INTERVIEW | Make Money by Writing Books That Build Your Business

Summary

Podcast Summary: Travis Makes Money

Episode Title: INTERVIEW | Make Money by Writing Books That Build Your Business
Release Date: July 10, 2026
Host: Travis Chappell
Featured Guests: David Epstein, Dave Burke, Mark Devine

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Episode Overview

This compilation episode focuses on how writing books can serve as a powerful tool for business growth, personal brand building, and thought leadership. Travis curates conversations with best-selling authors—David Epstein (Range, The Sports Gene, Inside the Box), Dave Burke (Echelon Front leader, Need to Lead), and Mark Devine (SEALFit founder, Unbeatable Mind, Way of the SEAL)—who share the realities of their writing process, key lessons from their careers, and how books have expanded their influence as entrepreneurs and leaders.

The tone (insightful, motivational, candid) matches Travis's mission: real-world money advice from unconventional success stories, with a focus on abundance, authenticity, and actionable wisdom.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

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1. The Value of Constraints and Structure in Writing

Guest: David Epstein
Segment: 03:25 – 09:22

• Why Write "Inside the Box"?

  • David’s last book, Range, prompted readers to ask, “I have a broad background. Now what?” This new book is his answer on focusing that breadth into tangible accomplishment.
  • Partly motivated by personal struggle (“Me-search”): “I was that way—broadly curious, [with] broad skills and experiences, [having] a ton of trouble focusing my projects.” (03:41)

• Research vs. Writing Balance

  • Almost a year dedicated solely to research and mapping the field before writing a word.
  • Leveraged AI to create citation maps for academic research.

• Innovative Outlining Method

  • Locked himself in a hermitage at a Franciscan monastery with printouts of 100,000 words of notes; boiled down what stuck in memory to a single-page outline.
    • “If it’s not on that page, it’s not in the book.” (05:59)
    • Result: more coherent and focused writing, finished ahead of schedule—where previous books came in at the last minute.

• The Power of Monotasking

  • Monastery retreat exposed the value of single-tasking and environment control for focus and productivity.
    • “I was monotasking the whole time. It helped me understand how much of the daily stress I feel is a result of multitasking that I don’t need to be inflicting on myself.” (08:35)

Notable Quote:

• "[Bent Flubier] calls it ‘think slow, act fast.’ If you spend time early on drawing boundaries, when you move into execution, it'll be much faster." (07:08, David Epstein)

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2. Military Lessons, Leadership, and Authorship

Guest: Dave Burke
Segment: 10:11 – 18:26

• Origins with Jocko Willink and Echelon Front

  • Dave’s connection with Echelon Front came from direct battlefield collaboration with Jocko and Leif in Ramadi, 2006. Their leadership in combat subsequently formed the foundation of their business.
    • “All the missions that Leif and Jocko talk about in Extreme Ownership ... for the most part, I was with them.” (12:19)

• Transition to the Private Sector

  • Leadership principles translate universally—private sector, home, or military.
    • “People don’t change…all the things you do in the military that lead you to success apply perfectly in the private sector.” (14:43–15:16, Dave Burke)

• Writing Need to Lead

  • Collaborated closely with Jocko and Leif to capture concepts not in earlier books.
  • Describes the process as “humbling, painstaking, discipline-invoking.”
    • “The 70,000 words in that book probably is 250,000 words to get to that in several years. It was tough, man.” (17:28)
    • Writing often triggered self-doubt and a need for relentless revision: “I wrote a lot, I’m like, this sucks. I cannot write what’s in my head.” (17:53)

Notable Quote:

• “Everything worth doing is on the other side of a bunch of struggle.” (17:41, Travis)

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3. Authenticity, Resilience, and the Business of Books

Guest: Mark Devine
Segment: 19:21 – 32:21

• On Foundations and Character

  • Stresses patience and foundational depth—character built through adversity matters more than polish.

    • “Don’t shortchange the foundational stage. ... You want to make sure the foundation is deep and broad.” (19:21, Mark Devine)

  • Readers seek relatable authors who share real failures.

    • “They want someone who’s been there and done that. ... You gotta earn the stripes.” (19:42)

• Struggles of Writing and Business Building

  • Founders should step back and hire experts; learning to let go is vital.
    • “If you want to make money with your business as a founder, you ultimately got to get out of the way and you can’t be an island.” (23:50)

• The Inspiration (and Pain) of Book Writing

  • Describes a love-hate relationship with the writing process: rewarding and excruciating.
    • “It’s extremely rewarding to literally give birth to a book, but it’s painful like giving birth.” (24:52, Mark Devine)
  • Warns against writing purely for credibility—“If the book isn’t already in you, screaming to come out...don’t put crap out there.” (26:06)
  • Personal stamina: each book took 2–5 years; often wrote two at once when inspiration struck.

• How His Author Journey Began

  • Wrote first book (Eight Weeks to SEALFit) after being approached by a publisher impressed by his innovative training program; book became a New York Times bestseller.
  • Leadership book (Way of the SEAL) grew from a niche, Zen-influenced perspective and also hit bestseller lists.

• Self-Publishing vs. Traditional Publishing

  • Financially, self-publishing was most lucrative due to his platform.
    • “I actually earned the most money by far from the self-published book.” (30:25)

Notable Quotes:

• “There's a certain nostalgia about [having a boss]. Just tell me where to stand and what to say.” (24:18, Mark Devine)
• “Find a niche. And people wanted to hear about it.” (31:39, Mark Devine)

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4. Relatability and Credibility in the Author Space

Host: Travis Chappell
Guest: Mark Devine
Segment: 26:28 – 27:44

• The danger of writing books purely for "credibility": mistakes or low-quality publishing can damage a brand.
  • “If you put out a crap book, then it just makes you less credible anyway.” (26:29, Travis)
  • Anecdote: Travis shares a personal story of a poorly edited book with an immediate, jarring grammatical error.
    • “[The] first line was, ‘It was 3am in the morning.’ I was like, that’s...crazy obvious grammatical error. ... destroying your credibility.” (27:10, Travis)

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Memorable Moments & Quotes (with Timestamps)

• David Epstein on Monotasking:
  “Removing distraction just let me do more, higher quality work. ... Even breaking [work] into monotasking blocks just feels so much less stressful.” (09:22)

• Dave Burke’s Humility:
  “I’m not a naturally good writer. ... It was a humbling, painstaking, discipline-invoking process.” (17:07–17:28)

• Mark Devine on Founders Stepping Back:
  “If you want to make money as a founder, you ultimately got to get out of the way and you can’t be an island.” (23:50)

• Mark Devine on Publishing:
  “I actually earned the most money by far from the self-published book. Isn’t that interesting, because I have a platform.” (30:25)

• Mark Devine on Writing for Credibility:
  “If the book isn’t already in you, screaming to come out...don’t put crap out there.” (26:06)

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Noteworthy Timestamps

• 03:41–09:22 — David Epstein: Using constraints, research, and monotasking for efficient, high-quality writing.
• 10:11–15:16 — Dave Burke: Battlefield lessons, applying leadership to business, meeting Jocko, and Echelon Front’s origin.
• 16:28–18:26 — Dave Burke: The writing journey for Need to Lead.
• 19:21–21:11 — Mark Devine: Patience, adversity, and authenticity as author and entrepreneur.
• 24:37–26:28 — Mark Devine: The inspiration and challenge of writing, and why books must be genuine.
• 31:29–32:21 — Mark Devine: Accidental success as author and podcaster; relatability is key to audience engagement.

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Conclusion

This episode offers an in-depth look at the strategic and human side of writing books that not only sell, but deepen credibility, expand influence, and grow businesses. The recurring theme: success comes from authenticity, disciplined structure, and real value—whether on the battlefield, in a business, on a bestseller list, or on the page.

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For prospective authors, entrepreneurs, or anyone considering using a book to build their brand, this episode is a must-listen for both tactical insight and the unvarnished truth of the journey.

Transcript

[Travis]

So good, so good, so good.

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[Travis (Podcast Host)]

You're listening to the Travis Makes Money

[Travis]

podcast presented by gohighlevel.com for a free 30 day trial of the best all in one digital marketing software tool on the planet, just go to gohighlevel.com travis what's going on everybody?

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

Welcome back to the Travis Makes Money podcast where it's our mission to help you make more money. On this episode of the show. We're continuing with our compilation series highlighting some of my favorite conversations from the first half of 2026. But in easy to digest hyper valuable compilation episodes, we're taking multiple guests talking about a similar topic and putting them into one episode. So you have no barrier to value here. In case you missed a couple of these along the way, today's episode is featuring a few amazing authors that are also in this this entrepreneurship space. So first off we have David Epstein. He's number one New York Times bestselling author whose books the Sports Gene and Range have sold millions of copies worldwide. Former senior writer at Sports Illustrated, investigative reporter at ProPublica. He stud how people succeed in complex high stakes environments. He has a new book Inside the How Constraints Make Us Better. I really enjoyed talking to him about the writing process. Honestly. Very, very interesting conversation. Brilliant writer and somebody who has consistently invested in ensuring that his writing skill continues to evolve over the course of his career. So David's a really, really interesting interview. Next we have Dave Burke. Dave is a former Top Gun instructor and then he also works for the

[Travis]

little company that was started by Jocko

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

Willink back in the day where they consult corporations on leadership and things like that. And so it was really cool talking to Dave. This one was actually a sit down in person. Then we did a collab episode with Mace Curran who's also a fighter pilot but she was in the the Air Force's fighter pilot program and David's from the Navy fighter pilot program. And so yeah, very interesting conversation. Anyway, he wrote a new book on leadership as well that sort of continued the mission of Jocko's first couple of books on leadership and has maintained this position at Jocko's company now for quite some time. So this is a really fascinating conversation as well. And then we have lastly on this episode, Mark Devine. Mark is also a former military veteran. He was a U.S. navy SEAL commander Entrepreneur, and he's the founder of SEAL Fit and Unbeatable mind. So after 20 years of leading elite special operations operations teams, he transitioned into entrepreneurship. And so he's a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling author and knows how to blend military discipline with mindfulness practices to help others unlock their full potential. So lots of dense value in this episode from three amazing authors who've been here on the show before. So please enjoy this episode with Mark Devine, Dave Burke, and David Epstein.

[Travis]

So before we dive into some of the backstory here and and and talk about where you how you got to

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

where you are now, tell New Book

[Travis]

Inside the Box this seems to be a little bit outside of the topics that you've talked about before. What prompted you to explore this topic more?

[David Epstein]

Two main things. So my last book range was about the benefits of broad skills and experiences in an increasingly specialized world. And that book went much wider than I expected, basically. And probably the most common question that I got from readers was something along the lines of, okay, I've got this broad background, now what? And so this book Inside the Box is my answer to that, which is how do you then focus that into achievement? And the fact is the second big impetus was there's a hefty dose of Me search in this book, which is that I was that way broadly curious, broad skills and experiences, ton of trouble focusing my projects. Like my first two books. I wrote 150% of a book and then had to cut it back to get one book because I did not do a good job at drawing boundaries around my own projects. So it was partly responsive to reader questions from my last book and partly, you know, something I'm I was terrible at, I wanted to get better at

[Travis]

when you decide to go on a topic like this, how much time is spent in research versus writing?

[David Epstein]

That's a great question. I'm usually interested in the topic before I'm thinking about it as work. So it's something I'm researching again because I want to get better at it. The Me search component, but explicitly once I sign the contract for it, pretty much a two year process. But the first year, zero writing, none research, only reading papers, interviewing, making basically a map of the territory so I can start to understand who are the important figures I'm going to need to talk to. What are the important papers? You know, now I'VE used AI to make these citation maps, these webs that show me what are the most important papers in an area of research. And that's all I'm doing. And at the end of that year, in this case, again, I put more constraints on myself with this book than I had in the past. And one of those was at the end of that year, I forced myself to make an architectural plan basically for the structure of the book. To be honest, what I actually did is I took this hundred thousand word notes document that I had printed it out, went and rented the hermitage in the back of a Franciscan monastery that had no Internet and no one to talk to for several days, read it flipping pages by hand, and as soon as I finished, said, now I'm outlining the book based on what's in my memory from having done that on one page and one page only.

[Mark Devine]

Wow.

[David Epstein]

And if it's not on that page, it's not in the book. And I think that gave one. It forced me to clarify priorities. So I didn't have bloat the way that I did with my past books. But it also led me to have a coherent structure because if you're putting it on one page, you really need to make sure things are linked. It can't just be scattered stuff all over the place. And it gave me this framework that allowed me, once I moved into execution or writing, to move so quickly that I turned the book in early. My previous books I turned in at 5pm on the day the contract specified. This time I was just sitting on it for several weeks, even though I started writing later than usual because I drew this process out a little more making the architecture, once I moved into execution, I had such clear boundaries that I wrote fast.

[Travis]

Wow. So it's definitely sort of that, like, spend five hours sharpening the axe adage of, you know, like, yeah, you get six hours to chop down a tree. And then, you know, somebody said I would spend the first five hours sharpening the ax. It sounds like that's exactly what you did when we compile all of this. And then once you actually sit down to do the work, the. The product was the easy part. It was everything else that was. That was difficult.

[David Epstein]

Totally. And there's a. There's a researcher in the book named Bent Flubier, a Danish guy who studies how projects go wrong or right. And this is basically what he advises, what he calls think slow, act fast, where if you spend time early on drawing the boundaries, when you move into execution, it'll be much faster. But typically People rush into execution and then you've got momentum and it's harder to pivot and all these things. And that's what happened with my past books. I mean, they worked out well, they sold well, but they took longer than they should have. You know, it was six or seven years between those books. It didn't have to be that way because I rushed into execution to some degree instead of spending this time and saying what, where are the boundaries here? What is the framework? And then you can execute quickly.

[Travis]

Tell us about your time at the monastery.

[David Epstein]

So yeah, there's a Franciscan monastery in Washington D.C. that had these two little one room hermitages out back in their gardens that they allow visitors to use. And it's a beautiful place to just get into a reflective mood. There's nothing there, you know, there's like a fork and a plate and a concrete floor and this garden and a few books and I just didn't open my mouth for several days. All I did was turn over these pages that I read again. This was a hundred thousand words. So my notes were significantly longer than the actual book would turn out to be. But. And you can't hold that much information in your brain. Right. But having just read it, I said, okay, the things that stick in my head now as fascinating having just done that are the things that I think will be interesting to other people. So I'll put those down. But it was beautiful. So I would do it. I would spend a few hours just doing the reading, then walk around the gardens, maybe go for a run or something like that. Or you know, in a few cases they would leave a few books about the life of St. Francis in the back. Maybe I would read a little bit about the life of St. Francis and then return to it. It was almost like having three, three work days in one. It was like I'd have a several hour workday, take a break another, and then a, and then a third. It was amazing and it, and so refreshing because I was monotasking the whole time. It helped me understand how much of the daily stress I feel as a result of multitasking that I don't need to be inflicting on myself.

[Travis]

It's pretty crazy the volume of quality

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

work that you can do when you just remove distraction.

[David Epstein]

It's crazy. It's crazy. And even, even doing the same work but breaking it into monotasking blocks, it just feels so much less stressful.

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[Dave Burke]

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[Travis]

Think you have what it takes? Talk to me about the camaraderie between you as a pilot versus like ground forces overseas because you get deployed and now. And correct me if I'm wrong, but is this. Do you meet Jocko around this time? Like, is he in Radi? You what? Like how? If not, you know, how did that relationship come about where you started working now with Echelon front and stuff like that.

[Dave Burke]

Totally circuitous. But I finished Top Gun as an instructor. I do an instructor tour at Top Gun. So I graduate from Top Gun, go off to war after September 11, second carrier deployment, combat in Afghanistan, come back, go be an instructor Top gun, get the F16 qual. And I'm like, all right, I've done everything I wanted to ever, ever do. I'm going to get out of the Marine Corps. And right as I'm leaving Top Gun, I just gotten married like a couple months before and I had this nagging sensation of I always wanted to be a Marine. And I went to Navy flight school. I was in a carrier based Marine Corps squadron. Then I went to the Navy's weapon school as an instructor. So I had a very, very Navy centric life, which was great. It's everything I wanted. But I didn't do this. I didn't feel like I'd done this like uniquely Marine Corps thing. So instead of getting out, I volunteered to be what's called a Ford air controller. And very long story short, I was a volunteer to go be a FAC for ground. Ground Ford Air Control. That means you have a radio, you learning to call airstrikes. I was going to go do it in Japan in a training unit for a year and help stand up a unit called Anglico in Japan. Long story short, through some, they had some requests for some volunteers. Lots of detail. I won't go into, I end up in ramadi.

[Mark Devine]

Wow.

[Dave Burke]

In 2006, at the height of the insurgency on the ground. On the ground. On the ground in Radi, as a fact, with a team of 13 Marines that I was responsible for show up in Radi, it's like. I mean, this time 20 years ago, I'd been there for a month. I show up right when Jocko's task unit shows up from Task Unit Bruiser. So we're in the same place, same time, same mission to support the army. And essentially his team and my team ended up working really, really closely together. So all the missions that Leif and Jaco talk about in Extreme Ownership and all the things they were doing, for the most part, I was with them on all of them. So I got to know Jocko and Leif really well.

[Travis]

So in their. In their stories, when they talk about the Marine squadrons, that's you.

[Dave Burke]

It's not the squadrons. I'm on the ground now. Yeah. They're talking about the Marine unit, like, they mentioned, like, it's called an Anglico unit. They don't use my name because I was on active duty. That's me. I'm with them. So all those things that they're talking about in that book in Ramadi, I'm with them.

[Travis]

Wow.

[Dave Burke]

Which is crazy. And so if you're wondering why two Navy SEALs bring in a Marine fighter pilot to work with them at their leadership consultancy at us on front, it's because we're in Ramadi together. Yeah, well, that was 2006. We spent about six months together in Ramadi, and it's a. It is a brutal six months.

[Travis]

A war zone.

[Dave Burke]

It's a war zone. It's tough for seals. Killed came from Jocko's task unit. First Anglico Marine was my radio operator that was killed. We are in it together.

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

It's.

[Dave Burke]

We're in it. I leave. I go back to the Marine Corps. I go off, you know, back to the Hornet, back to the 22, back to the F35. They go back to being SEALs. Ten years later, they write Extreme Ownership and like, hey, this book kind of took off. This company's starting to kind of took off, and just the two of them.

[Ollie Sleep Announcer]

Right, right.

[Dave Burke]

And I, you know, stayed just enough in touch and. And Leif was like, hey, man, you know, we'd love to have you. Why don't you think about coming Joe national on front? And so 2016, I get the offer and. And I'm right on the ragged edge. I'm about to promote to colonel in the Marine Corps, about to go back to flying again. And like the day before or the morning of Leif calling me out of the blue, I decided I wanted to get out of the military. And then they call me later that day and I'm like, well, it seems to work. That seems he just kind of timing beyond my control. Why don't you just say yes to this? And as they say, you know, the rest is history. It's been nine years.

[Travis]

Wow. Wow. That's crazy.

[Dave Burke]

All because I was a FAC on the ground in Ramadi. I called in a lot of air support for Jocko, Leif and their seals.

[Travis]

How has your leadership ability developed being in the private sector now versus being in the military?

[Dave Burke]

In some ways, a ton. Because there's all sorts of uniqueness and nuance and perspective you don't have in the military about the private sector. I have personally worked with every type of industry, every company, every layer of leadership, every facet of private sector life that exists. Me and Echelon Front have worked there. And they're all unique. They're all different, they're all special. They all have a great amount of nuance and insight that you would never get in the exact same breath. All the leadership behaviors that lead you to be successful in those environments, as disparate as they all are, are exactly the same. So it's fantastic.

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

People don't change.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah.

[Dave Burke]

People are people. And what people sometimes don't realize about the military is like, I learned this, like, seals are just people. So are marines. So we're fighter pilots. And all it. Every unit is made up of the same thing.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah.

[Dave Burke]

And so what's been really cool about the Echelon Front, quote unquote, private sector experience, is recognizing all the things that you do in the military to lead you to success, apply perfectly to the private sector. And by the way, in your homes, with your family and your spouses and your kids and all the things you do in the military that lead you to failure.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Dave Burke]

Like when your ego gets out of control and you think you're better than other people, those things will lead you to failure in the private sector as well. And so the overlap is undeniable and the application is universal. And I've loved seeing the connection of my military life and now nine years in the private sector and all those different industries, seeing the perfect balance of totally unique and different. Exactly the same.

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

Yeah.

[Travis]

Right. It's pretty wild, man.

[Dave Burke]

It's really cool, man. It's an unbelievable company. The company is just. I've been on. I feel like I just jumped on a bullet train. Like, you were kind of laughing, like, oh, yeah.

[UPS Store Announcer]

What?

[Dave Burke]

Kind of took off. Yeah, obviously it took off, and I just been hanging on ever since.

[Travis]

That was like. That was like Tim Ferriss, right? That Jocko kind of first got on.

[Dave Burke]

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

And then.

[Travis]

Yeah, Tim. I remember listening to it on Tim.

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

I used to listen to Tim Ferriss release.

[Dave Burke]

That was the beginning.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah.

[Travis]

Right around that time, actually, like 2016. That's right when I started listening. Yeah. I think that was the first time I ever heard Jocko talk on a podcast. And was like, this guy's got something figured out.

[Dave Burke]

He's legit. And I knew him earlier. I never. I never. You don't think in Ramadi in 2006. Oh, maybe I'll go work with this.

[Travis]

Yeah, right, exactly.

[Dave Burke]

My boss.

[Travis]

In 10 years, maybe one day podcasts will be.

[Dave Burke]

You don't see that in the future. And, you know, Jocko is. He's one of a kind, man. The dude's awesome. I'm stoked to be back working with him.

[Travis]

How did you find writing the book? Need to lead, obviously now, like, because it's sort of part of like a trilogy of sorts from Echelon front.

[Dave Burke]

It really fits in this sequence of extreme ownership and dichotomy.

[UPS Store Announcer]

Yeah.

[Dave Burke]

I. I work closely with Leif and Joc. As we thought about. Our company had evolved enough that there's a lot of things we were teaching that hadn't been captured on paper in. In those first two books. And I was very fortunate, very honored that they asked me and kind of allowed me to do it. Yeah. And make it broader enough that it wasn't just a carbon copy. Obviously, it couldn't write the same things and had some unique perspectives that said, dude, it was hard.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah.

[Dave Burke]

I mean, Jocko might make it look easy, and I think at this point he's figured it out. But he. He let me know that, you know, when they were first writing Extreme ownership, it is a. It's a tough muscle movement. I am not a naturally good writer. And that book is a reflection of, you know, the 70,000 words in that book probably is 250,000 words.

[Travis]

Wow.

[Dave Burke]

To get to that in several years. It was tough, man. It was a humbling, painstaking, discipline, invoking process. Yeah. I'm really glad it worked out the way that it did. But, dude, that was a gut check for me.

[Travis]

I mean, turns out everything worth doing is on the other side of a bunch of struggle.

[Dave Burke]

You know, things are hard, man. That was writing for me for writing

[Travis]

a book that you're actually proud about, you know what I mean? You got to put in that level of work.

[Dave Burke]

And it's tough because, you know, I mean, that book is certainly a reflection of getting to a place that I felt like it was good enough to be published. Took a long. I wrote a lot. I'm like, this sucks. Yeah, I. I cannot write what's in my head. And it's weird because it's in your head. It seems so clear in your head. And we're trying to put it on a paper. Then you reread it. You're like, nope, this isn't. It took me a long time to get to a place that I felt like, okay, this is it. Even then, like, I mean, you know, you're gonna have to tell me what, you know, what you think of it, but it. It took a while to get to that.

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[Travis]

No doubt.

[Mark Devine]

And so one of the best kind of pieces of advice is just, just be patient. Don't. Don't shortchange the foundational stage. Because like that, you said that building, you build on top of that, it'll fall down. Right. Because it's going to meet a lot of headwinds. There's a lot of things that are changing really quickly. You want to make sure the foundation is deep and broad.

[David Epstein]

Yeah.

[Mark Devine]

That means that your depth of character, you need to fail a few times, especially when it comes to connecting with an audience. Right. They don't want someone who hasn't failed, you know, hasn't been through the fire, you know, and fought his demon battles. Right. They want someone who, like, has been there and done that. So you gotta earn the stripes.

[Travis]

They want to see a piece of themselves in somebody else.

[Mark Devine]

Right.

[Travis]

And if you're constantly presenting a picture of yourself that's perfect. There's no relatability there because you're taking away the bridge in people's minds from where they are to where they want to go. And in reality, that's essentially your job as, as a quote unquote influencer, author, creator, podcast or YouTuber, whatever it is. If you're helping, especially in like, self help or self development education space, then that's exactly what your job is. It's to get people to say, hey, you're in this position now. You want to go to that place over there. Let's build the bridge together. In order to let you know that I know how to build that bridge, here's the story of how I wildly failed and fell flat on my face, like you're afraid to do right now. And then things turned out okay, you know, I mean, we ended up figuring this thing out. Of all the things that you're doing now, Mark, what do you really enjoy the most? Like, you're writing, your podcasting, you're speaking, you run your businesses, you got a lot of things going on. What's the thing that, like, really fires you up?

[Mark Devine]

Well, I love training and coaching in person. Right. Like, I'm. I'm really good at it. And you have, like, instant feedback, you know what I mean? Yeah. Like, the transformation is right there in front of you and, and that's powerful. And I'm getting a little tired of sitting and standing in front of a freaking camera. You know what I mean? I'm okay with this podcast. I do enjoy podcasts, but it's getting a little bit maddening to just always be staring at a camera these days. Like, I feel like I'm in a virtual reality. So I'm trying to get out more and just do things right, be with people, be with people, work with people, get my hands dirty. And in that vein, like, I finally learned I'm a. I'm a very experiential learner, AKA slow learner. Sometimes I learned. I learn a lot, right? And I've got a lot of experience and knowledge, but when it came to business, I thought I could be the operator, you know, like the guy who's running the business. And. And I still do run my business, but it's only because I. I wanted to. I finally figured out that that wasn't me. And. But what I didn't know well how to do or how to do well was to hire the right person to kind of take over that. Not. Not me, because you can never replace me. Right? The visionary founder, content creator. But Someone to run full on the day to day business, you know, to where I trust them enough to just give me a report every week or we have one call, you know. Right. And I had two disastrous hires for CEO that almost, I mean, put a stake through the heart of my business. I cut my revenue by 75% and we've been rebuilding since then, but I have anyways, so I'm really looking forward to, to getting the company back to that place where I can kind of step out of the operating role. Yeah. And I finally learning like, okay, there are some really important things you have to have in place. You know, you have to have really good hiring protocols and checks and balances, ideally a board of directors or at least advisors to support you, you know, so I'm going more, more into that round where I'm going to bring in some capital and some expertise so that it's not just me flying, you know, alone, like a lot of founders CEOs do. And so that's. If you want to make money with your business as a founder, you ultimately got to get out of the way and you can't be an island. Right. You have to have support. You have to be willing to bring people in who are experts, smarter than you in a lot of areas and share the upside with it.

[Travis]

Yeah, it feels weird sometimes as a founder because it's, you're, you're almost at least when I was doing this, it felt like I was like hiring my own boss. I mean, it's like. But like ultimately that's what I wanted. Like I wanted somebody who just like, hey, you come in, this is what we need. And then tell me what you need me to do. Like to, in order to help us all fulfill the mission, tell me where to sit, where to stand, what to say, when to say it. And I will do that part and I will do it well. You know what I mean?

[Mark Devine]

Totally. Yeah. There's. I have a certain nostalgia about that too, you know, Just tell me where to stand and what to say.

[Travis]

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Now with your, with your books, Mark, where, where did, where did the idea for the books come from? Is that a process that you find enjoyable? Is it arduous? Is it difficult? Do you like doing.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah, yeah, just like the podcast, there's a. And I bet you every author says this. I have a love hate relationship with writing. It's extremely rewarding to like literally give birth to a book, but it's, it's painful like giving birth.

[David Epstein]

Right.

[Mark Devine]

It's, it's a lot of work. Again, who the hell knows where it's going with AI? But I think people will like, you know, books generated by AI or where someone heavily uses AI, I think will be easy to sniff out and people aren't going to engage with them. I wrote every one of my books, and each one took between two and five years. Two to five years.

[Travis]

That's crazy.

[Mark Devine]

Per book. Per book. Now I have six books. I'm working on a seventh. So it's not like I've been writing for like three times. Six years. I put my first book out in 2012, but I. So what I've done, I wrote two books in the same year. That's how insane I am, Right? Yeah. And my publishers were not very happy about that. So I double tapped a couple of them and. And I've done that a couple times. So when I get inspired, that's the other thing. Like when, when it comes to writing, you've got to be like, it's got to come through you. It can't be mechanical. You can't be like, scanning for different topics that you. That might land with your audience. Right. I know some people do that because they think they need a book for credibility.

[Travis]

Sure.

[Mark Devine]

Don't waste your time. If the book isn't already in, you like, screaming to come out because of your unique perspective on the world and your expertise. Don't put crap out there. You know what I mean? Yeah. So I go through periods where like, okay, I'm done. I don't want to do anything else for a while, and I'll just sit and wait until inspiration comes for the next thing.

[Travis]

And it's funny because, like, you can

[Travis (Podcast Host)]

actually end up doing the opposite if

[Travis]

you, you know what I mean? Like, you, you put out the book because you feel like you need to be more credible, but if you put out a crap book, then it just makes you less credible anyway. You just did a bunch of work for.

[David Epstein]

Dude.

[Travis]

I remember one time I was at this. This was like when I was first getting into the space, I think I launched my podcast like two weeks before I was at this event. And I was trying to go do the thing and be out and meet people or whatever. And this met this person and he. And gives me a copy of his book. And my very first thought. And again, I was brand new to the space. It's probably like eight, nine years ago. And my very first thought was like, oh, this is kind of flimsy. Like this cover, like, doesn't look super great. But I was like, whatever, I'll. I'LL you know, give them the benefit of the doubt.

[Mark Devine]

Right?

[Travis]

I opened the, I opened the first page while I'm still at the event and the very first line of the book, it said it was 3am in the morning. And I was like, it was 3am in the morning. That was the first, the first line of your book is a, is like a crazy obvious grammatical error. I was like, yep, I'm not, I can't, I can't do it. I got, I'm not going to be able to read this book clearly. Like, you didn't, didn't ask like your high school English teacher to give it a once over. You know what I mean? Like, this is the opposite of what you wanted it to do. It is destroying your credibility.

[Mark Devine]

Oh man, that's a bunch of product.

[Travis]

That's terrible. You know what I mean?

[Mark Devine]

Travis, you asked about how the books came about, so I didn't, I wasn't sitting around thinking I needed a book. I was training early days of SEAL fit. We had this incredible program I put together called the SEAL FIT Academy. And imagine like a Shaolin monastery on American soil for special operators. We had a 30 day. You would have loved it. We had a 30 day program where, where these athletes, warrior athletes would come live on site with me in Encinitas, California. And we had this massive 5,000 square foot training center. We had the kind of like the functional fitness CrossFit gym ring with pull up bars and all the equipment. We had the yoga room for breathwork, visualization, meditation, movement. We had the mat room for Jiu Jitsu and we had the whole grinder was just like, looked like a mini BUDS compound. You know, buds being basic underwater demolition seal. So we would have anywhere from like 8 to 10 to like 30 students living with us for 30 days at a time. Wow. And so I developed this incredibly intense curriculum for physical and mental toughness training and developed over a few years to where as I codified it, people were starting to use it in the military and law enforcement and it started to get popularized. They're called the SEAL Fit Operator Workouts Operator wads. And so all of a sudden I got a call from someone and they said, hey, here's someone from McMillan and they said, hey, we'd love for you to write a book about what you're doing there at SEAL fit. And I'm like, okay, yeah, okay, I could do that. So I, I wrote a book called eight Weeks to SEAL Fit. And it was like my, my training guide, but I like to tell stories just like You. So I told, I, I told the training model or I presented the training model laced with all these cool different stories. Yeah, right. About, you know, mental toughness and resiliency and discipline and honor. Right. Really cool stuff. And, and it became a fricking New York Times bestseller as a training manual. Yeah.

[Travis]

That's awesome.

[Mark Devine]

That's crazy. And so then, so that was the first one. And then I got another call from an agent who said, hey, I want, I've been. I was referred to you by another SEAL that I approached. I wanted him to do, I, I asked him, I think we could do a book on Navy SEAL kind of leadership. And he said, well, he said, I'm not the guy, but Mark Devine is the guy. And he said, are you interested in doing that? And I thought about it and same thing. I'm like, why not? I'm teaching leadership. I've got something to say about it. Right. So I said, but it's, it can't be, it's probably not going to be what you're thinking because my, my style is much more coming from, influenced by my Zen and martial arts and kind of my eastern practices, which served me so well at SEAL training and in the seals. Right. That, and that's what became my unbeatable mind. You know, the foundation for unbeatable mind. So we, we titled it the Way of the Seal. You know, kind of like the dao of the seal. The Way of the Seal. And, and, and we just barely missed the New York Times bestseller, but we got, we became a Wall Street Journal bestseller and Amazon bestseller with that and that was published by Reader's Digest. So anyways, this is kind of how it started rolling. And then I did a self published book called Unbeatable Mind which I, I actually earned the most money by far from the self published book. Isn't that interesting because I have a platform. And then Macmillan came back and asked me to write three, four more books. So I've done I think five with Macmillan or four with Macmillan, one with Reader's Digest and then one self published so far.

[Travis]

Yeah. So basically every time, every time you weren't sure, somebody else came to you and said, hey, based on everything that you're doing, we'd actually love to see this from you.

[Mark Devine]

Yeah. And that's back to that authenticity. Right. So we, I had a platform who's doing something unique and innovative. Find a niche. Right. And I had a niche and for a niche and people wanted to hear about it. Right. And so initially I wasn't compelled to be a writer. But you know, after the first one, I found out I'm actually pretty good at it. And a few more came out of me. Similar thing happened with my podcast. Like, I consider myself an accidental podcaster. Cause I started, this is our 10th year for the Mark Devine show. And it started with my stepdaughter who was working in marketing for me. I had a, like a. I put out a monthly interview style thing. I was doing it through a conference call, you know.

[David Epstein]

Oh, really?

[Mark Devine]

Way back in the day. And, and we'd record the conversation and put it, you know, out to my community. And my stepdaughter is like, you know, that's kind of like a podcast. And I'm like, yeah, what's a podcast? What's a podcast? Explained to me what a podcast was. I said, yeah, let's do that. Let's put it up on Apple, whatever. So we cleaned it up a bit and started doing, you know, zoom or whatever it was. I think Zencaster initially. Yeah. And sure enough, I had a podcast and I've been doing it ever since. And I have a love hate relationship with a podcast. As you know, it's a lot of work, right? So listeners, if you're thinking about just slapping a podcast together, you know, think hard. It's an enormous amount of work. It's very hard to monetize unless you get big at it. But it can be really rewarding because you get to meet some incredible people.

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