0:00
(upbeat music)
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LinkedIn is great at connecting you
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with the world's largest professional network,
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but it can't connect you with motivation
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on a Monday morning.
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LinkedIn can help you get insights
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from your professional community,
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but it can't give you any insight
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into why Dave's is still talking on mute.
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And while it can't stop your boss
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from bringing tuna for lunch,
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LinkedIn can help bring your career to the next level.
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LinkedIn is the network that works for you.
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Visit LinkedIn.com to learn more.
0:30
(upbeat music)
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This is Undaunted Life of Man's Podcast.
0:53
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
0:54
Let's get into it.
0:55
All right guys, welcome, welcome back
0:58
to the very end of the year.
1:00
And so at the end of the year,
1:01
we do all of our best of episodes.
1:02
So hopefully last week you listened to our episode
1:04
with the best books of 2023.
1:06
And today we are getting into the best podcast of 2023
1:09
before we get there.
1:10
Guys, leave a review and share the show.
1:12
So guys, if you want to know how this show
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can get out to other people,
1:15
the easy way to do that is to just share it.
1:18
So if you're on Apple podcast or Spotify or anything else,
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there's always a share button.
1:21
Share this around.
1:22
Don't keep this a secret.
1:23
And also leave us a five star review.
1:25
If it's four stars or below, just move on with your life.
1:27
I don't really understand people that leave two
1:29
and three star reviews.
1:30
It's like, why in the world would you do that?
1:31
Just move on and go find something that's better for you.
1:34
So make sure you go ahead and do that.
1:35
And guys, we are right in that season.
1:37
I'm sure you've been getting hit up with a lot of emails,
1:39
maybe even one for me, about end of year giving,
1:42
your year in giving.
1:43
So please keep on dawn to life in mind,
1:44
because if you don't know this by now, you should,
1:47
but we are basically donation based.
1:48
So we get a little bit of money from advertising
1:50
and other revenue sources.
1:51
But the overwhelming majority of how we keep the lights on
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add on dawn to life and how we're able to keep bringing
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this content to you is because we have donors.
1:58
We have one time donors and then we have guys that hop in
2:00
on a monthly basis.
2:02
I mean, as small as 10 bucks a month on all the way up
2:04
from there.
2:05
And so guys, end of year giving, keep us in mind
2:08
and wouldn't remind you to treat yourself
2:10
with amazing American content and American products,
2:14
maybe non-content products like Origin and Jocko Fuel.
2:18
So guys, if you don't know this by now,
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we are also an ambassador for those two brands.
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So Origin makes the best jujitsu geese on the planet.
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They also make jeans and boots, outdoor gear.
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They've got these brand new pants.
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They've got the hunting gear, all that's on the Origin side.
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And then on the Jocko Fuel side,
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they've got the go energy drinks.
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They've got the greens.
2:36
And I wanted to take a little quick aside
2:37
to talk about the greens because I don't need a whole lot
2:40
of greens in my diet.
2:41
I eat mainly meat.
2:42
And so that one scoop of greens that I get from them,
2:44
not only is this the best tasting greens
2:46
that I've personally had, that's on the marketplace,
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but I just throw that in my protein shake as I go off
2:51
out the door to go pick up the boys.
2:53
And it's just, it's amazing.
2:54
I get my greens and I get all those micronutrients.
2:56
So guys, you can check those two sources out,
2:58
those two brands out.
3:00
The links are in the show notes, get a little tongue tied,
3:03
but use the promo code undaunted.
3:05
Okay, so if you can find our show,
3:07
you can certainly plug that in.
3:08
Use the promo code undaunted to get 10% off.
3:10
Basically you get 10% off and that 10% goes to support
3:13
what we're doing here at Undaunted Life.
3:15
So here we are, another awards show.
3:17
I'm excited.
3:18
The thing about these awards shows is I think
3:20
about these literally all year long
3:21
because as I'm reading certain books
3:23
or as I'm listening to shows or as I'm preparing
3:25
our own podcast, I'm thinking, okay,
3:26
is this gonna have what it takes to be part
3:28
of the awards shows at the end of the year?
3:30
And so this is how we do the best podcast episode.
3:32
So I'm gonna give awards to other shows,
3:36
not Undaunted Life of Man's podcast things,
3:38
but I'm gonna talk about random Can't Miss episodes,
3:41
favorite new podcast of 2023.
3:44
The best podcast show overall of 2023
3:46
and the best podcast episode of 2023.
3:50
Then we're gonna talk about Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
3:52
Okay.
3:53
This is gonna be a little bit of a shorter episode today.
3:54
So you guys can go back and listen to some of the episodes
3:57
from Undaunted Life from this year,
3:59
but also from some other shows.
4:00
Before Undaunted Life of Man's podcast,
4:02
we're gonna do the hardest interview to prepare,
4:05
the hardest episode to prepare,
4:06
the most offensive episode,
4:08
the most talked about interview,
4:10
the most talked about episode,
4:12
the interview I was most nervous about,
4:14
the episode I was most nervous about,
4:16
the audience's favorite interview
4:18
and then audience's favorite episode,
4:21
my favorite interview and then my favorite episode.
4:23
So you might be wondering,
4:24
well, Kyle, aren't interviews episodes?
4:26
Yes, but I'm basically giving the interview episodes,
4:29
its own category and then everything else,
4:31
that's not foraging table.
4:32
So all my solo episodes, those are just normal episodes.
4:35
So before we get into that,
4:37
I need to tell you guys how you can listen to more podcasts
4:39
and I remind you guys about this all the time,
4:41
but a lot of you listen to podcasts at one time speed
4:44
and I don't understand why,
4:46
because your brain can hear and grasp
4:50
and digest things way faster than you feed it, okay?
4:54
And so some of you, you're like, wait a minute,
4:55
I can't even do one and a half speed,
4:57
two time speed seems crazy,
4:58
especially for guys like you that talk so fast,
5:01
but I guarantee you, test me in this,
5:04
spend the next week with your podcast player,
5:07
whatever podcast player you use
5:09
and do it at two time speed.
5:10
Because the thing is,
5:11
is if I talk at my normal canes,
5:13
this is my normal canes and this is how fast I talk.
5:15
But if I bump it up to two time speed,
5:17
you can still understand what I'm saying
5:18
because your brain is basically taking the words
5:19
you need to digest and it's gonna leave them in your brain
5:21
and then you're gonna move on
5:22
and you're gonna get to the content that you need, right?
5:24
So if you're already listening to this at two time speed,
5:25
that was four time speed, but you get the idea.
5:27
Also, don't listen to crappy podcasts.
5:30
So I don't know if you're like me at all,
5:32
but I'm the type of guy that even if the book sucks,
5:35
I have to finish it.
5:36
Even if the movie sucks and it's boring, I have to finish it.
5:38
Even if the meal's not great, I have to clean my plate.
5:41
But with podcasts, if you've gotten 15 minutes
5:43
into a podcast or a couple of episodes
5:45
into a particular new podcast and you don't dig it,
5:47
unless it's our show, you should listen to our show
5:49
no matter what, but if it's somebody else's show,
5:51
just don't listen to those.
5:52
And also move on from a podcast
5:55
after you feel like you've gotten the point.
5:57
So there are certain podcast episodes
5:58
from certain podcasters that I will leave nameless,
6:01
but they may do an hour long show,
6:03
but you get the point after about 10 minutes.
6:05
It's like they're gonna spend the next 50 minutes
6:07
just kind of repeating the same thing that they've said,
6:10
the same point over and over,
6:12
and you don't really need to spend the next 50 minutes
6:14
of your life logged into the exact same point.
6:16
And also do podcasting every chance that you can
6:19
so your normal downtime.
6:20
So I have these little things right here,
6:22
these Apple AirPods, and so I put these in.
6:24
And basically if I'm sitting, waiting for the boys
6:27
to get out of school, I'm listening to podcasts in the truck.
6:30
If I'm walking the dog, and it's just me and the dog,
6:33
I have these AirPods in.
6:35
I don't listen to music when I work out.
6:37
I'm kind of like a serial killer in terms of that goes,
6:39
how that goes, but in between sets,
6:41
I'm listening to podcasts on my Bluetooth speaker.
6:44
So you can find times to do things during your downtime
6:47
when you don't need to be thinking and concentrating
6:49
where you can listen to other people's words.
6:50
So that's a way for you to get some more podcast work in
6:53
for 2024.
6:54
Now I'm also gonna go into my lineup
6:56
'cause a lot of people are like,
6:57
so what podcast do you listen to?
6:58
So before we get to the awards, I will go into that.
7:01
Now I'm not gonna put links to all these in the show notes
7:03
because I know some of you guys listen
7:05
on different podcast platforms.
7:06
So I'll just put this list in the show notes
7:08
so you guys can check that out.
7:09
And also if I mention a show here,
7:13
this is considered an endorsement of that show obviously,
7:17
but I don't fully support everything that is said
7:20
by every person on every episode of each of these podcasts
7:23
because that would be insane.
7:25
And so if I suggest somebody, you're like,
7:26
oh, they said that one thing back in 2012
7:28
and I didn't like it.
7:29
Okay, I'm just saying in general,
7:31
these are shows that I like.
7:32
So I have three new shows.
7:33
I've kind of rotated a bunch of shows this year,
7:36
but then the three new shows that I've added this year
7:39
that are kind of in heavy rotation
7:41
are the Jack Hibbs podcast.
7:42
These are pastor out of California, Mike force podcast.
7:45
That's Mike Glover's podcast and Huberman lab.
7:47
That's the Andrew Huberman podcast.
7:49
And then here are the ones,
7:50
here are the podcasts that I basically don't miss.
7:52
I can't miss them.
7:53
I don't miss them. I won't miss them.
7:55
The briefing with Albert Mueller,
7:57
Cooper stuff with John Cooper,
7:58
the Ben Shapiro show, morning wire,
8:01
Prager U five minute videos,
8:03
fireside chat with Dennis Prager,
8:05
Bill Burr's Monday morning podcast,
8:07
Dan Carlin's hardcore history
8:09
and deep in with pastor Joby Martin.
8:11
And I also listened to the,
8:13
well, I'll go to the next next category here.
8:14
So the next category here,
8:16
these are consistent listens.
8:17
I listen to almost every episode.
8:20
So the first two are church of 11, 22 in the village church.
8:23
That's Joby Martin and Matt Chandler.
8:25
I say that I am a consistent listener of those
8:27
because as long as those guys are preaching,
8:29
I'm going to listen.
8:30
But if it's anybody else, I'm not going to.
8:32
So that's not me being a hater,
8:34
but it's like, look, I don't have that much time
8:36
to listen to everything that I want to listen to.
8:38
And so very rarely have I heard like a guest preacher
8:41
at one of those places.
8:41
And I've been like, man, I'm really glad to listen to that.
8:43
So basically just skip those.
8:45
I also consistently listened to the Just Thinking podcast
8:48
with Daryl Harrison and Virgil Walker,
8:50
the Matt Walsh show, the Jordan B. Peterson podcast,
8:53
Jocko Unraveling with Jocko Willink and Daryl Cooper,
8:56
the Joe Rogan experience,
8:57
the breakdown with James Langford
8:59
and the Mark Driscoll podcast.
9:01
Well, actually, we're going to go to the next category,
9:03
which is the here and there podcast.
9:05
And so I'm actually going to put the Joe Rogan experience
9:06
down there because I do skip quite a bit of his.
9:09
I probably listened to one for every four or five
9:11
that he posts because if he has another comedian on there
9:13
that I don't know or don't like,
9:15
that's going to be three hours of them
9:16
just talking about random topics.
9:17
So that's a here and there.
9:19
Some other here and theirs are the Sean Ryan show,
9:22
the Chad Prather show,
9:23
Unashamed with Phil Jason Al Robertson,
9:26
Jocko podcast, danger close with Jack Carr,
9:28
Mike drop with Mike Ritlin,
9:30
the way I heard it with Mike Rowe,
9:32
Art of Mainliness podcast with Brett McKay
9:34
and the Lex Friedman podcast.
9:35
So if I'm missing any,
9:37
I just gave you a whole bunch there.
9:38
If I'm missing any,
9:39
if there's ones that I absolutely need to be listening to,
9:41
let me know.
9:42
So if you're on social media right now,
9:43
shoot me a DM or leave me a comment
9:45
or shoot us an email through our website.
9:46
But without further ado,
9:47
we are getting into awards time right now.
9:50
So let's talk about other shows.
9:53
I'm going to give you lists
9:54
of some random can't miss episodes.
9:56
And again, these will be in the show notes.
9:57
So don't pull your car over
9:58
or try to furiously find these while you're driving.
10:00
That's stupid.
10:01
So here are some random can't miss episodes.
10:02
I'm not going to tell you why.
10:03
Just trust me.
10:04
So for the Joe Rogan experience,
10:06
episode 2055 with Tim Kennedy,
10:09
2054 with Elon Musk,
10:11
2043 with Francis Foster and Constantine Kissen,
10:15
2027 with Oliver Anthony,
10:17
2024 with Hulk Hogan,
10:20
2008 with Steven C. Meyer,
10:22
2004 with Ice Cube,
10:24
1987 with Jelly Roll,
10:26
and 1933 with Jordan Peterson.
10:28
Now here are some can't miss episodes
10:30
of the Jordan B. Peterson podcast.
10:32
402 who is Ron DeSantis,
10:34
354 a conversation about God with John Lennox.
10:39
And then I'll just I'll skip the titles.
10:40
I'll just say who's on it.
10:41
385 with Willie Robertson,
10:43
382 with Oliver Anthony,
10:45
373 with Andrew Doyle,
10:48
372 with Jim Caviesel and Tim Ballard,
10:50
371 with Eric Metaxas,
10:52
361 with Senator Josh Hawley,
10:54
360 with Dr. Peter Atia,
10:57
347 with Miriam Grossman,
10:59
343 with Rafe Kelly,
11:01
and 335 with Christopher Rufo.
11:03
Now for the Ben Shapiro show,
11:04
I've got a couple of episodes,
11:05
Ben Shapiro versus University of Cambridge
11:07
from November the 5th.
11:09
And what does it mean to be a man?
11:10
That's a short interview with Vodie Bakam
11:12
on July the 30th.
11:13
For PragerU five minute videos,
11:15
there's what's wrong with marijuana
11:16
from December 4th,
11:17
sex is binary from September 18th.
11:20
How dangerous is nuclear waste from July 24th?
11:23
What are Judeo-Christian values from May 29th?
11:26
Excuse me, got a little burps coming up all of a sudden.
11:28
And then lying liars from March 13th.
11:30
For art of manliness,
11:31
I've got protein,
11:32
everything you need to know from October 23rd.
11:35
Cormac McCarthy, the road
11:37
and carrying the fire from June 19th.
11:39
And what the world of psychology gets wrong
11:41
about men from April 10th.
11:43
Then on Mike Rose podcast,
11:44
I've got 351 bonus story,
11:46
rough delivery.
11:47
That's from October the 12th.
11:48
345 bonus story,
11:50
enough and 332 bonus story,
11:52
his final destination.
11:54
For Jocko podcast,
11:55
I've episode 402.
11:56
That's his interview with Bone nickel from September.
11:59
Then we've got the Matt Walsh show.
12:00
I've got his August 16th episode,
12:02
episode 12, 06 called traditional masculinity
12:05
is a solution to the male loneliness epidemic,
12:07
not the cause.
12:08
Then I've got the village church sermons.
12:10
That's broken covenants from August 13th,
12:13
purpose from June 18th,
12:14
and awake to truth from February 21st.
12:17
And then on the church of 11, 22 podcast,
12:19
I'm just going to say that you need to be listening
12:20
to all of these.
12:21
Because again, I'm, you know,
12:23
of course you guys know the Jobe Martins, my buddy,
12:25
but he was just on fire all year.
12:26
And so I was like looking through the ones
12:28
that I thought were, you know, memorable
12:29
and things that we should listen to.
12:30
That's just one that you should be consistently listening
12:32
to if you're going to listen to one pastor.
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13:03
Now we're going to get into my awards here.
13:05
So my favorite new podcast of 2023.
13:08
So that's new to me, not new in general.
13:10
That's the mic force podcast.
13:11
And so for those of you that know,
13:13
a lot of you came over here because of that podcast
13:15
because I was on that show in Utah here just a few weeks ago.
13:19
And it was a tremendous experience.
13:20
But what Mike Glover is doing out there in Utah
13:23
with field craft survival is incredible.
13:25
So not only is the headquarters amazing,
13:27
but he's teaching Americans what they need to do
13:29
in case the worst case scenario happens.
13:32
That's why I wrote the book prepared.
13:34
That's why he does preparedness classes.
13:35
That's why he sells preparedness gear.
13:38
And he continues that in those types of ideas
13:41
and those philosophies through the mic force podcast.
13:43
So he does some solo episodes
13:45
and then he does some interviews similar
13:46
to what I do with my show.
13:48
So that is my favorite new podcast of 2023,
13:50
the mic force podcast.
13:52
Now let's get into the best podcast show overall of 2023.
13:57
And that's the Jordan B. Peterson podcast.
13:59
I thought that he was on fire this year.
14:02
As you can tell, I gave you a bunch of Can't Miss episodes,
14:05
but I would say from wire to wire this year,
14:07
it was the highest quality podcast that I saw.
14:09
There were some interviews that just weren't that interesting
14:12
to me, so I either skipped them
14:13
or didn't listen to them all the way through,
14:15
but he just consistently had these amazing guests on.
14:19
My one complaint about his show would be this.
14:22
I do not know who's helping him with the editing
14:24
or the production of his show,
14:25
but as many of you know,
14:26
we will insert ads into our show.
14:29
And so basically in between thoughts
14:31
or in between sections of my podcast,
14:33
we will insert an ad break that a company can purchase.
14:36
And it might be an ad for a credit card
14:38
or some sort of car or something like that.
14:40
But whoever does the insertion of his ad breaks,
14:45
they just do them randomly.
14:47
And so he or his guests will literally be
14:49
in the middle of a sentence or excuse me,
14:52
in the middle of a word,
14:53
and he will just cut out and go to an ad.
14:56
And sometimes the ads are in Spanish,
14:58
and it's just very, very strange,
15:00
and it's very, very frustrating.
15:02
And some of the ads are 60 seconds long,
15:04
some of the ads are 15 seconds long,
15:06
and it's just so super random.
15:07
So if anybody knows who's helping him
15:08
at the Daily Wire with the show,
15:10
please, please, please start putting those breaks
15:13
in between thoughts or in between questions,
15:15
that would be great.
15:15
But overall, the content is just fantastic.
15:18
The best podcast show overall of 2023,
15:21
the Jordan B. Peterson podcast.
15:22
Now we've got the best podcast episode of 2023,
15:26
the best individual episode.
15:28
And that is episode 1824 of The Ben Shapiro Show,
15:31
called The Face of Absolute Evil.
15:33
And that was released on October the 9th.
15:35
So this was two days after the Hamas attacks in Israel.
15:39
And the thing about this show is everyone that knows,
15:43
or knows Ben Shapiro knows that he is an Orthodox Jew,
15:46
he wears the Yamaka, he's just like, he's very Jewish,
15:50
obviously, but he's very Jewish even in his philosophies.
15:54
And he brings his Jewish ethics and morality
15:58
into the things that he discusses
16:00
from a conservative political viewpoint.
16:03
And so a lot of people were interested
16:05
in what his reaction would be
16:06
to the Hamas attacks from October the 7th.
16:09
And I will say that it, as I was,
16:12
this was one of the few ones that I watched,
16:13
'cause I basically listened to a podcast,
16:14
I don't watch them.
16:16
This was one of the few that I made sure I watched on YouTube
16:18
because he very calmly and coolly
16:22
gave all of his very, very well thought out thoughts
16:26
on what happened, on the state of Israel,
16:29
on the state of the relations with Hamas,
16:31
what Israel as a country should do,
16:33
what individual Israelis should do,
16:35
and what frankly the rest of the world should do
16:37
as they looked at it.
16:38
And the thing that I appreciated the most
16:40
is he didn't pull any punches.
16:42
So he showed a lot of video and a lot of pictures
16:44
of the worst atrocities that happened.
16:47
And as time has gone on,
16:49
we've heard more and more about the atrocities,
16:51
but he was showing women who had been brutally raped
16:54
and they were, you know, bloody from being penetrated
16:56
so violently so often.
16:58
Decapitated heads, you know,
17:00
women and children that were shot through the head,
17:02
he showed all that on his show.
17:04
And to be honest with you,
17:05
I was frankly shocked that it was able to be put on YouTube.
17:10
They did have a little bit of a disclaimer there
17:12
at the beginning, but it was just,
17:14
it was a very sobering episode.
17:16
Again, that was, you know, within 48 hours of the attacks.
17:18
And so everything was still really, really fresh.
17:21
And I just appreciate how you approached it.
17:23
Same way that I approached it on my show,
17:25
which is we're not going to sanitize anything.
17:27
And his reasoning was the same reason for mine,
17:29
which is in very short order.
17:31
So in very, very short order,
17:35
there were going to be people that were going to be
17:37
advocating for a ceasefire.
17:39
Because people are just going to focus in
17:42
on, oh, what's Israel doing?
17:44
And why are they messing up?
17:45
And why are they being so mean?
17:46
And why are they this and why are they that?
17:48
And they're going to forget entirely about what Hamas had done.
17:52
And that's the reason why, as I hear about new stories,
17:54
that I make sure that I bring those stories to you.
17:57
Because here recently, we've heard stories about women
17:59
that were so unbelievably brutally raped.
18:03
You know, their pelvis's were destroyed.
18:06
Think about how hard and how long you have to rape a person,
18:10
a girl or an adult woman to break their pelvis.
18:14
I mean, just think about that.
18:16
What would you have to do to pull that off?
18:19
And so again, I really, really appreciate
18:23
how he approached that episode.
18:25
It was a very difficult episode for him to record.
18:27
It was a difficult episode for everyone else to even,
18:30
you know, even watch and listen to,
18:32
but it was basically required.
18:34
And so if you have not listened to episode 1824
18:37
of The Binge Piero Show,
18:38
it's called The Face of Absolute Evil from October the 9th.
18:41
That is on his YouTube channel still.
18:43
So I would definitely suggest that you go back and do that.
18:47
Hey guys, real quick.
18:48
So just this morning, I was at the doctor and on my way out
18:50
the door, I kind of struck up a conversation with him
18:52
because this doctor used to try to convince me all the time
18:55
that I needed to stop eating red meat.
18:57
He had been convinced that red meat was the devil
18:59
and it was terrible for you.
19:00
And then over time, as he was not having red meat in his diet,
19:03
he was kind of suffering from that.
19:05
And so he is all in now.
19:07
And so he's trying to go carnivore like I am,
19:09
but he and I were both kind of lamenting
19:11
and worrying about the fact that, man,
19:12
we don't know where to get high quality beef.
19:14
We're surrounded by all these cattle operations here
19:16
in Oklahoma and there's also these online ones,
19:18
but you don't really know which ones to trust.
19:20
And so I've been looking for a partner
19:22
in the cattle operation business and I've found one
19:24
and I'm very excited to tell you about them.
19:26
That is why I want to introduce you
19:28
to the official beef delivery partner of Undaunted Life,
19:31
my friends at Primal Beef.
19:33
So Primal Beef is a new cattle operation
19:35
owned and operated by Sean Glass.
19:37
So he's a retired Navy Seal that served with Jocko Willink
19:40
and Jocko is also a partner in Primal Beef.
19:43
So what makes Primal Beef different?
19:45
From all the other fly by night,
19:46
beef delivery service companies here in America,
19:49
it's a combo of the following.
19:50
So they have all American black Angus cattle.
19:53
The beef comes from one single farm
19:55
and that's in Virginia, Shenandoah Valley.
19:58
The beef is also all natural, it has no hormones ever,
20:01
no antibiotics ever, no mRNA ever.
20:04
And after slaughter, the beef is dry aged,
20:06
then it is hand-cut by artisan butchers
20:09
and then flash frozen to ensure that it maintains
20:11
tenderness, marbling and flavor.
20:13
So whenever you open the package,
20:14
you're not getting an old crappy piece of meat.
20:16
It is so absolutely perfect.
20:18
And here's another cool thing.
20:19
For every box sold, Primal Beef donates meat directly
20:22
to a member of America's Special Operations Forces
20:25
through the C4 Foundation.
20:27
So you can take pride in knowing that your purchase
20:30
will help put literal food on the table
20:32
for America's finest warriors.
20:34
So if you're not salivating at this point,
20:36
you absolutely should be.
20:37
Guys, go and try Primal Beef out today
20:40
by going to www.primalbeef.com.
20:44
That's primalbeef.com.
20:46
Use the promo code CHIL
20:47
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20:49
That's primalbeef.com.
20:51
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20:54
All right, let's shift gears from other shows to our show.
20:56
So I spent a lot of time thinking through these
20:58
and looking at all of our data and everything.
21:00
So let's launch right in.
21:01
So the hardest interview to prepare of 2023,
21:05
that was episode 473 with Benjamin Watson
21:07
where we talked about his new book, The New Fight for Life.
21:10
So if you listen to my best books of 2023 podcasts,
21:13
I talked about the worst book of 2023,
21:16
and I gave it to Benjamin Watson and The New Fight for Life.
21:18
And I talked about my consternation with that
21:20
because I like Benjamin Watson personally.
21:23
He and I are friends, we are friendly with one another,
21:26
but I just couldn't get over how bad the book was argued
21:29
and how poorly he delved into the most important parts
21:33
of the pro-life cause.
21:34
And so I'm not just gonna do a complete rehash to that,
21:36
but the reason why I was so hard to prepare
21:40
is because I thought about canceling the interview.
21:42
But I wanted to honor him.
21:43
I wanted to honor the place on my schedule
21:45
because one thing I can't say
21:46
and this happened to me recently,
21:47
you do all this preparation for a podcast
21:49
and then somebody just cancels it.
21:51
Like I had someone cancel within 24 hours of the podcast
21:54
and I can't undo the level of prep
21:55
and the hours I've spent with that person's content.
21:57
So it's really rude.
21:58
Now it's different on the other side
22:00
'cause you don't really have to do anything
22:01
to prepare for an interview.
22:02
But if I say I'm gonna do it,
22:03
I'm going to follow through.
22:05
I can count on one hand the number of times
22:08
that I've had to shift and move somebody around.
22:10
But I thought about not doing the interview.
22:13
I talked to some of my confidants about what I should do
22:16
because there were very few things I was able to find
22:18
in the book where we were gonna have deep levels
22:20
of agreement, but we did agree on the core things,
22:23
which is that people need to repent of their sins
22:26
and turn to Christ for their salvation
22:27
and that people should protect life in any way possible, right?
22:32
Well, I won't say in any way possible
22:34
'cause that's where we do differ,
22:35
but to in general, protect life,
22:38
to protect innocent living human beings.
22:41
But it was a very, very hard thing to prepare for
22:43
because I was like, look,
22:44
I don't want to just flame him the entire time
22:46
'cause that would be rude.
22:47
But at the same time, I don't want to leave
22:49
some of his most ridiculous comments
22:51
and arguments from the book unchecked.
22:53
And so I did focus more on what we agreed on
22:56
when we got into that interview
22:57
and I did push back a little bit
22:59
but that was certainly the hardest interview
23:00
to prepare for for 2023.
23:02
Now let's go into the hardest episode to prepare for
23:05
of 2023 and that was episode 518,
23:08
let those who love the Lord hate evil.
23:10
So this was my episode that I did
23:12
concerning the Hamas attacks in Israel.
23:15
And the reason why it was the hardest episode to prepare
23:18
is because I did not shy away nor look away
23:22
from the images and videos that were coming out,
23:24
that most of which were shot by Hamas fighters
23:27
'cause they were super proud of what they had done.
23:29
And so for that entire week
23:31
that I was preparing this episode,
23:32
I was literally marinating in pictures and videos
23:36
and written descriptions of men, women and children
23:39
being violently, brutally raped, murdered,
23:43
tortured, all of that.
23:45
And I'm literally sitting here
23:47
'cause I prepare my podcast right here where I record.
23:49
And at different times, I was like angry crying
23:53
as I was going through my notes.
23:54
I was so angry at what these Hamas pieces of garbage
23:59
did to these innocent Israelis
24:02
that it was just overwhelming me with emotion.
24:06
I let a few guys in on that and I kind of reached out to them
24:08
and kind of vented my frustration,
24:11
but it was just one of those weeks where I really needed
24:13
the powerlifting in my garage and I really needed
24:15
the jujitsu to just help me control my emotions.
24:18
And I was a bear to be around,
24:20
I had to apologize to my wife several times,
24:22
my kids several times because I would just like snap
24:25
and have these really big, angry, immediate reactions
24:28
to little nonsense things.
24:30
And it was because I felt like,
24:32
like I don't wanna be hyperbolic,
24:34
but I literally felt like my soul was being like mushed
24:37
and smushed and just crushed.
24:40
And it really was soul crushing.
24:42
And I reached out to some friends after I finally did
24:46
the podcast and after I taught my Sunday school
24:48
because I did both of those things in the same week
24:51
on that content.
24:52
And I just needed to get it out of my brain,
24:54
but it was just like, it was such a hard week.
24:57
It was one of the hardest weeks that I've had
24:59
of the entire year and it was because of that content
25:01
because when you look at the gravity,
25:04
it's a very difficult thing to do.
25:06
But one thing I tell you guys all the time is,
25:09
I'm here to equip you to push back darkness, right?
25:12
I try to encourage you to push back the darkness
25:16
that you see around you in the darkness in society.
25:19
You can't do that if your eyes are covered.
25:21
You can't do that if your ears are plugged.
25:24
And so part of what I do is I spend a lot of time
25:28
in those dark places looking at dark things
25:31
so that I can prepare you for what will follow you
25:34
potentially if you decide you wanna go full bore
25:37
into the fight.
25:38
So it wasn't the easiest thing to do,
25:40
but if something that had to be done,
25:41
hardest episode to prepare of 2023, episode 518,
25:45
let those who love the Lord hate evil.
25:48
Now let's get into the most offensive episode of 2023.
25:51
That is episode 426 called the ugliness
25:54
of gay adoption and surrogacy.
25:56
So obviously via our culture,
25:59
whatever gay people decide to do
26:01
is supposed to be just fine and moral.
26:04
So if they wanna bang each other, fine.
26:06
If they wanna have an open relationship
26:08
and bang a bunch of dudes, fine.
26:10
If they wanna adopt kids, fine.
26:12
If they wanna mail order babies from certain mothers
26:16
and swirl their sperm together
26:18
and have it combined with an egg
26:19
and then inserted into some random woman
26:21
that they pay tens of thousands of dollars
26:23
to carry their baby around
26:25
so that they can have an accessory
26:27
to carry around a child, fine.
26:29
That's what culture tells us.
26:31
But there's nothing beautiful
26:34
about gay adoption and surrogacy, nothing at all.
26:36
And in that particular podcast,
26:37
I talked about these two gay men
26:39
that adopted these two brothers
26:42
and they were systematically raping
26:45
and destroying those boys
26:47
and also pimping those same boys out
26:49
and selling them to their gay pedophilic friends.
26:52
Now, obviously every gay couple
26:54
is not going to act out in that way,
26:57
but it's certainly an issue, is it not?
26:59
So in that episode, I talked deeply
27:01
about that particular case,
27:03
but then I just talk about the ugliness
27:05
of gay adoption and surrogacy overall
27:08
because children deserve a mother and a father.
27:10
That doesn't always work out
27:13
'cause we live in a fallen world.
27:14
We live in a post-genesis three world.
27:16
Sometimes mom dies during childbirth.
27:18
Sometimes it's dad's a deadbeat and not there.
27:20
Sometimes things don't work out, people die.
27:21
Like there's a myriad of situations
27:23
I would lead to a child not having a mother and a father,
27:26
but that is the design.
27:29
And so this idea, and here's the other thing.
27:32
I've had a lot of people get mad at me here recently
27:33
and okay, get mad, I don't really care.
27:35
But people are like, why are you so mad
27:38
about gay people adopting babies?
27:40
But what they're talking about is gay people
27:43
paying a surrogate to carry their lab created babies
27:46
and then steal them from the woman on the back end
27:50
to rip them away from their mother.
27:51
Literally, the baby comes out of the woman,
27:53
they don't even let it sit on the woman's chest
27:56
and they just basically clean the baby up
27:58
and take it over to these gay fathers
28:00
that are sitting in a hospital bed
28:01
as if they just got their giving labor.
28:04
It's disgusting, it's horrific, it's satanic.
28:09
Like this idea that we're allowing gay men
28:13
that are living in this unbelievable filthy depraved sin
28:17
and to welcome children into that,
28:19
without their mother even being around, it's horrible.
28:25
But again, I say that and I'm a bigot.
28:28
I say that and I just don't understand.
28:30
I say that and I'm just being way too judgmental.
28:34
But again, why would we even allow as a society
28:38
the creation of a baby specifically to bring them
28:41
into a homosexual household?
28:43
Because again, something may end up happening
28:45
and they don't get access to mom,
28:48
but in this, we're allowing them to just take these babies,
28:51
again, as an accessory piece
28:54
and we're just supposed to act like it's okay.
28:56
So I did that one earlier in the year,
28:58
my opinions haven't changed
28:59
if anything they've gotten deeper
29:00
but the most expensive episode of this year,
29:03
episode 426, The Ugliness of Gay Adoption and Serecacy.
29:06
Now, let's do the most talked about interview of 2,023.
29:10
That was a recent one, episode 527
29:12
from the Senate with Mark Wayne Mullen of November of 2023.
29:15
So if you go back to that time, Mark Wayne Mullen went viral
29:20
for challenging this teamster leader to a fight
29:23
right there on the Senate hearing floor
29:26
and we saw the viral thing where he stood up
29:28
and he said, "Stand your butt up then,"
29:29
and had to be kind of chilled out
29:31
by Bernie Sanders of all people.
29:33
The funniest thing about that story,
29:35
for those of you that are new to the show,
29:37
he came on my show about 90 minutes after that happened.
29:41
So he literally goes viral,
29:42
I get a message from one of our guys here says,
29:44
"Hey, did you see this about Mark Wayne?"
29:45
And then I look at the clock and it's like,
29:47
"Oh, 45 minutes later, he's gonna be on our show."
29:49
So that day he only did a Daunted Life of Man's podcast
29:53
and one of the shows on Newsmax.
29:54
He said no to all other news things.
29:57
And so I was literally the first person
29:59
to talk to him about that in a public setting
30:01
and I released the episode that day.
30:03
The reason why it's the most talked about interview
30:05
of this year is because that little clip from that show
30:08
made the rounds.
30:10
So all the late night shows,
30:12
Fallon, Kimmel, they showed a clip from that show
30:15
where he said, "And hey, I'll bite somebody,"
30:17
like during a fight, which was the only thing he said
30:20
sarcastically of the entire show
30:22
and all these dumb, dumbs took it as if he literally minted
30:25
even though he had a huge smile on his face.
30:26
And so did I.
30:27
I think it made the Oliver, whatever that guy,
30:30
that British guy who pretends to be smart on HBO,
30:33
the super late show or whatever that thing's called,
30:35
but it literally that clip went everywhere.
30:38
It went bananas on Twitter.
30:39
It was all over TikTok and all that.
30:41
So without a doubt, it's not even close.
30:43
The most talked about interview of our show this year
30:45
is episode 527 from The Senate with Mark Wayne Mullen.
30:50
All right, next one.
30:51
The most talked about episode of 2023.
30:53
And that was episode 423 called Andy Stanley is a heretic.
30:57
And so many of you that have listened to the show this year,
30:59
I've done three entire episodes just on Andy Stanley.
31:03
But if we go all the way back to the beginning of the year,
31:05
I think this was released in January or February
31:08
is whenever I first really wrap my head around the fact
31:12
that Andy Stanley is pro LGBTQ,
31:15
that he does not see it as a sin.
31:17
And he's not going to talk about it from the pulpit
31:20
as if it is a sin.
31:21
And then we move through the rest of the year.
31:23
They do that conference, that LGBTQ plus affirming conference.
31:27
They have a ridiculous things that were said from there.
31:29
Obviously you can just go back and listen to the episodes I did.
31:32
I'm not going to rehash it here.
31:33
But that was easily the most talked about episode
31:36
because people were just completely unaware
31:38
that Andy Stanley thought this way and did these things.
31:41
A lot of people were maybe like I was to where,
31:43
they listened to him religiously, no pun intended
31:45
for a really, really long time.
31:47
And then maybe they just kind of fell off.
31:49
They got distracted and they were listening
31:50
to other preachers or something like that.
31:52
And so they had no idea that Andy Stanley had gone off
31:54
the deep end and become basically a progressive Christian.
31:58
And again, some of you are like, wait a minute,
32:00
you can't call someone a heretic.
32:01
That's crazy. That's a crazy high charge.
32:03
But basically a heretic is just somebody
32:05
that consistently holds to opinions that are outside
32:08
of the accepted doctrine of their faith
32:10
that they purport to be a part of.
32:12
And so from the pulpit, when he says the things
32:14
that he says, it's very damaging.
32:16
And then also we can look at it this way.
32:18
He's very much like Pope Francis in that he never speaks
32:21
clearly when he's talking about this issue.
32:24
He's such a master communicator.
32:26
He has his own PR spin team.
32:29
That's basically what Andy Stanley is,
32:30
which makes him so dangerous.
32:32
Because how hard would it be to say,
32:34
yeah, if you act out on your homosexual desires,
32:37
that's sinful.
32:38
Yeah, you can't live in it with the same sex person
32:42
in the same sex relationship.
32:44
You certainly can't get married.
32:45
It's bad if you have kids, it's all bad.
32:47
But he would never say that.
32:49
Same thing on the trans idea.
32:50
He's gonna be one of those guys within a few years.
32:53
He will come to come out as completely trans.
32:55
I didn't know, maybe trans identifying,
32:58
but it'll come out as pro trans saying,
32:59
yes, that is your accepted identity.
33:01
We're gonna go with that.
33:02
He's gonna use pronoun hospitality the whole deal.
33:05
And you guys have really hopped on board
33:06
and it's really done a lot for people
33:08
to really wake up and say, look,
33:10
your favorite passers may have written books that you liked.
33:13
They may have preached sermons that were fantastic.
33:15
They may have done things that have helped you.
33:17
They may have even brought you to faith.
33:19
But that doesn't mean we just blindly follow them
33:21
for the rest of our lives.
33:22
We have to keep paying attention to the things
33:24
that they're saying, the things that they're doing
33:26
and how far they're straying away from the Bible.
33:28
So most talked about episode of 2023, episode 423,
33:31
Andy Stanley is a heritage.
33:33
Now, the interview that I was most nervous about of 2023,
33:36
this shouldn't be a surprise to anybody,
33:38
it was the interview that I did with Vodie Bockam.
33:40
So that was episode 505 called Vodie Bockam
33:42
discovering the ever-loving truth.
33:45
And so I've been trying to get Vodie Bockam on the show
33:47
for like three or four years.
33:48
And, you know, I had worked with different publishers,
33:51
different managers, different friends of his.
33:53
And his team behind the scenes is,
33:55
I'll just say they're not the easiest people
33:57
in the world to work with.
33:59
But we got in, we had a very specific time crunch
34:02
and he had a book coming out at a particular time.
34:04
And I reached out at the right time to the right person
34:06
and it just worked out.
34:07
And I'll be honest, I'm not like flexing or anything,
34:11
but I really don't get nervous before interviews.
34:13
I don't even get nervous before I speak live
34:15
because it's like, I kind of remind myself,
34:18
this is what you were put on this planet to do.
34:19
So whether I'm speaking out of prison or at a men's event
34:22
or at a larger church event, it's just like,
34:24
all right, these are just people, this is just a microphone,
34:26
this is just the words I need to say,
34:27
or these are the words that God is gonna say through me,
34:29
ready, say go.
34:30
I do the same thing with interviews,
34:31
but I was like, I was feeling the weight a little bit
34:34
of this one to be like, gosh,
34:36
I've literally wanted to get this guy on for forever.
34:39
He's one of my favorite guys to listen to,
34:40
one of my favorite pastors, one of my favorite preachers
34:43
to preach, I don't think he's technically a pastor anymore,
34:45
but he's one of my favorite guys to hear preach the gospel.
34:48
And I was just so excited to talk to him
34:49
about the things that he had done,
34:50
the things that he had worked on.
34:52
And, you know, I wish the audio quality had been higher,
34:55
but he was in this hotel room where the audio was bad.
34:58
And, you know, the microphone or any ears were,
35:01
they were like rubbing against his beard.
35:03
So there was a little bit of friction.
35:04
And we did what we could to make the audio as good as possible.
35:06
But I don't think any of y'all noticed
35:07
unless you're an audio file,
35:08
but I was very, very nervous going into that
35:11
or I was slightly nervous, I could say,
35:13
but I couldn't have been more pleased with how it went
35:15
and how he and I connected.
35:17
So that was the interview.
35:18
I was most nervous about a 2023 episode 505 with Vodie Bockham.
35:22
Now we need to talk about the episode
35:24
that I was most nervous about of 2023.
35:26
And that was episode 496,
35:28
"The dangers of country music theology."
35:30
Now you might be thinking to yourself,
35:31
well, Kyle, why would you be nervous to talk about
35:33
country music and make up a phrase
35:34
called country music theology?
35:36
Well, that really wasn't it.
35:37
That was my first recording after I was back, back
35:42
from vocal cord surgery.
35:44
So I had two vocal cord surgeries,
35:46
which I'll talk more about in my year in wrap up.
35:48
But for those of you that didn't know I had to collapse,
35:50
vocal cord, one surgery, didn't fix the issue,
35:53
had to go in and do surgery again.
35:55
And then I took several months off
35:57
of doing like consistent recording.
35:59
You know, I would do interviews where I could talk
36:01
for a second, tee them up and then let my voice rest,
36:04
forging table where I could talk for a second,
36:06
you know, tee up the other three guys
36:08
and then let my voice rest.
36:09
But episode 496 was the first episode where I was like,
36:11
"Okay, this is just me."
36:14
I am back back.
36:15
I'm gonna do my larger topic at the beginning
36:18
and then I'm gonna do my quick hitters.
36:20
And I did it.
36:22
And part of the thing that I was most nervous about
36:24
is because I had spent months and months thinking about
36:26
this, these ideologies about country music theology,
36:30
about this idea that, you know, if you listen
36:32
to country music and if you are from the country
36:34
and if you vote Republican here and there
36:36
and you go to church a few times a year
36:37
that God's just gonna let you into heaven
36:39
'cause he likes all that stuff.
36:41
And now that's a really dangerous ideology
36:44
that can end up sending you to hell.
36:46
And so having that, it's kind of one of the things
36:49
about this show that's so cathartic for me
36:51
is I can have a incendiary or unique topic in my brain
36:56
and then I get to just write an episode
36:58
and then just, you know, get it out.
37:00
Just get to fart it out of my brain and then it's done.
37:02
And then I can move on to the next subject.
37:04
And so that was this for me,
37:07
but I normally I'll get like an idea
37:10
and like within the week,
37:11
the idea will be out on the podcast and I can move on.
37:14
But I was dealing with this, you know,
37:15
as I was recovering for three or four months
37:17
and having, you know, little setbacks here and there
37:19
and having to kind of figure out
37:21
what I was going to do with my voice overall
37:22
and, you know, go through my coaching and all that.
37:25
But to get all the way to that point,
37:26
to build up to where I could feel confident
37:28
to deliver that message to you,
37:30
it really, really took a lot.
37:31
But that was the episode I was most nervous
37:33
about of 2023, episode 496,
37:35
the dangers of country music theology.
37:38
Now we're going to get into the audience's favorite
37:40
interview of 2023.
37:43
And so the only way to really do this fairly
37:45
is to kind of break down the downloads
37:47
of these different episodes and kind of rank them from there.
37:50
And I know if it's earlier in the year,
37:51
it gets more downloads and blah, blah, blah,
37:53
but these were kind of spread out.
37:54
So number three audience favorite interview
37:57
was episode 441 with John Cooper.
37:59
And that was called Undaunted Cooper Life Stuff.
38:01
And so that was him and I hanging out in Tulsa
38:05
before their show up there.
38:06
And so we recorded a podcast that went on both of our feeds.
38:09
So that's why it's, you know,
38:10
Undaunted Life Cooper Stuff.
38:11
So Undaunted Cooper Life Stuff.
38:13
And so that was number three.
38:14
Number two was my interview with Yolmy Park.
38:17
And so that was in episode 431.
38:20
And so that's called a North Korean defectors
38:22
search for freedom in America.
38:24
Excuse me.
38:25
And that's another thing that,
38:27
that episode was a long time coming as well
38:30
because it had been two or three years of work
38:32
to secure that and, you know,
38:34
kind of worked out with a release of a book
38:36
and different things.
38:37
But that was Yol's second favorite interview of the year.
38:39
It's just fantastic.
38:40
And then number one was episode 443 of this podcast
38:44
with Jobe Martin.
38:44
So of all the interviews that we've done this year,
38:47
that's the one that got the most amount of downloads.
38:50
And so that's the interview that we did
38:52
to support the release of his second book,
38:54
Anything is Possible.
38:55
And the, here's the interesting thing about that.
38:57
Is he had already been on the show twice before?
38:59
You know, we did the first interview
39:01
to discuss his first book, If The Tomb is Empty.
39:05
And it was great.
39:06
We hit it off, started a friendship,
39:09
invited him back on.
39:10
He did another episode.
39:11
But there was something special
39:12
about this particular episode that the, you know,
39:16
he and I, like, we kind of got a better feel for each,
39:19
each other and the way that we liked to talk
39:22
and the way that we liked to cover subject matters.
39:24
And we weaved in and out of different things
39:26
that I wanted to weave in and out of, you know,
39:28
I challenged some things in his book
39:29
and he just, you know, he, you know,
39:30
chewed it up and spit it right back at me.
39:32
And it just, it was a really, really fun conversation.
39:35
But here's the thing.
39:36
I have fun conversations all the time
39:39
that don't turn into high quality interviews,
39:41
if I'm being honest.
39:43
You know, there are times when I do a really fun interview
39:46
and I think it's awesome, but the audience
39:47
just kind of like, man, they don't really care.
39:49
But this was one where the audience was like all over it.
39:52
The shares for it were through the roof
39:54
and people just really enjoyed what Joby had to say.
39:57
And then springboard to what we're doing now,
39:59
we have Ask a Pastor with Joby Martin.
40:01
So once a month, Joby's going to come on the show
40:04
and I'm going to take questions from me,
40:05
my internal circle here,
40:07
and then also from our donors to ask him.
40:09
So like, hey, if you wanted to ask a, you know,
40:11
a pastor, a particular question
40:13
that's maybe kind of a difficult question,
40:15
you know, what would you ask him?
40:16
And this is one of the things that we've done.
40:18
And it was because of episode 443,
40:20
because y'all just enjoyed his opinions
40:23
and the way that he brought it so much in that episode.
40:25
I was like, we gotta find a way to get him on the show
40:27
more often.
40:28
And so that's what we figured out.
40:29
So that's the audience's favorite interview
40:31
of 2023, episode 443, Joby Martin,
40:33
and it's called Anything Is Possible.
40:35
All right, now let's break down the audience's favorite
40:37
episode of 2023.
40:39
So we're going to do the same thing.
40:40
I just looked at the downloads
40:41
and we're going to go from three to one.
40:42
So number three was episode 408.
40:45
That's the forging table Galatians one.
40:47
So that was actually the very first forging table episode.
40:51
So we had recorded that in 2022.
40:53
And then we released that in January of 2023.
40:55
So you guys loved that concept
40:57
and you still love the forging table even to today.
40:59
So that was number three.
41:00
Number two was episode 423.
41:02
Andy Stanley is a heretic for obvious reasons.
41:04
And then number one was episode 410,
41:06
the top 17 ways to avoid being a crappy man in 2023.
41:10
So that is the episode that we do
41:12
at the beginning of every year.
41:13
I give you a certain number of ways
41:15
to avoid being a crappy man.
41:17
That's probably, the reason why that gets the most downloads
41:19
is obviously it's released early in the year,
41:21
but it's January, it's new year, new me people.
41:23
It's people that are finding podcasts, sharing podcasts
41:26
because this is the year that I get my body in shape.
41:29
And this is the year that I get my mind right.
41:30
And this is the year that I fix my whatever.
41:32
And so I kind of hit on a lot of those themes
41:34
and I've already prepared this episode.
41:36
I'll be recording it to be released in early January.
41:39
So that's always a very, very popular episode.
41:41
That was the audience's favorite episode of 2023,
41:43
episode 410, the top 17 ways to avoid being a crappy man in 2023.
41:47
Now we need to get to my favorites.
41:49
Okay, so my favorite interview of 2023
41:51
and then my favorite episode of 2023.
41:54
So I have some honorable mentions for my favorite interview.
41:57
There's a lot.
41:58
So what, get over it, it's my show.
42:00
So here are some of my favorite interviews from the year.
42:02
Episode 530 was Sean Glass, 521 with Joby Martin,
42:06
520 with Tom Rayner, 514 with Oskinis,
42:10
508 with Jay Warner Wallace, 506 with Vodie Bockum,
42:13
505 with Phil Robertson, 498 with Justin Briarley,
42:17
489 with Mike Dragach, 483 with Lucas Miles,
42:21
481 with Josh Hawley, 479 with Mike Glover,
42:24
477 with Tim Ballard with the asterisk that, you know,
42:28
it's come to light that some of the stuff about his life
42:31
is really not on the up and up.
42:32
We were going to talk about that more later,
42:34
but, you know, it was a big podcast.
42:36
I was glad to get it.
42:37
So that's why I mentioned it.
42:39
Keeping on here, 470 with Eugenia Constantino,
42:43
462 with Jack Carr, 452 with Shane and Shane,
42:46
446 with Matt Griner, 444 with Joby Martin,
42:50
441 with John Cooper, 440 with Ray Comfort,
42:53
437 with Holly McKay, 435 with Michael Fransese,
42:57
428 with Greg Hurwitz, 425 with Brandon Tatum,
43:00
422 with Josh Smith, 414 with Brittany De La Mora,
43:04
416 with Azuzula Aziz and 415 with Chad Robeshoe.
43:08
But when I look at the year and I look at the dozens
43:11
and dozens of interviews that we've done,
43:13
and even when I look at the hundreds of interviews
43:16
that we've done, there is one interview
43:19
that stands out above them all.
43:21
And that is my interview with Yeon Mi Park.
43:23
So that is the winner of the Best Interviewer,
43:25
my favorite interview of 2023.
43:27
Again, it's episode 431, Yeon Mi Park,
43:29
a North Korean defector search for freedom in America.
43:32
So this is actually two years in a row
43:33
where that award went to a woman.
43:35
And so for a man's podcast, I sure do, you know,
43:37
have an affinity for some of my conversations with the ladies.
43:39
But last year, that was with Sarah Wilkinson.
43:42
So we talked a lot about her husband's suicide
43:44
and, you know, the things that she's done after that.
43:46
And it was one of those interviews where I just,
43:48
you know, we were in tears within five minutes.
43:50
Both of us were, I basically Xed out of my interview questions
43:53
and I just said, "Hey, we're gonna flow
43:54
"for the next 45 or 60 minutes and see where we go."
43:57
But again, the Yeon Mi Park interview,
43:59
it was a long time coming.
44:01
I had spent a lot of time being familiar with her story,
44:03
reading her books, reading about the things
44:06
that she had gone through and the things that she has done
44:08
in order to literally get to America
44:11
and then to see, you know, America erode around her
44:14
and to see some of the same thoughts be popularized
44:17
that remind her of the country that she literally left
44:20
North Korea, which is one of the worst dictatorships
44:22
on the planet Earth right now, maybe even of all time.
44:26
And I just remember a one-point during the interview with her.
44:28
Again, you gotta go back and listen to it.
44:29
That's why I'm trying to be, you know,
44:31
somewhat short with all these descriptions.
44:33
At one point of the interview, it may have been 20, 25 minutes
44:36
and I'm like, this is the best interview we've ever done.
44:39
And it was because I'd spent a lot of time with the content.
44:43
So my questions were on point, I felt.
44:45
And she obviously lived that life
44:48
and she just talked about these crazy circumstances
44:51
of her life and kind of this all chucksy matter of fact way.
44:54
And her answers, I just, I loved them.
44:57
Again, you know, English is not our first language
44:59
and so some of it's a little bit hard to understand.
45:01
But it was just such, it was such an interesting thing
45:04
to sit there and to be talking to a woman that weighs, you know,
45:09
90 pounds and to realize she's probably one
45:11
of the toughest gangsters and maybe that's ever existed.
45:15
Because she goes into trafficking to be smuggled out of North Korea
45:20
to get over to China.
45:23
She endures a crazy hardship.
45:26
These thoughts that her and her mother might have to commit suicide,
45:29
watching her mother be raped and finding out later
45:30
is because the man wanted to rape her,
45:32
but the mother gave herself to him instead
45:35
to go through the desert of Mongolia
45:39
in the middle of winter with basically a light jacket
45:42
and bad shoes to try to get to the other side
45:44
to have a chance of getting to South Korea
45:47
and then to go from South Korea to America
45:50
and just, you know, I get frustrated when the wifi doesn't work.
45:54
You know, I don't like it when it's a little bit cold outside
45:56
and I don't have the exact, you know, right jacket on.
46:00
And it's just like, you look at someone like that
46:02
and it's just an extreme level of toughness
46:04
and an extreme level of something that we're very obsessed with
46:07
and that's resilience.
46:09
I don't know that I know of a more resilient human
46:12
that I've ever talked to than Yeon Mi Park.
46:14
So that is my favorite interview, not only of 2023,
46:17
but that is my favorite interview that we've ever done on the show
46:20
and that's episode 431 with Yeon Mi Park.
46:23
Now we're gonna do the last one here, the very last award.
46:26
That is my favorite episode of 2023.
46:28
And so I will give you some honorable mentions here.
46:30
So episode 538, the Pope is an effeminate pansy because he is
46:34
and literally like within a week or two
46:36
of me releasing that episode, he comes out with this declaration,
46:40
even though Catholics say that he didn't declare it,
46:42
but basically declaring that same-sex couples
46:45
can get blessings from the church.
46:47
And so that was something that I mentioned.
46:48
I'm like, hey, before too long, he's gonna have this.
46:51
And then I was found out right like very, very quickly after.
46:53
So here's some other honorable mentions.
46:55
Episode 532, the song that changed my life.
46:58
Episode 518, "Let those who love the Lord hate evil."
47:01
Episode 512, Andy Stanley, "The Circle Drawing Snake."
47:05
Episode 499, "Update."
47:07
Andy Stanley is still a heretic.
47:09
Episode 496, "The Dangers of Country Music Theology."
47:12
Episode 468, "What if God Doesn't Heal Me?"
47:17
Episode 438, "Preaching Behind Bars You Can Still Be Free."
47:21
Episode 432, "My Time with Jordan Peterson."
47:25
Episode 426, "The Ugliness of Gay Adoption and Sargacy."
47:28
And then 423, 80 Stanley is a heretic.
47:30
Sorry guys, I'm trying to like sneak in my drinks
47:33
and my coughs here, but having some issues
47:36
with the throat and with the voice,
47:37
but we're getting through it.
47:38
But let's get to my last one here at the winner
47:41
of my favorite episode of 2023.
47:43
That's episode 408, "The Forging Table Galations One."
47:46
This is the reason why.
47:48
Took a risk.
47:50
We took a risk adding a different thing to the podcast
47:53
'cause at the time, we've got my solo episodes.
47:57
We've got my interviews and I would do random conversations.
48:02
I think we had already launched from the Senate
48:03
with Mark Wayne Mullen, excuse me.
48:06
We hadn't quite yet launched the Ask a Pastor
48:09
with Joby Martin yet, but I was like, you know what?
48:12
I read way too many books that were not the Bible in 2022.
48:16
We need to fix that in 2023.
48:18
Hey, we might as well teach, you know,
48:20
turn it into content.
48:21
Hey, let's call it "The Forging Table."
48:23
Let me just set up a table with four mics,
48:26
grab three other laymen, non-professional Christians.
48:30
Let's just get around the table
48:31
and let's take the Bible, one chapter at a time,
48:34
random books of the Bible,
48:36
and let's just go chapter by chapter through different books
48:39
and just talk about it for an hour.
48:42
And I had no idea if it was gonna work, none.
48:44
The guys I pitched it to, they were like,
48:46
yeah, I actually liked that idea.
48:47
I think that would be cool.
48:48
But you never know, you know,
48:50
your crew of five or six guys,
48:51
you think something's cool,
48:52
and then you like pitch it to somebody else,
48:54
and they're like, yeah, that sounds kind of lame.
48:55
And it's like, eh, you're probably right.
48:58
And so for us, we really liked the idea.
49:00
But I initially was like, okay,
49:02
let's just do the book of Galatians.
49:05
And then if nobody liked it, and if it sucks,
49:07
we just won't do it again,
49:08
and we'll just pretend like it ever happened.
49:09
But even just preparing to record the first one,
49:12
Galatians 1, I sent a text to all the guys, I said,
49:15
no, we're just doing this now.
49:17
I don't care if no one listens to it.
49:20
Like, I need this selfishly.
49:23
I need to prepare as if I'm gonna present
49:25
on a chapter of the Bible.
49:27
And I wanna be surrounded by guys
49:30
that are doing the same thing,
49:31
that are spending time in the word,
49:33
marinating in the scriptures, the commentaries,
49:36
the different videos that are associated with that,
49:39
from other pastors or whatever.
49:42
And I was like, we need this.
49:44
And then immediately, the forging table episodes,
49:46
we're getting more downloads than our normal episodes,
49:49
and the audience could not have been more thrilled with it.
49:52
And so we just like, okay, we're just gonna do this now.
49:55
And so I'm telling you, unless something major changes,
49:58
we will be releasing a forging table episode every Sunday
50:01
for as long as this show is gonna be out.
50:04
So if you skip those, I would encourage you not to do that.
50:07
If you're a non-Christian listening to this,
50:08
we're so happy that you're here.
50:10
You need to see what it's like to have a group
50:11
of normal dudes, just regular guys,
50:13
sitting around talking about the Bible.
50:15
So it's a very, very important episode to me,
50:17
'cause it was the very, very first one,
50:19
but that's my favorite episode of 2023, episode 408,
50:22
the forging table, Galatians 1.
50:24
All right, guys, before we let you go,
50:25
we are gonna do a quick resilience boost,
50:26
add a don to life or mission is equipping
50:28
men to push back darkness with content
50:30
that forges spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
50:32
So I've got links to the Origin and Jocko Fuel website,
50:34
I've got links to our donation page.
50:36
I'm gonna include links for the Joby Martin 443 interview,
50:40
episode 410, the top 17 ways to avoid being a crappy man in 2023.
50:45
And then a link to the only park interview
50:47
in the very, very first forging table interview.
50:49
Those links will be here for your convenience.
50:50
And then everything else that I mentioned
50:52
will just be here in the show notes
50:53
so you can check it out there.
50:55
Thank you guys so much for listening to this episode.
50:56
Wherever you're listening to this,
50:58
please subscribe, rate and leave us a positive five star
51:00
review.
51:01
If you want to come speak live at your event
51:02
or on your podcast,
51:03
just shoot me an email to info@undonton.life.
51:06
That's i-n-f-o @undonton.life.
51:09
Follow us on Instagram and like us on Facebook
51:11
and check out our website for everything else,
51:12
including how to donate to keep more content
51:14
like this coming your way.
51:15
Just go to www.undonton.life
51:18
and also we want to thank the band Holy Name
51:20
for allowing us to use their music for our content.
51:23
The music on this podcast is our song Perpetua,
51:25
which is off their self-titled debut album
51:27
on Face Down Records.
51:28
The links are in the description.
51:30
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
51:32
Remember, keep pushing back darkness,
51:35
keep forging spiritual, mental and physical resilience,
51:38
keep seeking the lion of Judah.
51:40
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51:44
(upbeat music)
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