423: Your Personality May Keep You From Surviving. "Psychological Aspects of Survival"

Psychological Aspects of Survival, 1954 Air Force Manual. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jocko Podcast number 423 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo.

• 0:05Speaker 01

  Good evening.

• 0:06Jocko Willink?

  I was at an event and people give me a lot of stuff at events or they mail it to me. This particular one was given to me by somebody at an event. It was, it's an old Air Force manual from 1954. It's called Psychological Aspects of Survival. And people give me a lot of books, like I said, and I like to look through them, see what I can learn, to what I can share. This is, this manual, there's a couple very positive things about this manual. Number one, it was published, like I said, in 1954. So keep that in mind a little bit when it comes to being politically correct.

• 0:42Speaker 01

  I understand.

• 0:43Jocko Willink?

  Some aspects of it, maybe not quite dialed into today's standards.

• 0:49Jocko Willink?

  It also doesn't pull any punches. It's written in a real direct way. Since it's written, so it's published in 1954, so it's probably written like 1952, 1953. And it's based on interviews with soldiers, airmen, sailors, marines, that were evaders, in other words, running from the enemy, prisoners of war that were captured by the enemy, and also escapees, so people that escaped. And it's obviously from World War II in Korea, when both of those had just kind of ended. And it quotes them, it's, it's interesting. It quotes them like anonymously through the whole book. It's just filled with all these quotes from, from people that were interviewed.

• 1:34Jocko Willink?

  Lot of value in each one of the different chapters, but I just want to focus tonight on one section in particular. It's called Personality Requirements for Survival. And this is what's interesting. I think you'll see that these personal, personality requirements that are requirements for survival, I think you're going to see that they're kind of requirements for success in any realm of life, not just evading. And escaping and surviving in a prisoner of war scenario. So here we go. This thing kicks off. This is, this is the thing that I read was like, mm, I kinda gotta share this with some people. So it says, personality requirements of survival.

• 2:15Jocko Willink?

  Your survival may depend more upon your personality than upon danger. The enemy, the weather, the terrain, the nature of the in-flight emergency. So, did you hear what I just said?

• 2:28Speaker 01

  Yes, sir.

• 2:28Jocko Willink?

  Doesn't matter like, oh yeah, the weather might be bad, the enemy might be bad. What the terrain might be bad, all those things.

• 2:35Jocko Willink?

  Survival depends more on your personality.

• 2:39Jocko Willink?

  Whether you will panic from fear or use it as a spur to greater sharpness. Whether you will be overcome by fatigue. Echo Charles. Or be able to take the necessary action to survive. Whether you will be able to evade and escape or will be captured by the enemy. Even whether or not you will have frost-bitten feet. All are more dependent upon you than upon the situation. So this is just coming out of the gate with the extreme ownership of extreme ownership. Right? Listen, frostbite, sure, it might be cold. The cold doesn't matter as much as you matter. You ever heard someone say, my, my feet got frost-bitten?

• 3:21Speaker 01

  No.

• 3:22Jocko Willink?

  Never heard anyone say that? Well, I suppose you're not allowed in Hawaii. There's not a lot of people whose feet are getting frostbitten. So when someone says, oh, my feet got frost-bitten. Or my hand got cut. It never had anything to do with them.

• 3:35Speaker 01

  Oh, right.

• 3:36Jocko Willink?

  Right? It's like their feet detached from them. Their feet were over there getting frost-bitten.

• 3:43Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, I mean, I, that makes sense. I don't know.

• 3:47Jocko Willink?

  In a way it does.

• 3:48Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 3:48Jocko Willink?

  But in a way, if you, if you just explore that a little bit, it's like, well, I, my feet are attached to me. And what was I doing? So it goes into it here a little bit. This fact has been demonstrated in several important scientific studies. For example, an army medical research team found that men who were treated for frostbite in Korean combat tended to be passive, negativistic, hypochondriacal individuals.

• 4:16Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 4:17Speaker 01

  That's kind of rough.

• 4:18Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's a rough one. That's why I said this thing might not be the most politically correct because it's just calling fools out.

• 4:24Speaker 01

  It seems like, uh, what?

• 4:25Jocko Willink?

  You got frostbitten passive, negativistic, and hyperchondrical.

• 4:32Speaker 01

  What is that? Some victim blaming right there? What?

• 4:36Jocko Willink?

  I see where you're going. I see where your mind's at.

• 4:39Speaker 01

  That's what it feels like. Look frostbitten. It's not like you can just resist the frostbite.

• 4:43Jocko Willink?

  Hold on, okay, let's, let's think about it here. This is, this actually is just replies specifically to you. It says, this is not hard to understand. The passive individual lacks aggressiveness, takes things as they are without trying to do anything about them, and is lacking in drive and ambition.

• 5:03Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 5:04Jocko Willink?

  Now you see where I'm going with this, don't you?

• 5:06Speaker 01

  Fully.

• 5:06Jocko Willink?

  See, this is, you're right. This is victim blaming. The victim is freaking to blame here. Such a man will engage in less muscular activity, won't pay much attention to carrying extra footwear, and won't do much to prevent cold injury. The negativistic individual will either ignore or do just the opposite of what others suggest. If his personal equipment officer suggests that he wear woolen socks and carry a few extra pair, he's likely to wear silk socks and take no extra socks on his missions. If his aircraft commander suggests that he massage his feet or jump up and down to keep the blood flowing, he will probably ignore him. The hypochondriac personality enjoys sympathy from others.

• 5:51Jocko Willink?

  Injury has always gotten sympathy for him before. He wants sympathy from others so badly that he consciously or unconsciously permits himself to become frostbitten. Boom. Echo Charles.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  You're correct. Yeah, what? I see why you like, I mean.

• 6:10Jocko Willink?

  You can see why this book was, yeah, straight to the top of the queue.

• 6:13Speaker 01

  See why you're all over this book, but it actually now that you just said that and even the look you gave, I'm like, okay, I know that there's a big picture, you know, answer to this. And yeah, that's what that's really what it is. There's a bigger picture going on, right? It's not like his cells were aggressive, passive hypochondriac cells or skin, you know, his skin was being a hypochondriac and all this is, you know, and then allowed themselves to get frostbitten when they easily could have prevented it. It's not that. It's not that. There's a bigger picture going on.

• 6:44Jocko Willink?

  And listen, the thing that are there things that are truly out of beyond your control? Yes, there are. There I guarantee that the most aggressive, positive minded, happy conscientious person has gotten frostbitten before. I mean, it happens. But to say that when you look at, let's say a hundred people in in the Korean War that got frostbitten and you start interviewing them and you start, look, some of them, like I said, some of them were probably great dudes, but some of them, or there's probably a majority, you start seeing a pattern, you start seeing 70% that were like, they've been to sick call a lot.

• 7:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:24Jocko Willink?

  They, you see what I'm saying?

• 7:26Speaker 01

  Fully, man.

• 7:27Jocko Willink?

  And you get around people like this. This is what you gotta watch out for is you can be around people like this.

• 7:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, fully. Yeah, they in so, yeah, like how you sort out the numbers. It's a real, it's a generalization, right? Where it's like, okay, let's go into the numbers now. And, and you know, so you, you get a hundred people and you see, I don't know, whatever the numbers are, let's say 30 or let's say half of them got frostbitten and half didn't. Be like, wait a second, what's up with this 50% who straight up didn't? What's up with them? Not only what's up with like, hey, okay, you guys got frostbite, we're in the snow. I understand. Like, I've got fries cold and you know, whatever. We all have equipment and all this stuff. So why did you get frostbite? And then, but what's up with the guys who didn't? Then so it's like, okay, let's make this really like in-depth comparison. Let's go, let's go deep.

• 8:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's the big thing. When you start running the numbers.

• 8:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:14Jocko Willink?

  Cause look, there's some people that, let's say, let's say this dude sweats a lot. And so when he gets in, he's going on his ruck hump into position on an ambush, his feet are like sweaty. He and now they don't have time to change because they're trying to lay up and that guy might get frostbitten. He might be the toughest bastard in the world, but he gets frostbitten. Whereas some other guy that doesn't sweat a lot genetically, his feet didn't get wet on the way in. So you see what I'm saying? So there's going to be the, but when you start taking a hun- a hundred guys or even better yet, a thousand guys and you start looking at beyond the outliers, you start seeing a little pattern here.

• 8:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, like a little commonalities.

• 8:49Jocko Willink?

  And a little commonality. You know, it's the same thing with SEAL training. There's a, there's a small number of people like they had bad luck and they broke their leg or whatever. But if you start reviewing all those personalities at some point, they go,

• 9:07Jocko Willink?

  this isn't worth it.

• 9:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. It's like Jason Gardner, right? Was the one who said, said it where we're kind of hashing out like, oh, what makes a guy like make it through and maybe quit? And you know, like what's the difference? What makes it? And then I think if I'm remembering correctly, where it's like, hey, if you're a stud, if you've been a stud athletically your whole life, and then you all of a sudden just start losing like sharp drop off, just start losing stuff, bro, that can take a bigger toll on you than if you've been kind of losing here and there all your life. And then Jason Gardner was like, yeah, I've been losing since day one or whatever.

• 9:40Jocko Willink?

  There's no factor.

• 9:41Speaker 01

  There's no factor. I was like, but it kind of starts to answer the question in that same way where it's like, hey, this guy's a, this guy literally is physically more capable, even like endurance wise, is physically more capable than all these guys. And why is he like literally like quitting? Even his failed runtime or whatever is way better than a lot of these other guys fails runtime. They didn't quit. Like what's up with this guy? Then you kind of go deeper and you're like, oh, that's why.

• 10:04Jocko Willink?

  And just so you know, that's not a guarantee. Like there's plenty of guys that are total studs that crushed and they're like, oh, they fail stuff and they're like, oh, well, no problem. And they push on. But, but occasionally you get a guy that's a super stud. Dude, I mean, I had a guy that was freaking Olympic gymnastics alternate. How much more of a stud can you get? He freaking quit. I had D1 wrestlers like it happens.

• 10:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:29Jocko Willink?

  But yeah, tho- those cases are cases of people that have been winning and all of a sudden they get forced to lose and they freak out. This is, this is more like habitual. This, this line right here of the passive individual lacks aggressiveness, takes things as they are without trying to do anything about them. That's a whole personality trait. Accepting things the way they are in the world. You can't, there's, you can't do that. Now, listen, if you get some situation where you have to accept the reality of the situation, and they're going to talk about that as well. But, accepting things as they are without trying to do anything about them, that's a personality trait that'll get you frostbitten and worse.

• 11:16Jocko Willink?

  Alright, going on here. This discussion has two purposes. The first is to list and describe the qualities in a man which help or hurt his chances of survival. The second purpose is to help you size up yourself. If you know what you can expect from yourself under tough conditions, you can do a better job of handling yourself. You can be on the alert for trouble and you can come to rely on your strengths. Survival depends a great deal on your knowing and facing the situation. This is such a good line. But you are part of the situation. Take a tea party, for instance. Your mother or sister would have a fine time. You would be miserable. The party is the same. What makes the difference? You.

• 12:02Jocko Willink?

  You can make the situation better or worse by the way you manage yourself. Therefore, know yourself. Dude, I've been in so many situations in my life where I got to see other people being miserable and me being like, oh, that's gotta suck.

• 12:24Jocko Willink?

  Hey, you're in a bad situation. A classic example is just, I mean, look, we can talk about the cold. You can talk about hell week. You can talk about all those things. But just being on a ship in 110 degree heat, and I mean, this isn't during an operation. This is just like normal living on a ship. Dude, it sucks. But you can either be miserable about that or you can just like rock and roll. That's what we're doing.

• 12:47Jocko Willink?

  Okay, now he starts getting into these qualities in a man important to survival. One, he can make up his mind. Making up your mind doesn't mean jumping without looking, but it does mean that you make it up. Decide on a plan, then act on it. This is where if you can take this from 1954 and then add in a little leadership strategy and tactics, get to the iterative decision-making process where you make small decisions very rapidly and then make adjustments. That is such a great tool for people, for humans. If you look, it's hard to tell someone, hey, you need to make a decision right now.

• 13:30Jocko Willink?

  Either go left or go right and you don't know, you're looking at which way should I go left, should I go right? Is where's the terrain to be like all those things. But if you say, hey, listen, you got to at least start walking one direction. You've got to do it now to figure out to learn more. Okay. Well, I'll go start walking left, I guess. I can't really see much further, but once I start walking left, I'll be able to see more. And maybe I can figure out that that terrain is pretty good or it's really bad. In which case I can go back the other way. So make being able to make up your mind. Utilizing the iterative decision making process from leadership strategy and tactics field manual. Such a powerful tool for human beings, especially if you're a person that's a little bit indecisive.

• 14:06Jocko Willink?

  Cause people get, there are people that are. I don't want to say naturally indecisive because it may have been the way that they're raised. But between nature and nurture, their personality has developed into an indecisive personality. So they read that and say, I can't make up my mind. Learn to use the iterative decision making process where you make a small decision, the smallest decision you can possibly make in this situation. And then start moving and then assess and see what if it's a good decision or not. And then make adjustments as needed, no factor, but being able to make up your mind. The number one quality that they list here.

• 14:39Jocko Willink?

  And like I said, then they got all these, these anonymous quotes in here from probably a bunch of damn war heroes. Quote, the trouble was that I had no real plan. It was a hit or miss approach. I took a sudden direction and hoped I got out. I was inadequate to survive and had no preparation whatsoever, no plan whatsoever. My advice for anyone to survive is to make a long range plan.

• 15:04Jocko Willink?

  Another guy, this man couldn't make up his mind. I had a good chance to look at the entire, I had a good chance to look the entire area over. And I became quite confused as to where I wanted to land. This is, you can imagine this is a guy in a parachute. I changed my mind several times and only succeeded in making my descent all the faster by attempting to change direction several times.

• 15:26Jocko Willink?

  And then they've got this, this man made up his mind and acted. I decided it was time for drastic action as I didn't want that chopper to leave without me. So I gave up trying to remain undercover and made my way to a nearby clearing. I gathered some twigs and dry grass and made a small fire. When it was burning good, I put some wet grass on it to make it smoke. So there you go. Being decisive, making a decision. You gotta do that. Another quality. He can improvise. Ingenuity, or the kind of resourcefulness which enables one to improvise and do the best he can with whatever's available, occurs quite often in survival stories.

• 16:10Jocko Willink?

  This man didn't have a smoke flare, but he figured out something just as good with what he had. I spread out my parachute, burned a hole in the middle and used it to send up a smoke signal.

• 16:21Jocko Willink?

  This man also had to use what was available to improvise a signal. I discovered a large stack of old rice and straw on the side of a large green field. The construction of an air signal came to my mind. That night, when I went to relieve myself, I made my way to the area and devised a signal out of the straw. It read six PW in letters about 14 feet high. The success of this attempt raised all of our hopes. We figured at least it might protect us from a fighter attack. So these are people that's taking action. The other thing about taking action.

• 16:54Jocko Willink?

  Is it? It reduces your fear. It reduces your fear. There's nothing that makes fear worse than hesitation and waiting and pondering the what you're about to go through. You can't do that. Like you're sitting there looking at the squat rack. Yeah, yes, sir. And you know, you gotta do 20 reps. All the time you wait, it just gets worse. Doesn't get better.

• 17:20Jocko Willink?

  Uh, another quality. He can live with himself. We all know people who, like children, can't stand being alone, have to be entertained, always want something new. Other people can take care of themselves, make a good thing out of a bad one, keep their own and others' spirits up.

• 17:44Jocko Willink?

  One of the guys says, speaking of taking action, not knowing what to do, I decided to kill all the bugs. There were a lot of spiders, the big ones that do not hurt a human. So I killed the flies and gave them to the spiders to eat. I never killed the spiders and kept busy. Just keep him busy.

• 18:04Jocko Willink?

  Here's another valuable quality. He can rock with the punch. We all know people who can't change themselves, no matter how much their stubbornness costs. Others can change themselves to fit the situation. Here are some men who showed flexibility. So in survival and in life, what have we hit so far? You gotta be able to live for yourself, live by yourself, live with yourself. You definitely have to be able to improvise. You gotta be able to make up your mind. And then you gotta be able to like have flexibility.

• 18:41Jocko Willink?

  You can't be, and it's weird how it points out here, people's stubbornness, they'll stay with the same plan, no matter what it costs them. People make that mistake all the time.

• 18:55Jocko Willink?

  They'd rather lose than change their mind.

• 19:00Jocko Willink?

  One guy says, I noticed that my left ankle was set at an unnatural angle and I realized that it was broken. I decided I would have to attempt a landing on my knees. Well, little thing. Another quality. He can keep cool, calm, and collected.

• 19:17Jocko Willink?

  This doesn't even, they don't even have an explanation here. It just says, he can keep cool, calm, and collected. The old joke, I was calm, but he was collected applies here. Anybody can panic, but some people go to pieces more easily than others. If these men had remembered the signs of panic, they might have remained calm. And he's got some quotes here. A copilot, seeing his pilot killed, put his arms over his eyes and paid no attention to the controls. What a freaking nightmare that is. You see your pilot get killed, so you just cover your face up? That's disturbing.

• 20:00Jocko Willink?

  A navigator sat staring blankly at his logbook throughout a violent flak barrage and retained no memory of the event. You ever seen anyone get that freaked out before?

• 20:12Speaker 01

  No, not that I can remember.

• 20:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I've seen people like freeze up. We gotta kind of shake them and be like, hey, hey. Like, hey, we need to go. That type of thing. I've seen that before.

• 20:22Speaker 01

  I did see it, but obviously not on that level. I'm remembering something.

• 20:25Jocko Willink?

  What was it?

• 20:26Speaker 01

  When I was a little kid, um, one of my friends were bombing this hill on our bikes and my.

• 20:32Jocko Willink?

  What kind of bike did you have? Was it a BMX type bike?

• 20:36Speaker 01

  BMX bike. It was a freestyle bike. You know, like they're like all one color. Like a color, color, not black or silver. It's like a color with the wheels are white.

• 20:45Jocko Willink?

  Did it have pegs and everything? Did you do freestyle?

• 20:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit.

• 20:48Jocko Willink?

  Did you have the handlebars that could continuously spin around?

• 20:51Speaker 01

  No.

• 20:51Jocko Willink?

  Okay, that's like a little one level up.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 20:54Jocko Willink?

  All right, but we're in the game. Freestyle, check.

• 20:56Speaker 01

  So we bombed this hill and one of my friends wasn't very good on a bike. He was just like, I don't know. White belt bike rider, I guess. So he bombed the hill and I don't know, you know. I never felt this. Actually, I felt this on a skateboard, but when you go down a hill and you hit a certain speed, like it just, you just lose faculty, like it's scary.

• 21:18Speaker 01

  I never had this on a bike, but on skateboard I totally have where you just like panic. But so he, that happened to him. I didn't realize it was happening to him because we were bombing the hill all day, like all day, every, like, we always go to this hill. So he was bombing the hill and we're watching him and I remember thinking, oh, he's not very strong on a bike. So this will be funny. At the bottom of the hill was just, it goes into like a, um, like a field with no grass. So it's just a field with dirt, right?

• 21:42Jocko Willink?

  But it's a good place to run it out. Like coming down the hill, you could run it out or no?

• 21:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, you could run it out. Yes, fully. And you'd get hurt, but not injured. It's like that kind. It's not like a brick wall. Or like more cement, you know, it's like dirt. So, so I guess given the circumstance, it's pretty solid, solid little backdrop there. So he's going and I'm like, oh, wow. He's just, he's not even slowing down. Like that's pretty, because it's like, it's essentially a long, long, long, long hill with a cul-de-sac at the end. It was pre like constructed, like they were going to build houses there. So a lot of like dirt and whatever. So. This guy's flying down the hill and I'm thinking, oh he's

• 22:18Jocko Willink?

  How old are you guys? Like seven, eight?

• 22:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Yep, exactly. And he's going and then, you know, you hit the cul-de-sac, you gotta slow down a little bit at a certain time and it comes natural if you're used to doing it. So yeah, I'm not even thinking this. He's and you hit the, you hit the brakes a little bit, but you can't just slam on the brakes as you're going so fast. So you gotta hit the brakes good. You gotta lean one side, then you gotta hit the cul-de-sac, the, you gotta go around the cul-de-sac like a perfect kind of timing thing. Now, now that I'm thinking back on it. Anyway, this guy's going, he's not hitting the brakes at all. I'm like, bro, this guy's bombing still. I was like, he's not even slowing down, which is crazy. Cause you know, I've never seen him come down the hill before. Instead of hitting the brakes, I just seen him throw his arms up in the air and start doing this.

• 23:02Speaker 01

  And he just bombs like right into that dirt place and crashes real bad. Yeah, you got hurt. But that was what it was. He, he hit that velocity and just completely panicked. He took his, actually, he took his hands off the, off the handlebars, everything, just in the air flailing his hands, like all crazy. I was like, it looked, uh, it looked really, really funny for sure. Like it was a real funny. Hurt, not injured. Yeah, yeah. Little kids, you know, in the dirt. But, um, but it was more interesting. I'll never forget it too. It was real interesting how that was the decision. Well, that's what it seemed like. It seemed like he made the decision to just flail his hands up in the air. But he didn't, did he?

• 23:42Jocko Willink?

  No, dude. He lost his mind. He's the same as the navigator staring blankly at his logbook. Or the other copilot just covering up his eyes and not looking at the controls. Like that's crazy way to behave.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. It was, yeah, it was crazy.

• 23:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's a crazy way to behave. I'm trying to think if I've ever done anything like that where I just was like, just lost my mind. But I can't think of any time. Oh, check.

• 24:12Jocko Willink?

  It says this, other men actually think better under rough conditions. The trick here may be that these men keep their jo, keep their minds on the job to be done and off themselves. It's a real good thing to think about. You got a job to do, do it. Don't think about yourself and you're gonna die and all that stuff. You don't, don't think about that. Otherwise you'd be throwing your hands up in the air, just flailing them.

• 24:37Jocko Willink?

  Gives a good example here. These two men were in the same spot. The first man got rattled. I tried to use the canopy release to get rid of the canopy, but it did not work. I then opened my chest strap and pushed the harness off my shoulders so I could get at the May West toggles. My chute had started sinking and I needed support. The chute began to pull me under now even with the vest inflated and I had to kick my feet to remain afloat. My left leg became entangled in the shroud line. I don't believe I could have stayed afloat more than another minute or so. So this is a guy coming down into the water under a parachute

• 25:14Jocko Willink?

  canopy and freaking out. And then it says, this man kept calm and could remember his survival training. While floating down, I remembered hearing about some people having trouble getting out of the harness in the water. So I opened up my leg strap while at about 1,500 feet up and about 500 feet up, I opened the chest strap. Then as my feet hit the water, I raised my arms and slid out of the harness.

• 25:44Jocko Willink?

  So I'm assuming these guys are pilots, like in the SEAL teams, we get taught to do that. And I guess anyone that's airborne is going to get taught, hey, if you're approaching water, you kind of loosen these straps, you undo this strap. So that way, when you hit the water, you don't have to be in this big tangled mess of a parachute. But imagine you're a pilot, you probably had three briefings, you know, and he just heard one of his buddies or something like, dude, I almost drowned when I hit the water. So this guy, just being calm, cool, and collected, is just rolling down like, oh, you know what, I remember some guys had trouble in the water, I'm just going to loosen my leg straps, loosen my chest strap, get ready to take this thing off, and just slides out of the harness when he gets down.

• 26:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:20Jocko Willink?

  Totally different attitudes.

• 26:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, it seems like that'd be hard to do if you don't have that, like, in your personality kind of a thing. Cause like, how do you remember that under a, like, situation where you're like, could die kind of a thing? Or when you're at, you know,

• 26:34Jocko Willink?

  Well, what you want to do is you want to be able to detach. That's what you want to be able to do. We want to go. Did I tell you about that whole escalator thing? I was with Jamie Cochran?

• 26:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 26:44Jocko Willink?

  It was funny because it was kind of like one of those scenarios. Woman falls down on the escalator. The escalators like bringing her up the thing. People are yelling and like, what do we, uh, you know, it's like panic and no one knows what to do to stop the escalator.

• 26:59Jocko Willink?

  Or they don't know what to do. That, that's not even a mo, that's not even a thought that they're having. Cause I'm thinking like, oh, there's, how can we stop this thing? I literally had the conversation with myself, like, you know what? There's gotta be a way to stop an escalator. Cause this seems a little bit dangerous. Like looked around a little bit and said, oh, there's a button over there. It says emergency stop on it. And I walked over, pressed it and then thing stopped.

• 27:17Speaker 01

  Bro, that's, that was, uh, when you told me that, that was such a good, like, just real world example.

• 27:22Jocko Willink?

  It was, and I was with Jamie and we got, you know, we walk up to her and I'm like, hey, you know how I talk about detachment a lot? She goes, yeah, and it's, you know, that's it, you know, because there's 15 people around the bottom, like we're a bunch of people, there's 15 people waiting to go up the escalator.

• 27:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:38Jocko Willink?

  This woman falls. Now there's two, three people on the escalator that are panicking. And that's my instinct because, and, and it's important to remember that that's because you said it's natural. Some of it's natural. Yes. But that is the way that I have trained myself and have been trained is that when something is going down, take a step back. Even like back in the day.

• 28:06Jocko Willink?

  Like there's a fight. Right? A lot of people's instinct, you, me and, and Carrie were in a bar and like someone's, someone's gets in your face and starts talking shit to you. Some people's instinct is like, I'm going to get right up next to you and I'm like, hey, who the hell are you talking to? Right? That's a lot of people's instinct. My instinct is like, take a step back. Wait, how many friends do they have? Where's the exits? What are the bouncers? Like it's not to get into it. It's actually to step out of it because I'm going to have a much better advantage. When that happens.

• 28:35Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. The, you, that escalator story, it's like, if you have it, if you have it like a tree, like if this whole issue, this whole scenario on unfolding is a tree. When you look at a tree, what do you see? You see first the leaves probably, then you kind of look down some stems, some branches, the trunk, and you kind of don't really see the roots, even though you kind of know they're there. Right? Where you, if you see the person going on the escalator, right? An old lady, cool, she falls, uh oh, now we have a problem. What's, what's the attached, not detached, the attached problem is the lady who fell. That's the problem. We gotta get her up, right? That's the attached, like, that's the obvious problem.

• 29:17Jocko Willink?

  Do I run up there and help her, stand her up?

• 29:19Speaker 01

  Stand her up. Because, because think about it, logically, on a certain level, the escalator moving, that's not a pri- I mean, it's a problem now, but that's not the, the, the, um, how should I say, that, that surface level problem, problem, because that escalator's been working for decades, probably. So that's no issue, that's not the issue here. Today, the issue's the lady who fell down in your brain. But you have to, if you look at the whole problem, it's a combo of things. Just like the escalator has been going up, or in this case, for like decades. Ladies have been falling down for decades too. So like, but when you put them together, see what I'm saying? We got a situation. So, yeah, if you can detach and then recognize the hierarchy of, okay, this is gonna be the simplest

• 30:03Speaker 01

  solution that'll solve the most problems, boom, you can see it more. So it's like you're looking at the tree and being like, hey, this tree, like, the leaves are brown. Like, that's the issue. Don't paint the leaves green. You'd think, oh yeah, just paint the leaves, they're not brown anymore, right? No, no, water the tree or something. Go for the roots, see what I'm saying? Solves all the problems.

• 30:21Jocko Willink?

  It's like when there's a leak in the house, right?

• 30:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:24Jocko Willink?

  And people are grabbing it, trying to stop the leak, putting a rag around the leak. It's like, no, shut off the water.

• 30:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:29Jocko Willink?

  Usually there's a water that you can shut off almost immediately, but you can even run out to the street and shut the water off.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:35Jocko Willink?

  But people don't think that way. They start grabbing rags and they start holding the pipe and they start trying to get that thing shut down. And you do that because you're not detached. If you take a step back and like, oh, there's water coming, I'm not gonna be able to stop the water coming out of this pipe with a rag, it's not happening. But I can easily go to this, follow this valve and just shut it off and now we're good.

• 30:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:52Jocko Willink?

  But you have to be able to detach to do that and you can't get panicked. And to counter what you said about the natural ability, yes, there is some natural ability, but I know for a fact that you can train people to do it because I have trained. Hundreds of people, young seals, young seal leaders to like, take a step back, dude, hey dude, the problem, you're not gonna solve the problem going in there, you need to take a step back.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:20Jocko Willink?

  And it's a real thing.

• 31:21Speaker 01

  Oh, yes, sir. So I, I actually agree with you probably more than you realize because when I, I mean, I was talking about that one pilot, right? So, um, or the parachute guy, sorry. I was talking about the person, when you, when you're not like naturally like that as far as your personality, yeah. So when you're trained like that, it seems like when you compare someone who's untrained and trained, it seems so impressive. But when you're trained, it's kind of like, no, no, that's just how. So a big part, so you know how nature versus nurture and like all this stuff or whatever. So from what I understand, like the nature part of it is like such a massive thing and it's overwhelmingly like powerful, the nature part of it, right? But I've always thought like, hmm, or maybe that's just because most people are not trained in everything.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  So every time they point out how nature is revealing itself in all these different situations, it's like, well, how, how much training does a normal person have? How much training do we all have? And in how many things? Like even like you, who's probably highly trained in probably more things than I know of any other person, but what? Five things in life, like five things, you know? So it's like, all right, most people are trained in almost zero things, almost. As far as actually trained, see what I'm saying? If you went by the belt level, how many people are purple belts in more than one thing in life? Actually, even one thing in life, you probably have a lot of people who aren't even purple belts in one.

• 32:41Jocko Willink?

  Well, no, I think a lot of people are purple belts in one thing in life. It's usually their job, right? You're an accountant, like you, there's people that are black belts in Excel spreadsheets. There's people that are, you, you're a black belt in, what, video editing program thing, right? Like legit, like you spent more than 10,000 hours doing that, right? And so everyone has, I would say, most people have some skill. Whether they're a plumber, an electrician, a lawyer, like you, you have a skill that you developed. So almost, I would actually counter that and say, most people have at least one thing.

• 33:13Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 33:14Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. That they're an expert in.

• 33:15Speaker 01

  Okay, perfect.

• 33:16Jocko Willink?

  Unfortunately, in many cases, it's a random thing. Like, let's face it, what good is video in the natural world?

• 33:22Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 33:22Jocko Willink?

  Video has no value whatsoever.

• 33:25Speaker 01

  Well, you know, in our world today.

• 33:26Jocko Willink?

  In our world today, it has value, but.

• 33:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, you're right. But.

• 33:30Jocko Willink?

  I mean, literally, unless there's a computer there.

• 33:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:33Jocko Willink?

  Every other scenario doesn't matter.

• 33:36Speaker 01

  It's very specific, for sure. But, um, but yes, okay, cool. Let's say everyone has one purple belt skill or whatever. So, but that's still the point, though. Sure, cool, they got one. Even if they got two, even you with 10. Right. You know how many skills there are to have? There's a lot. So if you compare, okay, let's take a random skill. Let's say, okay, let's say weight training, right? For, let's say, muscle development. If you get a person who's trained, same exact genetics, trained and untrained, it's like night and day. They're completely different people. Same genetics, trained, untrained, right? So you can take a guy with good genetics, don't, untrained, not one single lifting session, ever.

• 34:18Speaker 01

  Then you take a guy's kind of junk genetics, right? Just his personality's not like that all the time. And you train him, bro, he's gonna look way bigger and stronger than the guy with the genetics.

• 34:27Jocko Willink?

  Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, bro. Hold on, hold on.

• 34:32Jocko Willink?

  Are you sure about that?

• 34:33Speaker 01

  I, well, you know, this is my bro-science hypothesis at this time, but I'm pretty sure here.

• 34:38Jocko Willink?

  No, listen, you take a, there's, there's people that have freaking insane genetics for the way they aesthetically look and the strength that they have. There's people that are so strong and they barely ever train. And you're just telling me right now, you take a person that has junk genetics and they can. A, look better and B, be stronger than someone that has awesome genetics.

• 35:02Speaker 01

  Okay, so.

• 35:03Jocko Willink?

  Are you sure about that? I'm gonna give you opportunity to revoke your statement.

• 35:06Speaker 01

  Alright, so let me refine this statement then, how about that? So I'm saying, okay, you take the extremes, the massive, massive extremes, okay, okay, I get it. And yeah, man, of course, and that's probably lends to why really like the facts, how they shake out is like, hey, nature is such a big part. It's true, but in the like, in the real, in the general way of looking at things, in the masses, you know? We're untrained, that's what, that's my point. So you get a guy who's like, you know, slightly, I don't know, however, by however, a factor of however many, like genetically gifted versus a guy who's not, and you just train the hell out of one guy, just pursuing ultimate results in training, bro, he's gonna outperform that guy, is what I'm saying. So you can have a personality that lends to this, untrained versus a guy who doesn't, you know, and then train him.

• 35:51Speaker 01

  He'll do better, you see what I'm saying?

• 35:54Jocko Willink?

  There's a lot of, it takes a lot, even, even like you take like jujitsu, right? You, you know, there's some people that are naturally good at jujitsu. And they, you take that person, I guess jujitsu is a bad example because if you don't know anything about jujitsu, you're getting beat.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  And, and that's the point right there, and now take anything, you're gonna be hard pressed to find a skill, unless you go like way at extremes.

• 36:18Jocko Willink?

  Strength, okay, so yes, okay, if you wanna talk about skill, yes, but genetic, like strength or flexibility, right? There's people that are naturally flexible, dude, we could, Franklin, remember, I remember his name, dude. That dude was naturally flexible to the insane level.

• 36:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:37Jocko Willink?

  Insane level, like he, he wasn't a guy that grew up doing jujitsu, he wasn't a guy that grew up doing gymnastics or yoga or anything like that. He was just born as flexible as a human could be. And if he would have started doing, like he could be any yoga person at freaking downward dog or whatever. He would just, he was just perfect at it, like everything he would do is just so flexible.

• 37:02Speaker 01

  Agree, yeah, yeah.

• 37:03Jocko Willink?

  So you take a guy like that, or you take, uh, let's see, who's one of our really super strong, natural freaking dudes?

• 37:15Speaker 01

  Naturally strong?

• 37:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, just a naturally strong.

• 37:18Speaker 01

  Like black belt guy or just a dude in general?

• 37:20Jocko Willink?

  One of our, one of our guys we train with. Just naturally.

• 37:25Speaker 01

  Okay. I mean, he's trained though, but.

• 37:27Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. He's trained. He's naturally strong.

• 37:31Speaker 01

  Actually, you know, you know, he's natural. Well, then again, he's trained too. It's Tim, to ruin Tim Ford. Like he had a weird, oddball, natural strength.

• 37:38Jocko Willink?

  A wiry strength.

• 37:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, like you couldn't, yeah. But I don't, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. Sloan is the strongest guy that I could remember right now.

• 37:46Jocko Willink?

  Damn, check that out.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:48Jocko Willink?

  So, so you have that, his, as strong as he is naturally, and then you take someone that's, like, we're not gonna call names here, but there's people that are naturally weak, right?

• 37:57Speaker 01

  True.

• 37:58Jocko Willink?

  And you could probably train that person, honestly, forever, and they won't be able to deadlift as much as like Sloan.

• 38:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, and.

• 38:06Jocko Willink?

  I don't even know if Sloan deadlifts. Well, I'm sure he does.

• 38:08Speaker 01

  Right, but Sloan trains and he's probably like.

• 38:11Jocko Willink?

  Even if he doesn't deadlift, he still can deadlift.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, so.

• 38:14Jocko Willink?

  More than a someone that's weak.

• 38:16Speaker 01

  So I agree with.

• 38:17Jocko Willink?

  So it's a bad, it's a bad thing to talk, it's a bad thing to talk about. Strength and flexibility, those are, there's a huge genetic component to those things.

• 38:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:26Jocko Willink?

  Now, listen, can a person that's not very flexible get more flexible? Absolutely. Can a person that's not very strong get very strong? Yes, absolutely. But it doesn't compare with things that are skills, pure skills. Jiu Jitsu is a pretty fairly pure skill. Uh, playing guitar is a pretty fairly pure skill. Shooting basketball is a pretty, it's a skill that you can learn a lot of. And again, some people will have, you know, some people play guitar, they have a natural ability to hear tones, they can move their fingers maybe a little bit more. That, uh, they have a little more dexterity in their fingers. So, so they're, they have like a 10% chance, uh, uh, head start.

• 39:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I.

• 39:04Jocko Willink?

  And there's some people that get a negative 10% head start, right?

• 39:07Speaker 01

  Fully, and yeah, and even more than that. The thing is, we're totally agreeing, the own, the caveat that I'm making, when you go to the extreme, so genetically, like physically, like genetically or whatever, it's easy to go to the extremes because you take like Franklin, for example. Franklin's probably, I don't know, I don't know everyone in the world or who's ever lived, but I would estimate of all the people I've ever seen, including on video, by the way, he's probably. Top 1% of flexible people.

• 39:32Jocko Willink?

  And by the way, doesn't even care about it. It's not like he, if he wanted to, he could be making videos himself of like, here I am, yeah, I'm pulling my leg over behind my left ear now itching my, you know, neck or whatever.

• 39:44Speaker 01

  Exactly right. So as far as what I'm saying, if I'm trying to do some freaking hypothesis right now, I'm excluding him. And then I'm excluding the guy who can't even scratch his butt. I'm excluding them. I'm talking about people. And then on top of it, I'm saying someone who is trained, trained, like that's what they do, that they're trained, purple belt or higher level versus someone literally zero hours training, literally zero. That, and I'm comparing them too. So you can, sure, one guy can have a head start or whatever, but the guy trained is gonna usually generally speaking, the more extreme you go, the more of a discrepancy for sure. But what I'm saying is that the ultimate point is that when you, when you take nature versus nurture, sure, I, I get it. But I think it's

• 40:29Speaker 01

  slightly important to take, take into account that people, we, we are untrained in most things. So now we're left with mostly nature. That's why they discount nurture as much it could be.

• 40:41Jocko Willink?

  And a good thing to remember about what you're saying, that's very positive, is we are mostly untrained. You're right. So most people are gonna have whatever reaction nature gave them to stressful situations, which very well could be throw up your hands, cover your eyes, freaking flail around and do nothing. You can train out of that. I have trained many, many, many people out of that behavior. I've had people come back, we've gotten so many like after actions reports of people being in extremely stressful situations and they're able to relax, look around, make a call, they're able to detach. Like this is a thing that is real. And look, probably this written, this man is written in 1952, I doubt they had any

• 41:25Jocko Willink?

  inkling to train people to detach. They naturally train people because you're gonna get put, if you're a pilot, you're getting in stressful situations, just as a pilot trying to land this thing and trying to take off and trying to do this stuff, whatever the instruments, and they're probably blindfolding you sometimes, like go, go through the protocol again. So you're, you're getting some level of it and you're learning it, but it's hard when you don't really identify what you're doing. That you're like, oh, why don't you just take a breath, take a step back, let me relax. Like that you can train. And if you train it, you'll get better at it and it will help you.

• 41:59Jocko Willink?

  Continuing on, it says, "The man who stays calm helps his whole crew stay calm." A quote, "Joe was the only one of us that was really calm, I think. He spoke slowly, carefully, repeating the latitude and longitude. I forced myself to concentrate on those all-important numbers. I repeated them back to him. 'That's right, Tom,' he said, and there was no excitement in his voice whatsoever. I think it was his calmness that gave me the courage to go back into the radio room. Maybe not, but it damn well helped."

• 42:32Jocko Willink?

  Calm is contagious. Panic and freaking out will spread to the rest of your team.

• 42:39Jocko Willink?

  A lot of men report that when they recognize the signs of panic, they could stop it, calm themselves. It can be done if you catch it soon enough. This man was scared and realized it. So this is exactly what we're talking about. And this is what, again, I've been lucky enough to be able to train people to do. Like, "Oh, you're starting to panic." I call this red flags, right? I call this red flags. I wrote about it in the freaking kids' books, right about in Leadership Strategy and Tactics. You've got to recognize when things are going sideways. In Warrior Kid, I wrote about you're losing your temper. You've got to recognize what are these red flags that are stepping up and popping up in your head. Here's a quote, "I was scared and realized it. So I tried to calm myself down and think it out, think things out.

• 43:22Jocko Willink?

  My thoughts, however, all came to the same conclusion. No one would track me down to help me. With this in mind, I decided it would only be a few minutes before I was sighted, so hoping I could still avoid capture, I selected a hiding place and some brush with my gun drawn and ready. I waited." So, this guy was starting to panic. He's like, "All right, calm down. Think through it. Yep, I'm probably not going to get, I'm probably not going to get rescued anytime soon. I need to make a move." This man stopped and fought things out. "My first instinct upon landing was to get out of my chute and run for cover. I did not think of the chute, just left it and took off running toward the first trees I saw that were about 70 yards to my right. Arriving there, I hid in a ditch to get my bearings and think things out."

• 44:08Jocko Willink?

  So detaching, taking a step back, relaxed look around. These things are infinitely beneficial for survival, yes, but for life in general.

• 44:22Jocko Willink?

  Another quality. He hopes for the best, but prepares for the worst. We all know people who could go, who go right along as though nothing bad could ever happen.

• 44:37Jocko Willink?

  And they're flattened when something bad does happen. And there's another type who goes around wearing an iron kettle on his head for fear of a meteor will fall on him. The first type doesn't face the facts. The second lives in constant and paralyzing fear of the facts. Neither one is smart.

• 44:58Jocko Willink?

  So you don't want to be hyper. You don't want to be hyper vigilant where you're freaked out all the time, but you do need to prepare.

• 45:08Jocko Willink?

  Fast forward a little bit, the man who keeps his hope and confidence up will see escape chances that the hopeless man would miss.

• 45:18Jocko Willink?

  I grew more confident because the sun was going down and it was growing dark. I had not heard any rifle fire for about 20 minutes and I knew the enemy realized I had a machine gun and would use it. I didn't believe they would risk moving fast enough to give their positions away to me. And this would make it easier for me to outdistance them.

• 45:39Jocko Willink?

  Little confidence goes a long way. Faith in yourself and hope for escape will lead you to make preparations. This man evaded successfully for five months. I had prepared my own escape kit in addition to the one issued. I sewed straps on my GI shoes and placed them in it on a small cable and fastened them to my chute. None of the other crew members survived.

• 46:03Jocko Willink?

  Lack of faith prevents you from making prepreparations.

• 46:09Jocko Willink?

  Is an interesting one. Lack of faith prevents you from making preparations. God can only help those who try to help themselves. So if you don't think, oh, I'm going to die anyways. And he kind of, it gives some examples of that attitude. Like I'm going to die anyways. Next thing you know, you survive and you didn't prepare for it. Freaking bad move.

• 46:30Jocko Willink?

  Another quality. He can hold his horses. We all know men who are like children. They have to do it right now. Others can wait a bit until they have a sure chance. They can put first things first, business before pleasure. They can wait their turn, or even give up the turn altogether. We call a man like this grown up. He's not only patient, he weighs what he'll get now against what he'll get by waiting.

• 47:04Jocko Willink?

  Being able to wait, having patience. Here are some men who had control of themselves. Patience, that is the prime factor. You can get in a hurry. If you do, you are lost. I would sit for two or three days watching some patrols.

• 47:21Jocko Willink?

  Another quote, "As the boats came closer, I quit swimming and just let my head remain above the water in order to attract no attention. The boats were about 2,000 feet from me when it grew so dark I lost sight of them." These are people out hunting for them at night. "I awoke from the sound, from a sound sleep and looked into the eyes of a man about six feet away. I kept still. Finally, the man looked off and walked away."

• 47:46Jocko Willink?

  That's a cool, calm dude right there.

• 47:50Jocko Willink?

  And then he gives some example of some people who couldn't keep their patience. "I tried patiently to operate the radio in every way I'd been shown. Growing more angry and disappointed at its failure, I tore the aerial off, threw the cord away, beat the battery on the rocks, then threw the pieces all over the hillside. I was sure disappointed." That's just insanity, right? Again, you wouldn't think that that could actually happen, but he is a war veteran, admitting like, there's no reason to tell this story, not like it makes you look cool. You'll, you say, "Oh, I got so freaking mad, I destroyed my radio, which is my only chance of salvation."

• 48:24Jocko Willink?

  Another guy, "I became very impatient. I had planned to wait until night to travel, but I just couldn't wait. I left the ditch about noon and walked for about two hours until I was caught."

• 48:39Jocko Willink?

  How's your patience level?

• 48:40Speaker 01

  Mine?

• 48:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 48:42Speaker 01

  Good, very good, yeah.

• 48:45Jocko Willink?

  I have a lot of patience. Jiu Jitsu taught me a lot of patience.

• 48:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, I think patience is kind of like temper where even, even before I was enlightened about anger issues and that, that thing. I told you I read the book Mind Games, blah, blah, blah. So even before that, I thought temper, I like, I for real thought it was like that powerful thing that I think most like primitive thoughts, like, I thought it was that. Cause I couldn't step back and understand, oh wait a second, you know, and then it was explained to me and it just clicked really quick.

• 49:15Jocko Willink?

  Like to have seen you lose your temper.

• 49:17Speaker 01

  I'd very rarely. And in fact, sometimes I would like fake it just to be like, yeah, you know, I have that.

• 49:23Jocko Willink?

  Were you when you last like faked losing your temper or actually lost your temper?

• 49:27Speaker 01

  Probably in college or something, you know, drinking and whoo, act like I'm like, I'll kick his ass. Yeah, yeah. But I'm like, I don't really feel like this, you know, I could easily just go back to my, but it was like that. So I never had a thing. But patience to me is kind of the same thing where like, what does it look like to lose your patience? Very similar to losing your temper, just in a, it's a little, just a different flavor. So I've always, long way of saying, I've always been pretty patient. And now that I understand it more and have for a while, I believe I'm very patient. Now, that doesn't mean I want you testing it all the time and like all this stuff, the way you do, but nonetheless, generally speaking, I'm all right.

• 50:05Jocko Willink?

  Check. All right. Next quality. He can take it and dish it out. Few of us know how much we can really take, but expecting things to be tough or unpleasant helps any of us to be prepared to meet the worst when, when that can happen. When the dentist says, now this is going to hurt a little bit. He is using sound psychology because he is preparing you so that you will brace yourself for the pain. Here are some men who could take it. Quote, "An important thing in survival is to accept, expect and accept unpleasant things." This was true of the food we had to eat in prison camp, lamb's eyes floating in soup, hair in food.

• 50:48Jocko Willink?

  Another quote, "I took off again. Most of my travel was done by crawling because my ankle began to swell where I hit it on the tail during bailout. It quickly grew worse until I could not stand on it. So I crawled."

• 51:05Jocko Willink?

  Another quote, "We moved into the middle of the forest approximately three miles from the barn. There we dug in. We remained there for four days without moving, without food or water."

• 51:18Jocko Willink?

  Gotta be ready to take some pain.

• 51:22Jocko Willink?

  And you gotta be prepared to take pain.

• 51:26Jocko Willink?

  Another quality, he can quote, "Figure out the other man." Some men step on everybody's toes while others manage to keep practically everybody happy. The principal reason that this second group of men is so successful is that they are always aware of the feelings and moods of other people. This ability to feel with and size up other people and predict what they are going to do is important in survival. Isn't that an interesting thing to bring up? Actually, understanding other human beings will help you in a survival situation and it will damn sure help you in life.

• 52:08Jocko Willink?

  It's, it, that is an interesting thing to, you know, when you're talking to people about survival, like how does that subject come up? You know, I wonder if some, you know, Fred just had, he just knew how to talk to everybody. You know what I mean? Like that came up. It's such an important thing that it bubbled to the surface because you wouldn't think, hey, when you were surviving, how, what were you thinking about the understanding and empathy for other people and other people's perspectives? That's not a question that you'd be asking. I can understand you're asking about food. I can understand you're asking about being tough. I can understand that. This is a very interesting subject to have come up and have it play such an important role.

• 52:43Jocko Willink?

  Here's a man who figured out what those who were looking for him would probably do. Thinking there would be a good hiding place, I crawled into a haystack, but after due consideration, figured each haystack would be searched in this area, so crawled out and continued traveling. That's just like, like a little thing.

• 52:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:59Jocko Willink?

  It's just a little thing.

• 53:01Speaker 01

  Yeah. So they're essentially analyzing like all these guys' actions, right? So it's like, okay, well you did this, but like, what were you thinking there? You know, and then you're like, okay, that makes sense.

• 53:10Jocko Willink?

  And then what quality drove you to do that?

• 53:12Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah. So when you, yeah, the deeper you look, the more, yeah, the more you, you discover these qualities and all this stuff or whatever, just by the way they were thinking. You know, like, all right, why were you thinking that? Well, I've always been. I used to, I used to hike in the mountains. I used to thought, oh yeah. Yeah, even like, um, for some reason that remember you were asking, I think it was Kirby, Herel. The ball peen hammer guy.

• 53:38Speaker 01

  So even that, you know, you paint this picture of like, yeah, well, kind of what would I do? Kind of real vaguely, you know, whatever. And you're like, how did you knock the, how'd you knock the guys out? And I'm thinking, yeah, how would I knock the guy out? But I'm exploring all my knockout methods, you know? I've never once for one second thought knock somebody out with a ball peen hammer. So that came as a surprise, but for him, he was like, yeah, that's how, you know, that's how, that's how we're rolling.

• 53:59Jocko Willink?

  Ball peen hammer.

• 54:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:01Jocko Willink?

  Did you ever see the movie No Country For Old Men?

• 54:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, hell yeah.

• 54:05Jocko Willink?

  In that scene when he finds the, the sight of like the drug bust gone bad, bad. And he's looking around to, he's like, oh, well, where would I go if I had this money? And he sees that tree off and he's like, I'd be looking for shade. That's the kind of thing that they're talking about. You're going to figure out what are people going to do? And if you can figure out kind of what they're going to do, you can make a better prediction, have a much better chance of survival. The other thing that's, because you know survivor's bias, right?

• 54:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:34Jocko Willink?

  But in this case it works because if you survived, then you're like, hey, here's what I did. Here's why I did it. And it actually makes sense. You're talking to the people that were able to get through whatever they went through.

• 54:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:43Jocko Willink?

  And then you get to also talk to people that got captured and they can tell you why they got captured.

• 54:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:51Jocko Willink?

  Another quality.

• 54:54Jocko Willink?

  He knows when it pays to be a gentleman and when it doesn't. At some time or other, all of us have wanted to beat somebody up. This is, I like stuff from 1954. At some time or another, all of us have wanted to beat somebody up, but since we were children, we've been taught that this is not the nice thing to do. It isn't nice under ordinary circumstances, but the survival situation is definitely not or ordinary. To survive, you may have to turn loose all the meanness and fight you have in you and then add some to that. Here's a man who knew how to let it go.

• 55:31Jocko Willink?

  Captain W whipped out his little carbine bayonet and attaching it to his carbine yelled that he was going after the bastard. Before we knew what was happening, the captain jumped out from behind his rock and began screaming in Korean and Russian. He was saying that he was a tiger or bear. He was letting out growls and roars like one. The mixture of Chinese and Korean soldiers began firing at him, but he kept going, growling and yelling like a maniac. The soldier was so scared and surprised that he just stood there with amazement and disbelief written all over his face. I saw the captain disembowel him

• 56:12Jocko Willink?

  with his bayonet and keep going. Enemy soldiers all over the area took to their heels.

• 56:21Jocko Willink?

  Sometimes you gotta go get some. Captain W bringing it. On the other hand, this man froze. A Chinese soldier in a tan and green uniform was about 10 to 12 feet from me, crawling on his hands and feet, carrying a machine gun. It scared me so badly that I emptied the balance of the clip into him, killing him instantly. I just froze and kept pumping bullets into him until my gun was empty.

• 56:52Jocko Willink?

  Here's another one. Of course, you have to remember who your friends are and not turn on them, as this man almost did. I was sure a copter would be back to get us within an hour, so I sat back and waited. Joe wanted to go on, and a heated argument ensued. By now, our nerves and tempers were really shot, so it was very easy to have violent disputes over practically nothing. Over this air rescue deal, I came within an inch of pulling out my old .357 and shooting Joe. I was on the verge of complete collapse.

• 57:26Jocko Willink?

  That right there, isn't it, when things go sideways, dude, people start, people can fall apart. It's funny, even on deployment, like, like, look, we weren't getting captured and running from the enemy, but even on deployment, just like, even my first deployment to Iraq, my first deployment to Iraq was pretty, pretty chill, right?

• 57:52Jocko Willink?

  And there was people that kind of like lost their minds. And you'd think, man, like the stress level isn't that bad right now. It's kind of fun. We're having a good time. We're doing what we train to do. So seeing, I mean, when people get into these kinds of stressful situations.

• 58:12Jocko Willink?

  Start threatening to kill your friend, your teammate.

• 58:18Jocko Willink?

  Not good.

• 58:21Jocko Willink?

  Fast forward a little bit. And as usual, behind it all, there must be the will to survive. Quote, five of us did not survive. The main reason they did not survive was because they had no will to survive. They didn't swim. They didn't make any movement. They just lay there and died.

• 58:42Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 58:46Jocko Willink?

  He can be, here's another quality. He can be the little man who wasn't there. This is an interesting one. Some men stick out like a sore thumb, no matter where they are, while others, if they want to, will simply not be noticed. It would be a good idea to study some of the ways of these men to kept, kept from attracting attention.

• 59:08Jocko Willink?

  And here's the one, uh, I made progress, quote, I made progress traveling merely by carrying a hoe or rake. Or another farm implement and walking along the main roads. I looked around and saw what people were doing, and then I did what they were doing. This was how I got the idea of using a farm tool. This is why I kept clean shaven. I'm imagining that's World War Two, like in France, shot down in France or something. Just act like you're a French partisan.

• 59:37Jocko Willink?

  Another one, quote, I finally decided it was clear enough to cross and made my way across the tracks and into a corn patch on the far side. I moved fast, but I did not run as that would call attention to me as if I, if I was seen for a distance. Pretty good self-awareness. That's a good one, though, man. Like knowing when not to run.

• 59:57Jocko Willink?

  When there's shit going sideways and you can just like, just kind of walk. That's a real good quality. Especially if you're gonna get in trouble for something. Running is like the worst thing you could do.

• 1:00:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. Like draws attention. Like, you know, you ever?

• 1:00:14Speaker 01

  I don't know, maybe when you're little, we used to do this where someone quiet is everyone has dogs. Right. And there are varying levels of behavior with these dogs. So your neighbor's dog, like sometimes they're kind of, kind of rowdy dogs, you know? So they'll kind of come up to you or whatever, but if you like start running away from the dog, the other thing will chase you. You know, but if you just act normal, whatever he'll sniff, he'll like try to, I don't, it seemed like he was trying to intimidate you.

• 1:00:36Jocko Willink?

  Oh, for sure.

• 1:00:36Speaker 01

  All the time. But if you like do a big commotion or whatever, it'll like bark at you and chase you and stuff.

• 1:00:44Jocko Willink?

  Well, what's crazy is like bears.

• 1:00:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:47Jocko Willink?

  There you, you, there's different ways to act with different bears, but if you stand up to them, like it, it can make them back away and run away. Like a bear will murder you.

• 1:00:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:59Jocko Willink?

  But and it depends on the type of bear. But, but so, yeah, with humans, it's going to be the same thing, like depending on how you act, depending on if you start to run, people immediately notice that. Like, oh, this guy's done something wrong.

• 1:01:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, something's with.

• 1:01:12Jocko Willink?

  Whereas if you just walk out of there.

• 1:01:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:14Jocko Willink?

  Like, uh, the movie Heat. Yeah. Seen the movie Heat?

• 1:01:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:17Jocko Willink?

  Just walking out of that bank robbery. If they were running, they'd get noticed. They barely got noticed.

• 1:01:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:23Jocko Willink?

  In the big robbery, they barely got noticed. But if they're just walking out, walk out normal.

• 1:01:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:29Jocko Willink?

  Goes a long way.

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:01:32Jocko Willink?

  This is the last quality that they cover. Um, he knows where his special fears and worries come from. All of us have had accidents, scares and worries when we were children that still bother us. Under dangerous survival conditions, these may cause trouble. But if a man knows where they came from, he can do something to control them. A man who as a child was bitten by a dog may still feel fear when a strange dog comes running from behind. But if he knows where his fear came from, he knows enough not to start running or start

• 1:02:14Jocko Willink?

  kicking the dog. He knows that his fear makes no sense and he controls it. However, some things learned in childhood can prove useful to survival, as in this case. Quote, "Remembering an old cops and robbers trick, I stuck my P1 helmet on the end of my dagger and eased it up over the edge of the foxhole at arm's length through my head. He fired another burst and put a hole through the top of that helmet."

• 1:02:44Jocko Willink?

  So you gotta know where your fears come from and what's causing them and then be able to control them. And then it kind of wraps with this. What this means to you. You may now be thinking, "I am stuck with the personality I have and there isn't much that I, survival training, or anything else can do to change it." You are right, but this is the same problem faced in any kind of training. Training always has to start from where you are. This is exactly what we were just talking about. Training always has to start from where you are. This is, this is basic in any training program. This way, this was the way it was when you started learning

• 1:03:29Jocko Willink?

  to be a pilot, a navigator, a gunner, a radio operator, or a flight engineer. The simulated survival situation will give you a chance to really size yourself up. You can take stock of yourself, find out what you have. Then you can find out how to use what you have to meet the emergency situations of survival. So this is where I think they take a little bit of a different view. Um, and I'll, we'll get into it, but take for instance, the indecisive individual, the fellow who can't make up his mind. He can place himself in situations where he must make up his mind about choosing routes, making camp, getting food and water. Further, he can learn

• 1:04:11Jocko Willink?

  some methods and techniques for arriving at decisions. So, so they are saying it good. Like, if you're an indecisive person, you can learn to make decisions. You can get better at it. You must realize that in a survival situation, you may be completely on your own. You will have to decide for yourself. By taking responsibility for expressing an opinion, even in a group, you can develop confidence in your ability to make decisions. If you lack ingenuity and resourcefulness and can't improvise, you can watch how your survival instructor and other members of your crew go about inventing useful articles and equipment from whatever they find. At first, you may have to imitate the things they improvise.

• 1:04:54Jocko Willink?

  But in this way, you will begin to get the idea. In this way, you will become, you will come to see that it is possible to live off the land and be comfortable and expect yourself to be able to do it in a real emergency. I like the fact that he talks about just imitation as a way of learning. Like you just start imitating the way your instructors are acting.

• 1:05:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:13Jocko Willink?

  Even if you're literally like there taking a stick and turning it into a shelter, right? You watch them do it and you do exactly what they did. Your mind opens up a little bit. It's gonna be beneficial for you.

• 1:05:27Jocko Willink?

  If you are a person with little personal resourcefulness, who can't live with himself, you may moan and groan throughout your survival training about the lack of movies, baseball and football games, nightclubs and parties, radio and newspapers. But you too will learn that you can exist without these things. Watch how your instructor and other members of your crew go about enjoying themselves under the condition. As you gain a little skill and confidence, you may actually take satisfaction in being able to live with yourself. It's a weird expression. We don't say that expression, really. Basically, we would say being alone.

• 1:06:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:06Jocko Willink?

  Have you ever watched the show Alone?

• 1:06:08Speaker 01

  Alone.

• 1:06:08Jocko Willink?

  There's a show Alone. And you get dropped off in the woods with, you're like, you have like clothes, you have some basic survival gear. Like 10 items, like you can have a bow and arrow, you can have a fire starter, you can have a tarp. So you get a selection of items.

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:27Jocko Willink?

  And then you go out and you get, and once you're out there, you're just by yourself in, in the woods. And they're, they're usually up north, like Canada or something like this. There's been some other, but the good ones are up north.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:39Jocko Willink?

  So you gotta go hunt, you gotta gather berries, you gotta build a shelter, you gotta do all the stuff. But a lot of the people go home because you quit and basically the person that stays out there the longest wins.

• 1:06:51Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:06:53Jocko Willink?

  A lot of people, I don't want to throw a percentage on it, but a decent amount of people, they quit. Not because they're out of food, not because they're out of shelter, not because they can't build a fire. They quit because they get lonely. They basically miss their family. Now, listen, is there some rationalization going on? Yes, there's because they're also starving. It's basically the show, instead of being called Alone, it could easily be called Starving.

• 1:07:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:16Jocko Willink?

  Because because everybody starves.

• 1:07:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:18Jocko Willink?

  Like they're starving. There's no, very few people are able to get a surplus of food and calories. It's just not going to happen that quick. There's, there's a guy, Jordan, that killed a moose. Freaking bow and arrow, that was legit. But then he, he built um like a place to store the moose. Meat and Wolverines came in and took like the fat away, which is the part that you really need.

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, like calories.

• 1:07:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, because you can get rabbit starvation. You ever heard of that? Where you're getting meat, you're getting protein, but no fat and you can still starve.

• 1:07:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:51Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So he was entering that mode. Luckily he won.

• 1:07:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:55Jocko Willink?

  But.

• 1:07:55Speaker 01

  There was a show Naked and Afraid. You ever heard of that?

• 1:07:58Jocko Willink?

  I remember, yeah, just like you were going naked into the, but you had someone with you, right?

• 1:08:03Speaker 01

  So, so some of them, there's a bunch of them now, but if I'm not mistaken, you, there's two people, yes. And then you end up meeting up after a few days or something like that. Yeah. So maybe the prime is slightly different because of the alone, actually if they're calling it alone, that's the main, the main thing. But yeah, no one, I don't remember anyone quitting because they were lonely.

• 1:08:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Well, if you have one other person, you're not alone.

• 1:08:23Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:08:24Jocko Willink?

  But and I, you look, some of it is definitely rationalization.

• 1:08:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, fully.

• 1:08:28Jocko Willink?

  Where people are like, well, I just miss my family and, well, I shouldn't say it so, but some people are like, hey, I really miss my family. I just want to go home. Meanwhile, I haven't eaten in nine days type thing and it sucks and I'm freezing.

• 1:08:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, it kind of exacerbates the loneliness, right? Where it's like, it's just more misery overall. And then the missing people, the homesickness or whatever is just elevated because of all the other discomfort.

• 1:08:49Jocko Willink?

  And all that being said, there's people that are like, oh, I just love it here so much. There's people that have been extracted because they do a medical check on you once a week. And if you've lost too much weight, your organs are shutting down. They just you lose. But there's been people that have gone through that where they're, they're saying, you know, I just love it out here. I got my friend, the, the, the, the tree bark. This is my friend, the tree bark. And they're talking to the tree bark. Yeah. A little bit wild, but they're not lonely. So this idea that there's some people that don't like being alone is true. Cause you can see it on that show for sure. Some people, they do not like being alone.

• 1:09:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I think that's a natural thing, right? Cause in prison, they put you in like solitary. I'm sure there's more to it than that.

• 1:09:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, but there's definitely some people that don't mind being alone.

• 1:09:35Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Big time. Like you, you ever been to the movies by yourself?

• 1:09:41Speaker 01

  Like even as a kid.

• 1:09:41Jocko Willink?

  This, we'd have to go back in the day because like you don't go to movies anymore.

• 1:09:46Speaker 01

  Right, right. Yeah, I would have to be back.

• 1:09:48Jocko Willink?

  But I don't think I've ever gone to a movie alone. I don't know.

• 1:09:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I have, but kind of later in my movie watching in theaters, uh, career, but it before that, it was like, it seemed weird. It seemed awkward. Like what? But and then I'm thinking logically, wait, I don't talk during the movie. I hope not anyway. Some people do whatever, but I don't, or I don't like to. So like, what's the big deal? It just seems weird.

• 1:10:15Jocko Willink?

  Isn't it weird now too? Cause you have your phone with you. So you're actually never technically alone in a way.

• 1:10:20Speaker 01

  Now, yeah, it's weird.

• 1:10:21Jocko Willink?

  Cause if you're waiting in line at the DMV, you're basically not alone. Cause you got your phone. You're texting people and the, it used to be like, you're straight up alone. You sit there and think.

• 1:10:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. And if you try that now, it's like, I mean, I don't know. I'm sure everybody's different. But if you try that now, like if you turn off your phone or let's say you forgot your phone or whatever, it's kind of refreshing on a conscious, like conscious level. At first you're like, oh my gosh, I feel kind of weird. Like, oh, I don't have my phone. I feel, but then after like maybe even like three minutes, it spreads like kind of nice.

• 1:10:50Jocko Willink?

  I like to do that when I'm in some, let's say I'm waiting for someone somewhere.

• 1:10:54Speaker 01

  I just, well, I'll just stand there.

• 1:10:58Jocko Willink?

  Cause it's

• 1:10:58Speaker 01

  Sit down?

• 1:10:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, cause, cause so many, I'll sit down, but I'll sit down and just like, look. Because so many people now, if instead of waiting, they, they almost feel uncomfortable standing around. So you just, hey, I'll just pull up my phone and just look at my phone.

• 1:11:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, fully.

• 1:11:14Jocko Willink?

  So instead of doing that, it's just stand there.

• 1:11:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:17Jocko Willink?

  Just, just stand there and think about stuff.

• 1:11:20Speaker 01

  As opposed to pull out your phone?

• 1:11:21Jocko Willink?

  As opposed to pull out your phone?

• 1:11:22Speaker 01

  Yes. Oh, yeah. Hell, yeah. In fact, to make it a hat, like I would, I would not advise, but I would recommend just as a thing to, to do that. Cause I do do that too. One, the thing that sparked it was kinda, it was kinda ego in a way where I was at the dentist and, you know, you wait, you're in the waiting room, right?

• 1:11:42Jocko Willink?

  And everyone's looking at your phone?

• 1:11:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I looked up and everyone's doing the exact, in the same exact position too. That's the thing. And they all had the same look on their face.

• 1:11:50Jocko Willink?

  You thought to yourself, oh, better than that.

• 1:11:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know, it's kinda like, I didn't think that consciously.

• 1:11:54Jocko Willink?

  So what did you do instead? Did you sat?

• 1:11:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I was like, hey, let me, cause I found myself, I was in the same situation. I was looking at my phone too, but you know, it was one of those moments of clarity where I looked up and be like, wait a second, we're all like, kinda doing it. It kinda felt like something was controlling us, you know, kind of a thing.

• 1:12:08Jocko Willink?

  Kind of felt that way?

• 1:12:09Speaker 01

  You know, like something on purpose, you know?

• 1:12:13Jocko Willink?

  Bro, hello?

• 1:12:14Speaker 01

  Bro, I felt it. So I was like, you know what? Let me do this. And it hit me so like significantly where I put it away and probably just started noticing all kinds of things. You know, just like even the picture on the wall. I was like, wait, bro, why they, you know, like this doesn't, all the, all this stuff I was noticing. So I was like, okay, cool. So kinda after that, every time I have to wait, I do, and of course I'll get on my phone sometimes when it's like, okay, this, it's not, it's not that serious today, kind of a thing. But it will be on my mind. I'll be like, okay, now am I getting on my phone right now? Or am I doing the whole like observing thing, you know? There's just so much that we miss, I think.

• 1:12:48Jocko Willink?

  It's crazy that you have an unlimited supply of entertainment in your pocket. Like an unlimited supply of brain stimulation in your pocket. You can do everything from watch a jujitsu video to watch a movie, to scroll through freaking Instagram and look at whatever your algorithms putting in front of you.

• 1:13:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:09Jocko Willink?

  God.

• 1:13:10Speaker 01

  Bro, it goes so deep that right there goes so deep because it's good and bad. Cause you can like read a book, you can like look up like info, like critical information. Like or you can look at dumb information, but you're still looking something up. Or you can just sit there and just mindlessly be entertained. Like you can do anything on there. So it's kind of like. Hey, you don't have to be bored or alone ever.

• 1:13:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:33Speaker 01

  Like literally ever.

• 1:13:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I bet the next generation of prisoners of war that are good, get captured and don't, they're gonna have a little. Wake up call, even go to bootcamp. Like if you're going to bootcamp right now, imagine you're a.

• 1:13:48Jocko Willink?

  Eighteen year old kid, you've had a phone in your pocket since you were thirteen years old. You've had been addicted to this thing and then it's gone.

• 1:13:57Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:13:59Jocko Willink?

  I like that, man. When I go to places where there's no reception, you know, I'll be out in the bush and it's just like so nice. We can shut that terrible thing down.

• 1:14:08Speaker 01

  Being alone without like people around or whatever. I mean, obviously, you know, everyone's different and I'm sure there's a balance to it, but. I feel like there's something like regen- regenerative about that.

• 1:14:24Jocko Willink?

  About being around with no people around?

• 1:14:26Speaker 01

  People, yeah. And if you're nature, like that show Alone, being in nature and like that kind of stuff where it's like. There's still stuff going into your brain, like in solitary, for example, like if you're in prison, just in a room, there's like no, that's nothing, that's for real aloneness. You know, you're not alone with the world. You're like alone in a box, you know, kind of a thing that's way different. But if you're like always with someone, you gotta be really comfortable with that person. If you're with someone, just them being there. Already has some of your attention, just a human being being there. Like the example, you know, you ever had someone stay, I mean, I know you're a little bit different, but there has to be. This has to register at least a little bit. You know when someone like wants to come over to your house?

• 1:15:06Speaker 01

  Or sleep over, freaking stay over, oh, I'm just gonna be a few days, you know, can I stay at your house or whatever, like that thing? Oh, I'll stay out of your hair, you know, like, oh, just act like I'm not even here, right? Kind of a thing. Well, they're impossible. They're borderline impossible. Like, how can I pretend you're not there? You're a human being. I can't pretend like, okay, I'm gonna pretend you're not here. Like, if you're the only one here, all of my family is gone. I'm gonna walk by you like you're, or walk by this area like you're not here. Impossible. It's not possible. You know, so your presence, a human being's presence is always noticeable. Always. See what I'm saying? So it takes some of your attention, no matter what.

• 1:15:47Speaker 01

  So the absence of a human being is like, it's essentially night and day as far as the mind sees, a state of mind. See what I'm saying?

• 1:15:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:57Jocko Willink?

  My, uh, my wife had a woman come by to like, help pick out some furniture or something.

• 1:16:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, hell yeah.

• 1:16:05Jocko Willink?

  And, and I happened to be there and she's like, oh, well.

• 1:16:10Jocko Willink?

  She's like trying to make conversation.

• 1:16:12Speaker 01

  Who, the furniture lady?

• 1:16:17Jocko Willink?

  She's trying to talk to me too, like I get dragged into it a little bit. And she goes, um, she goes, she goes, do you guys like it? She was like, do you guys like entertaining cuz and, cuz this would be really nice. And I go, no, I wish no one would ever come over to my house ever. And she looked at me like I was the biggest psycho ever, you know?

• 1:16:38Speaker 01

  I think, I can just, the funny part of that is not that you said it, but just the experience that she probably had with you being the one saying that. Yes, that is very funny. But I think that's pretty common. I think especially for guys where it's like, bro, I don't know. Then again, I don't know, I can't speak for everybody, but bro, I'm with you, man. It's like, i- if you're, look, if you're in the mood to have a little get together, that's one thing. But if you're not in that mood, bro, sit, don't even, bro, leave it at the door, fricking, don't come in, don't come over.

• 1:17:09Speaker 01

  You wanna come stay, you know, like how friends come in, uh, this has changed. I was not like this when I was young, whatever. You know when friends come into town, hey, I'm coming into town, you know, I'd be like, bro. Don't even ask, don't Brad, stay, there's a hotel and you know, two miles away at the very fucking closest, you know, but don't, what's with staying, don't stay, don't stay at the house, please, please, please.

• 1:17:33Jocko Willink?

  It's funny too, cause in the military, I mean, I was, you're living in barracks, you're living with roommates, you're living with freaking bunkmates, like it's, it's compressed, but then your house is a different thing.

• 1:17:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, and well, frick, Brad, my whole life, I, I've literally had a roommate since before I was born, by the way.

• 1:17:49Jocko Willink?

  Oh yeah, you had a roommate in the womb.

• 1:17:51Speaker 01

  In the womb, the whole deal. So Brad, even, and then growing up, we always shared room, dorms, same thing, boom. And then, uh, all the way really until about, what? Two thousand three, four, five, no, I've always like lived with somebody. I mean, I lived alone for probably like a year and a half, two years in my whole life.

• 1:18:09Jocko Willink?

  When was that?

• 1:18:11Speaker 01

  Like before I got, before I was with my current wife.

• 1:18:16Jocko Willink?

  You seem like you were really stoked living alone.

• 1:18:18Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, big time. Yeah, big time. Cause yeah, James got married, that's why I did all this stuff. So I was like, all right, well, I can't live with him, them anymore. Cause I was living with them, you know, so I'm down for, or I was anyway, down for whatever, but that's different than visitors, you know, like visitors. Brad, you gotta get, there's like needed time where I'm in the mood for that, cause otherwise, bro, don't, don't, uh, but I mean, that's an extreme way of putting it. You know, obviously I have a lot of flexibility for sure, but I'm with you.

• 1:18:46Jocko Willink?

  You're okay being alone.

• 1:18:48Speaker 01

  Yes, sir. Oh, yeah, big time.

• 1:18:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, me too. Big time. Check. All right. Going back to the book here. If you lack flexibility, you'll make many mistakes in your survival training because of this lack. But from these very mistakes, you can learn. Don't expect all the answers from your instructor. Reexamine the problem. Try and figure out what you did wrong and why. Then revise your thinking in the light of this reexamination, you will find that there's more than one solution to most problems in survival. Again, it's what they're saying, what they're saying is what we're saying is a flexibility. Some people are naturally inflexible. You're gonna get, you can get better at it. You're not be, gonna be as good as this guy over here who just has like a totally open mind, but you can definitely get better at it.

• 1:19:31Jocko Willink?

  If you make mistakes because of panic or over excitement, you can learn to recognize the signs of approaching panic and over excitement. If you can do this, you will discover oftentimes that easy does it, or techniques for calming down can also be developed.

• 1:19:48Jocko Willink?

  If you're a naturally pessimistic person, you'll probably be heard loud and long during the trek, or you will be a gloomy Gus. Either of these reactions will make it rough on you as well as the rest of your crew. They will start steering away from you. If this starts happening, try to figure out a reason for it. A pessimistic attitude is usually based on a feeling that everything is all bad. If you take an objective look, you will find that no particular time is either all bad or all good. These two allnesses, allness attitudes are childish and really the basis for pessimism and unrealistic optimism, both perhaps equally

• 1:20:30Jocko Willink?

  dangerous to survival. And what's cool is this, obviously, this book is about a survival course. And this is the way, this is the way you get better in the world. You have to go out there and you have to experience the world. And I've been talking about this a lot lately. Everything is training. Everything that you do in life is training. Taking your kids to school is training. It's training for you. It's training for them. Going to work today, the project that you're running, everything that you're doing is training. If you frame it in your mind that, hey, how efficient was I when my, when the teacher started talking about my kid and was saying they were did something bad and I started get mad, it's training. You're being trained. Everything that you're doing is training. If you frame

• 1:21:11Jocko Willink?

  it right, the right way, and you pay attention to it. Patience and tolerance for discomfort are essential parts of preparation for survival. If you know, if you know how to wait, you may learn in the intelligence phases of the training, what your patience can cost you. When you have to wait, you will be miserable and will want to turn your feelings against the training program, the instructor, or the air force. At this point, it'd be a good time for you to start learning how to occupy yourself by learning new skills, gaining new knowledge, or just making living conditions more comfortable and pleasant. If you look carefully, you can find a hundred ways patience pays off. If you're habitually impatient, you can learn to be more patient in survival situation. A navigator who has a long history

• 1:21:53Jocko Willink?

  of being very, very impatient individual, found himself in a situation which required extreme patience. He realized that the situation required patience and that he tended to be very impatient. Thus, he was able to meet the demands to survive. Didn't really go into the discomfort part. Oh, here it is. As for learning to put up with discomfort, you can learn many ways of making things easier and more comfortable for yourself. You also find that is much easier to put up with a little discomfort temporarily than to experience the suffering and greater discomfort from a failure to endure temporary discomfort. You should learn to recognize the signs and of the approach of your breaking point and develop skills for dealing with yourself in the situation. And doing things that make you

• 1:22:34Jocko Willink?

  uncomfortable, you'll get more used to it. I'm in the middle of def reset right now and I'm doing a hundred burpees a day. Yeah, like regardless of what else, what else I'm doing.

• 1:22:46Jocko Willink?

  And, uh, yeah, it's just like the first kind of few days, I was kind of like excited. And then I got into the like, dude, this just sucks. And what's cool now is I'm just like, yep. I mean, it's almost like, yep, just doing it. I can, I've, I've improved. I'm pretty good at discomfort.

• 1:23:07Jocko Willink?

  And just doing a hundred burpees a day. Um, I've gotten better. I've noticed in 20 days of just being like, yep, just shutting off my brain and just doing the burpees. Almost like I'm always doing the burpees as if it's an out of body experience. My body's doing the burpees and my mind doesn't. That's where I'm at right now.

• 1:23:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's good, man. Yeah.

• 1:23:24Jocko Willink?

  But I will say, when I do that, like,

• 1:23:28Jocko Willink?

  it's, it's more comfortable mentally, but I'm not in the game. So I'm not pushing myself as hard. I'm kind of just going through the motions, which is not a bad thing.

• 1:23:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:37Jocko Willink?

  To be able to just shut off your mind when I'm like, oh dude, I want to see how fast I get today or whatever. Then it's, I gotta think about, I gotta get into it.

• 1:23:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:23:44Jocko Willink?

  But just to be able to shut off your mind and just suffer through.

• 1:23:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:47Jocko Willink?

  Freaking, it's a good thing. It's a good thing to have. You will get better at it.

• 1:23:51Speaker 01

  When the, I mean, so generally speaking, and I'm sure there's a threshold here where, you know, you're good at, at enduring discomfort and stuff like that. Do you, is it, is your mind the kind where you recognize the discomfort and you ignore it or you choose to like me, like, don't give it a vote kind of a thing? Or, or are you for real like, oh, discomfort doesn't exist? To a certain degree.

• 1:24:19Jocko Willink?

  It might be a little bit of everything.

• 1:24:21Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, okay. So let's go with the reason I asked is for this because, okay, 100 burpees, right? That's a journey. Like, that's not like, I mean, you know, it takes a certain kind of like physical conditioning to be like 100 burpees is literally easy for me, you know? Um, so that's a journey. 10 burpees, I think for most of us, like on a certain that are used to a certain level of fitness, 10 burpees is a no factor. Like you can literally do that when you're like injured, like that, you know, depends on injury, but 10 burpees is not a journey is what I'm saying. 100 burpees is a journey. At what number ish does it become uncomfortable for you? Where you're like, this is, this is the discomfort part.

• 1:24:59Jocko Willink?

  It really does depend on how hard you're going.

• 1:25:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. So let's say, let's say a, a general run of the mill burpees. You're not testing yourself, but you're not slacking, like actively slacking.

• 1:25:12Jocko Willink?

  30.

• 1:25:13Speaker 01

  After about 30.

• 1:25:14Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. After 30, you start, um, you know, now you're breathing hard, your legs are feeling it a little bit. And again, it depends on like, well, how high are you really jumping and how fast are you going? But yeah, 30.

• 1:25:27Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so let's say, and especially when you're used to, if you've done as many burpees as you, or even, even half the amount that you've, you know, the protocol, you know, the journey, right? So like, when you say, how high are you jumping? You know, when you're like really getting after it and jumping high, and you know, when you're like, basically ticking the boxes where it's like, hey, I got off the ground, period, you know? So you know, and then you also know when, hey, this is my normal burpee. This is my normal burpee, you know, right at the level of acceptability, whatever. You kind of know that, right? So that, that being said, generally speaking, I'm just trying to extract info here from my purse, for our personal. So after about 30, and what's your protocol? You do for the 100, you do?

• 1:26:07Jocko Willink?

  40, 30, 20, 10.

• 1:26:09Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:26:09Jocko Willink?

  And I kind of like get a little breath in between.

• 1:26:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, fully. So the, so at about what? The first, that first go at 30, you're like, here's where the discomfort starts on this journey?

• 1:26:20Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:22Jocko Willink?

  And then you only have 10 more and you get a little breather. And then you do, uh, what's interesting is the seconds like, cause not like you're taking a long rest, but you're resting for like 20, 30 seconds or 15 seconds, something like that.

• 1:26:34Speaker 01

  Wait, wait. So you do 40. So when you're saying the discomfort comes, it's during that first 40 at number 30.

• 1:26:40Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:26:40Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:26:41Jocko Willink?

  But then you only have 10 more to do, like for that.

• 1:26:43Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:26:43Jocko Willink?

  For that sesh. But then the next one, it's like the discomfort's gonna come at 20 and you only have 10 more. And then you do 10 and you only have 10 more and then you do 10.

• 1:26:51Speaker 01

  So that's weird.

• 1:26:52Jocko Willink?

  Good little way to break it up.

• 1:26:53Speaker 01

  Mine is different than yours.

• 1:26:55Jocko Willink?

  What do you do?

• 1:26:55Speaker 01

  Where I do, I'll just, I'll go 20, 20, 20 and then I just break it up as is, however I feel at that point. But the weird thing is my discomfort doesn't cut, like I get fatigued, I feel the fatigue, but the discomfort, where it's like, oh, here's where the pain starts is at about 60 of the total.

• 1:27:14Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, but you're taking a break after 20.

• 1:27:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:27:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So if I did 20, 20, 20, I might not ever feel any discomfort.

• 1:27:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's why, that's why it's so funny. That's why it's interesting where it's like.

• 1:27:23Jocko Willink?

  We call that the comfort zone, my friend, and that's exactly where you're at.

• 1:27:26Speaker 01

  Whatever. No, doesn't it only matter the, at the end time, right? However you break it up.

• 1:27:31Jocko Willink?

  You wanna get to feel uncomfortable so you can be more accustomed to it, which is what this entire book is about. You're not sitting there inside the, why don't you just do one every half an hour?

• 1:27:40Speaker 01

  Well, you gotta get it within 10 minutes, right? I mean, that's kind of the paper or the penciled in goal there. You don't have to do it, but so if you, so then again, I guess if there's that little other goal, and this is just methods of kind of approaching this burpee scenario where you wanna get them under 10 minutes essentially, right? It's either a hundred burpees or 10 minutes of burpees, whichever comes first. You wanna get under 10 minutes. But if you know you can get it under 10 minutes, now comes the secondary goal where it's like, okay, how much under 10 minutes? Right? Doesn't matter as much, but it's a little something, right? That's when the protocol comes in. So it's like, all right, what's the best method to get under 10 minutes?

• 1:28:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there's also a chance that just doing them slower could be faster.

• 1:28:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know what I think though? Cause because I did that thing with Pete and Jason Kalipa, where we're whoever could get 100 reps of bench, the fastest. And Pete did the all out deal where as many as you can, every, every set rests as much as you need to. Now, I thought that was a bad move because when Jason did something along those lines, he failed. Once you go to failure, it puts your energy like at this weird level. So I'm thinking, no, I'm going to get the perfect fucking split, you know, for perfect thing. And I lost like I, and I didn't do well at all. Pete beat us by a lot with his protocol, just all out sprint. Yeah. So I think if you're going for time, I think, I don't know, it's my freaking hypothesis right now. Burpees, you just do the same thing, go all out because you get so many of them done.

• 1:29:08Speaker 01

  Like all at once.

• 1:29:10Jocko Willink?

  That's true.

• 1:29:10Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then if you, if you're gassing, it's good, then you can do the twos and threes and fives and you know, and freaking just kind of scrape up the last few. And by that time, that time is just like freaking hasn't gone nowhere. Two minutes, eight minutes, six minutes.

• 1:29:24Jocko Willink?

  And you'll be training in your discomfort, which is a good thing, which I recommend. Next one, if you're insensitive to the point of view of others, you will quickly learn in a crew survival situation that other people have feelings and ideas of their own. You also need to learn the value of sizing up and predicting what the enemy is apt to do. So man, human nature, got to know it. If the going gets rough during training, this is a good time to practice some aggressive action in meeting and overcoming obstacles, obstacles, whether it's heat or cold, thirst or hunger, to loneliness or confusion, do something about it. As for unobtrusiveness, even the bull in the china shop can learn specific ways for keeping from being noticed.

• 1:30:06Jocko Willink?

  The important thing is to recognize the importance of being able to keep from being noticed.

• 1:30:13Jocko Willink?

  Some childhood fears such as those of steep places, the dark, strange foods, water may return during survival training. Now that you are more mature and more adequate, you can now deal with these fears better. Once there was a reason for these fears, now there isn't. You can take care of yourself. Your chance of overcoming these fears is good if you try. And then it closes out saying, or close out this section, which will close out the book for us today. Use your survival training to size yourself up under stress. Man, that's a good one. It's a good one to kinda check and see where you're at. Learn the need for changing behavior to meet the emergency situations of survival,

• 1:30:58Jocko Willink?

  and learn how to use your strengths and control your weaknesses to meet the various emergencies of survival. And I think that's a good plan, not just for survival, but for life. Because we all have strengths and weaknesses, right? We've all got them. And we can utilize our strengths, and we should, and we can improve our weaknesses, our weaknesses, and we should. You can only improve your weaknesses if you're humble enough to admit them. So be humble. Take ownership. Do something about what's happening around you. And be the type of person that survives in a survival environment, but also be the type of person

• 1:31:39Jocko Willink?

  that wins in life. That's what we got for today from the US Air Force, 1954. Check. Speaking of survival.

• 1:31:52Speaker 01

  Wait, what did you, what did you think off the top of your head that was like inappropriate, given he was old school?

• 1:31:58Jocko Willink?

  There's other parts which we didn't get to today that, nothing, nothing, it's not so much inappropriate, but I guess. The way that the whole thing that we kicked off.

• 1:32:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:10Jocko Willink?

  When you said it was like, what'd you say? It was victim blaming?

• 1:32:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:13Jocko Willink?

  That, right? That's like politically incorrect.

• 1:32:16Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:32:16Jocko Willink?

  To say, hey, the reason that you lost, like if you, if you son lost a wrestling tournament.

• 1:32:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:21Jocko Willink?

  Instead of being like, hey, you did your best.

• 1:32:23Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:32:23Jocko Willink?

  And you just, you just didn't have it today.

• 1:32:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:26Jocko Willink?

  Or the other, you know, that coach really trained his kids better than your coach did. Like make, make, if you're like, hey, you lost because you need to train harder.

• 1:32:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:33Jocko Willink?

  Or you broke. You know what I mean?

• 1:32:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, actually, they, they went a little bit hard, harder. Now they, I'm thinking about it because they're talking about freaking frostbite.

• 1:32:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:43Speaker 01

  Where that's like, come on, let's face it, that's not obvious. Like if you lost a wrestling tournament, that's easy to be like, well, I didn't train hard enough. Where it's like, okay, now it's like, okay, how reasonable, you know, are you going to be about this whole wrestling kind of a thing? But so it's easy to, to connect the dots between your lack of preparation and your lack of, you know, outcome or whatever. But frostbite.

• 1:33:02Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm. That's a good example that they picked. They chose that for a reason.

• 1:33:05Speaker 01

  That makes sense.

• 1:33:06Jocko Willink?

  At least I'm assuming they did because everyone, a lot of people would kind of shrug their shoulders and go, eh, well, you know, it's frostbite. And you know, this, this, the, the same things come up when it comes to extreme ownership. I would say on average, people think that they actually have ownership of like 60% of what's going on in their world.

• 1:33:26Jocko Willink?

  And they probably have control of 96% of what's going on in their world.

• 1:33:33Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:33:34Jocko Willink?

  And there's 4% of stuff that just is totally jacked up. It's freaking diseases, it's car accidents. It's like, there's absolutely things that you don't have control over. And when that happens, you, you take ownership of how you respond to it. But we have so much more control than we think we do. And if your mindset is non-aggressive, lackadaisical, victim mental, they didn't use the term victim mentality, which you hear that a lot these days. And, but they're saying the same thing. I'm a vic, like, what's that line? There's a line in here that they use that it's, it's the passive individual lacks aggressiveness, takes things as they are without trying to do anything about them. That's like, I'm a victim to the world. The world is happening to me. I'm not happening to the world.

• 1:34:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:19Jocko Willink?

  That's not, that's, I guess that's what I was talking about when I talked about this thing being not quite politically correct.

• 1:34:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:26Jocko Willink?

  It's speaking the truth. And look, I, I, I'm, we could try and dive into the whole, like, what political correctness is and all that stuff.

• 1:34:36Jocko Willink?

  To me, those things wouldn't be politically correct according to right now.

• 1:34:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:42Jocko Willink?

  But they're totally accurate and a hundred percent correct.

• 1:34:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're right. And, and they actually did say that, that, that part of, um, what do you call it? Allness, you know, nothing's all good or bad, right? That in, but that concept of like, it's a little of both. So even like most situations where we might, where we might obviously see ourselves as the victim of a certain like event. Right? When you're, just like you're saying, hey, we have way more control over these things than you think. All you, there's a lot of things you could point out right off the bat that could have either been done or just a mindset or something. Something could have been done to reduce that, to reduce the victimization, you know? And even if you go as a whole, like even like when you say car accidents, yes, there is a certain percentage of car accidents.

• 1:35:26Speaker 01

  It's like, I was literally doing all of the right things, all of them. Yeah. But if you took all the car accidents that happened in a, in a given year and you analyzed each, all of the events, you'd be like, oh, that guy was racing. That guy was drunk. That guy, you just, and you eliminated all that. Yeah, it might, it could very well be like 90%. It could be, I don't know. I don't know. But it would stand to reason that it would be a significant amount of reduction.

• 1:35:51Jocko Willink?

  And, and let's say you get T-boned, right?

• 1:35:56Jocko Willink?

  Is it not a good idea as you're approaching an intersection with a green light to like at least cover the brakes a little bit? And not go through and maybe even like look both directions as you're approaching it? You know what I mean?

• 1:36:08Speaker 01

  Well, yeah.

• 1:36:09Jocko Willink?

  Look, I'm not saying that this couldn't happen to me today on my drive home where I'm going through a green light, of course. Like green light, I'm going boom, get T-boned. But to just say, well, there's nothing you can do about that.

• 1:36:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:36:20Jocko Willink?

  As opposed to teaching your kids, hey, when you're going, is green light? Yeah. But you still check both ways. Wouldn't that be a good thing to teach your kids?

• 1:36:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:26Jocko Willink?

  Right? Hey, look both ways. Wouldn't it be a good thing to teach your kids? Oh yeah. You know, you're responsible for your feet. And you need to carry extra socks. Teach your soldiers that. Like, hey, this is on you. As opposed to, well, my boss didn't tell me exactly what gear to bring. It's like, no.

• 1:36:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:41Jocko Willink?

  So again, what's the percentage? What'd I say? 96%?

• 1:36:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:46Jocko Willink?

  Man, you have so much control over your life, so much more than you think you do. That's like when people have, you know, the boss made me do this. Really? What kind of relationship do you have with your boss?

• 1:36:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:56Jocko Willink?

  Cause my bosses always listened to what I had to say, like in a big way. To the point where I kind of always got what I wanted.

• 1:37:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:04Jocko Willink?

  When it mattered, you know, if it's something stupid, I don't care. Oh, yes, sir. We'll fill out that paperwork. I got it. Like, who cares? Did I want to fill out paperwork? No, but did I get it done? Yep, no problem. But don't, but, but to just surrender ownership. It's the wrong answer. And it is true. And you start looking at these scenarios. And like you said, take a thousand people and you, you look at who ended up getting captured. Who, who, who ended up getting captured? It was the people that were lax to get days ago, that didn't have the aggressiveness, that were hypochondriacal. That's, oh, you always think you're sick. That's just like, it's an attitude. And look, I'm not saying, don't go to the doctor if you don't feel good.

• 1:37:49Jocko Willink?

  But just check yourself.

• 1:37:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is. It's true, man. And this is, that's actually very good, uh, good manual. Cause it's like, when you're in a junk situation, it's a super broad term, obviously, but when you're in a shitty situation,

• 1:38:06Speaker 01

  there's a massive difference, almost night and day, it's pretty much black and white, night and day versus the person who looked for every single opportunity to pursue to get out of that situation, every single one, always a hundred percent of the time on the lookout for an opportunity to get out of the bad situation. Versus the guy who, what, accepted it, you know, their favor, whatever the, the term is, versus the person who didn't.

• 1:38:27Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:38:28Speaker 01

  Night and day.

• 1:38:28Jocko Willink?

  Yep. Do you know how much it relieves stress?

• 1:38:35Jocko Willink?

  In life, if, like, like, I'll take me, for example, something bad happens to me, I, I, I'm like, okay, well, here's, um, here's how I'm getting out of it. Here's what I'm gonna do. Here's what I'm gonna do. That's like, that's, and some people don't have that attitude. Something bad happens and it's a beat down and there's no escaping it. I hardly ever feel that way about anything. You know, this is coming, I, I, I think if my freaking airplane has an engine failure at altitude, I'm gonna figure out a way to like free fall and hit a pool with a cover on it, whatever, you know what I mean? Yeah, I'm gonna, we're gonna figure this out.

• 1:39:12Speaker 01

  I understand.

• 1:39:13Jocko Willink?

  So, but if, if you have that attitude, it's like, oh, well, you know, bad stuff will happen, but it's not gonna be that bad. And we'll figure out a way out of it.

• 1:39:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:21Jocko Willink?

  And. Let's go.

• 1:39:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:24Jocko Willink?

  Whereas if your attitude is like, oh, the whole world is conspiring against me. That's a rough way to go through life.

• 1:39:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:32Jocko Willink?

  It's a rough way as opposed to like, yeah, you know what? That's gonna be bad and we'll sort it out.

• 1:39:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:39Jocko Willink?

  There's very little. It's such a much better attitude to have and it makes you so much more open minded about what's going on. And life becomes so much easier and better. When you're not, when you, when you look at things with a positive outlook of like, okay, we've got an opportunity here. And the, the way they put it in the book is what, uh, what makes the difference in the situation that you're facing is that you're in it.

• 1:40:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:06Jocko Willink?

  You're in it. You can make the situation better or you can make the situation worse by the way you manage yourself. Period.

• 1:40:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:12Jocko Willink?

  It's so weird though, because you can't convince, it's very difficult to convince people of that. It's very, it's very difficult for people to see in this other perspective. You know, it's very difficult for people to see that. When you have someone that's going through a tough relationship, you have someone that's having a problem with business, you have somebody, whatever they're going through. It's very hard to bring them around and be like, okay, look, the reason you're breaking up with this person is because you don't belong together. There's gonna go meet someone else.

• 1:40:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:42Jocko Willink?

  Go meet someone else. Go. Oh, the reason this business is failing is because it doesn't work.

• 1:40:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:47Jocko Willink?

  So you're getting out of it right now. Let's go. Figure out, oh, this gives you an opportunity. Go get a different job. Go find another business. It's hard when people are in those tough situations for them to hear and listen.

• 1:40:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. And actually in a way it goes back to that untrained and trained thing. You know, it's like, tell someone to do, if they've never done squats before, tell them, go do a 20 rep squat. They'd be like, why are you guys even doing this? Like, I would never select to do this ever. It makes no sense. I just. Had an additional realization about you, which I'm gonna incorporate into my whole thing. So you know how I told you this before where I kinda nerd out on the way things like work? You know, like, oh, this is why, but you kinda like, you need like, basically the, the minimum or appropriate amount of information. All, that's it. Only the minimum amount enough for you to take action.

• 1:41:38Speaker 01

  Like, that's what you need. Anything beyond that, you're like boring me, kind of a thing. You start yawning and like tapping your, whatever you tap. And so I'm like, okay, you just need enough information to know what action to take. And it's usually like a, a small action, just take some action, right? That's what it seems like. So it's like, oh yeah, so this falls in line and given even what you just said there. Like, you're always looking for, okay, so now what's the move then? It's like, cool, that's the, what, what happened? That's how it works? Cool. So what's the move then? Good and bad. So and then this, in this case, um, you know, in regards to like this manual and stuff. It's like when you consider when bad things happen, if you're just that kinda thinker where it's like, okay, what's the move now? Right. You're gonna get yourself out. At some point, you're out of that situation. And when you know that, you're like, okay, cool, bad things, not that big of a deal because I'm looking for that move.

• 1:42:22Speaker 01

  Or those, that collection of moves and we're out of here. See what I'm saying? We're done, we're successful, kind of a thing. Versus like, if you're not trained like that, you're like, oh my gosh, I can't believe this happened. I can't believe this happened. Oh my gosh, why, why didn't I do that? You're all nerding out about the way it works, or how you feel, or all this other stuff, or, and then making some in, uh, some inaccurate evaluation about your doomed life.

• 1:42:43Jocko Willink?

  What's your move gonna be?

• 1:42:46Jocko Willink?

  Jeff Glover.

• 1:42:47Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:42:48Jocko Willink?

  He doesn't care where he gets put in jujitsu. He literally does not care. Like, you can, he, you can say, I'll start, he'll be like, start on my back with a rear naked choke on.

• 1:42:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:57Jocko Willink?

  And he's like, oh, then he'll, and you know what? He might tap, but he doesn't really care because he's gonna also might, good chance of getting out. And if he taps, he just tries again.

• 1:43:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:43:07Jocko Willink?

  Not that big of a deal. And you watch him roll, he just doesn't care. And so think of how, you ever been to a mat where you're like, oh my gosh, there's certain guys there and I've never tapped to him before. I don't wanna tap to him. You ever had that happening to you?

• 1:43:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:43:20Jocko Willink?

  Where you're like, oh my God, I don't, I don't, oh, there's Bill and Bill like, he has a bad attitude, I don't like him, but he's getting really good and I don't wanna tap to him.

• 1:43:29Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 1:43:30Speaker 01

  Well, thankfully, I felt something similar, but it's more that like, man, I don't want this beef today. Like, I don't want to be on bottom side control of chocolate today. Like, it's just not in me. That beef is not with me right now.

• 1:43:42Jocko Willink?

  Now, it seems like Jeff Glover just doesn't care about that.

• 1:43:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:43:45Jocko Willink?

  Because his attitude is like, hey, he's just been in these situations before. He knows how to get out. He knows that's not big of a deal. So that's like a way to go through life. It's like, oh yeah, some bad stuff might happen. It also allows you to take a little bit more risk. Like, oh, I can invest in this. We'll see what happens. Oh, I've lost a little bit of money, but it's okay. I can recover, go through it.

• 1:44:02Jocko Willink?

  Just having that attitude of, of understanding how much influence and ownership you have in a scenario to move forward. It's a game changer, but you have to, it's not always easy to see. It's not always easy to see. In fact, it's hard to see. And one of the hardest things to see about is what we're saying is it's on you. And when that relationship doesn't work, it's on you to figure it out. When that business doesn't work, it's on you. There's no one going to show up and be like, oh, I've actually decided I want to give your company a bunch of money. That doesn't happen.

• 1:44:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:35Jocko Willink?

  Doesn't happen. You got to figure out what you can do. Shut the doors, reestablish another product. You got to figure it out. You got to make something happen. That's what you need to do.

• 1:44:46Jocko Willink?

  So that's how you survive. And that's how you win. All right. Speaking of survival, when I was at survival evasion, resistance and escape school.

• 1:44:58Speaker 01

  See your school.

• 1:44:59Jocko Willink?

  Yep. You then don't give you any food. What you do, you kill a rabbit, you eat the rabbit. I also ate like some disgusting bugs. I ate crickets and they're like, you ever picked up a cricket and it got like a barbs, like little tiny, tiny barbs on their legs?

• 1:45:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:14Jocko Willink?

  So kind of, they feel sticky.

• 1:45:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:45:17Jocko Willink?

  I ate one of, a few of those things.

• 1:45:18Speaker 01

  I did.

• 1:45:19Jocko Willink?

  Felt sticky going down the hatch. And then I ate, I ate, I ate like disgusting.

• 1:45:25Speaker 01

  Grasping for his life down your throat.

• 1:45:27Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. I ate disgusting, um, like larvae.

• 1:45:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:45:32Jocko Willink?

  Like bug.

• 1:45:33Speaker 01

  Grubs.

• 1:45:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, grubs. Okay. Pulled up like a bark.

• 1:45:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:37Jocko Willink?

  And there was larvae in there and I just ate it.

• 1:45:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:41Jocko Willink?

  And part of it was just me just like, just doing it to push through it.

• 1:45:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:47Jocko Willink?

  But boy, I would have really liked to have a mulk out there.

• 1:45:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:51Jocko Willink?

  I really wish, I really wish Jacofield.com was around at that time.

• 1:45:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, for immediately.

• 1:45:57Jocko Willink?

  To the house.

• 1:45:58Speaker 01

  No, yeah, no, that that's impossible, but the, uh, I hate to break his, do you, you know, yeah, you're a hard guy. I understand that. I've known that for a long time. Crickets are not that bad. Crickets are actually kind of good.

• 1:46:09Jocko Willink?

  I didn't say it was bad. I'm saying there was barbs on the legs that were kind of sticky going down the hatch.

• 1:46:14Speaker 01

  That part was kind of off. I get it. Uh, the larvae though, like, you know, when you see people eat those big ass maggots, like the big ones. Like, oh, okay, I can, I can see that's, that's, that's.

• 1:46:24Jocko Willink?

  Mine were probably the size of like a, uh, like a pen cap type scenario.

• 1:46:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:29Jocko Willink?

  You know, something like that, maybe a little half of a pen cap.

• 1:46:32Speaker 01

  I think right now, though, if, I mean, granted, you probably didn't, where were you in the, in the, uh, oily.

• 1:46:38Jocko Willink?

  Crunch then juice.

• 1:46:39Speaker 01

  Were you in the, um, woods?

• 1:46:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:41Speaker 01

  Okay, so if, for some reason, if we're by the beach, you put some salt on it and you're hungry, Brad, no problem. No problem. But be like some sashimi.

• 1:46:51Jocko Willink?

  We didn't have any salt out there.

• 1:46:52Speaker 01

  Ah, yeah, the no salt, but being hungry, that helps a lot. Cricket's no problem.

• 1:46:56Jocko Willink?

  No factor.

• 1:46:57Speaker 01

  Yeah. In fact, my kids have, uh, it wasn't, not the ones you find on the street or nothing like that. I forget where they, they went somewhere recently and they're like, fuck yeah, I'm down for crickets. You ever, you know, you ever heard of?

• 1:47:07Jocko Willink?

  My son used to eat ants, like it was. Just like no factor, just like crunch, crunch, like picking up ants. He was a little kid too.

• 1:47:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:47:15Jocko Willink?

  I was kind of like, mm.

• 1:47:16Speaker 01

  Well, you ever ate an earthworm?

• 1:47:18Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:19Speaker 01

  Before, yeah, like when we were little kids, it was, you do it off a dare or something like that. It's like, oh, this isn't actually that bad. So when you used to it, even the idea of sea urchin, right? If you go to sushi, eat sea urchin, it's like, it's kind of the same thing. Granted, it's kind of more salty and delicious, but.

• 1:47:33Jocko Willink?

  Here's, here's the facts, bro. You don't need to be eating this stuff.

• 1:47:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, well.

• 1:47:39Jocko Willink?

  Get yourself some greens, get yourself some hydrate, get yourself some joint warfare, super krill. You guys know the deal. We got, listen, you don't have to be eating grubs, larvae, crickets. Don't have to. You don't have to. You can eat something good. And we got it for you. Go to jockofuel.com. You can also go to Wawa, you can go to Vitamin Shoppe, you go to GNC, Military Commissaries, AFEES, Hanford, Dash Stores in Maryland, Wake Fern, ShopRite, HEB, Meyer, Harris Teeter, Lifetime Fitness, Shields, small gyms everywhere. We got you covered. We got you covered. Go and check it out. Get yourself some good, clean supplementation. So you can survive and win in life. That's what we're doing. jockofuel.com. Check it out.

• 1:48:23Speaker 01

  It's true. Also, Origin USA. Speaking of having us covered, you want to cover yourself with American made.

• 1:48:32Jocko Willink?

  Head to toe.

• 1:48:33Speaker 01

  Head to toe. It's a big deal. From the ingredients, materials, seeds, up to the fabric, up to the shirt, pants, products, all American made, from head to toe.

• 1:48:49Jocko Willink?

  Hundred percent American made. Go to originusa.com, get a gi, get t-shirts, joggers, boots. Do you wear joggers?

• 1:48:57Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah. The workout, for sure.

• 1:48:59Jocko Willink?

  Do you wear them when you do squats?

• 1:49:02Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:49:02Jocko Willink?

  You get too hot?

• 1:49:03Speaker 01

  Well, nowadays, yeah. Because I work out outside, my gym, home gym outside. So, yeah. Joggers all day.

• 1:49:09Jocko Willink?

  All day. What about that gym project you were doing? Weren't you going to do a gym project?

• 1:49:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:14Jocko Willink?

  Is that on hold?

• 1:49:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:15Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:49:16Speaker 01

  It was a big project, like, for a bunch of stuff. Gym was part of it. And then, it's, it's a long story. You ever, you ever worked with, like, what do you call, like, an interior designer?

• 1:49:28Jocko Willink?

  Well, I told you about that person that came over my house that wanted to, just wanted to know if I liked to entertain.

• 1:49:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. Was that for, like, construction? Like, was there construction involved, or just, like, decorative?

• 1:49:39Jocko Willink?

  It was like patio, like, outdoor furniture type stuff.

• 1:49:42Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:49:42Jocko Willink?

  You know?

• 1:49:43Speaker 01

  So ours was like a whole thing. Like, furniture, yes, but it was like, construction, additions, taking off this and opening this. You know, it was like a project or whatever.

• 1:49:52Jocko Willink?

  Was it a bit much for you at the time? Like, seemed like a lot?

• 1:49:55Speaker 01

  We'll just say, and look, I know everyone has their thing, you know, but that's like, um...

• 1:50:01Speaker 01

  That's like, there can be some creative differences, I think. And there was just a lot. And so, let's, let's say sometimes a lot of us don't see eye to eye on certain things. And you know, sometimes you gotta-

• 1:50:15Jocko Willink?

  Here's the deal, if you can't-

• 1:50:16Speaker 01

  Be patient.

• 1:50:17Jocko Willink?

  If you gotta have an outdoor gym?

• 1:50:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:50:19Jocko Willink?

  We got joggers, originusa.com.

• 1:50:22Speaker 01

  Thanks for bringing it back, yes. Yes, exactly.

• 1:50:25Jocko Willink?

  So there you go, get some.

• 1:50:26Speaker 01

  Oh yeah. Also Jaco's store called Jaco Store. If you want to represent Discipline Equals Freedom with a t-shirt or hat or hoodie. Got some new hoodies coming out, be on the lookout for that. Don't worry, I'll make an announcement, one of the very few announcements we make, by the way. About these hoodies. Also, we got socks coming, I'll make that same, uh, announce, or I'll include that on that same announcement. But anyway, if you want to represent with some cool stuff, JacoStore.com is where you can get it. Also, we have a thing on there that's called the Shirt Locker. Uh, it's a shirt, new, new design of shirt, every month, subscription scenario. Cool design, it's a little bit different than the, than the straightforward Discipline Equals Freedom, you know? Little creativity going, I guess, arguably. Anyway, it's called the Shirt Locker, it's on JacoStore.com.

• 1:51:13Jocko Willink?

  That's true. You wanted me to chime in, no, I left you hanging.

• 1:51:16Speaker 01

  No, bro, no. I know, the way I was, the way I felt that you were looking at me is like you're really enjoying where I was going with it. That's what it felt like, I don't know, was I wrong? Or I was wrong?

• 1:51:28Jocko Willink?

  Jack, hey, uh, if you guys need some steak, go to coloradocraftbeef.com or primalbeef.com. Two awesome companies making the freaking delicious steak, check them out. Subscribe to the podcast, uh, JacoUnderground.com, we're about to record one of those. We put those out once a week, on average. And we talk about stuff that will help you, we also answer a bunch of questions. JacoUnderground.com, check that out, we own the platform, so no one can, can come at us on that one. Also YouTube, we got a YouTube channel, Psychological Warfare. Flipside Canvas, Dakota Meyer, making cool stuff to hang on the wall. I've written a bunch of books about leadership and I've written a bunch of kids' books, check those out. Wherever you get books, Echelon Front, we have a leadership consultancy. Go to echelonfront.com.

• 1:52:12Jocko Willink?

  We solve problems through leadership. We also have a bunch of live events that you can come to. And we also have online training, online leadership training. Cause everything, we're talking about skills today and Echo is talking about how not too many people are skilled in one thing. I convinced him, most people are skilled in at least one thing, but, but not much more than that. And one thing that many people don't have skill in is leadership. And yet everyone needs it because everyone is in a leadership position. If you interact with other human beings, you're in a leadership position. So learn how to lead, learn the skill of leadership. Go to extremeownership.com, take the courses, join the live sessions and become a better human.

• 1:52:54Jocko Willink?

  Also, if you want to help service members, active and retired, you want to help families, Gold Star families. Check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an amazing charity organization. If you want to donate or you want to get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. Also check out heroesandhorses.org and beyondthebrotherhood.org. That's what we're doing. If you want to connect with us, I'm at Jocko Willink, Echo is at Echo Charles. Just watch out for the algorithm. Just look, if you're at the dent, what'd you say, the dentist's office? Or the DMV, just instead of connecting with us, just stand there. Just stand there and observe and be part of the world. Cause the algorithm is trying to grab you. It's a monster. Just look out.

• 1:53:35Jocko Willink?

  Thanks to all the military personnel around the world who are protecting freedom for us in this volatile time. And also thanks to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, and all other first responders. Thanks for keeping us safe here at home. And to everyone else out there, I got some advice from this book. Don't be a passive, negativistic, hypochondriac type person. Don't be a person that lacks drive, ambition, and aggressiveness. Don't enjoy sympathy from other people. You can have an impact on your world.

• 1:54:19Jocko Willink?

  Surviving and winning depends a great deal on knowing and facing the situation that you are in, but remember that you're a part of that situation. You can make the situation better or worse based on how you manage yourself. It is on you. So take action and go survive and win. And until next time, this is Echo and Jaco. Out.