your phone scrolling social media. But I want Bam Nation to be a platform when you're struggling, you need advice, something happened in your life, and you have nobody to go to, or friends, or a community, and you don't have purpose. Open the fucking app up, dude, and throw it in. And you see it every day. Look at the guys, what they're sharing, and they're like, yo, just went through this. How do I handle this? And then it's just incredible men that have been in the trenches that are able to give their real world life experiences back, and that's that's the atmosphere that I'm really trying to focus on and build because then it just becomes some Discord group where everybody's in there bullshitting and just talking crap nonsense all day, and then that I don't want that. That's my biggest fear is just turning this into just another app for men to go in and be distracted by. That's that's what I'm trying to undo.

SPEAKER_01

Gotta have some purpose behind it.

SPEAKER_00

And so, yeah, that's why every week we come out with a new word and there's the focus word, and so they guys can be like, okay, dedication, purpose, and you know, whatever all the words that we have, and then there's lessons in there, then you know, putting out free curriculum for guys that are in kids and just want to learn at their own pace. So, yeah, I think it's going to be, you know, like two years. I've given myself, I told the wife, like, I don't care about any of this for at least a year before I even start caring about numbers because I have buddies that have communities, and that's the thing. They want all these numbers, they want all these men. It's just a paycheck for them. Like, dude, I've I have yet to make a dime on any of this community. I actually spend I'm hemorrhaging money with guys' nights and communities and cigar nights, but that's what it comes down to is I I want to build a true brotherhood where guys that something happens with their kids or their wife or work or finances, they have dudes to be able to truly lean on. Like, nobody's there, hardly any of those guys knew each other going into it. There was actually a few of them that were connected, which is really weird that they didn't even know they were joining Bam Nation, but they've known each other um on the original 38 guys, and so but it's just I just want a foundation for men to be able to go somewhere and it's no gimmicks, it's not you're not scrolling content, everything is there and it provides a value. And I'll and then the bringing in experts like last night we had Chris Gethin on. You jumped in for a little bit. Chris Gethin talked peptides for an hour and a half with these guys, just talking, answering questions, and to be able to have men that I've networked with over the years of everything that I've been through and all the bullshit that have helped me come along and got out of my dark times and brought me out of trenches or helped me financially, whatever it may be. I want to bring those guys in and be like, cool, here, here's my group. This is what's helped me, or you might have somebody like, dude, this guy got me through this, changed my life. Let's bring him in and let them talk to the community. It's not built around. That's why I hate life coach for me personally. I'm not a life coach because my life is fucking fucked up. Start to finish. I sin, I wake up, I sin every day, I fail every day, I make huge mistakes as a husband and a father every day. So, like I myself am just holding myself to such a standard where I can't coach somebody else's life when I'm making the same mistakes, but I could help mentor because I'm making those mistakes, I've made those mistakes. I know a lot of dudes that have helped me along the way. So I would, if I'm gonna consider myself anything, it would be a mentor, but that's why I haven't built that group around me. You look at all these men's communities, it's always built around them and who they are as this influencer. Well, dude, I know I know a dude that has a ginormous community and the dude's all cheating on his wife constantly. Yeah, he's well, he's he's he's a piece of shit, but all these men look up to him because he hides that. I I'm I can't I can't be that dude, right? I I have too much integrity to sit here and try to like mentor and tell you how to be a better person while I'm doing that. But it's like, you know what, we're all gonna come together. I know guys in that community right now that have made some major mistakes in their relationships, but it's they're owning it and they're able to come to me on the side in the DMs and be like, yo, dude, this is where I'm really struggling. And that's where I can relate to these guys because I was that piece of shit for a long time, dude. I cheated on my wife more times than I'd ever want to admit. Like, I was a piece of shit human being for a long time. But that's what's helped me be able to help these guys, but I'm not an expert. I'm not, I'm I can't help, I'm not a porn, I don't watch porn. I'm very blessed there. I'm not a I've never had a battle with porn. A lot of dudes do. But so instead of me acting like I'm better than these dudes and I'm this perfect life coach, I'm gonna bring an expert in. He's gonna now have their own community, be able to talk to these guys about addiction and problems that they're battling. I want to bring in Ben, the cybersecurity guy. Perfect, perfect example. Great buddy of mine from the podcast, but he helps teach people how to keep your kids safe online. Why would I not bring somebody into the community that can offer that? And so that's where it's like I want to build a true platform where there's coaches on the side, uh, you know, experts, leading experts in fields that could come in and have their own little courses and be able to help men along the way and just build a true meaning of a community where you could pop in, take something that you want. Hey, this was a great lesson for me. Oh, there's some new curriculum that I can learn about my kids, go through it at their pace and they dip and they come back and forth whenever they need to. Like, that's that's all I want. That's what I'm trying to build because that's what works for me. I'm not gonna sit in some dude's group and tune in every single week and have to follow this and do that. Like, that's just that's just not my life. But I've sometimes I need to follow somebody and ask somebody some advice, and that's what it's there for. So I just want to build a really cool tool with through BAM Nation, just as a platform, but as a tool for men to be able to, if they're single, if they're married, if they got kids, they're divorced, they're going through whatever health issues. I want to just be able to have a resource, almost a really cool dictionary, like a thesaurus for men that as this grows, and that's why it's very slow. I'm not trying to rush any of this. I want to make sure it's done right. And I, dude, and you jumping is pretty awesome to be able to end to go start at the beginning. I mean, dude, I started with a thousand dudes, narrowed it down to 38 guys that were serious about it. You being one of them.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I feel like it was needed. I've just, I mean, I felt lonely a lot of my life, and I felt like, you know, once I did start getting around some people that shared their wisdom with me, like it changed my life. And so, like, you gotta have that. I I see, you know, too many people, my dad, even like I think about my dad, and he's really just been just solely either with his kids or with his wife his whole life. He's I didn't I asked him, I was like, Do you ever have any like man friends or anything outside of just co-workers or not even co-workers, just people you talk to in the office because he didn't really hang out outside of work and he's never had anybody. And I'm like, I I just think that that's such a downfall after seeing especially, you know, like you if you work in like a law enforcement or you work in the military, you're usually surrounded with like those kind of people too. But then once you get out, then they're gone, and then you think you're gonna be brotherhood blue, back to blue for your whole life, and it doesn't really they they go, so then you're all on your own, and then it's just you have to have these other men around you, and then having men that are just so experienced in life, and the things that you think disqualify you from evening to help others is actually a thing that qualifies you because you've gone through those things, absolutely, and now you can be like this is what happened, this is what helped me. You could take your own, you know, you could take do what you want, but this is what I would do, and they they could take their own advice because that's what I think for a lot of people is like it's gotta be their idea. You can share your experiences, but they gotta make the switch, you can lead a horse to water kind of thing, right? But it was just so needed, and so when I seen that you made that, I was like, I gotta hop on. I'm a huge supporter of like the iron sharpening iron, right? Like you gotta just surround yourself with like-minded individuals. I think Christ-centered individuals, because you can have like-minded individuals, but they want to be like in a gang or something like that. But if they're all Christ-centered, I feel like everybody's in the same direction, at least some kind of a a direction in life where they want to be better, you know? And I think that's been huge for me in the last few years, is just like the faith side of things, because I've never really had that in my life before 2024. But like after that, man, it's just like I don't I wouldn't have gone through hardly any of the stuff that I went through, like going into entrepreneurship, leaving a secure job, and like faith.

SPEAKER_00

Changes your life.

SPEAKER_01

Too many things coming together, you just can't make it.

SPEAKER_00

Make it make sense. Yeah, make it make sense, bro.

SPEAKER_01

God shit, right?

SPEAKER_00

It's a hundred percent god shit. That's that that's one of those things, man. I wish I could scream to the world. That that just having just start a conversation with the big man upstairs and just leave him a voicemail. You don't know how to talk to God, cool. I dude, I'm a horrible Christian. Like, I'll admit it. I have no problem. I I I I hate praying. My flesh fights me every single night on it. I can't read my Bible, but I'll tell you what, dude, I there I am there's no doubt in my mind that Jesus walked this earth and that God exists. And I'm at least man. I just posted about it the other day. I'm I'm man enough to accept that I am better and closer to God than I used to be, but I'm also farther away from Satan than I used to be. And so it's this journey that you're on, but you you go back to gratitude and kind of our original conversation, man, of changing your life. And that happened to me of getting on my knees and praying and and surrendering it to God. I was one of those. I've talked about it before, dude. I would have been one of those knights that I would have had my head lobbed out, I never would have bent the knee. I am that person, I will not bend the knee to fucking anything on this planet. I will not. So it was hard, dude. It was my pride, and I'd swallow my pride. And my after years of my wife chipping away at it, and she's just you know, this we had a huge come to Jesus moment, and and so yeah, she kind of checked me really good and man changed my life and just accepting like I grew up as a pastor's kid, and you know, and I fell away from it in the military. That's why it was really hard for me to come back because I'm like, I've seen shit. If there's a God, we wouldn't allow this to happen, you know, just the ignorant mindset.

SPEAKER_01

And so I think everybody feels like that. They've gone through something that said, like, if God exists, why would He allow this to happen?

SPEAKER_00

For a reason, yeah. And also at the same time, it's good versus evil. The world is full of evil. It's not if we lived in a world that was full of good and nothing happened and everybody lived forever, nobody would be a believer, right? You got God gives you free will, it's 100% free will, and so yeah, it's just one of those things, man. Like, and that's going kind of back to BAM Nation with faith. When I first originally wanted to launch BAM Nation, it was because I'm in my DMs all day talking to dudes about kids and their families and relationships and stuff like that, being a girl dad and having being a husband. So that was the whole foundation of it. I was like, Oh, I'm just gonna talk to husbands and and dads, and then obviously through the questionnaires that you guys filled out for us, completely changed everything. That's why I truly feel once this gets going, this is going to be one of the greatest platforms for men because it wasn't just built off of my ideas. It wasn't me going, man, this is where men need us in a community. I didn't know fuck all from after taking all of your guys' data and information and plugging all that in and breaking it all down. I was in I was in a whole different ball game. I was I'm in the freaking Dodger Stadium. Meanwhile, we're playing football, you know, like it's we're two different sports, two different worlds of where I originally thought I was going to be helping men. And then it came down to purpose and community and faith and fitness and legacy and brotherhood. It was, it was just it was wild of what men needed. But the fact that it just took me going, hey, why don't I just ask men what they need? Instead of me building this and be like, I've built, if you build it, they will come. You know, yeah, they will. Right. But instead of me building it off of what I thought I could provide, okay, why don't I just sit back and go, what do men need? Okay, if I'm gonna build this community for men, what what are men asking for? And that's where it really came down to the guys and narrowing it from a thousand dudes to the OG 38, and them being you and one of them being extremely vulnerable, very open to what is going on, what men need, what we're lacking, what's our purpose, and to see that and to read this and just dude, it was sad, bro. It's it was sad. Those guys and the guys in that community were low. A lot of those dudes were lonely, and they just didn't have anybody to be able to talk to. And so we're so secluded as men these days. And I don't know if it's just this world of the hustle and bustle and the grind bro mentality where you just gotta head down, don't associate with anybody. But we're we're not lonely creatures, we need people around. Does it need to be this? No, but I think this is the healthiest form of communication that we could do is you know, face to face, but also at the same time, there are ways to be able to build relationships with people that are in communities, and that way you can reach out and have people to fall on and and lean on in those times. But it's just I want to give guys what what they're asking for, not what I think they need. And yeah, it's been going really, really well so far, and um slow burn. That's why you know I kind of said a little bit ago that I'm not just opening it up because I don't care. I want I want this to be in guys that are in there that are betting for you. I want I want men that truly want they're at that point. I need to do something. I just need that. I I need to better myself somehow. If it's purpose, faith, fitness, finance, whatever it may be, cool. We got something for you in there, but uh not until they get to that stage because I'm not I don't want this to be just some another social media platform where guys are in there because oh, I follow you on Instagram, I thought it'd be cool. Yeah, it's the last thing I want. I want to do this. Hey, dude, I'm I need help, right?

SPEAKER_01

Well, that's why it's gonna be successful, is because you have the servant mindset, not a self-serving mindset. Well, thank you, dude. Because I mean, when you're only worrying about yourself, then God's not gonna back you, you know. But when you're like trying to help others, and that's one thing I've learned about business is like trying to give enough value first and then chase and don't chase money, chase value. And you know, so that's what you're doing, and in everything you do, whether it's in your family, friends, business, of just giving, giving, giving value, and then then people will see that your heart is like that. It's that's the whole thing with faith, is it's like a heart man, it's a heart change, right? Like you're you're just trying to serve others, please God and serve others. But a lot of people try and please others and serve God, and it's not like that.

SPEAKER_00

Yep. That's why it's I mean, dude, you look at the numbers in there. We don't even have 50 dudes yet, and it's like it's all I I want to get it to the point where every dude in there, every man that's in that community wants to refer a friend because then that shows me I'm doing the right thing. Yeah, and those are the guys that are coming in now, they're all friends of friends and you know, referred guys because that's that's to the meaning of this. I want I want somebody to look at that, their boy, and be like, yo, dude, these guys like this is what's going on in here. This is what we have this week, this is the challenges that's going on. And so obviously, my life gets busy, and you know, uh, it's got a lot, we got a lot to figure out on that end. It's it's almost like building a whole different social media platform with all the different groups and the way that it's let out with curriculum and our pillars and all that stuff. It's a it's a dude, it's a lot, and so it's one of those things, though. If you're not in it for the right mindset, it's a very easy to be like, yeah, screw this. Like, this is too much work because I'm not making any money with it. It's dude, it's a huge chunk of my day every day. I've never written so much, I've never read so much in my life. Like, there's so much that goes into this because you have so many different personalities, and you there's guys that are watchers and they just watch it, and then maybe once a month something will trigger, and then they come in there and they're super full into it. Then I have guys that are comment on every single thing, so it's just to teach their own. I just want to put out enough at this buffet of just knowledge and power and community where guys can be like, I need that right now, I can take this right now. Yeah, I'm good at the moment, you know. Check back in, see where we're at. That's that's how I want to uh eventually that's how I I at least that's the my goal with it, and how I envision the long term of just tight, badass community where dudes like yourself. You go you're going through a huge incredible fitness journey right now. Did you want to start your own community on the side? I want this to be the guys to come to me. You can start a community for correctional officers. Hey, we're gonna come in here, just talk, whatever it may be. I want men that are inside of there to step up into mentor positions and to be able to build uh their own little mini communities off of this massive community that it's gonna become one day. Like, you know, um, I'll go back to Ben. He's just a perfect example of the IT guy. I'm like, dude, build a TJ Webb, cop, shot six times. He has law enforcement. I'm like, dude, I'm gonna open this up to everybody so you can build a law enforcement community inside of this. But then if guys want into the community, it's completely different. I'm not giving everybody full access, but I want guys that are in there to be able to start growing themselves on the outside of it. It's like, dude, if I can help and I'm promoting this through my platforms and people are gonna find this, see your platform, dude. You can start building curriculum, whatever it may be to help mentor, one-on-one coaching, whatever it is. I want everybody to win. I that's just I I feel most people just get so jaded because it's all about me, me, me, me, me. I I gotta do I I I want to be so rich and successful. Bro, if you just try to bring all your homies along the way and watch everybody win, it's so much more enjoyable. If you could, if you're watching your boys win as much as you are, that's the greatest, that's one of the greatest accomplishments. Besides family, everything else, watching your homies win with you. Why would you not want that? Then then they're stoked and they're bringing more people. It's just a cycle, and it's just like a snowball effect. Then they're all bringing guys in, they get to build a community. It's just why? Why do we so protective of everything that we build? Is oh it's mine, I got a gatekeep. I'm like, dude, you want to start a community? Fucking hey, let's do this. Yeah, here's the here. Here's your here. What do you want to call it? Walk you through it. This is how you build shit. I'm doing it for guys right now. That I just want to see everybody win. That that's just it's fun, man. I love that. It's fun. You just watch other guys, you know, like you see them making making moves like dude, watching you on the podcast coming, like, yo, do this, try this. It's fun for me to watch other people doing it and listening and and making changes and growing. Like, I just I don't know where we lose that as a society.

SPEAKER_01

You get so much more fulfillment. I mean, that's honestly why I ended up leaving the prison was because I had nothing to do. I had no fulfillment there. And I'm like, I'm gonna help other other parents feel as good as I feel at losing weight. Like, that's gotta be more fulfilling than being a glorified Uber driver or whatever I was doing, you know. It's like, yeah, but just helping others is is so much, so much more rewarding than anything that somebody could give you.

SPEAKER_00

100%.

SPEAKER_01

Like seeing seeing that you help somebody else and you don't know like what the work that you're helping them with could how many generations that could change that person. You know, like somebody, somebody along the line had to change, you know, Gandhi or whoever, like somebody had to change one of these big wigs, somebody had to be the one that helped them out.

SPEAKER_00

You know, everybody's had help for at some point in their life, and it's just if that's the least I can do, if you know, and like that's what I tell, you know, TJ's a really good example for this. I'm like, bro, I have built this for 12, 15 years of my my art, my image online, my following, grinding out everything that I've done. I'm not gonna sit here and be like, it's mine. Nope, can't put your name on it. Now I'm like, yo, come on, like we got momentum over here. Jump on, dude. If you could if you could jump on this train with me, fuck, dude. Everybody's winning. Like, yeah, collaborate. There's so dude, there's so much out. There's it's it's the world, bro. You think like, oh, I'm not gonna tell you mindset, man. Like, I'm not gonna sit here and try to help you under pocket. You you're gonna you're gonna be the number one, you're gonna put me under. As a podcast, like that's how people think. Like, you know, my daughter, she's she's like the biggest gatekeeper. She's like, Dad, you gotta stop telling these people. I'm like, Christy, I can give everybody the playbook doesn't mean they're gonna they're gonna execute it. One, I mean, you lead a horse to water. Here's a silver, I've handed dude silver platters before and they just shit on it. Yeah, so it's like hey, cool, but but if that dude listens and taking action and they tweak little things, they take the action, then then they come back to you like, bro, my down my downloads are up 20% since we changed this. Fucking hey, dude. Like, what else? What's next? You know, I don't I don't know, man. I just I guess this is my personality. My wife, she's like, dude, if people really realize who you were instead of just this big, callous gorilla asshole that I run around all the time throwing my shit everywhere, you know. But like this, that but that's the true side. Like, I just I I love seeing people win, man. That's why it it kills me when your friends don't support you. It's like, dude, if you just came to me, I'd jump on. Yeah, I don't know, but instead, everybody's got that mindset, like me, me, me, me, me, I gotta do this myself. And it's yeah, dude, it's it's fun when you you're doing it yourself. But if you have a mentor or you have somebody that can give you advice along the way, take it. Take the advice. If I'm sitting here going, oh, dude, jump on this, like, why would you not? And if everybody was doing that, look how awesome the world would be if instead of just like the whole little self-bubble world that you live in. If you're like, yeah, I'm gonna bring as many people along with me as I can do, and then they can trickle that on, or if that's helping them with their kids and their family, and then they get the help and pass that. I don't know, just help somebody whenever you can. Doesn't mean you got to, and it doesn't mean you gotta film it and make it a big fucking YouTube reel. Just help people when you can. If you can lend a hand, do it. And it just I don't know, it makes you feel better too. It's like you look back and be like, man, that's cool. Like I listened, you know, and now it's working. And I've helped buddies that are blown by me in certain aspects and certain jobs and positions, and I'm like, Yeah, good for you, bro. Right, like I'm glad, I'm glad it worked out, and that's how it should be. I feel like if everybody looked at like that in life, man, it would and it's just more fun, you get to enjoy it.

SPEAKER_01

That's awesome, dude. Well, I really appreciate you coming on. Where's a where's a good spot for everybody to follow you? I'm sure a lot of people follow you, but just on the off chance, someone hasn't already followed you, where they good spot.

SPEAKER_00

I'd say Instagram is probably my most active um Bam Bam0069 or the Wild Chaos Podcast. They can go check that out there. And we got some cool episodes coming up, and I got that one, like I said right now, it's going crazy in Reno. The chief just got fired, and after our conversation with Gabe, and it's been interesting. I'm sure you get some interesting DMs. I do. I do. I have people that absolutely hate me. That's all right. Absolutely hate me. You can't have people love you if you don't have people to hate you. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, but at the same time, it's like you saw a 30-second clip. So it's just I look at it as pure ignorance, but not everybody's gonna agree with everything you say, and it is what it is. But I just laugh at it and you know, gotta move on. I'm not gonna stop because somebody got butthurt over something, so it actually makes me go even harder on certain subjects.

SPEAKER_01

That's good. I mean, if you're just always sitting on the on the fence and nobody's gonna take any action or like or anything, let's scroll right past you. But at least they hate you. That's a comment.

SPEAKER_00

It is, those are the ones we'll never waste my time listening to this. I'm like, but you commented.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, like you're telling me an additional 10 comments how you felt on each one of my com on each one of my reels, please. 100%. So tell me how you hate me on all the other 100%, 100%.

SPEAKER_00

Then you just respond to that's my thing. I'll respond. I'll like I'll chirp back at people and they don't think as like an influencer or a face or Christian or whatever. I'm not gonna talk some shit.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Then I chirp back and then they just oh man, you can't talk to me like that. Then it just then I just look at the algorithms, and then I'm just like, that's why whenever I put out like anything conspiracy, and I just talk shit. I even though I don't even care, disagree, agree. I don't care. Like, I've already moved on with my life. I'm in my garden, I'm smoking a joint eating fucking cucumbers and shit, and you're all fighting over me over flat earth or something.

SPEAKER_01

So yeah, I just I know I love watching movie posts too. I was like, oh man, he's just putting an engagement post up. I love this.

SPEAKER_00

See, and when you see it from that point, it's hilarious. You're like, all right, I see what you're doing, because this is sometimes where I could use a boost and all this throw out, like, make this make sense. And then all the global globe tards and conspiracy people are like dinosaurs aren't real, and they're like, you know, and they just blow their minds off, and then I'm just like, I'll talk shit back to them, like you're regurgitating everything from the public education that taught you.

SPEAKER_01

They're like, I'm educated, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And I just sit and laugh because in reality, it's like, dude, I'm just enjoying my day, and you're over here fired up trying to fight me in comments on a social media app. Yeah, like I'm good, dude. Like I'm sitting in my garden fucking vibing. You're mad over the world's flat or not.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So shit, you can't control.

SPEAKER_01

Like, if it is flat on the ground, who cares?

SPEAKER_00

Politics, dude. Like, we're fighting over politics, like they're all slurping on children, they all hate us. Like, and you think one side's better than the other, you're an absolute clown. But you could use that in your advantage on social media, put on some that's how all of these political rage baiters are so successful because you're you're so brainwashed for a side that you're willing to like hate somebody or worship somebody because the side they agree on in reality, they're all owned. There's only one party, they all hate us, we're all slaves to them. And it's like, once you realize that you're like, Yeah, I don't care, I'm gonna live my life. Yeah, you know, like I'm not fighting over Trump. Imagine being as an adult and you're fighting over Trump. Like that to me, or I just die laughing. I'm like, okay, you've we're not on the same page.

SPEAKER_01

I know. We're not the same. And I I used to be like such a Trump supporter. 100%. But then it's like just the same thing with like the fantasy football thing. It's like this doesn't change my life in any direction. Like, if gas is four dollars a gallon right now, I could bitch about that online all day, or I could just pay it and go make more money.

SPEAKER_00

What are you gonna do? Vote for somebody else and it's gonna go four dollars again.

SPEAKER_01

I'm like, man, if that's really what our our communication's coming down to, like, I don't have anything else to talk to you about besides four dollars a gallon, or there's weather outside. I'm like, I'm around the wrong people.

SPEAKER_00

100%. Yeah, 100%. That's that's like anybody I get with, dude. We're not talking politics, like it's it's fun, it's fun to mess with online because people are so consumed by it, but that should show you where your mindset is. If you are that consumed by sports, politics, anything that's going on except for what's in your world, your family, your wife, your relationships, your business, they own you.

SPEAKER_01

I want to talk about growth. I don't care if that's money growth, I don't care if that's just like family growth, life, but I want growth.

SPEAKER_00

100%. Every day should be something about growth. But if you're sitting here rotting and brain rot shit and you're you're watching another dude run around on a field and you're wearing his name on your back, like I'm sorry, that's gay as fuck. Like, yep, and you're watching all these games. Oh man, it's my team, it's my team. You're willing to f people that fight over sports, dude. I can't fathom it that you're fighting over a sports team that doesn't even know you exist. Meanwhile, you have no relationship with your kids because you're a drunk piece of shit. Why don't you sit there instead of watching a stupid football game that because you're gonna live your glory days, why don't you spend the time with your kids? Yeah, it's a Sunday afternoon and you're sitting in front of your TV for three or four hours watching idiots that's all scripted, anyways. On a low end of three or four hours, yeah. Yeah, for one game. That's that, yeah. Don't even get me started on that rabbit hole because it's just that's those are the dudes where I don't do my my friend application is closed. If I know you're sitting and watching sports all day, I don't need you in my life because you you're not growing. Those are think about four or five hours on a day that you can be out doing something to growing, starting a side hustle, spending time with your kids, go play ball instead of watching football. When do you go play football with your kids?

SPEAKER_01

You can tell me somebody else's stats in their life and what they're gonna be making the next year and their contracts, and you can't tell me anything about what you're eating or what you're doing with your life or your daughter's favorite color, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

But you oh, but you know, you know Edelman's fucking stats. Like, yeah, well, we ran for this, color for this. Like, cool, dude. What's your wife into? What are your kids into? I don't give a shit. You sound like an idiot. Honestly, like that's that's that's how I look at that shit. Uh grown ass men over sports. And I was a biggest sports fan, like we said in the beginning of this podcast. I should have gone and played D1 Ball. And I was like, yeah, military set, because I'm an idiot.

SPEAKER_01

No way. Right?

SPEAKER_00

So facts. Great conversation. Sorry, I hope I don't crash your numbers, so no.

SPEAKER_01

I I don't appreciate it. I uh I've been really lately thinking about what I'm doing with this podcast, so