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0:50
This is Undaunted Life of Man's Podcast.
0:54
I'm your host Kyle Thompson, let's get into it.
0:57
Remember guys, we got a special guest on the podcast today.
0:59
His name is Jason Redman.
1:00
He is a retired Navy SEAL, entrepreneur, author, and motivational speaker.
1:05
He served on SEAL Teams 4 and SEAL Teams 10, and he is the author of a couple of different
1:09
books.
1:10
He's got his first book here, The Trident, the forging and reforging of a Navy SEAL leader,
1:15
and his latest book, which is this one, Overcome, Crush Adversity with the leadership techniques
1:19
of America's toughest warriors.
1:21
So his daughter is a big fan of the show, his daughter and his son-in-law are big fans
1:25
of the show, and so they reached out, and I was very well aware of Jason Redman, but
1:29
they pitched him to come on the show.
1:30
I was like, "Absolutely, let's do this."
1:32
So if that name sounds familiar to you, it's because back on September the 13th of 2007,
1:37
he was caught in an ambush where he was actually hit with eight rounds from an automatic weapon,
1:41
and one of the rounds actually entered the right side of his face, entering his jaw and
1:45
exiting through his nose, so ripped off part of his face.
1:47
He did manage to survive the attack, and so you may have heard about all of those different
1:52
things, and we talk about that a little bit in this interview today.
1:55
We jumped around to a bunch of different subjects, which was awesome, but he goes into a lot
1:59
of detail in the trident about exactly what happened during the ambush, but during recovery
2:04
is when he went viral, because he became fed up with this feeling that everyone around
2:09
him was like talking about him like he wasn't there, and they were just feeling sorry for
2:13
him, and so he posted a sign on the door of his room, and the sign said this, "Attention
2:18
to all who enter here.
2:19
If you are coming into this room with sorrow or to feel sorry for my wounds, go elsewhere.
2:24
The wounds I received, I got in a job I love, doing it for people I love, supporting the
2:29
freedom of a country I deeply love.
2:31
I am incredibly tough and will make a full recovery.
2:34
What is full?
2:35
That is the absolute utmost physical, physically my body has the ability to recover.
2:40
Then I will push that about 20% further through sheer mental tenacity.
2:44
This room you are about to enter is a room of fun, optimism, and intense, rapid regrowth.
2:50
If you are not prepared for that, go elsewhere.
2:53
Signed the management."
2:55
So most of you probably saw that it went mega viral back in that time.
3:00
Someone actually took a picture of the sign that went viral.
3:02
He was brought to the Oval Office to the White House to meet with President George W. Bush
3:07
at the time.
3:08
The sign actually still stands at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and
3:12
the thing is, is this guy is just a very, very resilient dude.
3:16
And there's actually a quote from Overcome that I want to read that will kind of give
3:19
you an idea.
3:20
I know it's a little bit of a longer intro than I normally do, but it's just, I'm trying
3:23
to really set you up for what you're about to hear.
3:25
So here's a quote from Overcome, "I have undergone 40 reconstructive surgeries.
3:29
I have had six blood transfusions and I wore a tracheotomy for seven months and two days.
3:34
I've had approximately 1500 stitches, 200 staples, five plates, a titanium orbital floor, 15
3:42
screws, eight pins, 20 skin grafts, and four bone grafts, including a calvarial bone graft.
3:48
I have had my jaw shattered, broken, and rebroken three times.
3:52
My mouth was wired shut for over 12 weeks.
3:54
I've lost over 50 pounds.
3:56
I've spent ultimately 190 hours in surgery under anesthesia.
4:00
Despite all that, I am still standing.
4:03
I'm still breathing, and most of all, I am still in control of my destiny.
4:07
Guys, I really, really enjoyed my time with Jason.
4:10
And without further ado, let's get into it.
4:13
Jason Redmond, welcome to Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
4:16
I would do more of a casual introduction, but you and I became fast friends offline.
4:20
And I'm like super excited to get into this.
4:22
I don't want to like kind of chill as I get into most things.
4:25
I just want to like fire away.
4:26
Send it.
4:27
Is that cool with you?
4:28
Kyle, let's go, baby.
4:29
Okay.
4:30
Sorry.
4:31
It's honored to be on.
4:32
Thank you for having me.
4:33
Hey, I'm honored that people in your family like our show and like the way that we do
4:36
things and they thought you'd be a good fit for this.
4:38
So this is a family affair today on Undaunted Life of Man's podcast, but we do need to
4:42
start somewhat simply because I did not serve in the military, but I did grow up in Lawton
4:46
Fort Sill.
4:47
And so I've been around the military my entire life.
4:50
And so I kind of live a little bit of a militaristic Spartan life myself, having not ever raised
4:54
my right hand and, you know, promised that I would, you know, defend this country from
4:58
enemies, foreign and domestic.
4:59
But for you, what led you or drew you to the military, but then specifically the Navy and
5:05
the Navy seals.
5:06
Yeah.
5:07
Yeah.
5:08
And before we get too far away, I will give a shout out to my middle daughter, Sierra,
5:12
who is absolutely amazing and her husband, Ian, both of them, amazingly strong Christians,
5:18
Ian, a tremendous protector.
5:20
I'm honored to have him as a son in law.
5:23
And I wouldn't be on the show if it wasn't for them, bringing it up to me and saying,
5:26
Hey dad, there's this great podcast.
5:28
We think you'd be a good guest.
5:29
So much love this year.
5:31
And even though you're a Michigan fan, I still love you.
5:38
So yeah.
5:39
Hey, the military I was, as you can tell by my job at Michigan, I'm originally from Ohio.
5:44
My family's from Ohio.
5:46
So I am a die hard buck.
5:47
I fan.
5:48
There you go.
5:49
And I was born into a family of service.
5:54
My dad had served in the army and I grew up with, and it even went back further than that.
6:00
I mean, my both grandfathers on my, on my parent's side fought in World War two.
6:08
On my grandmother's side, very decorated.
6:11
They were pilots.
6:13
My grandfather, my grandfather, my maternal grandfather flew B-24s across the European
6:18
theater.
6:19
I remember reading an article that hung on the walls in our house where they were shot
6:23
down and he crash landed the plane and Yugoslavia saved his whole career crash landed in a snowfield.
6:30
And then led his crew back to Italian lines and earned the distinguished flying cross
6:35
for that.
6:36
And then flew all his missions, multiple, multiple air metals on my, my, my, I'm sorry,
6:44
my paternal grandfather's side.
6:45
My maternal grandfather's side, they were French and they fought with the French in World
6:50
War two and then immigrated over to Canada after the war.
6:55
And then my mom was born in Canada before she came here to America.
6:59
So I just grew up with these tales of service and it was something from a very young age.
7:05
I said, Hey, I want to be, I want to be a protector as I call our class of fire military
7:11
law enforcement.
7:12
Anybody willing to step up and serve others and, and risk their lives in the service of
7:18
others.
7:19
So I call that the protector community and I started out wanting to be a firefighter
7:23
and then I wanted to be a pilot and then, you know, I grew up in the GI Joe generation.
7:27
So man, I became infatuated with snake eyes and storm shadow and special operations and
7:33
started learning about that when I was about, probably when I was about 14, my dad who had
7:39
been a airborne, airborne instructor and he was a rigor.
7:45
He said to me, Hey, you know, you talk about your interests and special operations.
7:49
There were a group of guys that went through airborne with us.
7:51
They were called Navy seals and he said they're considered to be the best of the best hardest
7:56
train in the military.
7:58
He's like, you should look into them.
8:00
And I did.
8:01
And there wasn't a whole lot of information back then.
8:03
But what I could find just peeked my, my interest and, um, and interestingly, I'm not like the
8:10
traditional candidate that you would think I wasn't like this gigantic jock.
8:15
I wasn't, you know, this, uh, I didn't, I, I hunted a little bit, but I wasn't like this
8:20
die hard hunter or anything.
8:21
I was just a young kid and graduated with the warrior class, if you will, in a lifetime,
8:26
you know, in a life of service and the more I explored about the seal teams, uh, the more
8:32
it inspired me to do it despite everything I heard, hardest training in the US military,
8:36
all this stuff.
8:37
So I just decided, okay, well, I'm going to start training and I need to do hard things
8:41
and I need to prepare myself to do this.
8:45
Do hard things.
8:46
That's something that's going to be a, a through point of our entire discussion today.
8:50
And now here's the thing with Navy seals.
8:52
I don't know if this is going to be breaking news to some people, but a lot of Navy seals
8:54
have written books, including you.
8:56
Okay.
8:57
And so I think at this point we've seen the book, it is the ongoing joke now.
9:00
That's right.
9:01
Yeah.
9:02
Oh, you're a seal.
9:03
You have a book.
9:04
Yeah.
9:05
Exactly.
9:06
Of course you're a best selling author.
9:07
But at this point, I think we all know that at some point, Jason, that you were cold, wet
9:10
and sandy, that you had to roll around on the beach, that you were very, very uncomfortable.
9:14
I'm more interested with what are some of the misconceptions about seal training, but
9:19
also just being a seal in general because we don't have to spend forever on this.
9:23
But I know there's a ton of misconceptions out there and it's got to drive you guys nuts.
9:26
So what are some of those?
9:27
Well, and Kyle, I'd like to say something about my book.
9:30
It's one of the favorite things I hear when people read my book.
9:33
I hear this all the time.
9:36
They go, that's not what I expected.
9:40
And frequently people will say to me, oh, every sealed book is written the same.
9:43
You write about buds.
9:44
You talk about how awesome you were, how you were Achilles.
9:48
And then, you know, how you did some missions and you slayed people and the greatest warrior
9:53
on the planet and that's your book.
9:54
So did you follow the same format?
9:56
And I said, no, I write about how I totally screwed up.
10:00
I almost failed.
10:01
I almost blew my brains out in Afghanistan, how I had to course correct as an officer
10:06
and had to rebuild myself and earn back the reputation and trust my teammates.
10:10
I don't write about buds at all.
10:12
I write about ranger school where I finally grew up and understood what it was to become
10:15
a leader and then implementing those new leadership lessons as a young officer before
10:21
I was severely wounded being shot eight times on the battlefield in Iraq.
10:25
So that's my book.
10:27
Much different.
10:28
A lot of people that read it are like, man, hey, thank you for being so humble and transparent
10:33
in your journey.
10:34
I pull no punches on the mistakes that I made.
10:36
And frequently I hear other seals out there like, oh, Chase Redmond, that's that guy that's
10:40
screwed up.
10:41
And I'm like, yep.
10:42
And I own every second of it.
10:44
There's nothing I pull back on.
10:46
So if you want to read a great book about overcoming adversity and about leadership,
10:51
then read my book.
10:52
If you want to read another book that's about how awesome a guy is, how he's achilles and
10:56
how great budges, then I don't know, go read somebody else's book.
10:59
Well, Jason, if I can hop in on that because I think that that pretty much sums up, you
11:04
answered a better question than the one I even asked.
11:05
So this is going to be a great interview today because you're we're both going to make each
11:08
other better.
11:09
The refreshing thing about the Trident is, okay, back in the eighties, everybody wanted
11:16
to see the, uh, the superhero on the, on the big screen, the guy that couldn't be killed,
11:20
the guy that never bled, the guy that never sweated and that kind of thing.
11:23
That's kind of what we were drawn to, whereas now we're probably more into that authenticity.
11:27
We'd rather people be authentic.
11:29
And I do an episode at the beginning of every year in January called how to avoid being
11:32
a crappy man.
11:34
And so with that, I have, you know, 15, 16, 17 different things and it's everything from
11:38
don't let sports ruin your night to don't be late.
11:41
But one of the things I put in there as well is don't pretend like you know something that
11:45
you don't.
11:46
Now, the, the lesson for that is if I don't know how to work on a car, but I'm pretending
11:50
like I know how to work on a car.
11:52
I'm stealing an opportunity from someone else to teach me what they know.
11:56
And that could be the same with jujitsu or with shooting or with any type of other modality.
12:00
The same thing is true is if you pretend like you're spotless, like you've never made a
12:05
mistake that you've never potentially blown up your entire life, it's like, dude, you're
12:09
missing an opportunity to minister to somebody, to mentor to somebody else.
12:14
And that's not nearly as valuable.
12:15
Believe me.
12:16
I like reading the military memoirs, you know, from civil world, World War II and Vietnam
12:20
and, and, you know, the modern world and terror and all those different things.
12:24
I love the superhero stories, but there's something different about the authenticity
12:27
of yeah, I was pretty jacked up and I had to make a choice to fix it.
12:31
You know what I mean?
12:32
A thousand percent and that's something that's hard.
12:35
And I think that's a little bit of a problem with specifically speaking to men.
12:40
A lot of men have no idea how to be men today.
12:42
And part of that is some of the ways we've been taught, if you go all the way back, like,
12:47
you know, I was raised on this idea, you never criticize, you never complain, you never condemn,
12:52
you hold everything in.
12:54
And as I get older, I'm getting to realize, you know, that's not necessarily true.
12:59
There's a level of transparency and you're still human.
13:01
We still have issues, we still have problems.
13:05
There is a balance there, you know, you can't become a victim, you must be a victor.
13:10
I think one of the great gifts that I have is the ability to spite my doubts and fears
13:14
and challenges.
13:15
I continue to drive forward and take action and that was one of the biggest things I tried
13:18
to talk to people about.
13:20
But it doesn't mean that you're, you're perfect, it doesn't exist.
13:23
There's only one perfect man that's ever walked his planet and ain't any of us.
13:27
So yeah, how do we convince people to A, not allow their doubts and fears and areas of
13:36
their life that may not be as great as they'd like them to be, which is all of us.
13:41
And we live in this comparison society.
13:43
It's so easy to look at other people and say, well, I'm not that guy and I'm not that
13:47
guy and I'll never be this guy.
13:48
So maybe I should just stop.
13:50
Well, that's [inaudible].
13:51
You know, you have a lot of great strengths.
13:53
You have a lot of great talents.
13:56
Some of you may never be an AV seal, but you're far better than me in other areas of your
13:59
life.
14:00
There's no doubt about it.
14:01
And it's those things that make us great.
14:03
And I think that's where we have to lean into as men and as leaders and understanding
14:08
that.
14:09
And that can be hard in today's society where everything is constantly dictated by this.
14:15
How many likes do you have?
14:16
How many people see you?
14:18
What's your level of impact and the reality is, you know, if your impact is with your
14:23
family and the circle of people around you, then that's probably the greatest impact you
14:28
could have.
14:29
But that's hard because of the world we live in today that's trying to push.
14:32
You know, we measure ourselves by this stupid thing.
14:36
Hey, and I fall into the same gap.
14:38
There are times where it's like, okay, I don't really care if I've made my son laugh today,
14:42
but I'm like, Hey, but I got a good response to the latest video I put on Instagram.
14:45
And so it's a little bit of a seared consciousness where we're moving our priorities around.
14:50
Now, one of the big parts of your story really ties back to, I guess you could call the darkest
14:54
day in your life or something like that, or at least what started a dark period in your
14:58
life.
14:59
And that was back in September the 13th of 2017.
15:01
And so that's a big part of your story.
15:03
As you've already mentioned that you were shot eight times, you know, by machine gunfire,
15:08
you were on a mission looking for a high value, uh, al-Qaeda target.
15:13
And I'd like to get a sense of you, because we know we'll talk about the mission here
15:16
though, man, because that's not the darkest day of my life.
15:19
That's what's interesting.
15:20
And so many people think the day that I was shot up and almost died on the battlefield
15:24
was the dark.
15:25
I would say that made dare be one of the best days of my life for a lot of reasons.
15:31
The darkest day of my life was, um, September 26, 2005, which was three days after I made
15:38
a bad call on a mission in Afghanistan after a series of bad calls.
15:43
I just, I just doubled down on a lot of bad selfish, uh, decision making as a young leader.
15:50
I allowed my ego to get in the way.
15:51
I allowed my pride to get in the way.
15:54
I allowed distorted ideas of leadership to get in the way and made a bad call that was
16:01
the, the, the straw that broke the camel's back with my credibility as a leader and found
16:06
myself standing in front of the leadership of my team with people saying we should kick
16:10
this guy out.
16:12
I hit rock bottom and put a gun in my mouth and almost took my life on that day.
16:18
On September 26, 2005, I didn't.
16:21
I think the big man above smacked me in the head and said, what are you doing?
16:25
What message do you send to your wife and kids?
16:28
Um, and it started a whole new journey.
16:31
I often tell people that, that God works in mysterious ways.
16:36
There's no doubt in my mind.
16:38
God was preparing me to be wounded severely.
16:41
Because if I had not gone through this whole process of failure as a leader and having
16:46
to rebuild myself and rebuild the way I led and rebuild the way I, I, I specifically the
16:51
way I led myself and my viewpoint of the world, having to lean into extreme discomfort, having
16:57
to lead into people who really didn't want me there in the beginning because they didn't
17:00
trust me.
17:01
I had to rebuild this trust, I had to rebuild my credibility, all these things over these
17:06
years that I, these couple of years that I had to do that led up to being severely injured
17:13
on the battlefield in on September 13th.
17:16
So what's interesting is, yes, I was all shot up in a gunfight.
17:19
I was hit eight times between my body armor and body, including taking around to the face.
17:25
Massive damage.
17:26
Um, and I won't lie in the very first several days, I was struggling, uh, a lot.
17:32
Um, and then I remember at one point, just kind of taking a breath and going, listen,
17:37
you cannot go back and change the past.
17:40
What has happened has happened.
17:42
You, you did things based on the tactics we've been taught.
17:45
You didn't do anything crazy.
17:46
You didn't like run off the reservation and do something.
17:49
You were the most severely wounded.
17:52
We didn't lose anybody.
17:54
And I said, and this is no different from the leadership failure that you had and all
17:58
the lessons you've put in, like you're going to lead yourself.
18:01
You're going to lead others.
18:02
You're going to lead always and we're going to overcome.
18:04
We're going to drive forward.
18:05
We're going to get off this acts, all these things that I taught myself and it was in
18:08
that hospital bed.
18:09
I said the same thing.
18:10
I said, the formula is the same that that, that, that, that path where you climbed out
18:15
of that deep dark leadership failure hole that started in 2005 continues in this hospital
18:22
bed in 2007.
18:24
The formula is the same.
18:26
So the great news I try and tell people is when you, when your world gets rocked and
18:30
you get crushed and you go through a life ambush that just breaks you mentally, physically
18:35
and emotionally.
18:36
Well, I want to tell you something.
18:38
God is sending you a gift and it is a gift that you can grow and get better.
18:43
The overcome mindset never gets built in good times.
18:47
You are only, it's one of the reasons I called the trident, the forging and the reforging
18:51
because you have to be forged in massive adversity to truly be better.
18:56
And if you really want to overcome massive hardship in your life, be fat, be thankful
19:01
when it comes because it's during those times you're forged.
19:04
I never would have been able to launch out of my injuries if I had not gone through that
19:08
journey before.
19:09
So you talk about the darkest day.
19:12
The darkest day was putting a gun in my mouth and almost blowing my brains out over a leadership
19:16
failure.
19:17
September 13 changed everything for me.
19:19
It made me one, I had a miracle moment on the battlefield that night, two, it made me realize
19:25
how precious this life is and how in those final moments where I thought I was dying
19:32
on the battlefield, I didn't think about all the BS that all of us focused on.
19:37
I didn't think about any stuff.
19:38
I didn't think about the things that I thought were cool, I didn't think about my truck or
19:43
motorcycle or money in my bank account or any of that.
19:45
All I cared about was my wife and kids and I just wanted like one more second to tell
19:50
them I loved them.
19:51
I realized driving forward, don't get me wrong, I want to be successful, I want to accomplish
19:57
things in my life.
19:58
But at the end of the day, if all this stuff is gone, none of it matters.
20:01
All that matters is I want to make sure I'm here for my family and kids and that's the
20:06
biggest impact I want to have and that night taught me that and it also showed a miracle
20:15
when I reached out to God and went from not being able to move a muscle to being able to
20:19
get up and walk 75 yards and get on that helicopter.
20:23
So Jason, I love this because we're going to be jumping around to a bunch of different
20:27
subject matters, which is a good commercial for the Trident and overcome because we're
20:32
not going to be just going through a normal narrative from beginning to end here.
20:35
So there's a question that came up when you were talking about that because I appreciate
20:38
you talking about because, yeah, I just assumed, you know, I think I said 2017, but it was
20:42
obviously 2007 on September the 13th.
20:45
That was a terrible day.
20:46
You get shot eight times.
20:47
I think you're going to die, but I'm curious as you were describing that.
20:51
What would you say was more difficult or discouraging or maybe even like soul challenging trying
20:58
to rebuild your leadership credibility or trying to rebuild your body after being shot
21:04
up so bad?
21:08
Uh, rebuilding myself after the leadership failure by far.
21:13
Hey, guys.
21:14
Real quick.
21:15
Like me, you are constantly on the lookout for high quality products that are actually
21:18
made here in America by American hands.
21:21
The problem is that a lot of American companies have outsourced their labor overseas.
21:26
So it's an American company, but it's supporting people that don't live here.
21:29
So I've always went to partner with an American company that prioritizes America, American
21:34
workers and making all of their materials here in this country.
21:37
That's why I want to remind you that we are partnered with origin.
21:41
origin is an apparel company based in Maine and they are focused on getting as much manufacturing
21:45
back to the United States as they can possibly do.
21:48
What do they make?
21:49
They make the best jujitsu geese on the planet.
21:52
And these are the only jujitsu geese that are made completely in America.
21:55
They also make jeans.
21:57
Yes, they're stretching and awesome.
21:58
They also make amazing hunting gear.
22:00
And I know you guys love your kuyu and your sicka, but those companies use overseas labor
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22:49
With that in mind, that would probably shock a lot of people, Jason, that, Hey, like you
22:53
were shot, you know, you had to have all these different surgeries.
22:56
You've listed out, you know, in your different books, the different surgeries, it's very
22:59
easy to find that.
23:01
But at no point do we see the same depths of despair that you were in whenever you had
23:07
your leadership failure.
23:08
Obviously, we were the pistol in your mouth and you're not the only guy from that world
23:12
from the special operations world that I've that have heard that had a similar experience.
23:16
And we don't need to talk about those guys now, but that would be a big shock to a lot
23:20
of people, Jason.
23:23
You know, interesting, humans are tribal, man.
23:27
And the military is very tribal.
23:29
The SEAL team is probably one of the most tribal organizations I know.
23:33
We are and that's a good and a bad thing.
23:37
It is a good thing because we built tremendous camaraderie and trust and a ferocious fighting
23:44
unit and some of the greatest fighting units in the history of the world are this way.
23:51
The downside of that is when you mess up if you're ostracized from that unit or any unit,
23:57
I mean, anything in life, if you're told, hey, we no longer want you, whether that's
24:02
a family, whether that's a relationship, or in this case, whether it's part of a organization
24:08
or a tribe you're a part of, in my opinion, those mental and emotional wounds.
24:13
We also see it when guys, and I'm going to say guys, I mean, this could apply to some
24:18
women, but it's more guys in the protector community that suddenly find themselves out
24:23
of the protector community.
24:26
Maybe not because of their own doing, but because of an injury or something happened.
24:30
So when guys suddenly get forced out of the community because they suffered an injury,
24:34
so they've been medically retired from police law enforcement fire abruptly, that's really
24:39
hard.
24:40
And it's the mental and emotional wounds that are much deeper and harder to deal with than
24:45
the physical ones.
24:46
It's the same thing on the battlefield.
24:48
I try to explain this to people.
24:50
It used to drive me insane, I ran my own nonprofit, I would bring wound warriors to events or
24:57
I'd get invited to events and they always loved having me because I got scars all over
25:01
my face.
25:03
And I'd bring other guys who either A, you couldn't see their injuries or B, they had
25:08
some invisible wounds.
25:10
And it used to, it was so insulting when individuals would go, hey, is there any way, yeah, these
25:17
guys, they look okay.
25:18
Is there any way you could bring more people that are missing limbs and have more scars
25:22
like you?
25:23
I mean, I know this Christian podcast.
25:26
So it makes me angry.
25:27
I want to say F you, you can say whatever you want, man, say whatever you want.
25:32
Yeah, I just want to say, [inaudible] you, man.
25:34
I mean, that is just so insulting and for those who have never, ever been through massively
25:42
traumatic things in their life, they don't understand that.
25:46
And that's why I tell them that physical injuries are hard.
25:50
But where you have power over physical injuries is you have a choice.
25:56
You have a choice in how you're going to deal with it.
25:59
You can, granted the doctors have to fix things, but you play a big part into that your attitude,
26:06
how you drive forward, how you attack rehab, how you understand, okay, maybe this is where
26:13
I'm at.
26:14
You have the ability to get here, you have some control and you have a choice.
26:17
Now you can lay there and feel sorry for yourself, which plenty of people do.
26:20
They choose that victim mindset.
26:22
When you fail and you have the mental and emotional deep wounds, that's much harder.
26:28
You're having to now navigate the, the most dangerous battlefield you'll ever walk on,
26:33
which is this one as far more dangerous than the real world battlefields we walk and the
26:38
physical injuries that you'll go through.
26:40
Well, and I mean, you have so many things that you need to overcome goes back to something
26:44
that you were talking about earlier, like the doing hard things part.
26:47
I mean, we live in a society where we don't have, we don't have to hunt for our food.
26:51
We can drive to the store in our, you know, climate controlled vehicle and walk into a
26:54
climate controlled environment and buy, you know, meat wrapped in cellophane that somebody
26:59
else killed the animal and took care of the meat and got it to us.
27:02
We live in such an easy place.
27:04
And so to a certain degree, we have to bring in difficulty into our life.
27:08
But then for you, you know, you didn't choose the difficulty of the ambush, like you didn't
27:12
choose to get shot up.
27:13
You chose the job and you knew that was potentially part of the job, but there was a fairly appropriate
27:17
quote from overcome that I think kind of will back into the question that I have on a read
27:21
the quote here, I could feel the life slipping out of me.
27:25
To be honest, it was a luxury knowing I was dying.
27:28
For some people, death comes in a millisecond.
27:31
They don't even realize is coming.
27:33
For me, I was lying in that firefight for 35 minutes, which left ample time to reflect.
27:39
So it seems like there's different categories, Jason.
27:41
There's people that just die suddenly, right?
27:43
You know, maybe they're shot in the head or, you know, they get like incinerated in some
27:47
sort of an accent.
27:48
So they die suddenly.
27:49
Then you have the people that die slowly.
27:50
Maybe they have cancer for months and months, maybe years and years.
27:53
And so they're staring mortality in the face every single day.
27:58
You're kind of somewhere in the middle where you're like, I am in the process of dying.
28:03
It is imminent.
28:04
It is somewhere between seconds in hours away.
28:07
This is it.
28:09
I want to talk a little bit more about your mindset in that moment, because you mentioned
28:13
it a little bit earlier where you had this clarity that didn't have anything to do with
28:18
social media clout, it didn't have to do with the number of pushups or pullups you could
28:22
do.
28:23
It had to do with the most important core level things.
28:26
So as rough as it might be, even though you've built, you know, a very successful career
28:30
of helping people because of this situation, let's go back to where you're sitting in the
28:34
sand thinking that this is going to be it and take me through the mindset and the type
28:39
of clarity that you did actually have in that moment.
28:42
Yeah.
28:43
I mean, the clarity, so training kicked in first.
28:47
I mean, I was shot up and I was knocked unconscious, although I didn't realize it funny when I
28:57
got to the hospital, you know, they kept asking me to never lose consciousness and I was adamant
29:02
that I never did and it's not like you realize there were just gaps in time, which my teammates
29:07
filled in once they got back and I met with them.
29:11
So in my mind, I just had a steady stream of consciousness.
29:14
So I remember being shot.
29:15
I remember recognizing, you know, at some point, oh my God, I've been shot in the face.
29:20
I recognized that I was totally pinned down.
29:24
I mean, literally I was laying on my back and there was machine gun fire about eight
29:28
inches above me.
29:30
So I realized I was totally out of this fight.
29:32
I mean, we call it combat ineffective.
29:34
I mean, there was nothing I could really do.
29:36
I had to rely on my teammates, although training was still, I was thinking through, well, what
29:41
should we be doing?
29:42
And I was thinking through, well, hey, we need to be contacting the quick reaction force
29:47
and what what air assets do we have overhead and what, you know, what drones do we have
29:52
so we can see where the enemy is on the battlefield and I knew I needed a medevacs.
29:57
I was like, all right.
29:58
I hope that they're contacting the, you know, we had a TF 160 at the Special Operations
30:03
Medevac helicopter on standby.
30:05
So these were all the things that were initially going through my head.
30:10
Once I kind of realized that my team leader was running the fight and that I was bleeding
30:16
out, my thoughts kind of transition from operational to, hey, dude, you're dying.
30:26
And that was kind of a little bit of a realization and my first thought on that was anger.
30:32
I was angry.
30:34
I was angry that a, that my decision making had put me in this position, that I had led
30:44
my team into this position that, you know, because I knew, you know, other guys had been
30:49
shot at this point.
30:51
I'm all shot up at this point and I didn't know what the outcome was going to be.
30:58
But I knew if I died, that that was a tremendous victory for the enemy.
31:03
Killing Special Operations members was a top prize for them and they were very good at
31:10
leveraging information warfare and they would have broadcast that, hey, we kill to seal and
31:15
all this stuff if they had found that out.
31:19
I mean, that's what was going through my mind.
31:23
From there, it started to transition to, I feel like my life kind of flashed before my
31:31
eyes and not necessarily seen by seen, but it was more of, I started thinking about the
31:37
things that I had not, I had started thinking about things I had done, regrets.
31:43
I thought about things like I wish I had not done those things.
31:47
And then I started thinking about things I hadn't done.
31:49
I wish I had spent more time with my family.
31:52
I wish I had spent more time on the important things and not so much of the dumb [inaudible].
31:58
And that kind of led me full circle back to my family and I was just like, man, I wish
32:04
I had, if I could do anything, I wish I could just tell them I loved them one more time before
32:11
I check out.
32:13
I also thought about that I wouldn't get to celebrate these big milestones that you think
32:20
about with your wife and kids, as you're raising kids, the holidays and the graduations.
32:31
And someday, I thought about I would never walk my daughter down the aisle and that's
32:37
a hard thing.
32:38
I am so thankful that last year in 2022, December of 2022, my oldest daughter got married and
32:49
I walked her down the aisle.
32:51
So I am so thankful that God gave me that gift that I didn't think I would ever have.
32:56
Because in those moments, I literally was dying, I mean, there was no doubt about it.
33:03
We get an extensive amount of medical training.
33:06
I knew I was going through all the signs of what we call a hyperbolemic shock.
33:12
I mean, it's from blood loss.
33:13
I had lost a lot of blood.
33:14
I had not been able to get my tourniquet on.
33:18
And I was pinned down still out front in front of my team.
33:24
So at this point, my faith, I grown up in a very religious home growing up.
33:33
When I got into the military, I kind of lost my faith for a while.
33:37
And although I will tell you that it was coming back more and more in combat, combat has an
33:43
amazing way of making you facing the fact that you may not be coming home.
33:48
I think on every mission I went, as I left, I accepted the fact I may not, you know, hey,
33:53
this is a dangerous job, I may not come home.
33:56
This may be the last mission I do.
33:59
So a lot more prayers as you know, this was the end of my second combat deployment, my
34:05
first in Afghanistan, the second one here in Iraq.
34:08
And as I lay there and I thought about never seeing my family again, I called out to God.
34:12
I said, God, like, I need your help, I need strength.
34:16
I want to see my wife and kids again.
34:18
And I went from, I could not move a muscle.
34:21
I remember I tried to move my right hand, which was not injured and I couldn't even feel it.
34:27
And instantly I had energy, I had, and I don't know how long this, I don't know how long
34:34
this was.
34:35
I don't know how long that I said that prayer.
34:39
And by the time the Medevac helicopter came in, but I do know that when, at some point,
34:45
my team leader ran forward to grab me, got me back behind a tire, we were using for cover.
34:52
And then we called in some fire missions and then we called in the Medevac.
34:56
And he tried to drag me into the helicopter and it was really painful.
35:01
And I just told him, I said, hey, like, just help me to my feet.
35:05
And he helped me up.
35:06
And I went from not being able to move a muscle and struggling just to breathe to getting
35:12
up and I walked 75 yards and got on that Medevac helicopter under my own power.
35:16
So I can't explain that.
35:20
The doctors say it's a miracle I survived.
35:22
I needed eight blood transfusions from the time I got to Baghdad until the time I got
35:28
to Bethesda.
35:31
And the doctors say it's a miracle I survived.
35:34
You know, it's funny I've talked to a lot of different people.
35:38
I've talked to doctors who just say, you know, you know, it was your fitness that enabled
35:43
your survival.
35:44
You know, I've talked to atheists who say, well, you know, it wasn't this or that.
35:52
I don't know.
35:53
I've never felt anything like it before.
35:55
It was like this power.
35:57
And I wish I could feel it again because sometimes I struggle, you know, I'm very transparent.
36:03
Sometimes I struggle with my faith and I try and go back to that night and I ask God,
36:06
why can't you want to feel that again?
36:11
Show me.
36:12
And I have other friends who say, hey, man, like, yeah, you know, be thankful for what
36:18
you, you know, be thankful for that moment and lean on that moment.
36:21
So anyways, amazing.
36:24
And I can't, I can't explain it.
36:25
But I feel like I am still here and got a second chance and I'm so thankful for that.
36:30
Most of us do not get it.
36:32
Most of us, you get one shot at this life.
36:35
And when your day comes, you know, like we talked about split second and you see, wow,
36:40
this is the end.
36:41
And then it is the end or, you know, maybe you do have more time, but we never know when
36:46
it's coming.
36:47
I mean, we never know.
36:49
Yeah.
36:50
I mean, I, I appreciate you getting into all that detail.
36:53
I remember early on, because, you know, I live in Oklahoma, belt buckle of the Bible
36:56
Belt.
36:57
And so we have a lot of church camps around here and so kids go to church camp, right?
37:00
And so you got the church camp high, you know, it's worship every night and everybody's crying
37:04
and praying and all that.
37:05
And then, you know, a couple of weeks go by and you're back into your normal routine
37:08
of school and practice and siblings and, you know, all that kind of stuff.
37:12
And you're wondering where the feeling went.
37:14
And I remember a guy that was mentoring me in college said, Kyle, do you want your entire
37:17
faith in God to rest on how you feel at the moment?
37:22
And then you start reading through scripture and you see the laments of David and the Psalms.
37:25
And you see just the anguish that the apostles went through, like in the book of Acts and
37:29
things like that, and you're just like, man, we're not guaranteed fun feelings, but there's
37:34
one word that stuck out to me when I was reading overcome.
37:38
And it was the word ignite or I was actually reignite.
37:42
And that's what I think was very interesting.
37:43
I'll actually read the whole quote here because I think it's, it's, it's special.
37:47
For me, spiritual leadership means a strong faith in God meeting with other people who
37:51
share my beliefs and living for more than myself.
37:54
My faith journey has been reignited in Iraq or had been reignited in Iraq.
38:00
That night when I called out to God in the middle of a firefight and I had that sudden
38:03
influx of energy enabling me to get up and walk off the battlefield, I felt like God
38:08
had given me a second chance at life.
38:10
And I wanted to make the most of it.
38:11
Your spiritual leadership might look different, but it's worth investing in and understanding
38:16
that there is a much bigger world than you can impact than just the small sphere you
38:20
live in.
38:21
And again, great, great section there, but it's reignited, right?
38:25
So like your faith had been reignited.
38:28
And that's what I think is so important is because you'd probably rather not have to
38:33
have it reignited in a way like that, but you certainly don't want that all the time.
38:37
It's part of the reconciliation process when you accept Christ that it's like, okay, you're
38:42
not a finished product right in the moment.
38:43
It's like the moment you got your trident, like, yeah, in terms of the federal government,
38:48
you were officially a Navy seal, but even you would say, yeah, a lot of other workups,
38:52
you had deployments like you, you were being reconciled as a seal, as it were.
38:57
Whereas like as a Christian, it's like you're just a baby when you become a Christian, regardless
39:01
of what age you are.
39:02
And it's that process of God pulling you through those moments, allowing you to walk through
39:07
the valley of the shadow of death because he's there with you the whole time, whether you
39:11
realize it or not, you know what I mean?
39:13
100%.
39:16
And the thing that I think is important about this entire discussion, Jason, is just the
39:21
overall idea about resilience.
39:24
And we see that, you know, whenever you're going through your recovery process, because
39:28
you know, you get back to United States, you're starting your recovery process, and in the
39:31
introduction for this episode today, I read the sign, write the sign that posted, you
39:36
know, that you posted on your door, that you had your wife write, and you know, the fact
39:42
that it went viral and it really changed your life in a lot of ways.
39:46
And so we don't have to read the entire sign right now.
39:49
But the whole time, I remember the story when it happened, and I remember rereading it, you
39:54
know, here recently.
39:55
And it's like the only word that could come to mind was resilience.
39:58
It's like, I don't need your pity.
40:00
Like if you can't help me fuel my recovery and my resilience, then I don't need your
40:05
presence.
40:06
So let's just go back to the recovery room.
40:09
Your back state side, you're, you're starting the recovery process.
40:12
Again, you're all shot up.
40:13
You've got a lot of surgeries in your past and a whole lot more in your future.
40:18
But then as opposed to sitting there and lamenting your situation and your circumstances and
40:24
maybe your life choices, you seem to be overwhelmed with this thought of, will you please stop
40:29
talking about me as if I'm not here?
40:31
Will you please stop talking about me as if I'm this porcelain animal that could crack
40:35
into a million pieces, you know, at any moment?
40:38
Yeah.
40:39
And I mean, I think way one, I had been down that path before.
40:43
I mean, the victim mindset.
40:45
So it's interesting when people go through hard times, you know, there, there is some
40:53
power in saying, you know, like our grandpas used to a buck up, you know, rub a little
40:57
kerosene on it and let's go, you know, and we're so, we're overly sensitive now.
41:06
And one of the great things about being a severely wounded warrior is now I can call
41:10
out other wounded warriors.
41:12
The victim mindset is a real thing.
41:14
And there are people that buy into it.
41:16
As a matter of fact, we are, we are cultivating a culture of victimhood in this country right
41:22
now.
41:23
We want to convince everybody they're a victim, race, creed, color, gender, gender persuasion,
41:28
demographic, I don't care what you are, you're a victim.
41:31
And you don't have the power to pull yourself up and to be successful without government
41:37
or somebody else helping you, which is such BS.
41:40
The reality is there are millions of millions of people who have suffered all kinds of losses
41:47
who came from whatever catastrophic thing, whether it's they were born on the wrong side
41:52
of the tracks or the wrong color or the wrong gender, I don't care what they think they were.
41:56
At the end of the day, you know, it's merely a choice to drive forward and be a victor,
42:01
not a victim.
42:03
And that's what happened.
42:05
People wanted to put me in the victim box.
42:07
Oh my God, you're severely wounded, your face is blown out.
42:10
You have no use of your arm.
42:12
They may amputate your arm.
42:16
You know, oh, what was you and we just want to pat you on the head and you know, hey,
42:21
you just sit there in your sorrow and pity.
42:25
I walked that road before when I failed as a leader, man, I went through a period where
42:30
I was the victim like, hey, my teammates put me here, everybody put me here.
42:36
And the world is unfair and that was my mindset for a while, for several months until I finally
42:45
realized like, hey, man, like A, most of that was your fault, 90% of it was your fault.
42:51
And guess what?
42:53
You know, the other part of that is you are the solution to getting out of this problem.
42:59
And this is where you drive forward.
43:00
And I realized the same thing.
43:02
I was like, I'm sure not going to lay in this bed and feel sorry for myself.
43:05
I'm not going to go down the road I went before where I saw myself as a victim when I failed
43:09
as a leader.
43:10
I sure as hell wasn't a victim for being all shot up.
43:14
I mean, it's amazing to me how many people, I mean, somebody the other day, I just did
43:18
this big interview with English group, the Mulligan brothers.
43:23
So big shout out to them.
43:26
And you know, we have people in our own country, but I also see it abroad where people, people
43:31
are writing like, hey, we're really sorry your government did this to you.
43:35
And I'm like, what are you talking about, man?
43:37
I willingly serve.
43:39
I'm so proud of my service to my country.
43:41
This weirdness we're having where patriotism is being eroded and this idea that your love
43:46
of country is a bad thing is disturbing and just crazy to me.
43:53
I'm proud of my service.
43:54
I learned so many lessons from my service, the highs and lows of my career.
44:00
I went into it knowing that A, I could be injured and B, I could be killed, but I was
44:04
willing to do it because I believe I saw very evil people and we were taking very evil
44:09
people out.
44:10
I stand behind what I did.
44:11
So I just think that's crazy.
44:13
All of that once again lends itself to this victim mindset.
44:17
And I had been there before and I said, I will never go down that road again.
44:21
So when everybody was talking about, you know, hey, we feel sorry for you, I was like, uh-uh,
44:26
that is not going to happen.
44:27
No one is coming in this room and it was, it was an awesome red line for me to draw because
44:33
I was like, Oh, hell no.
44:36
Like if people are going to start coming into my room feeling sorry for me.
44:40
That's a dangerous thing because at what point does that start planting seeds in your mind
44:45
where you start feeling sorry for yourself like, Oh no, you're going to live in my world.
44:51
I'm not going to live in yours.
44:53
So I knew that I was going to make a statement like, Hey, here's the rules.
44:58
You can either live by them or go away and, uh, you know, control control.
45:05
You have control over the people that are around you.
45:07
So that's how the sign on the door to came be in that moment.
45:10
I wrote out that sign.
45:11
It's an attention to all who enter here.
45:12
If you're coming to this room with sadness or sorrow, don't bother.
45:16
The wounds I received, I got in a job that I love doing it for people that I love defending
45:19
the freedom of a country that I deeply love.
45:21
I will make a full recovery.
45:23
What is full?
45:24
That's the absolute, most physically have the ability to recover and I'm going to push
45:26
that about 20% further through sheer mental tenacity.
45:30
This room you're about to enter is a room of fun optimism and intense rapid regrowth.
45:35
If you are not prepared for that, go elsewhere and, uh, that, that became the sign on the
45:41
door and in the interesting, I'll, I'll finish with this, Kyle and turn it back over to you.
45:47
I often tell people how powerful it is to write a mission statement like that.
45:52
When you're going through hard times, and I even encourage guys to do it in any part
45:57
of their life, I, I have a planner called the Point Man Planner and in it, I talk about
46:02
writing a mission statement because in the hard times, it's easy to lose ourselves and
46:07
to forget who we are and forget who we want to be.
46:12
That sign became my anchor for years.
46:16
And even today, I mean, people know me for that sign, but when I was going through my
46:19
recovery and the hardest times, when I was having setbacks, when I was having, um, infection
46:25
problems, when I was really struggling, I would look at that sign and say, that's who you
46:29
are, bro.
46:30
Like get up, let's go be positive, you're setting the example for your kids and other
46:35
wounded warriors, like stop feeling sorry for yourself.
46:39
So it didn't mean that I had this perfect path.
46:41
I mean, I had plenty of hard days, but it did always remind me and it gave me a touch
46:45
point to go back to, to remind me myself of, Hey, this is who I am.
46:50
Right.
46:51
And that's your anchor point.
46:52
And that's where you have to set and part of it, I talk a lot on the show about pre-decision.
46:56
So there are a lot of people that wait until they get into the dramatic moment to decide
46:59
what they're going to do.
47:00
Kind of the extreme example is like, okay, um, you know, a kinetic, uh, active shooter
47:05
situation.
47:06
It's like, if you're deciding in the moment, whether or not you're willing to take a life
47:09
to protect yourself and the other people around you, it's probably a little bit too late for
47:13
you to make that decision.
47:14
There's some pre-decision that that, that has to happen.
47:17
I'm, oh, I've, I've struggled with alcohol before.
47:19
Maybe it may be your story where it's like, well, I'm going to pre-decide that I'm not
47:22
going to accept an invitation to hang out at a bar with buddies, right?
47:25
If that's been a temptation or a source of struggle for you, but I do want to go back
47:29
to something that you said, because of the absolute disastrous pull out from Afghanistan
47:37
a couple of years back because of, um, I guess the hue through which we view the war on terror,
47:44
the global war on terror with the things that we did in Iraq and Afghanistan.
47:48
There have been, there has been a lot of talk around the number of military members that
47:54
we lost, but also are wounded and the ones that aren't just physically wounded, but mentally
47:59
wounded, PTSD or any of those other struggles.
48:02
And a lot of people are asking the question, they're like, well, was it worth it?
48:05
Was all that blood and treasure over two decades?
48:08
Was it quote, unquote worth it?
48:10
Now everybody gets to decide their own value judgments in terms of what is worth it in
48:14
this, you know, type of sacrificial system on what is not worth it, but I'm curious for
48:19
your perspective because I talked to a lot of people that served, you know, in the weeks
48:23
after the Afghanistan pull out and they were all pretty much unanimous in that they were
48:28
flabbergasted.
48:30
They were sickened by how everything went down, but then none of them were like, oh, and by
48:35
the way, I also regret my service because it was a complete waste of time, but to the
48:39
generalized SIVI public, you do get that sentiment, which is like, look at all the people and
48:45
money that we just wasted over there to have the exact same people in power as before we
48:51
got there.
48:52
So I would just love your overall thoughts on that because believe me, there are a lot
48:55
of people having these conversations and thoughts.
48:58
Yeah, so I'll see one million unequivocally, there aren't even numbers that can say was
49:06
it worth it.
49:07
It's worth it for such a myriad of reasons and one of the biggest ones, you know, there's
49:14
this mindset out there, you know, America first, we shouldn't go abroad.
49:20
We should pull everything back in and I don't agree with that.
49:23
I am a fan of foreign diplomacy and I do think we need to be around the world spreading a
49:28
message of democracy and freedom.
49:31
And there are people that say, well, there are some people that just can't understand
49:34
that.
49:35
Well, you're right.
49:36
I understand if we close our doors and never get out there at the end of the day, I don't
49:40
care who you are.
49:41
If I go to, I was in Peru and I met a tribe that was deep, deep, deep in the Amazon basin
49:48
who literally lived the same way they've lived for thousands of years.
49:52
So and if I sat down and talked to them and I said, hey, what are your thoughts on human
49:57
rights and freedom?
49:59
They would say, well, I think that the average person should be able to live their life, how
50:02
they see fit and that they should be able to make decisions on their own, because I don't
50:06
care who you are as humans, that is a natural thought process.
50:11
And I think that that's part of who we are and part of our duties and responsibilities
50:16
as humans.
50:17
I think throughout history, I mean, you think, if you look at Christianity, Jesus said,
50:21
go out into the world and spread this message.
50:23
I think democracy is also similar to that.
50:26
Like, hey, people should be free to follow their hopes and dreams.
50:30
And we should push that.
50:31
That is something that has been built on the foundation of America.
50:36
And we have been doing it.
50:37
We did it in all these different things and all these people who want to say, oh, America
50:41
is just an evil place and colonialism.
50:43
And we only went to Iraq for oil and all this other BS is it's mind numbing to me, the people
50:50
that write things like that on my social media, you were just a puppet of the government.
50:55
I want to make something incredibly clear.
50:58
The people who knocked down the World Trade Center and flew a plane in the Pentagon and
51:03
into that field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania were incredibly evil.
51:07
And the people who follow them and believe in them in this distorted view of radical Muslim
51:13
ideology would gladly rape, kill, behead, defile, you, your sons, daughters, every aspect of
51:21
our life because of a twisted ideology and I met many of those people.
51:25
I saw the heat they had for us and I am glad, I don't bat an eye at having the opportunity
51:33
to go out and try and help those people on their way to the other side because there
51:44
were some of them who merely didn't really believe that was one of the things I began
51:49
to find.
51:50
There were a lot of them who didn't believe in the cause they were fighting.
51:54
They were just pulled into it and war kind of makes that happen.
51:57
They were opportunists, if you will.
51:59
But when they learned about America and we were over there and we were setting up schools
52:03
and we were creating electrical grids in places that had never had electricity and we were
52:09
showing them running water and we were showing them plumbing and we were showing them, hey,
52:13
let's set up schools.
52:14
We created all these schools across Afghanistan that had not happened with the Taliban.
52:20
It's rights and all these different things and finally they were like, "Ah, America doesn't
52:25
seem to be here to invade us.
52:29
They actually seem to be here, A, to eliminate an idealistic threat, the Taliban, al-Qaeda,
52:37
and ISIS if you want to look at it in that manner."
52:45
So yes, if we come full circle for any of you that serve, that is what we went after.
52:52
It really was good versus evil and at the end of the day, throughout history, sometimes
52:58
that line gets blurred, but at the end of the day, there are evil people who do evil
53:02
things and then there are good people who are willing to stand up against those evil
53:06
people.
53:07
I am fortunate to say I was able to go after some of those evil people.
53:12
So yes, it saddens me that we lost friends in Afghanistan and that this country did such
53:18
a poor job.
53:20
Our leadership did such a poor job both in Iraq and Afghanistan and we continue to make
53:25
those same mistakes.
53:26
We did the same thing in Vietnam.
53:29
So I hope that we can do a better job of electing better leaders.
53:35
I sure don't feel like it's the leaders we're putting forth right now, but at some point,
53:38
I hope we can get better about future political leaders who truly understand what's best
53:43
for the future of our country and what's best for the world, America's impact in it.
53:47
And I'll get off my soapbox.
53:49
No, dude, I'm going to get you right back on your soapbox here in just a second so you
53:53
just get ready.
53:54
But evil doesn't stop itself.
53:57
Only foolish people believe that evil would stop itself.
53:59
Evil has to be stopped.
54:01
Like the mission of adopted life is equipping men to push back darkness.
54:04
How do you think exactly darkness is pushed back?
54:07
Sometimes you push back on bad philosophies and you do that through argumentation.
54:11
Sometimes you push back on the darkness that people would have in humanity or not in humanity,
54:16
but in eternity by sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with them so that they can accept it,
54:20
repent other sins and put their faith in Christ.
54:22
But when there are people, there are wolves that are trying to take advantage of the sheep
54:26
and kill the sheep.
54:27
I use the example all time.
54:29
There was a woman on a train car in Philadelphia that was being raped.
54:34
And whenever the police showed up, there were a bunch of people that went to the police
54:38
with their phones because as opposed to interceding, they had filmed the rape.
54:43
So nobody tried to stop it.
54:44
And guess what?
54:45
In that moment, there's no time for a Bible study.
54:48
There's no time for, excuse me, sir, I don't know if you actually know this, but in the
54:51
Bible in this one particular section, it says that we're not actually supposed to do that.
54:55
So if you wouldn't mind, you know, when it's convenient for you, stop violently penetrating
54:58
the innocent person, there's no time for that.
55:00
The only thing that you're needing to do in that moment is to protect that image bearer
55:04
of Christ and stop that thing from happening to them.
55:07
And so again, I would echo your sentiments to everyone that served over there.
55:11
You were pushing back darkness.
55:13
And that doesn't mean that everything you did over there was copacetic or, you know,
55:17
went by all the rules or that you're not going to have to answer for it someday.
55:21
But that is the mission ultimately that you were on.
55:23
But Jason, we're in this kind of weird space where, you know, we, the United States, we
55:29
are the dominant, you know, hegemonic structure in terms of the world, people are like, Oh,
55:33
you're just the world police.
55:35
You're getting into all these other situations, military, industrial complex or whatever the
55:39
latest, you know, conspiracy theorist person is saying on their podcast.
55:43
But we do get involved in a lot of different places directly with boots on the ground.
55:47
And then there's other places where we don't.
55:49
So right now there's a whole lot of money flowing to Ukraine to fight a war that not
55:53
everybody here states side really believes in and certainly doesn't believe in the non-corruptibility
55:57
of the Ukrainian government and their officials.
55:59
The same thing happening with Israel.
56:02
We have Joe Biden playing pretty fast and loose some days.
56:05
He seems to be pro Israel and other days he seems to, you know, be like, Oh, well, if
56:09
you don't do exactly what I want, we're not going to send these missiles to you or these
56:13
other armaments and things like that.
56:15
So how do you feel about how the country currently operates?
56:18
Because, you know, Republicans and Democrats both understand that boots on the ground.
56:23
We don't really have the appetite for it as American civilians right now putting boots
56:28
on the ground, you know, in Taiwan to protect them from the Chinese or in the Middle East,
56:32
really anywhere right now.
56:33
How do you feel about our current standing and how we all basically see our place in
56:37
the world and keeping the peace as it were?
56:40
Well, I think part of the problem is our political system has reached a point where everything
56:45
is done for the immediate right here and right now.
56:48
So we have to, you know, we have to appease our constituency right now.
56:51
If you say they don't have an appetite for boots on the ground, you're right.
56:55
We just finished 20 years of war with Iraq and Afghanistan and, and we, we, and I'll be
57:01
honest, it was the pressure of the people who drove us out of Afghanistan along with poor
57:06
decision making political leaders on both sides, in my opinion, that started with Trump, with
57:12
the decisions to pull out of Afghanistan.
57:14
And then that continued with Biden and, you know, making deals with the Taliban and just
57:18
bad decision making, in my opinion.
57:20
We never should have allowed, hang on, let me back up for a second.
57:25
So we're making decisions on the right here and now that's checkers.
57:30
We need to be, we need to be getting the American people to think about, we need to
57:34
be making decisions for the next 20, 30, 50 years.
57:38
You need to stop thinking about you and what's best for you and you to be, think about what's
57:42
best for your kids and your grandkids and, and, and, you know, there's this idea, this
57:46
idealistic idea that everything will be great and that it'll continue this way.
57:51
Russia is not playing that game.
57:53
China definitely is not playing that game.
57:55
They're playing a very long game and they're doing everything in their power to destabilize
58:02
us and make us look bad and we're, we're playing into it a hundred percent.
58:07
And when we say, well, we're not going to get involved, whether it's boots on the ground
58:12
or whether it's, you know, how we're going to support it, it's not really Ukraine.
58:17
And even if you try and say, well, some of their government is, you know, not, what's
58:23
a word I'm looking for.
58:26
Some of their government is corrupt.
58:29
Yeah.
58:30
Well, so is ours.
58:31
So give me a break on this.
58:33
You know, there is probably no government in the world that doesn't have some levels
58:36
of corruption, but at the end of the day, the enemy of a friend, you know, Russia is a problem
58:43
for us.
58:44
China is a problem for us.
58:46
Those are real things and they would love to destabilize and knock America off.
58:51
It's puzzle pedestal, they'd love to knock the American dollar off, which would be detrimental
58:57
to us in the future of our country and our kids and grandkids.
59:00
So we need people and leaders to start playing the long game and to start talking to their
59:05
people about saying, Hey, look, American people, you may not like this in the short run.
59:10
It may be hard.
59:11
But guess what?
59:12
We need to start making decisions that are better for the future of America 20, 30, 50,
59:18
a hundred years down the road if we're ever going to continue to be a great superpower.
59:23
Because if not, if you're going to continue to make decisions in the right here and now,
59:27
and we're going to say, ah, makes us uncomfortable, you know, because, and God forbid, we don't
59:31
want to send it.
59:32
I don't want to send anybody to war.
59:33
I've been to war.
59:34
But I tell you what would be more horrible is we reach a point that we collapse and Russia
59:40
or China has the ability to come in through whatever means and now we allowed it to happen.
59:48
Because we sat back and we were so focused on what can you do for me right now instead
59:53
of what should we be doing, what's better for the future of our country?
59:57
Well, Jason, you're nailing it because in America, we think in two year cycles.
1:00:02
Why?
1:00:03
Because that's when we have elections.
1:00:04
Right.
1:00:05
That's when we have our major election.
1:00:06
So we're thinking what can get us a little bit more of our people and our color ties
1:00:10
and either the house is in it and then the White House and we think in two year chunks,
1:00:14
whereas China, as you alluded to, they're thinking in hundred year chunks, right?
1:00:19
You know, G is obviously he's he's going to instill himself as the leader of China for
1:00:23
his entire life.
1:00:24
That's that's the entire point of why he's trying to kind of running this totalitarian
1:00:28
game right now.
1:00:29
But they're trying to think in a hundred years, how can we be dominant?
1:00:32
That's one of the main reasons why no politician left or right here in the United States will
1:00:37
talk about entitlements.
1:00:39
They won't talk about entitlement spending.
1:00:41
Why?
1:00:42
Because it would get them out of office in the next election, whether they're the president
1:00:45
or a senator or a US House of Representatives member.
1:00:48
And so that we're going to be going over a cliff as a country and these programs will
1:00:52
become insolvent because we won't just like raise our hand and be like, Hey, guys, this
1:00:57
isn't sustainable.
1:00:58
That was one of my hopes that if Trump got a second term, you know, not, you know, with
1:01:01
a break in between with co president Biden, but if he got a second term that he would
1:01:05
have been loose, can enough to be like, yeah, the stuff is disastrous and we have to restructure
1:01:09
it.
1:01:10
And everyone's just going to have to deal with it.
1:01:12
Because otherwise we're not going to have a country by the time this is all sudden.
1:01:15
And now I'm on my soapbox and I got to get off because, you know, we're whining a little
1:01:18
bit to a close here.
1:01:19
And the cool thing about what you have, Jason is some people just have a story.
1:01:23
You don't just have a story.
1:01:24
You have a story and you have a mission.
1:01:25
So you've got a lot of different things that you've done and a lot of different things
1:01:28
that you're doing.
1:01:29
As opposed to me picking the ones that sounded the coolest to me, I just want to set you up.
1:01:33
I want to know, what are you working on right now?
1:01:36
How are you helping people right now?
1:01:38
And what does the future look like for you?
1:01:40
Yeah, I'm trying to help people to become the best person themselves.
1:01:45
And I think that, you know, for all you men out there, I think there's three components
1:01:49
that you need to be, you need to be a provider, you need to be a protector, and you need to
1:01:54
be a leader.
1:01:55
Those are the three components that we need more and individuals.
1:01:58
So as a protector, you need to train.
1:02:03
You know, I am a staunch advocate of the Second Amendment and this idea that I think
1:02:11
everyone, I saw it, you know, it's a perfect example.
1:02:14
Iraq and Afghanistan were a perfect example.
1:02:16
We were the greatest superpower in the world with some of the greatest military technology
1:02:20
in the world.
1:02:21
And we had individuals with AK-47s who were able to effectively fight back against us
1:02:26
by, you know, asymmetrical warfare that they waged against us.
1:02:31
What does that tell you?
1:02:32
Well, that tells you, you know, we're not going to do it with muskets, you know, but
1:02:36
with a basic semi-automatic military-style weapon, you have the ability to make a stance
1:02:43
against a tyrannical government.
1:02:45
Now, I pray that's never our government, but I tell you what, throughout history, governments
1:02:49
have lost their way when they start losing power in the support of the people.
1:02:54
And that's what our founding fathers understood, and that does not go away.
1:02:58
So hey, you should train.
1:03:01
We're only 96 hours at any given moment, we're only 96 hours away from a collapse of society.
1:03:07
That's in fact.
1:03:08
Yep.
1:03:09
And if you don't understand that, you know, Kyle, you said it in the beginning, you know,
1:03:12
hey, we can go to the store and don't get me wrong, I love, I love nice things.
1:03:16
I mean, speaking and this life that I provided, man, I love a five-star hotel and a beautiful
1:03:21
bed.
1:03:22
And guess what? In a moment's notice, if I have to, I have go bags and I have trained
1:03:25
my family and I will be ready if the worst happens and I pray it doesn't, but you know
1:03:30
what? You should have a mindset of that. You should have a mindset of just what if, I mean,
1:03:35
you talked about all the tornadoes. One of the massive tornado came along and did damage
1:03:38
that totally disrupted your community where for months, you didn't have access to any
1:03:43
of those things. How are you going to take care of your family and your community?
1:03:47
So those are things that I'm teaching on the tactical side survival and tactical training.
1:03:52
I'm teaching individuals to be better, to be better leaders, to build that overcome mindset.
1:03:57
I've started people, I've started teaching people to be better speakers. God gave me
1:04:01
a gift to deliver a message and I'm very good at looking at how people deliver a speaking.
1:04:08
Speaking, believe it or not, is that we've set it throughout history. The pen is mightier
1:04:13
than the sword, your ability to gain freedom on audience and articulate a message and motivate
1:04:19
and inspire and provide guidance and communication to people is one of the most powerful things
1:04:24
you can do. So you should know how to do that. You should know how to communicate to your
1:04:27
family, your community, your company. So I teach those things. I want to help people
1:04:32
to be better communicators, whether that's from a stage or whether that's in your company.
1:04:37
Those are things that I'm doing. And then the last thing, Kyle, I want to help men be
1:04:44
better husbands. I am very fortunate that I have been with my wife for 25 years. We've
1:04:52
been married 23 years. We have overcome massive things that most people cannot. She is my
1:05:00
most important teammate and we ran our marriage kind of like a mission, like a no fail mission.
1:05:07
Like tier one operators go on no fail missions. And we ran everything about our marriage
1:05:13
that way. This is a no fail mission. Well, in order to train for no fail missions, you
1:05:17
have to train. Well, guess what? You have to train in your family, in your relationship.
1:05:23
And then number three, you have to communicate at all times. It's not, Hey, I'm the dude.
1:05:27
I'm the leader. You're going to do what I say. It is a team. And sometimes she is behind
1:05:33
you. Sometimes she's beside you. And sometimes my wife has been in front of me fighting like
1:05:37
hell for me. And we are an amazing team. So our book Invincible marriage comes out next
1:05:43
year. And I'm super excited about that. Cause divorce on the rise, almost 50% of marriages
1:05:49
today end in divorce. And guys need the tools to understand. Hey, man, you are the leader
1:05:57
of your family. But at the same time, that your wife can be the most important teammate
1:06:01
you have if you understand how to build that relationship. Well, make sure your wonderful
1:06:07
daughter takes a note that I would love to have you back on next year to talk about that
1:06:11
book. I think that would absolutely be fantastic. We share this because here's the thing. If
1:06:15
you believe in spiritual warfare, it's because you're a smart person. And the thing about
1:06:18
Satan is what of all the things on this planet would he revel in destroying more than marriages?
1:06:23
And the answer is nothing. And the reason is, is because we were given marriage as one of
1:06:28
the only ways we could possibly fathom Jesus's love for us, because Jesus's bride was the
1:06:34
church and he laid his life down for her, right? And so for us specifically as husbands,
1:06:40
that's the closest we can get. Our relationship with our wife is the closest that we can get
1:06:45
to even understanding a modicum of what that actually means in terms of humanity, eternity,
1:06:51
the trinity, all of those different things. So I would love to talk to you more about that.
1:06:55
But that's all the questions that I've got for you. Is there anything else you want to
1:06:58
get off your chest? No, man, if you guys want to find me, if you're looking for a speaking,
1:07:04
I speak everything from companies to churches to teams and organizations, you can find me
1:07:10
at Jason Redman dot com and you can find all my information for the different programs
1:07:14
I'm running there and along with my social handles. I will make sure all that's in the
1:07:18
show notes. Jason Redman, thank you for coming on on Dawn to life and man's podcast. Thank
1:07:22
you, brother. Appreciate you.
1:07:25
Alright guys, thanks for listening to my interview with Jason Redman. But before we let you go,
1:07:28
we are going to do a quick resilience boost add on to life or mission is equipping men
1:07:31
to push back darkness with content that forges spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
1:07:36
So the links I got for you today, I've got a link to Jason's website. So if you're interested
1:07:39
in any of the stuff that he's doing, especially the stuff he talked about there at the end
1:07:42
of the interview, you can go to Jason Redman dot com. And I've got Amazon links to where
1:07:45
you can buy your own copy of the Trident and overcome. Thank you for listening to this
1:07:50
podcast. Wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe, rate and leave us a positive
1:07:53
five star review. If you want me to come speak live at your event or on your podcast, shoot
1:07:57
me an email to info@undontin.life. That's I N F O at undontin.life. Follow us on Instagram
1:08:03
and like us on Facebook and check out our website for everything else, including how to donate
1:08:06
to keep more content like this coming your way. Just go to www.undontin.life. And as always,
1:08:12
we want to thank the band Holy Name for allowing us to use their music for our content. The
1:08:15
music on this podcast is our song Perpetua, which is off their self titled debut album
1:08:19
on Face Down Records. The links are in the description. I'm your host, Kyle Thompson.
1:08:24
Remember, keep pushing back darkness, keep forging spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
1:08:31
Keep seeking the lion of Judah.
1:08:49
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