Episode 413 - Walt Disney - The Most Feared Navy SEAL Instructor of All Time

Summary

Cleared Hot Podcast – Episode 413 Summary

Guest: Walt Disney – "The Most Feared Navy SEAL Instructor of All Time"
Host: Andy Stumpf
Date: October 27, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this rich, three-hour conversation, Andy Stumpf welcomes Walt Disney—not the animator, but the legendary, famously intimidating former Navy SEAL instructor and now therapist—for an exploration of SEAL culture, the long tail of trauma, leadership in adversity, post-service transformation, and the power of community and vulnerability. Walt opens up about his journey from infamously feared instructor (“Satan”) to therapist, his personal regrets and apologies, trauma, the work he does with first responders and veterans at Camp David, and the essential need to develop deeper human connections. The conversation weaves together military stories, psychological frameworks, and actionable advice for service members and civilians alike.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introductions & Light Banter

• The episode opens with classic SEAL banter and hunting talk, including discussions on venison jerky recipes and hunting experiences (00:21–06:00).
• Walt and Andy share camaraderie, culinary tips, and bow-hunting stories, setting a relaxed and authentic tone.

2. SEAL Instructor Reputations and Reflections

• Andy asks Walt about his name, leading to jokes and a discussion about Walt's infamy as an instructor (12:13).
  • Quote – Andy: "How many times in your life have you been asked… is your name actually Walt Disney?" (12:15)
• Walt recalls being called “Satan” by students and expresses deep regret about his unnecessarily harsh demeanor.
  • Quote – Walt: "I was acting out of fear and as a small human being…my apology…is that to anybody…[who] suffered injustice, I am very sorry." (19:25)
• Both reflect on the lack of formal mentorship for instructors, how roles were adopted based on predecessors, and how trauma and culture shape the training style.
  • Quote – Andy: "When you get there as an instructor they don’t sit you down and say…just shuttle them through [the process]."

3. The Nature of Military Training and Trauma

• Andy ponders, “Have you ever considered [that] the training itself is an injustice? The stuff that they ask…?” (22:56)
• Discussion about how extreme training is not just tough, but inherently unjust, and how the career itself brings cumulative trauma.
• The role of personality, humility, and post-service growth in making sense of military experiences (24:44–31:30).

4. Suicide, Addiction, and Post-Service Struggles

• Both share reflections on suicide in the veteran community, with Walt expanding on trauma, addiction, and the "shield bearers": veterans, law enforcement, first responders, and frontline medical staff (39:00–44:53).
• Introduce Dr. Chris Free’s “Operator Syndrome” model and the need for a multimodal approach (physical, psychological, neurological) to recovery (41:42).
  • Quote – Walt: "It’s not just psychological. There’s TBIs…There’s some deep stuff going on there, and we have to address all of it."

5. The Reality of Evil, Service, and the Burden of Bearing the Shield

• Exploration of the reality of evil in the world, war’s beauty and horror, and the perpetual “clarion call” for individuals to say, “Here I am, send me.”
• Masculine and feminine energies, boundaries, and chemical/neuroscientific research (like the soothing effects of baby’s tears on adults) (48:33–51:17).
  • Quote – Andy: "If you touch war, it’s gonna touch you back. Unless you’re a sociopath…For some people, it destroys them."

6. The Impact of Social Media, Exposure to Violence, and Dialogue Collapse

• Discussion of public trauma, including reactions to viral violent events (Charlie Kirk’s assassination), the spread of haunting images on social media, and a loss of public civility (51:55–57:14).
  • Quote – Andy: "What bugs me most…is we now live in a world where the norm is my 17-year-old daughter can watch that video over breakfast…We’re not designed to deal with that at all."

7. Approaches to Healing: Breath, Regulation, and Relationship

• Walt presents his framework for emotional regulation and relationship “breathe, slow down, calm down, grow up” (63:13–70:27).
• Interpersonal neurobiology: Recognizing, naming, and working with the “elephant in the room” and helping ourselves and others process trauma by creating safety and understanding.
  • Five greatest human fears identified: annihilation, mutilation, separation, loss of autonomy, death of ego (64:21).

8. Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE), Attachment, and Internal Family Systems (IFS)

• Walt explains ACEs, trauma’s lifelong effects, and prevalence in the military—many high-performing operators come from childhood trauma.
• Introduces Internal Family Systems model (IFS): the idea of “parts” inside oneself (exiles, managers, firefighters) and their role in trauma, addiction, and healing (111:18–130:04).
  • Quote – Walt: "I am IFS informed...We have parts that are competent and self-led..."

9. Hope, Post-Traumatic Growth, and Community

• "Post-Traumatic Growth" as a concept and goal, not just treating PTSD but building something stronger post-adversity (80:06).
  • Quote – Walt: "We have to go through this stress and breaking down...And then we get stronger…"
• Use of humor, camaraderie, and "locker room honesty" as vital tools in recovery and resilience.

10. The Shield Bearers Program & Practical Advice

• Camp David’s Shield Bearers group: a 12-week, in-person, peer-led therapy group for veterans and first responders; anonymous, supportive, and humor-filled (174:57).
• Walt’s drive to scale this community into a global, always-available network akin to AA for shield bearers.
  • Quote – Walt: "We’re trying to create a network…so you can go to it anywhere in the world 24/7…connect with a human being who knows [and] rules."

11. Vulnerability, Recovery, and Responsibility

• The importance of taking responsibility ("It’s not their fault, but it is their responsibility," 71:24).
• Abstinence and self-ownership in addiction recovery; multimodal treatments including psychedelics (Ibogaine), EMDR, and TMS for trauma and healing (139:06–166:14).

12. The Power of Showing Up, Giving, and the Role of Faith

• Andy shares a childhood memory of family giving at Christmas and the profound impact of modeling service (142:02–144:18).
  • Quote – Andy: "Why would you not want to continue to try to pay that forward?"
• Walt: meaning, hope, and the role of faith or higher belief systems in motivating and sustaining recovery.

13. Closing: Hope & Call to Action

• Walt invites listeners to join or support Camp David’s work (www.camp-david.org).
• Encourages shield bearers and supporters to buy the “My Preferred Pronoun Is We” shirt to fund services.
  • Quote – Walt: “When I get over me we make a better we…The greatest Republic…freedom and opportunity come with security.”
• Ends with appreciation for Andy, the value of camaraderie, and the importance of loving, understanding, and serving each other in keeping the Republic strong.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Walt Disney (Apology):
  "I was acting out of fear and as a small human being...my apology...is that to anybody…[who] suffered injustice, I am very sorry." (19:25)

• Andy Stumpf (On Trauma & Instructors):
  "When you get there as an instructor, they don’t sit you down and say… just shuttle them through the process. Here’s your blue and gold, hang out with Bob. Figure it out together." (24:44)

• Walt Disney (On Post-Traumatic Growth):
  "We have to go through this stress and this breaking down. How do you get any stronger? …You tear your muscles at a micro level when you're working out and… your body says, we’ve got to put the attention and resources biologically toward it. And then we get stronger." (80:47)

• Andy Stumpf (On Social Media Exposure):
  "What bugs me the most… is we now live in a world where my 17-year-old daughter can watch that video… over breakfast… I don’t think we’re designed to deal with that… that’s the world we now live in." (52:57)

• Walt Disney (On the Purpose of Shield Bearers):
  "Someone has to do that job. But the job itself is an injustice due to what you have to suffer. It changes you." (44:53)

• Walt Disney (Final Hope):
  "Don’t give up. There is hope. There is a way. Just like the watch, just like what we talked about. Get in touch with people who are on this path… and you won’t find them at the bar." (198:38)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Venison Jerky, Bowhunting, and SEAL Banter: 00:21–06:00
• Walt’s Reputation as “Satan” Instructor & Apology: 12:13–19:25
• Discussing Trainees, Trauma, and Culture: 22:56–24:44
• Suicide, Addiction, and Operator Syndrome: 39:00–44:53
• Reality of Evil and Purpose of Service: 48:33–51:17
• Social Media and Violence Exposure: 51:55–57:14
• Breath/Regulation Framework: 63:13–70:27
• ACE Scores, Trauma, and Internal Family Systems: 111:18–130:04
• Post-Traumatic Growth & Hope: 80:06–83:00
• Shield Bearers Program: 174:57–176:59
• Vulnerability & Community in Recovery: 198:38–End

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Tone and Style

The conversation maintains a “locker room/therapist’s office” hybrid of banter, raw SEAL humor, direct inquiry, and deep emotional honesty. Walt’s earnest self-interrogation and humility are matched by Andy’s open, sometimes skeptical, always empathetic presence. The dialogue is heartfelt, unfiltered, darkly funny, and ultimately hopeful.

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For Listeners: Takeaways & Resources

• Healing is possible: With the right education, regulation, and community, post-traumatic growth is achievable—even after deep trauma.
• You are not alone: Whether you are a veteran, first responder, or loved one—there are programs (like Camp David) and people who care and understand your experience.
• It takes a “we”, not just a “me”: True healing and societal resilience depend on authentic connection, service, and mutual support.

For more information or to support: visit camp-david.org

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Transcript

[A]

Okay, got the red smoke. Sun run north and south.

[B]

West of the smoke.

[A]

West of the smoke. Okay, copy. West of the smoke. I'm looking at danger close now. Come on with it, baby.

[C]

Give it to me.

[A]

I mean it.

[B]

You're cleared hot.

[A]

Copy. Cleared hot. We might have to turn the recording on for this.

[B]

No, we do. It's on. Michael, what state is Kansas City in Missouri?

[A]

Correct and incorrect.

[B]

Does it.

[C]

Is it on the border so it's.

[A]

Like, on both sides? It is. There's actually Kansas City, Missouri, and Kansas City, Kansas.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Kansas City, Missouri, was established first. Yeah.

[B]

Michael could be the only person on earth consistently both right and wrong at the same time.

[C]

I told a line you.

[B]

So a line. I'm not sure what it is, but.

[A]

So you know what we call a blind deer in Missouri?

[B]

Nope.

[A]

No idea.

[B]

Okay. No idea.

[A]

All right. You know what you call a crippled blind deer? Nope, still no idea.

[B]

How far does this go?

[A]

That one stops there. Yeah.

[B]

That is good jerky. What do you use for the seasoning?

[A]

Dale's is the base.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So do you have an iPhone? I can pass it to you. No contact. I do indeed. So this came from a friend. It should pass right through if I. Yep. Yeah.

[C]

Nice.

[B]

I like that they added that feature.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Oh, damn. Okay. All right.

[A]

So Dale's salt, garlic salt, pink salt, black pepper, crushed pepper, venison in strips. I like it to be a little meaty, and I don't take it all the way. I like it a little.

[B]

Yeah. Otherwise shoe leather.

[A]

Exactly. I don't like pulling strings through my teeth.

[B]

Yeah. I wouldn't have guessed that was venison. And that's perfect timing for that recipe because hunting season.

[A]

I know.

[B]

Well, bow season is open.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Rifle. Michael, when does it start? Is it October 1st for rifle?

[C]

Rifle. I actually don't know. Let me see.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

Not.

[B]

Not that it's critical. I mean, I know the. The bow guys are out there running amok. It's very hot out there, though, right now. I don't know how much luck they're having.

[A]

It is. Johnny was telling me on the way up here he goes, man, the rut is on. Be careful at night. So. But I did not see any, like, rut activity. I saw some strays just kind of grazing around.

[B]

I've seen some bulls that are out of vel. So my first hunting trip starts a week from Sunday, actually. No, I take that back. It was a week from last Sunday. It starts this Sunday. So I hope that the rut holds off just for a little bit. About four days.

[A]

Are you hunting in Montana?

[B]

Utah first. Utah first Tag down in Utah with the black rifle guys.

[A]

Yeah. Where would you rather hunt?

[B]

It's a good question. The Utah hunt has a very high likelihood of getting a shot for sure. Very high. Likely. So that aspect is enjoyable because there's a little bit less pressure.

[A]

Is it guided?

[B]

Yep, it has to be. Bow rifle. I was supposed to get a new bow this year and was not able to do it.

[A]

And are you Matthew's guy or.

[B]

I follow whatever Dudley does. I kind of tag along with him. He's the one who got me into bow hunting. He switched back over to Hoyt and I have the previous bow. He used to be with pse, which I have, but want to support him and what he's doing. So I'll switch over to Hoyt.

[A]

Knock on, bro.

[B]

I don't know that I think at the highest level of the Bose, they're like their top skew. They're all about the same. Dudley was actually saying every bow shares multiple patents anyway, so the technology kind of crosses over because one of the company owns the cam patent. The other one I think owns, you know, some of the.

[A]

So they buy rights or something to that effect.

[B]

Yeah. So I think again, at an entry level you're probably getting a lot of difference in technology. But I think feel like at the higher level ones, the bows are pretty similar, but also just shoot whatever feel people get nerded out about it.

[A]

Yeah. That's like a lot of the armament. You know, you get to the high caliber, really good tools.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I mean, less than a minute of angle.

[B]

Yeah. Which most people can't shoot.

[A]

Most people can't shoot. Right. And so you get there. So then you're start. You're chasing gnats. Wings.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And most people can't. That won't be the difference for them.

[B]

It's amazing though how they'll spend multiple tens of thousands of dollars.

[A]

I know.

[B]

Quarter minute of angle gun.

[A]

Crazy. Yeah. Crazy.

[B]

If I had that type of money, maybe I would too. I don't know. I prefer to keep my shots 200 and in. It's real nice.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

For me.

[A]

Yeah. My last. So I got my first buck. Not this last winter, but the one before boa.

[B]

Rifle.

[A]

Rifle. I've actually got. I should put this on mute, but I've got a. A picture of my last quarry with Bo and what had happened. It was last light and I'm like, they're there and they came within. And I pull back and I hold. I pick the One I'm gonna go for. And I go right for the vitals. The thing is, from your attitude, eating from right or. Yeah. Left to right, it jumps up like this. Does like a cartwheel. Lands in the ground. Doesn't move.

[B]

When you shot at it.

[A]

When I shot it.

[B]

Whitetail.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Oh, yeah. Were you on the ground?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah, that's. It's tough to hook my tail from the ground. Today's episode is brought to you by Montana Knife Company. We are almost into November, which means psychopaths out there already have their Christmas stuff out. This used to be an after Thanksgiving thing. I'm already seeing stores with holiday shopping stuff in the windows. Drives me crazy. But I digress. Let's talk about Christmas. Let's talk about what you could get your significant other. Let's go over to the Montana Knife Company website. We're gonna start right over here. Speedgoats are in. Stop the 2.0 here. Flat tail and stub horn. Those are dropping, actually, right before this episode comes out. The Great Falls Skinner. That is a town just east of where I live. We'll talk about what alignment is here in a second. We have the V24. This is part of tactical line. And then we have a little. Looks like a mossy oak collection for some apparel. Now, alignment. What is that? Well, Josh Smith, the founder of Montana Knife Company, used to be an electrical lineman. Youngest master bladesmith in the history of bladesmithing. I think that's true. Doesn't matter. I'm saying it anyway. Founder, CEO of Montana Knife Company, bringing as many jobs as he can into Montana. Based in Frenchtown, 120 miles south of where I live. But they're moving into Missoula, and they're constantly doing cool collaborations. Look at this. This is the MKC EDC razor. This is made by a company called Proof. These things are awesome. And if you scroll down, let's look at all the knives they have in stock. Who wouldn't want to pull one of these out of a stocking with the sheath on? Of course, you don't want to cut yourself. They make, in addition to knives, killer apparel. They're always doing collaborations. They have a little bit of outdoorwear, T shirts, hats, soft goods, all of that stuff. Even, like, an EDC tray holder from time to time will come out there. Thursdays and Saturdays, they release knives. You can sign up on email. You can sign up for a text. I've seen them do releases that are text only. So if you're not a part of that, you're going to probably miss out on it. They go quick. Why? Because they're super high quality. The demand is high. They're trying to forecast out 8. Morning, Zoe.

[A]

Got donuts.

[B]

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[A]

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[B]

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[A]

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[B]

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[A]

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[A]

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[B]

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[A]

Back to said show, but with a bow. Yeah, I mean it literally did a cartwheel right where it stood and didn't move. And I'm like, re knock.

[B]

Of course.

[A]

And I'm like, wait, didn't move, didn't move, didn't move. You know, the other one was. Yeah, took off and I was like, what the boogers happened there? What happened was I had lost my people.

[B]

Nice. A little bit tough to aim without the rear aperture.

[A]

Tragic day when you lose your people.

[B]

I've actually lost one on a hunting trip as well. Yeah, it sucks.

[A]

So I, you know how to line it up across my nose. Corner of the mouth on the chin. Right. Pull back and great release. And this is what happened. I'm like, what the skinny happened here? So what I did was I went back into my basement. I've got 13 yards in my basement. We have basements in the Midwest.

[B]

We have them up here, too.

[A]

Yeah. Tornadoes. Okay, so check that out.

[B]

Oh, nice. I mean, there's some parallels to the modern news going on right now.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So I'm like, how did that happen? Can you see that, Michael? Oh, yeah. I'm like, how did that happen? So I went into my basement, sure enough, without a peephole, which is where I realized I didn't have a people. Yeah, it's eight inches off.

[B]

Well, you still got it done.

[A]

Oh, my gosh.

[B]

Is that jerky some from that deer?

[A]

No, no, no, no. That was. This. This happened three years ago.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So that jerky was from last year.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

The beneficent from last year.

[B]

I generally don't know what to do. I love, you know, the back straps. You can cook them. Do, like, a nice reduction. Most people couldn't tell you that it was venison.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Some of the other stuff.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I generally don't know how to prepare it, but I am 100% gonna make some of that stuff.

[A]

You have to watch it after a while. So after. Like, after about 45 to 60 minutes, I flip it.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So on my Traeger, I'll take those. They have some screens for vegetables for grilling. You might find them at the Blue Mart. Yeah, And. And I just put it on there so it doesn't fall through the grates.

[B]

That makes sense.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Yeah, I know exactly what.

[A]

And if you. If you have enough, what you can do is, is have an extra screen, Grab it, pull it out, flip it, take the other one off, Just work your way down the sets.

[B]

We call that smarter, not harder.

[A]

I. You know, every once in a while they say something about a blind squirrel.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. Walt Disney, too.

[B]

How many times in your life have you been asked, because this just happened earlier today. Is your name actually Walt Disney?

[A]

So I can't count that.

[B]

I feel like this has been a lifelong thing.

[A]

So you and I, in our common field, it is. And any relation distant? No money, no tickets. That's trauma, Andy. That's why I'm a therapist.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That's deep familial trauma right there.

[A]

Yeah. When you get cut out of that kind of money. Yeah, it's big. So when I was on my way to the island.

[B]

As a student.

[A]

As a student? Loot at the time. Lt. Don Thompson, who I'm presuming has passed. You know that name?

[B]

I know there's a couple Thompsons that I serve peripherally with, so I don't know. What class did you go through?

[A]

150.

[B]

150. So what was that, like 1840.

[A]

Really? 1849. Yeah.

[B]

No. So I went through 212.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So that's 60.

[A]

Some classes you left right after I ended my tour as an instructor.

[B]

I don't think we ever crossed paths.

[A]

I don't think.

[B]

What phase were you?

[A]

Yes, one in three.

[B]

One and three. I. I do not remember our paths crossing.

[A]

Yeah, I. I don't remember many of my students.

[B]

I'm in the same boat. I was a second phase instructor. They occasionally will reach out, like, hey, man, do you like. Listen, I'm sorry.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

This has nothing to do with you. I saw hundreds of students and you.

[A]

All looked almost exactly the same, except for height, such a Maybe some build.

[B]

And when they're wearing scuba gear underwater.

[A]

Right. First phase, everybody looks the same.

[B]

God.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's hard to tell how close or far. Only because the boat heights are different. Right. So it's interesting because you had the reason I'm here and I reached out to you, which. Thank you for the opportunity here.

[B]

Oh, my pleasure.

[A]

And we're going to go into that. My nephews are fans of your podcast.

[B]

I apologize for the things that I publicly say all the time. Michael tries to keep me in check.

[A]

But fails never works. Well, it happens to all of us. And you can't admit that we've got a problem.

[B]

Parents will reach out sometime. My kids are fans. I just write back. I am deeply sorry. Please tell them to not literally take seriously everything that I say. Occasionally I'll have a gem. Most of the time I'm talking out of my ass.

[A]

Impromptu is what we. We reframe that with impromptu. Well, yeah.

[B]

You're using therapist speak. I'm still a caveman.

[A]

It's called psychobablogy. You'll hear more of it as we go. So Rich Devinny was on here, and do you remember your conversation with him?

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

Where he goes. Yeah, you're talking about. So Mike Mayer, Instructor, Chief, mayor.

[B]

The first. So I had checked into buds and they still called it ptrr. Physical training, rest and recuperation.

[A]

I think it was pre training.

[B]

Preach.

[A]

Was it recovery and. Yeah, rest and something. Recovery something.

[B]

PTR is what we call it.

[A]

Yeah, pre training.

[B]

And nobody wanted to be There because that meant you were either starting a class or you were rehabbing for an. From an injury or were rolled back.

[A]

You're on hold for rollback.

[B]

Yeah. So you wanted to get out of there. And I swear it was a Saturday and we were over at 6:18 and he had his jaw wired shut and his daughter Nikki walking through the ranks as he was beating the ever living hell out of us. And two people got up and just ran towards where they thought the bell was and he yelled at them to come back. They did not, by the way. They quit on Monday.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But yeah, yeah, he. He ended up for a brief period of time being my first platoon chief.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Yeah, he had to.

[A]

Over at 5.

[B]

At 5. He did not remember me. I remembered him, of course, again, you.

[A]

Know what he always saw? Shaved heads, green uniforms. Right.

[B]

I don't know what we had done to all arrive at 618 at the same time. I think he might have just been on duty and been pissed.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I could barely walk for a week after that.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

It was unbelievable. So, yeah, I remember that conversation because that is almost. That actually is almost 30 years in the rear view mirror and I still remember that.

[A]

You can still feel it.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

We're gonna come back to that. We're gonna. We're gonna come back to that.

[B]

Aspects of it you can still feel.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

But that was one of my first days at Bud's.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Where you're sitting there trying to remember how many. In the course description, how many days was that that we're going to be doing this? Awesome. Great life choice.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Real good job. Real good job.

[A]

Oh, there's so many ancillary weaves we could get into right now. There's so many. Here's where I want to take this, if I may, which is Rich Devini goes. Yeah, we had an instructor that was related to Walt Disney.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

That was no Disneyland.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Do you remember him saying that?

[B]

I do.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

So we never crossed paths, but yes, I had heard the shared reputation that what. I mean, what the students basically would call the instructors the Hammer, essentially. So, yeah, it was. The reputation was out there for.

[A]

So I know what the students called me, but never to my face.

[B]

No. Why would you do that? Because one person that you. The name you're calling them would come out.

[A]

Well, one of my best friends is Todd Miller.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And you may have met him at five. He was in Rich Devinny's class.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

He was the LPO of 210.

[B]

Man, that is not a fun role.

[A]

And no not at all.

[B]

And any leadership role is for people listening. Gray man is about E3 to E4.

[A]

Well, in the teams. E5 is a wonderful.

[B]

It's the best.

[A]

It is. It is. Because you've got it going on. You know what you're doing. You're a journeyman, if you will, but you don't have to lead anybody.

[B]

But not at Bud' E5. You might find yourself as a bow crew. You might find yourself having a count of maybe like six or seven.

[A]

My bow crew leader was an E4 when I went through boats. Yeah.

[B]

I was an E2 semen apprentice. Stump is what it says on the plaque.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Perfect. Gray man material. No. Nothing on the helmet except for the name and number.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

No rank to draw people's attention. Like, get out of here, whoever you are.

[A]

Right. Very.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The white car.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

On the street.

[B]

Unintentional. That's just the way the time worked out.

[A]

So when Rich Devini said, yeah. Instructor Disney. No, Disneyland. My nephews took note of that.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

They sent that podcast to me. So there's a couple things. That's part of the reason I reached out. So I was telling you about one of my best friends, Todd Miller. Todd was in that class. He goes, yeah, well, we used to call you Satan.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because I roamed about seeing whom I may torment. It was really, really poor decisions. So I'm gonna ask you if I can make an apology.

[B]

You can do whatever you want.

[A]

Thank you. Because there's many people. I was acting out of fear and as a small human being, like, you're not that small.

[B]

You're five something.

[A]

Thank you. Small in mind.

[B]

Did you realize it at the time?

[A]

Not at the time. Well, there's a story behind that.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

There's a story behind it. But my apology, and I would say this to anybody to whom suffered from my unjust behaviors that I'm truly sorry. At Bud's instructors, all you have to do is shuttle the cattle into the curriculum and. Yeah. And it. You don't. I did not realize that. And I made poor decisions. So this is my apology. Is that. That to anybody. Anybody that suffered injustice, I'm very sorry. I'll never know it all. And if they need me to hear that so they can forgive and get the freedom of forgiveness, I would be honored to step into that humble position if I could. So. And to Rich Devini specifically, because I have a lot of respect for him. Did then. Even more so now. The work that he exp through this channel. Fantastic. I've actually Recommended his books to about great books, 50 people. They're great principles. Because he was saying, look, what are the attributes? We have to define the behaviors which they call attributes. Why are we releasing you? You're cotton headed ninny muggins. That doesn't help anybody.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Oh you. We just. I know a guy who's a great guy, got released from Green team. They couldn't tell him why. It was just personality, whatever.

[B]

That's real though there.

[A]

I, I understand that I'm not been.

[B]

There, but I understand the personality stuff.

[A]

And so for. Yeah, yeah. So for Rich to be able to say this is why we're separating our relationship because of these behaviors that manifest in these attributes. Right. Brilliant work, brilliant work. And how he's applying it to, to society as a whole. That is a major, major theme that I hope we get to discuss. How the military and military members, veterans essentially make America great. You go.

[B]

All part of it, I would say.

[A]

I agree they aren't the whole.

[B]

They can't because there's not enough.

[A]

I agree. But that's where you get force multiplication.

[B]

It's still a low number. Like you need a huge force multiplier to reach out that much. But I agree it's a great, it's a great lever. It's just not enough in totality.

[A]

And this is why at this time, right. So John Adams said, He was asked, Mr. Adams, what have you given us? And he said a republic, if you can keep it. Right. And right now, if we haven't seen in the news, there is a clarion call for us to do some work to keep this republic. And not all but veterans have been. Who was our first president?

[B]

Washington.

[A]

Washington. He led us in victory. And the people said, yes, lead us now in liberty. Right. And we need people of that ilk. And so Rich Devini, in terms of the work that he's doing, he's bringing forth goodness into this republic. This, this community, this test that we're in and we need more of it. So I agree with you, Rich. I'll look into the. Rich, I'm truly sorry that you had to suffer injustice under me, so love to hear from you.

[B]

I don't think, I mean every student is going to have from probably the origin of SEAL training, they're going to have an instructor that they view as Satan esque. I don't think they actually hold a grudge, though some do, some for sure, some might. But I tell you what, have you ever considered that the training itself is an injustice? The stuff that they ask not Only the training. How about the career itself?

[A]

So I hear where you're coming from. I'd like to hear more about you expounding on that. I can start to entertain that from. Conceiving is in extremism. Yeah. To be sure.

[B]

I mean, you put the training. Again, the instructor's role, if you look at it, is shuttling people through the curriculum, which I think. I think more instructors don't realize that than do. It was interesting. So I did 18 months as an instructor. I didn't yell a single time. I tried not to raise my voice because I remembered well. And this was before I started at Bud's. Anytime an adult would yell at me, and I'm just, turn it down, turn it off. When people you respect talk quietly, you have to listen harder. And I think that the information gets in. But I watched, and I'm not perfect by any stretch, but I would watch. I would call them characters. They thought that they were kind of playing a role or they thought that they needed to be that role. And I think a lot of that was based off an instructor that they saw when they went through. Right.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Because when you get there as an instructor, they don't sit you down and say, oh, hey, by the way, just shuttle them through. They're like, here's your blue and gold. And. Yeah. Hang out with Bob. Bob's been here for a year and a half. And figure it out together.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That was pretty much how I learned how to be a BOTS instructor. Right.

[A]

Well, you're getting toward mentorship, the sea daddy thing. And you're right, I didn't experience a good or orientation toward expectation.

[B]

Yeah, no, it was literally. What size is your shirt and shoes? Here's blue and golds.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Pair of green shorts.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And go forth and do great things.

[A]

Yeah. A lot of the time I was tasked to the ambu because I was a medic. Right. Yeah. Which was really. Really.

[B]

I didn't realize how many people got hurt in butts.

[A]

Oh, my gosh.

[B]

I did not realize that until I went back as an instructor. I was aware that people got hurt when I was going through. I didn't realize the volume, though.

[A]

Yeah. Can I put a cherry on the Rich Divini? And.

[B]

But then we got to go back to the training being injustice because there's an argument that the job is an injustice.

[A]

I would love to talk to that, because the person that I visited.

[B]

Well, it goes backwards. It all goes backwards from the execution of the job. I think that's why the training is what it is. Has to prepare you for the real world execution of the role.

[A]

There you go. So when Rich was talking about Chief Nightmare. Yeah, right.

[B]

Mr. Wired Jaw.

[A]

Mike was my. Mike Mayer was my roommate during that very period. Oh, God. So Satan and Nightmare were roommates at the time.

[B]

I mean, honestly, that explains a lot.

[A]

I mean, isn't that irony, man? Yeah, no.

[B]

So I've been out now for. I got out last day of June, 2013. So. Yeah. Okay. So was that check my math skills carry the one that's 12 years. And I'm glad that I got out. I got medically retired. I would have had to do five more because I switched over to becoming an o at the 12 year mark. Small print resets retirement calculated by 10 years.

[A]

Yeah, there's the injustice again. Again.

[B]

Well, I tell people if you're gonna join the military, they're gonna get their pound of flesh.

[A]

The house always wins.

[B]

But get yours too. I mean, there's vocational programs. Just make sure you juice. You know, squeeze them for the juice as well, too. It just takes longer and it's usually on the tail end. And I have lived up here now for eight years. There are some team guys up here, some military guys up here.

[A]

Can I put an asterisk in here? Well, Zinke is the rep up here. I drove by a. I've had him.

[B]

On a few times.

[A]

Yeah. So anybody considering moving up here? Don't do it. This place is so ugly.

[B]

Well, did you see the polar bears walking down Main street?

[A]

I did. As a matter of fact, I grabbed my ice drill because you know how you trap a polar bear with a hole? You cut a hole in the ice and then you put peas around it. Frozen peas. It creates the contrast, and when they come up to take a pee, you kick them in the ice hole.

[B]

Okay. I don't know if I would try that because that's one of the only species that will hunt humans. That might be, like, good for a kid's book, but I don't think you should try that. No, the locals try that.

[A]

What's the highest altitude you've been to.

[B]

Like, exposed to the elements?

[A]

Highest altitude.

[B]

I mean, airplanes up 45,000.

[A]

You jumped for Navy Seal Foundation.

[B]

That was 36,500. That's what I'm saying. So I've been. I've flown an airplane to 45,000, but it was a pressurized cockpit.

[A]

Well, the reason I asked is that joke went right over. Over your head, probably.

[B]

Yeah. Just remember, our old job doesn't select for intelligence.

[A]

I. I Understand? But I've seen enough of you to know that you're intelligent, Annie.

[B]

Yeah, but not in all aspects.

[A]

When he comes to take a pee. Yeah. You kick him in the ice hole.

[B]

Yeah. He's gonna eat a pee, and you'll kick him in the butthole.

[A]

I get it that.

[B]

Have you considered the joke isn't funny?

[A]

That guy that got me censored in the Boy Scout trip. Let me just put it that way.

[C]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I mean, I'll throw it back at you. Consider. Consider the joke's not funny.

[A]

I'll consider that to some people, but most people deal with it. Yeah. So let's go back to injustice.

[B]

Well, it's been an interesting optic, having some time away. And also having some time away. So when I first got out, I was living in southeast San Diego, surrounded by guys I used to work with. So you're out adjacent. You're still hanging out with the same people. And there's nothing wrong with that. But I think you get a little bit of a different optic. I mean, you've seen some of Montana now. It's starkly different than Southern California. For people who don't know, basically, the jobs you get. Virginia beach are San Diego. So up here is very different. And I've had fascinating conversations with people in our previous line of work and actually a lot. A lot deeper than the conversations we had when we were in. And I don't think it's because we weren't capable of having that depth of conversation. Maybe we didn't have the time or the setting wasn't right. I feel like they would have shared, but it seems like post military there is.

[A]

So if I may primer our conversation for later with this. This came from a professor of mine in my master's of marriage and family therapy, Dr. Tim Nelson. He said, we're always most loyal to our greatest fear. Always most loyal to our greatest fear. So when we're in, there's a fear of being ostracized. If we show something of weakness, that's part of it. I think, additionally, we didn't have time. I think there's some maturity aspect to that.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I mean, I'm talking about meaning of life stuff now at that. I didn't. When I was 28.

[B]

Oh, I didn't have a comprehension of it.

[A]

Right, Exactly.

[B]

I don't really.

[A]

I think you're onto it, but. Yeah, that's right. So you got out, you're surrounded by this amount homogenous group of people moved.

[B]

Away from the homogenous group of People and then have reconnected over the years and just had some really deep conversations with friends. And also, quite frankly, have had quite a few friends who decided to kill themselves.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And. And kind of digging into. I mean, of course you can't have a conversation with them or understand the why, but then a lot of similarities start to reveal themselves. And, you know, my theory is if you touch war, it's gonna touch you back. Unless you're a sociopath. Probably. And then. Which I think we probably did serve with a couple of those.

[A]

Amplifies it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Facilitates it.

[B]

But for everybody else.

[A]

Can I add a point there, Please. Because I've had a professional who claimed to be culturally aware of veterans, law enforcement. Ask me, aren't all military members, like, bloodthirsty?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And it was.

[B]

That's just called bad movies.

[A]

Right, Exactly. It was so angering because this person took a position of knowledge and was way off because. Back me up on this. A vast majority of the people are relatively healthy human beings. There's a spectrum. And not bloodthirsty sociopaths. Would you agree with that?

[B]

I would say average to above average IQ and EQ for most people.

[A]

EQ.

[B]

For most, not all. If I look back at the people I gravitated towards the most, it's not. I mean, everybody has an emotional range, but one of the skills that you learn along the way is emotional control. Right. Just to operate in the environments that I do. So they had an amazing ability to control it, but they had a depth of character be behind that.

[A]

Yeah, there's something to that. And I think you gravitated toward, like, people. There's a perspective in psychology called differentiation. Right. How differentiated are you? How do you. How well are you grounded in yourself, your identity, and yet still take on other people's influence without being swayed or painted by it? Right. And from what I've seen from you, you have a pretty healthy differentiation. So I think that might be a factor into who gravitated around you as well.

[B]

I just assume I'm the dumbest person in every room.

[A]

Well, that humility is a good posture to have, and I've noticed that. But it's also very important to know our skills and our attributes because we've been given them. You can do both, though, for the greater good. You know what?

[B]

I assume that until I'm proven wrong.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So there's a second part of that sentence.

[A]

Yeah. Good, good. Well, I will say, from what I've been exposed to and, you know, when we started talking about coming on this Podcast. I'm like, okay, I. He has a reputation. I know his background. But who is he? And I've found that.

[B]

You let me know if you get an answer to that.

[A]

Well, we will never fully know, because next week you'll be different, and you should be. I mean, that's growth. But I was like, who is this person? Well, he's very composed. He's differentiated. You have an intellect. Do you remember when Rich was on here and he used a word, nonuscience?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, Right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Remember when you were talking about buds? Somebody's talking. I just turned it down. Yep, that was it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And that is actually capacity. My buddy Todd Miller has that. That is a capacity that serves Well.

[B]

I just figured everybody kind of had that.

[A]

Not everybody does. Some people.

[B]

Does it go the opposite for some people?

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

Okay. And so it would unwind them.

[A]

Yeah. So this breaches into a subject of what we can call attachment. Attachment. And there's extremes in almost everything. There's a healthy middle. There's an extreme one way and extreme another. So an attachment. It means we're together. I know you got my back. You know I got your back. I'm not scared. Even if I'm alone, I'm not scared. That's a relatively normal attachment. That's how it's supposed to be. There are people who are fearful and will avoid. There's people who are fearful, and we preoccupy fearful and avoid. It's the angry vet who's sitting in a town with no stop signs. Right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Tired of being hurt by people, and then the people who are preoccupied. This often happens in domestic violence, but it happens in kids, and there's a reason for that. So with domestic violence, which probably has primer history in their childhood, this gets to the adverse childhood experience scores. So you have preoccupation where they did not get what they needed. Their parent was not capable of giving them the attachment, and thus they became preoccupied with the parent soothing the parent. You get in an addiction, you get it in abuse. Okay. And then when they grow up and they're in domestic violence, there's something you have a whole everybody's heard of fight, flight, freeze. Okay. So there's actually fight and flight. And what happens in the freeze is we oscillate between the two of fight and flight.

[B]

Almost like indecision.

[A]

Exactly. And then in the extreme, there's fainting. Okay. If you haven't seen fainting goats on there, they're amazing. Watch it. I want one as a pet, just for humor. Friday night. Boo.

[B]

They're pretty amazing.

[A]

And then the other one is fawning. When and forever. All the law enforcement out there, I know they've seen it. In our groups that we work in, everybody admits they've seen this before. Fawning happens when the abused is trying to soothe the abuser, because they haven't. They believe, believe, perceive that they have no other option. So if I sue this person, they won't leave me and I'll still be safe. It's a very tragic schema or priori. So it gets developed in childhood. Oftentimes I'm going to tell a story about how this got developed. A very dear man to our family told me a story. And his former wife, who was not healthy, was angered at their daughter. 8, 9, 10, adolescent grabbed her by the hair and started pulling her around, so much so that it pulled clumps of hair out of her. The man rightfully stood up to that. The mother and mother, wife then turned on the husband and the daughter came up after just being abused, grabbed them both by the leg and said, mommy, daddy, just tell each other you love each other and it'll be all right.

[B]

That's heartbreaking.

[A]

Very heartbreaking. And what happens to people like that? They often gravitate toward the familiar. The devil we know is safer than the angel we don't know. We were just talking about somebody, right? Yeah. They're comfortable with the devil hovering around, if you will. Right.

[B]

Are they really comfortable, though?

[A]

Well, here's the other thing. And it came. I've heard this out of so many people. I am so afraid of change. And that is they're afraid of the cost of what change might bring. And this happens. Here's another dynamic with that. So we have the current duress of our current situation. Okay. This is the perceived duress of change. Okay. If I change, if I put down the bottle, if I put down the drugs, if I walk away from this relationship, it's going to cost me so much. Let's give it a value of 8, just so we can enumerate it. Our current duress is only a 4, 5. I'm not going to change. It's only when our current duress gets over that eight that we move toward change and cascade that way. So we call tragedy. Sometimes tragedy is what takes people into change. Right. Somebody gets a dui, they go sober up.

[B]

Yeah, Right.

[A]

And we'll get into addictions because it's very important. Veterans, law enforcement, fire, frontline medical personnel. It's quite prevalent that I call shield bearers. I call that demographic because they're holding the shield between and good and evil, life and death for our society. And there's a great cost to it. A great cost. When Dr. Chris Free was on.

[B]

He's spectacular, by the way.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. I cannot loud him enough. The work that he has done has created a framework for what we're doing in our organization, Camp David, because it's just not. It's not just psychological. You can't just throw pills at it. You can't just talk your way out of it. You've got to look at the body. The body's not functioning as it should. Well, if my body's not functioning as it should, I don't feel as I should. Yeah, right. We get. There's some grief aspect to that. And believe me, moving into my seventh decade of life, I can do things that I used to be able to do. So there's grief with that. I mean, physiologically, actually, I want to make sure we talk about your injury and CrossFit because I think it creates a great model for hope. Okay.

[B]

I mean, I would recommend people avoid the experience.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Use me as a shitty example.

[A]

Right, right. Well, I am just amazed at some of the details of that. And we'll get into. But Dr. Free has accumulated data to prove what we know inherently. And I'll talk to you about this. So I'm going to get in a little my history and go for it. Thanks. So got out in 2000, did a little walkabout, slept on my friend's back porch looking down Mission Valley in San Diego. And what I called degaussed a little bit from the energy that I had. It's very important in terms of the neurology that we're having that we'll have to talk about. So. And then I went back to Kansas City where all my family was. Actually, at one point, my friend Scotty King invited me up to Seattle to help him rebuild his house. And it was in September. Have you ever been to Seattle in September?

[B]

I have, yeah.

[A]

It is one of the most beautiful places in September in the world. Other than that, it's raining almost all the time.

[B]

Yeah, pretty much every day.

[A]

So I decided to move up there and I did construction. Like within the first month, it rained 12 inches in a 24 hour period. I was like, I'm not so good with this. I'm going to rethink this.

[B]

I couldn't do that either.

[A]

So I ended up going back to Kansas City, did some construction back there, and then in 2011 doors just opened up and I went to Friends university to get my Master's of science in marriage and family therapy. So I've been working in this since 2011, seeing clients since the beginning of 2012. And I told God a couple things. One, I would never marry a Filipina.

[B]

Did you ever marry a Filipina?

[A]

No.

[B]

I went to the Philippines, though, many times.

[A]

Did you? So the people that I ran into, it's like the culture, there's a base of knowledge that I just didn't think would work. Well, God proved me wrong. I've got one now. I've actually got four because we have four kids too. So. And the other thing is, I wasn't going to be pigeonholed as a veteran therapist. So now I can't not address this issue. Right. And this is where Dr. Free comes in. So I started listening to some podcast, Taco. Dan Cirillo.

[B]

Yeah, he's a good friend.

[A]

Okay. So at one point he was on the Eddie Gallagher podcast, Shoot Me Straight. Okay, listen to it. Toward the end of it, he gets to it. And I had been thinking about it because I've worked with a number of organizations, probably about four. And at that point I've worked with about 600 vets and first responders in one capacity, another some more intense enough. And I'm like, it's more than just, you know, you can go to the one week retreats, you can get cleaned off, and it's a beautiful thing, but then you step right back out into the fire. And we need something that perpetuates the journey upward, not allows the weight to come back on them. And I started looking around at all this and understanding psychological aspects of it. And I heard Dan Cirillo and he's like, instead of taking a million dollar job, I started working as CEO for the American Recovery. Right? And he said when we would get the VA to bring people in for 30 days, and when they were in for 30 days, if they needed to go to horses, we went to horses. They need to go to psychedelic assisted psychotherapy. We would form them out and do that and we would send them there with somebody. So they weren't alone. Very important thing, weren't alone. And it started clicking for me. There was one other aspect that evades my memory right now, but I stumbled on Dr. Freeze book operator Syndrome. And I ate it up. I was like, yeah, this is the expression of the understanding that I've developed. It's not just psychological. There's TBIs, right? It's not just medicine. Right. There's some deep stuff going on there, and we have to address all of it. So I refer to this as a multimodal approach to what we need to recover back to service.

[B]

That's what I say. The job is an injustice. So to use your vernacular, the shield bearers.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

It's not that they're involuntarily making that choice. Somebody has to do that job. But the job itself is an injustice due to what you have to suffer. And it changes you.

[A]

So I agree with that totally. And they volunteer. And I've heard so many times, especially with cops on the old guard is they were like, you knew what you got into, you were getting into. Well, nobody does.

[B]

Yeah. It's like a pre 911 seal trying to tell a post 911 seal, okay, you know what you signed up for? I'm like, dude, you just did 20 years in peacetime. You don't even know what I signed up for. Nor do we know what's going to happen tomorrow.

[A]

Right. And. And so we step into this with the best of intentions. Most people, the vast majority. Right. And we bump into imperfect people. There is a Dr. Carl Menninger who said, it is unlove that makes people unwell. And it is love and only love that makes them well again. Harvard trained psychiatrist. Okay. I think we can agree war is about the most unloved condition you'll ever experience. Other than childhood abuse, probably.

[B]

I found it to be the singular most ugly thing and beautiful thing at the same time.

[A]

Say more about that.

[B]

I've never had more clarity of purpose and thought and conviction.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And sense of action. But then you have to look at what those actions are targeted towards, which is some of the worst things that humans can do to another.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Which is horrendously ugly. Which will again, if you touch war, it'll touch you back. It leaves a mark on you. And for. For some people, it's. It destroys them. And for other people it doesn't. But in and of itself, asking people to do those things, whether they volunteered for it or not, is an injustice.

[A]

So the question then is who created the injustice?

[B]

Humans did. We've been fighting each other since humans were humans.

[A]

Right? Right. There is something that people don't like to hear. But there's evil.

[B]

Oh, I agree. I've looked at the whites in the eyes and that's right. This is why I don't try to change people's minds. If people ask me about my experiences, I'll answer honestly. And I always preface what this is my Singular experience. Take it for that. Being a veteran doesn't give you special powers, doesn't give you special knowledge, doesn't give you special insight unless you're asking about very specific things that a veteran or somebody in that job, a role on that veteran. Because not all veterans experiences are the same. Not everybody's military experience is the same. But you can't. I've realized you can't explain that concept to people because it explains itself if they ever encounter evil. Thankfully, almost nobody ever really does to the degree that we were asked to overseas.

[A]

Yeah. It's like describing love.

[B]

Yeah. Or a sunset to a blind person.

[A]

Good luck. The phrase for that is ineffable. It's ineffable. You can't explain it because it impacts your nervous system in such a way. You can't describe that to somebody. Right. And a lot of people don't like talking about emotions and feelings. Hopefully we'll talk into that a bit. But you can't explain that to somebody. But there is evil. I've seen evil. It wasn't in war. I didn't go to war.

[B]

Well, you don't have to go to war to see.

[A]

Exactly. So. So, yeah, it's out there. So this is the question. There's a phrase here. I am send me. You've probably heard it, right? And it's noble. Somebody has to do it. So in my schema, I talk about masculine and feminine energy, not just boys and girls, because all have both. It's just the distribution of. It's kind of like talents. Masculine energy is made to create safe boundaries.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Feminine energy makes it warm, soft and open. Very nurturance. Right now we all have both, because we have to have both. And I'm going to drop a little bit of knowledge that I pick up. A big fan of Andrew Huberman.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I had Dude.

[B]

He doesn't seem to be very smart or knowledgeable.

[A]

He's lucky, that dude.

[B]

People will ask him a question. And I'm like, I don't have enough notepaper, nor do I understand the English words. I think they're English words that you're using right now.

[A]

Some of it's Greek, some of it's Latin.

[B]

Holy cow. That's the one. You gotta. You know how there's like double speed. Yeah, Playback. I need that at like quarter speed.

[A]

Like 0.25.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. He is that guy. That's when you realize that we might be the same species, but we're not all created equal.

[A]

Different distributions. He's a guy you love and Hate. You love him because he's so smart and he's giving so much. You hate him because he's so smart.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

I mean, anyway, I won't get off on here. I forget, I forget. So Andrew Huberman. So we were talking about masculine and feminine energy. He had Dr. Noam Strobel on there. And Andrew talked about a grandfather who, when he held his grandchild, felt just totally relaxed. And Noam Sobel, without missing a beat, said, hexadec. Oh, my gosh, I'm gonna brain fart here. There is a drug, a chemical, in the tears of babies. And that chemical has an idiosyncratic effect on masculine and feminine energy. Masculine energy, it calms it down, makes it safe. Feminine energy alerts and coalesces, so protects it. Right. It's brilliant. You're like, well, where does that come from? Right. So trying to keep track of the vein on which we were speaking.

[B]

You're talking about the. We were essentially talking about humans fighting evil.

[A]

So masculine energy is there to fight evil, to protect against evil. And like I said, it's a distribution between all. Because everybody has the capacity to create boundaries. Okay. Very, very important. So that is something that most people. I mean, we don't have to look any further than just last week. I mean, assassinating Charlie Kirk was evil. It was selfish.

[B]

I tell you what, I actually have struggled pretty deeply with that one.

[A]

I would say everybody I've spoken to, dozens of people, say, I don't know why, but this has hit me to the core.

[B]

So again, my experiences are unique. Seeing somebody die in that manner, although.

[A]

Horrific.

[B]

Not my first time. So that the mechanism of how he died.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It's not that it doesn't bother me. That's one of the consequences of my old job. I'm a little bit more tuned down to that. Don't want to see it, realize it's horrendous. There's the conversation that absolutely should be had about how you, you know, defeat a bad idea. And the answer, hopefully most people realize this is with a better idea.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

That doesn't bother me as much. Even though that does deeply concern me. What bugs me the most and what I'm really struggling with as we seem to now live in a world where the norm is my 17 year old daughter can watch that video happen over breakfast.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

On repeat, on any social platform. And she wasn't searching for it because all these platforms, autoplay, even if you scroll by and it was reposted. And I don't think we should have access to something like that. I have had a lot of people reach out to me to include people who were in the crowd saying, I never thought I was going to be that guy that froze up. And then that happened when I was standing there and I did. And I've never seen somebody die in that manner. And maybe they are not using the words haunting, but they're using a lot of words that are kind of peripheral to that. And maybe they were just searching for the right word. I would describe it as haunting. And when I respond to him like that's the normal reaction to something like this. It should haunt you.

[A]

Right.

[B]

That should bother you.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

You're not trained to deal with that type of thing, but yet here we are and it's accessible everywhere. And I don't think we're designed to deal with that at all. It. That's what's bothering me the most about this is that that's the world we now live in.

[A]

So I think you're spot on when you talk about how do you combat a bad idea and it's with another.

[B]

Idea, it's with a better idea.

[A]

You're right. Here's the problem is people are assassinating the civil public dialogue. That's what happened. And that's why I think it's grieving people so deeply.

[B]

It should.

[A]

So I forget who. Oh, it was. Mike Rowe said, dude by the.

[B]

Well, like Dirty Jobs was one of my favorites growing up.

[A]

Like him. I like what he puts out. We'll talk about the dialectic. Dialectic is. There's a. Both hand. Almost everything. Yeah. Right. It's kind of like when you talked about war. It was one of the most horrendous and wonderful things at the same time. Clarity and horrible. Right. So Mike Rowe said, I feel like the Constitution has been held up and somebody shot the First Amendment. Quite poetic.

[B]

It's not a bad description.

[A]

Yeah, but what happened? The civic civil public dialogue got shot. Now it's up to those who remain to resuscitate it. And I think that's why forms like this are incredibly powerful. They're also incredibly dangerous. Aforementioned comment about your daughter watching it on repeat all the time. I would tell her, please stop.

[B]

I tried to. She wasn't looking for it.

[A]

And then. Right. Put up boundaries.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because this is one of the complexities in our society is we have so much access to information, we can use it for good or evil, and that is not a good thing.

[B]

No, I completely agree. And again, she. She wasn't searching for it as. As soon as that Happened. I mean, it flooded every platform, whether you wanted to see it or not. Like I could scroll by and it's playing.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And you're watching a guy bleed. I mean, I would be shocked if he was alive by the time he got to the car.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And I don't know how we. I don't know how we reverse our way out of this.

[A]

Yeah. I get into some lofty or deep dialogues and people get into the weeds, if you will. And I always try to come back to this. What is before me, Andy's before me. How can I treat Andy with respect, understand, serve and love him? Love him. Phileo.

[C]

Right.

[A]

There's many Greek words for love, right? A brotherly love. Imagine a world, Andy, if everybody tried to understand, serve and love each other.

[B]

Yeah, that's not happening. Especially the understand.

[A]

Well, we don't believe that given what we see. But the only way to change that is to believe that it's possible.

[B]

The biggest impact for me from that event actually is it because of the. What I have seen on social media since. Not only the, the incident itself, but what I've seen since. I'm very deeply debating shelving all of those platforms because I think it's the worst expression of who we are.

[A]

I can see why you would do that.

[B]

I'm not saying stop doing the podcast, but the Instagram X Facebook. I don't have a TikTok account. Even though I understand conceptually what it is, I. It makes me. It makes me not want to be on them.

[A]

I can understand that. And, and I would say that you've given that thought and that's all we can ask of anybody is a thought before action. And you have to. So let's, let's get an analog of that, which is. Let's say what's your favorite it Ice cream.

[B]

That's actually a really deep question. I know.

[A]

Cuz all ice cream is good.

[B]

It is all good. And people who say cake batter, I just, I don't trust them.

[A]

I, I can, I can empathize with you on that one.

[B]

And then if they eat it with their left hand because they're lefty. Equally untrustworthy. It's just, there's tells out there. You got to look.

[A]

Yeah. Sharp. I told you we were sharp.

[B]

Honestly, I like vanilla.

[A]

There is something about a good vanilla. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I'm not sponsored by this company, but there's an ice cream out there called Hudsonville that I find it very. I mean, it could lure me away from my wife. Let's put it that way. That good?

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Rolling in. Hudsonville ice cream. Yeah. So there's plenty of wonderful ice creams out there. So where I was going with that is if you understood that an overindulgence in that dietary intake was bad for you, what would you do?

[B]

You limit it.

[A]

You cut it off or limit it. You create boundaries. Right. Same thing with social media.

[B]

You manage it with dosage.

[A]

Right, Same thing with social media. And this gives us, again, gives us the opportunity to move close toward those that we love. Like your daughter. Right. So when I work with couples and it actually applies with anybody, this is a interpersonal theory, relationship theory, it's really a feedback system. Right. But when I work with people, I talk about how do we make a better we? How do we make a better we? Well, I've got to start with me. Okay, So I breathe. Why do we breathe? Because it's one of the fastest way to regulate our nervous system. Right. We talked about the shift wave chair earlier. That is a way, but it's not as accessible. I can't do it at work. I can't do it driving down. This is something to help me train for.

[B]

You could if you had a Tesla, I think. I believe they're fully self driving.

[A]

Ooh la la.

[B]

That would suck if you were using one of those though, and then your Tesla wrecked. That would be really conflicting inputs, Barry.

[A]

Oh, I went there. There's some memes popping through my head right now, but I can't read. Okay. So what we do is we breathe and that slows us down and it calms us down. Because quite frequently some of our greatest mistakes happen like that. Right. Not checking our tongue. And then we grow up. Especially if we're struggling with fear. Remember, we're always most loyal to our greatest fear. Okay, this is important. When we get to the shield bearers, right? The veterans, law enforcement, because they're practicing fear so much more than the general populace. It's way more prevalent. I believe there's a study out there that says the amygdala, which is the center of fear, atrophies. Excuse me, Hypertrophy. So. Grows up to four times larger than normal in trauma. Sustained trauma. I think that's it. I can't cite this study.

[B]

Well, and the data's out there too. I think the data shows that most people will be exposed to single digit.

[A]

Massive traumas in their 1.27 per the common citizen.

[B]

First responders, I think it's in the six to seven to eight hundreds.

[A]

So firefighters. A study I've seen around 450, police around 8 60.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Military is a unique thing. And Dr. Free has both operator syndrome for veterans and fire syndrome. Right. For firefighters. And I looked at it and I started talking with him about how do we develop something for police syndrome or LEO syndrome. Law enforcement officer, because they're unique. And I'm going to get back to my algorithm. But part of the uniqueness of police is they're alone. Even when they call for backup, oftentimes they're alone. The other is they're driving through their own town or city when they have to deal with this. And every time they drive by it, it brings it up. That's a trigger. And it can reinstigate the memory and the whole nervous system affect. And then what happens neurologically is it ends up being a second. The memory becomes traumatic as well.

[B]

So multiple traumas from the same incident.

[A]

Absolutely. So I was working with a firefighter and he was at an incident where two firefighters died. And he was the battalion chief and he found himself driving by it. And he said, five minutes later, I found myself five minutes down the road and I didn't know how I got there. Okay. So it takes over. So again, working interpersonally, we breathe, slow down, calm down, and grow up out of the amygdala into the prefrontal cortex where we have complex thinking and empathy. Empathy is a good thing. Keeps humanity alive. Okay, Then we get close. So I. Right here, Breathe, slow down, calm down, down. Then we get close and try to understand. So taking a one down position, serve and love that person. Let me tip into something else. I have an elephant in my therapy room, a wood carved elephant. And I tell my clients it's because there's always an elephant in the room. We just need to name it because what we're fighting about is not what we're fighting about. Okay, so if you, for instance, come along to your daughter and you say, honey, you are so precious to me, I can't think of too many other things other than your siblings and my wife. That is more precious. And this really concerns me. What's her fear? Her fear is going to drive her response. Yeah, you're just wanting to control me. You're wanting to take away all my social. I'm not going to have friends, I'm not going to be popular, I'll be rejected. So our five greatest fears. Okay. Annihilation, mutilation. So death, injury, separation. We are herd animals.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, if you take a baby and separate it from its mother, what's going to happen?

[B]

Nothing. Good.

[A]

It dies. Simple. It dies. Makes sense.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Then the other one is loss of autonomy or choice. That's what she's afraid of as well as separation. This is hypothetical, but I'm probably pretty close. The last one is death of ego. Whether I'm competent, worth, or lovable. Follow that. If you're trying to take any of those, we're gonna have a fear response. She needs to breathe, calm, slow down, calm down and grow up out of that fear into this. Okay, but when we try to understand. Tell me what you're afraid of. She goes, well, I'll lose contact with my friends. I can understand that. Okay, let's think through this. Is this good? It's watching Charlie Kirk's blood spilled over and over again. Good. It's a Socratic process. Right. So is it true? Is it beneficial? Right. Does it have utility? Yes or no? You do that with an understanding posture. You're walking her into the decision instead of forcing it. Now we as parents have to say, okay, we're not going to go down that dark alley. Okay. Helpful framework.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, that's basically how I've tried to be with my kids. Two. I mean, so I have a 22 year old and a 20 year old. @ some point, you know, they are making decisions on their own life. Two of them live outside of the house with me. My daughter lives with me and my wife. But the I. I have conversations with her and we talk about, talk very deeply. I don't try to be dogmatic. I don't try to replicate myself and my kids. I don't expect my kids to make the same choices or have the same desires that I have. And, oh, my God, we talk about stuff I do not want to hear about. I'm like, could you maybe not tell me that? Oh, dad, you always say you should talk. I'm like, yeah, but not about that. Let's have boundaries.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

No, but it's. But then at the same time, you know, I will ask myself, would I not want to know if that's happening? Or do I want her to know she can reach out to me, to anything. Of course, the answer is that it's a slower path because you have. It's a softer touch than a more directive touch. But for my kids, it's way, way more impactful.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. So can I put some traction to this principle?

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

You.

[A]

Can I use an incident that I heard you talk about on this podcast? Sure. Thank you. So you had your first incident of thievery, Right? It was When? Right. Well, when Chris Free was on or somewhere before thievery, somebody came in and.

[B]

Stole from the coffee shop. Yes, indeed.

[A]

Yeah. Okay.

[B]

Were you on staff of security then, Michael?

[A]

O Michael.

[C]

I don't think so. And if it was, it was after I left.

[B]

Do you notice how he just. There's no ownership of any kind.

[A]

I noticed he did that.

[B]

He can. He was not. The mic wasn't even in front of his mouth. Excuses are just Tommy gun.

[A]

Should we check in the mic levels and input at this point?

[B]

Oh, I do now, all the time.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, here's where the cost comes and this is where we get into our fear that if I actually put effort into correcting this situation, it's going to cost me something. And that may be too much. Okay, that may be too much. I would say Charlie Kirk expressed in his behaviors that the Republic, saving our free speech, ours, yours, mine, everybody that's hearing this was worth it to the extent of his life. So we'll talk about this person who came into your store was a couple example. Ooh, Bonnie and Clyde. So Bonnie and Clyde came into the store and they stole something. Okay, you have to ask, what's their motive?

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Are they just trying to get a dopamine hit? Is that it? Or are they afraid that they can't afford what they're king from you?

[B]

There's a third option, and this particular individual had a documented history of theft.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

So maybe it was an addiction or maybe it was just a behavioral pattern.

[A]

Yeah. So I would say that that kind of behavior is almost. You could track it into the dopamine cycle. So there's a Great book by Dr. Anna Lemke, L E M K E. She's Stanford, of course, introduced by Andrew Huberman. Got a great podcast on there. She wrote a book, Dopamine Nation. This gets back to your daughter's stuff.

[B]

Oh, for sure. Not only my daughter. I mean, most human beings, whether they realize it or not, are completely addicted to that advice.

[A]

Right. I was trying.

[B]

I designed, though. But there's also. There's a heavy hand in the people creating those devices and platforms in that.

[A]

Right. Again, we all need to stop, breathe, slow down, calm down, and ask questions. Right. So I was driving out to a beautiful place today just to get some. Some peace and enjoy the beauty. I mean, this place sucks. Don't come here. And my phone was dinging. I got into a remote area. Phone didn't ding. I got back into signal and ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. You know, you're like that's why I planned this trip the way I did, to get away from that. So we're talking about a third person. And if I take the time to try to walk with that person into a better way of living, it's going to cost me. And most of us have a hard time writing that check, and that's why we don't do it. However, if we don't do it, what's going to happen? Society continues to do what it's doing. Makes sense.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. So I think it would be good to get back to the vein of injustice in our job, right? Fighting evil. People step in and say, here I am. Send me. But I don't know where exactly I'm going. You're going into the dragon's breath is what's happening. So the phrase that I use for that when we work with people is we're all walking around with a wheelbarrow. Some people like the metaphor of a backpack and rocks and stuff like that. That and it's fine, it's good. But I like the wheelbarrow because we bump into imperfect people and they put their BS in our wheelbarrow and try to convince us it's ours. Hurt people, Hurt people. That's what's happening.

[C]

Right?

[A]

So all that gets put in, and the job that we did, the war, puts a lot of BS in the wheelbarrow. So we've got to get in and get it. Okay. It's not their fault, but it is their responsibility.

[B]

Agreed.

[A]

Fair enough. So this is an altruism, and I believe it's true with every human being because of what we aforementioned. This exists everywhere. And so we've got to make a decision to put our hands in that, slow down and give it thought, turn it into fertilizer instead of sloppy BS that we're running around with all the time, bumping into other people, people putting it into their wheelbarrow. Make a picture, fairly reasonable picture. So how do we do that? Number one is education. We have to realize this is what's going on. Two is regulation, because we have to learn to regulate the nervous system. It's all about the nervous system. So if you took a picture of the nervous system and we got some pictures I can share with you guys and you can put them up. There is an array. You've seen pictures. You may have even seen this jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. Of the continents all lit up at night. Okay? So imagine that and overlay it on our bodies. That's our nervous system. It goes everywhere. It's Detecting and directing. Okay. So we need to learn what has happened to it and what we need to do with it. Right. That's where regulation comes in. We need to regulate our nervous system. Breathe, slow down, calm down, grow up. Fair enough. Yeah. So this is the big thing. And when we can do that, then we can go interoceptively. That's looking in the wheelbarrow. And when we do that exploration, we can actually get revelations of what's in the caves of our heart and unburden those things. Get that BS out of us so we can be the flourishing self that we were made to be.

[B]

Sounds good.

[A]

Yeah. So there's a process to do it. So I'm going to move toward a metaphor right now. Now, I'm going to hand this to you. Does that look familiar?

[B]

What do we got here? A Tudor, like as a watch. What am I supposed to be looking at?

[A]

The watch? Yeah, just the watch. It's a Tudor Submariner.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

It's got a datejust right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So that's a watch that used to be employed in SEAL teams. That very one. When I was in my first platoon, I was in supply. And the guy goes, I don't know why I have this. It's the only one we have.

[B]

They used to issue these. Yeah, you bastard.

[A]

I never got one until this story.

[B]

We got G shocks.

[A]

I know, I know. Well, that's why they stopped issuing. Because this is analog.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

They're old, they're expensive, and doesn't require batteries and doesn't require B and. Yeah, but these are old and. And he said, you know what? I'm never going to refurbish this and reissue this. I'm just going to write it off. He looks at me, goes, hey, Diz, do you want it? I'm like, yeah, sure. Tosses it to me.

[B]

I can't believe they used to issue that.

[A]

It's mine.

[B]

Yeah. As it should be. I did not know they used to issue those.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So I took it over the Philippines, had a guy clean it up and get it running, and I put it on one of those Velcro straps that we had. By then, it got all sweaty and stinky and nasty. Right? And I was like, this is sweaty and stinky and nasty. My Timex doesn't do that. Right. So I just held on to it. But when I started doing therapy, I was like, I need an analog watch. I can just kind of glance at, see where I'm at in the hour. Right. Track our approach. And I started wearing it, but it was all scuffed up like you couldn't see through the date. You couldn't. I mean, the crystal was smashed. Yeah, yeah. And he goes, hey, I have a friend who can probably clean that up. And he's the kind of guy I had to say to him, okay, but you can't pay for it. I'll pay for it. So they put it through and they found out, you know, SEAL team watch. And this guy does therapy and he's working with vets and first responders, yada, yada. And everybody pitches in a little bit, and he gives it back to me on my birthday in a little gold box with a ribbon. I'm like, dude, really? I mean, you say you saw how I wrapped your swag, right? Yeah, but that's the appropriate way to wrap. That's the appropriate way to.

[B]

Plastic shopping bag.

[A]

Exactly, man wrap. That's what we call it.

[B]

Gets the job done every time.

[A]

It works. You both got it. How did you like your gifts? Michael thought they were great.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. Except the nuts. You can't eat nuts.

[C]

Yeah. The jerky's really good, though.

[A]

The meat's good.

[B]

I'm trying to do a video series. I want to see how many nuts he can.

[C]

Half of one and then we're done.

[B]

Now, you said it's not that. I'll have an EpiPen.

[A]

I'll stand by.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

I do not want to be stabbed with an EpiPen.

[A]

It's not that bad. We've done it. See, Listen. Did you do it? Did you do it it? No. Did you do it in NBC training?

[B]

No. We used the fake ones. We put it on the cardboard.

[A]

Oh, it's so easy.

[C]

Did it have actual epinephrine in it?

[A]

No.

[B]

The training ones had saline. Yeah. We would just put them up against the cardboard and it would squirt through.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

Super tiny needle. I don't even think you'd feel it.

[C]

Probably not, but I would feel.

[B]

That puts a lot.

[C]

I would feel the epinephrine.

[A]

Yeah, but that's great. That's better than caffeine.

[B]

We're not sure if you'd be dying.

[C]

Well, first of all, I wouldn't even need it it. But I. It's still so uncomfortable.

[B]

He's not even adventurous.

[A]

In the comment section, we want everybody to vote on whether Michael should test drive some nuts.

[B]

Oh, he's test driven some nuts. But I want to see if he can actually digest and tolerate.

[A]

What is it?

[B]

Peanuts?

[C]

You're allergic to peanuts? Pecans, walnuts. Yeah.

[B]

I think we start with girls Allegedly. Girls, usually half of a walnut. No, we'll do it. We'll do it. Down the alleyway right in front of the fire station.

[C]

No, it's just. It's. It's just so. Just comfortable to my throat that I'm not doing it.

[A]

I think it's psychological. I know somebody who can help you with that.

[C]

It's not psychological. It's.

[B]

We have 100.

[C]

A physical reaction. Trust me.

[B]

God, I have so many things I want to punish him with.

[A]

Have you seen pictures of this? I haven't seen pictures of this.

[B]

He has no evidence. Evidence of any of this.

[A]

Yeah. I love people who don't provide evidence.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Where were we? We were at the Watch. We were at the Watch.

[B]

Yes. They gave back to you in a basically Liberace case.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. A Louis Vuitton. Right. I was like, dude. He's like, no, really? He goes, everybody pitched in. Doesn't cost you a thing. And it's worth about 6,000 bucks.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

And if you can document the history behind it, it's a little different. I haven't done that. Kind of like being related to Walt Disney. I haven't documented any familiar history, which I never you the picture, and I will here in a second. And so I started wearing it, and it stopped at 9:30am on the dot with the second hand. Right at the 12 on. I got to get my days together on Memorial Day. Einstein once said, either nothing's a miracle or everything is.

[B]

I feel like that's very black and white. I think there's some middle ground there. Relatively smart, man. But I think there's some middle ground there.

[A]

There's some stupidity. We've experienced this.

[B]

I mean, he didn't hit all home runs, you know.

[A]

Yeah, right. Me running into a wall, that's not a miracle.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So it's a miracle I don't do more stupid things. So moving into this, I considered this, and I've told this story to veterans. Okay. You stood up and you said, yeah, put me in service. You got beat and bruised and broken, worn, and they just wanted to write you off and throw you away. But in the right hands, with the right process, you can become something quite handsome and valuable. And you'll probably need more attention later down the road.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Because it just stopped. I'll show you another picture later. What had happened is one of the hour markers, the square markers, tumbled off to stop the second hand.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[A]

Wedges wedged up against the side. I mean, it was. It's pretty crazy. So that is the journey and the message that I'm trying to share through Camp David is that through, through this, right, education, regulation, exploration, we can get to the revelation and get some of that BS out of your wheelbarrow. Wasn't your fault. You didn't ask for it. But we can do something about it. We can turn it into growth. There's an organization, it's called Eagle Crest, and they wrote a book called Struggle well, and in there they cite some data on post traumatic growth. Okay.

[B]

One of my favorite terms. Not used enough.

[A]

Yeah. So I believe in post traumatic stress disorder. And this is why. Not just because I'm a psychobiologist, but because if your arm isn't working well, is it disordered?

[B]

I would say yeah. If it's not functioning in the manner that it was designed to.

[A]

And all it takes is therapy, which is a Greek word, therapia, to attend to. We just have to attend to it, that's all, to get a different outcome. So they find that, and this is a very organic truth in all human beings. You'll see me tie this in, is that we have to go through this stress and this breaking down. How do you get any stronger?

[B]

Yeah, you tear your muscles at a micro level when you're working out and.

[A]

Your body says, we've got to put the attention and resources biologically toward it. And then we get stronger and then we start talking.

[B]

With AI, agents are everywhere, automating tasks and making decisions at machine speed. But agents make mistakes. Just one rogue agent can do big damage before you even notice. Rubrik Agent cloud is the only platform that helps you monitor agents, set guardrails and rewind mistakes so you can unleash agents, not risk. Accelerate your AI [e-mail] that's R U B R-I K dot com.

[A]

The oscillating accent.

[B]

Only if you take enough trend.

[A]

Only if. Yeah, so that is. That is the process. We have to share that because that brings hope. And again, there's uniqueness to, to each of these demographics, Right. Fire, police, veterans, even frontline medical personnel, right?

[B]

Oh, yeah, for sure.

[A]

So in our shield bearers group, it's a. It's a 12 week group you meet once a week. But it's trying to create a community. And we've got channels going and people put all kinds of funny, all kinds of support, all kinds of memes on there.

[B]

Memes, I think, are actually the only great thing about the Internet.

[A]

Only.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I try to never speak in absolutes. They always get me in trouble.

[B]

I never speak in absolutes. But memes are the only good thing of the Internet.

[A]

Dude.

[B]

It's one of the things that you see, a good one, you're like, damn, not only are there smarter people than me, but they're more creative. But thankfully, the Internet exists, so I get to see this.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It's just. What's wild is that some people get their news from memes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So there's, you know, I can't say it's the only thing because there's a. There's a dark side to it as well. You know, the other side of that.

[A]

So we'll talk about more humor. But I gotta ask you this question. Who is the funniest group you've ever been around in your life?

[B]

Oh, the guys we worked with.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So their intelligence and grip. Now, there's something about dark humor. Humor is incredibly medicinal. It does a couple things. Number one, it produces some brain chemistry that's good serotonin or dopamine at times. But it also says, I'm not overwhelmed by that. I can still stand here in IGY 6. Right. I still got your 6. So it communicates internally. The other thing is it becomes a jousting, which we have to do. So again, so this is a different podcaster, did a podcast on Rough and Tumble play, and I can't remember the guest on there. It was a Jordan Peterson podcast.

[B]

Like between kids.

[A]

Yes, okay. Absolutely. This guy actually now runs programs to get kids out there. So here's what happens. And Peterson often quotes guy named Jack Pansep, which I can't even spell that name. And he does a lot of stuff with rats. So for little rats to continue to engage big rats in rough and tumble play, they have to win at least 30. I think the quote is 30. It's 25 or 30% of the time, otherwise their spirits crushed.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. So in Rough and Tumble Play, I don't know where you grew up in Santa Cruz, were you guys kind of free range kids? I mean.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Was it organized sports or pickup sports?

[B]

Both.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And also, hey, mom and dad will see you when the sun goes down.

[A]

Right? Exactly.

[B]

And I don't know where the hell I was, but I probably shouldn't have been there.

[A]

Yeah. So if I did something wrong where I grew up, my parents knew before I got home.

[B]

Small town?

[A]

No, Kansas City.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah. It's just the way it was back in the 1970s.

[B]

Yeah. In the 1800s. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah, 1870.

[B]

Carrier pigeons.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Stuff. They could fly faster than you could ride on your bike. Yeah.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Or were you guys still riding those big bikes that only had one big wheel?

[A]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Creates a lot of. Yeah, yeah, balance challenge. But that's why I'm good at balance. Yeah, so. So quips like this, right? Back and forth, the repartee, fantastic for resilience. Right. Improvisational. So out of the box thinking, creative thinking. Same thing with play in play, pickup games. You have to, you have to work together for the greatest greater good so that everybody creates rules that everybody can participate in. It's sociological development. Also, if somebody does something to you that causes pain, then you go, oh, I know if I do that, it's going to cause them pain. Now in appropriate situations, you'll refrain from that. And other times, which of course are appropriate situations, you'll engage in that. Right. And this is one of the challenges that we're up against right now in our society is we don't have immediate and appropriate bit consequences training us.

[B]

I would agree with that.

[A]

To be better. It's. It's ridiculous.

[B]

The pendulum is almost pegged in the other direction.

[A]

Don't give hope. Don't give up hope, Andy.

[B]

I'm not giving up hope. I'm just saying it looks like the pendulum, if there, if there was a happy medium it has. It's just for whatever reason, still currently bouncing off that other wall.

[A]

I have seen grand scale both in both holes, personally.

[B]

Yeah, no, each can be taken too far, I believe.

[A]

No, no, I'm not saying that. I'm saying where. Where, for lack of better terms, where this disgusting, vile stuff is seems to be more prevalent. There's a lot of goodness growing too.

[B]

I hope so.

[A]

And that's one of the things we have to focus on is. Is promoting that pure, noble, true, just thing and speaking about it because it gives people hope. Hope without hope, we perish.

[B]

People in the modern era, and maybe this has been the case forever, would not be able to agree on what is true, noble or just.

[A]

And this is the challenge with what you're talking about is there is so many. This is a slippery slope and I got to be careful, careful with this one.

[B]

Really. What's slippy about it like, from a clinician perspective?

[A]

I hold a license as a clinical marriage and family therapist.

[B]

I mean, so do I. It's not a big deal.

[A]

I know. That's why we get along. It's perfect. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

But you're not working in a therapy, you know, a therapy capacity. Right now. We're just having a conversation.

[A]

We are having a conversation that doesn't Matter in this world. They'll take anything out. I could quote somebody.

[B]

Yeah. And it's actually happening right now too, with stuff around Charlie Kirk.

[A]

Right. So I could quote somebody and they'll take that and make it as if I said it. And that's, that's the canceling and the doxing. It is very, very toxic if you have or haven't experienced it. It's very uncomfortable.

[B]

I have not.

[A]

Okay. You gotta fight a fight that takes resources away from doing good, good, fair. And it's out there. It's out there. So the point is that. And this has been going on for decades for sure. And in an attempt to empower our kids, I think they have gotten too much voice and choice and not enough boundary and consequences. When we had free range as kids, we organically grew, engaging the world and learning from consequences, learning from our friends. And that is not happening. We're in 72 degree prisons. We're giving counterfeit entertainment.

[B]

It's a good description for it, actually, that.

[A]

So I've heard it said that TV is bubblegum for the mind. Now that is a quote that I'm quoting somebody else. And somebody could take that and attribute it to me to try to disparage me. And that is a very deceptive thing. Thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. So I, I think that's. I think we're seeing that is people get online and they, you know, say horrible, awful, untrue things about other people and rip them down and then no consequences. What? The other person can comment back or not common at all. Right. And then they just keep going and going and going. I'm seeing that. Personal even. Yeah, it's horrible. That's part of the. That's part of the problem. That. And there was also. So Dave Grossman. Have you heard of Colonel Dave Grossman? Okay. So he wrote a book on. I forget the title. On video games. First person shooter games. Okay. Now there's some evidence that in combat, when people come back from operations and they've been engaged, they. They come back and engage in these and they can win. It helps to them to process and has decreased PTSD effect. Okay.

[B]

By playing the video games. Interesting.

[A]

So this, this applies to BJJ too. There's a book out there and BJJ is therapy. I'll have to try to remember it.

[B]

But I'm cautious with anything around growth.

[A]

Grossman say more about that?

[B]

I've interviewed him.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

His book on killing pulls heavily from SLA Marshall.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Who is completely and utterly full of shit. Okay. So a lot of the data that he is pulling forward is flawed.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And they've done expansive research. The guy wasn't even able to, from a time perspective, interview the number of people, frontline troops groups. Grossman talks around it and he cherry picks stats and he was showing me hand drawn graphs bracketing the segment of information that he wanted to make the point off of as opposed to showing the entire graph. And I have a problem with that.

[A]

This is where your intellect comes in and I applaud it because this is what they call peer review. Right. And we need to have that so people don't just, yeah. Go off cherry pick.

[B]

I mean, you write a book called On Killing based off of data from somebody that has been proven to be inaccurate. I mean, the whole provenance of your theory is in question.

[A]

I can see that argument. I can see why you would move that way. The comment where I, that I was going to is about video games, the first person shooter.

[B]

Where did he draw that data from? Is my question.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I say that only based off my experience of him showing me data that he had drawn off of before.

[A]

Yeah. So let me ask you this. If I were to tell you his hypothesis that first person person shooter games results in younger people developing a schema or perspective that diminishes their respect for life and then we get all these shooter things, does that in your heart resonate as true?

[B]

I would say it's possible.

[A]

It's possible, yeah. Would you say it's probable?

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

I would need to actually look at the data and where that's coming from and I would need to see where they're drawing those data points from.

[A]

Okay. So let's talk epistemology for a second.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Epistemology says is it authority, intuition, revelation or experience? Right. Does your intuition tell you that that's true?

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

Mine does.

[B]

Well, that's what I'm saying. I'm open to it being either way, you know, first person shooter video games, has there been an increase in violence in that time period? Period, yes. But is that causal or corollary? There are.

[A]

Good question.

[B]

You know, I don't think the statistics when it comes to size of population and access to guns has changed that much. But what else has changed? Access to a medium that makes you think that the world is falling down around you at all times and you're being bombarded largely by negativity and things that are designed to induce, it seems to be anger and rage and engagement. But then those devices, they pay attention and people don't realize this, and this is incredibly open source. As you're scrolling along, there's teams of people figuring out where you stop, what you're looking at, what you click on, what you engage with, and then they're feeding you more of that. So if you start going down this rabbit hole pole, it's easy to say, well, you know, it's, it's the creator of this platform that's feeding me this and it's giving me this flawed sense of the world. But you have an equal hand in that as well because your hand's on the steering wheel. So it's easy to point at first person shooter video games, but I think we need to look at all of the changes that have occurred in that timeline as that angle of the vector has changed as well. Possible for sure. Plausible. I don't know if I would put it in the plausible category. Today's podcast is brought to you by AG1. Now, if you're a fan of the show or you listen to it, you've probably heard me talk about my morning routine and how I drink their greens in the morning to help me with my hydration and macro and micronutrients. I have a really dialed in morning routine. And here's a question for the audience and myself. Is your evening routine as dialed in as your morning routine routine? And if not, why? The answer to that for me is laziness. And the more I have started to dial it in and that is going to bed at a certain time, eating a certain distance from when I'm going to go to bed, breathing aids. And now the addition of agz. It really has turned the corner for me. You might ask yourself, what is agz? Well, it's a nightly drink that helps you wind down and rest up. It is a melatonin free formula with clinically studied herbs, adaptogens and minerals. It is designed to help your body and mind wind down before bed. Who doesn't want that? It's designed to optimize your sleep quality during the night and help you wake up feeling well rested without grogginess. There are a variety of IP things inside of this particular formula. One of them I want to highlight is magnesium. AGZ is an excellent source of magnesium. Each serving of AGZ delivers 250mg of highly bioavailable magnesium, providing over half of your daily value or recommended intake. If you are ready to stop messing about and start treating your evening routine with as much discipline as you do your morning routine, head over to drinkag1.com ClearedHot and you're get a free frother with your first purchase of AGZ. These things are awesome. Little battery powered, helps you mix things up. Nobody likes drinking a grainy mixture of anything in the morning or the evening. That is DrinkAg.1.com ClearedHop God. Start treating your evenings like you do your mornings. I have done this and I have been well suited because of it. And rewarded if you will. Back to the show.

[A]

So there's a quote from William James. As a man thinketh, so shall he be. You start thinking a lot about that kind of stuff. That's how our pathways develop and we'll default to that. And so Sandy Hook, remember that?

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Okay. Horrible. Yeah.

[B]

Hard to forget.

[A]

Single mom and the son was I believe addicted to video games.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

And they were first person shooter.

[B]

Yep. Have you looked at the correlation between people on SSRIs and mass shootings?

[A]

I haven't. What do you.

[B]

Huge correlation.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

To include Sandy Hook.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

That's what I'm saying. There's a lot of pieces out there besides just video games.

[A]

Yeah. So again I don't disagree and this is where I think it's super important for especially in recovery from ptsd is looking at all aspects of the human being. It's not just PTSD what they. Because some people can go to war and not carry deep heavy sequelae from it.

[B]

I think it made me a better version of myself.

[A]

I don't disagree. I don't disagree. And there are people that get overwhelmed by it.

[B]

So I'm curious your thoughts on this. You know because I touched on this. I've had some very deep conversations with friends post service. I have no data to support this but I have been shown shocked by the number of people who brought a truckload of trauma with them before the teams variety of childhood trauma. Some sexual in nature, some physical in nature, all of the above emotional.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It was almost as if there was a cohort. And of course I never, I don't remember ever sitting in the cage room be like walt, tell me everything about your childhood. It's like hey, do we have five minutes? Get your together.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Don't be late.

[A]

So have you been exposed to the 8 ACE survey, Adverse Childhood experience survey.

[B]

I have heard of it. I don't think I've ever been exposed to.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

I don't remember ever filling it out. Maybe that's something that they're doing now.

[A]

They wouldn't. They wouldn't do it. So it was developed by Kaiser Pembron ante in the 90s, which is when I started in the teams.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Late 80s.

[B]

Same here. I started 97. I went through.

[A]

Yes. Yeah, I was almost a decade before that.

[B]

60 classes would make sense. 6 per year.

[A]

So. And what they said is these 10 questions can predict with some, well, reasonable validity, what the person will encounter later in their lives. Things like addiction, promiscuity, divorce, mental illness, fibromyalgia and other diseases. I'd have to go back. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk cites this in his book. It's a seminal book. The Body Keeps the school. Remember we talked about the nervous system? Okay. So the hypocha, or the hippocampus isn't the only place memories are held. You can recall something and get that sense again within the array of the nerves in the body. And that's part of the process back there. So the adverse childhood experience starts off. Did anybody yell at you? Scream at you and make you feel like you're worthless or not sick? Yes or no? So ten questions. The threshold is three.

[B]

And the affirmative answer, correct?

[A]

Yes. Three affirmatives are yes. Right. I'm trying to remember. Were you ever hit so hard?

[B]

This is why I love Michael.

[A]

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Did your parents. So that's a different one.

[B]

Michael, we were gonna. We were giving you credit.

[A]

Your job. No, no, no. He actually. He actually did. Did what? He's. He's showing what anybody would come across.

[B]

So he says, blows a list of 10 categories adverse. Oh. Of adverse childhood experiences. This may not necessarily be that ACE test you're talking about, though.

[A]

So this is the ACE test, but it's not in the order that I'm used to.

[B]

So again, a human that can be both right and wrong at the same time.

[A]

Right and wrong.

[B]

Shocking. Statistical.

[A]

Perfect. Yeah.

[C]

Very good fence sitter.

[A]

I'll send that schmedium shirt right way.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So did you feel you didn't have enough to eat or wear dirty clothes or had no one to protect you or take care of you? It also says take you to the doctor if you were sick in the original form.

[B]

Number two is really interesting way to phrase that because you can have a divorce and not lose a parent.

[A]

I agree. And the original one says where your parents divorced.

[B]

Okay, okay.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Because that is so.

[A]

I think this is a better way to do it because through divorce, abandonment, death or other reason, lose a parent. Because this goes back to the attachment.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Attachment means am I being seen? Which soothes my nervous system, makes me feel safe and secure enough to go travel out in the world. So here's a story about this. Because people say, oh, that we're adults now. I don't. I don't have an attachment. Need. Need. Well, we do. So when I was in the team's second deployment, I think we were in the Philippines. We were doing training over on Green Beach. And in the dark, no moon. You're.

[B]

Did you guys even have nods back then?

[A]

Oh, no. Well, hold on. Somebody that we mutually know was our point man.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Two things. And again, I'm not.

[B]

Please tell me it was a starlight scope.

[A]

I'm not gonna mention his name.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

But you know who I'm talking about.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

We do a rally point. This is not the incident I'm talking about. We do a rally point, and he comes back to each person. Hey, man, do you have a compass? I forgot my compass. Point man extraordinaire. Then the other one was we were out at an island, and did you ever go out to. No, I don't think you. I know you didn't. What island? Before it was rebuilt into a compound.

[B]

Yeah, the old camp. I. I know where it was in relation to Billy Macon, the new camp now. But, no, never was out there before.

[A]

It was a bunch of tin cans stitched together. It was. It was fantastic, man. So here's the funniest part about it, is we were right along the canal. Yeah, Right. And so we would go at the end of each iteration of training and just take all of our gear right into the canal. Strip down. Right. And then. Then if you had to let go. Discharge. Yeah. Right. Lock swimmers out.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

It was going down the canal, which fed LA with water.

[B]

I feel like there's a filter in between you guys.

[A]

There. There was. There was. But just fun to think about.

[B]

I mean, you got to think of all the animals that are pissing and in there. Like, you're gonna be okay.

[A]

Totally.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So we're. We're patrolling in the mountains on Green beach, and we get into stuff that's so thick now, like, light, and you just can't see. It's totally out. And so you'd feel your way to the guy in front of me and put my hand on his shoulder. When I did, I noticed my nervous system relaxed. Okay. The two behind me did the same. Gave me the squeeze. My nervous system relaxed even more. This is what we're talking about. Attachment. It does happen in adulthood. Okay. So when you lose a parent. When you lose a parent, you lose that attachment source.

[B]

Okay. Seven is the question. You were, did your parent or a Parent or adult in your home ever swear you insult you or put you down?

[A]

Yeah, in. In the survey that I use, that's number two, because that is an emotional assault.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

The number one up here is neglect. Okay. Dirty clothes, health care, food. Losing a parent is attachment. Number three, depressed, mentally ill or attempt suicide. Remember we talked about fawning? This is a prime field for developing somebody who fawns or is preoccupied attachment.

[B]

With somebody who's depressed mentally or.

[A]

Exactly, exactly. And then four, did you live with anyone who had a problem drinking drugs, including prescription drugs? Okay, again, that dopamine cycle in addiction, what we call addiction, somebody preoccupied with that instead of healthy human relationship? Okay. Parents, adults, ever hit, punch, beat, or threaten or harm each other? Now, this is a good rephrasing of this, in my opinion, because predominantly male led domestic violence. No doubt. Statistics supported. But there is female le. Domestic violence. I've had to deal with it in my office more frequently than you would want to believe. It's very sad. So the way they rewrote that in. Number five, parents or adults in the home ever hit, punch, beat or threaten to harm each other. Number six, went to live with anybody who went to jail or prison. Again, this is all statistically validated by actuarials that work for Kaiser Permanente trying to predict how much they would need to have to cover this person's health care later down the road.

[B]

Oh, interesting.

[A]

Okay, so we've covered seven about swearing, insulting parent. Ever hit, beat, kick or physically hurt you? Anyway, the one that, that I'm used to says leave a mark. Now, this is tricky because there is a parent that I have, one of my two parents who I find to be one of the most wonderful, loving human beings in the world, but hit me in a way that left a mark. Back in my era, the coffee pots had a plug that would unplug from the wall and the pot. And it ended up being the quickest thing for a quick reprisal, let's put it that way. And it only happened once. And then I started training for the SEAL teams. But I'd run away and throw crap behind me that they would have to hurdle and whatnot.

[B]

It's not a bad strategy.

[A]

Yeah, it worked, right? I didn't have claymores back then. So did you feel no one in your family loved you or thought you were special? There's some tie ins with birth order on this one. Second, third kids often get overseen or forgotten. Second kids off. Are you first, second, third born second, second.

[B]

Yeah, but I'm perfect. Yes, ask my wife.

[A]

We know that, don't we? Talking every day.

[B]

Michael knows how to answer that question. I pay his bills.

[A]

You're singing signature at least is perfectly good for a check. Right. Did you experience unwanted sexual contact, et cetera, et cetera? The, the, the Kaiser Permanente study says anyone five years or older. This is an important factor in that because oftentimes there's sexual exploration that is innocuous. Okay. It's not violating, it's kids like going, what is this? What do I do with this? So, okay, so above 3 and the precedence of subsequent pathology effects. Okay, so like I said, anxiety, depression, alcohol, aberrant behavior, fibromyalgia. Fibromyalgia to me is pathopneumonic. That means it is so overwhelmingly connected with sexual abuse that you always have to, and I do mean always have to explore that. When, you know, find somebody has fibromyalgia really doesn't mean it's always the origin.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Because it is. So sexual assault is one of the most atrocious violations that I see. I've seen so many beautiful people ruined because somebody sexually assaulted them.

[B]

Andy, if you had to guess on a percentage how many were sexually assaulted by a random person versus family member or social circle?

[A]

Well, I don't know the statistics off the top of my head, but everything that I've heard, it is predominantly. Predominantly. So more than 50%, maybe even almost three quarters, somebody who is known a.

[B]

Stranger danger is a disservice to our kids. It's valid to a degree.

[A]

Agree.

[B]

But it's, it's the enemy, the devil that you know, or that is the weird uncle. Or in the social circle, that seems to be far more likely.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So.

[A]

I'm, I'm at a juncture. So I, I was, I was violated as a child. And each time it was somebody that we knew. Yeah. The first time I believe. And this was a very interesting work for me. I, I am, I am ifs informed. Ifs is internal family systems. It says that there's a we inside of me. I have parts that are competent and self led. You remember the differentiation? So when we talk about self leadership, it means I, I'm. You. You and my perception are very self led. Okay.

[B]

Maybe you might have caught me on a good day.

[A]

I'm. I've seen you on a couple days and they, they all seem to be.

[B]

Good sometimes I can string a few good ones together.

[A]

Yes, you can. And I, I acknowledge that you can make mistakes, but I'm, I'm. This is my Perception.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. Nobody has immaculate perception. So this is my perception. Okay. Now I'm drawn off. So NIFs and if you want somebody to interview, you can interview Dr. Richard Schwartz. He is the, I would say, I would call him the author or steward of internal family systems. He discovered it when he was working with people who did self injury and somebody came in and said had in their face was all marked up, they were to trying. Trying to not cut their body.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And he just says, I can't beat you. And the client says, the part of me that's doing this doesn't want to fight you. And so Dr. Schwartz was like, what do you mean this part of you that doesn't want to do this doesn't want to fight me? And he started getting curious around it and he developed internal family systems. So here's the basic theory is that we in ourselves have this great power, okay? Power, love and sound mind. And they have eight Cs to describe that. I can never remember them all and neither can Dr. Schwartz. So I don't feel so bad. Right.

[B]

That's legit.

[A]

Clear, competent, compassionate, connected, creative, courageous. And two more that I can't pull up right now. You can look it up online. Oh, Michael, look up, up, look up. Ifs so go to ifs graphic.

[B]

There is third paragraph. Confidence, calm, compassion, courage, creativity, clarity, curiosity and connectedness.

[A]

Correct? Correct. So if you go up to. If you do image, ifs graphic, that should bring up something fairly good because in the center is this part of us. And this is very Eastern Orient. Excellent. So if you will go to the second from the left on the top. Excellent. Thank you, sir. And as we explore that. Right. So the self. So again, my original abuse that I had to explore, I did with a colleague using this approach.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

It is very much focusing on where memory theories create a sensation within the body. Okay. Any theory that you get into, there's about 85% commonality. So it doesn't matter if it cognitive, behavioral, younging, whatever. And this is referred to as a somatic element to it. So what's held in the body? Okay. Again, the nervous system detecting and directing. We direct through emotions. So. So as I moved toward this, what we have is, so if you look at the exiles, the exiles are the injured little ones. Right? The injured little ones. And this is getting back to our discussion about like people from our profession and how much abuse they went to. Do you remember goodwill hunting? Yeah. Okay. So you remember when he and Sean were talking about and he said, do you know anything about this And Sean was like, yeah, my dad was a mean drunk.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And he goes, yeah, my dad came home one time, he sell the wrench or the belt? I. I chose the wrench.

[B]

Yeah. Why fuck him?

[A]

Because F him.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Right. So what happens is there's this exile that is when we go back to the A score. Physical abuse and verbal abuse. Okay. Okay. So this is where I get. Get a little touchy feely. And I believe that verbal abuse is. Can be incredibly damaging to human beings.

[B]

I would agree with you. Especially depending on the age and the arc of their life in which it happens.

[A]

The context says it all in the family. If. If this person who is supposed to protect you and see you as present or precious, even though you're imperfect and they beat the crap of you or they call you a pos, you're not going to feel safe.

[B]

Yeah, of course not.

[A]

So this gets. And I'll get back to this. This gets into my query that a lot of the ADD that we see and is treated could be trauma. And they're starting to see that over the last two and a half decades is because if what's the difference between the distractibility of ADD and the hypervigilance of ptsd? The only way to discern it is history. History. History.

[B]

Yeah. Those might actually, from the outside look really, really similar.

[A]

Really similar. I'm seeing it too many times.

[B]

Yeah. It's not identical actually, from the outside.

[A]

Yep. And so what they do, if it's trauma and they're treating it as add, guess what they do with addiction? They give them an amphetamine.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So now you've got this fast moving, highly energized nervous system and we're turbocharging it.

[B]

That doesn't sound optimal.

[A]

It's not.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. And that's what we do because we don't take the time to slow down, calm down, grow up, get close and understand. Serve and love that child. It takes time. And we're under resourced, over taxed. But this brings up a story. There's a story about a little boy who was walking the beach at low tide and it was strewn with starfish. And he started picking them up one at a time and throwing them back into the water. And a man came up to him and said, what are you doing? He's like, I'm throwing them back. He's like, but there's millions of them of them. Picks one up, throws it back. Said, I made a difference to that one, didn't I? And that's what we have to Do I really, truly believe that?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That's what we have to do. So in the back to the ifs, right, this exile is the child, the younger part. And it doesn't always have to be. I mean, I've dealt with adult age parts before. So to be clear, I am ifs informed. That is different from ifs trained or certified. That makes sense because it's very. It was kind of like free fall when I was in. It was very hard to get trained.

[B]

Pipeline now, can you believe it?

[A]

Yeah, I think it's wonderful. So when I was.

[B]

It can't be wonderful because we didn't get it. So they have to suffer the same way we did. Dang it all. Generational trauma in the SEAL teams must be passed down.

[A]

Must be passed down. Brats, spoiled brats. All that gear and that training and.

[B]

They'Re doing it in, I think, a week and a half. They're not even getting the Yuma experience, so.

[A]

The Yuma experience?

[B]

Yeah. Where'd you go?

[A]

We got Fort Bragg.

[B]

Well, Yuma ended up becoming the extension of Fort Bragg. Yeah.

[A]

So when I was an instructor, I tried to put forth a point paper to move SEAL team graduates or Bud's graduates through a three day course in Coronado to save a week of travel. Three weeks that it took to cram. Three days of jumping into.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And another week of travel. It would have saved millions and the.

[B]

Training would have been about way better.

[A]

Yeah, way better. Because you're still on the beach running along. Yeah. Did your instructors ever take you and circle up around Pretty Woman laying on the beach?

[B]

Beach, yes.

[A]

Oh my gosh.

[B]

Yeah. They would direct our beach runs north or south or they. We'd go south and they're like, ah, it's not the crowd we're looking for. Heading to the Hotel Dell. Okay.

[A]

Yeah. Oh, I remember. Oh, I gotta. This is, this is a fun one to salt this with. So I remember being in pre training, it was a Friday and it was like, oh, it's Friday. You know, you get back from lunch at 1 o', clock, it'll be easy day. No, I don't even remember this instructor's name. It was him and only him in charge of pre training. He was a redheaded guy, so a ginger.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Soulless maybe. Yeah. Pardon me. So he's like, all right, boys, we're gonna go for a run. And he ran us for three and a half hours.

[B]

Did he even have an ambu with him or anything like that?

[A]

Nothing.

[B]

Oh, sweet. So it's fully. Just deviated from all curriculum perfect. No safety ratio of any kind.

[A]

We ran up to north island and we would circle pretty women and he's like, all right, boys, keep it going. He'd sit there and talk to him and then he. All right, follow me. Just all I remember, it was a tall, lean redhead and he had a southern accent and he was devilish. That might have been the pain that I tried to inflict on others. And then, then up at north island, there was a. A water discharge, like for the sewers, except it was summer. No, this would have been like right before November 1st. That's when I classed up 87. And it was like, full of muck. And he started playing games, you know, where somebody lays down, you stand at their head and then you dive over, grab their feet.

[B]

This classic hell week games, like, down.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. When I was going through this, I was like, this is so fun. I loved it.

[B]

I was like, you might have loved it. To other people, it was an injustice.

[A]

I'm just, you know, every. This gets back to my point. Everybody responds differently.

[B]

Training is something for everybody. That's one of the most interesting things about that curriculum is regardless of who you are, it's got something for you. Give it enough time, the curriculum will. Oh, yeah, it'll pull whatever. You are not good at that. Straight out of the shadows.

[A]

Yeah. Hey, by the way, have you ever heard of these?

[B]

Yeah, they're sponsored. The podcast.

[A]

Yeah, I know. That's why I have one. I love these David bars. So what I have to do is I have to keep, like, protein in me. These are fantastic. Go for it.

[B]

Gown.

[A]

Thanks. So we go.

[B]

I use them as my evening when I want something. That's not healthy. You're not.

[A]

Ice cream dessert.

[B]

Yeah. And then sometimes I just have the ice cream afterwards, but so I legit.

[A]

Good. I remember Jocko talking about being at a party and this. These are the best that I've found. I mean, I've been eating power bars and protein bars for 40 years now. Right?

[B]

Yeah, they're good.

[A]

Yeah, really good. So I remember Jocko being at a party and eating ice cream cake and he said this. This old foreign lady came up. Jaakov, what happened to your discipline? He said discipline. What's the. How does he say it? Discipline and freedom.

[B]

Discipline equals freedom.

[A]

Says he goes, discipline led me to the freedom of eating this.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, kept it in his ecosystem.

[A]

That works, you know, we can justify anything. Yeah, yeah. So we get back to the exiles. The exiles are the little ones or the offended one. They hold the shame. Right. The pain, the disgust. This one doesn't have the same ones that I'm used to, but these are where emotions come into play. Emotions are really important. And I'm sure in your SEAL team experience, you guys talked about emotions all the time.

[B]

Except for never.

[A]

Yeah. Well, no, I disagree because it's anger. Anger or anger I never heard. Or fun.

[B]

Well, they never reinforced anger. They reinforced aggression.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which I guess they could be tangential, and maybe they were trying to say anger, but it was foot on the gas. Aggression, sharp teeth.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So when it comes to anger, there's a proportionate distribution between masculine energy and feminine energy, Again, because of purpose and purpose calling. Okay, so I try to keep it simple when I talk about emotions. The uncomfortable, scary, awkward USA Emotions are fear. Remember, we're always most loyal to our greatest fear, anger. Which means we've been violated. So fear is a threat. Violation. Shame. Should have already mastered everything. Should hide all my emotions. Should hide all my excrement.

[B]

Why are they scary for people?

[A]

The vulnerability. So if. If I'm not perfect.

[B]

Who gives a shit if you're vulnerable, though?

[A]

Because. Because if I'm not perfect, I run the risk of being exiled from the community.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You've seen it before. We talked about it earlier. If you're not good enough, they dismiss you from the command. Follow that. Yeah. Okay. So that's rooted in shame. Shame is the signal that we get in our. In our. Our nervous system.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, not everybody's good enough. Life isn't fair.

[A]

I don't disagree with that. Yeah, I don't disagree with that.

[B]

Life isn't fair.

[A]

How?

[B]

In Iowa. With cotton candy and merry go rounds.

[A]

And it's one of the best in the world.

[B]

I know.

[A]

And my wife. It's on my fair. It's. It's my bucket list, actually. They have a. What is it? A butter cow. They carve a cow out of butter in the Iowa fair.

[B]

But that's the only place you're going to find three fair.

[A]

Right. I don't disagree with that. The. The point being is that we do have some evidence that shame is a commonly experienced.

[B]

Oh, I bet. Yeah.

[A]

Emotion.

[B]

Yeah. Okay.

[A]

Actually, I would say it's ubiquitous. I. I would say that everybody in the world. And I will speak this way. Has at some point experienced shame.

[B]

Oh, for sure. Most likely through falling short of the person you wanted to be.

[A]

Right. So we move into that. So we have shame, and then there's hurt and pain. Hurt is relational. When somebody says something to Threaten the relationship. It hurts. You step on my toe, that's pain. There's sadness. Sadness means there's loss. And disgust is something vile. So we were talking earlier about Charlie Kirk and. And discussed is part of the milieu of that experience.

[B]

A lot of people have expressed it to me, and my response is that is probably spot on and appropriate.

[A]

It's appropriate and it moves us. So emotions come from the word, the Greek word imovare, to move so they detect and direct. Got that? So I'm going to throw a quote in here from General Norman Swartzkopf, who was being interviewed by the oh so tender Barbara Walters and said, what is it like knowing your decisions will lead to the deaths of your men? And he began to shed a tear, and she jumped right on and she said, general, aren't you afraid to cry? He said something brilliant. I am afraid of the man who cannot cry. Because you lose somebody, you should cry about that. You get this newborn humor that you participated in for a minute. That should be a joy. We cry at that. We cry beauty, we cry at sadness, we cry at loss. Okay. Very unique human expression. But we have to do it. If you cannot do it when appropriate, it means you have muted your whole emotional system and tamped it down. You know what happens when you tamp energy?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It goes big. Yeah, right. And that's where the anger comes. And that's why we often see that anger in the expression of quote, unquote, ptsd, or quote unquote, the expression of ptsd. It's an illegitimate protective maneuver for the legitimate pain and fear and anguish that somebody's in. Okay? So the exiles hold this offense. So if you touch fire, there's a part of you, your cognitive capacity that says, I will never touch that fire again. I'll never get burned again. You run across somebody, let's say you have a bad run in with a Marine, or let's say a cop.

[B]

Okay?

[A]

You have a bad run in with a cop. All cops are dangerous. A part of you said says, don't go near them. Makes sense.

[B]

So it doesn't make sense to me, but I don't.

[A]

The example.

[B]

Well, I know. I know people who feel that way. And it's a. It's like, to me, it's an illogical thing to assume that because an individual experience speaks for a community.

[A]

So let me use a different example. Okay, let's say you're in a social group and somebody is not kind or good. You're like, yeah. And then there's a part of you that is on guard for whenever that person comes around. So it takes some of our cognitive energy. So instead of being integrated and whole, there's a part of us. And the metaphor that I use is think about having a battalion. You are a battalion. You're in command of a battalion. A battalion of capacities, talents. Got that? And you take a squad and go put them out there to make sure that Sally or Karen does it doesn't offend you or bring havoc to your life again. Okay. Part of that, your overall capacity gets distracted. Okay. Tad, or whatever you want to call it.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

When we go in and find this, what we do is we get rid of the perceived threat and bring that energy or those resources back to the command of the self again.

[C]

Okay.

[A]

So we're getting into the weeds a little bit. So managers are proactive. I will be controlling or I will be perfect. Or if I get enough awards and ceremonies, they can't criticize me as not being good enough. Okay. When it gets in extremis, we go down to the firefighters and I joke about this, but it's true. Firefighters respond to an alarm, go in and hose everything out.

[B]

Literally.

[A]

Literally. And then they pull everything apart to make sure there's no latent threats and embers, and then high five themselves for the destruction they've done on the way out.

[B]

I'm here for it.

[A]

I think it sounds fun, right? Yeah. And I've worked with a lot of firefighters, and believe me, I may joke about this, but I have deep regard for all of them. They're all shield bearers. We have to have safety. Okay, so we were ventured off in the ACE score. So that's all about safety. That is all about safety. Because we have to have safety. That's why the shield bearers are so important, because we have to have safety. Why do we have to have safety? Because aforementioned evil exists. Okay. There are people that just want to watch the world burn.

[B]

Truly.

[A]

Okay, look up dark tetrad, Machiavellianist, narcissist, sadist.

[B]

Do you think they come out of the box that way?

[A]

I am not convinced they do. There is always the nature, nurture. The answer is yes. I mean, nurtured, anything can reach a certain capacity. Neglect is nurturing toward one of those darker personality traits.

[B]

Do you think it's possible, even for a super small subset, but just for whatever reason, chemical makeup, physiological makeup, that they are just broken, absent the nature of nurture, like they're going to express in that way. If they're going to express in that way or does it always take outside influence, do you think?

[A]

So you ask the question, is it possible?

[C]

It's.

[A]

Yes, it's possible. The precedence is in question question. Right now, in any sociological geographic, there's 3 to 5% that fit into that dark tetrad. Really? Yeah. And it only takes one narcissist or one sociopath or psychopath. Are you familiar with Machiavellianist?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. So any one of those. It only takes one of those to just ruin a group. Yeah, it really does. And that's why it's so sad, so potent. And so you asked nature, nurture, and the answer is yes. And I have seen. So one of the pretty clear examples we have are kids that are orphaned in the Eastern bloc countries and they're in inhumane conditions, like infants put in a drawer, they shut the drawer, they bring them out to change them, give a new bottle and shut the drawer again. Okay. They're in. Able to connect, have empathy and connection.

[B]

Shocker.

[A]

Yep. Right. And so this is why. So one of the epiphanies that I had as a child before the age of 12, I was looking at my little brother. Brother who is six years younger than me. No, that would have been. I was 8, he was 2. And back in the 70s, we had these horizontal striped shirts, and he was in his diaper, and I was watching over him. Main street, usa. So it was pretty. And another little kid. And I walked, I looked down on him and I was like, this is the most precious anywhere in the world. And we cannot withhold anything that keeps them safe, healthy, and gives them challenge and growth. When I was 8 years old, very clear to me. And I think this is part of the maid, the nature stuff. I think I was made with this perception, this gift. Some people have mathematical skills, linguistic skills, etc. Etc. I think this was a gift that was given to. To me. Okay.

[B]

I would like to go on record and say I've had no epiphanies up at that age and in my life since then, just for clarity. Yeah, I certainly had no epiphanies at the age of eight, other than perhaps pants are appropriate to wear outside of the house.

[A]

That was probably an authority thing. Andrew, you will put on pants. My diaper's way better. You are 13.

[B]

Put on plants, the nudity phases. You're well past the acceptable societal norm on that.

[A]

Yeah. Oh, gosh. My son, he was at home with my wife one time, and he goes, mom, I gotta go pee. And she goes like, go pee. And he starts running out the back Door. She's like, where are you going? Outside. Why? It's so beautiful.

[B]

And also, it's way easier to do it when you're a dude. So. Wait, sorry.

[A]

We won.

[B]

We won the lottery on that one.

[A]

She's like, okay, okay, go. So we get around to the firefighters, right? Extreme behaviors. Rage is the biggest one. This is where we get a lot of our extreme behaviors in terms of addictions, cutting, dissociation, distractions. You talk about dopamine nation. I mean, that's what is all around us, is all these distractions. So the friend that I've just visited, he called me last night when I got here because he knew I was in training transit. And he goes, well, I smoked some venison. Oh, salmon. He goes, I'm gonna sit outside and listen to the silence. Yeah, we get way too distracted. Everything distracts us. So abusing substances, attempting suicide, binging on food, affairs, sexual addiction. It's prevalent. I'm trying to remember. Remember? Oh, gambling right now, especially with teens and college kids, is like a vertical takeoff, right?

[B]

Now look at the access they have.

[A]

Exactly, exactly. So it's like baby adders. They're the most dangerous. You know why?

[B]

Probably lack of control.

[A]

They cannot control the amount of venom they inject. Yeah, yeah. It's all or nothing.

[B]

Yeah. Well, let's see here. Young man without a fully formed prefrontal cortex and ability to make a decision. Decision, yeah. Struggling with gambling at your fingertips.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Color me not surprised.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. This is something that logic or intuition clearly leads us in the direction. Now, do we need to study it and verify the data behind it? Yeah, absolutely. But the data is showing it's out there right now.

[B]

I mean, let's work on. Morning, Zoe.

[A]

Got donuts.

[B]

Jeff Bridges, why are you still living above our garage?

[A]

Well, I dig the mattress, and I want to be in a T mobile commercial like you. Teach me. So, Dana. Oh, no, I'm not really prepared. I couldn't possibly at t mobile get.

[B]

The new iPhone 17 Pro on them. It's designed to be the most powerful iPhone yet and has the ultimate pro camera system.

[A]

Wow, impressive. Let me try. T mobile is the best place to get iPhone 717 Pro because they've got the best network. Nice. Jeffrey, you heard them. T mobile is the best place to get the new iPhone 17 Pro on us with eligible traded in any condition. So what are we having for lunch?

[B]

Dude, my work here is done.

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

New line minimum 100 plus a month.

[B]

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[A]

Taxes and fees required.

[B]

Best mobile network in the US based on analysis by Oklahoma Speed Test Intelligence data 1H 2025. Visit t mobile.com A strategy to combat it while we're studying that data, because what the data is going to show is what we already know.

[A]

Abstinence.

[B]

So easier said than done for a lot of people on a lot of subjects.

[A]

So Dr. Lemke has a protocol and I forget the name of it, but it's in her book. You can look up Dr. Anna Lemke and Restoring Normalcy, but she has a protocol. But the first one is abstinence. You have to choose because nobody else can choose for you. So I personally am in a recovering cussaholic and I tell my clients at times I can't shit for you. I can't because nobody can. And at some points you are going to have to make that decision. Wasn't your fault, fault, but it's your responsibility. You have the choice to accept that or not. If you don't, the dung heap is going to get bigger.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

If you do, you will grow as a human being. Absolutely. So that's one of the challenges that we have out there. We got to this. This is a little harder to exemplify one on one, unless you're doing kind of a therapeutic setting, but I found it to be one, if not now. Emdr, you talked about that in one of your podcasts, and I'm certified in that. I actually brought buzzers to do it if you wanted to know about that. But I would say I use them hand in hand. The IFS is one of the most effective approaches that I've utilized.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Yeah. I tell people that it's kind of like the work I used to do. I help people go find lost people. People and bring them out of the darkness into health. And it's one of the most rewarding things that you could do.

[B]

How could it not be?

[A]

And Matt, did you ever go on a rescue mission?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

How did it feel?

[B]

Pretty awesome when we were successful. Not awesome when they were briefing us the likely enemy combatants that were there and what we were going to be facing in comparison to the number of people we had. I really, really didn't. Never been great at math, but I understood that ratio.

[A]

You math that one out.

[B]

Hard not to. Thankfully, nobody was there. But Remember that brief? I'm looking around like everybody's, everybody's hearing these numbers. We're still doing this.

[A]

Okay, did you guys have fire?

[B]

There was shots taken from the roof. External, nothing internal.

[A]

Let me, let me clarify. Did you have fire from above?

[B]

As in like assets support? Yeah, no, we had a ground force.

[A]

Okay, so I've heard some pretty impressive things. I mean, I've, I've seen some of that, but that was 30 years ago. Right, But I've heard like our mutual friend talking about fire.

[B]

Oh, it's unbelievable. I mean, you want to talk about something? So if you have a small force and you might be going up against a massive force that levels the plane field, literally and figuratively.

[A]

Yeah, there's some implements that we have that can clear the football field in about 15 seconds. Yep, totally.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. So I don't think we had that. Plus we were going internal, so we didn't know. I mean, that wouldn't have helped very much because you're not going to do pre assault fires on a building where you're trying to rescue somebody.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Like I said, thankfully, nobody would ever believe that this military intelligence was not accurate.

[A]

Well, I would like, I would like to say a couple things about that. Number one, I am glad you're alive because Me too. Because what I see is a lot of goodness coming out of you. I try and that's all that's required of us.

[B]

So I, I feel obligated to, to try to make a difference.

[A]

Yeah. So that's a good question. What part of you feels that kind of compulsion to make a difference?

[B]

What's the point of any experiences that you may have in your life, good or bad, if you can't try to help other people with them?

[A]

Okay, is there a point in your life where you got a clear understanding of that? An event a person thought?

[B]

I think it was more just the example when I was young, from my parents.

[A]

Do you have a picture of that? And what would that picture be?

[B]

You know, there's something that sticks out in my mind and solid, like middle class family. My dad was a masonry contractor in Santa Cruz. And after the San Andreas earthquake in 89, let's just say there was a lot of work to be done in that field. And my mom did a bunch of administrative roles, oftentimes in the tech sector, not like working in technology and herself, but in the administrative side. So good money, but like solid middle class. Maybe the lower section of middle class.

[A]

What I hear is Americans.

[B]

Yeah, for sure.

[A]

Just.

[B]

Well, I want to make sure people. Because the example I'm going to give is providing to others. Even though it probably came at the cost of providing. Providing for us.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which you know, people can say well yeah, but if your parents were millionaires, you know, how much did it really hurt? And I actually don't know how much the giving hurt our family, if it did at all. But I remember for it was at least one Christmas, but I think two in a row. We, I was working through I believe an organization and we provided Christmas presents for a family in need on the southern end of the half moon bed. And my parents took my sister and I with us and I mean I didn't get to know the people that well known absolutely nothing about them, the story or the arc of their life afterwards. There was kids for sure didn't know the kids names. All I could really see was the reaction and it was a feeling of absolute joy from the kids seeing the presence. And I don't know what feeling I would associate with the parents. I think think it was a blend of relief and happiness honestly. Maybe just a touch of shame in there maybe that they weren't able to provide on their own and that's probably unavoidable and I hope that that was short lived for them. And again this is like 10 year old Andy trying to remember this.

[A]

Right.

[B]

But why would you not want to continue to try to pay that forward? I don't know if there's programs like that that exist here but I've lived a unique life as far as experientially. For whatever reason people seem to reach out and they ask for my opinion on things. So why would I not try to do exactly that. The example that was given to me from my parents.

[A]

Yeah. If I can slide something in. I think the reason people ask your opinion on some things and I want to kind of circle around to this and move. Got lots to talk about but is because you have a gift of discernment. Andy.

[B]

I'm not so sure I know what that means.

[A]

That means you understand right and wrong, wise and stupid. Doesn't mean you've always done it. You're going to go that way.

[B]

No, no. I don't know if I. Well, I don't know if I have that. I try to just answer honestly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I'm not afraid to say I don't know.

[A]

So let's go back to. I listened to the podcast from last Friday, cleared hot and somebody asked a question about intervening in domestic violence.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Do you recall that? Okay. So I want to talk. I'm going to talk about that, but I want to talk about suicide because it's way more germane to the audience that we're reaching for. So when you said that, it reminded me of a movie. Open ranks.

[B]

I don't know if I've seen that one.

[A]

Oh, Randy. Andy. Andy. Andy.

[B]

What year did it come out?

[A]

Michael's looking it up. Because Michael's going, oh, Walt's got Andy on a movie.

[B]

Trust me, he hasn't seen it either.

[A]

Yeah, that's fine.

[C]

It was 03, though.

[A]

03. Pull up the.

[B]

What do they call it?

[A]

Movie poster. Yeah, the poster. So is Kevin Costner and Duvall.

[B]

I have seen this.

[A]

Okay, so they're in the restaurant and they're talking about the corrupt land baron, who is the bully, right? And they're cowboys. And I mean, it's good to rewatch. Okay. And the guys he's talking to are Carter. So they go. They take their wagon. They go pick up mercantile and they bring it back to the community and sell it. Right? They're freighters, and they're talking about taking this guy on who's got hired guns. And the guy goes, what do you want us to do? We're just freighters. And Costner looks at him, he goes, you're men, aren't you? Right. So there's Dr. I knew. I'm going to Robert Lewis out of Little Rock. And he has a definition of a man as one rejects apathy, accepts responsibility, serves and loves courageously and seeks only a higher reward. Fairly good definition and has balls. That's the rejects. Apathy accepts responsibility.

[B]

No, I mean, like, literally.

[A]

So there's actually. We can talk about that because again, Huberman had.

[B]

And a penis.

[A]

Agreed. And agreed. Because when you talk about the SRY gene, which is the factor that kicks things into male development or not, that has to be element. That's the deciding factor. And you know what it creates? A penis and testicles. Yeah, yeah. As well as an angular inverted triangle versus the base of the triangle. More feminine. Okay, so this is what you did. Is you set, Said I stepped up. I knew was having an effect on my children. Again, noble and perceptive discernment. You showed the courage to step up and intervene and then call for backup. And you were like, I don't want to get involved in this, but I'm not going to let this guy run tyranny over the small microcosm of society we're in right now. Makes sense because we've been talking about that in the Shield bearers. Because that's what they do. They step up and say, here's the boundaries. Right. Okay. The other one is when you talked about suicidality, and I want to applaud you for that.

[B]

That's me repeating what I've talked with a lot of counselors about and people who have been left behind by that catastrophic act.

[A]

Great. It is one of the hardest things that we have to deal with, and I understand it. I'll talk about the understanding of it. Because it is an illegitimate resolution to the legitimate need. Mm. Legitimate need is I need to feel not so much anguish. I'm overwhelmed with anguish. Okay. And if you asked any therapist, they will tell you one of the hardest things to deal with is depression. Because the answer for depression is to move. Guess what they don't want to do.

[B]

Yeah. They don't want to move.

[A]

Don't want to move at all.

[B]

Because you feel like gravity is 10x what it actually is.

[A]

Right. So. And you. You honorably and graciously shared some of your story around that, and it was brilliant. Yes, the person has to move the covers. Yes, the person has to put their feet on the ground. But if they know that somebody's going to be there when they walk out of their bedroom, is exactly what helps them move toward better. You advise that person don't stop calling them. Yeah. When they stop calling you, that's an ominous sign. Okay, so Rich Deveny talked about duration, duration, path and outcome. They don't know the duration. They don't know the path. And the outcome is not able to see, not through the darkness. So well played. When you can help somebody create a path that takes one of the factors out. Don't know the duration, but maybe you can create a plan together to create, you know, shorten the duration and then the desired outcome again with post traumatic growth. Right. And depression's part of, as you revealed so graciously and humbly is depression's part of divorce. It's a grief process. So the five elements are depression, anxiety. Excuse me, Depression, anger. So D, A, B, D, A. Bargaining. Depression. Excuse me, Denial. Anger, Bargaining, depression, acceptance. The sixth stage, which is developed by a man who is a protege of Elizabeth Kubler Ross, says purpose. So we walk through that real quickly. Okay. Denial. No, no, no, my son isn't. Wasn't killed in an auto accident. Anger. Who did this? Depression. Pretty self evident.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Well, there's bargaining. Take me, not them. Take me, not them. Depression. And then acceptance. The P comes in. In purpose. This. Mothers Against Drunk Drivers.

[B]

It's a good example.

[A]

Make it. Yep. Okay, good. So we've got that. So you told him, keep connecting. Remember, a key component to every challenge in life goes back to attachment. It's all about relationship. It's all about relationship. We were designed for relationship. Okay. This gets into metaphysics. Right. Theology. If you want to. Higher belief beliefs. We challenge people to develop, ask the questions that get them to discern their meta beliefs because they will answer questions that cannot be answered by just data. Right. Why is there evil?

[B]

Hell if I know.

[A]

Yeah. Well, there are meta beliefs that will offer an answer to that. Right. And the big question is, do they promote or resist that destructive force? And so you have to have that in all of this because, like, you know and you know better than I, in war, there's some things that happen that you wouldn't do otherwise.

[B]

Yeah, for sure.

[A]

Right. Number one, is killing different from murder?

[B]

Killing probably depends on the eyes of the beholder.

[A]

I don't disagree. Right. And it gets very murky in there. Yep. Okay. But killing is to protect great boundaries. Murder is volitionally selfish. Right. I'm gonna hug you around the neck because you called me a cotton hint. And any muggins, I'm gonna shoot you from 200 yards away because you said something I didn't like. That's murder.

[B]

Agreed.

[A]

Yeah. So I want to commend you on that. It is very, very important. One of the things that we try to do in our shield bearers group at Camp David is to create three to five people you can call at 3am it takes a lot to create that kind of relationship. Yeah, it really does.

[B]

Or to believe that that type of relationship is real.

[A]

Absolutely. Absolutely. And this gets back to some of our conversations that we may or may have not had in our former life, but. Long live the brotherhood. What does that mean? Does that mean you will back me up no matter what? Or you can trust him with your life, but not your money or your wife.

[B]

Second one is a very common saying.

[A]

Yeah, it's. It's hard to find. I've been in places where I've found. In the teams where I found myself alone. Absolutely alone. Very, very hard. Yeah. Very, very hard. Right. Steve Viola. I met him at 18 Delta.

[B]

He's the dude who answered the. The telephone at Team five when he was on watch the night that I participated in the event that terminated me losing my trident for six months. He was the recipient of the Tucson police telephone call.

[A]

Oh.

[B]

He had choice.

[A]

How did he do?

[B]

Colorful words. When I returned to Team five.

[A]

There is Something about an ass chewing. That'll help you say straighten up.

[B]

Oh, his was about the fifth one I got that day. Yeah, the CMC flipped the table in the classroom right off the grinder. That's what we opened with.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then. Yeah, let's see. I got some from the exco. Had to do chief's mast. Got some in there. It was a couple days later that actually Steve told me that he answered the call. He kind of finished off the ash chewing with whatever pieces were left.

[A]

Was he career counselor?

[B]

He was, yeah.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

In my first reenlistment, he was the one.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have come to esteem him so deeply.

[B]

What's he up to these days?

[A]

He lives.

[B]

Other than being short, obviously.

[A]

He's not up to much then, huh?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

I can't say much myself. I peaked at 5, 9 and I've jumped out of perfectly good airplane. He's a parachute that may or may not work. So I'm not that tall anymore.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Lost some parts too.

[B]

Yeah. It happens.

[A]

Yeah. So he lives in Texas and he's very involved in service, veterans in recovery.

[B]

Awesome.

[A]

Especially with. And I can name psilocybin, but the psychedelics. So I don't know if you know or your audience knows that Texas has passed legislation with Governor Rick Perry and a guy named W. Brian Hubbard.

[B]

I've had one.

[A]

Oh, incredible, aren't they?

[B]

You remember when we had him on Michael, could you listen to him read the ingredients list on a David. That guy.

[A]

It goes kind of like this.

[B]

He's the modern day Marty Huggins, which you're not gonna get because that's a reference to a movie, I think called the Campaign with Will. With Will Ferrell.

[C]

Oh, actually, yeah. I have seen that. Yeah.

[A]

He.

[B]

Those two talk exactly the same. I would listen to that guy.

[A]

He has such a deep and smooth voice that the people of Texas could not resist passing this legislation.

[B]

He's got the voice, the pedigree and the knowledge behind it. He was fantastic when we had him on.

[A]

He's a redneck man. Yeah. But he is so intelligent, so passionate. Yeah.

[B]

So they pass. Are we talking like ayahuasca, baby gain type stuff?

[A]

So the state of. And I'm gonna. I'm gonna pressure the state of Missouri, where I'm from, the show me state. Show me that you really care about veterans. And let's get a bill to do the same thing. They took $50 million, 5,050 million dollars that they got from the opioid manufacturers that got sued for the opioid epidemic. Epidemic. And they're going to. So Texas took $50 million of their allotment and allotted it toward research with ibogaine, using veterans as the subjects with ptsd.

[B]

Awesome.

[A]

Very awesome. So I'm actually talking. I'm in. I have professional relationships with people who are trying to get that into legislation and passed in Missouri. Missouri actually passed an HBOT, which is hyperbaric oxygen treatment. So 1.6 ata. So low pressure, but does help with PTSD. HBOT is hyperbaric oxygen oxygen treatment. These are some of the multimodal approaches to recover from PTSD that we're talking about in all of the recovery from ptsd. It's not just group. Right. It's all these different things. The psychedelic assisted psychotherapy, I was introduced to that by a guy named Adam LaRoche. Heard that name before. Okay. Adam LaRoche, Major League Baseball player. Player. Look him up. He has the E3 Ranch Foundation. E3 Ranch foundation, and they support veterans and counter human traffic. Incredible stuff. He's got a lot of tier one connections, whether that's good or bad, but he's. He's got very capable people on his team. He worked with Chad Robichau, who does much of the same.

[B]

I was just with Chad and not Knoxville. Oh, really? Two days ago.

[A]

So, Matt Height intro. I've not met Chad, but I've. I've been introduced to his work in Mighty Oaks, etc. Etc. So. So Mighty Oaks deals with the. The meta narrative aspect of trauma.

[B]

So.

[A]

Adam LaRoche. I was at one. A deer hunt. I actually shot my first deer at his deer hunt hunt with a crossbow. And it was a doe. And I went back to kind of help out. I. They had a kid down there that was a gold star survivor from a Spec Ops guy and Green Beret and the deceased's best friend. Green Beret accompanied this kid down there. It was a beautiful thing, right? Again, we talk about. About our greatest commodity is time. He gave his greatest commodity to that kid because that kid's dad gave his greatest commodity his life for our country, right? So when I went down there, I was like, first deer, you got to eat the heart. Kids eyes went big, right? So I have acquired a recipe for venison heart, which you can. You can apply for the bovine or whatever you want to. Right. Etc. And it uses coffee grounds, really. Salt, pepper, rosemary, and bourbon. Have you ever heard of whole and wild?

[B]

No.

[A]

So look that up. And that chef, she presented that recipe. So I use it all the time with the heart.

[B]

I can't say I've ever eaten the heart of these animal.

[A]

Really? Yeah.

[B]

I find organ.

[A]

There's another one for you, Michelle.

[B]

Yeah, I find organ meat to have a. A little bit too much of an.

[A]

Irony taste for me, so. Not.

[B]

Not like irony. I r o n y I r. I'm talking I r o n. Iron. E Y. Iron.

[A]

E iron esque.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So it's a very different texture.

[B]

Oh, I bet that.

[A]

So you know how the liver is not, like, grainy like meat is muscle. It's smooth. But. But the liver has a grainy to it, and. And the. The cardiac muscle does not. It's. It's. It's very interesting. It's very smooth, but it's not grainy like liver.

[B]

All right.

[A]

Yeah. So I'll share that recipe, please do.

[B]

You know, it's not that I'm against it. Yeah, it's. And honestly, it probably does come down to either the preparation or what you're making it with.

[A]

As with almost all quarry.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, so I got. I got to cook the heart for that. That kit. Oh, there's butter in it.

[B]

Well, of course.

[A]

Of course. So she said, these are things you're commonly going to see at a campsite, a deer camper, bear camp, or whatever. So you know what the three secrets to French cooking is?

[B]

Nope.

[A]

Le bur. Le bur. Le bur.

[B]

Does that mean butter?

[A]

Butter, butter, butter. So I got this funny. I got this funny story, and I'll get to it because it ties into something else that we're talking about. Then we'll get back to Texas and ibogaine. So I have this friend who immigrated here from France as a pastry chef, and if you think I'm short and you think Steve's short, he's right down there with us.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Right. And he has his very sick French accent. And I'm like, dude. He calls me up one day. He goes, I'm going to the police academy. I'm like, how are they going to understand you? Like, this is Mean streets of Kansas City. Yeah.

[B]

He needs to go down to, like, New Orleans and work.

[A]

So we have. So unfortunately, and I don't know if it's still the case, we have the murder zip code of the nation.

[B]

That sucks.

[A]

Kansas City. It's really sad. Really, really sad. And so he had to train in linguistics, so, like, every third word is the F bomb. Stop the freaking ground. Put the freaking gun down, dude. He's told me some funny stories, so. And. And hard stories. I think police actually have the hardest job in our society. Agree. Because so many of the different factors. So he's on a call, he has to arrest. He's so smart too. And you want smart cops, not just bullies.

[B]

Agreed.

[A]

Or brutes. And he's so smart, he has to be by because he's like 5 foot 6. He always messes with me. I go, you want to go on? No, no, no, no, no, no. Right. So he comes over to my house for barbecue. He's like, oh, I've got this pain in my neck. I'm like, really? I go, sit down. Because I did massage therapy and kinesiology, all that stuff. And touch is actually one of the non medical healing modalities. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Very important. It helps to soothe the nervous system. Remember I talked about on patrol that I touched them, they touched me. It connects us to each other in a physical way. Energetic too. And so we sat down. I go, what's going on? You remember history, history, history. Oh, on Thursday, I was in a fight. Guy resisted arrest. I go, oh, did it go bad? Yeah, what happened? He went for my gun. Well, when you go for the gun, you have to bring the dominant hand to lock the device. And there's great locking systems on there, and it'll lock it down, period. Right. All you got to do is keep a thumb on it. And so I go, did you win? He goes, yes, I always win. I like, good. You should. Right. It took about 10 seconds for that knot. That was like a lacrosse ball in his trap. He's not that big. Maybe it was more like a marble. Big marble, Better marble. And it just released and he got up. He goes, I have to go. I go, what do you mean you have to go? I haven't even put the chicken on the grill. He goes, no, I have to go. So he goes to the bathroom, comes out 10 minutes later. Later. I go, what happened? He goes, when that let go, this let go? Well, if you look at the innervation of the vagus nerve, which controls sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system status, it innervates the lower bowels. So what happened? We got that to release that energy that was stuck in the body to release by safety connection, verbalization, rationalization through an objective perspective, okay. Because you don't want him to be stuck in that subjective position. And it released for him. He felt he was safe again. And then when that released, the bowels released. I was like, when did you have your last bowel movement? Sales day. I always take care of business before I go on Duty.

[B]

Probably not a bad idea.

[A]

Not a bad idea. Yeah. Right. And like before jump, better clear the pipe just in case you.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

And so it was three days, it was all stuck because of that. Right. So that's the nervous system they detect and direct. He wasn't safe. He was still. He wasn't in blue, which is super calm. Wasn't in green, which is public. Right. The yellow, orange, red. He was probably still in that yellow. Makes sense.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So this is the nervous system that we need to take care of. Sense Big part of it all. And I'm not sure where we were at.

[B]

You're going to tell me more about Texas and I begin.

[A]

Yeah. So Texas has passed this bill. Brian Hubbard and Governor Rick Perry have champion that. And I'm not sure when it starts, but Steve Eola is involved in some of that.

[B]

That's awesome.

[A]

Very good. Because I've seen over the last five years of studying this, I've seen it take place. I've gone on the, the treatments myself. I went down to what I call South San Diego.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It's wild that you have to cross an international border to legally participate in this.

[A]

Yeah, that's part of the debate because you know the schedule status of ibogaine, which comes from an African tree. They say it's habit forming and no medical use. Well, they're disproving that left and right.

[B]

I have never talked to anybody who has used ibogaine that expressed a desire to willingly do it again from an addictive perspective. They actually describe it as a pretty rough ride.

[A]

It is a rough, rough ride. Mine was dark. And that's what I brought.

[B]

Super common is what I hear.

[A]

It's about 30%. Yeah. That's what I brought back. And that's where I found up. Oh, not redwoods, but ifs. That's where I found out the part of me that was repressed, that had been abused. And when we talk about the ifs, the protectors. I had eight protectors protecting this six year old child. And it was very important to work through that. I didn't know was in there, but it was there. I tell people in the 20 years I've been married, my wife slept with eight different men. They all have the same blue eyes. Security name.

[B]

There's a couple ways I was thinking about going with that because my mind races.

[A]

But that's, that's why I say it that way, to lure you in.

[B]

Yeah. But then I'm like, yeah, you're talking about the same guy. Just eight different versions. Yeah.

[A]

One time I gave a.

[B]

Which one did she like best?

[A]

Current seems to be working okay. Not optimal because, you know, I poop, but I did a presentation with people in an addict recovery program, and I shared the ACE score with them. And somebody asked questions at the end, and I said. They said, what do you do if you get a score of 8? I said, you go into the seal teams and then become a therapist.

[B]

Yep. I mean, obviously, that's the only thing to do.

[A]

Well, we talked about this, and it's very interesting because. So did you ever hear about Rocky Carlock?

[B]

Why does that name ring a bell?

[A]

One of his last. He was in Bud's instructor. Prior to that, he was Red cell.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So he had a chest that you couldn't. I could. I could not get my hands around. I mean, it was like 62 or something crazy.

[B]

Just a Viking.

[A]

Well, but he had legs that were about as big as my arms. Lucky legs. And lucky they didn't break off and poke him in the Heineken.

[B]

People forget.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In the gym, there's a squat rack.

[A]

They do.

[B]

Justin tries back and buys.

[A]

But he was. He was so intimidating. And at the end of hell week, he goes, disney, I knew you'd be here. You're always laughing and smushing. Well, it's actually a nervous response that I have. I have a good friend that has it too. But I thought a lot of the shenanigans were the activity was fun.

[B]

It was.

[A]

Right. I mean, if I could physically do it, I would go back and do it again.

[B]

I mean, let's not go that far.

[A]

I mean, not all of it. Just the fun stuff.

[B]

I mean, I was 19, 18 going on 19. It was where I wanted to be. It was a blast.

[A]

Right, Right.

[B]

Aspects of it. It was a blast bookended by aspects that were the opposite of a blast. But then you'd go back to having a blast eventually.

[A]

So it was the island.

[B]

I'm like, what? What are we doing out here for 30 days? Throwing grenades, Learning the basics of fire maneuver. Like, let's go.

[A]

So when I was out to the island, remember I talked about Lieutenant Don Thompson?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

He said, disney, when we get out to the island, I want to see Mickey Mouse ears on you for your first swimming call. Hoo ya.

[B]

Yeah. Which is. Yes. No, it's everything.

[A]

It's everything. It's. It's. Yeah, it's the white sock. It fits on everything. So we get out there and he goes, disney, did you get those Mickey Mouse ears? About that Lieutenant? He's like, you didn't fail a mission. Nope. No sir. Hoo ya. I'll see at 5am tomorrow morning. Of course you're up till 12 o' clock in the morning cleaning weapons at the break. And so I went to the galley and built this nice out of cardboard, pipe cleaners, aluminum foil and Sharpies. I love Sharpies. Yeah. Showed up at 5am for the swim call. I'm standing there tall. He comes over, Disney comes over, looks at me, just laughs. Laughs, Right. There's so much good humor there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then turns around, walks away. Doesn't even give me an inspection.

[C]

Right.

[A]

Yep. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. Man. The comical nature of that course.

[A]

Oh God, it could be so fun. One of my funnest times. So I was at the first phase for a while and then went to third phase. So when we were on the out on the island and we did the 14 mile run, I was in the ambulance at the back. We had this instruct Pepper taste. Did you ever.

[B]

I remember that name. Yeah.

[A]

So he's very dark Hispanic origins and his swim buddy was like pasty white like me. And so Dodd Coutts named him Salt and Pepper. So he got the name, he got the name Pepper. Right. So he would go out and get hammered the night before. Just hammered. And he would lead the run and when he was, could be inebriated, no pain. No pain or no brain. No pain. He's all numb. He would hit a blistering pace and we'd be on the island and he would take, he would run in a speedo.

[B]

Nobody wants to see that.

[A]

Nobody wants to see that. Nor do they want to see him pull it up and tuck it into the cleft between the two glutes.

[B]

Nobody.

[A]

And I'm sitting, I'm sitting there. Back in the ambulance. Go doing gentlemen, this is your life for the next two hours and 30 minutes.

[B]

If somebody watching from the outside, seal training and the community, oh, they would.

[A]

Certify him as crazy.

[B]

Well, they would think that most of the people were trending towards being gay. There's a lot of gay stuff that happens.

[A]

So I'm quoting somebody. This is a quote from somebody else else who said you can't out gay a Marine.

[B]

I have seen that. I have seen basically an outgaying competition and it got really out of control really fast.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Nobody wants to cry, quit first.

[B]

No, I left. I'm like this has gone too far. Nobody should see this in their life. I'm out.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

So there was in my second platoon we had all seasoned guys except for Two Jos. And we went out to Nyland and one of the senior senior guys brought a hot dog out. And as the corpsman, I said, that's a no go. We're not gonna do that one. Yeah, not gonna do that one. No. No.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So we're. We're back from hot dogs and pepper tagles, sputcheeks. So one of the things I did is I just had this droll monotone voice the whole time. And you know San Clemente is a national forest.

[B]

No, I didn't know that.

[A]

There's one tree where it's at mile 12. I said, gentlemen, everybody look right. That's the San Clemente National Forest. You're now entering. Entering San Clemente National Forest. Look straight. You have now left San Clemente National Forest. Yeah, it was. That's the kind of humor that's really fun. So on to better things. And humor is very important. So when I talk about the shield bearers group, I don't get back to the ibogaine. Yeah, I talked about the shield bearers group. It is 12 weeks, once a week to create a community. It's psychotherapy, educational group mixed with the authenticity and anonymity of aa. This is very important. The grace of church and the humor of the locker room.

[B]

It's a really good combination.

[A]

And everybody says, I'm in when they hear the fourth one. There's two really important aspects to that.

[B]

Does it have to be in person? How do you do this?

[A]

Yeah, it is important in person right now. But here's the big hairy audacious goal is like minded therapists out there who give two shakes about the people that give us the freedom to do what we want to do, even if it's stupid and will help develop. Because the big hairy audacious goal is like AA or 12 step programs. You can go to it anywhere in the world 247 and connect with a human being who knows a similar vein of experience and rules. This is very important, Andy, because most of the guys like we talked about, you can't talk about. Wow, man, I'm really struggling with this. So here's There's a couple demographics. So police and fire. If they go, hey, I'm struggling, it's so insufficient, it's criminal. They're like, okay, well, go to an EAP person. EAP person is like the government, unfortunately. And this is not the case in all cases. It's a newer person living off a business model that includes insurance. I would not participate in that because they wanted to pay me 50% of my going rate, market rate, to do twice as much work because of paperwork, reporting, and then wait 90 days to get paid. That is not a successful business model that creates somebody who's stressed out, who's not getting their baby, basic needs met. They're not living safely, or they're fawning because they were trained to be fawned. And that may not be healthy either. Now, there's a lot of good people out here doing this, but you have to go to somebody competent. Alliance, in other words, do I get you? Okay, so you and I have been speaking now for a little while.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Right. And you have developed some sense of who I am. Whether I get your mix or Not alliance is 85% of it. If I don't get you, doesn't matter how theoretically competent I am for sure. Right. You have to feel safe. You have to feel seen, soothed, safe, secure. This is called interpersonal neurobiology, and it's defined by Dr. Daniel Siegel, which you'll find a lot about him. And without that, can't have anything. You won't get the progress that you get. The other thing is, there's some stuff that's pretty overwhelming, and not everybody can. Has the constitution for that. So I've had to walk with an officer where he was attacked by a mother carrying a knife, point forward with aggression toward his clavic or subclavicular, actually his carotid artery. He had to shoot her. The baby died in the process.

[B]

It's a lot.

[A]

That is a lot. That's a lot of BS in your wheelbarrow. Not everybody can handle that.

[C]

Right.

[B]

Yeah. I don't think you're supposed to be able to handle that.

[A]

Well, be able to be with somebody in that, you have to recognize how evil it is. It was evil. I mean, it was evil. So the group is trying to create the safe place. This officer said if he didn't have this group, he wouldn't know where he would be. Actually, yes, I do. I'd be in the bottle getting a divorce. My life crushing. My family being crushed. Crushed. My kids being crushed. So our mission is not only shield bearers, but also their families.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We're trying to get up to scale. And the scale is this is a big, hairy, audacious goal is to get a place somewhere in the world 24 7. Now, you might say that sounds like it probably can't be done.

[B]

Not with that attitude.

[A]

You started it. So. So that's what I've been called to do. I tell people I'm an Empty nester. And I got about 20 years.

[B]

So we have been at this for over three hours, which that's how you know you're having an awesome. Does not feel like three hours. Yeah, but much more than that. And we'll start losing the audience just due to time. So because there's two aspects, obviously, where you live. People could find you if they're in that geography. Yeah, but that's a glass ceiling to a degree. How do counselors, therapists, people in your line of work, get a hold of you to replicate what you're doing and work with you?

[A]

Yeah. So I work with Dr. Chris Ostrander has created a soft network of therapists, which is good, but me personally, the curriculum is hard to develop because I can give the same class on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. And it's same subject, different every time.

[B]

Yeah, for sure.

[A]

Because you're in a different mix. You have to feel that. So. Www.camp david.org www.camp-david.org is the website that'll lead you to me. Walt. Www. Or waltamp-david.org.

[B]

You need to throw Disney in there. Walt Disney at. Lean into it.

[A]

Well, so we were talking. Yeah, so we were talking about the shift Wave chair and like to talk about that. They've helped us. But when you go to order a shiftwave chair and they can. That's shiftwave. Co. Not. Com. But co. Yeah, but when you do a forward slash. Walt Disney, that's how you order under my name. And when they do that with the shiftwave chair, share, what happens is that money. I'm an ambassador, so I basically get paid a commission. Well, that allows me. Well, it gets them like free shipping on a free bag, which you haven't seen. But it pays me a commission. That's how I'm doing this. Because I have scaled my private practice. Not taking any new clients unless they're a shield bearer. Not taking any new clients. Clients. Right. I've scaled that back so far. I've got to have some stream. And right now funding. This has been my wife's weight loss program.

[B]

Do you take just straight donations?

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. At the website.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Www.camp-david.org. yeah.

[B]

Okay. Because that's another. I mean, sometimes I have actually found fundraising to be one of the most difficult things I've ever done. But there are people out there and. And I've heard people say, well, I can only give five bucks. I'm like, listen, who cares, right? I don't care if it's 5 cents.

[A]

Right.

[B]

You don't Know, like the kid throwing the starfish.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You don't know how close you are to picking up the next one.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Somebody.

[A]

Well, it takes somebody. Somebody to partner with us is somebody who has empathy and recognition for the cost of keeping our society safe through veterans, the military. Military, law enforcement, fire medic, and frontline medical. So RNMDs, they're not perfect either.

[B]

No.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I would actually look at throwing 911 dispatchers into that.

[A]

Absolutely. And I, I mean that when I talk about law enforcement.

[B]

I, I'm glad and forgotten.

[A]

Very overlooked. And I'm glad you mentioned that because I've worked with them. It is. It is one of the scariest situations in there because one of the greatest, greatest cognitive aspects about trauma is powerless, helpless. And I've worked with a dispatcher who was the dispatcher when two of the officers from their agency were gunned down, and they could do nothing about it except keep calm and call more people in. So, yes, they are absolutely included in that. Here's another one that's overlooked. We have somebody in our community who's been a chaplain for 35 years. So imagine being the one who has to always carry somebody through the mud pit.

[B]

Yeah. They're spending their time propping other people up.

[A]

Exactly. And the gentleman that I'm talking about who would admit this, I can, I will quote him, said, this has changed my life. I was always the one giving, and now I found a safe place to receive and just be. This happens. Yeah. Nothing set in stone. We're open to reasonable approaches. The other thing is, when a shield bearer goes through our program, it's free 99. That is free 99. Yeah. If you really want to contribute, you can contribute. Free 80. Free.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Why? Because there's people out there who care about. See, you care about the weight that you're bearing, hence the shield bearers. So lots of good stuff. And, you know, we're trying to create a network. Should we be concerned about that?

[B]

Nope.

[A]

Oh, that's fair. God bless them, man.

[B]

Good chance they're going to a medical call.

[A]

Yeah. Well, that's interesting because a lot. And this is the vast majority of their calls. Right. What, what, what happens with fire is burnout. Because it's like, I signed up to be a fireman, now I'm carrying somebody down the stairs again. Right. Fifth time this month. Yeah. Right. It's very trying, Very trying. So, yeah, a lot of that stuff out there, but we have a lot of hope in Missouri, Ohio and Florida. There's ETMS, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. People can look it up. ETMS, MO.com, eTMShohio.com, ETMSflorida.com fire, medic, veteran. So first responders, veterans and their families can get that treatment for free. Helps with sleep, anxiety, depression, cognition. One of our guys went through it. He had an inactive area in his brain via eeg and it got reactivated through it.

[B]

That's awesome.

[A]

It's helpful for autism. It's. It's crazy. Amazing. Non invasive. Right. And the states are funding it because they're seeing that. And how many. How many times have you come across somebody go, oh, I didn't know I could get. Get that.

[B]

Oh, because. Too many to count.

[A]

Because the VA is an open book. Right.

[B]

I mean, they are an open book, but there's no glossary. An index.

[A]

Right. It's the one they throw at you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

When they say no.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Well, I feel like we need to do round two at some point. Next time you're up in the area, we need to record another. I mean, I don't know. I don't know where your travels take you.

[A]

Okay. Andy, I want to tell you this with the deepest regard. I came here just for you, just to do this.

[B]

Well, that's awesome. Well, will you do it again?

[A]

I want to tell you, next time they'll fly.

[B]

I'll fly you up. Because I don't know if you notice, airplanes get you places faster than cars. Yeah.

[A]

I will tell you, windshield therapy is good therapy.

[B]

Oh, I love it.

[A]

I have. I. You know, I came up to see two people. I've seen three people. Excuse me. Right. Johnny, you and Jim. On the way home. I'll go see Jim. He's a couple hours away. These were guys that were in my first platoon. Right. Because when you show up for people, they feel loved.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And that's what keeps us alive and hopeful. So I would love to come back. There's a whole lot more. I was dreaming of talking you into wearing the ship shirt that I shared with you.

[B]

I'll wear it on another episode.

[A]

Awesome. So, yeah, that is our.

[B]

I mean, Michael, we're gonna do a Friday episode. I think tomorrow we'll both wear it. I'll force him. He won't have a choice. That is, he can't stop me from.

[A]

What shirt is this the one he gifted you.

[C]

Oh, yeah, yeah, we'll wear it.

[B]

Were you hit in the head when you were young?

[A]

So tb. TBI is another thing, right?

[B]

He doesn't have tbi.

[A]

We can give it.

[C]

That's just how I am.

[B]

He suffers from not paying attention, so syndrome.

[A]

So the shirt. The shirt is. And hopefully you can stick it up there. Yeah, yeah, throw it up there. The. The shirt is a graphic and it says. My preferred pronoun is we.

[B]

He was about to hold it up without turning the camera on.

[A]

I was gonna get the right shot. Yeah. So the reason this is. The reason this is important is because when I get over me, we make a better we. And I've actually heard you use that phrase before. So I am in consideration of starting a podcast called A better we.

[B]

You 100% should.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Do you sell that shirt?

[A]

We do sell it. It is on our website again, www.camp-david.org.

[B]

If people buy that. Is that an indirect way to help?

[A]

It is a. Actually, it's a direct way because it's direct to consumer. They can. It is our flagship swag. I had another shirt on yesterday. It was the American flag with 13 stars and said, I didn't start fighting until I started fighting back. I'll send you a picture sometime.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So point being is that. Yes. But the reason this is so important is because, like you and I said earlier, we're at a juncture where we have to keep the Republic. People don't like hearing this is the greatest country in the world. This is the greatest Republic. There's never been one that has established such safety. Freedom and opportunity comes with security. I love immigrants. My wife is actually an immigrant. And we've got to maintain that, not just for us, but for those who this is their only hope. And I've talked to hundreds of immigrants and they're like, the US Is our only hope.

[B]

Yeah. And so there's a reason why they're coming here.

[A]

Yeah. So when I get over me and I try to love, understand, and serve my neighbor. Right. That's how we make a better we. That's why we made that shirt.

[B]

It's a cool shirt.

[A]

It also gets into the ifs because there's a whole lot of weed ease in there. Makes sense.

[B]

It does, yeah.

[A]

Andy, this has been a pleasure. Thank you so much, Michael.

[B]

Less of a pleasure on your side, Michael. Constantly getting things right yet wrong.

[C]

Michael, professional fence sitter.

[A]

You know, I bet you are. There is professional vet setter. That was.

[B]

That's a fence sitter.

[A]

Oh, fence it so people don't get to see the person behind the scenes. But I know you're the one that actually makes Andy look good because you take all this and make it straight.

[B]

That's accurate.

[A]

Yeah. So thank you very much.

[C]

Yeah. It was possible to make Andy look.

[B]

Good, but it's never going to happen. But he tries.

[A]

You know, we polish whatever material is given to us.

[C]

Right.

[B]

I'm the shiniest turd you've ever seen, though.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Looks really good.

[A]

So I'm going to make a suggestion, and you don't have to do this. So due to cold plunge, I dislike cold water.

[B]

Shockingly enough, so do I. Yeah, no, I'm familiar with it.

[A]

My wife goes, hey, let's go vacation on the beach. I'm like, do you understand a guy from the Midwest, My first exposure to the beach was to be tortured with it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I'm like, I'm either gonna run on it or swim in it. So I'm not gonna sit here and bake. Yeah. So I do the poor man's cold plunge or cold water, which is 52 degrees, for 11 minutes. Composite in the week. That's the science.

[B]

11 minutes total.

[A]

Yeah. So you break that up, and it's about a minute and 40 seconds.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. So I won't do it for you all today, but at the end of my showers, I turn it to cold and I sing the national anthem. Actually, just the first verse because otherwise it would be too long. So when I was growing up, they would end the TV channel production at the end of the day with the national anthem.

[B]

So you think that's. We should end the podcast with.

[A]

So I think that this is such a fantastic podcast that you should consider that.

[B]

Michael, what are your thoughts? You get an equal say.

[C]

That sounds. I don't want to sing it.

[A]

We don't want to sing it either way.

[B]

Did you talk about him singing?

[A]

This is what I have to deal with, so. Actually, I can explain. This is PTSD manifested because.

[B]

Remember when I said what he suffers from not paying attention?

[C]

No, this is. Okay. I said that because he said. Walt said that he sang it in the shower. So I thought he was inferring that.

[A]

You, for some reason, that one of.

[C]

Us should sing it at the end of the episode.

[A]

It's your podcast.

[B]

I don't know what to do with you sometimes. I understand how you got there.

[A]

How old are you? You, Michael?

[B]

He's 23.

[C]

5. Don't listen to him.

[B]

So I understand how he got there mentally, but it's like, why did you take that off ramp? It was so not the direction we were heading.

[A]

So I just want to say this. You're doing a whole lot better at 25 than I. Oh, I.

[B]

Same here.

[C]

Yeah, dope. That's cool.

[A]

Don't say dope.

[B]

What do you see? Yeah, you just went back. You've regressed.

[A]

I don't grapple, but I might go on. Yeah, that one. Dope, dude.

[B]

What do you think? Not you. Singing for clarity sake. Ending the podcast with the national anthem.

[C]

Yeah, we could do that. I mean, I don't know how many people would stick around to listen, but we could still do it.

[A]

Commies.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

So you're, you're, you're for it?

[C]

Yeah, the whole thing.

[A]

Hey, he just stepped onto one side of the fence, but then he's like.

[B]

Well, what do you mean the whole thing? First 20 seconds.

[C]

First verse, like Walt does.

[A]

It's a:40. Do you know in the, at the super bowl, they bet on how long the national anthem will be? Plus or minus, like, second.

[B]

There are sites now you talk about, you know, young men out of control and killing. You can bet on the weather. You can bet on. Yeah, actually, you can bet on like horrific things happening in like, it's. We shouldn't have access to do that.

[A]

Well, it's, it's, it's a gross abomination. But that's why, that's why we need to find.

[B]

That's how I'm going to start describing Michael. Actually.

[A]

That's the perfect gross abomination.

[B]

Yeah. Wow, Mr. That's pretty accurate. Do me a favor, voice actor, give me your best rendition of the national anthem. Not right now as a singer. Well, we're gonna, we're not. We're gonna find out since you're doing your voice work and sliding.

[A]

So Michael, Michael, why don't you, why don't you show Andy? Oh, my gifts I gift gave you.

[C]

I believe. I took a quick look. These are vocal warm ups, correct?

[A]

These are elocution exercises.

[C]

Yeah, yeah, there's a, there's a. There's a whole bunch of them here.

[A]

So it may or may not surprise.

[B]

You that is this like the anchorman stuff? The Human Torch applied for a home loan.

[A]

You're right.

[C]

I've seen that one, by the way.

[A]

So at one point I started working, working toward doing some voice work. And so this was what my coach gave me. So I actually want to encourage you to do this.

[B]

I actually did too, because he texted me, was all embarrassed, and I said, that's awesome. Let me know what you need. And then he turned around and turned off my microphone.

[C]

Sabotage.

[A]

Now that is worth some gorilla tape. But we'll talk about that later. But here's what I want to encourage you to Do. And this goes back to the man in the arena. Right. Dare greatly. Yeah, dare greatly. Because you know what? If you don't get there, you got somewhere you did more than most won't. I will tell you this. It is a. This was. So I have a friend at church who was a radio station manager and he would sit at his computer running the station and he had a great, great voice and he would see things popped up on the. The. I think it's voices. 1, 2, 3. There's a couple other one. If you Google voice actors, they would be up and gone so quickly. It was really hard to get the jobs.

[C]

Oh yeah.

[A]

There's so many people. Especially now with technology. Almost anybody can do it in there. Right. And that's what I could not do is spend that much time doing it. So I had to reallocate my time resour to my wife and four kids.

[C]

Yeah, that's fair. I feel like that's a.

[A]

How do you think about that decision? Yeah.

[C]

I don't have a wife and four kids, so I might be able to swing it.

[A]

We should talk about that.

[B]

You should dare greatly. But let's just remember you're not very good at stuff. All right, so like realistic.

[A]

How is he? How is he a bjj?

[C]

I suck.

[A]

What's your, what's your belt level?

[C]

Purple.

[B]

He's purple belt? Yeah. He's very good.

[A]

How many, how long you been doing it? About six years. Okay. I want to tell you something. I've done a little rolling and I like it a lot. I can pull stronger than I can push, especially with my shoulders. And there was a 16 year old girl who was the daughter of one of the black belts at Ground Zero BJJ in Kansas City. Derek Ruffin, Shout out the Man. And this little girl who I'm guessing 92 pounds, worked me. I'm like, oh my gosh.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

People don't believe how effective it is until you actually grab up and lock up with somebody who knows what they're doing.

[A]

Right.

[B]

You're in trouble if you don't train. You're in trouble.

[A]

Right, right. Very, very effective. Very effective. So my hat's off to you. Well done.

[B]

He's a very. He's a very good purple boat. I would say I'm not a coach. I'd say you're getting close to your brown boat.

[C]

I don't want to be a brown belt. I'm good with purple.

[B]

You don't get to choose.

[C]

I know I don't, but I'm good with sticking a purple for?

[B]

Well, just remember I'm not a coach, so I might be completely wrong.

[C]

I hope so. You usually are.

[B]

So that is an accurate.

[A]

Michael, do you want to know what the worst denigrating name you could call anybody in the SEAL team names?

[B]

Quitter.

[A]

Quitter.

[C]

Oh, I'm not gonna quit.

[A]

But if you don't go for Brown, guess what you're doing?

[C]

Mentally quitting.

[B]

Hashtag, suck it.

[C]

Like I said, it's not up to me, so.

[B]

No, he's good.

[A]

Yes, it is up to you. It is up to you to put forth the diligence. So, anyway, so with everybody out there, don't give up. There is hope. There is one way. Just like the watch, just like what we talked about. Get in touch with people who are on this path. That's what 12 steppers do, and you won't find them at the ba. Okay.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So, Andy, thank you so much. I would be honored to come back and share more.

[B]

Oh, we have to.

[A]

For sure. Yeah. It's up to you, sir. Thank you. God bless America.