299: Sometimes You Need a Little Laugh. Sometimes You Need a Big One. With Theo Von.

0:00:00 - Opening 0:04:31 - Theo Von 1:26:36 - How to stay on THE PATH 1:50:08 - Closing Gratitude. 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 299 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Echo. Good evening.

• 0:09Jocko Willink?

  So there is a video and it's, it's out there in the world on YouTube or whatever. You can find it and it's, it's a video of the Battle of Ramadi.

• 0:23Jocko Willink?

  In 2006 in the summertime and there's this big firefight going on.

• 0:30Jocko Willink?

  And you can tell it's pretty intense. There's machine gun fire. A bunch of people putting rounds downrange. People are yelling and barking out orders and passing information. And you can kind of put together that they're working to get a bomb dropped from air support. On a vehicle that the insurgents had been utilizing and fighting from. And they, they get the bomb run.

• 1:01Jocko Willink?

  And right as the, right as the bomb is about to hit, there's a lull in the gunfire because guys are taking cover. You know, as that bomb is going to hit.

• 1:10Jocko Willink?

  And then, so there's a lull in the fire and then the bomb hits.

• 1:17Jocko Willink?

  And there is a massive explosion. And you hear like a couple hoots and then you hear this. You hear this bellowing laughter from one person. And you can tell that the laughter is sort of, it's some surprise. It's some excitement. It's some level of relief and some, it's also just some twisted, dark military humor.

• 1:44Jocko Willink?

  That's making this person bellow out with this laughter and.

• 1:51Jocko Willink?

  I watch that video sometimes.

• 1:56Jocko Willink?

  And I listen to that video sometimes, not for the firefight or not for the bomb drop.

• 2:03Jocko Willink?

  But to hear that laugh.

• 2:07Jocko Willink?

  That laugh is coming from Seth Stone.

• 2:11Jocko Willink?

  And you don't see him on camera. But if you knew Seth, then that laugh is unmistakable.

• 2:22Jocko Willink?

  And that's what I like to hear.

• 2:26Jocko Willink?

  And that's reflective of life. Because Seth was, he was tough, and he was brave, and he was smart, and he was creative, and he was a combat leader.

• 2:41Jocko Willink?

  But above all those characteristics,

• 2:46Jocko Willink?

  what I like to remember most about him now,

• 2:51Jocko Willink?

  now that he's gone, is his laugh.

• 2:57Jocko Willink?

  And humor is a blessing, and laughter is an antidote to pain and suffering and anguish. And sometimes it's the only relief for those things.

• 3:14Jocko Willink?

  I have another friend who once told me, "Everybody's got their Vietnam."

• 3:21Jocko Willink?

  And in this particular case, he was talking about the fact that his first girlfriend, when he was a kid, was older than him and was bigger than him, and she would just pick him up and kiss him against his will, and there wasn't anything he could do about it, and so he just had to deal with it. He just had to get through it.

• 3:41Jocko Willink?

  "Everybody's got their Vietnam," he told me. And he wasn't in Vietnam, nor was he even a veteran, but he was just adding humor

• 3:54Jocko Willink?

  to life.

• 3:57Jocko Willink?

  But there is some truth to that statement. Everybody struggles in life.

• 4:04Jocko Willink?

  And those struggles vary. Some struggles we face are imposed on us by the world. Some struggles we face are imposed on us by ourselves.

• 4:15Jocko Willink?

  They also vary in intensity and consequence, and depending on who you are, when it's your problem, when it's your struggle, that's the world.

• 4:27Jocko Willink?

  And as was with Seth, one of the best ways to overcome struggle is humor, comedy.

• 4:36Jocko Willink?

  And that same friend of mine certainly has used humor to get through his life.

• 4:43Jocko Willink?

  Let's get through some of his struggles and some of those struggles more severe than just getting kissed by a 7th grader. His name is Theo Vaughn and he's here with us tonight to share some of his struggles.

• 4:56Jocko Willink?

  And some of the lessons he's learned.

• 4:59Jocko Willink?

  In making everyone laugh as a comedian in order to overcome those struggles that we all face. Theo, Theo Vaughn, thanks for coming by, man.

• 5:09Speaker 01

  Good to be here, man. Thank you guys for having me. Um, what's going on? Yeah, I'm sorry to hear about Mr. Stone, man. I didn't know that guy, but definitely, I've never been through anything like basmati, you know, I mean, I've had their rice, I guess. I don't even know what I've had. I think, I don't know. I mean, I, I, yes, I have had it and I think I'm gonna say I have. And it's actually one of my favorite, I like a long, I

• 5:38Jocko Willink?

  So basmati is a kind of rice?

• 5:40Speaker 01

  I think it is.

• 5:41Jocko Willink?

  Echo, confirm?

• 5:42Speaker 02

  I, I can neither.

• 5:43Speaker 01

  Come on, bro.

• 5:44Speaker 02

  Nor did Jasmine.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  If anybody at this table has more, had more experience with rice, I'm gonna say it's you, brother, to be honest, man. No offense, dude, but

• 5:52Speaker 02

  That's an advanced rice.

• 5:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay, yeah, okay, yeah. Yeah, sorry. But, um, yeah, man, I never had anything like that. But yeah, I think, yeah, I don't know. I'm, I'm just happy to be here, man. I, I, I think, yeah, everybody does have their own Vietnam, you know, in some ways. Sometimes they're small and sometimes they're big, you know? Sometimes they're on the inside of us and sometimes they're on the outside.

• 6:13Jocko Willink?

  Yes, I was, uh, one of my kids came home and this was, I was still in the Navy at the time. And I came home and there was like wars going on and there was something happening overseas. And I was trying to contend with how we're gonna get guys prepared for this combat situation. And I came home one time and, you know, one of my kids complained about something. And it was some kind of real struggle. I forget what it was. But I remember at first I was kinda like, what are you kidding me? We're at war. I didn't say those words. I was able to keep myself in check, but what I realized was Whatever you're doing in life, that's, that's, that's, that's your world, right? And so when that world gets tough and you don't know anything else, man, that, that struggle, that is your Vietnam.

• 6:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:56Jocko Willink?

  And that's where people end up, whether it's, you know, some girl kissing on you when you're whatever.

• 7:02Speaker 01

  Susanna dude, well, the tough part was other people were watched, like the bigger boy, like my brother and his friends, the bus would pick them up first. And so then it would come and get me. And so that's when she would pick me up. And it was like my first girlfriend. So I was also like excited kind of to have her, but I was kind of embarrassed, honestly, to have her like in front of, I didn't want every, I was just kinda, she was just tougher than me, you know? She played, I think, baseball, you know, and she could have played softball.

• 7:30Jocko Willink?

  Right, right. She just opted.

• 7:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, dude, I mean, she was doing that, you know? So, yeah, they didn't even have that back then.

• 7:38Jocko Willink?

  So let's get, let's get into, uh, for the people, a lot of people don't know who you are, I guess, that might listen to this podcast. I know you're really, uh, famous as a comedian, right?

• 7:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:48Jocko Willink?

  That's the deal?

• 7:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I've done well as a comedian, man. And so I'm grateful to have that. I'm, I'm happy to be here today with you guys, man. You know, I really am. Thanks for having me.

• 7:55Jocko Willink?

  So you grew up, where, where were you born?

• 7:57Speaker 01

  I was born in, um, Louisiana. I was born in Louisiana, in, uh, Covington, Louisiana. So not a real, I mean, it's a good place. We have the tallest statue of Ronald Reagan. And, um, he's never seen it, but we got it. So if there's ever like,

• 8:16Jocko Willink?

  What's the connection with Ronald Reagan?

• 8:18Speaker 01

  Copper too. So like homeless dudes are always trying to like get in there and ship his thumbs off and, and you know, uh, get the reimbursement, but, um,

• 8:26Jocko Willink?

  Why, why Reagan? He connected to that town at all?

• 8:30Speaker 01

  They just, somebody dug him, somebody that had enough copper enjoyed him and I think donated it to the city, to be honest.

• 8:35Jocko Willink?

  No, your dad was like an older gentleman when you were born.

• 8:39Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. My dad was 70 years old. My dad was born in 1910 and, um, And he was from Nicaragua and he was uh, so he was a senior citizen when I met him, you know? So.

• 8:53Jocko Willink?

  And he was from Nicaragua?

• 8:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:55Jocko Willink?

  Now, I, I, I saw that he was from Bluefield, Nicaragua.

• 8:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's from Bluefield. I've never been there, but I heard a lot of, I've heard it's a tough place to be sometimes because of their politics, but I heard it's really nice.

• 9:06Jocko Willink?

  I heard that, and I don't know, what, what's, so what's your dad's like background? Was he from there? Cause I, I guess this place was kind of settled by European pirates.

• 9:15Speaker 01

  Oh dang.

• 9:16Jocko Willink?

  Have you heard this?

• 9:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know what my dad was doing as younger. I'd never even seen any of our pictures of him, so I don't know.

• 9:21Jocko Willink?

  No eye patches?

• 9:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, I never seen, yeah. I'd never seen him, you know, hanging out with a parrot. I've never seen any of his, you know, past work. When I knew him, it, this, you know, it was just a lot of stories and there was more like the stories by the time I met him. And stories, you know, they, they get barnacles on them over time. They gain traction. They get tread. They get, they take different avenues. And so by the time I knew him, it was more, I was kind of left with the, you know, just the stories, you know, the refined stories, you know?

• 9:55Jocko Willink?

  What, what he, how did he end up in America?

• 9:58Speaker 01

  I don't know, man. I really don't know. And those are things I wish that I'd have been able to know better. And I think those are things where sometimes like for me anyway, where I feel disconnection sometimes is not having had that, you know, the, some of those types of conversations when I was old enough to kind of care. You know, um.

• 10:17Speaker 01

  And yeah, when I was like twelve, and once I got to like twelve or thirteen, I kind of, I was like, I mean, it was kind of embarrassing. You know, having such an older day, my dad would fall, he'd be asleep at like events. He would fall asleep at the, um, carpool. When he'd come pick us up, he'd fall asleep. And so the lady had to go wake him up. It was always like so much extra stuff that you don't think you have to deal as a kid, just a lot of like, oh, you know? So, um, but yeah, he was cool though, man. It was also interesting. You know, he knew a lot of people that were about to die. Everybody introduced me to him about to die, so.

• 10:52Jocko Willink?

  What was the deal with your mom? I mean, he must have been some kind of a, you know, he must had some cool characteristics, because how old was your mom?

• 11:01Speaker 01

  My mom was thirty two when I was born, and he didn't have any money. So I don't know who would bang an old dude with no money, bro. That's insane. That is pioneer woman, dude.

• 11:12Jocko Willink?

  I know one woman that would.

• 11:15Jocko Willink?

  You're related to her.

• 11:16Speaker 01

  That's a good point. I mean, that is a pioneer woman. You want to talk about a pioneer woman?

• 11:21Jocko Willink?

  Was he super swab or something? Was he super like?

• 11:25Speaker 01

  He had a comb, I remember, that he kept in his pocket. Maybe he was. Pretty dope. He had a nice, one of those small combs men used to keep. They still keep them in Cuba a lot of time. You see a lot of Cuban men still got that small comb on them.

• 11:37Jocko Willink?

  Mm hmm. And you think that might have been the critical factor for for your mom, looking at him thinking, damn, look at that comb?

• 11:43Speaker 01

  I think in a small town, you know, it's just that something like that could stand out.

• 11:47Jocko Willink?

  Was your mom from Covington, Louisiana too?

• 11:50Speaker 01

  She was from Illinois, so she just real hardworking lady. You know, my mother really likes to work hard and she's oh, delivered newspapers and stuff when I was a kid and delivered all type of stuff.

• 12:03Speaker 01

  Oh, she used to deliver cookies for a little while for some company dude and I'd go lay in her car at night and just lay on the box and just eat them bitches right. Just just imagine being the almost as big as the box and you're just laying on it and you're opening up. And that's my Vietnam. You're in the dark. You're trying to be quiet, dude. And sometimes they would tape them extra, you know, and you're like, I'm gonna be all right. And you just, you get in and you're just as many cookies as you could have, man. You're laying on them. Your mouth's laying open on them.

• 12:31Jocko Willink?

  Like chocolate chip cookies?

• 12:32Speaker 01

  Nah, these, I remember the ones they had were kind of a a hard kind of yellow cookie with a bit of a kind of this granulated sugar kind of square. It looked like glitter on the top. Oh, yeah, yeah, the shortbread one.

• 12:45Jocko Willink?

  I don't know. I

• 12:46Speaker 01

  It was good.

• 12:47Jocko Willink?

  I was excited about your story, like I could picture that, but I I just don't feel like choc- I don't feel like cookies. There's chocolate chip cookies and then everything else is kind of just not in the same ballpark.

• 13:01Speaker 01

  I don't know if I'd agree with that, sir.

• 13:05Jocko Willink?

  I mean, we don't have to agree on everything. I'm just giving you my perspective.

• 13:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, and I appreciate you giving it to me, man. And I would probably, I'd watch you eat a chocolate chip cookie, I think, you know? I'd watch, I wonder what would be fun to watch you eat, you know?

• 13:20Jocko Willink?

  I don't know.

• 13:21Speaker 01

  A mango, I bet, would be pretty fun.

• 13:23Jocko Willink?

  I don't even like mango, oddly enough.

• 13:25Speaker 01

  Then that would make it better for us.

• 13:27Jocko Willink?

  No, I, in fact, I don't really, I've, like, I grew up, my, my, we didn't have a lot of money when I was growing up, and so we ate a lot of hamburgers, right? Like, in the morning, I would have a hamburger on a English muffin. And then for lunch, I would have hamburger on bread, and then for dinner, I'd have hamburger on a bun. So you get, you know, all meals could be burgers. But I didn't really, I didn't even like steak until I was maybe like twenty-two or twenty-three.

• 13:53Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:53Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, because it just, it didn't taste good to me. I mean, I would think, why not just grind this thing up and put it on, put it into a patty?

• 14:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:03Jocko Willink?

  So I don't know, maybe it's funny to watch me eat a burger on a muffin for breakfast.

• 14:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, I could see, I, I think that would be a unique show, watching strong men eat stuff that's a little bit more dainty.

• 14:14Speaker 01

  You know, maybe have a petty for some kind of a unique, a delectable, you know, kind of a cookie from another country or something. I could see that. You can't even manage it with your fingers, you know? It's almost like a grenade almost to, to a regular guy, you know?

• 14:30Jocko Willink?

  Did your mom and dad stay together?

• 14:32Speaker 01

  They stayed together for a while, man. They had four children and, um, and then I don't know what happened. I don't know what happened. And that's kind of when I started to become like mentally, you know, aware of my world and, yeah, at that point, my dad was older, he didn't live with us, and then, um, yeah, we just had four children, and my mom was working a lot, and that's where we were.

• 14:56Jocko Willink?

  So your mom basically ended up as a single mom?

• 14:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, she ended up as a single mom and...

• 15:02Speaker 01

  And yeah, and I don't know, I, I, I, you would almost, I don't know what you would expect kind of having a child or children with the older man. You know, what kind of expectations you might have. Um, but, but I don't know, you know, I don't know what kind of comfort she needed in her world. Maybe she needed to have a family. I don't know what she needed, uh, at that time. But, um, yeah, and so they had, they had children and then my dad was kind of gone and then I got a little ashamed of my, I got embarrassed a little bit. I was just at that age, I think where children get, um, where they're, if they're not like other children, if anything's out of the norm, then they feel like something's wrong with them or they feel just embarrassed. I'm sure you, have you seen it with your children? Was there a time where they get embarrassed?

• 15:46Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it doesn't, I don't think it matters if you're, uh, you know, like Tom Brady, your kids are going to be embarrassed of you. Or, or like Dwayne The Rock Johnson, your kids will be like, oh, here comes the big idiot again. Like, I don't think it matters who you are. There's going to be, your kids are going to go through an age period where they're embarrassed by you.

• 16:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:03Jocko Willink?

  And then you gotta kind of like just work through it, I guess. And hopefully you come out the other side and they realize, oh, you know, dad's not too bad. But I guess the weird thing you said, like your mom's expectations, I mean, the fact of the matter is, he's 70 when you're born. I mean, expectations are, they're not even expectations. Facts are, he ain't gonna be around all that much longer.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  Right.

• 16:29Jocko Willink?

  You know?

• 16:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a limited time offer.

• 16:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 16:31Speaker 01

  That's limited time. That's got an expiration date on it.

• 16:34Jocko Willink?

  So she signed up for, cause she kind of signed up for that activity?

• 16:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. And I think, and, and I think when, sometimes I, it's hard to not hold that angst when I look at my life in places that were uncomfortable for me as a child, like, um, and I'm not complaining, I'm just trying to share some of, you know, share what some of that was like for me. But, um, yeah, I think there was times where it's like, uh, you felt like you weren't part of a plan, like nobody planned. Or if you were, it was a plan that was, um, destined to fail. You know what I'm saying? And so then that almost makes you feel like, well, what's going on if my commander in chief here, my mother or something, set me up in this plan that doesn't seem like it has statistically, just doesn't seem super smart.

• 17:23Jocko Willink?

  Now, now, now, how old were you when you started having thoughts like that?

• 17:28Speaker 01

  I always

• 17:28Jocko Willink?

  It's you know, you that those are kind of thoughts when I was a kid like I was just thinking, you know, machine gun throwing rocks, uh, you know, taking apart pieces of furniture. Yeah, I mean, just talking ignorant stuff. And it seems like you're sitting here thinking about the grand scheme and all these plans. Like, how how old were you when you started going down that road?

• 17:48Speaker 01

  Uh, I don't think I was old. I think I was older when I when I started realizing that stuff.

• 17:52Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so this is like looking back.

• 17:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, a lot of that's looking back. Um, but I think at the time I'm dealing with the ramifications of some of that without knowing it. Without always wondering, well, what, why do I feel certain ways or why do I behave certain ways?

• 18:07Jocko Willink?

  So like a subconscious, that's probably just that probably just a subconscious feeling of, man, this doesn't seem like this is gonna even as a little kid, you're like, man, we're eating ramen again.

• 18:18Speaker 01

  Right.

• 18:18Jocko Willink?

  Who came up with this plan, right?

• 18:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's just no plan like mom's working. There's no dad's so old. So you start to get concerned for your dad's health and you have this weird uncomfortable thing where you're supposed to be kind of a child and be free to just not have any worries, but you have these weird extra worries of like, you know, your dad is getting older, you know, and so I remember being like eight years old and walking to church with my dad. We had a church a few blocks away. And he would ask me what the where he could walk and stuff because of the sidewalks in Louisiana. The the roots come up through them, just like kneecaps, just like, you know, you got a thousand long legged men buried right there under the sidewalk, you know?

• 19:04Speaker 01

  And some of them's, you know, you know, they just, it's just real femory along those, you know, the sidewalks will do a damn, they'll be in a damn trapezoid or something. Half of it, dude, if you take the sidewalk, honestly, it can take you more time to get where you're going. You know what I'm saying? The street is much the sidewalk is like the Oregon Trail, bro. There's natives under part of it. I mean, it gets real dicey. So I remember walking with my dad and he's like, can I walk here and stuff like that? So then you're, I remember getting in this weird space of like, um, Just hyper concern and awareness. That's what I think it was awareness. So then I had a lot of awareness.

• 19:44Jocko Willink?

  So did that lead to, you said behaviors. What kind of behaviors do you think that this situation? Were you, were you getting in trouble in school? Were you, you know, turning into the delinquent kid? Were you trying to work real hard to make sure you always had money? I mean, what, what, how did you react to this situation?

• 20:04Speaker 01

  Well, I think looking back on it, and it's interesting because in my life right now, I've been doing a lot of work on this kind of stuff specifically. Like trying to just, just get enough comfort in the sediment or those sedimentary layers, those real like just those deep layers. It's hard for me to plant roots, I notice in my adult life. And I think it's because something is the soil is just, it's just not enough room in that soil from when I was, when I was younger. And I wouldn't care if I was able to plant things in my life that would, would be able to grow effectively. But I've had trouble doing that, like relationships, commitment to things, wanting to start like a family or have a relationship, but struggle with it.

• 20:46Speaker 01

  So, and sorry, this isn't very funny, dude. I feel bad, guys. You know, the one day, I mean, everybody on your show, somebody dying. Or, you know, somebody got naded out, bro. And then I'm supposed to come in and add some relief and I'm sitting here.

• 21:01Jocko Willink?

  I don't think there's, there's no one really that tuned into my podcast that's expecting or anticipating, or is going to be let down if they're not, you know, if there's not levity in the situation. It's okay. You don't have to be funny here. You can just talk about just mayhem and, and death as far as I'm concerned. It will still be good to go.

• 21:18Speaker 01

  Okay, okay, good. Yeah, I think so. Um, one of the things that I would know, that I noticed now looking back is that I didn't, whenever I realized that that was my life situation, that my dad was real older and that my mom was working all the time. I didn't believe that the world was a comfortable place for me. So as a real young kid, I just, there was enough elements in the atmosphere where I just made that choice as a, my spirit made the choice, whatever it is, something inside of me, it wasn't a choice I made like I would make a choice now. It's like I don't trust the world to be a safe place for me. Uh, so whatever brought me into this world, whatever the elements are, these are not trustworthy elements.

• 22:04Speaker 01

  And not that I would treat them untrustworthy, not that I'd be mean to them, but just in my spirit knows that you have to take care of yourself. So then you start to try and manage everything yourself.

• 22:17Speaker 01

  So I was always really concerned with, uh, the only thing I had left then, like people would look at me, you know, the bus dropped me off like in the poor neighborhood and my dad was so old and my mom was always gone working. She wasn't like a mom, some of the other kids had. So, um, so the only thing I could control was me. How you saw me, that was it. The only piece of my image I had was what you saw of me. So I would like bike to school so I didn't have to get off the poor bus. I would like, um, befriend certain kids so you thought I was in a certain group. Uh, I just, I was hyper concerned with kind of image management.

• 22:59Speaker 01

  Cause it's all I had left, you know, I wouldn't, I'm trying not to be seen around my family. I kind of, because I just didn't want,

• 23:07Speaker 01

  I don't know, I was just hyper concerned with the only thing that I had that I still had control over was my own image, really.

• 23:16Jocko Willink?

  And this is something,

• 23:17Speaker 01

  Does that make any sense?

• 23:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it makes sense, but it's like, this is something that you're realizing reflectively looking back. Like at the time you were like, you weren't consciously saying, oh, I'm, I'm embarrassed, so I'm gonna do this. You were just like, man, I don't really wanna get on that bus or get off that bus, so I'm just gonna bike to school. That seems like a smart thing to do.

• 23:34Speaker 01

  Right, I think, but I start to, I had so much awareness, I think. I was just so aware always. And so then,

• 23:42Speaker 01

  you know, I just, I think I was making choices that I didn't want people to see me a certain way. How am I gonna be? So then I got stuck in this, how can I manage what people think of me?

• 23:53Jocko Willink?

  So was the was the was the image that you wanted to project? Cause you could see there's plenty of people that they're in those kind of rough situations and they're, you know, some people go, all right, I'm gonna get straight A's and I'm gonna go to a good college. I'm gonna do all this other stuff or some people, well, I'm gonna become a, you know, I'm gonna become a the toughest delinquent that there can be and people are gonna be scared of me. So, you know, you get someone going towards like the gang life or whatever. What was it that you were kind of moving towards? Were you an athlete? Were you playing sports?

• 24:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, we played some decent sports in our neighborhood, dude, and it was real dicey, bro. We had a lot of people, man. We had one dude who would sneak my, we'd play football and he'd bring matches with him and burn you while he was doing defense. Bruh, and that's crazy when you're thinking, okay, who's guarding me? You know, Thomas, this kid, Thomas, dude, and he's just matching you down where you're, you know, if you're not making cuts real hard. So, so just some shit like that, man. We played in this one field that had a big hole right in the middle of it, dude, or not to the middle, but off off to the side. We had this church football field, man. And, uh, damn, people would go missing in that bitch, son, you know? I mean, there's a couple. They had a family of 11 that I swear to God after a long game was a family of 10, dog. They lost somebody in there, little Jennifer or somebody. But I remember they, dude, I remember.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  They would make girls, they would put them on the football field, playing football just in the neighborhood, spray paint a number on this one kid's back. Just all kind of shit, man. Fun stuff, though, looking back.

• 25:20Jocko Willink?

  What about organized sports in high school? Did you play basketball?

• 25:24Speaker 01

  I got into that when I was 11. I got into that when I was 11. So, yeah, I think one thing we just were around our neighborhood a lot. We'd get, we'd get home from school and we would just be up to our own devices, you know?

• 25:38Speaker 01

  But one thing I started to notice was like, uh, I didn't, I had a real untrustworthy relationship with the world. So I was always worried about, I think, what people were thinking of me and I felt like people didn't like me. I felt like I think because sometimes, um,

• 25:58Speaker 01

  I don't know if I was just such an uncomfortable kid sometimes that I needed laughter. So I always felt like if you were laughing, you couldn't dislike me and laugh at the same moment. Like at that moment, like it was down to that moment. Like when you were done laughing, I didn't know what you thought of me, you know? And it was kind of scary because um I think I didn't think much of myself. And so the only way I had to feel about myself from moment to moment was how other people felt about me. You know, if I'm real honest and so um. So I think that's why I needed laughter because it was like, oh, man, if I can get.

• 26:40Speaker 01

  It was the only thing I trusted is that there's no way somebody could be laughing. And I could see them laughing and having joy and.

• 26:50Speaker 01

  And hate me at the same time, you know, it was just so that was like. That was the only equation that made that to me was undeniable. And I think that's and I was a hypersensitive kid, you know? Other people aren't as sensitive and so they're able, you know, they can manage things better. I was hypersensitive, you know, um. So I'm really grateful that God gave me. Whatever I needed to be able to find humor, you know? Cause there was other kids in my neighborhood and in the environment that that in my family didn't get that. And so it's.

• 27:32Speaker 01

  And I'm not trying to get any self pity, I'm just trying to share what I'm thinking and feeling at the same time, you know? And a lot of this is stuff I've been working through recently, like in the past few weeks, pretty heavily. And so a lot of it's real fresh on my brain as well, you know?

• 27:48Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, it's scary about well, not scary, I from your perspective is the minute someone stops laughing. You just want to try and make them laugh again so you can get that, get that, get that good feeling back.

• 28:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, it's that safe feeling, I just need to, it's like, man, this is a place where I feel okay if they're laughing, you know? So, yeah, so I think and I wasn't like a goofy dude, I wasn't like farting in the pudding or anything like that. You know what I'm saying? I wasn't some, you know, booty creep or something. I just liked saying things and and I was real aware so I would see things kind of going on. I think I was real aware and so, so it was fun to be able to get people to laugh at moments where you didn't think they were and then you start managing laughter because laughter becomes your main tool that you have to feel okay and so then you start using laughter

• 28:43Speaker 01

  almost like you're calling plays and stuff and you have these little, those are my weapons, you know. That was my knives, that was my fists even, you know, I wasn't, I didn't have a lot of physical confidence, so, so laughter was it really for me. That was my biceps, you know.

• 29:00Jocko Willink?

  It seems like too, uh, there's a opportunity for someone that's in your position where you have this kind of like insecurity and kind of a little bit of a paranoia against the world to go down the path of like drug and alcohol abuse and we all know where that path ends up if we stay on it. So how, how did that enter your life and what about, there had to be drugs and alcohol down there, what was, what was that like, what was that influence? How, how did you manage that part of the world?

• 29:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, that's interesting, you know, I have family members in my own close family that have suffered with addiction and stuff like that. And I really love, and I also love thinking about this kind of stuff, like this kind of stuff for me, talking about feelings and stuff, some people say, well, you know, feelings is the past and actions is what matters and that's true. I believe that, like, I can think all day and it's probably not going to help me act any different. And I know in my own life, if I do act a certain way, my thoughts will follow me. My thoughts really are your troops really, you know, uh, um, they say in a lot of recovery

• 30:13Speaker 01

  rooms that you can't think your way in the right action, but you can act your way in the right thinking. It's a common term and it's easy for, uh, people that struggle with.

• 30:25Speaker 01

  Um, addiction or addictive personalities to understand that it's real simple.

• 30:32Speaker 01

  So, sorry, what was the question? I feel a little bit nervous.

• 30:36Jocko Willink?

  Just, just as far as what, you know, how old were you when alcohol got introduced? How old were you?

• 30:42Speaker 01

  Oh dude, I remember I found some liquor on some, uh, Alize liquor or something. Peach mango, Starburst, baby breath, watermelon, something dude on the top shelf, dude. It was nine different colors, bro. And I found some nudie mags up there too, same time, titty literature. So next thing you know, dude, I'm ejaculating and just, just, I remember falling off the shelf. I never made it off the top shelf, dude. I was there about four hours, dude. I'd never been on the top shelf, you know? I don't come from a real balancing family. So I'm up there, dude, I'm drinking, I'm fucking masturbating, you know? And I remember just blacking out and falling off that shelf. And I probably fell, man, I bet six and a half feet, almost eight feet, so not far.

• 31:26Jocko Willink?

  How old were you at this time?

• 31:28Speaker 01

  Oh, I was probably about thirteen, you know? And so then, but I had other family members who were struggling with drugs and alcohol. So I had this really, I didn't see that.

• 31:41Speaker 01

  I didn't see that as like a, a way for me to get in a thing. Like, I didn't see that as an escape really for me. So I never used that as an escape, um. But as I got a little bit older in my life, I, I started realizing that I was uncomfortable. Uh, and I was, some of the survival techniques I'd used as a child weren't helping me anymore.

• 32:07Jocko Willink?

  You mean even the comedy piece, even making people laugh? Did that start to wear out?

• 32:12Speaker 01

  Well.

• 32:13Jocko Willink?

  Or what survival?

• 32:14Speaker 01

  It was the only connection that I knew. So I had a tough time making real connections with people, especially women. If I wanted to be in a relationship or, or even I think sometimes friends or knowing that a connection was safe. Like, sometimes I'll overdo a connection, somebody will say, yeah, everything's fine, man, we'll be there. And I'll still be hyper worried about it, you know? When it's fine, it's somebody else that's totally normal, but, um. Cause some, some connections with people are, are always feel real new and scary to me. I think I was just scared to make them.

• 32:48Speaker 01

  So anyway, I started realizing I was having trouble making real connections with people. People would say, "Man, I feel like I don't know you, but I feel like I would be sharing a lot of stuff."

• 32:58Speaker 01

  And so then, I got into, I started going to some recovery meetings, 12-step, and I couldn't relate to the drugs and alcohol, but I could relate when people talk about how they felt. You know, just, uh, just the feelings. And so, I started learning about, "Oh, other people feel some of these ways, and it's okay to have feelings or to struggle with them and whatever." And so that's when I really started to like being a part of recovery. And there's all types of it, you know? I mean, there's stuff for everything. There's recovery for people that wear shirts that don't fit, or that fit too tightly.

• 33:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I've struggled with that. It's really, it drags me down hanging around with Echo, because we're both kind of feeling off each other, and it just turns into a bad.

• 33:44Speaker 01

  I was gonna say, I see who your dealer is, obviously, okay? You guys meeting up behind the frickin' AutoZone to fucking pick up a couple extra Smalls, dude. The sad part is, there is a small boy out there somewhere right now.

• 33:58Jocko Willink?

  And he don't have a shirt on.

• 33:59Speaker 01

  He don't have a shirt on.

• 34:02Speaker 01

  Have we talked about that before, Jaco? Did we talk about that?

• 34:04Jocko Willink?

  Talk about what?

• 34:05Speaker 01

  Some boy with a small shirt.

• 34:07Jocko Willink?

  Uh, I don't know if we've talked about that.

• 34:09Speaker 01

  So, yeah, so I think that's where I found 12-step was interesting, and then I-

• 34:12Jocko Willink?

  That was later in life, right?

• 34:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was later in life. So, for a long time, I think I just, I chose comedy because it... Doing stand-up comedy, oh, it's like a lifestyle of disconnection. You're in town for four or five days, and then you go. So if you have a relationship starting, you're like, "Oh, you know, gotta go to Chuckle Willy's over in Tacoma," you know? And so, it's like you're out of town, and then, and then you're in a new place where you can have something, you know, it's like...

• 34:41Speaker 01

  The, the moss of life never has a chance to grow on you, really. You keep outrunning the moss, really. And the moss is things that, that are real, or, you know, are barnacles. Anything that you just, you just evade things enough, and comedy just offered me that. I don't even know if I wanted to be a comedian. I think I wanted to not have to be somewhere.

• 35:08Jocko Willink?

  So, what, how old were you when you did your first, you know, got on stage and did your first stand-up gig?

• 35:15Speaker 01

  Let me think, man. It was Rwanda, dude, I think it was 2001. It was midnight. And I was in a, I think I was in a foxhole or falcon nest or something. I don't know what was happening, dude, we couldn't see. So we got a bad batch of banana taffy from a local. Shit was dicey. There were fire, fire ants. There was a, there was not, yeah, not firefight, there was actual fire ants in the hole.

• 35:46Jocko Willink?

  Even worse.

• 35:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. Um, no, sorry, I'm just trying to, um, trying to make you laugh a little bit, um.

• 35:54Jocko Willink?

  Was it local?

• 35:56Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, I went to a school. Oh, when I was, oh, I remember. Well, the best thing was just at the lunch table with your friends. And I think that's the thing you're always chasing as a comedian is just being in an environment where you're just making your friends laugh, you know? But I went to a class in Los Angeles. A lot of people don't even know that. I went to a class.

• 36:16Jocko Willink?

  Like a comedy class?

• 36:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, like one you see written, like just like putting those cheesy orange letters on the side of a strip mall. Yeah.

• 36:24Jocko Willink?

  I was always wondering who signed up for those things. There you go. Apparently they work.

• 36:29Speaker 01

  Dude, and it was so weird. There was some guy that worked.

• 36:33Jocko Willink?

  Speaking of AutoZone.

• 36:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, totally.

• 36:35Jocko Willink?

  It's your future employment, Holmes.

• 36:37Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, dude. I think the class was even sponsored by like a Pep Boys or some quick oil offering outlet. So, man, we were in the, in the class and it was, but the interesting thing about the class was it was not very, I don't know if it was helpful. It was an environment where you were joking around. But the thing was, at the end of the class, you got to perform on stage at a real comedy club. So that was the thing. And they taped it for you. And this, now everybody's got tape. This back when they had a limited amount of tape.

• 37:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  So you had a tape, baby. You had that cassette, dog, you know? And so I remember I got up there and you had to do three minutes and you were so nervous, but then you had a tape. And so then you felt like, oh, I have a piece of proof, you know? And then after that, they had a comedy room near me. This gentleman had half a limb. And he was.

• 37:31Jocko Willink?

  Which limb?

• 37:32Speaker 01

  He was missing part of his leg, I think, or he said he was. So he could have been faking it.

• 37:38Jocko Willink?

  CGI or something?

• 37:39Speaker 01

  I don't know what his name was. I mean, it was a. CJ, it was, no, it was a white dude.

• 37:45Jocko Willink?

  Okay, check.

• 37:47Speaker 01

  But, uh. Anyway. Yeah, he opened up a comedy room about two blocks from where I was living in LA and I went over there on Wednesdays and.

• 37:58Speaker 01

  And there was a couple of times where I quit, I moved back to New Orleans and they had a comedy room there.

• 38:02Jocko Willink?

  How, how are you making money when you're working at, I mean, this guy's, is he even paying you? Or are you paying to, to get to perform or are you paying him?

• 38:09Speaker 01

  Oh, there was times a lot of it was bringer show. You gotta bring people and if you don't bring enough, you have to pay. So that was part of it, man. That's a, that's a under, that's a dirty. Subculture business of, uh, comedy.

• 38:22Jocko Willink?

  Did you say bring or show? What'd you say?

• 38:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, they call bringer shows. And you gotta bring people with you and if you don't bring like five people and the. You know, probably $10 to get in or something, then you have to pay that, the difference on the $50.

• 38:37Jocko Willink?

  Damn.

• 38:38Speaker 01

  So.

• 38:39Jocko Willink?

  So this is, that's where you start in comedy. That's where it's at.

• 38:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's really where I start and, and honestly, man, when I started, I knew, I. I knew that I was doing pretty good at it when I started. I knew that I could do it. I knew that I could do it. And then once the lifestyle came along where you got to scoot around and be. Any place that I didn't have to make a real connection, which I didn't realize wasn't a strong suit of mine, really. I didn't really realize it at that point. I didn't really realize I was. Evading something. I thought I was going towards something. And I think it's probably like that for a lot of us in all types of. Jobs. You know, sometimes the field I'm chasing, it's. It's not so much something that I'm going for as if I can figure out if there's something that I'm trying to be away from, you know?

• 39:26Speaker 01

  And, and that's just for me. I don't know if that's really for everybody.

• 39:29Jocko Willink?

  In the, in the SEAL teams, we used to say like. Well, you know, if I mean, things get bad, you know, just go on a trip, get on that plane. Everything's, everything's gone. No more problems. You're in some new place. Everything's great now.

• 39:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:42Jocko Willink?

  That was the, that was the deal. You know, so whatever's happening, you know, you'd have some guy living out here in San Diego. He's having problems with his wife or his girlfriend or whatever. Cool. Going on a trip. Down a plane. No problems anymore. They're all gone. Similar thing.

• 39:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:56Jocko Willink?

  Evading the problems.

• 39:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I was, and I didn't, yeah. And I didn't know I was doing that, you know, I just didn't know. And then also you're out there, you have, you were able to establish brief relationships, you know? One night stands, you know, a little bit of sex here and there, a little bit of touch and jerking off next to someone, not even sex. Sometimes, or even just jerking off by yourself and wishing somebody was there. You know, which is really one of, I mean, that was, that was probably two out of three times.

• 40:27Jocko Willink?

  Like only one of those sounded like a relationship. The other one sounded like perversion and the other one just sounded lowly. So I don't know where's, you know, you're kind of getting a taste for maybe what a relationship could be.

• 40:39Speaker 01

  But if you got a good imagination, dude, you could have a real dime right there with you, you know? And I was strong, bro, in the fricking, in that mental fricking cauldron. I was really running some strong soup. So.

• 40:50Jocko Willink?

  So you would, you'd be out in LA, how long you out, out in LA for?

• 40:53Speaker 01

  I've been out there, you know, I'd be out there for months at a time.

• 40:56Jocko Willink?

  And then what would make you, would you just run out of money and be like, all right, I'm going back to Louisiana?

• 41:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, something would be uncomfortable. I'd have a long-term, I had a long-term relationship for a little while, which is like the closest relationship I could get into was having one with a, you know, thousands of miles of space in it. And, um, yeah, so I, I, yeah, and then comedy, but comedy kept doing good. It was like this thing. And when I look back, I really think it was something God that just. You know, God just wanted to keep taking care of me, you know, even though I think when I was young, I always. When I didn't trust the world, I didn't trust God. I didn't trust that anybody had like was looking out for me.

• 41:34Jocko Willink?

  What what years is this?

• 41:37Speaker 01

  It's probably two thousand, probably two thousand nine or about two thousand sixteen. I would say two thousand seven.

• 41:48Jocko Willink?

  So during this time, you're like, what's the progression? Once you would you do good with a bring or show, once you get good at that, like, okay, now you're almost always going to have people coming in. At what point do you at what point are you you thinking to yourself, all right, I can I can live, I can make, I can pay my rent. I can get food from comedy.

• 42:11Speaker 01

  Right. Well, I had got I got a credit card. That's at what point.

• 42:15Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  When I got that credit card, boy, that Delta Reserve, they hit me up in the mail, bro, you know? And I looked at some of the planes online. I said, these people are doing well. I'm opening an account with them. So I went probably about thirty something thousand dollars in debt. Over probably about four years, which was a lot of debt when you never have had, you know, three thousand dollars in a bank account.

• 42:35Jocko Willink?

  So for all those years, are you paycheck to paycheck?

• 42:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:39Jocko Willink?

  Just paycheck to paycheck. Maybe you have eight hundred bucks in your bank account. Maybe you got a thousand, maybe you did a good show and you maybe you got fourteen hundred. But then you got to buy a new freaking whatever.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, the next flight usually was the big expense was that next flight.

• 42:55Jocko Willink?

  So this is a struggle.

• 42:57Speaker 01

  It's a struggle and it start it is a struggle, honestly. And I look, I know it's it's it's my own struggle. It's the struggle in that sense. I'm not. Other people have way bigger struggles. But it's uh but that's the struggle part of that job.

• 43:11Jocko Willink?

  At a minimum, it's a financial struggle.

• 43:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:13Jocko Willink?

  And you are you looking at it thinking, well, I'll be doing this for the rest of my life, like for the rest of my life, I'm going to be sitting here, you know, going from town to town. Making four hundred and eighty dollars one night. Is that how much you make when you're one of these level comedians?

• 43:27Speaker 01

  No, I think at that point, if you do a feature weekend somewhere, you can get paid six hundred dollars for about five shows, but you have to buy your flight. So that takes three hundred. If you eat on eighty.

• 43:38Jocko Willink?

  This is similar. Do you know anything about mixed martial arts besides UFC? Like when you're young, these fighters, like I've trained a ton of fighters, that's what they're doing. They're, they're going to fight in Nebraska. They're gonna get paid two hundred dollars to fight, two hundred dollars if they win, and the flight out there costs freaking eight hundred bucks. And they gotta pay medical for their checkup. It's a freaking disaster.

• 44:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:03Jocko Willink?

  This is the same thing, right?

• 44:04Speaker 01

  It really is, man. I think it really is, dude. At the end, those guys are carrying, they have two of their teeth taped into their belly buttons. They don't forget them. It's dicey. Yeah, it's just that circuit. It's that circuit. It's the circuit of that thing. And it's, um, the benefits are the things that keep, that are kind of nice. And especially if you don't know, if other people are settling down, getting married, your friends, getting real jobs that seem more real on paper. And those things are...

• 44:36Speaker 01

  I didn't want to be like everybody else. That's the thing I always remember in my head. I just didn't want to be like a lot of people. I wanted to manage my image. The only thing I had was, everything else in my life since my birth felt like it was like a sentence. Like, this is who you are. You are somebody who, you know, you're not gonna be in a home where you were really loved. You're not, you know, things like that. I'm not complaining. I'm just sharing what I felt like. And some of this might not even be real. That's the crazy part of some of the stuff. It could be in your head. But if, to me, it was very real. Um, so the only thing I could still control was what I, what you saw me, how I, what I was, you know? And I was just gonna hold out to try and be

• 45:21Speaker 01

  something.

• 45:24Speaker 01

  I don't even know if I knew what it was, but I was just gonna hold out.

• 45:28Jocko Willink?

  So when you're a comedian making $600 for five shows in a weekend that you had to pay $740 for your ticket to get out to wherever you were, the, what is making it at that time? Cause I think it's changed and that's where I was trying to wonder what the time like nowadays, you know, there's different avenues since uh, social media is out there and you can use that avenue. YouTube, you can use that avenue. There's podcasts, you can use that. There's all these different avenues, but you go rewind 10 years, like there's none of that.

• 45:59Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 46:00Jocko Willink?

  You can't make a living from YouTube wasn't even a thing.

• 46:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, there was no way.

• 46:04Jocko Willink?

  Nothing. So you're just, just freaking comedy club to comedy club. What was quote making it back then?

• 46:13Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 46:13Jocko Willink?

  Did you get a, did you, did you see that as a possibility?

• 46:17Speaker 01

  I got 3,000. I remember they gave me 3,000. Did the Comedy Central like 10 minutes or something and they give you 3,000.

• 46:24Jocko Willink?

  $3,000 for Comedy Central.

• 46:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:26Jocko Willink?

  You do 10 minutes, they give you $3,000.

• 46:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:29Jocko Willink?

  The big ass network Comedy Central. That's like these fight organizations.

• 46:36Jocko Willink?

  It's the exact same thing.

• 46:37Speaker 01

  It was the ultimate fighting. It was the, yeah, it was comedy. It was just, it was like, obviously it was just a different day. It was just a different Dana White or it's just a different organization, you know? But then also they had all the eyeballs then. They had the eyeballs. And so, yes, you got a little money and then you start to get a little nori- noriety from the deal. From like you could show people, oh, I really am a comedian. That was, that's the scariest part as a comedian. Cause you're a comedian and then do, you could tell people you're a comedian, but it's a real weird thing to tell people until you have some proof that you are it dude. Cause unless not, you could be a, just a, just a.

• 47:16Jocko Willink?

  I'm a comedian for all practical purposes, right? Well, I'm a comedian.

• 47:20Speaker 01

  You could be a murderer.

• 47:22Jocko Willink?

  Probably better suited to be a murderer than a comedian, but it's all good.

• 47:25Speaker 01

  Dude, definitely, man. And I always loved peeping Tom and man, since I was a kid, dude, I love peeping Tom.

• 47:30Jocko Willink?

  That's really uh, not one of the best things to ta- talk about on the podcast. If you want to maintain, you know, yourself not being in prison.

• 47:39Speaker 01

  Look, I'm a recovering friggin' PT-er, baby, you know? But that's one thing you need about recovery and being in the circles. I have friends that are flashers, dude. I have friends that have, I mean, I have friends that have just gone and knocked on the devil's door, dude, and waited there till he opened it. You know what I'm saying, bro? And the devil works overtime, so rarely is he home.

• 47:58Jocko Willink?

  He's 24/7 opening that door up.

• 48:00Speaker 01

  So if you're milling out there, just hanging on that friggin' welcome mat.

• 48:05Jocko Willink?

  So, so Comedy Central.

• 48:07Speaker 01

  You got that money.

• 48:08Jocko Willink?

  And now you're kind of, I mean, other comedians are looking at you.

• 48:11Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 48:12Jocko Willink?

  But also other comedians, you're kind of like elevated, right?

• 48:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, you started to get elevated.

• 48:15Jocko Willink?

  You're sort of the man.

• 48:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit. You get enough that boost that then it tells you, okay, this path is starting to choose you. There's, I think there's a unique moment in different paths where you're choo-, you're, you're, you're putting yourself into the path, and then the path is also saying, hey, you know, put in its hand out, son. And I do believe that for comedians, man, at a certain point, it kind of chooses you.

• 48:39Jocko Willink?

  So, once you do Comedy Central, now, when you're going to a comedy club, are you headlining now?

• 48:45Speaker 01

  You have a credit, you're getting close, and you're starting to headline, and then you get like 1,500 a week. So that's when you can start to save a little money and, um, and you're not selling tickets, though. You were just, most people are coming, there's a few people coming to see you, maybe 10, 15 people. But also, back then, the, the clubs had all the email lists. They were the gatekeeper. So they, you know, you don't have all that. You can start to put it together. We'd put the cards on the table, fill it out, and like, but then you're coming before you have to do that, and, and I did it all, man. Put the boxes with the cards.

• 49:17Jocko Willink?

  Are you, do you have a manager or whatever, like that thing is?

• 49:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, you have a manager that helps you through the agencies to get booked.

• 49:24Jocko Willink?

  God.

• 49:24Speaker 01

  But you don't have.

• 49:25Jocko Willink?

  Are they taking their cut?

• 49:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, they take their cut.

• 49:27Jocko Willink?

  So you're getting 1,500 bucks and they're taking?

• 49:30Speaker 01

  150, yeah.

• 49:31Jocko Willink?

  150.

• 49:32Speaker 01

  And then the agent would take 150, and so then you're down to 12 there. But, but yeah, you're still grinding, and I still didn't have any other.

• 49:42Speaker 01

  In life, there's only so you, you, you, I find you, I'm either doing something that I want to be doing, or I'm attaching my life to other people and maybe starting a family kind of. There's not really a ton of different things to do, you know?

• 49:57Speaker 01

  Really, I mean, you just, so I, I didn't, and I didn't have anything on that other side of the coin. I didn't have any place where I felt like I could make a commitment or start a family. So I'm like, well, this is, this shoe just fits so well right now.

• 50:09Jocko Willink?

  How, how many days a year are you touring at this time?

• 50:13Speaker 01

  Oh, I did, man. I probably did forty-eight weeks a year. I toured hard, man. I toured, I toured hard, man. I really did. And sometimes, and here's the crazy thing, this is one thing I noticed about a brain of somebody that has,

• 50:27Speaker 01

  has maybe issues with alcoholism, stuff like that. My brain forgets that.

• 50:34Jocko Willink?

  My brain forgets what?

• 50:35Speaker 01

  Forgets all that I did, all that work.

• 50:39Speaker 01

  So my brain every day has this weird governor in it that's like, man, you, you gotta do something, man. You know, you haven't done anything, you know? I got this weird, and I, sometimes I don't know where some of that comes from. And, and those are things I still want to figure out in my life, you know? Where does that come from, you know, some of those things? So those are things I love kind of thinking about and talking with people about is like,

• 51:03Speaker 01

  yeah, where do these weird, like, this weird legal system that's, that I've built into my soul? Where does that, where does that all come from? And, and it's interesting, you can figure, some of the times you can figure some of that out by talking with other people about, uh, that sort of thing, anyway.

• 51:20Jocko Willink?

  What do you feel like the prosecution and the defense are, are arguing over with the legal system that's in your head?

• 51:28Speaker 01

  The prosecution is always just a never, there was never like a, a base foundation that I'm okay. So when I don't have that, then anything else has a really good chance of infiltrating and getting really into me because there never was this.

• 51:50Speaker 01

  Like I had a friend one time who just texted me, he said, hey, man, you're okay, you know, just out of the blue. And because he knows, we talked about stuff, he's in recovery and man, that shit just hit me, like never in my life had I just heard that or and it just came through it a certain way where I heard it, I was like, oh, man, and just, I'm just like, ball, I'm just like, so I think just when you don't have that weird, that foundation of that, anybody just telling you that, or the world, or just like you feeling it, you know, then you feel, sometimes you always will feel susceptible to any other. Well, then, of course, you have to build your own thing in your head that's like, you gotta get going, you gotta get, you gotta pull yourself up by the bootstraps, so you do that. But then after you doing well, even that thing's still going on.

• 52:34Speaker 01

  That's a childhood system you put in, that bitch is loose, dude. And that bitch is out there fucking partying, got tits, dude, you know what I'm saying, it's turning up. And it's fucking, dude, and it just doesn't, there's no control, but that thing has been with you for so long that it's hard to get new systems in place to stop those survival things. Because something had to be in my head to tell me to keep going, you know, uh, but as you get older, it's just still running on the same childhood system, the same original DOS or whatever, Microsoft DOS. So.

• 53:08Jocko Willink?

  Did you ever have a point where you're like in freaking, whatever, upstate New York, you just performed in front of seven people that were talking while you were up on stage? And then you had to pay them money and you're like, you know what, dude, I'm going to get a job at Mickey D's. Did you, did you have that?

• 53:26Speaker 01

  Oh, dude, yeah, I worked at a damn, fuck, I got a job at a, uh, doing tacos, selling Mexican food to people. And I'd sold all kind of food to people over a restaurant and stuff like that, I used to sell, I sold Mexican food to people when I was younger, too.

• 53:41Jocko Willink?

  But did you ever have a point where you were like?

• 53:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, I gave up at that point, there was a point where I gave up.

• 53:46Jocko Willink?

  Oh, you gave up on comedy at some point?

• 53:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I had this girl, I had, it was in this long-term, uh, relationship and I went back to New Orleans and worked at a bar and we were selling Mexican food to people. Above board, it was legal shit. And, uh, and they had a margarita machine in there and I was working that bad boy, you know, and just doing what I could and. And then I, some guy came in who worked next door and he said like one thing to me and it just set me off.

• 54:16Jocko Willink?

  Like treated you like a chump or something?

• 54:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, treated me like I was somebody that didn't.

• 54:27Speaker 01

  It was like some rich dude, some rich, you know, secondhand generation rich or thirdhand generation rich, you know? Somebody, look, I'll say this, somebody in their family probably had some cotton on them, okay? And I was more of a polyester bad boy, you know what I'm saying? I was one of those, fuck it, you know what I'm saying? Those synthetic fabrics, dog, okay? Racism free daddy, okay? So this dude, he said something, yeah, and it just. And, oh, and his family partially owned the place. It was a business next door. They sold wine. Like Gary Vee or whatever that guy's name is, Jerry Vee, telling people to fucking sell their home and sleep in their yard. You know what I'm saying? And that dude was raised on a damn wine, wine farm or something, dude.

• 55:09Speaker 01

  He's in there fucking, you know what I'm saying, dude, hiding grapes in his ass at night. Freezing grapes and fucking hiding them in his ass. And he's telling people how to struggle, dude. That guy out of his mind, he's like, oh damn dude. Oh, you still have silverware in your house? Fucking sell it. And then he shows up and he'll like hug the dude. The guy can't even, he has no way to get food in his mouth, you know? The guy's fucking just knuckling through some chowder, knuckling through some bouillabaisse and he's like, no worries, man. You made seventy-six dollars last night? And he hugs him, you know what I'm saying? It's like, what the fuck? And then he drives off and the family's just standing there in a park.

• 55:47Speaker 01

  Another winner. That guy's out of his fucking mind, dude. And he hugs, oh, you sold two extra Christmas sweaters you didn't need from last year and they're crying together? Like, what is going on, dude? Um, but anyway, I don't want to look, man.

• 56:05Jocko Willink?

  I gotta give some love to my boy Gary.

• 56:07Speaker 01

  Oh, I'm sorry. The videos, I'm not saying the guy's not a smart guy. The videos though, and the guy grew up well off.

• 56:16Jocko Willink?

  Well, no, I think he actually didn't grow up well off. That's part of his.

• 56:20Speaker 01

  Oh, and I could be lying.

• 56:21Jocko Willink?

  No, you're partially lying, but it's not really lying if you don't know, but he was, he grew up. You know, his dad owned like a corner liquor store or something and he did, you know, he got after it, created the uh.

• 56:32Speaker 01

  But in my neighborhood, a corner liquor store is the same as a winery.

• 56:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, true, true. So if you're looking at it from maybe from Theo Vaughn's perspective, hell yeah, he grew up like big time.

• 56:40Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Look at these dudes over here, huh? Slanging that re-slang.

• 56:47Jocko Willink?

  So this rich dude comes in, he says something to you.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  He said something and that night I broke the margarita machine. I set that bitch on and broke it. And I knew that cost him probably about 600. And that was it. And I didn't go back there, man. And then I went back to LA and I was kinda, yeah, I didn't want to be. Yeah, I couldn't commit to the relationship I was in and I just went back to LA and so. And then things like I started, I don't know what happened then, but I started picking up some steam and that's when pods, some podcasting started. And um, and I just was really fortunate, man. You know, my producer, Nick Davis, who's a great guy, is a huge fan of yours. And so you were gracious enough to come on and Rogan had me on his podcast at the same time.

• 57:32Speaker 01

  And a couple of other little things happened where suddenly I kind of had a fan base. I don't know if there was much space in between. Oh, I did a Netflix special that didn't do anything.

• 57:43Jocko Willink?

  Wait, what came out first? The Netflix special?

• 57:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:46Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So that thing came out, but it doesn't really matter. No one really notices.

• 57:49Speaker 01

  It did nothing, man. I was so excited. I remember I went to Chattanooga, I'm all fired up. And I'm thinking it's going to be packed, man. And it was a small, it wasn't even a big club and there was nine people in there.

• 57:59Jocko Willink?

  Damn. So when stuff like that happens, that's gotta be tough to power through. I mean, when you're especially with everything you've said so far tonight about wanting people's laughter and approval and all this stuff. And you'd release a Netflix special.

• 58:21Speaker 01

  Echo, what do you think, man? Bruh, I'll say this, for somebody named Echo, you don't even repeat much, dog.

• 58:35Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 58:36Speaker 01

  That's painful. Oh, it's painful, bruh. But when painful, here's the crazy thing about painful, man. When most of what you know in your life feels like painful, then I think shit like that just kinda fucking fits on the ship.

• 58:48Jocko Willink?

  So how are you, how are you, so for other people, right? Cause other people are having their Chattanooga experience where nine people show up. They're having, you know, whatever happened in their life. What did you do? Cause here's another thing, when you, you know, we're talking about Gary Vee. And I, I, people will assess this about me too, cause it's like, hard work, hard work, hard work. And I just had this conversation with someone the other day. They're like, you know, at my, at my company, hard work doesn't necessarily mean you get promoted. I'm like, that's true everywhere. Hard work doesn't necessarily, like, you can't just expect, oh, I'm just gonna work hard, work hard, work hard. And that, then things are just gonna happen. If that, if it was, I hate to say it, if it was that easy, a lot more people would do it. Not everyone do hard work, but a lot of people would do it. A lot of people would start working hard.

• 59:29Jocko Willink?

  But you gotta have, like, I'm sure you've seen comedians along the way that were really hard working. They're sitting there, they're doing, hey, I wrote another 19 jokes tonight. And you read them and they all suck, right? So when you get done with this Netflix special, you're all amped, your expectations are so high. You show up, there's no one there. How do you, how do you power through that? How do you get through that? What do you do?

• 59:51Speaker 01

  I don't know, I made out with this big thick girl, I remember that.

• 59:55Jocko Willink?

  Okay, bro, can we get some like, something a little bit more than thick girls making out?

• 59:59Speaker 01

  Okay. I mean, that's how, you know, I'm sure you've been there, dude, being from the islands or whatever. So, yeah, man, I mean, it's like, I fricking did it, you know? I remember, yeah, well, that was, that was an interesting thing about comedy clubs. It's, comedy club's just a bar. It's a bar hooked to a stage. So it's like, then there was always a couple, you could always get a couple of drinks at the end of the night to kinda say shit to yourself. And I was never a big drinker, I'd have maybe two drinks, you know? But, um, but after that, I don't know, I started to get...

• 1:00:30Speaker 01

  You know, I don't know really what happened. I just knew that that wasn't it, that Hollywood. Oh, somebody wrote an article, I remember, right when my special came out and it said like, uh, oh, this would be Donald Trump's favorite comedian or something. It was like a negative. It was, I think it was right around the time, maybe when some of that campaigning was started or something. And it was, and a lot of my stuff is sarcasm, like a character also. It's me, but it's also this, it's a.

• 1:01:01Jocko Willink?

  A caricature of like where you're from.

• 1:01:03Speaker 01

  Right, right, right. It's a mix, really.

• 1:01:05Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 1:01:06Speaker 01

  And that made me really not trust any of like Hollywood tabloids, any of that kind of shit. So, and it just was so debilitating. You work so hard and then somebody just does something just completely errant and aimless, you know?

• 1:01:22Jocko Willink?

  When you watched your own Netflix special, were you like, oh yeah, oh, were you kind of like, damn? Or were you neutral?

• 1:01:32Speaker 01

  I felt okay about it. I felt like I went too fast during the material. I felt like I was probably a little nervous and went too fast.

• 1:01:41Speaker 01

  So I never really looked back on it super fondly. But, but then at that point, things started to evolve in some podcasts and started going.

• 1:01:50Jocko Willink?

  From my perspective, so I didn't know who, I didn't, and this is, it's funny because as I was like reading about your background and trying to figure out, because I thought you just like everybody thinks. I thought, oh, he just made it famous overnight or whatever. That's kind of, and I didn't, as I researched, I was like, oh, this dude's been doing comedy for like, whatever, two decades or a long time.

• 1:02:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, about seventeen years.

• 1:02:13Jocko Willink?

  And there was a video, it was Free Connor. That little video that you made, you know what I'm talking about?

• 1:02:19Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, dude, with that bus?

• 1:02:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:02:23Speaker 01

  That Greyhound dude, yeah. We just had a Greyhound driver on the podcast, man. Cause I used to go hound all the time. I'd go on there. Somebody fricking, somebody's like, you want to see something? And it's always their dick on there. You know what I'm saying, bro? It's like, come on, bro.

• 1:02:36Jocko Willink?

  So, so.

• 1:02:38Speaker 01

  Somebody pull his dick out of a hat, you know? Like, how you even get your dick in a hat? You know? That's supposed to be a rabbit. Just a lot of friggin shit magicians, man, out there, bro.

• 1:02:48Jocko Willink?

  So I saw that thing and and it just I was dying laughing. I kind of shared it with all my friends because everyone kind of likes MMA and here you were talking about, you know, bust and every and and kind of my generation did win on Greyhounds, right? So we kind of knew I don't think a lot and in in California, like no one takes public transit. So it's different, but across the country, man, you've been to a Greyhound station or you've seen some, you know, you you've seen some shit, man, in your life. If you've been to Grey, you've been to a Greyhound.

• 1:03:19Speaker 01

  Dude, I saw a lady drinking a can of uh baby formula, dude.

• 1:03:25Jocko Willink?

  Similac, bro, yeah. You said that on that video. I didn't even know what Similac was. I thought it was some kind of drug.

• 1:03:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's making me think of it.

• 1:03:34Jocko Willink?

  I had to Google it, man. So so you did that. Uh, you go on Rogan for the first time. And this is what I wanted to say is that when I think you had like a or you have and still have like a like a vulnerability and honesty about yourself that I think is really different. And I think that that is what make people ma- makes people made me. The first time I heard you, I was like, oh, yeah, he's not, he's exposing himself, you know, not in not in the way that your friends do, whatever the flashes are that you're hanging out with, but exposing yourself.

• 1:04:10Speaker 01

  Not hanging. We're on a, we're on a text, like a, you know, support chat, but yes.

• 1:04:16Jocko Willink?

  So I think that was a a huge thing that uh I think a lot of people connected as soon as they kind of heard you and heard you talking to Joe and and freaking Joe. I mean, obviously, his his podcast is so massive and and he's such a good guy and, you know, was telling everyone, oh, yeah, this guy's hilarious. I mean, I remember he told, I think he told me. Yeah, he did. He was like, oh, that guy's freaking hilarious. You know, I was like, hey, dude, have you seen this Similac thing or whatever, whatever brought it up? He's like, oh, that guy's hilarious. So so then you, when did you start your podcast?

• 1:04:48Speaker 01

  I started, I did a podcast with a friend for about probably two years. That was about more like interviewing people that was in Hollywood. My friend worked at TMZ and we tried a podcast together. And it was fun, but I didn't get to be myself. I had to like, it was more interviewing, you know, and I didn't really like that as much. And so then, once, one day I walked out of Rogan's and I said, I needed to do something more like that. I didn't know that that's, I don't think I knew until I was there and hands on in the environment that that's the way you could do it. Even by listening, I didn't get the concept a hundred percent.

• 1:05:26Speaker 01

  And then I walked out and I said, I need to do something more like that. And so I just started then, I started one in my kitchen and just started kind of talking about stuff and things that I was thinking about. And uh, and yeah, and it's been, yeah, it's been, it's been a place sometimes where I share maybe more than I should sometimes and I don't realize it.

• 1:05:48Speaker 01

  It's been a lot of different things, man. Sometimes it's been a blessing because it's the, it's like the thing that keeps me going each week. It's like a guaranteed thing. You know, the longest relationship I've had in my life sometimes is with my podcast in a lot of ways. It's the one thing that I'll show up for every week even.

• 1:06:09Speaker 01

  Even on times I notice like where I don't feel good, like the past maybe two years I haven't felt really good. Something's I think physically kind of, I don't know what it is. I'm doing like a lot of blood work and doing all these different therapies and like trying to kind of figure out why I don't feel as good as I used to. I physically don't feel good. So the hardest thing sometimes is when you don't feel good to go in a, into an environment and put yourself out. It's like, you almost want to hide from people. You don't feel, you want to wait till you feel okay to get out there and like, you know.

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  So that's been one of the most challenging things is on weeks where I don't really feel that great, to put myself out, put myself right there. It's like you just, sometimes you're like, man, I don't want to see people to see me not at my best. Especially when the only thing I've always had is my own image, how you see me. It's like it's, it makes it real dicey sometimes. But at the same time, man, I've learned a lot about people through podcasting, you know? I'm just enamored sometimes of the people that come out and the sweet, the really nice stories that they share, you know?

• 1:07:13Speaker 01

  And then people will share stuff with me that means something to them sometimes, like some guy came up to me this morning at the cafe and said, hey, man, I got five years sober, you know?

• 1:07:24Speaker 01

  And you're just so excited when you see how somebody's life gets different or better and not that I have anything to do with that. I don't feel like I do, but just that he wants to share that with me and that he feels okay sharing it, you know?

• 1:07:38Speaker 01

  Things like that, man, it's

• 1:07:41Speaker 01

  that's one thing I've learned, I think, through podcasts and is really a power in

• 1:07:48Speaker 01

  even though it's not real human connection, it's not the hand to hand combat of of human connection because we're through microphones and stuff.

• 1:07:58Speaker 01

  It's been surprising to me how many people connect, you know, and how many people feel and how much feelings you can get through stuff. It's it's pretty remarkable sometimes. So anyway, I don't really know what I'm talking about, but.

• 1:08:12Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's interesting because you were made it, you know, you were joking around earlier about how you know, you're sorry not being funny right now on this podcast you're supposed and that's what's interesting about that is you you have some pretty serious stuff that you do on your podcast, you have some, you know, you kind of sometimes you open up about stuff and how you're feeling and maybe it's not feeling that good. And and again, I think that people tune into that because, look, man, if I guess, I guess, I guess you could try and like fake being funny or fake being in a good mood, but I I don't think you can really fake it 100% where people really believe it. And I think it's better that you just be who you are and and, you know, if you've got something, if you're not, if you feel like

• 1:08:55Jocko Willink?

  freaking depressed or whatever, then you're like, hey, this is what I feel like right now. And it makes people comfortable that there's someone like you who's usually funny and seems to have a pretty good life and all of a sudden they're like, hey, man, this is freaking hard right now for whatever reason, whatever that reason might be. And, you know, I I think when people

• 1:09:18Jocko Willink?

  just knowing that someone else is kind of like there with them, it's reassuring.

• 1:09:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:22Jocko Willink?

  And and the other thing that's interesting about this is you've been saying this whole time, you know, that you have a hard time with. Relationships and long-term and all this, but how long you been doing your podcast for?

• 1:09:34Speaker 01

  For maybe five years.

• 1:09:35Jocko Willink?

  So five years and this is the thing about podcasts and I have the same thing where I meet people that listen to podcasts and they feel like we have a relationship.

• 1:09:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:47Jocko Willink?

  And they're right.

• 1:09:49Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:09:49Jocko Willink?

  Because you don't get, you don't, you don't, I mean, my podcast is three, four, five hours long.

• 1:09:55Speaker 01

  Jesus Christ dude. Now I see what happened to you. You said things probably years ago and there's just not much in there. I bet if we tickle you, we'll get them out of you creep.

• 1:10:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. How often do you sit down and talk to anyone for three hours or two hours?

• 1:10:13Speaker 01

  I walked out of your room and I remember telling him, I said, hey, that's the longest conversation I've ever had in my life with anybody. Especially with a man, you know, like I didn't have any male figure. I had, you know, there was no male

• 1:10:26Speaker 01

  figures in my neighborhood. One guy shot up a ready med 24 hour clinic and that was like the toughest dude we knew. You know, and he was on pills, so he wasn't even really doing it out of his own heart. So, you know, we didn't have a lot of, uh, so I think yes, I, I've found more probably male influences through podcasting.

• 1:10:48Speaker 01

  Then anywhere else in my life really, which is kind of interesting.

• 1:10:54Speaker 01

  You know, um, and sometimes, uh, yeah, I don't know, podcasts is powerful. And here's one thing that's neat too, Jaco is I mostly meet people who I would like to meet anyway. It's like the guy that came up to me this morning, you know, I would like to meet him in, you know, like he was, some people's like I did some reality television when I was younger, you know, for a couple of years on TV and I would meet people that I didn't know, they didn't, didn't know anything about me. It's just people that see you. And that was just, there was nothing to it that meant anything really. So to meet people where you, you, they know you somewhat and you, so you would have some common ground, you know, uh, it's really nice almost.

• 1:11:38Speaker 01

  That's one thing that's interesting, man. I feel like God has given me this weird way where it's like.

• 1:11:45Speaker 01

  He

• 1:11:48Speaker 01

  He always is trying to show me that people care about me, you know? Because I think for so long I didn't feel like anybody did, you know, when I was real, real young. And I'm not complaining, you know, I'm not complaining about it. I'm not, I don't need any self pity, I don't need anything like that.

• 1:12:05Speaker 01

  But I do think it's fascinating how, you know, he'll send people in every, you know, every now and then somebody say something, just something, it's like, it's this slow healing of this space inside of me that was just, has been uncomfortable for a long time. You know, and so, there's powerful stuff like that going on, you know, so. And, and, and sometimes I can do that for other people. You know, I know a friend of mine. He's in the military, I think his dad had some. Well, I, I, I probably shouldn't talk about, I might be talking out of shot, but. Yeah, it's just, I don't know. I, I don't know, man. I'm enjoying being alive these days a lot more because I want to see what else can unfold.

• 1:12:48Speaker 01

  You know, and I don't know if I always felt like that as a kid, I felt like more like every day was a battle, you know? Whereas now I'm like, man, every, there's, there's a lot of good stuff out there, you know? And I can be a part of it, whether it's for me or somebody else, if I can just do my best to take care of myself and keep myself. I don't even have to win every day, but dude, if I can just show up and get a strong tie, dog, you know what I'm saying? If I can even fucking tip a judge fam, you know what I'm saying, dog? And pull out that dirty W, dog, you know, then it's possible. And I wish Darren Till wouldn't have lost, honestly. No homo, bro.

• 1:13:25Jocko Willink?

  Uh, speaking of, um, fighting, what about jiu jitsu? Where are you at?

• 1:13:29Speaker 01

  I haven't gone in probably about two and a half months, I just kept getting hurt so bad.

• 1:13:33Jocko Willink?

  Who are you training with, man? You gotta get, find somebody that's gonna be a little bit more relaxed when they train with you, man.

• 1:13:37Speaker 01

  Oh dude, I'm training with locals, bro, dude. And I was one stripe white belt, man. And last time I even left because I couldn't find parking, dude, so that's kind of where I'm at right now.

• 1:13:48Jocko Willink?

  That's not a good sign. That is not a good sign.

• 1:13:50Speaker 01

  I've been taking a lot of yoga because some of it was my flexibility. And, uh, and I kept getting hurt so bad, like for me anywhere, I couldn't like, I used to do comedy, I was getting ready, we just taped a Netflix special. It's coming out in October. This one I'm proud about. I felt excited. This one is more of a reflection, I feel like of. Just more of a confident me as a comedian, you know?

• 1:14:15Jocko Willink?

  So what, what, what goes into, what goes into that? How long does it take to get ready? Who, who contacts you like, what's happening? If I, if, if Echo Charles was gonna do a Netflix special, what would it look like? How long would it take?

• 1:14:30Speaker 01

  Probably be Caribbean, I would bet, you know? No offense dude, you could be from New York. But yeah, I would probably do, yeah, something maybe tropical, you know? Maybe some ocean sounds in the back. You know, maybe get that Vietnamese guy to go by drinking that cranberry on the skateboard. You know, I would get it kinda, you know, maybe slightly urban, you know? Maybe somebody playing, you know, maybe a dog up near a chain link fence in the back. And then if you can't tell jokes, I would sing dude, I think people would enjoy that. There's something about watching a strong man sing dude, it's pretty powerful. It's kinda like Jewel, but for people on steroids, you know? Stood in the rain, you're always crazy like that. What'd you ask him?

• 1:15:14Jocko Willink?

  Netflix special, so you got a Netflix special coming out.

• 1:15:17Speaker 01

  So this is what happened.

• 1:15:18Jocko Willink?

  Last one, maybe you say you didn't feel a hundred percent on, this one you feel a hundred percent.

• 1:15:21Speaker 01

  This one I feel a lot better.

• 1:15:22Jocko Willink?

  What made you feel, but what, how'd you prepare for it?

• 1:15:25Speaker 01

  Well, one thing I had to stop doing was jujitsu, cause I kept, my ribs kept getting cracked. So I, it was just, I mean dude, you couldn't do any yoga, so when I don't do physical things to take care of myself, I start mentally feeling bad.

• 1:15:37Jocko Willink?

  Key point, by the way, key point for everybody, you just heard it from Theo. If you, if you can't do physical stuff, you're gonna start feeling bad mentally, facts. So, go do physical stuff.

• 1:15:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I have to. And it's not even fair for me anymore to evaluate myself sometimes if I haven't been physically active, because I'm not giving myself a fair chance really, you know? I have to be able to take care of myself. I have to be able to be thinking with a, a brain that's, you know, healthy, so. Yeah, so I noticed that, but anyway, they gave us a budget and we made, um... And I wanted to, I wanted to do one where I felt like this one is gonna, I'm gonna do, I'm gonna do right. And I got to hire the production, a production company. And I've gotten to go through the editing more and it's been tedious. But the, the months before it, I had a yoga instructor coming to my home every couple of days.

• 1:16:32Speaker 01

  I was doing, I had a weight trainer, I had a weight trainer.

• 1:16:37Speaker 01

  I was doing a lot of stuff to take care of myself, you know? And then where'd you dig for the material? The material, well, I'd had about six years to get some good material. The hard part was COVID. It was so fresh. At 2019, the material was ready to go. You know, it was just like a damn. I mean, it was really just like a damn newborn, like a strong newborn, you know what I'm saying? One that fucking elbow crawls out, you know, with a can of frickin' go in his arm, you know?

• 1:17:06Speaker 01

  I know. You know what I'm saying? The kind of baby that beats mom home, okay? Like, this thing was ready to go. This thing was 10 months in the, this, this thing was zygoted, baby. And then COVID hits. And then COVID hits, so then you have all this downtime. So I did move to Nashville and bought, I bought a home in Nashville and, cause the stage was still open. So I could still go and keep this material fresh enough. And then I did a couple of weeks in LA, uh, because there's a lot of stage time there. About six weeks ago, I went there for a few weeks and got it ready. And then put it down and put it down in Nashville and it was great, man. We had like 6,000 people came out. Damn. And, uh. That's massive for comedy, isn't it?

• 1:17:51Speaker 01

  It's pretty good. We did three shows of 2000. Oh, okay, yeah, right on. Yeah, otherwise it would be too big. This venue was just kind of real perfect enough to rhyme in over there and. Yeah, so it was good, man. And it was good and I, and I involved myself more in the editing. You know, I've seen a lot of the ropes now. I know when I can assert myself and, uh, sometimes I don't do it that well. Sometimes I'm too aggressive. Do they record all the shows? The first one was so bad, it was like people were heckling. We built a set that literally looked like a pedophile's, uh, like a pedophile that opened a candy shop, dude. That's how it was, okay? Was this on purpose? No.

• 1:18:32Speaker 01

  Great question though. And you still don't say anything huh?

• 1:18:38Speaker 01

  Okay, well, you know, you could listen at home, man. You're making people uncomfortable. I'm just joking, bro. You seem like a nice guy. I'm just joking because I don't have anything else to do.

• 1:18:48Jocko Willink?

  So you make this set?

• 1:18:51Speaker 01

  And it looked bad, bro. I got there. I was so angry when I saw the set. Cause I didn't make it. Somebody, I paid somebody to make it.

• 1:18:58Jocko Willink?

  What was the goal of the set?

• 1:18:59Speaker 01

  It was supposed to, the back of the Ryman has these beautiful windows. And um, we wanted to make the windows on stage, these colorful, kind of church, churchy, churchy kind of windows. And man, we didn't do it, dude. It looked like-

• 1:19:13Jocko Willink?

  So did they change it that night?

• 1:19:14Speaker 01

  It looked like a gingerbread house, dude, for John Wayne Gacy. It was like, as if he had entered a sweet GB, GB house contest before he fricking got busted. If he did it. You know what I'm saying? A lot of, if he did it.

• 1:19:30Speaker 01

  But it was so bad, bro. Even the next day, the guy came, we called him, we was like, get these fucking things out of here. And I took one of the windows and threw it out of the, over the railing outside, piece of shit. I mean, a kid could have made it. It looked like a kid's school thing. So the next night, we just went with a flat curtain, red curtain. And uh, when we carpeted the stage, which was a little interesting, I'd never done that.

• 1:19:52Jocko Willink?

  What purpose is that, sir?

• 1:19:54Speaker 01

  To take the reflection off of the stage, so it'd give us a better lighting, some better lighting opportunities.

• 1:20:01Jocko Willink?

  And then they record them all?

• 1:20:02Speaker 01

  And they recorded them all, yeah.

• 1:20:03Jocko Willink?

  And then you, depending on which night you did the best, you might take a chunk from here and a chunk from there? That's pretty much how you put it together?

• 1:20:11Speaker 01

  It's pretty much about, and yeah, we just did like two thirds from one show and one third from another. Um, the crowd was much better the second night. We had to get the, tell the people to have security. You know, or just have some control over the audience. And people wanted to be helpful, you know? And also, the uh, Netflix hit us a couple of days before and said, everybody has to have a test or a PCR. You know, or whatever, P P C R. Yeah. So that was. And I'm just grateful to everybody that came out, whether they got a test or made a fake car, whatever the hell they did, dude. And a lot of people went and got the test, man. And it just, it's just so nice, you know, um.

• 1:20:52Speaker 01

  It just, it just was, it's just so nice to go spend an extra half hour the day before you're gonna go to a show. To go and do something because you care enough, man. Um, yeah.

• 1:21:04Jocko Willink?

  Well, that's awesome. Uh, when does that come out?

• 1:21:06Speaker 01

  It'll come out in October, man. And I want to say before I forget, man, my friend Josh Colt, he's in the five twenty seventh engineer. Battalion, is that a term?

• 1:21:17Jocko Willink?

  It could be. Work, go with it.

• 1:21:19Speaker 01

  Okay. He's a commander and they's, um, they're in Kuwait and they're like working in different bases and stuff right now. And, uh. I know he's got a family that's not around and I just want to tell him I'm proud of him, man. And thank, uh, thank that whole group for their service and, uh. And thank all you guys who just can't, who have to, who can't be with your loved ones, you know, because I know they miss you and, uh, thank you.

• 1:21:39Jocko Willink?

  Right on. Uh, the podcast is called This Past Weekend.

• 1:21:43Speaker 01

  This Past Weekend. Yeah. We got, it's always nice, man. It's been a blessing and this whole little universe is a blessing. And thanks for coming through with those dimes you brought in last night, huh?

• 1:21:54Jocko Willink?

  That's my wife and daughter, bro. Take it easy.

• 1:21:58Speaker 01

  I wasn't gonna call them nickels, that's for sure.

• 1:22:00Jocko Willink?

  Cause you mentioned, cause you mentioned you were afraid, you've always had a paranoia about getting murdered.

• 1:22:04Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:22:05Jocko Willink?

  It could go down right now.

• 1:22:08Speaker 01

  Well, look, man, if anything ever happens to you, dude, I will stay far away from them even then. I'm gonna see that. No, beautiful ladies. It was nice to see, uh. Obviously they love you and it was just nice to see a little part of your life, man. It made me feel, it's just inspiring, you know? When I see other people doing the things that are like, seem like the hardest thing for me to do, to build for my own future. It's like, every time you see it, like. It just, it makes things feel a little bit more feasible or that I know if I need help, I can ask you or I can ask other people that I know care. So. It was, it was nice. I appreciate you coming out.

• 1:22:42Jocko Willink?

  Well, it's definitely feasible. It was a great show. I appreciate you being out there. Appreciate you making everyone laugh. I can already see we're gonna have to do this again. We have a little bit more time.

• 1:22:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, I would love to. I'm sorry I have to go, man.

• 1:22:52Jocko Willink?

  Five hours next time, but whatever.

• 1:22:54Speaker 01

  Dude, I don't know.

• 1:22:56Speaker 01

  I don't know, man, but we got, I would love to talk more about the stuff and talk more about other things. Hopefully I'll have some more BJJ training when I come back. So that would be something nice to talk about.

• 1:23:06Speaker 03

  Awesome, man. Let's get you out of here, brother.

• 1:23:08Speaker 01

  Echo, thank you. Nice to meet you, brother.

• 1:23:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, you too.

• 1:23:10Speaker 01

  Oh, you said it, huh?

• 1:23:13Speaker 02

  The, you know how you talk, you mentioned how like you'll run into people and you'll actually have like a little bit of a connection with them? Is, do you think that, like, you know how you share stuff openly more than a lot of people, I think? Do you think that that is an indicator that you're doing the right thing? Um, cause sometimes like, okay, so let's say if you're in the public light and people will approach you or whatever, I think sometimes they can like misrepresent who you are. They're like, oh yeah, maybe like, they feel like they know you, you got a podcast, all this stuff. And then when they, the things they say or they try to like relate to you or whatever, like they're just way off. A lot of the time, I think. Not, not necessarily in my experience.

• 1:23:56Speaker 01

  Sometimes it can be.

• 1:23:57Speaker 02

  You know, but the fact that like a random, quote unquote, random stranger can come up to you and then you guys can relate like on a significant, like kind of deep level or whatever.

• 1:24:06Speaker 01

  And to so quickly get there. That's one thing that's fascinating. I mean, you could have a moment where you're having a real moment with somebody.

• 1:24:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:24:12Speaker 01

  Like a moment that makes you feel something inside of yourself.

• 1:24:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:24:16Speaker 01

  You know, uh, and that's real. That, that to me comes from somewhere else.

• 1:24:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, it always, like, you always struck me as someone who's like so authentic. And I think that, that, that is a big indicator that you're doing the right thing. If you can really like relate to people who you've never met before that quickly.

• 1:24:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, thanks, man. Uh, yeah, I, I just, I think for feeling so dis, it's, a lot of it's so new to me, feeling connection. And so it's fucking like, being on a bridge that shakes, you know? Uh, I don't know what you guys call that in, you know?

• 1:24:50Speaker 03

  We usually call that a bridge that shakes.

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, but when you say it, it sounds way more technical, okay? It's not like people believe it, okay?

• 1:25:01Speaker 01

  But yeah, for me, a lot of that stuff is just, I'm a late, I'm a late bloomer in a lot of like, kind of, I think emotional kind of ways, honestly. Uh, and I'm not ashamed of it or anything like that, you know, um, but sometimes in a world where you want to be tougher, you know, it's, it's, uh, it feels. It feels tough to sometimes learn later in life. But yeah, I think it's nice and sometimes I don't know what role God is using me for, you know. You know, and I just want to try and keep myself the best. In the best way that I can so he can use me for the best, you know, like um.

• 1:25:41Speaker 01

  And I really, I really believe that, you know, and I don't mean it in a way like I'm some kind of hero or anything. I just. You know, if I can take care of myself well, I believe and I believe this for anybody that he that. Or you are your higher power. It doesn't, it could be whatever your higher power is can use you for good, you know. And we need more good out there and we need each other, you know. Anyway, I sound like a fucking weirdo, dog. Do I sound like a weirdo?

• 1:26:06Jocko Willink?

  Kind of.

• 1:26:07Speaker 01

  Okay, sorry.

• 1:26:08Speaker 02

  Keep being you, bro.

• 1:26:09Jocko Willink?

  No, man, I think, I think Echo's spot on. It's kind of, it kind of mimics or or reinforces what I was saying earlier. I think the reason that you're popular right now is because you reveal yourself because you're open and I think people. You're, you're a real person and I think people connect to that and, and I think it's awesome because I think it allows people to connect to themselves. So I say, keep doing what you're doing, Theo Von.

• 1:26:33Speaker 01

  Appreciate it, man, and I appreciate you guys having me, man. I really do. It's good. It's making me feel excited like I'm doing the right thing.

• 1:26:39Jocko Willink?

  Right on, brother.

• 1:26:40Speaker 01

  Gang, baby.

• 1:26:42Jocko Willink?

  And with that, Mr. Theo Von has left the building. He had to go. Bad planning on my part. He, he had a tight window. I should have got him in here earlier. Didn't, didn't make that adjustment, so he had to bail. But we're getting back. He's fired up to come back. Seemed like we were just kind of getting into some good stuff, you know, so.

• 1:27:08Jocko Willink?

  With that, it is good that Theo is, you know, he's on the path. He's working. Trying to get better, trying to be better, trying to stay on the path, sober, clean, fitness. What was he talking about? Yoga, like the whole nine yards.

• 1:27:24Speaker 02

  Some self-assessment going on.

• 1:27:25Jocko Willink?

  Self-assessment happening.

• 1:27:26Speaker 02

  There was some good stuff in there, actually, that he just sort of like mentioned.

• 1:27:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:31Speaker 02

  And I was like, wait, wait, wait, we, we could talk about, I didn't want to interrupt, obviously. But there's, um, when he mentioned the thing about your behavior and your thoughts. Like your.

• 1:27:42Jocko Willink?

  Thoughts and actions.

• 1:27:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, so your actions.

• 1:27:45Jocko Willink?

  Lead your thoughts.

• 1:27:46Speaker 02

  Lead your thoughts, yeah, yeah.

• 1:27:48Jocko Willink?

  The other way around doesn't, doesn't, I would say, if I was to assess that statement, I agree. Your actions can lead to your thoughts, I would say, more often than your thoughts lead to actions. Cause let's face it, gotta have some thoughts to come up with what you're gonna do.

• 1:28:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:28:05Jocko Willink?

  But there's a huge, huge space between having a thought and taking action. If you can close up that space, you're gonna be in a lot better position.

• 1:28:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, and he, and it felt like he was talking about something very specific, like, like, basically, it's essentially like, take action, you know?

• 1:28:24Jocko Willink?

  Yep, yep.

• 1:28:26Speaker 02

  Rather than just going around in your head. And Tim Ferriss, I think, yeah, Tim Ferriss said that too, where essentially the different way to say it, but the exact same thing is like, get out of your head and into your body.

• 1:28:38Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and he meant, and Tim mentioned that specifically around like getting out of depression. But then what Theo was saying is if he's not physically moving and doing work physically, he's gonna be in a bad place mentally. So, yeah, you're right, it's the same, same thing.

• 1:28:52Speaker 02

  Same gig, it's for sure. Unless there's a lot of stuff, yes, and you can follow up on, we can follow up on with you. And I will be looking forward to that. Nonetheless, in the meantime, bro, we're all on this path together, I think. I feel like it, I feel like we're all sorta, when we look up, we see other people on the path with us.

• 1:29:13Jocko Willink?

  Good feeling.

• 1:29:13Speaker 02

  It's a good feeling. So, I was doing some thinking about the path.

• 1:29:21Speaker 02

  These, okay, so you, when you created Jocko Fuel, you essentially made the path pretty luxurious. Cause think of, when you think about like how it was versus how it is now, right?

• 1:29:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, okay. I mean, yes, you are right.

• 1:29:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:36Jocko Willink?

  Maybe luxurious is not my favorite word.

• 1:29:39Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:29:39Jocko Willink?

  I know you maybe have that lingering in your brain from Theo Von being on here. Cause he and I had had a conversation on his podcast about luxury days, right?

• 1:29:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. Okay, so the, the, the way to put it, as far as how you called it one time, a couple of times is.

• 1:29:55Jocko Willink?

  Efficiency.

• 1:29:55Speaker 02

  Efficiency, yes, exactly right. Like, it's kind of like the logistics part of a, of a battle or a war or something, right? Where it's like, oh yeah, you want these cool new shoes that comfort your feet? Or whatever, I don't know, that's the first example I think of, but you're like, no, it's not that I need to be coddled. My feet, like, my feet are in good shape, but I can do a lot more running, a lot more rucking, you know?

• 1:30:20Jocko Willink?

  Hmm.

• 1:30:20Speaker 02

  A lot more marching.

• 1:30:22Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:30:23Speaker 02

  See what I'm saying? So you're, you kind of took that approach.

• 1:30:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:26Speaker 02

  To the path.

• 1:30:26Jocko Willink?

  You'll be more efficient, even though technically speaking, to support your perspective, if you have goods, good boots for rucking.

• 1:30:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:30:38Jocko Willink?

  They are, technically will make you more efficient and in some way that is somewhat luxurious compared to a piece of junk boots that are.

• 1:30:48Speaker 02

  Or bare feet.

• 1:30:48Jocko Willink?

  Or bare feet, damn.

• 1:30:50Speaker 02

  But one could think of it in terms of, oh, this is gonna, these bare feet is gonna make my feet tougher.

• 1:30:58Jocko Willink?

  When you say one could think of it.

• 1:31:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:02Jocko Willink?

  Is that because in high school, they're, they're telling you, you shouldn't use you, the proverbial you in a sentence?

• 1:31:09Speaker 02

  Sure, yeah. I think I got it from Fight Club, actually, to be honest.

• 1:31:14Jocko Willink?

  What did they say in Fight Club?

• 1:31:16Speaker 02

  I think he said on the plane, he said, one could make all types of explosives using

• 1:31:22Speaker 02

  ordinary household items. And then the other guy said, really? He's like, if one were so inclined.

• 1:31:29Speaker 02

  So it's like, I'm not saying me.

• 1:31:31Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:31:32Speaker 02

  I'm saying me, but I'm not saying me.

• 1:31:33Jocko Willink?

  Well, it's interesting. That's where you got, cuz I went to college and I studied English in college and you, you aren't supposed, you aren't supposed to say this is, you should do this, or you should do that. You are supposed to say, one should say, one is supposed to this. So.

• 1:31:52Speaker 02

  Right, right.

• 1:31:52Jocko Willink?

  I don't know. To me, it's, the language evolves.

• 1:31:56Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:31:57Jocko Willink?

  English evolves, and I think we're evolving to a point, and I think I evolved to a point where I say you.

• 1:32:02Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:32:02Jocko Willink?

  And I mean, you, you, you, all of you.

• 1:32:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, so in, in, that's actually, okay. That's kind of a good point. In general, because Ben, and I said this before, where it's baffling how good we can communicate. But when you think about this, all kinds, the words you say, the tone, bilingual, like all this stuff is all conveying a certain message. So if you're like, hey, he goes, I'll tell you what you should do is do this. And then there's all kinds of like, things that you imply when you say you. You don't really mean you should do this.

• 1:32:34Jocko Willink?

  You mean one.

• 1:32:35Speaker 02

  You mean, a person should do this or whatever. And I know that, but if I don't know that, I'll be like, tell me what I should. You don't know what I should and shouldn't do.

• 1:32:43Jocko Willink?

  So there's a, I'm, you have, you specifically, Echo Charles, have a really good point. And that's why the English language, technically, in the the highest level, you should be, I should be saying, one should be saying one instead of you.

• 1:33:00Speaker 02

  So, if one,

• 1:33:04Speaker 02

  I don't even know if I use that right. Right there, out of the gate, jamming it up. Anyway, if you're on the path with, you know, whether you're with somebody on the path or by yourself, or you feel like you're by yourself. It's not always gonna be easy. And to make you more efficient, we're gonna decrease the beatings, increase the recovery, so we can maximize gains. Best way I can put it at this point.

• 1:33:27Jocko Willink?

  Gains.

• 1:33:28Speaker 02

  Yes. Sure. The, so.

• 1:33:31Jocko Willink?

  Modern English.

• 1:33:32Speaker 02

  Okay, so in muscle building, right? You have the catabolic state.

• 1:33:37Jocko Willink?

  You just mean gains?

• 1:33:39Speaker 02

  You have the anabolic state, right? Catabolic, essentially, there's a lot to it, but is the breakdown of the muscle. Rest, nutrition.

• 1:33:48Speaker 02

  induces an anabolic state, right? We want to upside, we want to maximize anabolic state on this path. Catabolic state is part of the process as well. But that trans transition from catabolic to anabolic, we want that to be the luxury. We want that to be the efficient part of it. Am I right?

• 1:34:08Jocko Willink?

  Catabolic.

• 1:34:09Speaker 02

  No, bro, anabolic.

• 1:34:11Jocko Willink?

  Catabolic is bad.

• 1:34:14Jocko Willink?

  There was a funny guy in one of my platoons where when he would get hungry, he'd be, you know, he'd be walking. Dude, we need to go get some food. I'm going catabolic right now. One of those. That's why I said it leaked back out.

• 1:34:26Speaker 02

  All right, well, either way, we got some stuff for you. All right. So Jocko Fuel. Let's talk about discipline, the energy drink, new era, new era of of energy drink. We no longer have to pay a price for enjoying energy drinks.

• 1:34:40Jocko Willink?

  Positivity.

• 1:34:41Speaker 02

  Good tasting.

• 1:34:42Jocko Willink?

  Positive.

• 1:34:43Speaker 02

  Uh, uh, gives you the boost mentally and physically.

• 1:34:46Jocko Willink?

  Positive, positive.

• 1:34:47Speaker 02

  And makes you more healthy.

• 1:34:48Jocko Willink?

  Positive.

• 1:34:49Speaker 02

  It's a health drink.

• 1:34:50Jocko Willink?

  That's you. You have something that has no downside.

• 1:34:53Speaker 02

  No downside.

• 1:34:53Jocko Willink?

  Which is kind of crazy. Normally, everything has a trade off. Here, no trade off.

• 1:34:57Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:34:58Jocko Willink?

  Just pure upside.

• 1:34:59Speaker 02

  Pure upside.

• 1:35:00Jocko Willink?

  Pure upside.

• 1:35:01Speaker 02

  Kind of like salmon sashimi.

• 1:35:03Jocko Willink?

  Pure upside.

• 1:35:04Speaker 02

  Pure upside. Tastes good, good for you. Uh, you're better off, good for you. Yeah.

• 1:35:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:35:08Speaker 02

  It's the whole deal.

• 1:35:08Jocko Willink?

  Pure upside.

• 1:35:09Speaker 02

  So, yes, in the can.

• 1:35:13Speaker 02

  Mango. Okay, this is my opinion. Okay, I'll admit mango is the best one, straight up.

• 1:35:19Speaker 02

  Factually. Factually, in my opinion.

• 1:35:22Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:35:22Speaker 02

  All right, either way, um, either way, also for your joint stuff, you you don't want to have to worry about your joints. Joint, where for super krill oil, also vitamin D and cold weather, this is for your immunity. So, look, when you consider that these things are taken care of on this path, you are more efficient, more healthy, more efficient, mental, physical boost.

• 1:35:42Jocko Willink?

  And as you normally point out, these are things you don't want to have to worry about.

• 1:35:44Speaker 02

  Correct.

• 1:35:45Jocko Willink?

  You don't want to be thinking about your joints. You don't want to be thinking about getting sick. You just, you want that stuff to be handled.

• 1:35:51Speaker 02

  Handle.

• 1:35:52Jocko Willink?

  Handle it. Just handle it. That's what we're saying.

• 1:35:55Speaker 02

  Yep, it's true. Also, speaking of anabolic protein, it's part of the nutrition profile of gains, as it were.

• 1:36:04Speaker 02

  So Molk, additional protein in the form of a dessert, another one of these up win, win, win scenarios.

• 1:36:10Jocko Willink?

  Upside, upside, upside.

• 1:36:11Speaker 02

  Tastes good.

• 1:36:12Jocko Willink?

  All upside.

• 1:36:13Speaker 02

  All this stuff.

• 1:36:13Jocko Willink?

  Tastes good.

• 1:36:14Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:36:14Jocko Willink?

  Is good. Good for you. Just upside across the board.

• 1:36:17Speaker 02

  Exactly right. And don't forget about Jocko White Tea. If you're into tea, the OG.

• 1:36:22Jocko Willink?

  Or if you're good at deadlifting.

• 1:36:23Speaker 02

  Deadlifting as well, yes, for sure. So yes, you can get all these things at the Vitamin Shoppe. Energy drinks you can get at Wawa, of course. And also, everything is on jockofuel.com.

• 1:36:36Jocko Willink?

  Hey, also, if you wanna, if you want this stuff to come to your house all the time without having to think about it, if you want that taken care of, if you subscribe to any of these things, then we'll ship it to your house for free, which is amazing. And it might be not be, seem amazing in this day and age, because there's some really big companies in the world that do this. But it is amazing that you could, without ever thinking about it again.

• 1:37:02Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:37:03Jocko Willink?

  Have super krill oil, Molk, joint warfare, disciplined go, showing up at your house, you never thought about it again. You, it just happened.

• 1:37:12Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:37:13Jocko Willink?

  What a miracle.

• 1:37:14Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:37:14Jocko Willink?

  What an amazing thing. Subscribe.

• 1:37:16Speaker 02

  Yep. And life is full of these little miracles from time to time. Speaking of miracles, Origin USA, American-made stuff. And when I say stuff, because there's a lot of stuff. There's jujitsu stuff, all made in America.

• 1:37:29Jocko Willink?

  Gears, rash cards.

• 1:37:31Speaker 02

  Yep. Jeans, boots, compression stuff. Um, originusa.com, go there. All the stuff on there is American-made, from the cotton that's grown all the way up until the final product.

• 1:37:46Speaker 02

  That's a miracle too, in my opinion.

• 1:37:48Jocko Willink?

  In this day and age, it is a miracle. In this day and age, it is a miracle to put something on your body that is 100% without compromise, made in America, and it's the best thing you could possibly buy anyways.

• 1:37:58Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:37:59Jocko Willink?

  Talk about upside. Get the best gear, support America, support American workers. It's upside across the board.

• 1:38:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:07Jocko Willink?

  We're working on big time upside. That's what we're doing. No downside.

• 1:38:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, speaking of upside, so I do have my first pair of Delta 68 jeans.

• 1:38:17Jocko Willink?

  Finally you realize.

• 1:38:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, so here's what that did with the, you know, you know how like you, what do you call it? When you build something up in your mind, finally when it comes, you have this, you know, it didn't measure up or did it not?

• 1:38:28Jocko Willink?

  You have the high expectations.

• 1:38:29Speaker 02

  Yep, so did it measure up? Here's the thing, it did, they do measure up. In fact, they more than measure up. Cause you know how like you'll say, okay, they kind of have a stretch to them.

• 1:38:40Speaker 02

  Cool, they have a stretch to them. But when I, since I don't really have any stretchy jeans or any jeans with a stretch to them, I don't really know what that even means when I put them on, you know?

• 1:38:51Speaker 02

  But it's nice, it's good. It's like, in fact, it's hard to go back now.

• 1:38:55Jocko Willink?

  Oh, there is no going back.

• 1:38:57Speaker 02

  That's what I'm saying, yeah. So yeah, dang, impressive. I didn't know so much could go into jeans. I knew stuff goes into jeans, I understand.

• 1:39:04Jocko Willink?

  What's weird is you, it's hard to understand how much better something could be.

• 1:39:07Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:39:08Jocko Willink?

  It's hard to imagine. If you don't know, you just don't know. It's hard to imagine how much better they can be than a normal pair of jeans.

• 1:39:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:39:15Jocko Willink?

  And again, to be made in America with American cotton.

• 1:39:19Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:39:20Jocko Willink?

  And American buttons.

• 1:39:21Speaker 02

  Yep. American hands, as it were.

• 1:39:23Jocko Willink?

  American hands.

• 1:39:24Speaker 02

  Exactly right. So yes, originusa.com, that's the spot right there. Also, Jaco's store, it's called Jaco's store. So you go to jacostore.com and this is where you can get.

• 1:39:39Speaker 02

  Trying to think of a more interesting way to, to properly convey the cool stuff you can get. But at the end of the day, you can just get your t-shirts, hats, hoodies that represent the path.

• 1:39:51Speaker 02

  I think that's the best way to put it. Discipline equals freedom, good. Take the high ground or the high ground will take you.

• 1:39:58Speaker 02

  Some good stuff on there.

• 1:39:59Jocko Willink?

  That's a t-shirt, by the way, is what you're saying.

• 1:40:01Speaker 02

  Yes, sir.

• 1:40:01Jocko Willink?

  Hey, subscribe to this podcast. And we also have some other podcasts. Got Jaco Unraveling with Daryl Cooper. We got the Grounded Podcast, we got the Warrior Kid Podcast. Theo Von has a podcast, check it out, it's called This Past Weekend. And he talks about stuff and it's both funny and revealing and could help you. I like listening to it, so check that one out.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  We're, um, me and Kerry were talking during the break where Theo has this.

• 1:40:31Speaker 02

  It's pretty unique quality about him where he's like funny, but he's so authentic and open about the even not so funny parts of, you know, and I think some people they'll try to do this and they'll try to like, quote unquote, pull it off, but they lack the full authenticity.

• 1:40:49Jocko Willink?

  So they try and pull off the authenticity?

• 1:40:51Speaker 02

  Yes, and which is kind of a, what do you call it, catch 22. Like if you're trying to pull off authenticity, that's in and of itself makes it not authentic. Yeah, exactly right. But Theo is like a naturally, well, it seems nat- like he's a naturally authentic person.

• 1:41:05Jocko Willink?

  It sounds like from what you're saying, though, he wasn't always like that and he had to sort of open up about it over time.

• 1:41:11Speaker 02

  Okay, so, and this is what we're talking about, where a lot of times where if you have the, being funny to people legitimately is, it's kind of like a superpower. Like, you can essentially bestow one of the best feelings onto a person and make them laugh, right? That's one of the best feelings you can ever have is like laughing legitimately. And you have that as a superpower, you're just a funny person, right? So a lot of people, um, whether they have like internal issues or not, that starts to become the, the front running quality where they're always pushing that forward. You know, they're always leading with that, leading with that. And it's always successful. Meanwhile, the other stuff on the inside gets protected.

• 1:41:54Speaker 02

  You know, so anytime someone feels awkward or anytime someone feels vulnerable, even scared or whatever, anything that they don't like, they can just boom, they can bust out the comedy and they'll be protected. In fact, they'll get a payoff from it. They won't just be protected, you know? But after a while, the stuff on the inside becomes more and more sensitive, you know? Where if, if even if it's exposed this much, it's like, whoa, the reaction is a little bit, a lot stronger, you know? But Theo does a good job in like opening up and exposing that a little bit. And at the end of the day, as an audience, well, if I'm speaking for myself, it's kind of like you just like him more.

• 1:42:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, he's a very likable guy and he, part of the reason that he's likable is because he is like that, like what you're saying. And he, I even, the, last night I went and saw him do his, do a comedy stand-up routine. Is that what it's called?

• 1:42:46Jocko Willink?

  Well, I saw him do it and, and what's cool is like, you could see he's not, um, like he's-

• 1:42:55Jocko Willink?

  He's real up there like he's saying something he'd be like, I don't even know why I'm saying, you know what I mean? He's like, I don't even know why I'm saying this. He did it a couple of times today. He's like, I don't even know what I'm talking about right now. He did that a couple of times. We were like, okay, well, at least we know that we're getting the real, a real person. It's not just a big memorized script that, you know, where it's all a big front. Right? We don't want the front.

• 1:43:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, like a lot of times if you're just talking with your friend and you go off on some tangent or something, that's the kind of stuff you're gonna say to your friend, you know, or your friends behind closed doors, you know, just like in your own little environment. But ah, shoot, sometimes I don't know what I'm talking about, you know, but he's like so open with that. And I don't mean open like he's like making this huge effort to be open. He's just naturally, it's like, yeah.

• 1:43:40Jocko Willink?

  He's a good guy, man. I've spent some time with him and definitely a really good, authentic, nice, funny guy, man. I really like him a lot. I'm glad he was able to come on. You know, another podcast that there is out there is called Jaco Underground.com. This is the one where in the event of contingencies happening where the world goes crazier.

• 1:44:07Jocko Willink?

  Cause let's face it, the world's getting a little crazy right now. Let's say it gets crazier and they either start, I don't know, maybe they start injecting advertisements into the middle of this podcast or they start, maybe they start banning parts of this podcast. I don't know what they're gonna do. I do know this, right now, everyone's being pretty cool to us, but there might come a time where they're, where they say, hey, we don't want you to do that, or we, you're gonna follow our rules. So we have a contingency. In the event that that happens, we have a place to go, Jaco Underground.com. We're building it. If you want to join it, you can go to Jaco Underground.com. It costs eight dollars and eighteen cents a month. And for that price, you give us all a little bit of security in case the contingencies come.

• 1:44:52Jocko Willink?

  It's like an insurance policy against podcast apocalypto. And if that comes, a lot of podcasts will be like, well, I guess you're just gonna have to listen to an advertisement about a freaking mattress for seven minutes. We're not gonna put you into that podcast apocalypto. We're gonna be there, just doing what we're doing. So we appreciate that. If you can't afford that and you still wanna be a supporter, you can email [email protected]. That way you can get, you can get into the underground, which is where you wanna be. We got a YouTube channel too, by the way.

• 1:45:24Speaker 02

  It's true. Verified, by the way. For the video version of this podcast, you wanna see what feel looks like, if you don't know? I think a lot of us already know, but if you don't know, boom, you can see that. Video podcast is increasingly becoming kind of the way to, you know, to watch, listen to the podcast. So yeah, we have a YouTube channel for that.

• 1:45:45Jocko Willink?

  It's called Jocko Podcast. This is the name of the YouTube channel, correct?

• 1:45:48Speaker 02

  Correct.

• 1:45:49Jocko Willink?

  And Origin USA also has one. If you wanna see what's going on behind the scenes up there. I also have an album, Believe It or Not.

• 1:45:56Jocko Willink?

  It's almost like I made an album. You made it.

• 1:46:00Speaker 02

  Yep, we collectively made it.

• 1:46:02Jocko Willink?

  You kinda made it though. I just talked.

• 1:46:04Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:46:05Jocko Willink?

  Anyways, if you want to get through maybe a temporary moment of weakness, you can press play on your MP3 player of choice and you can listen to Psychological Warfare. Give you a little boost. Give you a little help getting through that thing.

• 1:46:19Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 1:46:20Jocko Willink?

  It's also a good way to support. Flipside Canvas, you wanna hang something on your wall? A graphic image that says good? By the way, you can go and buy a fake one from, you know, one of these various places.

• 1:46:36Speaker 02

  Various fake places.

• 1:46:36Jocko Willink?

  That are just jacking.

• 1:46:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:46:38Jocko Willink?

  They have the whole good thing written out. They sell it on a t-shirt. They sell it on a print. And I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about them, plurally, because there's a lot of people.

• 1:46:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, it is weird.

• 1:46:48Jocko Willink?

  Super whack.

• 1:46:49Speaker 02

  A lot of times those though, you can, all you gotta do is think for one second. Just think for one second, like, would they really sell this, you know? And then call it this? It makes very little sense.

• 1:46:59Jocko Willink?

  Oh, so you're saying it's easy to see through the fake?

• 1:47:02Speaker 02

  All you gotta do is pause for one second and you can see it real quick. It'll say, oh, Navy SEAL Jocko Willink motivational shirt.

• 1:47:10Jocko Willink?

  Okay, yeah, that's pretty awesome. I never thought of it that way.

• 1:47:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, and that's what they, and so it's like, man, and they're on these like, you know, if you're going to whatever freaking dot net thing that you never heard of.

• 1:47:23Jocko Willink?

  But there's some that you've heard of too. There's some that you've heard of. Like that ma- that sell these various T-shirts and posters and whatnot.

• 1:47:31Speaker 02

  Yeah, the only Jaco shirts official, the only place you can get them is Jaco store.com. I can't think of one single other place you can get them. Oh, if you come into Victory, I'm a man fitness. You can get one here too.

• 1:47:44Jocko Willink?

  That's true. Uh, so, so check that out. And if you want something to hang on your wall, like a, like a picture, poster, Dakota Meyer, this is his company, man, flipsidecanvas.com. Go check that out. Hang some cool stuff on your wall. Books, got a bunch of books, Final Spin.

• 1:48:01Jocko Willink?

  I don't know what to tell you. We're not even sure. I'm not even sure. You know, you know, you, you, you put something out there in the world. You don't know what their reaction, the reaction of the world's gonna be. It might be good, might be bad. So far, we're doing pretty good. Deb?

• 1:48:13Speaker 02

  Sure, Deb.

• 1:48:14Jocko Willink?

  Deb, she's, she was, she was moved. Let's put it to you that way. Final Spin, I got that book coming out. Leadership Strategy and Tactics Field Manual, The Code, The Evaluation of Protocols, Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. Way of the Warrior Kid, one, two, three, and four. Get the book for the kids that you know. Just get them on the path. Mikey and the Dragons, if there's a little kid you know, get them that book. About Face by Hackworth, I wrote the foreword on the new version and Extreme Ownership and the Economy of Leadership that I wrote with my brother Leif Babin. We also have Echelon Front. It's a leadership consultancy and we solve problems through leadership. Go to echelonfront.com for details on that. You can also come to one of our live events. We have the muster, we have field training exercise, we have EF Battlefield.

• 1:48:59Jocko Willink?

  The next muster is in Las Vegas. It's October 28th and 29th. So if you want to come check that out, we will see you there. We also have an online training situation. Extreme Ownership Academy, Online Leadership Course. We just, we just recorded a bunch of new leadership courses. So check that out. It's like going to the gym, man. You don't get goo- you don't get in shape one day in the gym. You don't become a good leader one book that you read. You gotta go to the gym. Extreme ownership.com. Come check out the Leadership Gym. And if you want to help service members, active and retired, their families, Gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom.

• 1:49:41Jocko Willink?

  Mama Lee, she's got a charity organization. And if you want to donate, or you want to get involved to what she is doing to help out, then go to Americas Mighty Warriors.org. And if you want more of my dreary, divulging, or you need more of Echo's extraneous assertions, you can find us on the interwebs, on Twitter, on the Gram, on Facebook, Echo's at Echo Charles, I am at Jocko Willink, and Theo Von, well, he is at Theo Von. And thanks to Theo Von for coming on the show. Thanks for making us all laugh. There's plenty of darkness in the world,

• 1:50:21Jocko Willink?

  and I know sometimes he shares some of that darkness. But in doing so, he brings some light and laughter as well. So, thank you, Theo Von. And to all the folks out there in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, that are right now, right now, while we're sitting in this air conditioned podcast thing, there are folks right now out protecting our way of life, and we thank you for it. We could not do what we do without you doing what you do. And the same goes for police and law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, and all first responders. You protect

• 1:51:03Jocko Willink?

  us here at home. And again, we couldn't do what we do without you doing your jobs every day. So, thanks to you all as well. And thanks to everyone else that's listening. And listen,

• 1:51:18Jocko Willink?

  we got struggles in life. We got them. And it can be a scrap, it can be a fight, it can be painful, and it can be a battle. But the battle will be a little easier if you have some fun. So, when you can, don't take it all too seriously. Crack a joke. Have a laugh.

• 1:51:46Jocko Willink?

  And then go out and do what you need to do, which is, of course, continue to get after it. And until next time, the Zeko and Jaco out.