← THE ED MYLETT SHOW
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- [00:00]
Ed Mylett
So, hey guys, listen. We're all trying to get more productive and the question is, how do you find a way to get an edge? I'm a big believer that if you're getting mentoring or you're in an environment that causes growth, a growth based environment, that you're much more likely to grow and you're going to grow faster. And that's why I love Growth Day. Growth Day is an app that my friend Brendan Burchard has created that I'm a big fan of. Write this down growthday.com forward/ed. So if you want to be more productive, by the way, he's asked me, I post videos in there every single Monday that gets your day off to the right start. Got about $5,000, $10,000 worth of courses that are in there that come with the app. Also, some of the top influencers in the world are all posting content in there on a regular basis, like having the avengers of personal development and business in one app. And I'm honored that he asked me to be a part of it as well and contribute on a weekly basis. And I do. So go over there and get signed up. You're going to get a free tuition, free voucher to go to an event with Brendan and myself and a bunch of other influencers as well. So you get a free event out of it also. So go to growthday.com that's growthday.com Ed, are you someone who tries to drive all distracted by your phone? Someone who props it on the steering wheel or peeks down at it for a glance or just scrolls and scrolls? If so, you could be the next person to get into a thunder bender, get a ticket, veer off the road, or even cause a crash that kills you or someone else. Enough already. Put the phone away or pay. Paid for by nhtsa. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart Choice. Progressive loves to help people make smart choices. That's why they offer a tool called Auto Quote Explorer that allows you to compare your Progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies. So you save time on the research and can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you. Give it a try after this episode@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. This is the Ed Mylett Show. Welcome back to the show, everybody. So to get on this show twice, I have to really be impressed with how you do. To get on the show three times means you're a Hall of Famer all time on the show. And slash, I really, really like you. And in this case, all of the above fits. The gentleman that's on the show today, he's got a new book out. It's called Masters of Uncertainty. He's highly qualified to write it. I consider him a friend. I like him very much. His background is, I'm supposed to say that he led an elite Seal team, Seal Team 6, when he was in his former lifetime. He's one of the great leaders of all time. I think he's one of the brightest minds that I've ever had on the show before. And we're going to talk about today a topic that is perfect for these times, which is really dealing with and thriving in uncertainty. And that's why he wrote the book Masters of Uncertainty, which I've written a blurb in in the front of the book on his behalf, because I believe in him in the book so much. Rich Devini, welcome back. Third time's a charm.
- [03:33]
Rich Devini
Ed, thank you so much. It's great to see you, my friend. And I'm, I'm honored to be back and honored to be, be, be a friend. So thank you.
- [03:40]
Ed Mylett
Likewise, brother. You start the book. I don't usually even do interviews like this, by the way. You can read this book in a day if you choose to everybody. But it's beefy enough and has enough information that it's of your time as well. But he starts the book with a story that not everybody in the world would be capable of telling, but he can. So you start the book with the bin Laden raid, where the book literally opens up. Why you do that? I guess it's illustrative of an uncertain moment. But let's talk about that raid and then the lessons from it.
- [04:08]
Rich Devini
Yeah, it's, well, it's both illustrated in as an uncertain moment, but it's also when, when it comes to spec ops missions, it's kind of the most well known mission, you know. So it's, it's widely known, it's widely talked about. It was something I could talk about which people kind of know the, they know what happened and they know the outcome. And, and it's really more of a reminder to say, hey, this was a mission that was, even though it was quick in terms of time that the, the unit was tasked till time of operation, there was tremendous amount of spent time spent on rehearsals, planning. This is what we're going to do. This is the angles. These are, everything's going to happen. This is what's going to happen. And as soon as they hit the target, things went out the window, helicopter crashed, and they had to now improvise. And I think it's just a testament to the fact that SEALs or Spec Ops folks, we just live in this world of uncertainty, challenge, and stress. And we are, in fact, our. Our mantra, our superpower, is the fact that we can actually thrive in uncertainty, challenges, stress. And so that's why I felt like the mission was a good one to open with.
- [05:10]
Ed Mylett
It's really good. There's all these terms in the book, and some of them reminded me of previous conversations. So what I want to do today is kind of layer a few things conceptually, because it kind of gets to the root of your work. And even something. I remember way back one, when on one of the shows we did, I was talking about peak performance. And you know, yeah, that's good. I'm using my phraseology. Go. But what we really are looking for is optimal performance. And so before you start to answer these things, you guys, your job, when you're hearing an interview, because not all of you are leading elite military teams, but you are leading a life and a family and a business. And more than ever, times are uncertain. And your ability to have some of these concepts at your disposal could literally make or break your business, your family, or your life. So what's the difference between peak performance and optimal performance? Because that's, That's a good place to at least lay the first foundation.
- [06:03]
Rich Devini
I think it's a terrific place. And then the idea is that peak. And I was, I was, I was pressed with this question even when I was in the teams doing work like this and, and, and peak. And people used to say, you Navy SEALs are the ultimate peak performers. And I used to disagree with that statement. And the reason is because peak, by definition, is an apex. And there's only one place you can go from an apex, and that's down. The other thing about peak performance is that often it has to be planned for, scheduled, and prepared for. The professional football player plans and schedules his entire week so that he can peak for three hours on Sunday. Well, Navy SEALs don't get to do that. We don't get to do that as regular human beings. We have to. We have to perform with what we've got. And so I used to say, we are optimal performers. Optimal performance means I'm going to do the very best in the moment, whatever the best looks like in that moment. So sometimes our best moment looks like peak. And it's flow states and everything's clicking and everything's grooving and cool. Sometimes our best in the moment, however, is I am just head down slogging it out, because that's all I have right now. And it's dirty and it's gritty and it's ugly and it's hard. And that is still performing optimally. And so optimal performance allows us two very important things. First of all, it allows us to celebrate those times when we are not at peak, when we are slogging it out and it's gritty and it's dirty and it's ugly and it's hard. I can't tell you, Ed, how many missions we went on. And we get back from the mission and we're like, man, that was ugly. But we still got the job done right? The other thing optimal performance allows us to do is what I call responsible energy management. In other words, I don't need to be peak. When I'm driving to the grocery store, I can be at some other energy level. And a myth I'll bust about Navy SEALs, because people might have seen it in TV and movies, is might see a group of SEALs getting ready to go on a mission. And right before they do, they huddle up like a, like a sports team, and they're hoo yaoing and high fiving like they're getting ready to take the field. I'm telling you, that never happens, okay? Never. In fact, a lot of times we'd be in helicopters flying into combat, and the guys around me would be napping. They'd be asleep. And there's a reason for that. We don't know what's coming. We don't know how long we'll be out there. We don't know what's going to be required of us energetically. We don't want to waste an ounce of our energy doing things we don't need to do. So optimal performance can be thought of as this umbrella underneath which peak lives and gutting out lives and even recovery lives. And we're constantly modulating ourselves inside of that umbrella so that we're optimizing what we need in the moment.
- [08:15]
Ed Mylett
You know, guys, when you listen to people that come from a background like Rich's, you'd think that there'll be some things today that'll just sound like kind of written leadership principles. You know, that's not Rich's work. We're actually going to get into breathing your. Your neurochemistry today. Like, this is not the guy you picture. Trust me. I've Always wanted to ask you this, but I'll frame it under something that's in the book. And I didn't. I wanted to ask you the first time I interviewed you. I didn't get a chance. So, first off, the question is going to fall under the predictability paradigm part of the book. Okay. But I want to ask it to you a little bit differently than you just figure your way through it. I always wanted to ask you the transition out of your former life in the military to a civilian life. You. You are seemingly a normal person. Like what you just said so in the seals, and we have a mission. And then my mind flashes. You know what I just thought of when you said that? The things this man has seen and experienced in his life compared to all of us listening, is so different. And for you to say that like a mission. But then I know enough from knowing you and some of the other guys to know a little bit of you have literally had a seat in life that is. It's unbelievable the things you've seen and done. So transitioning out of that life to now, you're living in an apartment or a house, and you're going to the grocery store every day. Can you talk about that transition and also what the predictability paradigm is? Because I have to imagine even in that transition, you had some idea of what you thought it would be like, and it couldn't. It must have been a little bit different anyway.
- [09:56]
Rich Devini
It's always different. And I think transition for anybody is going to be difficult. I think there's a distinct reason why. So I will say. I will say this. First of all, I think I'm very fortunate. I was able to transition fairly smoothly. And I think there are a couple reasons for that. I think one of the reasons is because I was ready to. I mean, it was 21 years in the Navy. I had deployed my ass off. I had been away from my family for a long time. I had no real interest in going up in the ranks and continuing to be away. And so I was ready. I had accomplished all of the goals in the teams that I'd set out to accomplish. And I think that's a big piece. I think guys who maybe get out prior to be able to say that may have some issues. I think one of the big factors, though, on healthy transition is it actually gets into one of the chapters of the book, and that is identity identities, and the identities that we collect for ourselves through a lifetime can be very powerful. And so. So one of the concepts is this idea of understanding identities and that as human beings, we actually, as we go through life, collect different identities. It could be, they could be, you know, really small to very serious. I went to this high school, I was a lacrosse player. I'm a Navy seal, I'm a husband, father, I'm a Metallica fan. Whatever those identities we collect, they come with them some rules and biases that, that drive our behavior because we have to behave in a certain way to, to be part of that identity. All this to say is that we will tend to prioritize or behave towards those identities. We're prioritized those most powerful identities.
- [11:25]
Ed Mylett
Yep.
- [11:26]
Rich Devini
My two identities, my two most powerful identities were, as you can imagine, Navy seal. Yes. But also husband, father. Now for me, I always prioritized husband and father above Navy seal. However often that's a lot of times the Navy would be like, nope, you got to prioritize Navy seal. Of course, when I go deploy overseas, Navy SEAL becomes a problem, predominant identity. But there were times, even in a SEAL mission where something would happen and to address that specific situation appropriately, you'd shift to your father, husband identity. Right. Maybe there's some, some civilians you have to take care of. So you'd shift all this to say is when I got out and when anybody gets out from a profession such as this, there is an enormous dearth in that loss of identity. And, and it's, and it's the seals, it's a little bit different I think. The Marines, The Marines, Are you hearing the Marines? Once a Marine, always a Marine. And that's very true. I mean you, you can meet 90 year old guys and they're, they still want to be called gunnery Sergeant. Right. And that's a beautiful way that they've managed that. The Marine Corps, the SEAL teams are different. The SEAL team mantra when you're in the teams is earn your trident every day. And it, soon as you, as soon as you get out, you're not earning your trident every day. So, so you're not an AV SEAL. All of us are former Navy SEALs and all of my buddies and some of whom you know and are close to will agree. Don't call me a Navy seal. I am a former Navy seal. But I will say I was able to, with, with the ability to put that identity or the, I guess the necessity of putting that identity on the shelf. I fell back on my most powerful identity. Husband, father. And from that base I was able to ask myself, okay, what's a new identity I want to build? And I set about building a new identity author Entrepreneur, you know, businessman, whatever that is. All those things I'm working on. I think the healthiness and transition is really very intimately tied to those identities you carry and those identities you prioritize. And I think some of the folks that I see who are having issues, they lose that very powerful identity and they don't have anything to fall back on. And so I think it's important for people who are in that situation to A, remember some of the identities they already have, because we all have a lot of them, but B, make a very conscious, deliberate decision to build a new identity. And this is something that's going to take work effort, but it's a mountain someone has to climb. And most folks who are coming out of the military are used to climbing tough mountains.
- [13:45]
Ed Mylett
There's so much meat on the bone in the book, you guys, that he and I can go detailed here. And we're going to give you 10% of the book, just so you know. So did you use the. Because this is one. I sent this part of the book to my son who just called when we were starting, but because he's starting something new. He's a golfer and very different than a bin Laden raid. But every time you tee off in a golf tournament, there's a ton of uncertainty, right. You don't know where that first shot's gonna go, you know what the wind's gonna start blowing. You don't know what the other guys are gonna shoot. You know how much sand is in a sand trap when you're laying in there, if you got a lie. And so in the book, you on, you unveil the uncertainty method. So I sent it to him and there's six steps to this method. Did you use any of that in your transition? And can you share with them what that is? Because I think this right here, if they just get this out of the interview, they walk away completely different than they started.
- [14:34]
Rich Devini
Yeah, so, so the answer is absolutely. I think I absolutely used these, these techniques in everything I do because it just was hyper developed in my, in my career as a seal. So let's just go through, I mean, the, the, the, the six things one has to understand about oneself to master uncertainty, or even just to begin to practice it, are first, the physiology around uncertainty itself. In other words, what are those things we need to do neurologically and physiologically to step through uncertainty? How does our brain operate and define uncertainty? And we'll get. I know we're going to get into that. I just want to get through the six steps. The Second one is how do we manage our chunks as we're moving through uncertain environments and manage our dopamine because that's a huge powerful neuro modulator that's affecting our ability to perform. Third one is to keep doing it. Right. So how do we, how do we. In other words, how do we. Well maybe I'm getting a mix up. So this first one is neurology. Second one is managing our autonomic response through breath work. Third one is managing our dopamine. Okay. Fourth one is so for the, the next three are understanding things about ourselves. So what do we have to know about ourselves so that we can effectively know how we're going to operate when the shit hits the fan? Okay, first one is attributes. And we've, you and I have gone talked about attributes. It was the first book. But if we don't understand our each but our attributes define our performance at our most cross, we have to understand that. Second one is our identities which I just kind of described. What identities are you to the situation? And then the third one are the objectives. What are the objectives that we hold true that we're moving towards because that will affect our performance. So these six factors are in fact what we have to understand about ourselves to master this. Now getting into the neurology, I think, I think let's get into the most important part because I think for people to understand how to apply this. So let's talk about this. First of all, I will say that, you know, to compare golfing in a bin Laden raid is actually not that much of a stretch. And I'll tell you why. It's because human beings, we all experience fear and uncertainty differently. And specifically when our autonomic arousal, those things that allow our autonomic arousal to go up are subjective to the human being. You could have a group of Navy SEALs in a gunfight with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and they can in that moment literally be feeling less fear and uncertainty than the eight year old you just asked to step in front of the classroom and introduce themselves. So what we have to understand is this is all human stuff. It's not Navy SEAL stuff. It's not. So, so we never, I never judge anybody's uncertainty levels. If someone is starting a golf tournament, they are actually having to manage a level of uncertainty and fear and, and, and, and physiological response. That is, it could be quite, quite large and even more than I may have to manage jumping out of an airplane at 22,000ft. So there's no judgment there. What we also have to understand is what our brains are in fact doing when we enter into uncertainty, okay? So when we start getting into an environment, our brains are automatically trying to figure out three factors of our environment. Those three factors are duration, how long is this thing going to last, Pathway, what's our route in, out, or through, and then outcome. What's happening at the end. If we are in absence of one or more of those, we begin to feel uncertainty and stress. Okay? So just get. You and I go. I'll give a very simple example that everybody can understand, okay? Imagine I, you or me, we get strep throat, okay? Strep throat is a. Is a known disease, right? There's a known antibiotic that you can take for it. So, so we get strep throat, we're going to get an antibiotic. And we know. We know people don't really die from strep throat, right? So we are in absence of only duration, okay? So we know the outcome. We know that you know the outcome. We know the path. We just don't know duration. Mild uncertainty, mild stress. Imagine we get the flu, okay? The flu is now something that's a virus. There's no real known cure for the flu. There's not. You can't take an antibiotic, right? So. So now we're in absence of how long it's going to last. Duration, and we're absence of our pathway. We have some, you know, maybe I'll put a hot compress or whatever, but we don't know how long. We don't know what the route is, but we know the outcome. Because unless you're, you know, elderly or have other symptoms, you're probably not going to die from the flu, at least not in today's environment. So. Or absence of two mild to moderate uncertainty. Now imagine we all get hit with a pandemic, okay? And it's a virus that no one's seen before. There's no cure for it that's known, and there are people dying from it, okay? And we don't know if we're gonna. We're not gonna know what's happened to us, okay? This might sound very familiar to all of us. I. E20. Okay? Now we're in absence of all three. Duration, pathway, outcome. Now we're in deep uncertainty, challenge and stress. And so the technique becomes when we want to start to operate and move through uncertainty, challenges, stress. Can we create our own duration, pathway, outcome? And this is the concept of moving horizons.
- [19:28]
Ed Mylett
Well, here we go to you guys. This is why I want. This is why I want him on. Rich told me about this work he was doing the last time we talked. He said, I'm really excited about some stuff I'm doing right now. It's sort of some of my SEAL stuff with brand new technology as it comes to the brain, breathing, etc. So let's talk a little bit about that. Just like, just take a continuation of where you just finished off. What, what does one do from there?
- [19:55]
Rich Devini
Yes. So, and by the way, this is so, so. And we're both our, our mutual friend Andrew Huberman. We, he and I, we first got together what seven or eight years ago and he was kind enough to write the forward. We started figuring this out. He was studying Furanov's lab at Stanford. He wanted to understand what seals actually do in the field. And so what we deconstructed was, well, what happens is we actually start doing this process called Moving Horizons, okay. And what that is is essentially creating your own duration, pathway, outcome or dpo. Here's a quick example. We can, and you and I can go through multiple. But Here's a quick one in Seal training buds basic underwater demolition seal training. Six months long, 90 attrition rate. Okay? You spend hundreds of hours running around with big heavy boats on your head. And you do this all the time. Especially during Hell week. I remember it was during Hell week. It was, I don't know, some God awful time in the morning, two in the morning or whatever. We're on the beach running with this damn boat on our head and we, we've been doing it for hours and we don't know how long we're to be doing it. It's insane. I'm miserable. I remember at that moment saying to myself, and we're, by the way, we're on the beach, we're next to this sandburn, okay? And I remember saying to myself, you know what? I'm just gonna focus on getting the end of the sandburn. And what I didn't realize I did unconsciously was I created, I, I picked a horizon in and in essence created my own dpo Duration from now until end of sandburn pathway from here to end of sandburn outcome. End of sandburn, okay? As soon as I did that, I created a dpo. I created certainty in my environment, something to move towards. As soon as I hit the end of that sand berm, I in fact received a dopamine reward because I just accomplished something which allowed me to come back out and pick a new horizon, right? And so really all this is all the trick, the secret and this Is the secret to making it through SEAL training, by the way, is to constantly pick horizons and move through stress and uncertainty. Couple caveat, couple caveats. We have to understand is that these horizons are very subjective to both the individual and the intensity of the environment. In other words, the more intense the environment, the shorter that horizon is likely going to be. I remember being freezing, you know, freezing in the surf zone. Just, you know, surf torture waves just hitting. You're just freezing. And I remember saying to myself, I'm just going to count five waves. That was my horizon in the moment, okay? By picking the appropriate horizon, we get into this other concept of managing our dopamine reward system. In other words, if we pick a horizon that's too short, we're not going to feel the reward from it. We're not going to get the reward. If we pick a horizon that's too long, we're going to run out of dopamine before we ever get there, and we're going to quit. This is why we have to actually pick the right horizons. And it's very subjective. But what this is, Ed, is this is a neurological equivalent to eating the elephant one bite at a time. And that's where.
- [22:31]
Ed Mylett
Okay, guys, we're now talking about some of the most powerful stuff we've talked about on this show in a very long time. I start taking theories when people feed them to me on the show or I've read them in my book, and I put them through my life experience meter, my BS meter, my whatever meter you want to call it. And you all know that one of the most important decisions that ever happened in my life was my father's decision to get sober. And what he did in that program he was in was he changed the horizon. Rich. I'll never forget when my dad got sober, I said, dad, are you never going to drink again? My dad said, I can't promise you that. He changed the horizon. And he said, I'm not going to drink for one more day at a time. And what that happened is he shrunk the horizon of time, like that berm you were in front of and my father's life. He was able to get that hit at every single day because it was the appropriate horizon. It was something he could manage, and he sustained it for 35 years of his life, eating that elephant of sobriety one day at a time, one horizon at a time. Hard question, I guess maybe there's an unknown answer to it. How does one know what the appropriate horizon is relative to the task at hand or the stress at hand. Is there any way of calibrating?
- [23:47]
Rich Devini
It's a. Well, it certainly is an experimental game. However, I think if someone's with it, and this is why I love trying to articulate, articulate this stuff, because as soon as you articulate it, people can start thinking about it as they do it. And so I think a couple of things are going to happen. Either one, you pick a horizon that's too short. You get there, it's like, oh, I actually, that was too short. You know it right away because you don't feel the reward. If, however, you've accidentally picked something that's too long, then in those moments, if you start to feel yourself burning out, because that's what it's going to feel like yourself, kind of wavering, pick a shorter horizon. Immediately adjust your horizon. Okay. And, and, and you can start to experiment that way because I think it's, it's one of those things that you can really play with because what you're doing. And oh, by the way, this lends itself to the second concept of the three, at least in the six. Okay. And that is managing our own autonomic arousal. And what we're talking about here is when we get autonomically aroused, I. E. And then the fear, the amygdala starts to get tickled and the fear response starts to enter into our system. What happens slowly is our frontal lobe, our conscious decision making part of our brain begins to start to take a backseat and our limbic brain starts to come to the forefront. In the most extreme cases, this is autonomic overload or amygdala hijack. And in those cases, what's happened is our frontal lobe, our decision, conscious decision making part of our brain has moved all the way back and we are now limbic, focused and we are acting without thinking. Okay. Now this comes in very handy for things like jumping out of the way of a moving train or, you know, pulling, pulling your hand off a hot stove or something like running from the bear. But it doesn't come in handy for 99% of the other things that happen where we actually want to be able to make conscious decisions and thought processes as we go through it. So at the minimum, what Picking Horizons does, what this process does is it immediately puts your frontal lobe back in charge. It gives you control of the environment, and you are stemming this tendency or this process of the limbic brain trying to take over by consciously thinking through the environment. And people. Once people start to actually engage their conscious thought and do this, they find A new sense of superpower in terms of their ability to manage what's going on. And I'm glad you brought up your dad, because what here's the great news, Ed, is that every single one of us human beings has done this. We all do this. The idea is, start to think about when you've done it, start to put it together and now start to do it more deliberately. Because if we start to do it deliberately, that means we can practice it. You start practicing it and you do it enough, you start doing it without thinking. And this is where the Navy SEALs are. We do this stuff without thinking. And that's where you want to get. And the coolest thing about this, and the reason why I'm excited to get this out, is because if one can practice and start doing this without thinking, guess what happens? You start deliberately stepping into uncertainty. And that's where growth lies. You start to grow as a human being. You start to say, I'm going to pick the next new challenge and I'm going to go for it, because you know exactly what you need to do. And so it's an encouragement for people to just start growing as human beings doing the incredible, doing the going for their dreams that seem insurmountable. You can surmount anything. Just chunk it and choose your horizons.
- [26:59]
Ed Mylett
Chunking. It's huge. You know, I. It's always embarrassing when you have someone of richest caliber on the show and you do anything to compare or equate yourself. I always just feel embarrassed. I'm serious. And so to compare, getting through buds or some raid somewhere in the middle of Afghanistan with a speech day of mine is rather hilarious. Right. Having said that, though, I just want to give everybody applications of these things. When I have days where I speak, I'm doing about everything I can during that day, especially if it's, you know, 15, 20,000 people, I'm just thinking through to. To arrive at my optimal state when I hit that stage. And so I'm doing things energetically to concern myself. People probably think, do you do a lot of preparation those days? I actually don't. I don't look at my notes a lot. I don't look at too much stuff because I feel like it's almost depleting me cognitively to some extent. You described how that's happening. But I like to arrive to that moment with every. All my faculties at their best in that moment. So I will create structures and move horizons around, so to speak, for that moment. Today, for example, not feeling well. I've got walking pneumonia. Three podcasts. When I woke up this morning to look at a day of that is different than me, I just got ready for the first one and then I. And then when it was done, I got that dopamine hit that you relate to, and I'm like, I'm actually ready for the next. And I recovered in between. So I just want to share the application because not all of us are doing the save the world things that Rich has done in his life.
- [28:29]
Rich Devini
Let me add, first of all, I did the same thing when I started public speaking. I did not like public speaking, and I had to do the very same. Every lesson that I learned of the battlefield and the SEAL teams, I used to public speak. So this is the same thing. You know, the other thing I want to make sure that people understand, because you brought it up and I think it's important, is that Navy SEALs and those who are masters of a certainty, we never worry about that which we can't control because it's energetically very expensive. And so if I can't control it, I'm not going to worry about now. This does not preclude proper planning and preparation. Okay? Proper planning and preparation is something you do for your talks, I do for my talks, we did for our missions. We don't achieve paralysis through analysis. In other words, we don't try to over plan. We just pick the couple things, hey, I'm gonna plan for this, plan for that, and then once we're in it, we don't worry about it until it happens. And that's very, very powerful in terms of hitting that stage with as much energy as possible, because you have. People don't understand how much energy they lose just by worrying about stuff that they can't control. And we have to understand, anxiety is all about the future. Stress is about the now. Anxiety is all about the future. And you know, the future is fiction. Out of the past is history, the future's fiction. We only have the now. And so if you want to really maximize your energy in the moment, worry about the moment. And that's it.
- [29:47]
Ed Mylett
It ruined my baseball career. I was a competitive college baseball player and beyond. And my worry over preparation, stress, fatigue, I would show up by the time the first pitch gone, absolutely exhausted, physically, Legs, gas, mentally gas. And I remember telling myself, this is not going to work for me when I go into business, whatever it is, I do a big sales presentation or a speech or a one on one. And not only was it debilitating physically and mentally, and a lot of you do this more than you realize you're not at your optimal state, but also over time, you're robbing yourself from the dopamine that Rich is describing. And eventually you convince yourself, I don't want to do this at all anymore. And then you're very, your very desire to prepare is gone because you're getting no reward for doing so. So, hey guys, I want to jump in here for a second and talk about change and growth. And you know, by the way, it's no secret how people get ahead in life or how they grow. And also taking a look at the future, if you want to change your future, you got to change the things you're doing. If you continue to do the same things, you're probably going to produce the same results. But if you get into a new environment where you're learning new things and you're around other people that are growth oriented, you're much more likely to do that yourself. And that's why I love Growth Day. Write this down for a second. Growthday.com forward/ed my friend Brendan Burchard has created the most incredible personal development and business app that I've ever seen in my life. Everything from goal setting software to personal accountability journaling horses, thousands of dollars worth of courses in there as well. I create content in there on Mondays where I contribute as do a whole bunch of other influence like the Avengers of influencers and business minds in there. It's the Netflix for high achievers or people that want to be high achievers. So go check it out. My friend Brennan's made it very affordable, very easy to get involved. Go to growthday.com forward slash ed that's growthday.com forward slash ed every day when we're on the road, people around us endanger themselves and others by using their phones while driving. They think they're hiding it, but we've all seen them and we know exactly who they are. For instance, there's the sneak, a peeker who darts their eyes between the road and their techs. There's also the I got a ticketer looking upset because they just got a ticket for using their phone while driving. And what about the fast scroller who can't drive five minutes without updating their social feeds. Or the night lighter who has that mysterious glow illuminating the inside of their car after dark. We've all seen them. Does sound familiar, doesn't it? If they remind you of yourself or someone you know. Rethink your behavior before you find yourself becoming the fender benderer, the veering off the rotor, or worst of all the driver who killed someone put the phone away or pay paid for by nhtsa. Did you know that Fast Growing Trees is the biggest online nursery in the United States with thousands of different plants and over 2 million happy customers. They have all the plants your yard needs like fruit trees, privacy trees, flowering trees. Whatever plants you're interested in, Fast Growing Trees has you covered. Find the perfect fit for your climate and space. Fast Growing Trees makes it easy to get your dream yard. Order online. Plants get delivered directly to your door just a few days they're alive and thrive. Guarantee ensures your plants arrive happy and healthy this spring. They have the best deals for your yard and up to half off on selected plants and other deals. And listeners to our show get 15% off their first purchase when using the code my let at checkout. That's an additional 15% off at fast growing trees.com using the code my let at checkout fast growing trees.com code mylet now's the perfect time to plant. Use my let to save today. Offer is valid for a limited time. Terms and conditions may apply. Go to fast growing trees.com for details. So let's talk about leadership because that's what I always think of when I think of you. And in the book, in segment three of the book, guys, by the way, he talks about team dynamics and leadership and obviously dynamic subordination is this term that just stands out from the book and then you kind of flip it on its butt a little bit in the book, which surprised me. So what is dynamic subordination and what are your thoughts about it?
- [33:53]
Rich Devini
Yeah, so dynamic subordination is, is quite literally the tax organizational structure for high performing teams. That's what it is. And, and I was, you know, this, this came to me in a moment. I was being asked by some executives. I was in front of executives and I had a, I had a whiteboard or flip chart next to me. They said, hey Rich, can you draw for us the task Org shape that would describe a high performing team? And I was stumped because the models I had didn't tell the story. I could have done the pyramid with the leader on top and all the word goes down. I can't use that. It's too bureaucratic, too slow. I could have done the flat model. The flat line, right. We've all heard about that. You know, no one ranks anybody. We're all in this together. It's all groovy. Problem with the flat model is that, you know, sometimes it's difficult to figure out actually who's in charge. And you can happen on the right side of that line that's not seen or heard by the left side of that line. In other words, information gets siloed in a flat model pretty easily. And that's not what happens in a high performing team. Finally, I had the Robert Greenleaf Stervant leadership model where he flipped that pyramid upside down, put the leader on the bottom, said I'm in service to the people in my span of care. That's probably the most beautiful one if I were to pick one, at least philosophically. However, still not how a high performing team operates. Because in a high performing team, burden is distributed. It's not all on one person. And so really largely in frustration, I drew a blob on the flip chart and I said, where do you think the leader sits in this blob? And I got answers like front, back, top, bottom, center. I said, you are all correct. The leader is wherever the leader needs to be in the moment. And this is what we call dynamic subordination. Dynamic subordination means that a team understands challenges and issues and problems can come from any angle at any moment. And when one does, the person who's closest to that problem and the most capable immediately steps up and takes lead and everybody and supports and then it switches. The environment switches as someone else steps up. It's a dynamic swap between leader and follower. I also call it alpha hopping. That alpha position just hops to wherever it needs to be. This is how all high performing teams operate. And I say this, I was an officer in the SEAL teams, okay? I did hundreds of missions. I was in charge of every single one. It did not mean I was always being supported. In fact, most of the time it was opposite. I was supporting other people, my snipers, my breachers, my assaulters. Sometimes the environment shifted to be in support of me. All this tells us is that very important concept, that our position on a team has nothing to do with our rank or hierarchy. Our position on a team has everything to do with what we're there to control, contribute to the team. And as leaders, it's our job to create that dynamically subordinating environment so that we have the highest performing, most efficient teams possible.
- [36:18]
Ed Mylett
In order to hold that together though, you have to have trust amongst that team.
- [36:21]
Rich Devini
Yes.
- [36:22]
Ed Mylett
And boy, I tell you, I'm thinking of some businesses that I'm involved with where we had leaders that maybe not even been as dynamic or as talented, but they had really established trust and how we just flowed together as a group and then other teams I've been on where there just wasn't that trust established by the leader. It just never got established. And no matter how talented we were, how prepared we were, long term, we struggled. You talk about competence, consistency, character, and compassion. Of those, what do you think lacks most? And why are all four important?
- [36:59]
Rich Devini
Yeah. So competence and consistency are often what teams, especially in, in the business world, focus on. Because confidence and consistency. Confidence is do the thing right. Consistency is do the thing right over time. Okay? Those are in large part visible and measurable. Okay? Skill and skills based. I would even concede. The problem is you're missing two very important ones. Character is the next one. And character is a big word. I'd break that down, maybe say integrity. Okay? So you have do the thing right in competence, do the thing right over time, inconsistency, do the right thing in character, and then finally you have compassion. Do the right thing because you care about me as a human being. Okay? Now you can build an environment of trust. You could at least start building an environment trust inside of any one of those four elements. It's only when you have all four that you have the longest, lasting, most durable trust. I'll give you a quick example. Okay? Imagine you and I are out having dinner somewhere. We decide, we have some drinks. We decide we're not going to go home or we're not going to drive home. So we, we call a cab. The cab shows up. We jump in the cab. The cab rolls out and within 100 meters runs into a telephone pole. We're not injured. We get out, we find, we find our way home. No, no big deal, okay? A couple nights later, we're out again. We're having dinner, having some drinks. We decide not, not to drive home. We call a cab again. Okay? The, the cab shows up. It's the same driver from the night before. Are we going to get back in the car with that driver? The answer is no or not. But rewind that whole scenario. You and I were out having dinner, having drinks. We decide we're not going to drive home. We don't call a cab. We call our mother, father, sister, spouse, brother, best friend. That person shows up, we jump in the car with that person. That person with 100 meters runs into a telephone pole a few days later. Are we going to get back in the car with that person? And now the answer is likely yes. Some people are like, nope, still not getting in the car. But we probably will. And the reason is because with that second person, we had all four. With the first person, the Cab driver, we only had the first two. We had the consistency of the cab company. We had the perceived competence of the driver. As soon as competence took it hit, trust went away. With that second person, when competence took a hit, we had something to fall back on. And so what we need to focus on is building all four elements through our behaviors. Okay. Behavior trust is a belief. Trust is a feeling that's been rationally justified by that person. So in other words, you cannot make anybody trust you. All you can do is behave in a way that allows someone to choose to make a decision to trust you. And so all this nonsense about someone coming as like, well, I'll trust that person when they earn it, or whatever that is, that's nonsense. We as leaders have to go first in these behaviors and build that environment.
- [39:30]
Ed Mylett
Gosh, this is so good, you guys. This every time Rich is on. So there's two things you're always doing. See how I go, guys? Like, we just keep going with him. There's two things you're always doing, even if you don't realize it. You're always breathing, and you're asking. You're actually also always thinking. And thinking is the process of asking and answering questions to yourself. That's really what a thought is. And so when we last talked, I'm like, this is going to be good. Because now I doubt maybe I'm wrong. I doubt when you were a seal, you were into maybe. Well, probably not true in the water, you were. But overall, I doubt breathing techniques were the number one thing you were focusing on every single day.
- [40:08]
Rich Devini
No, not at all.
- [40:08]
Ed Mylett
So, yeah. Okay, good. So that assumption is accurate. So talk to us about activating our optimal neurology through either questions or breathing or both. And take as long as you want on it, because this is. Guys, this is almost like pull the car over stuff right here.
- [40:25]
Rich Devini
Yeah, yeah. So the breathing. So. So one of our. One of our pathways into our autonomic response, our autonomic nervous system, if you will, is the respiratory system. We have a visual and respiratory system connected directly to the vagus nerve. And we can quite literally shift our. Our. Our physiology from sympathetic, which is our action state, to parasympathetic, which is rest and digest just through breathing alone or through visual tools. Breathing is very interesting because breathing you can actually use to modulate your autonomic response up, down, or even. Or even keep it neutral. So the couple. Couple ways to do that. So. So if you want to up your autonomic response, you want to get more excited, get more engaged. Okay, that's, you know, Wim Hof does this type of reading, Breath of Fire, things like that. You, you are, you are inducing some autonomic response and there's some techniques in the book you can do that. That's typically not what we're talking about when we're dealing with people in stress challenge or uncertainty. Because in stress challenge uncertainty, what's usually happening is our autonomic response is starting to go up too far and we want to get it back down so we can actually make conscious thoughts and, and then ask better questions, which we'll talk about here in a second.
- [41:36]
Ed Mylett
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- [43:14]
Rich Devini
Well, one of the ways you can do that is you can do what's called CO2 blowout breathing. Okay. In other words, you're breath, you're blowing out carbon dioxide. Why does this matter? One of the things that people don't recognize is that when we're say underwater or holding our breath, okay, that, that discomfort, that stress that we feel is not because of a Lack of oxygen. It's actually, in fact, because of a buildup of CO2. Now, people like free divers and some seals understand this. In other words, you can push past that discomfort because you have different oxygen reserves in your system. This is what freedivers do. That's how they can hold their breath for nine minutes, is they know how to push past that discomfort and start accessing the oxygen reserves in other part of their body. I do not recommend this. This is very dangerous because what happens is, as soon as you push past that first warning sign, you don't get another warning sign. In other words, you'll just go out. Okay? So I don't want anybody to try this at home, all right? Unless you're a free diver, you do it right. But all this to say is that buildup of CO2 is what's causing the stress. And so what we can do is we can literally begin to blow out our CO2 and begin to de stress just through breath. One of the best ways to do this is called the physiological sigh. All it is is a deep inhale and then up on top and then a really slow exhale for, you know, eight to ten seconds. So deep in.
- [44:29]
Ed Mylett
So is that a breathe in and then another one?
- [44:31]
Rich Devini
Yeah, breathe in and then a top off.
- [44:32]
Ed Mylett
Breathe in.
- [44:33]
Rich Devini
So a nice, fast breathe in, top off, nice slow exhale. You do that two, three, four, five times, you will literally feel yourself calm down. You're bringing your autonomic arousal down. You're bringing your frontal lobe back online in a position where you can start moving and picking horizons. Okay?
- [44:50]
Ed Mylett
Okay.
- [44:51]
Rich Devini
The other breathing technique I talk about, and many people have heard about this, is box breathing. Okay? Box breathing is, in fact, a technique that if you are at a perfect level of autonomic arousal, we might be like, maybe you and I, we just got on stage. You're like, okay, I'm right here. I don't want to get any more nervous, but I don't want to get any less. I'm. I'm really. I'm charged. I'm right where I want. Box breathing is a great way to do this. Box breathing is simply you're going to breathe in for a. For a period. So say four or five seconds. Let's say five seconds. You're going to hold on top for five seconds. You're going to exhale for five seconds, and then you're gonna hold on the bottom for five seconds. It's literally just a square box. You can pick whatever timing you want in any of those lanes. Whatever is Comfortable for you. But if you do box breathing, it actually keeps you at your autonomic level and allows you to actually engage at the state you're in. You breathe through the mouth.
- [45:39]
Ed Mylett
Do you reach through the mouth or the nose or both?
- [45:41]
Rich Devini
Usually, usually it's breathe in. Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth, but it doesn't really matter. Okay, to the extent possible. In through the nose, out through the mouth, but it doesn't matter.
- [45:50]
Ed Mylett
Okay?
- [45:51]
Rich Devini
So this is the way we can actually start to manage and manipulate our autonomic arousal. Once we do that, once we are able to do that and our frontal lobe comes back online. And now we're in business. Because now we can start asking better questions. Because you and I talk about this technique of asking better questions when we first talk. And like you said, our brains are question answering machines. All we're doing all day long is just asking questions about our environment, often unconsciously. It's picking out, okay, what do I mean? What's the duration, pathway, outcome? Do I understand it? If you understand, if you're getting answers, you feel great. If you're not getting answers, you're confused. You might feel uncertain. All right? All this to say is if we, if we were. Whenever we consciously place a question into our conscious mind, whatever that question is, our brain begins to come up with answers. A lot of times we do this the wrong way. We say things like, why am I so bad at this? Why did this always happen to me? Why are these people out to get me? As soon as you place that question in your brain, you're going to come up with some spectacular answers as to why you're so bad at this or why people are out to get you. It's inevitable to say, why am I so pissed off? You're going to come up with some spectacular answers as to why you're pissed off. All my performers do is they flip the script on the questions. They ask better questions, they get better answers. They say things like, what am I good at? Who's out there that can help me? You know, how can I make it through this? What can I focus on in this moment? What horizon can I pick? And you will begin to get answers to that question. This is the. You know, it's funny because we are physically, we do this all the time. We go where we pay attention to. You know, I think you and I, at one point, in fact, I think when we were together, at one point, when I gave a talk, we were talking about driving. I love having, I love everything about driving. It Give me anything to drive. Motorcycles, boats, cars, whatever. So I, you know, in the teens, you get to go to driving and racing schools. And I signed up for every racing school I possibly could. When you go to a racing school, they. The first thing they teach you is how to get out of a spin or how to get out of when your car starts to lose control. And the first thing they tell you is never look at the wall. Because if you look at the wall, you're going to hit the wall, you know, so you are and literally be facing the wall, but you have to be looking where you want to go because your body will start. You start steering towards that. So all we're doing neurologically with, with asking better questions, we're neurologically steering our focus. And once you steer your focus, man, you're in business. So you can do really anything.
- [48:02]
Ed Mylett
So good. But guys, one thing I love about Rich is that I think he humanizes elite performance. And obviously he has an unusually high iq. He would not admit that himself, but he does. And his temperament is really, really special. But you're behind the scenes now. If you've ever wondered how these special operator guys think and work and navigate through their lives, they have similar fears or, or anxieties just like you do. Maybe they're not similar, but they have them. And I'm just curious, as an aside, just as a aside, I'm. You and I are both sort of doing a lot of work in our lives on this parasympathetic, sympathetic state stuff, right? It's, it's kind of like the new frontier in performance and happiness and longevity and heart rate variability and all this stuff that you and I are learning and growing into. Do you do any other hack stuff with it? I'm curious, do you use like a pulsetto or one of those Nuvana devices? Do you. And most people don't even know what I'm describing. I'm not endorsing a device. I'm just curious. Beyond breathing and questions and meditation, are you doing any, any of these hack devices? Do you believe in any of them, use them?
- [49:08]
Rich Devini
I've experimented with some of them. The, the, the, the bio stuff that I'm using, I have the Oura ring, which I, I want to monitor my sleep. I have a GPS watch that kind of, you know, show how far I have gotten very good at, at controlling my own levels of. I don't, I just don't get stressed out. I, I just know, and I think obviously I got, you know, as hyperdeveloped again, as a Team guy. So, so. So I don't find myself needing to defer to some of these more conscious techniques because I just automatically. It's funny. We just. We automatically calm down. Here's a funny story. You know, I live in. I live in. I've, I. I'm in Virginia Beach. I've been in the same house for, for 23 years, my wife and I, and we've been married the whole time, right? And. And across across the street from us, a SEAL lives. A Navy SEAL is down the street to the left, there's a Navy seal, and down the street to the right, there's a Navy seal. And so I, I remember Kristen saying, you know, I love that these guys are in the neighborhood. And I said, why? So she said, because if anything, if you weren't here, anything went wrong, I know I could go to them and they'd act like you act. I said, what do you mean by that? It's like as soon as something happens, as soon as the shit hits the fan, all you guys do is you immediately calm down and you start solving the problem. You take it step by step. And so all this to say, I've experimented with some of that stuff. I very highly recommend there's breathing apps. I mean, the more people can practice this consciously, the more you create the unconscious competence. And you do it in times without even thinking. And so if it's something new to you, then go make conscious effort to practice on the stuff, whether it be breathing, whether it be DPOing and Shifting Horizons, because the more you do it, you'll be. You'll begin to achieve an unconscious competence until you'll start hitting uncertainty or uncertainty will hit you, and you'll just start moving the way you need to. And of course, like we said that the, The. The. The collateral of that is you'll start picking deliberate steps into your discomfort, your uncomfortable zone, and start growing as a human being.
- [50:58]
Ed Mylett
You really believe your language can override your thought. In other words, in the book, you put forward this I am statement stuff.
- [51:04]
Rich Devini
Yeah.
- [51:05]
Ed Mylett
And so I wanted to ask you about that. It's the part of the book where I've struggled in my own life believing my own language. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wanted to. I wanted to ask you about this so you can help me with it. But you push in the book, push, suggest I am statements and how that. That can begin to create the identity. And maybe, by the way, I do more of that to my benefit unconsciously than I realize. You know, maybe I, Maybe I. I must have, I guess because it works. So talk about I am statements and how it correlates with identity. Because we. We moved off identity earlier, but I want to give everybody the tool as well.
- [51:42]
Rich Devini
Yeah, well, so at a minimum, what an AM statement does is it focuses you. It focuses your attention. Anything we put. I always kind of say that the two most powerful words in the human language are I am. Because whatever you put after those two words is where you focus your behavior. I am a father. I am a. A Navy seal. I am whatever. I'm a smoker. Right. I mean, we've heard about people quitting habits like this by just saying, I am not a smoker. So. So. So at a minimum, what an I am statement does is it focuses your attention appropriately. However, neurologically, this is also true. And, you know, like Andrew Huber will talk about this. This. This part of the brain, it's called the. The anterior mid cingulate cortex. Okay. It's a. It's just.
- [52:23]
Ed Mylett
So I'm talking about this. Go. This is great.
- [52:25]
Rich Devini
It's a part of the brain that allows human beings to do hard stuff. And if we're not doing hard stuff, it actually shrinks. If we're doing hard stuff, it actually grows. But one of the things, One of the techniques that he talks about is that you can literally be doing hard stuff and say to yourself, I love this stuff. I love this stuff, and be lying to yourself. And if you do it enough, your brain will start to believe that you actually love it. So I am a hundred percent believer in the fact that our words and our thoughts focus our attention and can, in fact, change the outcome by. By. By.
- [52:59]
Ed Mylett
Even neurologically, I believe the reverse is also true. Guys. When you're doing something that didn't work out or doesn't serve you to use your language to separate yourself from it so that it doesn't become a part of your identity. Just to kick in here a little bit. So, like, with my golfers that I work with, I'll just share this in front of Rich, and I'll ask another question. But when they putt, if you've ever played golf, usually when you miss a putt, when you say, I suck, I can't putt, blah, blah, blah. And believe it or not, even elite professional players do this, and they'll miss a putt. I suck. And they're actually reinforcing this part of their identity with their language. And so if you just simply say, when you miss the putt, that's not like me. Yeah, that's not like me. That's not like me. You bang a drive to the left out of bounds. That's not like me. And believe it or not, if you repetitively do this with your language, it's that powerful. I am or I am not are powerful language statements. Now, obviously your brain is accepting the I am statements much easier if you understand how the mind works, that it is an I am not statement. But when you separate from something with your language as well, and even when you have a disagreement with your spouse, that's not like me. I shouldn't talk like that. I don't talk like that. It's a, there's a separator. Let me ask you this, bro, because we're going to run out of time and there's, there's way too much stuff in the book. This message is sponsored by Green Light. Hey guys, I talk about Green Light all the time. I talk about Green Light. Not on camera with my friends who have children. Because you think about it, at least when I was was young, nobody taught me about money. Most parents don't teach that stuff. School doesn't teach it, even though they should. So let's be honest, most of us learned about saving and budgeting way later than we should have way later in life. And so that's where Green Light's so awesome. It takes technology and helps your kids and your family build financially responsible children. Green Light's a debit card and money app made for families that lets kids learn how to save, invest their money, and they can even be paid for chores and whatnot. And you can track their spending. Parents can send money to their kids and keep an eye on what they're spending. Meanwhile, kids and teens build money confidence. It's just super good. Millions of people are already using Greenlight. Start your risk free trial at Greenlight today. Go to greenlight.comed that's greenlight.comed to get started. Greenlight.comed what's some what's a practical application of something we've covered here so far? Someone walks into. I mean I think almost everyday life is uncertain for most people. What is one thing someone listening to this right now goes I heard everything these guys said. I got breathing stuff. I've got moving my horizons. I've got my language, I've got all these different things. What's something I didn't ask you. That should be in here. And we had a great. We, we've messed the conversation up if we didn't cover it.
- [55:41]
Rich Devini
Oh yeah, that's a great. Here's what I would say is. Is. Uncertainty by definition cannot be predicted. So. So it'd be. It'd be impossible for you or I to give examples that people could lean upon in terms of using this. The great news is you can start using and practicing this stuff in fairly certain environments. We do this, by the way, when we work out. Okay, I was on. I was this morning on Mondays, I go, there's a huge hill here in Virginia beach. And I basically put on a 40 pound weight vest and I run up the hill. I do sprints up the hill. I was DP on, I was picking horizons as I go up that hill, you know, because I. Because it's, it really is. When you're working out, you could pick horizons if you want to get healthy and you don't want to eat right. You know, don't talk about, you know what, I'm going to start Monday. I'm going to eat healthy for the next six months. No, no, no, no. Start Monday and eat healthy for breakfast. That's your first horizon. And then you say, you know what? My next horizon might be lunch. My next horizon might start experimenting with some of the distances on these things and getting good at this idea of picking horizons and creating DPOs. And it becomes habitual. You'll start doing it everywhere. And so you'll begin to, at a minimum, take some of that mundane stuff and actually start to make it more palatable and in some cases more fun just by using this technique. And the collateral effect of that is when uncertainty, in fact hits, you'll start to do it. You'll say, okay, what do I know? Can I control? Here's what I'm focused on. I'm going to move to that. And then do that. You're move to the next thing. So the reason why I get jazzed about articulating some of this stuff, even though you know me now, I just love doing it. I love figuring this stuff out and putting words behind it is again, once you can say it, you can practice it. And once you can practice it, you can get good at it. And once you can get good at it, you can master it. And so in there, become a master of uncertainty.
- [57:21]
Ed Mylett
I was thinking when you were talking earlier, I was this year's Super Bowl. Everyone knows I'm sort of a Brady fan. And we were neighbors for quite a while and. And he broadcasted the super bowl this year, Rich, where the Chiefs were getting beat really, really bad. And there was this ongoing conversation, hey, is Mahomes the Goaters, you know, which was ridiculous. Of course, sorry, Chiefs fans. But having said that, that game got away from the Chiefs. And I thought, this is such a great analogy of horizons and moving the horizons. Brady was asked afterwards, what do you think happened? Because Brady was down 28, three in a Super bowl and came back and won it it. And he said, I, he usually. He literally used the word horizon. He said, I think they tried to score all 20 points back on one possession. He said, we were down 28 to 3. I changed the horizon. I just wanted to get a first down. It's okay to throw a screen pass and just move the ball three yards. Now it's second and seven. Now it's a lot more manageable. And to begin to chunk the game or to bite the elephant one at a time. If you look at almost anything, you guys, that you admire, someone who's come back or someone's overcome something, they do exactly what Rich is describing. My dad's sobriety, Brady in a Super bowl, someone preparing for a big test. They've got in seventh grade to get into eighth grade. These are the things you do that Rich has described here. So I just want to acknowledge the power of your work. Masters of Uncertainty, guys, that's the title of the book. Let me ask you, outside of the book you've had, I said earlier, I referenced. I want to just get into you here. The book is so good. He sold it to you guys today. If you didn't even read the book, your life's a thousand times better. You've. You've had a view of life, though, of leadership, of people you've led, of the world in general. The very few people have had. I always love your opinion, especially when the world is chaotic and stressed and uncertain as it is, I guess, every day. But sometimes the light shines brighter on the uncertainty than other times.
- [59:16]
Rich Devini
Yeah.
- [59:17]
Ed Mylett
So whether you look at the economy right now with tariffs, or you look at, you know, the geopolitical environment in the US you look at the border, you look at Gaza and it. And you look at Ukraine and Russia and Iran and China and the world. What is your view? Are you. You an optimistic. Are you bullish on the world in the future? AI coming. All of this uncertainty, Right. Like, I could keep going, right? Oh, you're right. AI coming. What is your overall worldview right now? And is it different than it was 10 years ago?
- [59:57]
Rich Devini
Well, okay, so this is the second part of that question. I'm not sure if I know that. It likely is different. I think. I think we change as we, as we mature. And we grow older. So I. It would be tough to say how it's different, but it certainly is different. Here's what I'll say is. And. And regardless of anybody's politics or your mind, you and I share a lot of the same views. I am someone who, once we have someone running our country or our administration, I root for them. I want them to do great. I think that's what patriotism is. Patriotism also, though, is taking a hard look and being honest with your assessment of what's going on. And I will say that I am remaining optimistic because I think that there are some initiatives and directives that I think are worthwhile and are meaningful. I want to make sure that we as a nation are making sure, are looking at what's going on, both in our country and with geopolitically and all that stuff, and the way we're responding and constantly asking ourselves, are we still doing the right thing? Are we still doing the right thing? Because the beauty of this country is we get, every two years, we get a chance to. To vote our opinion or vote our conscience on this stuff. And what I fear in today's society, in today's politics, is the polarization to the degree that some people are like, hey, that's my team. And even though I believe these two issues, I'm going to go all in on this side. And none of us should go all in on any side. As Americans, it's our responsibility to not go all in on just one side. It's a responsibility as Americans to look at things holistically and ask ourselves some really honest questions about how things are running. And I think if we do that, I'm optimistic about the fact that I think we will get some good stuff done and some good stuff will be done. And if we start to see that it's overspill or things are starting to go in a direction we don't want to. Let's make a stand and let's vote a different direction and let's find a different way to do it. If we find things are going great, let's keep doing what we're doing. But overall, Ed, I remain optimistic because I think pessimism in my mind, is energy, expensive. There's not a lot of value I can derive from pessimism. I can still, as an optimist, be skeptical. I don't think skepticism and pessimism are the same thing. I think skepticism is an honest look at questioning what's going on and thinking about answers and thinking about solutions. I think pessimism just veers towards negativity and is less valuable. So. So I will remain optimistic, but I will also remain a skeptic, a healthy skeptic, and be looking at things very carefully as we move forward, staying engaged, staying positive, and also making sure I'm not getting drawn into either of the polarities. Because if you're in those polarities, man, just know you're lost. You are a sheep. If you're one of those polarities, you're a sheep. Even though you're accusing other people of being a sheep, you are a sheep. So stay out of polarities.
- [62:59]
Ed Mylett
Cy is one of my favorite people, you guys. I just get a sense of humans. And the minute that I met Rich, I liked him instantly. I mean it instantly. And every time I'm around him, it's confirmed. It's one of the things that as life gets busy and you get older, when you initially meet somebody, you think, I'm going to know them and be a lot closer to them. And then eight years goes by and you're like, I've only seen him a couple times. You know, I enjoy his company very much. And you can tell why. I just think he's a bright mind and a good mind and a good man. And by the way, I've only written. I've probably been asked four or five hundred times. I've only written an endorsement or a blurb. And I think eight books ever. And when he called and asked me to, is this. Yes. I didn't even seen the book. I'll be honest with you. At the time, it was just because he had asked me to. And so I was honored to do it. And after reading the book, I'm really glad my name's in it. I'm honored that I'm in it. And so Masters of Uncertainty, everybody. With Rich Devini, you don't hear conversations like this every day, everybody. You get to hear them here. And I'm very grateful for our friendship, brother. Thank you for being here today.
- [64:00]
Rich Devini
Thank you. I'm grateful and honored as well. So I look forward to all the future conversations. So thank you.
- [64:06]
Ed Mylett
10 out of 10. God bless you, everybody. Share today's episode. Max Out. This is the Ed Milan show.