351: SEALS, Spec Ops, and Psychedelics w/ Marcus & Amber Capone

The story and life lessons from US Navy SEAL, Marcus Capone. Fighting TBI, PTSD, and Demons with Psychedelic medicine. 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 351 with me Jocko Willink.

• 0:07Jocko Willink?

  Master Sergeant Andrew Christian Marcassano was born in Phoenix, Arizona on October 22nd, 1986. He graduated from San Luis Obispo High School in 2004, joined the Army in 2005 as an infantryman. Master Sergeant Marcassano's first assignment was in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, where he served in the 2nd of the 508th, 82nd Airborne Division. Rose through the ranks from rifleman to squad leader while at Fort Bragg, he deployed to Afghanistan in 2007 and 2009.

• 0:46Jocko Willink?

  In 2011, he was assigned to Hunter Army Airfield in Georgia. In 2013, Master Sergeant Marcassano was deployed again to Afghanistan. In 2013, he attended Special Forces Assessment and Selection at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. And he was selected to attend the Q course there. He graduated in 2015 as a Special Forces Weapons Sergeant, assigned to 2nd Battalion 7th Special Forces Group.

• 1:18Jocko Willink?

  Master Sergeant Marcassano deployed again to Afghanistan as a Senior Weapons Sergeant on ODA 7223, and in 2016 to Columbia.

• 1:33Jocko Willink?

  Master Sergeant Marcassano's schools included Basic Airborne Course, Modern Army Combatives Level 1 and 2 Ranger Indoctrination Program, Small Unit Ranger Tactics Course, Warrior Leaders Course, Basic Non-Commissioned Officer Course, Advanced Leaders Course, Ranger Course, SER, Free Fall Parachutist Course, and the Special Forces Weapons Sergeant Qualifications Course.

• 2:03Jocko Willink?

  Master Sergeant Marcassano's awards include the Silver Star, the Army Commendation Medal, the Army Achievement Medal, Valorous Unit Award, Army Good Conduct Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Afghan Campaign Medal, Combat Infantryman's Badge, Ranger Tab, Special Forces Tab, Parachute Badge, Military Free Fall Parachutist Badge.

• 2:30Jocko Willink?

  Master Sergeant Marcusano had a wife and three children, Riley, Andrew, and Madeline.

• 2:40Jocko Willink?

  And his friends that served with him alongside him called him "The Real Captain America."

• 2:51Jocko Willink?

  And in early July 2020, he sent some of those friends a message.

• 2:58Jocko Willink?

  He said, "Text me. I told you before, my door is open. My phone is at hand. We did things that people make movies about and in some cases, writers and producers wouldn't even try to write our story.

• 3:14Jocko Willink?

  But the rucksack is heavy. And when it gets heavy, we help each other.

• 3:20Jocko Willink?

  But you have to reach out. Don't let the valley win."

• 3:31Jocko Willink?

  So that's Andrew Marcusano.

• 3:37Jocko Willink?

  The kind of guy that we all look up to.

• 3:44Jocko Willink?

  Kind of guy that's looking out for us, kind of guy that we see as strong and unflappable.

• 3:52Jocko Willink?

  Kind of guy that's helping others and of course couldn't possibly need any help himself.

• 4:04Jocko Willink?

  But a few days after sending that message to his friends and comrades on July 6, 2020,

• 4:11Jocko Willink?

  Andy Marcusano killed himself.

• 4:22Jocko Willink?

  Which is a nightmare.

• 4:30Jocko Willink?

  And it's only one of thousands of these cases. And we've talked about some of them on this podcast. We talked to Sarah Wilkinson about her husband Chad,

• 4:46Jocko Willink?

  who committed suicide after multiple combat deployments with the SEAL teams. We talked with Mike Hayes about a friend of ours named Joe Price, another SEAL.

• 4:57Jocko Willink?

  This one who killed himself in the middle of a deployment.

• 5:05Jocko Willink?

  And the list goes on and on in every branch, and it's not a new problem. On this podcast, we discussed Charles White Whittlesley,

• 5:18Jocko Willink?

  Medal of Honor recipient, World War I,

• 5:23Jocko Willink?

  who killed himself after returning home.

• 5:30Jocko Willink?

  We discussed the awful suicide of Louis Puller Jr., son of Chesty Puller,

• 5:38Jocko Willink?

  who was wounded in Vietnam and fought off the darkness for 25 years before finally losing his battle with the demons.

• 5:55Jocko Willink?

  But there are people that overcome.

• 6:01Jocko Willink?

  There are people that find a way to push through and push on and begin to truly live again.

• 6:12Jocko Willink?

  And there are many ways to get there. And tonight, it's an honor to have Amber and Marcus Capone with us, two people who have found a path.

• 6:28Jocko Willink?

  A path out of the darkness, a path toward the light, and they're doing their best to share it with as many people as they can. Marcus was a SEAL. For 13 years, completed multiple deployments overseas and his wife, Amber, also here, who stuck with him through all that and much more. And from everything I can tell, she eventually saved him from himself. Amber, Marcus, thanks for, uh, thanks for coming on. I know it's a heavy topic and I know you are in the trenches every day dealing with

• 7:10Jocko Willink?

  this and trying to help people out. So thanks for coming on here to share your story and, and hopefully guide some other people in the right direction. Um, I guess we just start at the beginning. Like, uh, I guess start with Marcus. Your, your childhood, where'd you grow up? What was that all about?

• 7:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, first, thanks for that introduction. That was, uh, wow. I just, wow.

• 7:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Powerful. You know, one of, one of my most, um, you know, every, every single Marine knows who Chesty Puller is. Probably the most iconic Marine of all time. Um, if not, he's definitely in the top two or three. And yet no one knows about his son. Or I shouldn't say no one, very few people know about his son. And well, it's, I think it's one of the most tragic stories in history about what happened to his son. And Louis Puller Jr. Coming out of Vietnam, so severely wounded, but I mean, he like kinda got it together eventually and wrote a Pulitzer Prize winning book, which is an incredible book and. Just kind of fell apart at the end.

• 8:24Jocko Willink?

  And we should, that should be, you know, he, people should know at least as much about him as they do about his dad. Because if that's not a warning, then I don't know what is.

• 8:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, Jaco, I think that's a good point. And that story in particular is that, you know, I'm good right now and guys are good, but it took him, you know, 25 years, you know, he wrote Pulitzer Prize book, seemed like he was okay, but I feel we've all come to this point and even, you know, you go do this treatment that we're going to talk about. It doesn't mean you're healed forever. You don't go to the gym or go downstairs to work out and think you're going to be a black belt for a day. And you're trying every day, right? And so I think in this healing process, it's, you know, I don't want to call us damaged, but we came to a point where we needed some help to climb out of some darkness.

• 9:16Speaker 01

  And so I have to work on it every day, literally every day, probably forever. And so I, you know, you mentioning that story, I think is important for people to hear, like this is not a one and done, it's not a panacea, you know, this is, this is forever. Right? And this is forever. And so we gotta work on ourselves every day forever. Otherwise, you know, we don't want to end up,

• 9:39Speaker 01

  you know, underground too early, so.

• 9:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 9:46Jocko Willink?

  So let's talk about how you got here, how you got here, sitting here today. Where'd you grow up?

• 9:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I was, uh, I was born in Queens, New York. Moved to the island when I was, Long Island, when I was three and, you know, I thought I was just like a typical Long Island kid. I played everything, you know, my dad and my grandfather both played college sports, basketball, baseball, football. So I literally, I think I had a ball in my hand at, you know, two or three years old. I was on skis at three. I was in the water at four.

• 10:25Speaker 01

  We had one of the top wrestling programs in New York and so I was like on a mat at like seven, you know, and most of those places you didn't get to wrestle, like junior high or maybe even high school. And so, you know, I was lucky. And I grew up in a beach town in Long Beach, New York. And so, you know, I was always in the water, always on the beach. I was a lifeguard at 16. Um, yeah, I mean, I thought life was good. And, you know, I know.

• 10:50Jocko Willink?

  That sounds like a pretty freaking good life.

• 10:51Speaker 01

  No, I mean, it was, yeah, it was, it was, you know, at least I thought it was good.

• 10:54Jocko Willink?

  Both your, both your, uh, your, your dad and your granddad were athletes? You said like?

• 11:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, they were, they were athletes. My, uh, my grandfather was an all-state basketball player.

• 11:04Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:04Speaker 01

  Um, white dude too, from New York, which is, you know, to play basketball. And, and, I mean, I'll, I'll brag, I think New York's got some of the best basketball in the world. So, you know, we, we played, played in tough leagues. Um, and then my dad was more, uh, football and baseball. So he, he started as a freshman in high school, uh, which was huge in, in the Catholic High School League. So I went to all-boys Catholic High School, where he went Holy Cross and Flushing.

• 11:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 11:31Speaker 01

  As a shout-out. And, um, yeah, so I just-

• 11:35Jocko Willink?

  I don't know if I'm cut out for that all-boys scenario.

• 11:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, maybe it's why, why I'm here today. Who knows?

• 11:42Jocko Willink?

  Um. Hey, what about like grades and stuff? Were you doing good in school?

• 11:45Speaker 01

  I was, I was good in school. I was really good up until high school. And I, I slipped a little bit. So I was like a straight-

• 11:52Jocko Willink?

  Were you still in an all-boys school in high school?

• 11:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, high school was all-boys. So I went to public grammar and middle school-

• 11:58Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 11:59Speaker 01

  -in Long Island. And then I went to all-boys Catholic High School in, back in New York. So I took the train for an hour every day. Uh, the football coach, um, at the time would pick me up in Valley Stream. So I-

• 12:11Jocko Willink?

  What, what year is this?

• 12:12Speaker 01

  So this is ninety-

• 12:14Jocko Willink?

  Like, what year did you graduate from high school?

• 12:15Speaker 01

  Ninety-four.

• 12:15Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 12:16Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so, um, yeah, I would, I would take the train at like five fifty in the morning. He'd pick me up at six thirty, the coach, and then he'd drive me in, um, the rest of the way. So that was just normal back then. Um, you know, some people don't understand it now, but the Catholic High School League and everything was good. And I didn't, uh, I grew up in a town that didn't have a great public high school. And, um, again, I was, you know, I was all about sports. So wherever they had the best sports, I was, I was going, I was going.

• 12:50Jocko Willink?

  What'd, what'd your dad do for a living?

• 12:52Speaker 01

  Um, you know, he, he kinda, just a bit of a hustler, really. Never, um, never finished college.

• 13:01Speaker 02

  Like, men's so smart, though.

• 13:03Speaker 01

  Super smart, you know, was really into the market and, but just never applied himself. Um-

• 13:10Speaker 01

  He uh, he winded up, I think the last twenty years, he was a bridge operator. So he literally opened and closed a drawbridge in the county and you know, he worked for the county and

• 13:21Speaker 02

  Well, the funny thing is whenever my, I think my uncle Shane asked me, what does Marcus's dad do? And I asked you or asked him or something. He goes, tell him I work for the union. Just leave it at that.

• 13:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, for the union. Well, he used to tell people he was a bridge engineer.

• 13:41Speaker 01

  It sounded better than telling him that he was uh, opening and closing a drawbridge and um, and then on the side, he moonlighted, he um, he drove for people. So he would drive for um.

• 13:55Speaker 02

  Elected officials.

• 13:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, but um, who, I'm, I'm drawing a blank. From New York.

• 14:01Jocko Willink?

  Something like governor?

• 14:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, you know, just a few like, kinda.

• 14:05Jocko Willink?

  So he had like a link, he had like a town, Lincoln Town Car and he was getting.

• 14:08Speaker 01

  Literally had a square Lincoln Town Car. That was handed down to me.

• 14:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 14:14Speaker 01

  VA sucked gas, it was awesome.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  I love that thing.

• 14:19Jocko Willink?

  And what about your mom? Was she around?

• 14:21Speaker 01

  You hit it right on the head. Yeah, yeah, mom worked for a dentist for over thirty years. So she was uh, she was at the front, answering the phone, you know, paying the bills, greeting everyone. So I had free, free dental growing up, which was nice, right?

• 14:36Jocko Willink?

  And what about brothers and sisters?

• 14:37Speaker 01

  None.

• 14:38Jocko Willink?

  You're only child?

• 14:39Speaker 01

  I was only child. I had a, I have a half sister I've never met.

• 14:42Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm.

• 14:42Speaker 01

  Um, and well, at least that I, I, well, I can't remember. Well, I mean, I, we, I mean, I never, I can't, I don't remember that.

• 14:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:52Speaker 01

  So it was like less than one when I think they separated us. But uh, yeah, other than that, it was just me. So spoiled, spoiled only child.

• 14:59Jocko Willink?

  And total, and the focus was just on sports?

• 15:01Speaker 01

  It was all on sports. And you know, and academics. My dad was, he was an academic. And you know, I would literally get like backhanded if I came home with like, you know, a B.

• 15:11Speaker 02

  That's the part of his childhood.

• 15:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a part that, you know, that may not have been.

• 15:16Speaker 02

  Very, very hard dad.

• 15:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, dad, dad was hard, right? So um.

• 15:19Jocko Willink?

  What do you think was driving that in your dad? Cause it sounds like he's kinda laid back in a way. Or is he just pouring all of his dreams into you?

• 15:25Speaker 01

  I think that. I think you hit it. I he, I think you hit that on the head. Yeah, my parents went to Woodstock. I mean, they were like, they were like hippies, sorta hippies, you know, mom used to protest the war. Um, but yeah, he had like a real mean side and his grand, his dad, my grandfather was even meaner. Um, I think he told me what before noon, he'd already, he would already drank like two quarts of beer. You know, courts back in the day. Um, and then he owned, they owned, uh, like his family owned a bunch of the, um, I guess medallion, like a cabs in New York.

• 15:56Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 15:57Speaker 01

  You know, components from New York, right? Um, and so I don't know how he was treated as a kid. Well, I'll tell you how he, he was sent away to boarding school. All boys Catholic boarding school.

• 16:08Jocko Willink?

  This is your dad.

• 16:08Speaker 01

  It was my dad in the Bronx at four years old. So, I mean, if you and I think back at four, kind of love we had from our parents, his sent him away. Uh, to Catholic boarding school in the Bronx and I could just imagine what went on there from, you know, some of the, some of the individuals that, you know, we're hearing about now, all these stories these days. So maybe he had some shit, uh, that he was, he was getting out on me. Um, possibly, right?

• 16:40Jocko Willink?

  What do you, but it sounds like he just wanted you to be successful in a big way.

• 16:44Speaker 01

  It was all about me. Yeah. He like, they hung up their life to, he was at every practice, literally. Um, you know, right there cheering, watching.

• 16:54Jocko Willink?

  Did he yell at the referees?

• 16:55Speaker 01

  Yelling. No, that was my mom.

• 16:57Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 16:59Speaker 01

  So, no, he would, he would backhand me if, if something just didn't seem right. And she would get thrown out at a little league world series because she was screaming at the freaking umpire about a call and they actually did get thrown out. Like she had to leave the stadium.

• 17:13Jocko Willink?

  Hell, yeah.

• 17:14Speaker 01

  In the little league.

• 17:15Jocko Willink?

  I say, hell, yeah. I like people, I don't know why people get the impression that I would like be, uh, yelling and screaming, but I'd never like for my kids played sports. I would just, I wouldn't say anything. I wouldn't even coach them. I wouldn't even, but well, maybe occasionally, but most of the time I would just sit there and watch because it's hard to coach your own kids, man. They don't.

• 17:35Jocko Willink?

  They don't really want to listen to you, so.

• 17:36Speaker 01

  No, no, no matter how much you know.

• 17:38Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  You're just telling me the story downstairs.

• 17:40Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 17:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I was telling him, my son was doing jujitsu. I've been doing jujitsu at this point. I've been doing jujitsu for like 25 years. And my son, I'm watching him roll and he's got an arm lock on somebody. And I say, hey, you know, you need to get your hips a little further underneath that elbow. And he looks at me and he goes, no, you don't. And I'm like, okay, fair enough. Bastard. Not gonna listen to anything. But so you, so you, your grades are good. You sound like a freaking good model kid.

• 18:09Speaker 01

  I was a good kid, but I think that was the problem too. I was like, I was, I was, I was too nice. I'm still a little too nice. But um, yeah, so I got, you know, I was skinny too. So I was skinny, nice kid. That also got put ahead, not held back like, like we do in Texas. We hold back our kids.

• 18:27Jocko Willink?

  Texas, the kids like 17 years old, going as freshmen.

• 18:29Speaker 01

  Absolutely. I mean, you have to.

• 18:32Speaker 02

  Our son graduated with someone who was turning 20.

• 18:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 18:35Speaker 01

  I mean, you have to, you know, you have to pass for 3,000 yards.

• 18:39Speaker 01

  They call it the Texas gray shirt.

• 18:42Speaker 01

  No, instead I got put ahead early for whatever reason. And so I was with older kids, skinny, nice kid. And uh, yeah, I got, I definitely got abused.

• 18:54Jocko Willink?

  Just picked on.

• 18:55Speaker 01

  Picked on constantly. I think some people call that rite of passage. I think it was a little bit of both. But uh, it wasn't fun.

• 19:02Jocko Willink?

  What kind of music did you like?

• 19:05Speaker 01

  Growing up in New York, like in Queens, um. Everything, rap. Like uh, Beastie Boys, right, from Brooklyn?

• 19:17Speaker 01

  Guns N' Roses.

• 19:19Jocko Willink?

  So just your kind of normal.

• 19:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:22Jocko Willink?

  Music.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, it wasn't.

• 19:23Jocko Willink?

  For late 80s, early 90s, get some.

• 19:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, but then I got into like some other stuff in high school, like um. Trying to think like kinda Lollapalooza-esque music Pearl Jam, you know, everything that was coming out of Seattle.

• 19:38Jocko Willink?

  That's right.

• 19:39Speaker 01

  So all that stuff was good.

• 19:41Jocko Willink?

  Cause that stuff made it mainstream in the early nineties. So you could, you could pick up on it.

• 19:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:46Jocko Willink?

  Even in a

• 19:47Speaker 01

  Big baggy shoes.

• 19:48Jocko Willink?

  Boys school.

• 19:49Speaker 01

  Boys Catholic high school in Queens.

• 19:53Jocko Willink?

  And was all this geared towards you going to college to play sports?

• 19:55Speaker 01

  Yes, it actually was. It's all we talked about. I mean, that's all I knew.

• 20:00Jocko Willink?

  Were you going to camps?

• 20:01Speaker 01

  I was going to camps every summer from the, I can't even remember. Jaco, that's how far back I was either in a basketball camp or a football camp at Fordham or a baseball camp. Uh, junior lifeguards, like just all that shit. Yeah.

• 20:19Jocko Willink?

  And what, what did you, what sport did you like the best?

• 20:23Speaker 01

  I liked football.

• 20:24Jocko Willink?

  And is that, is that the one you were best at as well?

• 20:26Speaker 01

  That's the one I was best at. I, I played in college for her dad. We'll get into that later. Um, but yeah, I got full scholarship to play.

• 20:33Speaker 01

  Definitely beat your body up, of course, but um, I just, I don't know. It was one of those things I, I liked. Um, I was a quarterback from I think like seven years old and um, you know, I think it was up to me. I'd probably be surfing and I tried cause because we did live in a beach town and my dad was like not having it at all. Um, so I would try to surf and then immediately like it would go right into, you know, some kinda camp or, you know, baseball, double headers in Brooklyn, you know, at 90 degrees in the middle of summer type shit.

• 21:08Jocko Willink?

  Check. All right, Amber, your turn.

• 21:10Speaker 02

  Well, I enter the picture at the football juncture where my dad recruited him, but prior to that.

• 21:17Jocko Willink?

  You must've been doing something prior to that. What were you doing?

• 21:20Speaker 02

  Yeah. Prior to that, I grew up in a really small town in Southern Illinois. So everyone, when I say I'm from Illinois, I think it's Chicago, but I've actually only been to Chicago one time in my life. Um, I grew up on a retired dairy farm in a very rural part of Illinois.

• 21:35Jocko Willink?

  Retired dairy farm, meaning there's no more cows there?

• 21:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's not, there's, there was, it, all the barns were still there. The milk house was there. The farmhouse was there. All the land was there.

• 21:46Jocko Willink?

  Was it your families that retired it?

• 21:49Speaker 02

  Yes, my great grandfather, great, great and great grandfathers were the milkmen of my county.

• 21:58Jocko Willink?

  And then they shut it down at some point.

• 22:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, so they had, I don't even know how many, you know, hundreds of cows. My grandfather worked the farm whenever he was in high school. And then at some point shortly thereafter, he was like their farm hand and he ended up going to college and uh getting married to my grandmother. And I, I think at some point they retired it after that.

• 22:18Jocko Willink?

  And did your dad have to work on the dairy farm at all or was it already done?

• 22:21Speaker 02

  That was my mom's dad. My dad's dad owned an excavating business. And yes, my dad and his brothers worked the tractors. So I come from a very hardworking family.

• 22:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, dairy farmers is, that's a hard life, man. It's a hard life.

• 22:37Speaker 02

  But like a really good wholesome life. And I just grew up in a really wholesome family and a really wholesome town. And um, my dad being a football coach just really always drove me, loved me, but drove me. And like he, the, the one thing he taught me was, don't you ever quit anything. Don't ever quit. And so, you know, it didn't matter how uncomfortable things got. In my mind, I'm like, I'm not quitting. I don't have a quit in me.

• 23:09Jocko Willink?

  Did you play sports?

• 23:10Speaker 02

  I was a cheerleader. I probably would have been more athletic had my dad been in my life, my parents. He, he was in my life, but not in like a dad way, you know, he was um, my parents were divorced. So I saw him, spring break, a couple of months during the summer, over Christmas, but you know, day to day, I was raised by my mom.

• 23:31Jocko Willink?

  And cheer, did you do cheer, how long, how long did you cheerleading for?

• 23:35Speaker 02

  From the time I was in seventh grade to senior in high school.

• 23:41Jocko Willink?

  Damn, so you were out there.

• 23:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:44Jocko Willink?

  I remember I was working and my middle daughter, she did gymnastics and then she, that's like a little, there's a little, there's a little off ramp or a little on ramp to cheerleading, right? And so she was doing gymnastics, then she got on that little ramp and you know, I was kinda like, dang it, you know, like. It just doesn't seem like it's the thing that you want your daughter to do, at least for me, right? And then two things happened. One of them was this woman CEO that I work with, who's an awesome woman. I told her, I was like, yeah, you know, my daughter's doing cheerleading. She's gonna do cheerleading. And this woman's like, I did cheerleading and it was awesome. And I was like, really? She goes, yeah, you're out there, you're standing in front of people.

• 24:26Jocko Willink?

  You're projecting your voice. And I was like, okay, fair enough. And my daughter only did it for a couple of years. Then she's, then she got more committed to wrestling.

• 24:36Jocko Willink?

  Which was awesome. That, and another thing that happened was one of my buddies was also had a daughter who was also doing cheerleading. And he's like, he's kind of making fun of me. He goes, oh, you're letting your, cause his daughter's doing cheerleading, my daughter's doing, they're both doing cheerleading. But he's gonna make fun of me, cause I guess I don't seem like the cheerleading type of dad. And he goes, oh, you're letting your daughter do cheerleading? And I go, yeah, you know, I figure I either let her do cheerleading. Or she comes home with a tattoo on her face when she's like 18, right? Cause that's what happens. You like, pressure your kids or you like steer them or you prevent them from doing something. They're gonna rebel hard against you and they end up on the wrong path. So anyways, she did cheerleading for a little bit, all good. And did you do good in school?

• 25:22Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. I was pretty much a straight A student.

• 25:26Jocko Willink?

  Did you, what did you want to do when you grew up? Did you, did you want to go to college? Like, what was the deal?

• 25:30Speaker 02

  So my parents were both raised in this really small town. They were in the same class together and had this sort of crush on each other since they were in third grade. All the way through, you know, junior high school, high school, prom, king and queen, captain of the football team, captain of the cheerleading team. Like, you know, they, everything was my two, two sides of family in this one little town. But my dad had these big aspirations to be a football coach. And so, he actually got a full ride to University of Illinois and,

• 26:04Speaker 02

  That's where he ended up going for his first coaching, you know, his first coaching gig. And from that point on, when he got out of that little town, he always said to me, you get out of here as soon as you can.

• 26:19Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 26:19Speaker 02

  Cause he knew that, you know, there wasn't the opportunity for me there that I would need to have, you know, that he wanted me to have in life. I don't think he thought Marcus would be my ticket out of there, but um, you know, he helped facilitate that.

• 26:36Jocko Willink?

  All right. So let's get to that. So you end up getting recruited to go play football?

• 26:40Speaker 01

  I did at Southern Illinois.

• 26:43Jocko Willink?

  And Amber, your dad was the head coach there?

• 26:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. So at that point, he'd been from U of I, he went to Miami of Ohio and then got the head foot, the head football coaching job at Southern Illinois University. And that was about 10 minutes from this little town that I grew up in. So he was 34 years old and he was the head coach of, you know, our, our hometown team.

• 27:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. Big school though, 25,000 students.

• 27:06Speaker 02

  Division one.

• 27:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. Now it's, it's, the enrollment's really gone down significantly, like a lot of schools, but it was, it was, you know, it was a large school back then.

• 27:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:16Jocko Willink?

  And you roll in, you get recruited D1?

• 27:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. It was, um, so I got hurt in high school, so I wound up not playing my senior year.

• 27:24Jocko Willink?

  What was the injury?

• 27:25Speaker 01

  Uh, I tore a couple of ligaments in my wrist, my throwing wrist. Um, tried to play through it for a couple of years and they never, actually no one ever knew it was torn. I just kept having this like, I'd land on it wrong and you know, have this like screaming pain. Finally got an MRI and they're like, yeah, you're, you have several torn ligaments. Like that's why you're in pain. So I said, we can do surgery. Um, now you'll miss football season, but you'll be back for baseball season. Or you can play football season and then have surgery after, but you'd miss baseball season. And so just chatting with, you know, dad, um, I was excelling more in baseball.

• 28:07Speaker 01

  And we decided, you know what, let's hang up football, have the surgery and we'll get you ready for baseball.

• 28:13Jocko Willink?

  And you said, what year was this?

• 28:15Speaker 01

  This was ninety four.

• 28:16Jocko Willink?

  But what school year was it? Like this was your junior year?

• 28:19Speaker 01

  This was my, uh, like summer. Yeah. Summer, summer going into senior year.

• 28:25Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 28:26Speaker 01

  And so we decided to go ahead with the surgery and, and, uh, they went in and, and, uh, they did like an arthroscope. And they found like the ligaments torn and then they just went ahead and sewed them back. And I remember it was a long, um, recovery. It was like, it's almost six months. Um, and this is, this is so my dad. So I get done. Get the surgery, go through, you know, however long I was in a cast, get the cast off, literally came home. From getting the cast off after being in it for like four months. It was, it was long. It was, it was weird. And he, he literally put, grabbed two mitts and pulled me onto the beach.

• 29:06Speaker 01

  And he was like, throw the ball. I'm not, I'm not making this shit up, but, but first off, like, can you imagine the size, like difference? It was like, my wrist was like this big. I hadn't done anything. I pick up the ball and this is no shit.

• 29:22Jocko Willink?

  Was it baseball or football?

• 29:23Speaker 01

  It was a baseball. Cause I was trying to, I was trying to get ready for baseball. I literally threw it like a foot in front of me. I didn't even, and I didn't even know what to say. Like dad, I can't, like, I'm in a lot of pain.

• 29:32Speaker 02

  Did he get mad?

• 29:33Speaker 01

  He like, yeah.

• 29:36Speaker 01

  It was so fucking weird.

• 29:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. He got mad at me like it was my fault that I couldn't throw this baseball after I just got out of, anyway. So, so I played baseball.

• 29:48Speaker 01

  Didn't have a great season, just played and, and, and, um, my.

• 29:55Speaker 01

  Younger football coach, Tom Fraley, I considered kind of like my second dad and quarterback coach, and he just said, hey, man, you're so talented. He's like, I think you should play football in junior college. Like, you're, you know, I, you know, I think you have something you should do that. And I said, nah, you know, I kind of threw it around. I went, okay, I'll, you know, I'll take your advice. And I started throwing him in the summer. And I wound up enrolling in, at Nassau Community College in New York. And Nassau every year had like, top 10 football. They always sent, literally, anywhere between 15 and 20 guys to Division One, and, and, and big Division Ones, like Ohio State, and Miami, and things like that. And so, I was going to a real place to play. And when I showed up, man,

• 30:36Speaker 01

  I was, I was skinny. I was 17, going into my freshman year of college.

• 30:43Jocko Willink?

  Damn, you were young, huh?

• 30:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was, yeah, it was.

• 30:47Jocko Willink?

  Bro, your dad, for all this pushing, should have held your ass back like, two years, dude.

• 30:51Speaker 02

  Two.

• 30:53Speaker 01

  You're right. You're so right. So, I, you know, I show up, again, 6'4", 180. And, I mean, these, this is like, a Division One junior college. These guys are fucking massive, from like, Brooklyn, and the Bronx, and these guys are like, straight up meat eaters. And, I'm like, man, I don't even know if I belong here. So, I hung in as a, as a freshman. You get redshirted. I went to practice every day. I worked hard. And, I turned 18, that December of my freshman year. And like, in February, I went from 6'4", 180, to like, 6'4", 225.

• 31:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 31:30Speaker 01

  Just on the, I was on the program.

• 31:32Jocko Willink?

  Getting jacked.

• 31:33Speaker 01

  Getting jacked. And, yeah, it was good. I was actually, you know, I felt like a, felt like a human, after that.

• 31:40Speaker 02

  Well, and, I didn't know you then, but from what I gather, all that pent up frustration from the bullies of your childhood, you started taking it out with your increased size.

• 31:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, we've talked about this. So, yeah, so, so, with the increased weight and size, yes, Amber is correct. I did, I started getting into a lot of fights, Jaco.

• 31:59Jocko Willink?

  Really?

• 32:00Speaker 01

  Like, stupid, like, dumb, like, all the time, a lot. And it was like...

• 32:05Jocko Willink?

  And this is when you're at this community college?

• 32:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, it just fed me, I think, because of the years of, maybe... You know, dad and then like being skinny, constantly getting harassed. Um, I finally put on some weight and uh, I would just snap every time we went out, didn't matter where, any bar, um, I was getting in a fight. Yeah, guaranteed.

• 32:25Jocko Willink?

  Are you drinking now? You drinking now at this age?

• 32:28Speaker 01

  Yes. Yep.

• 32:29Jocko Willink?

  That doesn't, that doesn't subdue fighting.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  Doesn't help at all.

• 32:34Jocko Willink?

  It doesn't help.

• 32:35Speaker 01

  Um, yeah, I think growing up on Long Island, I actually remember the first time we drank because it was all my high school buddies freshman year, I believe it was Memorial Day. Like, hey, Memorial Day, we're all gonna get together, we're gonna go get a couple cases, we're gonna go down to the beach, we're gonna drink some beer. And I remember saying, how can, like, how can you put something in your body and it makes you act weird? Like, I don't, I don't get it. Like, I honestly did not get it. And we were having this argument. Like, I don't get it. Like, I could drink 10 of these. Like, I'm gonna be fine. Um, I think I remember at some point of that night, like, humping the pole. Um, literally. And so, uh, yeah. Don't, don't drink.

• 33:15Jocko Willink?

  This is your freshman year, you're like 12 or 13 or something.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  Literally 13. Yeah, I think I was 14 at that time. Because it was the second part of my freshman year, so.

• 33:23Jocko Willink?

  So, did you keep drinking through this? Or was it a thing or not really?

• 33:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I drank, but I drank, um, I drank on the weekends when we went out. So, never during the week. Amber still makes fun of me that I was in bed.

• 33:37Speaker 02

  He had a bedtime, 9:00 PM until he left at the house.

• 33:40Speaker 01

  Lit through senior year of high school, like, not even during senior year.

• 33:46Jocko Willink?

  Was this a mandated by the old man?

• 33:48Speaker 01

  This is mandated by mom.

• 33:49Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 33:50Speaker 01

  Like, but at that point, though, I didn't think for myself at all. I was just like, oh, it's 8:30, I need to get ready and go to bed. You know, the light was on and my mom's screaming down like, Marcus, shut the light off, go to bed. You gotta get up in the morning and catch the train, you know? Um, meanwhile, Amber's out at my house in college till like 3:00 in the morning. But we'll talk, we'll get into that after. Um, yeah, so, uh. Where were we at?

• 34:16Jocko Willink?

  Are you, are you thinking through high school, are you thinking about the military at all?

• 34:20Speaker 01

  No, not at all. I mean, I didn't, I didn't think much, Jaco. I'm, I'm just starting to come into thinking the last couple of years.

• 34:26Jocko Willink?

  And you're just solely focused on athletics.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  That's it. That's it. Um, but, uh, yeah, I didn't think, the only thing, the only connection I had to the military. Uh, my grandfather had a Purple Heart. It was in the house. I didn't know the difference between a Purple Heart and a Purple Rose. And, um, he mentioned it was from a, a mortar attack, fighting the, uh, I think fighting in Northern Africa against the Italians.

• 34:53Speaker 01

  And, but he was another guy who evidently got in a lot of fights because I, I guess the military was a lot different in World War II. Where they would pull like your rank away, like when you weren't on the battlefield. You know, if you got in trouble like he did, and then when he came back, I, I don't know, some weird story that I listened to. It was probably completely wrong coming from my dad. Um, so that's the only like real.

• 35:15Speaker 02

  Oh, and your dad was in the army?

• 35:17Speaker 01

  Well, he was by, I think on, uh, I don't think, I don't know if he got.

• 35:22Jocko Willink?

  Wait, your dad the hippie was, your dad the hippie was in the army?

• 35:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, he was in the, he was an MP. He was a dog handler. That's all I heard about growing up was his ferocious dog that bit everybody. So I'm like, so you're a shitty dog handler?

• 35:36Speaker 01

  Cause we had a few of those guys too, right?

• 35:38Jocko Willink?

  Did he give you any impression of like, hey, you know, the military is dumb or you shouldn't join it or whatever, anything like that?

• 35:44Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Yeah. He was, you know, he never, I don't think he ever talked about it negatively.

• 35:48Jocko Willink?

  Just, just, just wasn't there.

• 35:50Speaker 01

  It just wasn't there.

• 35:51Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 35:51Speaker 01

  And, and I wasn't with a crew of like, um, you know, first responder families, like police and fire. So I just didn't have that. You know, it was more like artists and, and, uh, but nothing negative, nothing ever negative, but really no, um, I was never, uh, It just wasn't a part of my life.

• 36:09Speaker 02

  I was raised a patriot.

• 36:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:11Speaker 02

  Marcus was not. I have a letter that I framed that I wrote in third grade on Veterans Day. And it was, it's so funny to read it back, but even as a nine year old, I'm like, yeah, that's who I am.

• 36:24Jocko Willink?

  Were your parents military or was your dad military or granddad or anything?

• 36:27Speaker 02

  No, my great grandmother had five brothers in World War II. And two or three of them were killed. One of them was a POW and so, you know, I just, it was just instilled in me that we love America and we honor our military. But I didn't ever think I wanted to be married to someone in the military.

• 36:50Jocko Willink?

  That's a whole different ballgame.

• 36:51Speaker 02

  Right. I was also, you know, my hometown was so small and it wasn't, you know, a very,

• 36:59Speaker 02

  there wasn't a lot of money in the area that I grew up in. So people that joined the military in my hometown couldn't afford college. It was just a way to pay for college. So like I had this great appreciation, but I also, I was completely dumb to like what the, what military service actually was.

• 37:14Jocko Willink?

  All right. So let's get into this, how the coach's daughter. I mean, how does this go about? This can't be.

• 37:21Speaker 02

  Not controversial at all.

• 37:23Jocko Willink?

  Right? Marcus, I mean, this is, this is like taboo. Is there anything more taboo than, oh, that's the coach's daughter? Cool.

• 37:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:30Jocko Willink?

  That's where I'm gonna go.

• 37:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's exactly it. So I, I end up at Southern Illinois.

• 37:37Speaker 01

  In, I don't know, was it 96, Amber? Yeah. And.

• 37:46Speaker 01

  I'm just trying to think how, how I get into, how, how you and I met. So, okay, when I was first looking at the, like the media guide for the football teams, before I even went to Southern Illinois, I was still in New York. I saw that Coach Watson had a, had a, you know, obviously had a family in there and had a daughter. And I just, again, never even, I was like, oh, wow, that's interesting, you know? That, that's came across my mind. But that was it. Like, let's put that away now for like two more years. And I show up at school and I think about a year and a half in is I met you at Cuckoo's.

• 38:24Speaker 02

  No, at a golf tournament, but I didn't even see you there.

• 38:27Speaker 01

  You didn't see me? I saw you at the golf tournament. You looked really angry and pissed off that you were there.

• 38:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, so we had, we did a, um, I guess, uh, like volunteer for the, some golf tournament. And I remember seeing Amber there, like at the table and she was angry and I remember a guy saying like, that's Coach Watson's daughter, you know, and everyone was like, okay, stay away from.

• 38:47Jocko Willink?

  Are you just trying to keep people at bay? Just scowling at everyone or what was up with that?

• 38:51Speaker 02

  I don't know. I think I was probably, I don't know. I think I was probably traumatized by having to be there.

• 39:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. Um, so, so that's the first time.

• 39:04Jocko Willink?

  Are you, Marcus, at this point, are you like a full on like just straight beard swilling jock?

• 39:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:11Jocko Willink?

  Is that what we're dealing with?

• 39:12Speaker 01

  One hundred percent. But a nice, but I was a nice jock. I don't know if that makes any sense.

• 39:16Jocko Willink?

  But you're fighting a lot.

• 39:17Speaker 01

  I'm fighting a lot.

• 39:18Jocko Willink?

  Still fighting a lot when you get to college?

• 39:19Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Oh, gosh, yeah. Um, I mean, we'll go into, I mean, I was suspended from Amber's dad my whole sophomore year after I just got named the starting quarterback over four seniors. Um, so your dad was great in, in recruiting me, but not in the choice of, of personality. Um, so that night I go out, uh, go to fraternity party.

• 39:44Jocko Willink?

  This is the night you get named as a starting quarterback?

• 39:47Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:47Jocko Willink?

  So you're freaking stoked.

• 39:50Speaker 02

  And I'd been hearing about him and, you know, like the whole area had been hearing about him because you get like this big, good looking guy from New York and it's, who's named Marcus Capone. And so I'm like hearing this buzz.

• 40:05Jocko Willink?

  But did you meet him yet? When he gets named as a starting quarterback?

• 40:07Speaker 02

  No, and apparently we'd been at that golf tournament, but I didn't know who he was and.

• 40:12Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 40:13Speaker 02

  So.

• 40:14Jocko Willink?

  Alright, so now you get named.

• 40:15Speaker 01

  So we go out, myself, the fullback, who was my roommate, who's just a stud, you know, like 600, 400 pound guy, like squat bench, you know, that type of dude and can run like a four, five, 40. And, um, we go to this fraternity party, which is really off limits. Um, football athletes and fraternities really didn't mix.

• 40:34Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 40:35Speaker 01

  Um, most of the fraternities.

• 40:36Jocko Willink?

  Officially, like you're not allowed to go to them or just?

• 40:39Speaker 01

  No, it's more, you just don't because a lot of those guys were high school athletes that couldn't play in college. And so there was a little bit of like, you know, bad blood. We went because a lot of the female trainers that, you know, you go in and get your, you know, put your ice in, in, you know, your elbow in ice or get hooked up to STEM or whatever. They were all sorority, so they invited us, so three of us went. And right from this get-go, you can tell, like, just, it's in the air. You know exactly what I'm talking about. The, uh, you could feel the energy in there, it was just not going our direction. And, uh, one thing led to another, and the next thing you know, there's, uh, literally a whole fraternity house on top of us in the middle of the yard.

• 41:21Speaker 01

  Uh, there were so many of them, I think it was lucky, I think it was what saved us, because there were so many that they couldn't, like, get to us and, like, punch and kick and everything else. But I do remember, like, being on the ground and going, "Man, they can't even get to us, there's so many of them." Uh, I remember this hand, I could feel this hand, like, coming up, like, my arm, and then my shoulder, and then my neck, and then I feel it, like, get to my face, and then, like, just start, like, like, raking me, like, raking my eye, I'm like, "This guy's trying to boom my..." And I couldn't do anything about it. So for somehow, this is the best, so somehow, the fullback, my roommate, crawls out underneath all of them and charges the wooden fence, and boom, literally hits it, and knocks the whole fence down in the yard.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  So you can tell how well these fences were made in a college, uh, you know, collegiate house. Pieces of crap. So the fence goes down, which enables us to get out, because now we're out of the yard. So I'm standing in the street, like, my eye is completely red, like, they, now, like, it's, it's, it's good and scratched. Um, I'm missing a sandal, my shirt's ripped, um, you know, I'm standing in the street cursing, and we, we cool down a little bit, and we go walking back to the, um, the dorms. Go to bed. Because that was a fun night, getting, getting jumped by a fraternity house, the Pikes. And, I shouldn't even gave him that.

• 42:49Speaker 01

  Gave him that shout-out. Um, you guys are just jealous. Um, and we, we come across, um, the str- we, we, we cross the strip where all the bars and clubs are at. And, uh, out on the street, this club is emptying, and it's the, um...

• 43:11Speaker 01

  All the guys on the football team were coming out. And they're like, Marcus, what's going on? Wait, wait, what, what the fuck happened to you? I'm like, oh, man, you know, the, the, the pikes, they, they jumped us and these guys, everyone's drunk. And that was it. So they decided they're gonna go back to the fraternity house. So like thirty dudes go back to the fraternity house. Um, I follow behind them. And when I get there, it's complete mayhem. There's people getting bricks busted over their face. I watched a person in the NFL pick up a, uh,

• 43:47Speaker 02

  Grill.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  A grill and throw it on somebody. Um, so it was, it was that type of shit going on and, and I was like, wow. So, uh, police, you could hear police sirens coming and like everybody splits and, you know, kind of the rest is history. I get brought in because I was the only white guy at the, at the fight. They couldn't identify anybody there and, um, they wanted me to give up all the names of the guys that were there. And I was like, no chance. I don't even know who's there actually. So because I would not give up any names, your dad, Amber, suspended me for the whole season.

• 44:26Jocko Willink?

  God.

• 44:27Speaker 01

  Um, because they couldn't identify anybody. And so I wind up being suspended for pretty much that was, and that was it. That kind of crushed.

• 44:34Jocko Willink?

  Your dad's a hard ass.

• 44:37Speaker 01

  I think, well, I think he was pressured.

• 44:39Speaker 02

  No, my dad is very principled and on the same hand, my dad, you know, was trying to turn this program around and his entire team would have been out. So Marcus took the punishment for the whole team. And I, I know he felt bad about that, but I also know that he respected Marcus not giving up anyone's names. And it coincidentally saved his ass too, I'm sure. Um, but I remember that fight because I had worked really hard all summer to save money for a car and we were gonna go buy the car and I had, I had picked the car out. We were supposed to go in.

• 45:20Jocko Willink?

  We being you and your dad?

• 45:22Speaker 02

  No, really, just me.

• 45:23Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 45:24Jocko Willink?

  Um.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  Just to go back, like, it wasn't, it was a local fight, but evidently, some of the guys at fraternity houses, dads were in kind of higher positions in Chicago. So it made national news because there were eight guys got sent to the hospital.

• 45:37Jocko Willink?

  Damn.

• 45:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was like a, it was not good.

• 45:39Jocko Willink?

  That's legit scrap.

• 45:40Speaker 01

  And I had a few drinks, as you can imagine. It was legit scrap, for sure.

• 45:45Speaker 02

  So I had picked out this car, I'd been working so hard for it, my dad had been so busy, and we were gonna go on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. something, and I called my dad, and I'm like, "Dad, are you ready?" And he goes like, "No, honey, my quarterback caused the biggest fight last night. You have no idea the shitstorm I'm dealing with." And so I'm like, "Scare your quarterback, I hate him, I don't even know him, he's, all I wanted was, I've waited so long to get this car." So anyway, that was also the beginning of my independence, of being like, you know what? I'll go negotiate this deal, and that's exactly what I did. So, um, that was sort of how I came to know, like, who Marcus even was, because it was all over the news. And then I saw his picture in the paper, and I was immediately like, "Oh, damn.

• 46:31Speaker 02

  This is the guy, he's so hot." And, um, like, fast forward, probably a year, my best friend had drank too much at a bowling alley slash nightclub, and I had to go pick her up, and I was not happy about that either. And so, um, when I walked in, I went to the back door, and the bouncer opened the door, so I could get in to get her, and Marcus was like, remitted him right now, he was right there, and I was like, immediately taken so aback, and I just said, "Oh, you're the troublemaker." And, uh, we sparked this conversation, I, oh, I was so smitten, but I didn't, I don't think I let on like I was. And I saw you there every week for like, four weeks.

• 47:16Speaker 02

  I, I went back every week, and then he wasn't there one week. And his friend, who was the bouncer there, took my number and gave it to Marcus, and he called me that night, and we hung out for the first time on July 4th of 1997. And we've been that since.

• 47:35Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm. The end.

• 47:39Jocko Willink?

  So you get suspended, was that your sophomore year?

• 47:42Speaker 01

  That was my sophomore year.

• 47:43Jocko Willink?

  You get suspended?

• 47:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:44Jocko Willink?

  Are you allowed to practice? Like, what are you doing?

• 47:46Speaker 01

  I, uh, yes. So I had, yeah, I did everything.

• 47:48Jocko Willink?

  You were working your ass off?

• 47:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I worked my ass off. I practiced every day. Um, I went to treatment room, you know, three days, three times a day. Still went to study hall, which we had to do every evening. And then I broke down every film. So I'd have to watch hours and hours of every play from every angle of every upcoming game. And then I would write, you know, take notes and like all defensive, um, coverages. And so like, I learned, you know, I, I learned, but it was miserable because I couldn't play on.

• 48:17Speaker 02

  What did you think of my dad? I don't think I've ever asked you this. What was your relationship with my dad like?

• 48:23Speaker 01

  It was, it was good. No, we, I mean, we always had a good relationship. I mean, I was angry because I didn't get to, you know, I didn't get to play, like.

• 48:30Speaker 02

  How did he treat you then?

• 48:31Speaker 01

  He treated me well. Yeah. I mean, I was cutting up film for him every day.

• 48:35Jocko Willink?

  It seems like, like, like there's a little bit of mutual respect, like he respect, kind of respected the fact that you didn't rat anybody out.

• 48:41Speaker 01

  He actually said, they said that too. They all said that because they were like, kind of saved the season because if you, if any of those, you know, they were all, they were all the, you know, they're all the starters, right? So, um, and these were good guys. Um, so they weren't, yeah, they weren't angry. They were just like, you're an idiot.

• 48:59Speaker 01

  You got, one, you got caught. Two, what are you doing at the Pike House? You know, that's what I mean. So.

• 49:05Speaker 02

  There was one time when we were dating, but we hadn't been dating for too long, that Marcus came home from practice and said, your dad knows. And I was like,

• 49:14Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 49:15Speaker 02

  What do you mean, my dad knows?

• 49:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's after he left and went to Northwestern.

• 49:19Speaker 02

  Yeah. So we were never dating when my dad was there.

• 49:22Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 49:23Speaker 02

  That year that Marcus was breaking down film and whatnot, at the end of that year, my dad took a job at Northwestern.

• 49:30Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 49:30Speaker 02

  And so a new coach had come in and I met you when, when Coach Q had taken over the team.

• 49:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. And your dad already left. So, but he did find out and he called and he was not happy with her.

• 49:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was 17.

• 49:44Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 49:44Speaker 02

  I was in my senior year of high school.

• 49:46Jocko Willink?

  Oh damn. And how old are you at this point?

• 49:48Speaker 01

  20.

• 49:50Jocko Willink?

  Oh yeah. That's not a happy dad. I got three daughters, man.

• 49:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, you wouldn't be happy. I have a sophomore at San Diego State. I get it.

• 49:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 49:59Speaker 01

  She has pepper spray and taser on at all times.

• 50:04Speaker 02

  He, I had to call him because I didn't, you know, I respect my dad a lot and um I wanted to call him and sort of like head this off and one of Marcus's coaches who was still friends with him said like, hey, Coach Watson knows that you're dating his daughter. So I called him and he was like, well, honey, I'm gonna tell you this. Um, he said, Marcus is one of the few players that I can say that I truly love. Like, I love that kid. He's like, but he's a womanizer and he will break your heart. And if he breaks your heart, you tell him I will break his neck.

• 50:45Jocko Willink?

  Oh, there you go. Right on. Pop's coming in hot.

• 50:50Speaker 01

  He had a, yeah, he had a, he had a temper. Yeah, he had a real temper. On the field, he had a temper. No, he actually had a temper everywhere. He's an amazing human being, though.

• 51:01Jocko Willink?

  So, so your dad leaves from coaching that job. The next year, now it's your junior year in college. Are you starting as a quarterback?

• 51:08Speaker 01

  No, they brought in a really good quarterback from Missouri who actually split time at University of Missouri with one of the guys who was up for the Heisman. So, you know, really after the fight, I feel like everything just went downhill after that. So.

• 51:22Jocko Willink?

  Were you still on the team?

• 51:23Speaker 01

  I was still on the team. I was still under sc- you know, still in scholarship. So I, um, this, this guy came in and, you know, we're actually really close to, to this date. Um, Kent Scornia, he's a very successful in, in Missouri and St. Louis and, uh, he actually is a donor to vets and, um, he was always my roommate on the road. But, um, he, yeah, he came in, he was like a true quarterback from the Midwest. Like, this guy could sling the ball all over the place. And I played quarterback more as a linebacker, you know? Um, and that was our difference. So I would, you know, I would put my head down and, uh, you know, he would, he would throw the ball, you know, and, and slide and things like that. And, uh, and finally they moved me over to tight end my senior year just because, um,

• 52:07Speaker 01

  I wasn't going to get on the field with him. But we, we actually split time first couple of games of the season, uh, and I did well, but he wound up like kinda taking command and control and, and, uh, he was like a true leader, true quarterback. I was a bit of a knucklehead and wanted to get in fights and run linebackers over, you know? And, uh, yeah, so, um.

• 52:28Jocko Willink?

  At what, was there a point in your life when you thought you were gonna play in the NFL?

• 52:33Speaker 01

  I mean, from when I was, you know, five, Jaco, like, that's what I wanted, that's what I wanted to do.

• 52:39Jocko Willink?

  I should have rephrased that. You know, there had to be a point in your life when you were going to be playing in the NFL. When did that dream go out? Like, when did that flame extinguish?

• 52:48Speaker 01

  That flame extinguished my, was my, before my senior year, so I popped for, I popped for testosterone.

• 52:59Jocko Willink?

  This is your senior year of college?

• 53:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Going into the senior year, so Marcus, you're moving over to tight end, you're gonna start at tight end, put on some weight. Roger that. So I went and found some testosterone, sipping eight and got, got bulky and faster. And I remember, uh, we were doing offseason workouts. And the quarterback who, who, uh, we were about the same speed, I put on 20 pounds and then I started beating him in the, in, in sprints. He's like, dude, what the, he's like, how could you gain weight and be faster than me all of a sudden? Um, so the NCAA came in actually three weeks early and, uh, a few of us, uh, popped positive for, for performance enhancing drugs.

• 53:40Jocko Willink?

  Uh huh. So that's like, I had a, I had a, knew a guy that was a bike, bicycle rider. And he said that when you're on, or maybe I just heard this on a, I don't know where I heard this. I think it was this guy I know, who said like, he's a bike rider. And he said, when someone's on, on juice. It's like they're on a Harley, like you literally just can't hang with them. They're just that much better. So did you feel like, I mean, it sounds like dude, you put on 20 pounds and you got faster?

• 54:08Speaker 01

  Oh, you mean, I could, I could dunk a basketball just from a straight vertical leap, you know? Um, yeah, it's, it's pretty, pretty, pretty potent stuff. When you're, when you're abusing it like that, not when you're like using it for like replacement therapy, you know, where they're trying to keep your levels at around seven or 800, we're talking about, you know, 2,400, 2,000. You know, your blood, your blood levels are through the roof. And, but you do, you feel like-

• 54:32Jocko Willink?

  Who's your guide during this?

• 54:34Speaker 01

  Guide?

• 54:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Just bro science, just like-

• 54:37Speaker 01

  This is straight up-

• 54:38Jocko Willink?

  More is better.

• 54:38Speaker 01

  Bro science, no Google. Um, this is what three of my buddies said. Oh yeah, that guy was in the Marine Corps. This guy, you know, took steroids in high school and yeah, we think it's okay. You'll be fine.

• 54:53Jocko Willink?

  So you pop positive. I didn't know the NCAA was testing back then.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:57Jocko Willink?

  I guess I'm just an idiot.

• 54:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, they tested everybody. Well, I shouldn't say they tested everybody. It was random.

• 55:03Speaker 01

  But.

• 55:04Jocko Willink?

  And so then are you done? Or is that the end?

• 55:05Speaker 01

  Done. That's it. I'm done.

• 55:08Jocko Willink?

  So you said that's the moment when you realized the NFL wasn't happening?

• 55:12Speaker 01

  NFL wasn't happening.

• 55:15Jocko Willink?

  And you finish? How'd your dad feel about that before we go? What do you finish?

• 55:18Speaker 01

  So Amber, uh, no, it wasn't your dad. Uh, no, your dad had already left. The co- the co- head coach called. They weren't happy.

• 55:26Jocko Willink?

  Uh huh.

• 55:26Speaker 01

  You know, but everything, you know, they were always like, ah, it's not Marcus's fault. You know, it was, it must've been somebody else.

• 55:32Speaker 02

  Your parents?

• 55:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, my parents.

• 55:33Jocko Willink?

  Oh, your parents were like, mm, they shifted blame. They covered for you a little bit. But your dad must've been realizing that the dream was over.

• 55:40Speaker 01

  Probably. His dream.

• 55:42Jocko Willink?

  The NFL dream. Yeah, his dream.

• 55:43Speaker 01

  His NFL dream. Which by the way, I had like a one in like a trillion chance of making it to the NFL.

• 55:49Jocko Willink?

  For sure, for sure. But you gotta, I mean, it seems like anybody in pursuing any athletic pursuit that hard is gonna think, well, I'm gonna be able to make it. And then at some point you go, it ain't happening.

• 56:02Speaker 01

  You want, you want to go as hard and far as you can, right? I mean, that's, that's all you know. Literally, it's all you know. I mean, I remember getting in the teams and telling guys and buds like, dude, I never turned a wrench. Like all I did, all my dad had me do is play ball. Like I literally, you know, so I learned a lot. Just, you know, that's why I thought just the teams were so good. Cause I just learned a lot of like man shit outside of, you know, playing ball, which I look at now. I don't even, I don't remember the last time I watched a sporting event, right?

• 56:28Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 56:29Speaker 01

  You know, I kind of frowned upon some of the stuff that's going on. It's, it's gross, but yeah.

• 56:33Jocko Willink?

  So is this when you started thinking about going in the teams?

• 56:39Speaker 01

  Into the teams.

• 56:41Jocko Willink?

  What was the, uh, what was the trigger there?

• 56:43Speaker 01

  You're gonna love this. This is, this is right up your alley, Jaco. So my roommate, uh, of course,

• 56:51Jocko Willink?

  Dad was a SEAL in Vietnam.

• 56:54Speaker 01

  I don't think he was. He, he may have been a Marine.

• 56:57Speaker 02

  Wait, what roommate?

• 56:58Speaker 01

  Jason.

• 57:01Speaker 01

  Jason O'Neil.

• 57:02Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 57:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, we lived in the apartment, remember?

• 57:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, I didn't know he was part of the story.

• 57:07Speaker 01

  Oh, he's part of the story.

• 57:08Jocko Willink?

  I'm just thinking, you know, you said, I'm gonna love this story. So I figure you're like one of your brother, your one of the friends down was.

• 57:14Speaker 01

  You're gonna love it, and then you're gonna scratch your head too and be like, alright, we're gonna go with this, Marcus. So we're, we're sitting, we're sitting in the apartment one night. And, and this guy actually started as a freshman, wind up, uh, when we graduated, I went in the Navy, he went in the Marine Corps, flew F-18s, you know, did the whole, did the whole thing, uh, Top Gun and all that, all that good stuff. And then, of course, the Marine Corps, what they do to their guys who go to flight school, fly F-18s and go to Top Gun, you would expect them to continue flying. They handed him an M-16 and put him on the ground in Afghanistan. You know, with all that training, I guess as a FAC.

• 57:53Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's what the Marine Corps does. And that's one of the best things that they do is because those guys can talk to aircraft better than anybody else.

• 58:00Speaker 01

  Hundred and a hundred percent, and he did. But he did complain because he said, man, you know, they spent all this money on training me how to fly. And he's like, I was really good at it. And then I'm on the fucking ground in Afghanistan dodging mortars. You know, uh, which he never, ever signed up to do. Um, so it was just interesting to hear from his perspective, like, they don't like, they don't like it, you know, like, they want to fly. And now they're stuck calling, calling in CAS.

• 58:23Jocko Willink?

  One of my, uh, one of my really good friends was the same thing, Marine Corps, F-18, Top Gun, Top Gun instructor, Top Gun senior instructor. And he was a FAC on the ground. He was Anglican, uh, team leader in Ramadi with us just getting after it. And it's funny because he taught, like, all the stuff he did in the Marine Corps, he taught, like, he talks about what he did for this one six-month deployment to Ramadi because lot different than what it was, as I constantly tell him, being in an air-conditioned cockpit, you know, 20,000 feet up in the air.

• 58:56Speaker 01

  That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So you're right. I mean, those guys, can you imagine what kind of perspective they get on the ground? And then go back up there and go, oh, wait a minute, like, I know what it was like down there.

• 59:05Jocko Willink?

  That's, that's the Marine Corps, uh, and I've, I've read some great stories about like the Korean War. Those, those Marine Corps pilots that would go and deploy, they're like the Marines, everyone loved them. Because they, they can just talk to those pilots the way they need to be talked to. So, I mean, and look, we have the JTACs. There's JTACs are awesome too, uh, but in the Marine Corps, it's just with the way they do it and it's pretty freaking cool. Uh, so this guy is your roommate?

• 59:29Speaker 01

  So my roommate, so I come home, we throw on the TV and on comes this movie. And you're looking at it and you know, it's got people running around and. I think you're talking about Sean. No, I'm not. Okay. No, you're, you are incorrect. One. Amber's incorrect two times out of a hundred. I always tell her she's always 98% right. I just don't ever remember you living with him. Yeah, we lived together, remember for like six months. I don't remember that. Okay, sorry. It's okay. Go ahead. It's all good. I love you. Um, and, and they, so here, G I Jane, so G I Jane comes on. I'm just gonna, you know, I'm just gonna get to the point, alright?

• 1:00:11Speaker 01

  G I Jane comes on TV and I'm like, what is this? And, uh, they start talking about, you know, these units and this and that. And I have, when you were talking about exposure to the military, I hadn't, I had none. So if I had exposure, I could have maybe called this out right away. This was it. This was my military. I'm like, I want to do that. Like this looks hard. They said, these are the best of the best, right? Cause they talk about it in there. Not, not Demi Moore, but the rest of it. So that's what actually just, um, told me that there's a unit out there that's special. It's supposed to be the toughest training in the world.

• 1:00:50Speaker 01

  And that's, that's what piqued my, at least my initial interest to start to look into it and go, let me just look into what this is. And so, you know, then I read the first book, cause back then it was, um, there was nothing online about the teams. So I just, I, I read, I literally read every book from Vietnam. I mean, everything, all, and the more I read.

• 1:01:15Speaker 01

  The more I got like focused and the more hungry and and and you know and then nothing else mattered.

• 1:01:21Jocko Willink?

  Do you start training at this point?

• 1:01:23Speaker 01

  I did, I did.

• 1:01:25Speaker 02

  You also met someone who was at SIU and he was a SEAL, right?

• 1:01:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, oh God, I forgot his name. Uh, from, yeah, from.

• 1:01:36Speaker 02

  He died in a car accident.

• 1:01:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, Team Four. Uh, I remember, I know you're talking about. Yeah, I thought he was like.

• 1:01:40Speaker 02

  Will Bichelle.

• 1:01:41Speaker 01

  Will Bichelle, there you go, Will Bichelle. And so imagine you're, you're in college, you know how it is, you want to be a team guy or in high school and then you go, you find out that there's a guy that was a team guy. So he, of course, he, you know, he slit people's throats, he was behind enemy lines and like, so every time I saw this guy, I was like, I was in awe, you know, and of course, then when I got to team, they're like, oh, that shit, no, I'm just kidding, I'm joking, I'm, I'm totally kidding, he, he, he actually had a decent reputation. But, yeah, I looked up to this kid and, um, yeah, I was just, you know, I was just hungry after that, Jaco, it was, uh, nothing mattered. I called my parents, I told them what I wanted to do and they thought I was crazy. Um, Amber thought I was crazy.

• 1:02:23Speaker 01

  Um, but as you know, once you get on that, that path, nothing else matters. And it's nothing but focus and discipline and like, that's it.

• 1:02:33Jocko Willink?

  What did you do, uh, were you dropping weight? Were you, cause if.

• 1:02:37Speaker 01

  I stopped lifting. That's what I did. So all, all I knew was like sport lifting, you know, heavyweights. Um, I completely stopped lifting and all I did was, uh, body weight workouts. So the typical like Stu Smith, I think I had maybe the book, you know, pushups, pullups, situps, dips. Um, nobody taught me how to do any of these, by the way, nobody taught me how to even like jog too, like I didn't know anything, like I never jogged, like just went out and ran like six miles, everything was like 40 yard sprints, you know, or maybe hundreds, but that was it. And so I thought I was like jogging at a good pace until I ran with Sean Toll, who was in the army, uh, for a long time. I, I went for a run with him. And

• 1:03:17Jocko Willink?

  Were you jogging slower or

• 1:03:18Speaker 01

  I was jogging slower.

• 1:03:19Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:03:19Speaker 01

  I was like, oh, this is good. I'm like, I'm working out.

• 1:03:22Jocko Willink?

  Jogging.

• 1:03:22Speaker 01

  This is, this is jogging. And he crushed me. Like, I couldn't even, I could barely keep up with him. And he's like, I'm not even running at a hard pace. I went, holy shit. This is like, so he kind of brought me up to another level that I just didn't know about. Um, so then I started, you know, jogging faster.

• 1:03:39Jocko Willink?

  And so this is what you're doing your senior year.

• 1:03:40Speaker 01

  This is my senior.

• 1:03:41Jocko Willink?

  College.

• 1:03:42Speaker 01

  Senior, senior college and

• 1:03:45Speaker 02

  It was like this summer before your senior year that you decided to do this. He came to me and said he wanted to be a SEAL. And of course there was no nine 11. I didn't know what a SEAL was. I really didn't know the difference between the army and the Navy. Although I was, I knew I was patriotic, but then I also thought that maybe the military wasn't for me based on what I knew about kids from my hometown that went in it. And so I thought, you know, this is a great jumping off point because Marcus was so captivating and so cute and such kind of a check in the box for me to be like, I dated the SIU quarterback. I don't expect that we'll stay together. You know, I thought maybe we'd date for the summer, you know, whatever. And we'd been together at that point for two and a half years.

• 1:04:26Speaker 02

  And I met him at 17. So, you know, in my mind, like, no other guy had ever existed because he was everything to me. But at the same time, I knew that I was young and I was, you know, very independent and I was raised an only child. I have two half brothers who I love like, like brothers. Um, and I consider them brothers, but I was raised an only child. And so I wanted to be independent. I wanted to be, I wanted to graduate and, and move to maybe Chicago or St. Louis. At some point I even thought like, maybe I'll move to LA or New York. I just wanted to be. And when he told me he wanted to go into the military, I thought this is, this is perfect because I've kind of been thinking this and we're young and probably not going to stay together and get married.

• 1:05:10Jocko Willink?

  So by jumping off point, you mean jump off the, the freaking Marcus train and go your own way?

• 1:05:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, but in a healthy way.

• 1:05:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, like all good.

• 1:05:17Speaker 02

  We talked about it and he's like, you know, these are my goals and this is my vision. And I'm like, well, I'm, you know, I'm a couple of years behind you in school and I wanted to rush a sorority. I wanted to be young and be, not be in this committed relationship. And so we, we had super amicably decided to break up.

• 1:05:35Jocko Willink?

  So you break up and this is how, when did you talk to a recruiter?

• 1:05:40Speaker 01

  So that's, that's what I was gonna talk about next. So I did, I just went on the strip. Uh, same place where I ran into the guys coming out of the club. There was recruiting, there was a Marine Corps Navy recruiting station there and I went to talk to the Navy recruiter and he was a, um, I think he was a diver, combat diver. And he was really cool, like really cool. And he just said, hey, he's like, you're, you're at the, you're at school here, right? And I said, yeah. He said, well, you know, you, you can be an officer. And I was like, what's that? I literally said, what's that? Fucking knucklehead, right? Um, he's like, well, you know, you go to college, you get your degree and you know, you could become an officer in the military. Um, most people that are enlisted, you know, don't go to college and they enlist and kind of explained it. I said, oh, okay. Well, that, that sounds cool. Like, let's do that.

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  And so he handed me off to St. Louis, which was running, I guess, um, they, I think they managed.

• 1:06:34Speaker 03

  The officer recruitment.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  And, and again, I didn't like have, I had no mentors, you know, um, you know, as you know, a lot of the, you know, the officers that go in either go to the academy or they have, you know, congressmen, like they just, they have a better network. I just didn't know anybody. And so I was training on my own and then the day I had to, uh, he drove, the, the, the officer recruiter drove down from St. Louis and met me at the university to take my like PRT, SEAL PRT test. I borrowed a pair of, I'd been training in sneakers. I borrowed a pair of boots because I didn't have any, you gotta wear boots. Um, I'm a size 14. I, the only size that was available to me, I think it was like 11 and a half or 12.

• 1:07:20Speaker 01

  So I, I literally squeezed my feet into these size 12s. About the second lap in, I completely like, both my legs cramped up.

• 1:07:33Speaker 01

  Finish the run, um, do start doing pushups and I'm doing, uh, what do they call them? Grasshopper pushups?

• 1:07:41Jocko Willink?

  Oh, like, like little half pushups?

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, like your elbows are in instead of like out here. And he's like, stop. What? He goes, you're, those aren't, those aren't pushups. Those are, we call those grasshopper pushups. I was like, well, it's the only ones that I know, you know, so I'm going to keep going. He said, no, you, you can't because they don't count. You have to move your arms here. So the whole test was a complete failure. Like I fucked that thing up completely. And, um, you know, I found out, of course, I didn't get picked up for, for spec war, but I got picked up for every other officer program. So you come in, go to NUC, you go to whatever, SWO. Um, you, but you can't, can't go to BUDS. And you can transfer after two years. And I went, yeah, but you know, the reason, you know, just the only time I actually thought

• 1:08:25Speaker 01

  a little bit, and the only reason I'm going in the military is to be a team guy. And, and so I just told him like, no, I, you know, I want to go to BUDS. And he said, well, you can just go back to the, you know, the recruiter and you can enlist. I said, great.

• 1:08:40Jocko Willink?

  Can you give me a ride?

• 1:08:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, give me a ride. We shook hands. I took my, you know, my little packet that I already started building, my record, and went back to the recruiter and I think I enlisted right there, like sign, you know, MEPS, I think it was.

• 1:08:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, MEPS.

• 1:08:56Speaker 01

  Or early. I think it was, no, or, uh.

• 1:08:58Jocko Willink?

  DEPS.

• 1:08:58Speaker 01

  DEPS, DEPS.

• 1:08:59Jocko Willink?

  Delayed entry.

• 1:09:00Speaker 01

  Yes, that was it.

• 1:09:00Jocko Willink?

  And then MEPS is where it actually happens.

• 1:09:02Speaker 01

  MEPS you go to, exactly. Yeah, you're right.

• 1:09:04Jocko Willink?

  So you, how long was it like when you enlisted? How many, how long did you have to wait before you could leave?

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  It was quick and we'll get, yeah, we can get in that story. But from when I talked to the recruiter, I think it was about six months. So I was, you know, I'd show up every month and they'd have like little gatherings or whatever. But I was still training, um, starting to get a little bit indoctrinated into the, into the military.

• 1:09:27Jocko Willink?

  So were you guys, were you guys split up when you actually signed the papers?

• 1:09:31Speaker 02

  No. Uh. We were actually living together.

• 1:09:34Jocko Willink?

  Oh dang.

• 1:09:35Speaker 02

  And.

• 1:09:36Speaker 01

  I don't remember that now, I'm just.

• 1:09:38Speaker 02

  And yeah, you were just training and getting ready and we knew that, you know, the, the end was coming. But we were still together.

• 1:09:46Jocko Willink?

  Okay. And then you sign the papers and now you got your date. Hey, you're gonna leave on this date.

• 1:09:51Speaker 01

  I'm gonna leave, I'm gonna leave on this date, uh, what's that, June fifteenth? Two thousand and I don't know, when did you tell me?

• 1:10:04Speaker 02

  You were also finishing, he had his last semester in school, which ended in December and then you did your internship.

• 1:10:10Speaker 01

  Well, then I did my internship. I did my internship for four week, no, four months at the Breakers Resort in Palm Beach, Florida.

• 1:10:16Jocko Willink?

  What is it?

• 1:10:16Speaker 01

  It wasn't a terrible internship. It was like resort management. Like, I basically got paid to be a, a, a cabana boy and like get tips. I mean, literally, and then two weeks run the children's like kid program. It was crazy.

• 1:10:29Jocko Willink?

  And that's what you did from December until?

• 1:10:32Speaker 01

  Until, uh, April.

• 1:10:34Jocko Willink?

  April?

• 1:10:34Speaker 01

  Yep. So April, came back, graduated, didn't walk. I didn't really care about like walking across the stage. To me, that wasn't.

• 1:10:40Speaker 02

  We're, we're missing a huge chunk of that. Don't go too far into the story.

• 1:10:45Speaker 01

  Uh, where do you want me to start?

• 1:10:45Speaker 02

  Because, well, in May two thousand.

• 1:10:48Speaker 01

  Okay, go ahead.

• 1:10:50Speaker 02

  So in the summertime, July, August, school's starting is when we decided this will be our last semester together. I knew he was gonna leave at the end of the semester. I also had an aunt who was dying of breast cancer and so, and I was working full time. I had eighteen credit hours. I was working thirty hours a week. My aunt was dying. And so, um, for a couple of months, I was thinking like, I'm not sure I feel quite right. But I just kept delaying what I would soon realize was the inevitable, which was taking a pregnancy test.

• 1:11:24Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 1:11:25Speaker 02

  And I finally took this test in October, um, and I had been pregnant since August. So I was about twelve weeks pregnant with our son when I found out and he was set to leave in two months in December.

• 1:11:43Jocko Willink?

  Set to leave for the Navy?

• 1:11:45Speaker 02

  For his internship.

• 1:11:46Jocko Willink?

  Oh, for the internship. Okay, okay. So, got it. Now I'm tracking.

• 1:11:51Speaker 01

  Yep. Hey, I'm still trying to track the story. It's a long time ago.

• 1:11:55Jocko Willink?

  So, so

• 1:11:56Speaker 02

  It was a whirlwind.

• 1:11:57Jocko Willink?

  And what did you do? I mean, so?

• 1:11:58Speaker 02

  Freaked out. Completely freaked out. And Marcus was so supportive initially. He's like, he's like, this is gonna be fine. Like, we're gonna be parents. It's gonna be fine. And here he is, like, all this, these dreams and plans. And I was the one freaking out. And then he told his parents, and they freaked out. And when they freaked out, he freaked out. When he freaked out, I really freaked out.

• 1:12:22Speaker 01

  There's a lot of freaking out going on.

• 1:12:23Speaker 02

  There was a lot of freaking out.

• 1:12:25Speaker 01

  Freaking out, shit rolls downhill, obviously.

• 1:12:27Speaker 02

  Well, I just thought, like, my life is over. It's absolutely, I was so excited about this new beginning, and it's over. And um, I, I now see that is the beginning. That's the beginning of everything. Thank God.

• 1:12:43Jocko Willink?

  Wow. So, you find out in October, then in December, you're going to be a cabana boy in Florida.

• 1:12:50Speaker 01

  That's right, cabana boy.

• 1:12:51Jocko Willink?

  But meanwhile, you're an expecting dad.

• 1:12:54Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:12:54Jocko Willink?

  At the same time.

• 1:12:55Speaker 01

  Right, at twenty, twenty-two years old.

• 1:12:58Jocko Willink?

  And you're already know you're gonna join the Navy?

• 1:13:02Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:13:05Jocko Willink?

  And then what's the call, then?

• 1:13:07Speaker 01

  So, the call is, I go do my internship, because...

• 1:13:11Jocko Willink?

  You gotta do it to graduate or whatever?

• 1:13:13Speaker 01

  To graduate. Amber stays back. Did you, did you, um, did you go to school in the spring?

• 1:13:18Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:13:19Speaker 01

  You did. Okay, so Amber's pregnant. She's going to school in the spring. I'm in Palm Beach, Florida,

• 1:13:26Speaker 01

  working as a cabana boy and snorkeling in the evenings on the, on the,

• 1:13:32Speaker 02

  And training. You ran to a work.

• 1:13:34Speaker 01

  I trained my ass off down there. No, I, I did.

• 1:13:36Jocko Willink?

  But you're working seventeen jobs or whatever, with eighteen credit hours? You're just like...

• 1:13:39Speaker 02

  I think I took fifteen in, in the spring. But um, yeah, I was working full-time and going to school. I was, you know, nine months pregnant, taking finals. It was...

• 1:13:48Speaker 01

  Amber worked forever. Like, from the day I met her, she was always working, like, non-stop. And it hasn't stopped. It's the only reason we're still here. Um, yeah, she worked her ass off. She really did. She's a grinder.

• 1:14:00Jocko Willink?

  And then how did this whole scenario impact your decision to go in the Navy?

• 1:14:08Speaker 01

  It I mean, it really didn't like I was. This is what I want to do. I, you know, twenty three, I I I didn't um, I didn't even think about what it was like to start a family. Um, but then again, what what were we supposed to do? I was supposed to graduate and then get a job, you know, like.

• 1:14:26Jocko Willink?

  Well, here's your job.

• 1:14:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I mean, here's here's your job. How are you making, you know, how are you making money? Again, you know, my dad handed me a ball when I was three. Um, I don't know. I was scared to death. Honestly, I remember saying, I'm supposed to put on a shirt and tie now and go step off in the private sector and get a job, you know, doing what and making what to support? Support the family. Like, I was scared to death, too, then, once I started really thinking about it.

• 1:14:49Jocko Willink?

  But did the Navy seem like the viable option?

• 1:14:53Speaker 01

  The Navy, the Navy, yeah. The Navy seemed, at that time, comfortable, you know?

• 1:14:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's like paycheck, healthcare.

• 1:15:00Speaker 01

  Paycheck, healthcare, yeah. And I think that's some of the probably advice I got from individuals. I don't remember. I mean, I think maybe I talked to a few. Just say, hey, you'll, you know, she'll be taken care of. You'll be taken care of. You make a few hundred dollars more if you're married. Whoa. Um, and at that time, when you don't have any uh, money, and I don't think anybody, I my my parents are definitely not supporting us. And I mean, Amber's family, of course, would have, but we I don't think we were thinking about that.

• 1:15:29Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:15:29Jocko Willink?

  So you end up getting married prior to leaving?

• 1:15:31Speaker 02

  Well, we spent most of my pregnancy apart and not just because he was in Florida. It's because, you know, we had this whole, like, existential crisis where we didn't know how to make this new curveball fit. And there was, there were several months when I thought, I'm just gonna raise this baby, you know, I I absolutely thought about ending the pregnancy. And I couldn't. There was no way I could. And I thought, I don't care what this means. I don't care how hard this is. I'm just gonna figure it out. And um, you know, even if that meant doing it by myself and

• 1:16:13Speaker 02

  Marcus was in the um, kids area like he had alluded to earlier, and we had picked our son's name.

• 1:16:22Speaker 02

  Before he left and at the time, no one was naming their kid Kayden. You know, it was like, he wanted to name him Cadence. I think we saw in a baby name book. And he's like, oh, it's like the quarterback calling Cadence. He's like, but that sounds like a girl's name, so let's shorten it. And there was this little baby that came in when he was at the breakers named Kayden. And we'd never heard that name before. And so he called me that night and he was like, I can't do this anymore. Let's figure this out. And so that's what we did.

• 1:16:57Speaker 01

  And we named Kayden.

• 1:16:58Speaker 02

  We named him Kayden.

• 1:16:59Speaker 01

  Of battle, of war. That's the, that was the.

• 1:17:02Speaker 02

  Ready for battle.

• 1:17:03Speaker 01

  Ready for battle. That's the, that was the meaning. So I thought it was a cool name.

• 1:17:06Jocko Willink?

  Jack.

• 1:17:07Speaker 01

  Why not? I mean, I tried to call him like Nico.

• 1:17:10Speaker 02

  Oh, Nico, Vito and Major were his three names of choice, but I wasn't going for that. So yeah, we named, Kayden was born in May of 2000. Marcus came back, proposed. We got married in June of 2000 and then six days later he, he left for boot camp.

• 1:17:32Speaker 01

  Typical story. Just like most Americans, right?

• 1:17:36Jocko Willink?

  And did you stay like at home in Illinois?

• 1:17:39Speaker 02

  I did.

• 1:17:40Jocko Willink?

  When he left for boot camp and everything, because there's no point in.

• 1:17:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, I couldn't, you know, move. The Navy wasn't going to move me, but um, of course, and then he had to go to A school and C school. It's because of Sonar Tech. And so when he was finished with C school and he was getting ready for Bud's in dock. I was able to move out. Kayden was nine months old at the time. So I was 21. I'd never been away from my little, you know, tiny town in Southern Illinois. And we moved to the Towers in Coronado. And so he would walk to work, like, you know, walk to Bud's every morning. We had no money.

• 1:18:13Speaker 01

  No, we were raking in the money at a thousand eighty-two per paycheck.

• 1:18:17Speaker 02

  And our rent was a thousand a month.

• 1:18:19Jocko Willink?

  What was the rent?

• 1:18:19Speaker 02

  A thousand.

• 1:18:20Speaker 01

  A thousand. So we got a little bit of help from mom and dad, a little bit.

• 1:18:23Speaker 02

  Not, no, not really. Not really.

• 1:18:26Speaker 01

  No, we didn't. You're right. We just racked up a lot of credit card bills.

• 1:18:31Jocko Willink?

  And now you're rolling into Bud's.

• 1:18:33Speaker 01

  Rolling into Bud's.

• 1:18:34Jocko Willink?

  How, how are your, how's your preparation? Are you good?

• 1:18:36Speaker 01

  I'm good. Yeah, really good.

• 1:18:39Jocko Willink?

  And you joined in May, June, July. So when September 11th, when is that? What's your career? Where are you at?

• 1:18:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:47Jocko Willink?

  When September 11th happens. Were you in a school?

• 1:18:49Speaker 01

  We'll get into that. No, I was in third phase.

• 1:18:51Jocko Willink?

  Oh damn.

• 1:18:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:52Jocko Willink?

  Before we get to that, let's start with first phase. I mean, how's that going? You, you're?

• 1:18:58Speaker 01

  First phase was, uh, first phase was good. So I showed up, uh, 175.

• 1:19:04Speaker 01

  Started.

• 1:19:05Jocko Willink?

  Wait, 175 pounds?

• 1:19:07Speaker 01

  No, no, no, I'm sorry. The number of, uh,

• 1:19:09Jocko Willink?

  People in the class. Got it.

• 1:19:12Speaker 01

  So I get, yeah, I show up and I look around and there's a, I mean, that's a lot of people. 175 is a lot. And all I keep hearing is, you know, one in four are gonna make it, like 25%. And honestly, the first thing I thought of was, how can I be one of these one in fours? There's so many people here. And I'm, again, I'm, I'm, I don't even consider myself, I'm not a big guy compared to like the guys I played ball with in college. But, but everybody else there was like, oh, Marcus is a big guy.

• 1:19:40Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah, for sure. How tall are you?

• 1:19:42Speaker 01

  Six, four.

• 1:19:43Jocko Willink?

  And how much did you weigh when you started buds?

• 1:19:44Speaker 01

  Like two and a quarter, two and a quarter, two twenty-five.

• 1:19:46Jocko Willink?

  That's a big dude going through buds.

• 1:19:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I, and I,

• 1:19:49Jocko Willink?

  Just FYI, I was like, just turned 19 and, uh, I was 174 pounds when I got there. I was like a little kid. This is so awesome.

• 1:19:58Speaker 01

  We had guys, like you probably like you, we had guys in buds that gained weight during buds.

• 1:20:01Jocko Willink?

  I did. I gained 10 pounds. Yep. I gained 10 pounds. But like, if you, you, you were what, 23, 24?

• 1:20:07Speaker 01

  I was 23.

• 1:20:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So you're like a man.

• 1:20:09Speaker 01

  I was a man-ish. Well, I was not really.

• 1:20:11Jocko Willink?

  Well, physically, physically, you were pretty close.

• 1:20:14Speaker 02

  I think you were 24.

• 1:20:15Speaker 01

  That'd be questionable to the instructors if we were men, right? Was that?

• 1:20:17Speaker 02

  I think you were 24 when you started buds.

• 1:20:19Speaker 01

  Was I? Who's counting?

• 1:20:22Speaker 02

  Almost years run together.

• 1:20:23Jocko Willink?

  So you're in pretty good shape. You're in good shape.

• 1:20:25Speaker 01

  I'm in good shape, but this is, this is where I'm getting at. So I, I look around and see these guys and all of a sudden, you know, we start doing the in-doc. And everybody is just in phenomenal shape. They can do pull-ups forever. They can run forever. You know, I'm still a little heavy. So for me, pull-ups, I can do them, but I can't do, like, I was watching guys do like 20, 30, 40, 50 at one time. Or run, our class, I swear, we had at least 10 individuals, you know, Mike Murphy, Nelson Sanchez, these guys were running sub 24 minute, four mile timer.

• 1:21:02Jocko Willink?

  God.

• 1:21:02Speaker 01

  Murph, Murph and Sanchez would always be like neck and neck. It was insane, right? And I was, you know, I never, I, so this was cool about the runs. I never, uh, I was in the goon squad, literally one day, one time, uh, never failed four mile time run and never got gooned, except the one time. So like for me, the running, I did it and I, you know, I, I got ahead of the goon squad, but it was miserable, you know?

• 1:21:30Jocko Willink?

  What class were you in?

• 1:21:31Speaker 01

  Two thirty-six.

• 1:21:32Jocko Willink?

  Two thirty-six. Check.

• 1:21:34Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so, so third phase, Jaco. So we're in third phase. Oh, we'll go back to first phase. Yeah. I, um, I was in good shape, but, but again, I look around and see a hundred and seventy-five guys and I was, I was nervous. And then after I started seeing guys work out and then guys doing, literally doing splits, I'm like, am I in the right place? Like these guys are, these are, there's some freaks here, you know, like Olympic swimmers and all these, these, these crazy individuals. And then, as you know, class starts and the loudest, it is wild. And the loudest screamers, all of a sudden you're like, hey, where's so-and-so? He, you know, he talked a lot of shit.

• 1:22:07Jocko Willink?

  You can't even comprehend it. Like we, we were talking before we started recording. It's like you and I have survivor's bias, meaning every friend I have, one hundred percent made it through BUDs. So as far as I know, the freaking pass rate for BUDs is a hundred percent. So you know, like, oh, everyone made it. Everyone, everyone I know made it, made it. But yeah, the wild thing is the people that, like you said, like Olympic swimmers and Olympic this and D1 this and D1 track guys and D1 football players and everything. And they all just quit. It's insane.

• 1:22:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, they all go away pretty quickly.

• 1:22:41Jocko Willink?

  Was there anything in Hell Week that like tripped you up or were you just like, hell yeah?

• 1:22:47Speaker 01

  No, the only

• 1:22:49Jocko Willink?

  reason I say hell yeah for me is because I, I like sucked at everything. Well, I didn't suck. I was, I was okay at everything, but I had to put out really hard to pass runs. I had to put out really hard to pass the O cars. I had to put out really hard to pass the swims. And look, everyone's putting out, but I had to put, put out really hard to pass the evolutions. But in Hell Week, it wasn't, it's not pass fail. It's just keep going, which there's anything I'm okay at. It's like, oh, I can keep going. I will, I will keep going. And so for me, Hell Week was almost like a break because you just had to keep going, which I was good at. Everything else, like I did, I failed war, I failed a four mile time run. I paced myself. I was an idiot. I mean, I wasn't fast enough to pace. I just needed to sprint.

• 1:23:33Jocko Willink?

  I failed to swim and again, like a bunch of people failed to swim and I was one of them. So that sucked. I don't know if I failed in an obstacle course. I probably did, but it like, so I was kind of middle of the pack, but it was because I was putting out hard. So for me, Hell Week was like, cool. And a bunch of people quit. A bunch of people quit and I was like, damn, are you dumb? Like,

• 1:23:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. And a lot of those individuals were up front.

• 1:23:58Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah. It's insane. We had some pipe hitters, some like legit, I shouldn't say pipe hitters because they're not. They're good athletes, right? They're good athletes and yeah, it doesn't really matter, man. Get tired, wet and cold.

• 1:24:11Speaker 01

  We had, I mean, we had a bunch of Rangers and Marines in our class. We had some Egyptian officers in the class and it was, it was diverse. But you know, I, I did have trouble on the runs, but, but like you, I, I put out. So I had to really put out hard to stay up and pass the runs. Um, I couldn't, I couldn't like keep it back a gear, you know, I had a, I had to really put out. But no, I, everything I did was, um, I did, I did okay. Uh, I remember one time they pulled me out of the, um, log PT because everybody was literally just, it was falling on their head and I was just, I don't know, I was in a different gear. And they're like, components sit down.

• 1:24:53Jocko Willink?

  Like a higher gear, like doing better?

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. I just felt, I felt, I felt good, you know, with the log and they made me sit down one time. They're like, you know, just sit down because you're, you're,

• 1:25:05Jocko Willink?

  Damn.

• 1:25:05Speaker 01

  You're, you're doing all right. Um, it was one time at Hell Week, I think it was, what were those called? Elephant?

• 1:25:12Jocko Willink?

  Elephant cage?

• 1:25:13Speaker 01

  Elephant runs?

• 1:25:14Jocko Willink?

  Oh, elephant runs. Yeah. When you're like holding.

• 1:25:15Speaker 01

  Yeah. So there was, there was one day I was super dehydrated and I remember this and, uh, like I thought I was going to die. And I kept trying to like pull back. So like guys would run and I would, I was literally trying to like pull it back because I couldn't, I couldn't keep up. And you know, I was getting yelled at. I'm like, guys, I don't know what's going on. Like I, I can't, I can't do anything right now. And I barely made it through that evolution. I remember it. It was, it was miserable. I remember to this day because. You know how it is. You just, everybody hits a point, right? And I hit that point where I could not, I felt like I couldn't go any further. And the only thing that kept me going was like probably the guys behind me like kicking me in the ass like, "Hey dude, like, keep going." Um, and then there was a, there was a ruck hump when we used to do, uh,

• 1:26:00Speaker 01

  you know, you used to do the O course, throw on a pack, whatever it was, three miles. There was a time there also that I felt like I was about to like pass out. Something was wrong. And I remember one of the guys in the class, and I'll never forget this, Ben Souders, who, you know, a lot of guys made fun of because he grew up in the Midwest and he was a Bible beater, and he never cursed, and he never drank, and never did anything. He comes running up past me. He's like, "Hey man, what's, what's wrong with you?" I said, "I don't know." I was like, "I'm, I'm about to die." He's like, "I'm gonna stay with you, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, is that cool?" I'm like, "Yeah, absolutely." He ran with me the whole way until we finished.

• 1:26:35Jocko Willink?

  And this was because you were dehydrated or something?

• 1:26:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was probably just like dehydrated or whatever. So, those are like the two times I just remember at Bud's where it was like, "You're about to, you're, you're gonna die," you know? But, other than that,

• 1:26:48Jocko Willink?

  How about dive phase? How were, how were you in the pool? Cause you surfed.

• 1:26:51Speaker 01

  I like, yeah, I liked the water. Um, I think I had some trouble with, um,

• 1:26:57Jocko Willink?

  Pool comp?

• 1:26:57Speaker 01

  With pool comp, like everybody else does. Um, my, I think, if I remember my exhalation knot, I almost fucking drowned because I'm like, "Hey, there's water going in my, my tube here, and it's not supposed to be," you know? So you come up and like, I'm trying to explain myself to the instructor staff, and they just jumped all over me. I'm like, "No, no, no, no, no. Wait, just listen, just hear me out, one time."

• 1:27:22Jocko Willink?

  I was talking pool comp with Andy Stumpf the other day up at Jiu Jitsu Camp, because he was an instructor. He's a third phase instructor. And you know how that, that, that motherfucker, like, he's just like, so hilarious. And, but he's telling me from like his instructor point of view of what he would do and what he would see, and how he would do it. And like, he's laughing hysterically, like, and I go, "How many people did you?" I go, "Were you like the hard instructor?" He's like, "Oh yeah." I go, "How many people did you pass?" "Oh no," I said, "I said, "Were you like the hard instructor?" And he goes, "I passed three people, three years, or four people, three years past his pool comp. Everyone else failed." And he said, "The guys that passed," he said, "I respected them."

• 1:28:05Jocko Willink?

  Cause you know, he put them through hell.

• 1:28:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, Andy, um, we, we, we did Andy's podcast and Andy put me through, um, jump training. Okay. East Coast and, uh, he was, you know, and he knows this, he was, God, he was such a dick to all of us. Except if you were in his like, his circle, you know, um, but it was cool to see him up in, uh, Montana. And, uh, yeah, it was great. Just what he's got going on now. And he was awesome. He's one of the best. You know, obviously one of the most talented, uh, jumpers that, that I.

• 1:28:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And one of the most talented wise asses.

• 1:28:38Jocko Willink?

  Just so good. Um, but yeah, you gotta have him debrief you on his experience as a, uh, I think he was a freaking dive instructor, a second phase instructor for like a couple of years.

• 1:28:48Speaker 01

  Oh, man.

• 1:28:48Jocko Willink?

  So he was telling me about how like he'd watched the kids' hands and when their hands would go into this like involuntary claw, like motion. And he goes, yeah, that's when I knew I'd had him. It's like, good God. I cannot imagine, uh, him having more fun torturing people, but I guess he's doing it.

• 1:29:07Speaker 01

  One of many.

• 1:29:08Jocko Willink?

  And then you're in, so then you get to third phase.

• 1:29:10Speaker 01

  Third phase and third, third phase, um, I couldn't, couldn't wait for, I think like most, most guys. And, uh, yeah, third phase is great. Um, the only problems I had there out on the island. We, we made a really shitty hide site for like, you know, your, your day that you were supposed to take hours to do it. It was, it was so pathetic, Jaco, that, um, one of the instructors came out, I don't want to say his name.

• 1:29:38Speaker 01

  But he lost his shit. He lost his shit so bad that I think if a, if a, some type of brass was there, they might've thrown him in jail.

• 1:29:49Speaker 01

  He flipped out on us. He took one of the students, like just threw him every which direction. I think put his boot in the guy's chest and like kicked him a mile. You know, it was one of those things. Uh, we were scared to death and then we worked on that hide for another four hours. I'm sure it was tight, but so, but because of that, we had to sleep on the beach. It was at Camp Stupid. So I got to sleep at Camp Stupid, which you really don't sleep, because I was getting, I was trying to sleep on the ice with those ice plants. And ice plants had nothing but some kind of nasty bug that was just biting us all night. So we didn't get any sleep. Some kind of sand flea scenario? It was bad. So, um, yeah. So that was my, uh, my third phase experience and, uh,

• 1:30:29Speaker 02

  Well, also the towers came down.

• 1:30:31Speaker 01

  Well, then the towers came down. So we're up at, um, we're training out east, you know, in the desert and, um, instructor comes out from the house there and says, hey, uh, US is being attacked. Uh, World Trade Center just got hit by, by an airplane. And we all looked at each other like, man, can these fucking guys just leave us alone? Like we're in third phase. We're, this is a conversation. We're about to graduate and they're still messing with us. Like what did we do wrong? Like we, we had a shitty second phase. I, I should, I shouldn't talk about that. Um, we had a really shitty second phase, but. What made your second phase so shitty?

• 1:31:09Speaker 01

  Just what, I, I, I actually did. Me and, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna name, name him. Uh, me and, me and Jeff Boss. So he, he and I are, are swim buddying it to the bathroom. And we go running out and our, our, uh, our proctor was a guy by the name of, uh, you know, Favero, uh, super laid back SDV guy. I don't know. Like probably the, actually we were told the only instructor that you can't piss off. Like it's impossible to piss him off. We, we somehow figured out how to do that because we were running to the bathroom. We didn't see him. And he called us evidently like three times and we didn't answer and he fucking flipped his lid.

• 1:31:51Speaker 01

  Because of that, and because the cadre was like, yeah, he doesn't ever flip out. Like we've seen him for like 15 years. They made us spin the Wheel of Misfortune every day for, this was the first day of second phase. They made it every day. Just you and your swim buddy? No, the whole class. Oh, God. Which is even better, right? So we got really, we got, we made a lot of friends after that. Um, so the Wheel of Misfortune, I've talked to classes like before and after us, like, oh, we, we spun it like twice. I'm like twice a week or like, no, no, the whole phase. I'm like, we spun it every single day. We got back from our dive. So we'd get back from our dive, didn't matter. One, one o'clock midnight, it didn't matter.

• 1:32:32Speaker 01

  Put all your stuff away, get back in the grinder, spin, you know, spin the wheel of misfortune. Ah, 208 counts, go. So, we did that every day for second phase, which I was told like never happens. And it was just like a miserable second phase because we had to do, you know, more PT for like an extra hour or whatever. So it sucked. Third phase, we're still being harassed, we thought it was a joke, they march us in, we watch it on TV for 30 seconds. We march back out to the grinder and we just didn't have any idea what was about to happen. The cadre, their demeanor was completely different. I'm getting chills, you know, talking about it. But you can tell like they knew what was about to happen.

• 1:33:16Speaker 01

  And I remember them like having this like hatred and just, you know, like we're about to go to war, guys. And, and we're just like, no, we're out here, we're, we're in BUDs, we're on the beach, we're working out. And the demeanor from the class, which is all we want to do is get through BUDs, this sucks. From their demeanor, which was like, we are, we're going to war, like this is what's happening. And it was, it was totally different. And, and from that day forward, from the last, last part of the third phase, like they were serious. It wasn't more of this like joking crew of cadre, like they were, um, like, this was real. This was not the shit, you know, that, in, in all honesty, that some people signed up for.

• 1:33:59Speaker 01

  I mean, there was, right after that, there was a few guys from SQT, and one, and one in particular, I remember quit in SQT. It was like, I didn't sign up to go to war, you know, at the college and whatever. So I think some people, this was like, obviously a big reality check. For us, we, I don't think we knew any different because we were just trying to get through BUDs. So.

• 1:34:17Jocko Willink?

  Damn. So Amber, this whole time, your new husband is coming home freaking with the shit beat out of him. And he's working crazy hours and all this. Like what's your, what's your impression of this whole scenario before September 11th?

• 1:34:35Speaker 02

  I really, Jaco, thought we just have to get to the end of BUDS. I literally thought after the six months of training, things are going to really even out.

• 1:34:44Jocko Willink?

  Of course.

• 1:34:44Speaker 02

  I mean, even minus nine eleven, that, you know, nothing could have been further from the truth, but in my mind, that was like at least something that was an end goal. And so all of the late nights and ice baths and I don't, I, I just need to stay on the couch all weekend. Like that to me was going to come to an end and life was going to be normal again. Um, it's also some of the sweetest times because he was so spent and I look back at photos of our one-year-old climbing all over him and he's got both knees, you know, wrapped with ice and he's trying to be a dad and, you know, we've got pictures at the zoo and I can see how beat down he was being a BUDS student and trying to be a dad.

• 1:35:27Speaker 02

  He came home one night on our anniversary and it was like, you know, midnight, like he'd missed the anniversary and he had geraniums picked from our apartment complex. And it was the sweetest thing. Like he was still trying so hard to be sort of this dual role. And after nine eleven, like it's like cadre, I mean, he completely changed.

• 1:35:49Jocko Willink?

  And what about, did you realize what an impact September 11th was going to have from the perspective of when I was going in the SEAL teams and it was 1990, 1991? I thought I was going to Vietnam. I thought I was going to Vietnam more like that. I thought we, hey, there's SEALs just sneaking around the world, just killing people and that's what I was going to be doing. So I just thought that's the way the SEAL teams was. That's what you did. Uh, then I got to the SEAL teams and it wasn't like that in the nineties. It was not like that at all. So did you have the impression like, hey, he's going to war anyways? Or were you like, oh, once this is, once he gets done with the SEAL training, we're going to be, you know, able to just kind of live normal lives, but now this September 11th happens?

• 1:36:35Speaker 02

  I didn't know what had happened because I went from being an independent sophomore to a pregnant college student, to a wife and a mom. And now nine eleven happens and

• 1:36:50Speaker 02

  my birthday is on September 12th today and, um, thank you. My mom had come to visit in 2001.

• 1:37:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, two, two thousand, nine eleven, two, oh my gosh, it's twenty one years, nine, oh, okay, yeah, sorry.

• 1:37:09Jocko Willink?

  Zero one.

• 1:37:11Speaker 02

  Yes. Anyway, my mom had come to visit and um, I remember telling her like, I think he's, I think he's at war. Like, I think he's gone. He was on the island. I had no idea. I'm like, he's probably gonna leave like today. And we also, it was just a crazy time. I had no idea how much it would.

• 1:37:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't think any of us did.

• 1:37:33Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, even, uh, I mean, from my perspective, I had been in the SEAL teams for like ten years at this point and, you know, you thought, like, everyone was, I was paranoid that, you know, I wasn't gonna get any. I was gonna miss it. It was gonna be over. Like, everyone was feeling like that. And because it seemed like it would last for, you know what, six months, maybe, maybe. I wouldn't even, I was about to say maybe a year, but I don't think anyone thought, oh, this is gonna go on for a full year. Like, we would do some strikes, we would do some hits, take out some targets, and then that would be that. Um, I would love to hear someone tell me that they knew it was gonna last twenty freaking years. I would, I would be very suspect.

• 1:38:16Jocko Willink?

  Now, I did have some officer, senior officer friends of me that said, when I was like, hey, get me back to a team, please now. They were like, hey, this is gonna go on a while. I'll give him credit for, for thinking that and for telling me that. Um, but almost everybody was like, oh, we need to get over now. If you don't get it now, it'll be another, you know, because the first Gulf War, you, but you kind of base some stuff off the first Gulf War, which was seventy two hours. It was seventy two hours.

• 1:38:44Speaker 01

  Russia and Ukraine, right? Right away, everyone said, oh, this is gonna end. This is gonna be a month. And now it's like, wait a minute.

• 1:38:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Oh, wait a minute. Um, it's, it's, it's a lot different. Um, yeah, so I, I think that everybody in the community, no one, no one that I talked to was like, oh, this is gonna last two decades. That wasn't even a thought.

• 1:39:10Jocko Willink?

  Did you go to SQT on the west coast?

• 1:39:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:39:14Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so you did like the group SQT?

• 1:39:16Speaker 01

  That was like, I think I was the first or I think it was the second class where they didn't do the STT anymore. Everyone did SQT. You didn't get your, well, actually you got your, you got your Trident when you graduated SQT.

• 1:39:28Jocko Willink?

  Oh, so that was, that was your class?

• 1:39:29Speaker 01

  That was a class, I think, before us. I think it was like, uh, it was, uh, was it like? Yeah, like Goggins and, uh, Brent.

• 1:39:40Speaker 02

  I know it was relatively new.

• 1:39:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:39:42Speaker 02

  And, and I remember too, Jaco, thinking like, I'm so happy that he's going to get to do something with all this training. Because, you know, SEALs during times of peace versus, you know, nine 11 on, um, I'm sure it's a very different way of living and deploying and being. And I just thought like, I know it's been, you know, it's been peaceful times for a while and good for him. I'm glad that he gets to actually utilize this training. And I also remember thinking SEALs are so incredible. They, nothing, you know, they don't die. I guess you hadn't, you know, you hadn't hurt. And that was, my thinking back then was so naive.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  Um, but I never was afraid, like, he can't do this anymore. Or I was actually very, uh, I, I was afraid, but I wasn't thinking that I needed to intervene. I was very supportive of, you know, of him deploying.

• 1:40:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, um, that's so crazy because you were young. We were all, I mean, I think, so I was in the Navy for 13 years before I shot my weapon at the enemy. So 13 years that you're talking about like this peacetime. And I actually, it was awesome. Like I had a great time. Like we worked hard, we trained hard. We were hanging out with our friends. Uh, we were trying to be ready for combat, which was the big thing that we didn't know and didn't understand. So you're kind of preparing for something that you don't really. That you really don't understand, but I really loved the job of being a SEAL. Even if the job is just going out and going into the desert and doing desert warfare training. I love that job. It's an awesome job. But I mean, what you're talking about, Amber, like the fact that you feel that as like a mom and a wife,

• 1:41:27Jocko Willink?

  even you felt like, I'm glad he's going to get to do his job. Imagine what the dudes are like. The dudes are like, oh, you know, it was, it was, I mean, we used to, I hate saying this because it sounds so freaking horrible, but we used to like pray for war, like just want to go to war so bad. We just, that's what we wanted to do. And um, yeah, it's, we got, we got what we asked for. We got what we asked for. I was going to ask you about SQT. So you go through SQT?

• 1:42:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:00Jocko Willink?

  And now that must have been, those dudes must have been like, fully, full on like, we're going to war. You guys are all going to war.

• 1:42:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely. It was, it was weird too. It was like a transition. So they're bringing in guys in that had just gone overseas and done something and like after actions. And so like, all of a sudden the shift started changing from like H gear to stuff that actually, you know, fits you and works. And we also had, I think 11, 11 guys in SQT class that came back that had gotten out. Right after nine 11, they came back in. So we had all these guys that were team guys before, went out in the private sector, like oh, nine 11.

• 1:42:41Jocko Willink?

  That's to your point, Amber. Like, can you imagine? You're a dude. You were in the team for four years or six years. You get out of the teams. You're going out. You're doing whatever you're doing on the outside. The war kicks off. You're like, I'm going back in. I'm throwing everything I have away, all built up, whatever. I'm going back in. Cause that's what dudes wanted to do.

• 1:42:55Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:42:57Jocko Willink?

  What did you get? So you get your Trident at the NSQT. What, what'd they do when you got, what, what team did you go to?

• 1:43:02Speaker 01

  I went to 10. They just commissioned 10 and seven. So half the class went to seven or STV one. And then half of us went to 10.

• 1:43:10Jocko Willink?

  Did they, did they, did you, did you keep your trident when you got there? Cause I know I heard some good stories, like some teams were taking your trident and painting it blue. So it was inert.

• 1:43:20Speaker 01

  Two and four, two and four. Oh yeah. Like you showed up, like you didn't have it. You got it ripped off. I think as soon as you came across the quarter deck.

• 1:43:27Jocko Willink?

  I know. I want to say somebody, SDV was telling me they took the tridents and put them into a birdcage.

• 1:43:32Speaker 01

  That's what they did on the east coast. They put them on, they put them in birdcages. And like, you can look at it, but you can't, you can't have it. You know, and of course the ones, you know, the guys who struggled, uh, they had to keep their tridents in the birdcage, you know, a lot longer than guys that were, that were squared away. So. But we did, you know, we did, um, we did get beat into our chest, uh, from the instructor staff at SQT, you know, while all the families were there and stuff. So that was, you know, at least we felt like there was something there, but.

• 1:44:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:01Speaker 01

  Maybe not so much.

• 1:44:03Speaker 01

  Compared to how it used to be.

• 1:44:04Jocko Willink?

  Compared to how it used to be. Yeah, it was cool. Uh, you know, I checked into the team and we went through something called SEAL tactical training at the team and then you did a board with your, uh, did a board with like the senior people in each department. But man, the training that the guys get now, the training that you got, this like centralized training with all the experience, all consolidated. It's, it's awesome. Like there's no doubt.

• 1:44:29Speaker 01

  There, I think they're coming out of, I don't know if they're, they might be coming out of BUDs now, not just SQT, I think BUDs with like four weeks of CQC training.

• 1:44:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's.

• 1:44:38Speaker 01

  You know, compared to like, you wouldn't even see it until you're at a team, you know, six months down the road that you went to Shaw's for two weeks, you know?

• 1:44:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And the, the thing is like, uh, when you were talking about guys coming back from like combat deployments and they're getting in there. And that's cool, right? That's awesome. But imagine like it turned into, hey, these guys were in sustained combat operations for years. Cause I remember in the nineties, like if a guy did a mission, like singular, like one mission, it was like, hey dude, this guy's combat experience and. Like they had this thing that you didn't, you know, like I had a platoon commander who's an awesome guy and he had been in Grenada and was like, you know, he had, he had slayed the dragon and we were all just looking at him like, yeah, he was the coolest guy ever.

• 1:45:26Speaker 01

  We had first phase instructor was on the, uh, the train op in Bosnia.

• 1:45:29Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 1:45:30Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:45:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:45:31Speaker 01

  And it was like, oh, man, there was a gunshot like, like five miles away.

• 1:45:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, a farmer was like shooting an animal and like that was contact left. And you were getting debriefed on it.

• 1:45:42Speaker 01

  Not judging anyone that was there, just.

• 1:45:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no.

• 1:45:44Speaker 01

  Passing.

• 1:45:45Jocko Willink?

  You did.

• 1:45:46Speaker 01

  Passing gouge.

• 1:45:47Jocko Willink?

  You did, you did what you were, uh, what the country asked you to do. So you get into a, you get, you show up at the team now, you go right into a platoon?

• 1:45:53Speaker 01

  Right into a platoon, yeah.

• 1:45:54Jocko Willink?

  What's your job? Do you just get handed a sixty or what?

• 1:45:57Speaker 01

  How did you guess? You didn't think I'd be like the comms guy or, um, I got handed a sixty just cause I couldn't wait. I was like, give me two, please. Um, I couldn't wait to be a sixty on it actually.

• 1:46:08Jocko Willink?

  Did you get a mark forty-eight or did you get a sixty?

• 1:46:10Speaker 01

  I got a sixty.

• 1:46:11Jocko Willink?

  Sweet.

• 1:46:11Speaker 02

  By the way, Marcus had never shot a weapon before.

• 1:46:14Speaker 01

  Shh, don't tell me.

• 1:46:16Speaker 02

  Before going into the Navy, right?

• 1:46:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I was, like I said, I grew up.

• 1:46:20Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:20Speaker 01

  I grew up playing, playing ball.

• 1:46:23Jocko Willink?

  Well, the cool thing is no bad habits, good hand eye coordination, cause you were an athlete, like that's all points to you probably being a pretty good shot and everything.

• 1:46:30Speaker 01

  I was, I was a better pistol shot. I picked that up quickly, immediately. Rifle took me a while to get proficient at it. And even when I went over to, to DEP group, you know, I, I never struggled with it, but like the pistol, I was, I was a really good pistol shot and quick and faster than everybody. But the rifle, like, I was like middle of the road. I had, I struggled with it actually, early on. Um, I remember out at Shaw's, the, uh, what are the guys out there, Ross? And just coming over and saying, hey, you know, just, you know, don't, don't put your magazine on the car, like just a bunch of things that like, he's like, I can work on. But soon as he worked like with me, you know, I went from being pretty like not good to, to, to excelling.

• 1:47:13Speaker 01

  Um, but it took me a while and I tell people, I was like, no, I actually had to like really focus and practice and like stay late or, you know, go out to the range in the evening when guys were like hanging it up because I just, there was just something not right about not being proficient at it. Right? Like, I want to actually be good. I don't want to just hang it up and, and, and walk away. So I, I got, I got decent at shooting a, a, a, um, you know, a rifle.

• 1:47:40Jocko Willink?

  What year was it when you checked into Team 10?

• 1:47:43Speaker 01

  2002, like April.

• 1:47:45Jocko Willink?

  And do you, do you know where you're going on deployment?

• 1:47:47Speaker 01

  No, nothing. We didn't know anything yet. They were.

• 1:47:50Jocko Willink?

  Oh, because the world was still just chaos.

• 1:47:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was chaos and new team, like there was going through, you know, growing pains, I think. And so we didn't know anything. In my, my first deployment, actually, we went over to Germany and just.

• 1:48:01Jocko Willink?

  Got your UCOM on?

• 1:48:03Speaker 01

  Got, we got our UCOM on. Um, yeah. And that was, that was whatever, right? You just trained, more training.

• 1:48:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And the frustration level is everyone just going nuts, like, you gotta be kidding me.

• 1:48:14Speaker 01

  It's insane. The people that were getting out, like after, you know, soon as a platoon wouldn't go to, um, you know, Iraq or Afghanistan, like guys were getting, you know, you saw it out, out here. Guys were getting out immediately. You know, they're jumping into Blackwater and all these other places. Um, I saw a lot of it. And the guys get out to one, one platoon because they weren't, you know, because you'd hear about like these Rangers and SF and like all these guys are going down range. And you're like, what? I'm fucking going to Germany to do what? Like, yeah, I just went to Buzz and SQT and it did a two-year workup and what is this for? You told me, I'm like, good. You know, maybe that was garbage.

• 1:48:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And plus you had that feeling that this whole thing's gonna be over like really quick. And I better, if I don't get it now, if I don't get out and go work for a contractor, this is really horrible. Well, how do you, how are you liking the team life, Amber?

• 1:49:04Speaker 02

  You know, I didn't mind it. I realized really early on that there was a pretty clear distinction in the wives that, you know, it was probably best to keep one foot in, but don't try to, you know, jump in full throttle and don't stay completely away. I saw that there were women that were. Very angry and resentful towards their husbands and I I felt like there were women that were really supportive and I always wanted to be supportive. I also felt like, you know, it it was not something that I wanted to necessarily make my life about, but I wanted to support Marcus enough that I knew what was going on within the community and so it was good, you know, we had two kids at that point.

• 1:49:49Speaker 01

  Oh dang.

• 1:49:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, I got pregnant with our daughter when Marcus was in, was December of 2001, right after nine eleven. So we had two kids when he checked into his first platoon and he was pretty much gone all the time.

• 1:50:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:50:05Speaker 02

  So.

• 1:50:06Speaker 01

  Wait, no, no, no, we had, no, I was at, I was at Lead climber when you were like nine.

• 1:50:12Speaker 02

  I was overdue, you got home on my due date and then I ended up being five days overdue. But, um, yeah, he was at Lead climber and I'm like, can you tell them that you're having a baby? And he's like, no, no, I can't.

• 1:50:24Speaker 01

  She's literally ready to burst and I'm like five hours away.

• 1:50:28Jocko Willink?

  It's just like, it's such a, the way.

• 1:50:31Speaker 01

  It's the way.

• 1:50:32Jocko Willink?

  It's the way.

• 1:50:32Speaker 02

  I'm like, if you're deployed, that's one thing, but you're in West Virginia, I'm in Virginia. He had, you know, no cell phone.

• 1:50:38Speaker 01

  There was one cell phone.

• 1:50:39Speaker 02

  No, a pay phone you walked to and he would call and be like, have you had the baby yet? So he got home on my due date, but I ended up being a little overdue and, um, yeah, it was just gone all the time. It was really actually hard. I was an only child, so there was part of me that really, you know, I was raised an only child, so it was part of me that that did love that independence and didn't need him around, but it did get lonely and I was now with two little kids away and I was meeting wives, but it was, you know, there's, there's just, there was a lot of like, I don't know what schools have your, has your husband been to, what's your husband's ranking? I just, I don't ever, I've never played that, sort of like living through, getting validity through your husband's career.

• 1:51:20Speaker 02

  Marcus was always like, you know, my reputation means a lot to me and so don't ever do anything that would embarrass me in the community, like, don't risk my reputation and I really respected that.

• 1:51:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. My wife was due with our first kid and my XO, who's a prior on list, a guy who's an awesome guy, this is at SEAL Team Two, he's like, so when did your baby due? And I was like, oh, you know, like September or something and he's like. When are you supposed to go on deployment? I'm like, uh, August something. He's like, he's like, you're not going. I was like, yeah, sir, no, I'm going on deployment. He's like, yeah, you're not. And I was like, sure, I'm definitely going on deployment. Like, I'm not, I'm, I'm definitely going. He's like, you are definitely not going. And so he literally said, hey, you can go on deployment as soon as she has that baby. And that's what I did. And I missed about a week and a half of deployment. She had the baby and I left the next day, which was probably, I mean, at least I was there.

• 1:52:16Jocko Willink?

  But the attitude from me was just like, no, it's like first baby, whatever. Like I got, I'm going on deployment. That's just, that's just the way it is. I mean, so like for you to be like, no, you know, uh, I'm not coming home. I'm at, I'm at a school right now and I'm not coming home. That's the way it is. Like, it's just the, the normal thing. And then I remember I, I told my wife, God bless her.

• 1:52:44Jocko Willink?

  She called me at work.

• 1:52:47Jocko Willink?

  And I don't, I don't, I forget what was going on, but she called me at work and my chief was like, hey, Jaco, your wife's on the phone. And I remember I pick up the phone and I go, what? And you could tell she was like so apologetic because it's this, I put, probably put the same freaking psycho pressure on my wife that, that Marcus put on you of like, don't, you know, don't freaking mess.

• 1:53:13Jocko Willink?

  Don't embarrass me. And so I was like, what? And she's like, uh, you know, blah, blah. And I go, okay. And that was it, like hung up, like a total jerk, like I'm a total savage. Uh, so I'm sorry darling about that. But what I'm saying is like, that's just the normal thing. Like you, you just, you're in the team, you all about the team, everything's the teams. And it sucks to be married to those dudes, I think in a lot of way.

• 1:53:38Speaker 02

  It does, but there was also this shared sort of like aggression, if you will, for lack of a better term, that I understood that he needed to be so focused. And I was just pissed after the, the attacks of nine 11. And I just thought like, yeah, get over there and like, do whatever you do.

• 1:53:56Jocko Willink?

  Hell, yeah.

• 1:53:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:53:58Jocko Willink?

  Go do it. Just, I don't want to know about it, but go do it.

• 1:54:00Speaker 02

  Like I knew that the teams always came first and I accepted that because I knew that it was a short period of our lives and. It needed to be done.

• 1:54:10Jocko Willink?

  Mm hmm, mm hmm. So your first deployment, you go to, go to Germany, you're sitting over there, so why the hell are we doing this? You get back and you roll into another platoon. What's, are you gonna be a sixty gunner again? Wha- what's up?

• 1:54:24Speaker 01

  Absolutely. I asked for it. But I think at that time, then we were, I was carrying a Mark, I was carrying a forty eight.

• 1:54:31Jocko Willink?

  Got some Mark forty eight, nice.

• 1:54:32Speaker 01

  Forty six too, yeah. Um, so that was good. We, you know, that was, uh, my, my task unit was, uh, was Red Wing, so, you know, we, um, you know, we worked up together, we flipped a coin, uh, you know, I'm a grievous platoon, basically got to go to Afghanistan first, we go to Germany first.

• 1:54:54Jocko Willink?

  Oh, so when we were ripping out like halfway through to get guys more exposure?

• 1:54:59Speaker 01

  Yep, so literally over a coin toss. And, uh, so those guys went down range and we went to, you know, we went to Germany and then, you know, the rest is kinda history. And once the Hilo went down, we actually deployed a week later because, you know, they were, they were Iraq.

• 1:55:17Speaker 01

  I mean, half, half platoon was gone and the other guys were, you know, not good.

• 1:55:21Jocko Willink?

  How do you even, how'd you guys get word? What are you guys doing in Germany?

• 1:55:24Speaker 01

  It was terrible how we got word. Um, we actually got word from, from them. So here we are, we're forward deployed in Germany, actual unit, and we gotta find out from our spouses that there's guys, uh, in full, uh, military dress showing up at people's doors. Like, that's, that's how we found out. So it was, that was a rough couple of days.

• 1:55:51Speaker 02

  It went on though, I mean, it was, the communication wasn't a whole lot better back in Virginia Beach because they were still searching for Marcus Luttrell, and you know, that went on for like, what, almost a week? Um, and, you know, no one knew if their husband was on the helicopter or not. And the ones that survived weren't allowed to call home. And so it was literally pins and needles. And they weren't hearing much more, but then when the knocks started coming, um... They were finding out.

• 1:56:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, I remember being on the phone with you and you like screaming crying because like somebody was like somebody showed up to the door like you were they were all you know women were together and stuff so it was that was like a just a shitty you know just a shitty time I think for everybody and then the community as you know didn't really didn't experience a loss like that so it was really difficult how people were handling it when those guys got back to Germany I think they flew in a psych to like meet with everybody for 30 minutes the first guy went in there and didn't come out for almost three hours so they were they were they were gonna they they gave each guy 30 minutes to talk to psych and the first guy went in to come out for three hours so it was just one of those things I don't think

• 1:57:01Speaker 01

  anybody even knew how to prepare what to do or and so it was just a bit you know it was a bit rough for a while but again once we got like over that week got our heads back straight we were like get us over there yesterday like why are we still sitting here but we did we wound up within a week we were in country and we already we were doing our first mission like within the first couple of days so

• 1:57:23Jocko Willink?

  And then what were you guys doing what was like your mission set?

• 1:57:25Speaker 01

  Uh, mission was going after different like like different cells different Taliban cells that were um but like larger it was almost like a little bit different wasn't like CT missions even though we did like a CT op right like initially the first op was like a no shit like it's probably the coolest op ever like you know Black Hawks come in ropes go out you know fast rope you know charge on the gate like boom everybody you know like it was like a real op and then because that was done at night it got shut down and the whole country then got shut down because you you're not allowed to go after bad guys at night because that's not nice

• 1:58:05Speaker 01

  so that's what we were dealing with in in uh you know in Afghanistan at the time so then we started just you know going out to uh in the daytime chasing different um different groups like in valleys and we're working with the Kansovs so the Canadians who are like men compared to us they're fucking they look like Vikings but they wore way too much gear and we had to tell them to like like dude you're going out in the mountain for three days and you got six nine mil mags on your body do you think you're gonna use six nine mil mags?

• 1:58:35Jocko Willink?

  I really hope you don't need to use six nine mil mags.

• 1:58:38Speaker 01

  So you know shit like that but um but uh so that's what we were doing and

• 1:58:42Jocko Willink?

  What's your job on the platoon?

• 1:58:45Speaker 01

  I was a air ops lead breacher. And so I, um, you know, in fire team leader. And, um, yeah, it got, we had a good, like, I would say good, good deployment. It was, it was a really spicy deployment. I mean, we had, uh, like multiple engagements. We had, our chief got, we got lit up by a army Apache. Which was wild because like that was not supposed, obviously wasn't supposed to happen. It was a big deal because it was, it was daytime. Still don't know how they didn't recognize us.

• 1:59:25Speaker 01

  Uh, full on engagement, like full on gun run, not just like, oh, there might be a position of more, like, we were, we were engaging a small group. That was engaging us and we were, it was like five of us and maybe three of them. And we were starting to bound forward, like from cover to cover. And, you know, I, I actually, I was a patrolling with a, with a saw. So it was a little bit lighter and I just remember just like, just fucking going off on that thing. It was awesome. And then I remember hearing this deep, um, like deep, deep. Sound of just like doo, doo, doo, doo, doo. And I'm like, what the fuck is that? And literally in the middle of this little valley, and it was, it was not wide.

• 2:00:10Speaker 01

  I turn around and this army, uh, this Apache is in a full on like front tilt. Gun run and I'm, I literally thought it was a movie. Like you saw like the dirt. And the, you know, whatever that was a 20 millimeter maybe, um, it was just coming straight at me. And I'm like, you know, all this happened so fast. I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? Like we're getting engaged by our own guys. And so it's come, it's tearing ass. We all dive out of the way. I remember diving behind rocks and watching my chief. Do a full on like dive, like into rocks, like did not give a fuck.

• 2:00:49Speaker 01

  And the thing comes tearing through. You can't see anything because dust everywhere. He wound up getting hit in the face. Well, the way they were working, uh, gun runs then is that dash one would come in and do, uh, 20 millimeter guns. You know, dash two's coming in with next. Right? 2.5.

• 2:01:08Speaker 01

  Rockets and so I just get this rock and I just huddle up and I'm like this is fucking it like I may live but like I'm gonna get fucked up I'm gonna get fragged here because like we we've been calling in gun runs all day long into caves and like we get we'd get engaged we pull back call in some guns move forward that's the kind of mission it was through the through the mountains there and so I was just waiting I was like huddled up and like oh this is it we're gonna get I'm gonna get sprayed hopefully it's not bad like I was like trying to cover up my face I'm thinking like okay if I just get wounded you know it'll be okay but just not my face or my head and the second one just comes tearing through and didn't fire anything but I could see them I could literally see

• 2:01:48Speaker 01

  them and they were so low so somebody who who didn't have their head up their ass was able to move over to fires and call it off somebody cleared them hot I still don't know to this day and we still talk about it because like it was a fuck up you know it was a bad fuck up

• 2:02:04Jocko Willink?

  How bad was your chief wounded?

• 2:02:06Speaker 01

  He his whole face was like um like you couldn't it wasn't bad bad like but it was like if you took a picture you're almost unrecognizable because the I guess the frag going that fast was so fast it just kind of blew his face up and he was like like spitting blood a little bit but he honestly was fine

• 2:02:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah

• 2:02:25Speaker 01

  Yeah like let's be real yeah yeah yeah a hundred percent like you know looking back you're like but um yeah that was a big deal I just remember well I think when we got back and again I was a E but I think E5 at the time maybe E6 you know so I was I was tucked away but I think the leadership got in the ass of of that unit you know over at um over at Siege of Odo and it's like what what happened there you know who caught first up who who cleared them hot you know we were on the offensive it was just a it was a total mess

• 2:02:56Jocko Willink?

  When I was a young radio man I was standing out in the desert in Fallon Nevada trying to call in for an extract from a helicopter two helicopters and I'm sitting there and I'm looking they're they're like maybe a couple hundred feet at altitude and I I'm just standing there making comms with them like hey you know we're ready for extract and they couldn't see me and I was like this is crazy I started like waving my arms they still can't see me and finally Uh, you know, I'm like, I'm getting a bearing and I'm like, hey, I'm right over here to your southwest and they just can't see me. And finally, I like pop or whatever, pop a smoke and I mark you identifying, blah, blah, blah. But it showed me that when you're in the air, like, things just look so totally different.

• 2:03:37Jocko Willink?

  And, uh, they can't see shit and they're moving freaking hundred and fifty miles an hour. And they get told like, you're cleared hot. Guess what? They're gonna freaking shoot, man. Um, cause a lot of times they're saving your ass. They're saving someone's ass too.

• 2:03:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. And you know, there's like, I mean, you know, all the blue and blue that was happening just everywhere. And again, it's not, you know, of course it's not nefarious. It just, it happens just like that.

• 2:04:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:02Speaker 01

  Um, but we had, uh, as I'm sure, you know, you did, uh, we were in day, you know, day panels. And I popped out immediately and they were like, are you fucking kidding me guys? Like, we can't see a day panel that's cut up out of your shoulder. So like the lesson learned that day forward was like, no, no, you gotta carry a full day panel. And like bust it out and you know, because that's the only thing they said, that's the only thing we can see. There's no way we can see that little thing on your shoulder. You know, so.

• 2:04:29Jocko Willink?

  Uh, incredible lessons learned. Um, and, and so that, that deployment wraps up.

• 2:04:38Jocko Willink?

  But God, I mean, you lost freaking so many guys from your task unit.

• 2:04:41Speaker 01

  Good guys. Yeah. Couple buds mates and yeah, it was wild. I mean, we, matter of fact, right before we deployed, right after the, well, not right after the helo went down, but they flew, Marcus flew back to Germany. And they were like, hey, you and so and so get up to, uh, I forgot it was Ramstein, like go meet him. Like he's fucked right now. So we, we, we got in a car, went up there, met him like, once he, I think they, they cleaned him up. Once he got out of like the, you know, the, um, you know, the ER or whatever, but he was covered in, he was nasty looking. I used like, it looked like he, his, the, all the, the wounds he had were just like,

• 2:05:24Speaker 01

  just healing. It's like his face was covered in shit. All his arms and legs were like covered in, like, he looked horrible, but he was like super excited to see us because he was, you know, he thought he was gonna get his head cut off.

• 2:05:38Jocko Willink?

  I was, uh, I was the admiral's aide and I was just about done with that job. So I'd come back from Iraq and I, I became the admiral's aide. And so when that was happening. I was tracking what was happening and I remember they're like, like they're telling the Admiral, "Hey, it seems like there's a guy that's alive." And I was, like I said, I was a radio man, so I was like, "Bro, they're like, they have his, they have his radio." Like this isn't, I didn't say this verbally, but I was thinking to myself, "Man, they have his radio and they've turned his radio on and they've turned on the transponder or whatever." You know, "How is a guy alive right now?" It didn't make any sense. And then by the next day, it was like, "No, they actually have comms."

• 2:06:23Jocko Willink?

  And I remember thinking, "This is a freaking miracle." How this, if this guy's alive for real. And the weird thing was, I, I had met the Latrell boys at a west coast reunion. I need, and I just saw them, but I remember because they were big, giant monster guys and they're twins, right? Which is, they just stand out.

• 2:06:46Speaker 01

  Corn-fed Texas.

• 2:06:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:47Speaker 01

  Texas brothers.

• 2:06:48Jocko Willink?

  And I remember like me seeing them and being like, "Damn, that's freaking legit." You got your twin brother and you're both in the daze. Like, how cool is that? And then sure enough, as I put the piece together, I was like, "Oh shit, it's that guy." It's one of those two guys. And, man, that was horrible, horrible scenario.

• 2:07:09Speaker 02

  I remember thinking at that time, A, this is definitely going to be made into a film because the story was just unbelievable. And B, oh shit, like, bad things can happen to Team Guys. Like, you know, you'd heard of like a death or two, a training accident or, you know, someone died overseas. But until that helicopter went down, I sort of thought Team Guys were invincible. And for the first time, I remember thinking like, "Oh shit."

• 2:07:37Speaker 02

  This might not end well. And, you know, you see so many of your girlfriends suddenly become widows and got real, really quick.

• 2:07:49Jocko Willink?

  So what'd you do when you got home from that deployment?

• 2:07:52Speaker 02

  We had a huge party.

• 2:07:54Speaker 01

  We had a big party, invited everybody, including the CO. And I think to this day, we still talk about that Amber bought me a kegerator. She was kind of celebrating us coming back and, you know, a few people were not happy at that because of the, you know, you know, because of the HELO coming down and guys didn't come home and like those were all our like brothers and friends and sisters. And we, you know, Amber's thought was, hey, I just want to celebrate like that guys came back, you know? And so we threw a party and she bought me a kegerator, I think from Costco. And that was really cool because I had just all of a sudden I gained like a hundred friends overnight. Like guys would just stop by and be like, hey, I'm just grabbing a beer. How'd you do your kegerator? But I think that night Amber had the CO's.

• 2:08:36Speaker 02

  Stop, don't even say it.

• 2:08:37Speaker 01

  No, it's great. She had the, he had, she had the CO's wife doing a kegerator. But I had her like legs up in the air.

• 2:08:43Speaker 02

  She got thrown into that and in her defense.

• 2:08:46Speaker 01

  It was great, but it's still a good story. I think it was E5 at the time.

• 2:08:50Speaker 02

  She's great and he's great and they're the greatest.

• 2:08:52Speaker 01

  They're amazing.

• 2:08:54Jocko Willink?

  What about career? What you, what are you doing now? What's your next move?

• 2:08:57Speaker 01

  From there?

• 2:08:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:08:58Speaker 01

  So, uh, come back from my second deployment. Uh, I'd already screened for after my first. And they just said, hey, uh, we're not taking anybody after one platoon. So go, you know, you're good. Go, go do one deployment and come back and you'll be in that next class. I was in 06.

• 2:09:16Jocko Willink?

  And, and you roll into that selection. How was that?

• 2:09:20Speaker 01

  It was good. Um, again, just full focus. Um, I, you know, to my surprise, guys didn't practice, but like, I just wanted to be there. Like I wanted to be just, you know, when I found out about that place, I was like, yeah, that's exactly what I want to do. So I trained and worked hard and, um, Yeah, I just, I had a good CQC block and like I was saying, you know, like, like was one of the, I was the top like pistol shooter and with the rifle, that's where I was like struggling with the rifle. And I went from like, they post your scores every day, your time, there's no hiding, like, like when you shoot, like you show up and you're like, oh, Marcus 57 out of 60, like what? And everyone's like, oh, look at shitbag, like, if you don't move up, you're out of here, right?

• 2:10:03Speaker 01

  And so, um, I wasn't like in the pistol, pistol was at the top, but the rifle, the initial week, I was really close to the bottom. And I'm like, dude, this is not, like, I, I can't.

• 2:10:13Jocko Willink?

  That's so weird, dude.

• 2:10:14Speaker 01

  It was weird and then.

• 2:10:15Jocko Willink?

  To be good at pistol and not good at rifles, it's just weird.

• 2:10:18Speaker 01

  It's weird.

• 2:10:19Jocko Willink?

  Was there something that didn't click in your head and then some, something finally made it click?

• 2:10:23Speaker 01

  Jaco, I'm still trying to figure out what's fucking in my head.

• 2:10:28Speaker 01

  Um, I don't know, I, I, I, man, I, I wish I could, I could say, but, uh, I, I managed to crawl my way back into the top 10 just by like sheer, you know, have to, as, and you would respect that, like, I just, I had, I had to get, I had to get good and, and I got, I got a lot better. So, but no, I, I, I did really well.

• 2:10:51Speaker 01

  I finished that and kind of finished green team and, and you know, they kind of do a ranking and, um, you know, you're not supposed to know, but I was, I guess I was chosen first. Um, and I went over to squadron, hung out with our, got to work for our bro that I talked about earlier. I don't know if you care if we say his name on here or what, but.

• 2:11:09Jocko Willink?

  I, I say, don't say his name.

• 2:11:10Speaker 01

  Okay, there you go. But yeah, it was, uh, everything, everything that I thought, uh, probably actually more and, and a lot of stuff that I didn't expect, um, for sure. And probably Amber will tell you, like, life just got weirder after that.

• 2:11:29Jocko Willink?

  So now you start knocking out deployments.

• 2:11:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:11:31Jocko Willink?

  Um, what, what's the cycle that you're running there?

• 2:11:34Speaker 01

  Every year, so we were deploying every year, sometimes twice.

• 2:11:36Speaker 02

  Now, but it, it, at the time.

• 2:11:38Speaker 01

  It was, it was six on and then three, six on.

• 2:11:41Speaker 02

  It was three, yeah.

• 2:11:42Jocko Willink?

  Three month deployment, six.

• 2:11:44Speaker 01

  Six back.

• 2:11:45Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 2:11:45Speaker 02

  Three gone, three training, three on standby, three gone, three training.

• 2:11:50Speaker 01

  And then on standby, you know, flyaways.

• 2:11:52Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:11:53Speaker 01

  Um, and, um, it was good, again, but I was away way more than even, um, than even at the teams.

• 2:12:03Jocko Willink?

  Where are your deployments to?

• 2:12:05Speaker 01

  Um, Al-Sad, um, you know, Bagram.

• 2:12:11Jocko Willink?

  So both Iraq and Afghanistan?

• 2:12:12Speaker 01

  Both, OIF, OIF, yep.

• 2:12:14Jocko Willink?

  And you're bouncing back and what, what's your, um, what's your job?

• 2:12:19Speaker 01

  Uh, I was also a breacher there. Um, yeah, I mean, that's, that's exactly, that's all I did. Um, I loved it. And I was, um, I did a lot of the combatives, so it was that, that split at the time where it was like, sport fighters and combatives and combative guys hate sport fighters and sport fighters think combative guys are gay and you know, it was like that thing going on, you know, and I thought it was funny, but I do tell the story, um, cause I, I trained every morning. I went in, we had, um, you know, Koochie had his guys every day and so I'd go in for two hours and train. I never trained at, at a, at a gym just because we, after work, I went home.

• 2:12:58Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:12:58Speaker 01

  Um, but I did train every day and there was one day I was, um, I, I had a guy in a foam out and I was trying to figure out a way to, to put a, like a, like a collar, like some kind of choke with, you know, and I was trying to grab his collar and then it like stopped and I looked at him, I'm like, what the fuck are we doing? Why am I trying to choke you? Why aren't I like, why don't I like hitting you, put my knee on your chest, like get up and go to my sidearm or pull out something and stick you with it or just like push you and get away and from there I was like, you know, I'm not doing any more sport fighting. I just like, I just want to know how to like, just like pound, pound, pound or, you know, gouge your eye out or just like stick you in the gut with a knife and just get the fuck out of here. And, and then like I started more moving into the camp of like

• 2:13:41Speaker 01

  the combative side of the house. And then of course you had people saying, well, no, if you're a better sport fighter that'll transition. It's like the skydivers, like if you skydive slick forever, no, I could, any of those guys could strap on a heavy ruck and you know, so it was just anyway, it was back and forth and

• 2:13:58Speaker 01

  I don't know, I digress. Where, where were we going on that one?

• 2:14:03Speaker 01

  I loved all of it. How about that? It was, you know, I, um, but so, okay, my, you asked me what I was doing. I was a breacher and I did, you know, I did a lot of command stuff.

• 2:14:11Jocko Willink?

  That's

• 2:14:11Speaker 01

  And I climbed and

• 2:14:13Jocko Willink?

  And Amber, what's, what's life like for you now? Now he's gone even more.

• 2:14:17Speaker 02

  I was way more settled. So that's actually when I met, around that time is when I met Sarah Wilkinson. And our life was very centered around the command and, um, you know, other command members, command families, we all sort of, you know, worked out together, hung out together, weekends together. With the kids, sports and pool parties and birthdays and, you know, it was, it was, um, very tight knit.

• 2:14:45Jocko Willink?

  And one of the, one of the things that I remember so much about when Sarah was talking through, you know, her experience with Chad was like, it left such an impression on me. She's just talking about like this personality change that she saw from him over time. And, you know, it did, were you seeing that kind of thing from Marcus at this point? Were you seeing, was he getting withdrawn? Was he, you know, short fused? Was he, it's, you know, it sounded like what, what Chad was doing was more like the withdrawn thing. And, you know, she was like, look, he wasn't like the most talkative guy in the world, but

• 2:15:28Jocko Willink?

  all of a sudden, like she noticed that he was different.

• 2:15:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:15:32Speaker 01

  And Amber, before you even go, like, and, and so I, I worked with Chad. He was one of my rec guy guys and I never, like, he was smiling, happy, joking. And again, this is right when he, he showed up there and yeah, it's 2008. So he was still like just back from being out in the private sector for a number of years. And so like he was, I feel like he was still like giddy and just, hey, life is, life is chill. It's good. It's, you know, nothing's really taking me down. At least that's how I remember him.

• 2:16:02Speaker 02

  If, you know, if we go back to the examples that I already gave of Marcus with, you know, our son crawling all over him and showing up with the picked geraniums, like he was still very much into being a husband and a dad, and even in his first and second platoons.

• 2:16:19Speaker 02

  You know, with Maggie's birth. He was there, work came first, but he was there. What we transitioned into was living completely separate lives. And so he would come home and he would say things like, hey, where are your cups? You know, in his own home that he was paying for. And we would get everything looking perfect because he would be home for five days, which, you know, was pretty typical between trips.

• 2:16:49Speaker 02

  Anything more than that was a pretty long time, but he had, we had become distant and I had become, you know, way more rooted in my friends and my life and my kids and it was okay that we lived separate lives because the ladies that I was around and their children were living that same life. And so there was this shared respect and sacrifice that no one else understood, but the people in your inner circle knew without having to even talk about. And so as he was becoming more and more distant,

• 2:17:27Speaker 02

  I guess you just sort of chalk it up to that's how things are now. And

• 2:17:32Jocko Willink?

  Do you, do you actually notice it or is it like the proverbial like boiling of a frog where it's just like the frog doesn't know that the water's getting hot until it's all of a sudden it's dead. It's too, it's too slow. Is it like that kind of thing where

• 2:17:47Speaker 02

  I think so.

• 2:17:47Jocko Willink?

  You're just going through and it's like, oh yeah, he's going on another trip and oh, it's another trip and um, he's back, but he's, you know, going to sleep or I don't want to bother him, that type of thing over time?

• 2:17:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, like we could play nice for those five day spans where the house looked perfect and the kids behaved perfect and he was as present as he could be, but it became a lot more comfortable to live separately. And, um, you know, it was all in the name of the United States of America. It was all for the greater good and it, it felt like when he would come home, he would certainly be more checked out, like he couldn't wait to leave again. Like I could sense that. And, um, family time felt like forced time, especially at the command. So,

• 2:18:37Speaker 02

  yeah, it was, it was getting really hard. He was getting certainly pulling away more, drinking more. He felt like a stranger.

• 2:18:45Jocko Willink?

  How much you drinking at this point?

• 2:18:51Speaker 01

  Normal amounts.

• 2:18:53Speaker 02

  By team standards.

• 2:18:55Speaker 01

  By our standards, by the bros standards. Yeah, I think we just, man, we just, we just went down a rabbit hole. I mean, we, I think I was just drinking a lot of bourbon, often.

• 2:19:12Speaker 02

  But I never really knew that because I wasn't with him that much.

• 2:19:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, but even when I came home, like it was.

• 2:19:19Speaker 02

  I didn't know like what his drinking habits were because we were really never together. I mean, the last couple of years that you were deploying, he was gone for almost 300 days a year, like.

• 2:19:32Speaker 01

  But I think it's pretty toxic. I mean, we're all, everyone's doing the same thing. Everyone's drinking hard. Everyone's, I think, going through the same things. Some are affected probably more than others and I didn't see anything wrong.

• 2:19:44Jocko Willink?

  You didn't see anything wrong. At what point did you, at what point did you start to see something wrong?

• 2:19:50Speaker 02

  2008.

• 2:19:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think 2008.

• 2:19:52Speaker 02

  Josh.

• 2:19:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, Josh, one of my close best friends from, from BUDs and then through the teams, passed on a, on a, on a op. And that was just unexpected.

• 2:20:04Jocko Willink?

  And that was like a river and stream crossing, right?

• 2:20:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it was just, it was tough because I was, I was supposed to do that river and stream crossing. And we, when, when he got swept down the river, we, I think we looked for him for almost, it's like 10 to 12 hours. And then he, he washed up 50 clicks down, Kona, which was like a, you know, class four rabbits. It was, it was nasty. It was gnarly. So just, you know, seeing him kind of get, get pulled out of the water is like, really, it's not, not good.

• 2:20:44Speaker 01

  Not good. And myself and another individual took his body back to his, his family in North Carolina. And we stayed there a week. And then we were there is when Jason and Dusty got killed, like a couple of days later.

• 2:21:02Speaker 01

  On an op, direct fire, both of them got, got shot. And of course, we were supposed to be on that op. And it was just, you know, it was just, you, you know, you went through it, Jaco. And it was just one of those times that was.

• 2:21:18Speaker 01

  It was, um, you know, I tried to look at it as like, this is what it's supposed to be. Like, this is just the way it happens. And I became numb after a while. Um, you know, even when extortion went down, I remember talking to Scott Moore, Admiral Moore about it. And I was like, Admiral, I'm fucking numb to this. Like, this doesn't affect me anymore. Like, I don't just, I don't get it. Like, why is this still happening? And it was just, we, it was just, the conversations we were having, I think, through these years were just getting

• 2:21:45Speaker 01

  just odd. And, um, I think I remember seeing the psych for the first time in 08 at the command, just like asking him, like, what's, what's going on? Can you, you know, help me out a little bit or whatever? And, um, that was like the first time I ever actually went and spoke to somebody. But we didn't talk about it. Like, nobody talked about it, maybe.

• 2:22:06Speaker 02

  But he also has, we have his medical record, and I was just looking through it, and it says, like,

• 2:22:13Speaker 02

  you know, decided not to talk to the command psych for fear of not being able to deploy, which is the, you hear that all the time.

• 2:22:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't even remember, I don't even remember that.

• 2:22:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I was certainly noticing that he, it seemed like he was just like a renegade to me. He did not care. He did not care. And those deployments were so insane. It's like, someone was dying every deployment, and so it felt like Russian roulette. And I just, between Josh in 2008, and then there were, you know, other deaths that weren't so close to us, and then Adam Brown dying in 2010, who we were very, very close with, Adam and his family, and our kids' best friends at the time. I was just like, this is nuts. We can't do this anymore.

• 2:22:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so it got, got to a point where I just felt like I had to do something different. I wasn't, like, fully, fully checked in. And, um, again, talking to the Admiral, he's like, you should go to OCS. He's like, you should be an officer. I'm like, I just, I need a break right now, bad. He's like, no, you should go to OCS, you're gonna be a good officer. And so I went to OCS for like, two days.

• 2:23:23Speaker 01

  Oh yeah.

• 2:23:24Jocko Willink?

  Wait, didn't you have to put like a package?

• 2:23:25Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, I did fucking all this shit.

• 2:23:29Speaker 02

  He even passed up being promoted to chief so someone else could have it because he thought he was going to.

• 2:23:34Speaker 01

  I did, I went in, I went in and talked to the, uh, yeah, the CMC at the time said, don't make me a chief. So make so and so a chief because I'm, you know, I'm gonna go to OCS like, why would you make me a chief? And I'm like, you're gonna take it away from somebody. So they didn't, they made him chief and, and I went to OCS.

• 2:23:52Jocko Willink?

  So you knew what you were getting into with this?

• 2:23:55Speaker 01

  Not, no, obviously I did. Cause, no, I didn't, I didn't. Honestly, I didn't. I was not, um, I wasn't thinking clearly.

• 2:24:03Jocko Willink?

  Well, let me ask you this. When you went and talked to the psychologist?

• 2:24:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:24:07Jocko Willink?

  Wh- what do you say? What do they say?

• 2:24:10Speaker 01

  They, they have like a, you know, they have their standard list of like SOP, you know, like what's, how's your home life? You know, how is your family?

• 2:24:20Jocko Willink?

  You're like, oh, my, my wife is great. My kids are great.

• 2:24:22Speaker 01

  Fine. Like, what are you, are you drinking? Yeah, a little bit. But you know, normally what, you know, what the guys are doing, nothing. You know, like it's, it's very, um, vanilla, right? It's very templated. And I think, you know, obviously we'll talk about the route that I went. Eventually when, when I separated, but, um, I think that's the problem is like, they go to school. And they try to solve a problem in this box that they're taught, but everybody's different. Like you're different than me and I'm different from her. Like they can't use a standardized template to, I think.

• 2:24:57Speaker 02

  It's also like a check in the box. Like, you know, it's actually called the 30 minute checkup from the neck up. Right?

• 2:25:03Speaker 01

  Oh, is it?

• 2:25:04Jocko Willink?

  Oh, wait, is this like a, like they say, hey, did you get ordered to go do this? This is a start of part of the standard operating procedure. Okay. You're back from three deployments. You gotta go check in with the psych.

• 2:25:13Speaker 01

  Is that what, I don't.

• 2:25:14Jocko Willink?

  And then you give the answers, you know, that you think will probably get them off your back?

• 2:25:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. Let me, let me figure out what I have to say.

• 2:25:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:25:21Speaker 01

  So they're not.

• 2:25:22Jocko Willink?

  Wife is fine. Kids are great. I'm ready to deploy.

• 2:25:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm good.

• 2:25:26Jocko Willink?

  And so is that what you did? Did you go in there? Cause you said you were a little, you were starting to feel it a little bit. Did you expose that at all when you talked to this, this doctor?

• 2:25:34Speaker 01

  I don't, I don't think so. I don't even remember.

• 2:25:38Speaker 02

  I'm not sure.

• 2:25:39Speaker 01

  I just remember him telling me, Marcus, you guys aren't crazy. He's like, but your wives? He's like, they're freaking nuts.

• 2:25:45Speaker 02

  Well, it is crazy.

• 2:25:47Speaker 01

  I mean, like, literally, like, of all the conversations, that's what I remember. He's like, Marcus, I don't think you guys are crazy. He's like, but I do think your wives are crazy. I'm like, all right, Doc, whatever, whatever you say, I'm on board.

• 2:25:57Jocko Willink?

  So that's kind of crazy that you went in there, you're feeling like something's not right, but you still get like an up check to go to OCS, by the way.

• 2:26:05Speaker 01

  That it was, the, the reason I went to OCS is because I believed in, in the Admiral. I believed in my skipper. Like, that's the only thing. And I don't want to let him down at all.

• 2:26:16Jocko Willink?

  And he's all fired up.

• 2:26:17Speaker 01

  So fired up.

• 2:26:18Jocko Willink?

  He's all fired up. He's like, hell, yeah.

• 2:26:20Speaker 01

  He's always fired up. I love him.

• 2:26:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, for sure. And so he tells you, no, you're going to be a great officer if you send you to OCS, and you're like, Roger.

• 2:26:26Speaker 01

  I'm like, Roger that.

• 2:26:27Speaker 02

  It made sense on paper.

• 2:26:28Jocko Willink?

  For sure.

• 2:26:29Speaker 02

  It's like, we need a change. He wants to go to the West Coast.

• 2:26:31Speaker 01

  But I remember telling my close friends, like, like, no, like, my very close friends was like, like, I can't.

• 2:26:37Speaker 02

  At the airport.

• 2:26:38Speaker 01

  I can't do this right now. Like, I can't, I'm not good. He's like, no, bro, you gotta go. Like, you're gonna regret this. I'm like, no, you don't understand. Like, I, I can't, like, I'm not good. He's like, Marcus, you gotta get on that plane.

• 2:26:47Jocko Willink?

  What did you mean by not good?

• 2:26:49Speaker 01

  Like, I was just not, I was not into it anymore. Like, I was not mentally, like, focused or determined or, like, driven or, like, any of it. Like, I just didn't, didn't want to be there.

• 2:27:05Jocko Willink?

  Were you seeing this, Amber?

• 2:27:07Speaker 02

  I was, but I was also in a complete tailspin because we just needed to, we needed a change of scenery. I just needed, like, a calm in the storm to, to reassess. You can, like, survive, you know, like a tornado, for example. It's much easier to survive than it is to, like, survey the damage. I was in complete survival mode, and so it seemed like, okay, well, this is something that could get me to the other side to survey the damage.

• 2:27:31Jocko Willink?

  That's a good metaphor. So you're like in the storm shelter. You, there's this mayhem going. You're okay in the shelter, but you know, at some point, you gotta get out of this thing, and you gotta get somewhere safe.

• 2:27:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. And then once the storm is over. Like, you know, you think about like any natural disaster we lived in on the east coast hurricanes, like preparing and surviving the hurricane isn't the hard part. The hard part is cleaning up all the mess on the other side. And so I knew we needed to get to a place where we could start cleaning up the mess. But you just, you're in such survival mode that you don't even know what that looks like. And so for me, OCS sort of like check that box. It was a different change of scenery and in my mind, Marcus always needed a goal. His goal was to get a scholarship, to become a SEAL, to get to the command. This was just the natural next goal.

• 2:28:19Speaker 02

  I didn't know that he was so depleted mentally that he didn't have the willpower to care about the goal. And it was the first time that I had ever seen him not care about a goal.

• 2:28:32Jocko Willink?

  That's what I was going to ask you because you're describing a mess, right? But at the same time, you're both also kind of like, you know, the kids are doing good. You're

• 2:28:41Speaker 01

  No, we're doing everything.

• 2:28:42Jocko Willink?

  So was there some like under, the reason I'm asking you these, this question or this line of questioning is because if someone is a wife and they're looking at their husband, what are they looking for? And how do they go, oh, you know what? I see, I know what this is. I understand what's happening. There's a loss of motivation. Did you see behaviors? Was there anything that you said, this is not, Marcus is not in a good spot right now?

• 2:29:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, there were cert, I just felt like he was reckless. I felt like he was a complete renegade. He just didn't care. And so for me, OCS was a way to dial it back in, give him some direction and focus. Because like, I mean, he didn't cut his hair for nine months. He, he was drinking and then like the RSO the next day, like drinking till 4:00 AM, then the RSO at 8:00. Like it, to me, it was just sort of like very atypical behavior for him. Maybe not necessarily of the teams, but he was so laser focused that the sudden sort of renegade attitude was definitely alarming at the same time, I never saw him.

• 2:29:52Speaker 02

  So it was probably 10 times worse than I knew.

• 2:29:57Speaker 01

  OCS?

• 2:29:57Jocko Willink?

  OCS.

• 2:29:58Speaker 01

  You wanna hear all about it?

• 2:29:59Jocko Willink?

  OCS is, because I went to OCS.

• 2:30:01Speaker 01

  I know.

• 2:30:01Jocko Willink?

  And I can't imagine, uh...

• 2:30:03Speaker 02

  He'd come back from deployment like literally a week or two prior.

• 2:30:07Speaker 01

  I fucking hated it. I showed up and, you know, you have all the Marines and yelling and shit and you have like a rack like this and they're like, fuck is this guy? And, uh, I, I honestly, I mean, I lasted a day and a half. I remember sitting, first off, I was getting migraines. They gave me, they got me Ibuprofen six hours after I, I was fucking hurting. And then I remember sitting on the floor, my back was killing me. I had all types of like shit going on with my, my, uh, my, my, my L4 and L5. And I'm like trying to read the, uh, was it Eleven General Orders of the Century? Like I'm trying to, I'm trying to, uh, you know, trying to memorize them. And I, I remember taking the book and throwing it across the room. And I'm like, hey, who's in charge here? Like in a very nice way.

• 2:30:53Speaker 01

  And all the tenants, so I was like, can I speak to him, please? Uh, yeah, sure. I was like, hey, sir, here, here's the deal. I was like, I just got back from my sixth combat deployment. I was like, I got back a week and a half ago. I'm like, and I didn't curse. I was like, why are, if I have to go to OCS, like, why are you guys sending me with people who like never been here before? Like, I don't want to be around any of these people. Like, honestly, I was like, I just want to go back to my unit. He's like, you know, we usually keep guys here for 12 weeks. He's like, you can go tomorrow. I'm like, thank you. And I did that.

• 2:31:25Jocko Willink?

  Dude, that's insane.

• 2:31:26Speaker 01

  It was, I was like, what am I doing? I'm like, I'm learning how to fold my underwear again? Are you kidding me? And I remember going back and, and telling Admiral, I was like, hey, I was like, if you want good people to like stay in, you guys got to figure out this OCS thing. After guys are going over to cease the war for 10 or 15 years. Like, come on. Like, that's just, you're gonna, you're gonna get more people like me that are like, fuck this. Or they hear about what OCS is and instead of going through the whole process of sending their packet in, they're just gonna hear about it and go, there's no chance. Because that's what I've told, I, I talked to a bunch of people when I got back. They were like, oh yeah, you didn't know that? Uh, they're like, that's why I didn't go. I was like, how can you go deal with that for another 12 weeks after all the other shit?

• 2:32:07Speaker 01

  They're like, so I, they go, but there's this workaround. And if you, if you become a... It's like if you go in reserve, you go to like a fork and knife school for like four weeks, you get pinned and then you go back on active duty. Like they, they decided to tell me that.

• 2:32:22Jocko Willink?

  They figured something out.

• 2:32:24Speaker 02

  But he honestly, like, he knew intuitively, you knew you shouldn't have gone.

• 2:32:29Speaker 01

  There was no chance.

• 2:32:30Speaker 02

  He called from the airport. He called me and he called his best friend. And I think I said, like, you've got to listen to your gut. And he just ended up pushing through and getting on the plane and going. But

• 2:32:43Speaker 01

  The day I showed up, I'm like, what am I, I'm not, what am I doing here?

• 2:32:45Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's

• 2:32:46Speaker 01

  This is fucking the last place I want to be.

• 2:32:48Jocko Willink?

  Camp welcome, like.

• 2:32:50Speaker 01

  So

• 2:32:50Jocko Willink?

  Ridiculous.

• 2:32:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was good.

• 2:32:52Jocko Willink?

  So they sent you right back to the command?

• 2:32:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. And they usually keep

• 2:32:55Speaker 02

  He'd out process.

• 2:32:56Speaker 01

  They, they keep people in holding self like 12, 12 or 13 weeks at OCS. And yeah, they let me go like the next day.

• 2:33:03Jocko Willink?

  And what did the, what did like the commander, like the detailer say?

• 2:33:07Speaker 01

  They were just like, what, you know?

• 2:33:09Jocko Willink?

  Cause that's bizarre dude, like get a bill to, it's hard to get a bill to OCS.

• 2:33:14Speaker 01

  I, I did have to apologize to Admiral. He was like, hey, I'm like, I know. I was like, I know. Um, but he was, I, I also think he was on the, uh, what, the committee that, that

• 2:33:27Jocko Willink?

  Selected you?

• 2:33:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:33:29Speaker 02

  Well, I'm sure he had a lot of pull, whatever his position was.

• 2:33:31Jocko Willink?

  Well, yeah, for sure.

• 2:33:33Speaker 02

  But in hindsight, it's like whoever thought that that was a good idea.

• 2:33:37Speaker 01

  Anyway, um, but yeah, so I went back and they were like, hey, what do you need to do? I said, I just

• 2:33:42Jocko Willink?

  You know, there's someone out there right now going, see, OCS is so hard.

• 2:33:45Speaker 01

  It's so much harder. He's gotta quit. Yes, that's it. I quit.

• 2:33:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I just told him, I said, hey, I need, I just need a break. Cause wherever that is, um, I said, I was thinking maybe, maybe go out to the West Coast and just forget about stuff. And like, yeah, that's fine. Go do it. So that's what we did. So I went, went out to, uh, yeah, went to the center and wanted to teach tactics and they threw me in first phase, which was like the worst place they could have put me. And it was not good. Like I was, and as you know, all the guys there are awesome, like good dudes, all of them been overseas, hard, hard-nosed dudes, like great workers. I didn't want to be around anybody. I was like, I don't want to make friends with anybody.

• 2:34:33Speaker 01

  They probably thought I was like standoffish because like I didn't want to hang out with anybody. Um, it was just, it was just not a good time. I, um, I, I body slammed a student in front of the flagpole and like one of the, one of the instructor staff grabbed me and he was like, hey, man. He's like, you, like, you're going to get in a lot of trouble if you don't fucking like tone it down. Like, I don't know what's going on. And so there was just a lot of little things like that that were starting to happen. And, um, I just didn't care. I was like, you know, fuck everybody. Uh, you know, at the time.

• 2:35:04Jocko Willink?

  One of my guys, uh, JP Denell, who's been on this podcast a few times and he was, um, he was in my task unit. It was in Ramadi, came back, went to another platoon and then they got shoulder surgery and got pulled out and they sent him to BUDS. And it was like one month deep. They called me over at Trade Ed and they're like, you gotta come get your boy. It was the same thing. He was just not in a good headspace to be putting students through, you know, fir- first phase. Because he just wasn't in the right spot, you know, like had to get him out of there and get some free, you know, he was a loose cannon. Um.

• 2:35:44Jocko Willink?

  You, you're working for, how long are you in first phase for?

• 2:35:48Speaker 01

  First phase for a year and then finally they, they kicked me over to SQT.

• 2:35:51Jocko Willink?

  Now, now, now you're sitting here saying like, I didn't want to be around anybody. I didn't want to make friends with anybody. What do you see in Amber? Like, what does this look like to you?

• 2:35:59Speaker 02

  Ducking home with him and we had been a part for the, the bigger part of every year leading into this. And so it was very, very, very difficult. I know. I was trying to be optimistic. We were super settled in Virginia Beach. And so I'm like, oh, a new beginning. I bought cruisers for everyone. I thought we would come out to California and suddenly be this happy family. And when we got here. Everything just completely hit the fan because I didn't have my community anymore. We started every single morning at Sarah Wilkinson's gym, CrossFit Odyssey at the time. It's core group of girls and my kids had their friends. We had an amazing neighborhood, a great house.

• 2:36:42Speaker 02

  And suddenly we're in California, we don't know anyone and now Marcus is home. And the kids, you know, like our son in particular, had this sort of idea of who Marcus was in his mind. He was sort of like this myth of a dad and, you know, he really didn't know him. And I think that whenever we, the dad that he got delivered back was nothing like the dad that he had created in his mind at the time. And so he started acting out, like everything was going bad. And I don't know, I just.

• 2:37:18Jocko Willink?

  It's hard for me to like picture this right now because you seem like a super chill dude, like all nice and mellow. And like, so what, like, what does this look like?

• 2:37:28Speaker 02

  He had become a monster. Well, first of all, he was completely disconnected to us. It felt like he didn't want to be anywhere, really. I mean, I didn't, I didn't feel like he wanted to be anyplace else. I felt like he wanted to be nowhere, like he didn't have a purpose, a belonging of, he didn't give a damn about anything. He was definitely drinking a lot, a lot more than I had realized. Or he started drinking more than, you know, I was comfortable with. And there were certainly times that I was, I just thought, there's no good way out of this. Leaving him is not going to necessarily solve anything.

• 2:38:09Speaker 02

  Staying with him, I don't know how much worse this can get.

• 2:38:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, but just to go back, Jaco, like I was still like, I was still functioning, like I was still. You know, engaging with the guys. I mean, I had, you know, I had, I had bros and stuff, but I, but, but I was, I didn't want to. It wasn't, it wasn't fun for me anymore. I didn't want to be one of the guys and,

• 2:38:33Speaker 01

  you know, it was just not, it just wasn't the same. It was just, it was, it was different. You know, and thank God I got kicked over to SQT. Um, so I ran CQC for about a year and a half and a great staff. I mean, those guys, you know, I joke because we had a, we had a great sub. I feel like those guys did everything. I'm like, I was like, I didn't even need to be there. Like literally the LPO from, I mean, they just, they ran the show. And so thank goodness I was just kinda in the background, just, um, I think I started school online at USD. Did a graduate program there. So we would, you know, work the students in SQT and then at night we'd put them to bed and then I would stay up and, you know, do work and stuff. And so, you know, it wasn't like,

• 2:39:14Speaker 01

  it wasn't like a complete mess. You know, I, I think everything was like, I was functioning. That wasn't, you know, I don't want to sit here and say like, you know, he was like stuck in the corner of his house sucking on his thumb every day.

• 2:39:28Speaker 02

  No, no, no. He was still functioning, still going to work, but like you just didn't care. Like Marcus doesn't do well without a goal and a, you know, something to work towards. And so,

• 2:39:40Speaker 01

  I think most of us didn't.

• 2:39:41Speaker 02

  Going back to get his master's degree while he was at SQT was definitely like a check in the box. And then I think at some point, oh, well, then the bin Laden raid happened, which.

• 2:39:54Speaker 01

  Well, I kinda lost my mind on that one, just not being there. Like you, like, put me in the, put me in coach.

• 2:40:01Speaker 02

  There was like this big sort of like resurgence of let's get back to Virginia Beach and.

• 2:40:07Speaker 01

  So I did, I called up the CMC. I was like, hey, I want to come back. He's like, done. Come back. And then I, then I just kinda faded quickly.

• 2:40:14Speaker 02

  Well, no, it was replaced. I mean, that was our plan was to go back and then extortion happened and, you know, so many more of our friends died. And then it was like, what, what are we going to go back to, to that same game of Russian roulette? We just didn't know each other anymore and it was very uncomfortable to be in the house. He was learning how to be around the kids. The kids were very uncomfortable. Like, how does dad fit back into this dynamic? And so we thought, like, at the time, we know dysfunction. We know deployments. We know not being together. We don't know how to be a normal family. I don't know what families do on the weekends. I don't know how a family

• 2:40:54Speaker 02

  spends a Friday night. But I know how to be a single mom. And so rushing back into that dysfunction was the safest thing at the time, which was replaced by a big fat reality slap of, oh, extortion just happened. We're gonna go back to the Russian roulette. Do we really want to do that? And so that, at that point, he decided, let me just get out of the military altogether.

• 2:41:23Speaker 01

  No, you missed a whole bunch.

• 2:41:24Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 2:41:25Speaker 01

  My turn. You missed, you missed something.

• 2:41:26Speaker 02

  What?

• 2:41:29Speaker 01

  That's when I went to speak to OIC from SQT. And I was like, hey, I'm like, I'm not, you know, there's something not right. Like, I'm not doing well. And he's like, why don't you go speak to the, I don't know if it was a West Coast dive, medical officer, whatever they call. So I went over there and it was the psych and just started telling them about what's going on. He said, Marcus, he's like, first off, you're not, you're definitely not the only one that's come in here. He's like, matter of fact, he goes, I can't even count the number of guys that have come in here now over the last couple of months. And they have literally given me the same exact story. And he goes, I don't know what it is, but, he's like, you guys are all experiencing the same exact thing. And he said, so this is what I'm gonna do. And I think he, I think I got prescribed

• 2:42:14Speaker 01

  a, you know, a SSRI or SNRI, first time.

• 2:42:21Speaker 01

  And I guess that was supposed to stabilize mood. And then I got sent to NICO and I came back with like four more medications from a NICO, you know, a NICO clinic out and which I thought was actually a pretty good place. But they do a lot of, they do a lot of checking and giving you drugs and they don't do a whole lot of, in my opinion, healing.

• 2:42:41Jocko Willink?

  When you go and you tell this doctor, something's not right, how do you describe something's not right? Like, what does that sound like? Again, I'm looking at this from a perspective of

• 2:42:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, how can we help?

• 2:42:54Jocko Willink?

  A first responder, a firefighter, a police officer, or somebody in the military. That's what are the, what are you tracking that they should be paying attention to?

• 2:43:02Speaker 01

  Um, I think the, one of the biggest is lack of motivation or like lack of purpose. You feel like nothing matters anymore at all. Like, what am I doing this for? Like, I don't even care. And you're like, well, what do you care about? Well, I used to like to surf or work out. I could give a shit about surfing or working out. Or I used to like to go, you know, do X, Y, and Z. I don't even, here, we'll give you two weeks to do that. No, how about I just sit, sit at my house and watch TV and drink bourbon? Because I don't have to think about anything and I can numb myself. And so I would say to the people out there listening, it's, you're going to start to see that you're becoming

• 2:43:43Speaker 01

  less motivated to do things of things that you really enjoyed in the past. And that's, I think, one of the biggest signs. That, that right there is a telltale sign. Stuff you really enjoy doing, when it comes to like a screeching halt, like go talk to somebody for sure. You know, and I don't know if that's now depression kicking in, or now if you want to call it like PTSD or anxiety or like, you know, now we're getting into the science of it. And I don't know also, like, is this a, is this a chemical thing? Cause right now, that, that study that just came out said,

• 2:44:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's not.

• 2:44:17Speaker 01

  It's not a chemical thing, right? So now it's like, okay, well, what's, what's going on in your life that you can't get out of bed in the morning? Like, you don't want to go to work. You don't want to answer your text messages. So it's really just like a lack of just like, like if you just like slumped your shoulders down and just like,

• 2:44:33Jocko Willink?

  Not gave a fuck anymore. That's, that's really the.

• 2:44:36Speaker 02

  There was also a lot of anger, irritability.

• 2:44:39Jocko Willink?

  I think those are all things that, that are part of it. So like you, you become this person that doesn't want to do anything. And then you do snap or you throw mugs through the window or you choke out the bartender at the country club. You know, and stupid shit that.

• 2:44:55Speaker 02

  All these things have happened, by the way.

• 2:44:58Jocko Willink?

  That you probably shouldn't be doing.

• 2:45:02Jocko Willink?

  There's like a weird, uh, I don't know if that's the wrong word, but when you're, oh, when you're living your life and everything's like, like you're saying, you got goals, you got things that you want to do and you got a long-term vision and you got kids. And when people die that you know that are your friends.

• 2:45:31Jocko Willink?

  And then there's this like, there's, there's this thing of like, well, they're gone.

• 2:45:41Jocko Willink?

  And the world is still going.

• 2:45:45Jocko Willink?

  And what is, what, what does any of this shit mean? Of, oh, my friend was this awesome guy and now he's dead. And we're, I'm still going to, you know, morning muster.

• 2:46:02Jocko Willink?

  Well, what is, what, what are we doing here? And I, I think that sort of thing, you know, cause you start getting like an existential thought of this life is the most important thing, but now, oh, you, you, you lost a bunch of friends and we're still here and we're going on, but we're going to end up where they are. And this is the way things are going. It's like, seems like that could lead to. Well, I might as well just watch TV. I might as well just sit here and drink bourbon. I might as well just do nothing because this is where we're heading. This is where we're all heading. Um, I don't know. Again, this is just like I'm thinking out loud as I'm hearing you describe.

• 2:46:44Jocko Willink?

  Uh, uh, you know, where your headspace was.

• 2:46:50Jocko Willink?

  And especially when you're sort of get detached and you get put into a different environment where you don't have the same friends and you don't have the same like crew of families that you're with and um, you know, one thing I can say about losing guys in combat was like, you lose guys in combat and you're with all your friends and then you're going to go do more stuff in combat and you don't really, that feeling of what are we doing here? Actually, the opposite happens. You now know why you're here. Like, we're gonna go and we're gonna make things happen. We're gonna go do our best. We're gonna stand tall. Like, you're gonna go do all those things. So it's sort of the opposite.

• 2:47:25Speaker 01

  You get juiced. No, you get juiced up.

• 2:47:27Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:47:27Speaker 01

  No, I think you get fired up. Like, you wanna go do that. A hundred percent.

• 2:47:31Jocko Willink?

  And then.

• 2:47:32Speaker 01

  In the environment you're talking about, without a doubt. I mean, like I said, after that heli went down, like, I couldn't, we couldn't even, we were screaming, why are we still sitting here? Like, why isn't it, why didn't the helicopter land right next to us? Put us on there and send us over there to, to go, to go get redemption, right?

• 2:47:49Jocko Willink?

  And then when you don't have that outlet anymore. And then you're looking around and you're saying like, well,

• 2:47:58Jocko Willink?

  well, why am I even gonna get out of bed this morning?

• 2:48:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, you know, what you're describing, you know, someone told me once and I kind of laugh at it, but it makes sense. He's like, Marcus, I'm not sure. He's like, he's like, definitely, definitely dudes have this PTSD, but he's like, I think they have what they call, LSD, lack of, uh, yeah, lack of stress disorder. He's like, I feel like we have to be in chaos. And once that chaos stops is when our shit like unravels. And I said, you know, I was like, I get that. And I said, I feel that there definitely, that's part of it. But there's gotta be part of something else. Like, why is everyone, and not everyone, but why are there so many experiencing the same exact thing? You know, and I'll never tell you that. And I'll still, to this day, sometimes fight it that, you know.

• 2:48:46Speaker 01

  Like you, I loved going overseas. I loved going to war. I think that stuff is great. I think it, it, it makes you grow. Like it makes you, makes you better. You know, maybe it was some stuff that happened younger, then maybe some wartime stuff. Then maybe some transition stuff, like you said, like where I wasn't around some people. And then maybe some of the family stuff that wasn't working. And then maybe the concoction of all these fucking medications that they put me on. Say, you're going to get better if you take this and I'm going to believe you because you're a doctor. You're telling me this is going to be good.

• 2:49:19Speaker 01

  You know, then you get out and then you're in the private sector and then you don't have any of that at all. So maybe just all that together is a recipe for.

• 2:49:28Speaker 02

  It's a perfect storm. We found ourselves right in the middle of a perfect storm.

• 2:49:32Jocko Willink?

  I have never taken any, um, like drugs or anything. Yeah, like so, so even when I hear that and I, but I've, I've, you know, there's been a bunch of, data and information about them, what they're like and what they do and, you know, people. You get on all these, what are they called? Psychosomatic drugs? Is that what they are? They're.

• 2:49:57Speaker 01

  There's a few, yeah, there's a bunch of them. Some are supposed to like help you release some serotonin. So you're like happier and others are supposed to like stabilize your mood. You know, but then the problem is once you start taking those, then I don't know. All of a sudden you're feeling a little tired or you can't focus. So now they give you some provigil, nuvigil. So you can focus, but now those medicines are causing migraines. And I'm like, hey, I can't sleep now. So like, oh, here, you ever heard of Amber? I'm like, yeah, I was on them for six years while I was deploying. But no, you need this, or maybe we'll give you Amber, we'll give you the other one. That's not as, like, it's just, it's a constant cycle.

• 2:50:33Speaker 02

  He did, he was on no prescriptions until the year that he was getting out of the Navy. And like between that time and, you know, a couple of years after, he had 10 prescriptions. He's on zero today.

• 2:50:45Speaker 01

  Amber, I got prescribed my first at, at NYCO.

• 2:50:49Speaker 02

  I know.

• 2:50:49Speaker 01

  No, no, from the, from the, from the psych and then from NICO. They prescribed me four medications because I was just looking at my medical records.

• 2:50:56Speaker 02

  It's crazy.

• 2:50:56Speaker 01

  And then, once we went into all this, I think I was on seven and we get on average, you know, uh, what we're doing on the nonprofit. The average is seven to eight medications at one time. We have people coming to us, these are team guys, over 20 medications that they're on. Not that they're like, hey, I want to be on this, that they're being prescribed, say, here, you're fucked up. Like you should take these. Like who prescribed somebody over 20 medications?

• 2:51:20Jocko Willink?

  That's like, he seems completely insane to me.

• 2:51:22Speaker 01

  It's insane.

• 2:51:22Jocko Willink?

  And you know, no, look, I, I have friends that are psychologists and they've explained to me that there's like certain things, like there's certain times, certain people need certain things and like, it really helps them. But, um, damn, like seven prescriptions for some, some stuff that makes you stay awake and focused and then give you something else that's going to make you sleep. I, I'm not a rocket scientist or a psychologist, my damn self, but that doesn't seem like a great thing.

• 2:51:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, probably not.

• 2:51:51Speaker 02

  It's the go-to, it's the number one tool in the toolbox, at least if you are being treated by military medicine or the VA. If you can't write a prescription for it or talk to a therapist about it, they got nothing for you.

• 2:52:04Speaker 01

  I think the best research that came out recently is that they said, uh, if you get your heart rate up, go for a run, go on the mat. The, the actual research is showing that that's better than this, these antidepressants that they've been giving us for 35 years. And that's why I think now these antidepressants are, like, there's a lot of bad shit coming out about them. Like, there's no, like, every press you read about them now is, is not good. So I think they're slowly going away.

• 2:52:28Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, I never stopped working out and never stopped training jujitsu. Like, maybe that's, maybe that's it, dude, I don't know.

• 2:52:37Speaker 01

  Probably the best thing, at least what I understand you can do, but I still think. Not for everybody, right? So I still think there's certain individuals that probably need something.

• 2:52:46Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 2:52:46Speaker 01

  But, you know, when they just came out and said, hey, going for a run, getting your heart rate up is better than these, like, we should, we should take, we should take that on board because like most of America is sitting in front of the computer for 12 hours a day. They're wondering why, you know, they're angry or they're depressed, you know, just a little bit of, uh, you know, heart rate, heart rate increase, activity will help that out.

• 2:53:10Jocko Willink?

  And you throw booze into the mix, right? Cause like, how good is that for you? You got seven meds, nine meds, 12 meds, and you're drinking, like.

• 2:53:21Speaker 01

  And not working out as much.

• 2:53:24Jocko Willink?

  So you, you decide that you're gonna get out. And how many years do you have in at this point?

• 2:53:31Speaker 01

  12.

• 2:53:32Jocko Willink?

  12. And you decide, all right, I'm gonna go do something else.

• 2:53:35Speaker 01

  I'm like, I just wanna run away at that point. I literally just wanted to run. Yeah.

• 2:53:43Jocko Willink?

  And what are you thinking, Amber?

• 2:53:46Speaker 02

  Well, I should have learned from OCS that big dramatic changes are probably not the best. But at the time, I thought, I don't wanna go back to the Russian roulette. And I know Marcus needs a goal and I, he probably feels like, you know, leaving the command and becoming an instructor is going, you know, not necessarily going in a, a goal oriented direction. And so maybe having a career is the next best goal. He just graduated. He had, he got a, his master's degree and, um,

• 2:54:19Speaker 02

  I went with it.

• 2:54:20Jocko Willink?

  Dude, only a freaking team guy could be going like on all these drugs and drinking and still get their master's degree.

• 2:54:26Speaker 01

  Retarded.

• 2:54:26Jocko Willink?

  It's like, that's so ridiculous.

• 2:54:28Speaker 01

  I told people, I was the best when I wasn't thinking. Like, if I could just go, if you could just wind me up and go, I'm fine. But as soon as I stopped for half a second is when, when shit comes tumbling down.

• 2:54:39Jocko Willink?

  That's insane, dude.

• 2:54:40Speaker 02

  So little did I know that I was actually like stepping into like the, you know,

• 2:54:47Speaker 02

  Perfect, perfect storm. We were living in a pretty bad one, but the perfect storm was childhood trauma, war trauma, head trauma, transition trauma, family trauma, loss of purpose, loss of paycheck, loss of community, loss of identity. And he wanted to get so far away from the military and the teams that he went into banking.

• 2:55:12Jocko Willink?

  Do you, what was, what was pushing you away from the freaking teams?

• 2:55:17Speaker 01

  I, no idea. No clue.

• 2:55:19Speaker 02

  If I had to guess?

• 2:55:20Speaker 01

  Just anger, like anger at, and probably wasn't the teams. It was just anger of like everything.

• 2:55:25Jocko Willink?

  Because you know what it's like when you like see one of your team guy friends that you haven't seen in a while and you're just super stoked. Like I remember, I got back from my last balloon, I was working at Trade At, dude. I worked at Trade At, you know, so there's different team guys come, every day was like a reunion, every day, like, yeah, just like, oh, hey, what's your, like, every day was like that.

• 2:55:45Speaker 01

  I know.

• 2:55:46Jocko Willink?

  I mean, my freaking kids will say to me, my oldest daughter right now, she'll say to me like, why don't you just go back in? I'm always like, well, I can't really go back in. I'm like an old guy now. Why don't you just go back in? So what, was that just not there anymore? Were you feeling like, you know, you see your friends and you're like, I don't, I don't care?

• 2:56:08Speaker 01

  I don't care. Yeah, it was just, you know, Jacque was just like a, I don't, I don't know how to describe it.

• 2:56:16Speaker 02

  He was completely numb inside. He feels like that now.

• 2:56:19Speaker 01

  That's what I'm saying.

• 2:56:20Speaker 02

  It was a period of time.

• 2:56:21Speaker 01

  When the Hilo went down, I had this weird conversation with the Admiral. I was just like, I'm numb. This is not even affecting me anymore. Like, I don't get it. He's like, yeah, but this hurts. I'm like, yeah, it hurts, but I'm, I just don't, it's not even registering. It's just.

• 2:56:35Jocko Willink?

  So this is, this is when we see like, there's some, like, to me now, like, okay, there's something, there's something wrong, there's something going on in here. Like, for, for a team guy to, to not.

• 2:56:49Jocko Willink?

  Like be kind of stoked to see their friends like I just remember my whole life I would go to work and just be stoked. Like there's never a day where I was like, I'm bummed out to go to work today. Every day was just awesome and fun. And gonna see my friends and we're gonna hang out and we're gonna shoot some shit and like. Thank God, I always had that feeling, you know, I always had that feeling. So this is what tells me like, again, going back to Chad. And hearing Sarah describe this change in his.

• 2:57:21Jocko Willink?

  Personality, you know, and that's where I, the only thing that I could imagine. That could cause like, like it has to be something else that's causing you to get in this mode of. Uh, you know, oh, there's freaking. Four guys that I haven't seen in five years and I went to Bud's with him or I was at a platoon with him or whatever.

• 2:57:42Speaker 02

  I think you still would have been like that, though.

• 2:57:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I also used to want to run high too. Remember that? Like, I never wanted to go back to Virginia Beach. I didn't want to see anybody.

• 2:57:52Speaker 02

  And I also like, you know. He sort of had, he was at this pinnacle of what he wanted for his career in the teams and so. To leave that and go to a new place was hard and it would be like transferring coast for anybody where you're making all new friends or. Being out here, the vibe, I mean, obviously we love it here, we're here now. Um, but the vibe here versus the East Coast was very different and that people are a lot more spread out here. So we were by ourselves in a neighborhood, far away from other military families. And um, we just didn't feel like people really got it. And so.

• 2:58:34Speaker 02

  I think that he got to this place of being so numb and not really caring. After the transition, but it was very hard to go back to Virginia Beach.

• 2:58:44Speaker 01

  But I hear you now because like we live in Coronado and I love it because I get to see like my brothers, like guys that are contractors, they come in, I'm like, hey, what's going on? You know, so it's good. Now it's, but now it's different. I'm in a obviously a different place.

• 2:58:56Jocko Willink?

  I guess the thing that I'm trying to say is like you can, it's like the freaking check engine light in a car. Like to me, that's a check engine light in the car of like just about every team guy you know. Like when they see other team guys, they're stoked. I remember one of my buddies was stationed up in, up in Germany, in North Germany with the Compfremers. He was, he was up there, he was up there for three years and I went up to see him one time when I was in Germany. And like he was, cause he'd been not, he'd be these around kick ass badass Compfremmer guys, which is awesome and they're great. They're studs.

• 2:59:37Jocko Willink?

  And but man, when he saw me, it was like he was, he couldn't stop smiling. I go, bro. I was like, bro, you're so happy. He goes, bro, it's so good. He goes, it's so good to see you and it's so good to speak English. He's speaking German. So for me to like sit here and think about that, I'm thinking there must be like some, there's something wrong with the engine. Like there's a check, that's a check engine light. The real check engine light is coming on and, and, and then you tell me all these other things. Like that list you just rattled off of all these things that are going on, Amber, you're like, oh, loss of this, loss of that, change of this, change of this, you know?

• 3:00:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, you can't outrun it. Whenever you're processed out and you're a civilian, it all comes crashing down for so many. And we were one of, one of those cases where we couldn't outrun it anymore. And um,

• 3:00:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, if you're good, you're good. And so, you know, you, I think if you get out and everything is tracking and there's no check engine light and you maybe go through some transition, whatever, but you're fine. But if you're not, you know, I like that. I like that analogy. I may use that.

• 3:00:53Speaker 02

  And

• 3:00:53Speaker 01

  I'm gonna steal that from you.

• 3:00:54Speaker 02

  You can

• 3:00:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, of course.

• 3:00:55Speaker 02

  You can all Sarah describes Chad as like a light going out and I certainly would have described Marcus the same like the light in him completely went out and um but over time you just start to like sort of like justify it or rationalize it in your head like well like I mean I guess that's how things are now and they're kind of all like that and you just you just rationalize it and you try to handle it but like the level of suffering that you guys can endure is so great. It's terrifying.

• 3:01:34Jocko Willink?

  Well, this is how you get a dude that's like going through all this and getting his master's degree like that's

• 3:01:38Speaker 02

  Right.

• 3:01:39Jocko Willink?

  such a good example of I'll just suck it up like I'll just suck it up and just do this stupid assignment, you know?

• 3:01:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:01:46Jocko Willink?

  You're a grown ass man. You're getting told by someone to write a paper and you're like, cool, give me the freaking computer. Let's rock and roll.

• 3:01:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:01:53Jocko Willink?

  So um so you decide you're gonna get out. What kind of plan do you have? Like where are you gonna get money from? Did you already get a job? Did you get a job lined up?

• 3:02:02Speaker 01

  I got, I mean, I was, yes, yeah. So I was lucky enough. I had um I had a mentor and you know, and mentor connected me to some folks and so I did like a New York City tour, met a lot of different people, met a lot of people in banking and some other stuff and then got introduced to a lot of West Coast folks and just kind of went out there and figured out what's next. So I you know, I consider myself lucky there um that I got to I got to meet a lot of people and kind of figure out what I wanted to do. So I had a choice, really, I had a choice.

• 3:02:33Jocko Willink?

  And so you got you actually got a job lined up before you got out?

• 3:02:37Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 3:02:37Jocko Willink?

  Which is freaking amazing because sometimes guys don't realize that they get a paycheck every two weeks and that when you get out, that paycheck stops.

• 3:02:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:02:45Jocko Willink?

  And you know, like it's it's a rough transition for a lot of dudes.

• 3:02:50Speaker 01

  It could be very rough. And so, yeah, I was, yeah, I was lucky in that regard. You know, looking for something else to do and I mean, I wasn't thinking any other way. Again, like the way I'm thinking is I'm getting out to go do something, not to, I guess, figure it out. So

• 3:03:08Jocko Willink?

  And so what was the first gig? You were a banker? What was it?

• 3:03:10Speaker 01

  I was a private banker, um which is really like a

• 3:03:15Speaker 01

  a fancy way of saying financial advisor.

• 3:03:19Speaker 01

  And I had some people tell me, don't, don't do it unless you have a lot of rich friends. Literally, I got told that by several people. I'm like, really? Is that how this works out here? But no, I got, I got lucky and worked for a really good team up in LA. And yeah, I did that for like a year.

• 3:03:35Jocko Willink?

  Did you guys move to LA?

• 3:03:36Speaker 02

  Hmm, yeah.

• 3:03:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was terrible. That's why we moved to Texas, like, within a year after moving there.

• 3:03:42Jocko Willink?

  Were you still working at the bank when you moved to Texas?

• 3:03:45Speaker 01

  No, no, I got hired somewhere else, again, through, through my mentor.

• 3:03:49Jocko Willink?

  Doing the same kind of thing?

• 3:03:50Speaker 01

  No, doing different stuff, like operations now, just like more like leadership, operations, business development.

• 3:03:56Jocko Willink?

  And how's your headspace at this point?

• 3:03:59Speaker 01

  Um, I mean,

• 3:04:03Speaker 01

  I feel like it didn't really, I was like really excited to get out and do something different, but I'm not sure.

• 3:04:09Speaker 02

  He was in a holding pattern at that time.

• 3:04:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, I felt like it like it subsided.

• 3:04:13Jocko Willink?

  You had enough tasks to get done and another.

• 3:04:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I was all of a sudden I had something that like I was.

• 3:04:18Speaker 02

  There was like excitement.

• 3:04:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:04:21Speaker 02

  And I didn't mind LA, but I certainly, you know, we were so disconnected. And it was, it was a challenge, like our relationship was a challenge. His relationship with the kids was a challenge. He, drinking was still an issue.

• 3:04:38Speaker 01

  I was, I was still on, I was still on the meds, obviously. So I was on the meds for seven years straight.

• 3:04:44Speaker 01

  And by the way, you were, you were incorrect. I, I got prescribed while I was still on active duty. So from active duty till 2017, November 11th is when I was on.

• 3:04:53Speaker 02

  No, I just meant that like right before you got out of the military is you went your whole career not on meds, like even when he would get injured, he'd be like, I'm not taking that. And then, you know, finally relented in like his last year of service. And then from that point forward, he was prescribed more and more and more. But, you know, things were really still deteriorating at home. And I remember thinking, I can't be stuck in California like as a single mom. My dad had just taken a, a job at the University of Texas as offensive coordinator there. And Marcus was working in North Carolina commuting and so.

• 3:05:34Speaker 02

  At one point, he came home and he's like, why are we paying California taxes? I don't even work in the state. And we decided to move to Texas and I just thought this is going to be a great place for me to raise the kids and I just feel better about the kids being raised in a place like Texas and I can probably afford it more than California because I thought we were done. I didn't want to be done, but I just thought this is, this is not working.

• 3:06:01Jocko Willink?

  So from your perspective, as you're saying, raise the kids, you're thinking you're going to be raising alone because it's that bad?

• 3:06:06Speaker 02

  Well, it was just, you know, my dreams of my, my feeling of support for his job in the early days sort of turned to like indifference and feeling like resentment that the teams always came first. I never gave him an ultimatum or anything like that, but it was this sort of like pride was replaced with pain. And from there, I just kept thinking, well, maybe if we try this, I'll get the feeling back. Maybe if we try that, I'll get the feeling back. Maybe moving will help my family. Maybe getting out will help my family and nothing was helping. It was actually just deteriorating. And so I was basically losing hope that I would ever get the feeling back of like caring.

• 3:06:51Speaker 02

  I did care, but I just knew that this isn't the way I want to, this isn't a marriage I want to have. And so it felt inevitable. I thought at that point we would just divorce. I wasn't afraid like anything bad would happen to him. I just felt like this isn't workable.

• 3:07:09Jocko Willink?

  And what are you feeling, Marcus? At this point, you're move, you moved to Texas.

• 3:07:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:07:15Jocko Willink?

  Is this where you're choking out the country club people? Like what's up with this?

• 3:07:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Texas, it just got worse from there. Like nothing, nothing definitely got better. It got worse. I hated, I hated it there. I needed the water. I needed the mountains. It was flat. It was hot. I didn't like the people, the town we lived. You know, some, I got along with a few people, but again, like nobody got it. I felt like I was in that space of. Nobody gets me, you know, and, you know, I've been to war and like I can't get, I can't have a real conversation with anybody because only, the only thing they care about is like money and, and uh, it was just, I was just going through all of that. And, and again, it wasn't like we were struggling in terms of like financially or any of that, like,

• 3:08:02Speaker 01

  honestly, like we could have made, could have made a million dollars a year, nothing would have changed. It was like just, it was just a, it was just bad. Like it was just was not, I don't know. Again, I, I, I think I had less friends when we moved to Texas than I,

• 3:08:19Speaker 01

  um, we joke about it, but uh, you know, I don't want to be too, too angry here over the, over the radio.

• 3:08:25Speaker 02

  It was.

• 3:08:26Speaker 01

  Anybody's listening in.

• 3:08:27Speaker 02

  Definitely um, a challenging time and that's when the wheels, wheels really came off for us. I think that part of what has grounded Marcus has been his ability to get in the water and travel. And so, you know, in the Navy, you're always stationed near water and in the teams, you're doing a lot of traveling. And so when we were in Texas, he was basically stuck at home and it was a hundred and ten degrees outside with no water. And he tried to take up golf. He's just got to have, you know, that outlet. And in taking up golf, he started hanging out with the crew at the country club that were very, very, very heavy drinkers and he started to drink.

• 3:09:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, it kind of fell back into the,

• 3:09:09Speaker 01

  I think I was drinking hard anyway, though. I don't think.

• 3:09:11Speaker 02

  You were, but it certainly escalated to a point that, you know, I basically had to like sit them down at one point and be like, listen, don't call my husband anymore because this is becoming a problem. And um, it, it just, our son at that point was.

• 3:09:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, then he started spiraling a little bit, I think, just because of what was going on at the house. And so then, you know, we're dealing with him not being a. You know, just like your typical kid that can go to school and get good grades and come home and.

• 3:09:41Jocko Willink?

  He's not doing that.

• 3:09:42Speaker 01

  He's not doing that, you know, and so a mix of a little bit of everything. I think as it was at that time when, you know, Amber again started just like seeing more changes and so she started getting me into brain clinics.

• 3:09:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was actually.

• 3:10:01Speaker 01

  Two thousand and.

• 3:10:02Speaker 02

  There's a former teammate of Marcus's who took his life as well, like one of the first seal suicides and his wife actually did a two-part series in the Virginian pilot over Memorial Day. And that was in two thousand sixteen, I believe. And I read this article about him and she described him as the light going out and she described all these struggles that he was having and I was like, hold on, this is what we're going through. No one's talking about this, though. And it was the first time that someone had like had the courage to say that they were struggling and I had so much respect for that and I was also scared shitless. And so what the article basically ended by saying was that

• 3:10:47Speaker 02

  there was a pattern of scarring found in his brain linked to blast exposure and there was also some mention of CTE. And I started researching this and suddenly I was like, I remember going to the garage and calling my best friend and I was like, I feel like I've just read about a terminal diagnosis like this shit is scary.

• 3:11:07Speaker 02

  I started really digging into the effects of blasts and repeated head trauma and like his fifteen years playing football and thirteen years as a breacher and I was like, I don't know that this is purely psychological. I don't know that medication is going to help this. I know talk therapy is not helping it. And if anything, I feel like it could get worse over time and time is of the essence. So that's when I really did this heart pivot and I saw him through new eyes. And I was suddenly overcome with compassion for him because even though he had become a monster, I remembered, I chose to remember who I met.

• 3:11:47Speaker 02

  And who he was before this deterioration. And so I held on to the hope that I could get that person back, but I knew that it was gonna be really, really, really tough and it might not happen. I started, like, I was most comfortable with Western medicine. And even though he was being a really good soldier and like doing, taking all the medication that he was prescribed, I was like, I'm not sure that medication is what's, you know, fixable here.

• 3:12:15Speaker 02

  His only diagnosis really was, he had his TBI documented all throughout his medical record, but it was primarily like PTSD, PTSD. And in my mind, I'm like, gosh, I don't know about that. Because he loved to deploy and he would probably still be deploying if, you know, shit didn't go so, so far south.

• 3:12:34Speaker 02

  I don't think that this is wrapped up in anything he did overseas. What did make more sense was the TBI piece. And so I started getting into brain clinics and I got him into like five total. And he was willing, but you know, it was weeks away from home. It was a lot of diagnostics. There really wasn't a lot of hope or follow up on the other side. And he was becoming more and more and more angry and frustrated. And he was really hopeful that I could help. And my hope was diminishing month after month of more failed things.

• 3:13:11Jocko Willink?

  What do you do at a brain clinic?

• 3:13:14Speaker 01

  Oh gosh, they're all, I mean, they're all different. You take,

• 3:13:19Speaker 01

  you do a ton of batteries, you do a lot of cognitive testing. You know, they put you in machines, they spin you upside down. Like, they do a bunch of stuff that are really, in my opinion, for people who could like barely walk and talk, you know, or have, you know, autism and all these other things. And so for me, I was there, just, I felt like passing time. I'm like, this, none of this, none of this stuff helps. Like, what am I, you know, what am I doing here? And really, uh, oh, and you do like, like a lot of balancing. I mean, it's, it's for people, again, this is my opinion, but it's for people that I, I consider really fucked up, right? That are not, like, could barely talk.

• 3:13:54Jocko Willink?

  Do you, at this point, think you're fucked up?

• 3:13:58Speaker 01

  I was just looking for answers. I was like, just please, just somebody tell me like, something.

• 3:14:02Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so you think there's questions of what the hell's wrong with you?

• 3:14:06Speaker 01

  A hundred percent, yeah. I mean, I left NICO with, you know, with, you know, some, you know, the FMRI is showing like, oh, you have these deadened parts of your brain that, you know, aren't working, but...

• 3:14:17Jocko Willink?

  And those are just TBIs?

• 3:14:18Speaker 01

  Those are like TBIs, mild TBIs, mild TBIs.

• 3:14:21Speaker 02

  He looked at me one time, Chaka, like, he was trying to get out the door, and he used to be so, like, regimented, and like, you know, everything had a place, and everything was organized. And he was just kind of like this disorganized, functioning but chaotic

• 3:14:37Speaker 02

  guy now. And so he's trying to get out the door for a flight, and he was profusely sweating, and his eyes were gigantic, and he looked at me, and he was just like, sheer terror, like, something is wrong with my brain. I don't know what's wrong with me, something is not all right with my brain. And so, all through all his medical record, it's like cognition issues, memory issues, balance issues, and I'm thinking, he's the most capable human I know. There's something that's out of his control, and I don't, like, doctors aren't helping.

• 3:15:16Jocko Willink?

  When you, when they, when they look at these TBIs, these black areas in your brain, what do they do about it? Do they do anything? Are they, like, what's the...

• 3:15:24Speaker 01

  No, because I think it's, again, I think it's personalized, because I know some individuals that had no scarring, that were struggling bad, and then I know individuals that had a lot of scarring, and they were fine. Maybe they weren't fine, or maybe they were saying they were fine and they weren't doing well. But, you know, my, my, uh, my recollection and the conversations I have, peoples, people are all over the map. So individuals with no scarring to, you know, forty-five lesions on their brain are acting...

• 3:15:56Speaker 01

  Different and it didn't mean that the ones with higher scarring were acting worse and the ones that were, you know, maybe had none. So like, I'm not a, I'm not a neuroscience or neuroscientist, like I can't tell you why, but I think like everything else is just personalized.

• 3:16:13Jocko Willink?

  So there's no protocol for like, oh, memory loss, here's what you need to do or?

• 3:16:16Speaker 01

  Yes. No, there, there absolutely is. There's, there's like exercises and yes. Yeah, there, there's things you can do. There's supplements you can take. You know, I, I do all of it. Like I take every supplement that I can find that says this reduces inflammation or this helps you, you know, think clearly or, you know, whatever it is like nootropics. Like I'll try anything now that says, hey, this is going to make your brain younger. That's going to make you, you know, think more clearly. Um, yeah. I mean, I think, I think there's still a lot of research around there about, you know, what, what we can take. Um, but again, I go back to, you know, diet and exercise for probably.

• 3:16:54Speaker 02

  It all matters. We needed a nuclear option.

• 3:16:56Speaker 01

  It all matters. Yeah, you're right.

• 3:16:57Speaker 02

  But it all matters.

• 3:16:58Speaker 01

  It all matters. It's not one thing.

• 3:17:00Jocko Willink?

  And so how many of these brain clinic things did you go through?

• 3:17:03Speaker 01

  I would do five and you know, and honestly I went to some really good ones. Some like, like world renowned and I thought they do really good stuff, but a lot of these places soon as you leave, like it's kind of like they forget you, you know? So they collect your money, which are, some of these are astronomical, you know, 15K, 30K, two weeks, a month, whatever it is. Um, and then you leave and they, and they forget about you. And that's, that was the part that I, you know, I struggled with is that if individuals want to get better or these places want to get people better than they need to, there needs to be some type of continuum of care. Like they just need to check in on an individual 30 days, 90 days, or whatever it is. And, you know, we'll get probably, you know, more into it, what we're doing now. But, um, like Amber was saying, I was getting frustrated

• 3:17:47Speaker 01

  because I maybe get a diagnosis, but not a, not a like, here's exactly what you do.

• 3:17:53Jocko Willink?

  Here's a protocol.

• 3:17:54Speaker 01

  Go home and do this every day. It was just, they're, they're all very similar.

• 3:17:58Speaker 02

  Great for diagnostics. Great for diagnostics. But what do you do with those diagnostics?

• 3:18:03Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, they don't make any money either by doing anything else than you showing up, paying your bill and then telling you to come back so you can pay another bill.

• 3:18:13Jocko Willink?

  So what was, when was, and where was?

• 3:18:18Jocko Willink?

  Rock bottom. And what did it look like? Amber, what was it like for you where you are just, it can't get any worse than this right now?

• 3:18:28Speaker 02

  Um.

• 3:18:30Speaker 02

  Do you mind if I? There's three stories that come to mind. And I don't think I've shared them publicly. Um. The first one. Was our son called me and said, are you home? And I said, no, why? He goes, I need to borrow a shirt from dad. Um. But when I went to your room, your bedroom doors closed, your bathroom doors closed, and I'm standing at your closet, but the closet doors closed. And I'm afraid if I open it, I'm gonna find dad hanging. And. It was like a traumatic conversation, but it was also the normal in our house. And I just, you know, that was the first. Real like, oh shit. This isn't normal.

• 3:19:13Jocko Willink?

  How old's your son at this point?

• 3:19:16Speaker 02

  Fifteen.

• 3:19:17Jocko Willink?

  And what is it that he's picking up on?

• 3:19:20Speaker 02

  It just felt palpable that.

• 3:19:25Speaker 02

  Dad didn't have a purpose anymore. And. Um. It.

• 3:19:35Speaker 02

  Catastrophe felt imminent. And I didn't know what that looked like. I didn't know if that meant. Drinking and driving and wrapping his trucker on a pole. I didn't know if that meant taking his life. Um. I don't know. It just felt like it's coming. And then, um. One night. He came home and I. It, you know, 11 o'clock, he's not home, 12 o'clock, he's not home, one, two. And I heard him come home and I was just. I was like, I need to put the dresser in front of the door. And I.

• 3:20:12Speaker 02

  And then I ran out the back door. And I thought, this is not normal. This is. He never, he's never, ever, ever been physically aggressive with me, not once. Um. But it was tending in a direction that I didn't feel safe. Because I knew he'd been drinking. And. That particular night, neither one of our kids were home. They were both having sleepovers. And I just got unnerved. And maybe I overreacted, but you know, when you're sitting in a parking lot at 2am, you're just like.

• 3:20:46Speaker 02

  This can't, this is, is not sustainable.

• 3:20:50Speaker 02

  And then the third thing that happened, which was like the true rock bottom, the culmination of my son feeling these things, me feeling these things, was when our daughter was riding with Marcus and he had gotten into some like road construction and sort of like got lost or got off track and they were coming to pick me up from an event. I was out with my friends and by the time they got to me, he was so frustrated and of course I didn't know had he been drinking. I, I didn't, I, I just see my car coming down the street and out comes our daughter and she comes like spilling towards me and she, and he tears off down the street. And she said, he's, he's crazy, mom. He, we can't get in the car with him.

• 3:21:34Speaker 02

  He'll kill us. And she looked at me and she said, how much longer do we have to do this? And I said, not one more day. And the next day, I got on the phone with his best friend who died, Josh, with his family who had a foundation. And I said, we, we need help. I think if he goes to California and he does this sort of like trifecta brain treatment that I can at least have like a minute to figure out next steps. I, it was my last

• 3:22:14Speaker 02

  hope. And so they arranged for the funding. I arranged for him to leave. What was supposed to be six weeks turned into like three months. And during that three months, I came to visit him twice. And the first time I came to visit, things were pretty good for a week or so, but like on the last day of the trip, everything fell apart. And so I went home really defeated and frustrated. And in my mind, I was like, I don't think I can do this anymore. You know, we got him out of the house and there's been so much peace in my house since he's been away.

• 3:22:50Speaker 01

  I was doing, I went out and do TMS, like the transcranial magnetic.

• 3:22:55Speaker 02

  There was a, and not to knock that because that's incredibly beneficial, but it wasn't what we needed at the time. It wasn't enough. Would I sign him up to do it again? Like for an extra bonus to where he's at now, like totally. But it wasn't what we needed at the time. So I came home thinking, okay, this is it. I gotta start making plans and I did. I started making plans, but I wasn't like totally ready to pull the trigger because I just, I never wanted to leave him, but I definitely felt like I was in a position where I had to choose him or our kids. And so, um, he extended his stay, got more time at the, at the centers.

• 3:23:36Speaker 02

  And I thought, I'm gonna go visit him one more time. So around this time for on my birthday, I came out to visit him. And we were in his truck and I said something so benign and he started just like tearing down the five. And I thought, if I survive this truck ride, I'm done.

• 3:23:55Speaker 02

  And I didn't even tell him that I was leaving. Um, the next day I got up and I packed my bag and I left for the airport and I came home. And, um, I, my mom was there with the kids and I called my dad and I basically told my parents that I'm quitting. It was the first time that I'd really quit anything. And my dad was like, you know, this is not a disappointment to me. You are the, you're, you are the most important thing right now. And you feel that, that this is the right thing to do, then I support you and whatever you need. And I said, I think he's going to be dead in two to five years and I hate that.

• 3:24:38Speaker 02

  But I'm going to try to start forgiving myself now because I feel like the inevitable is going to happen.

• 3:24:47Speaker 02

  I'm not, we are the only stabilizing force that he has in his life. And when that's gone, I don't know.

• 3:24:55Speaker 02

  And so I was really working on forgiving myself and also like during the the the year or so leading into where we were at that point, I had been on my own really in-depth journey of like healing and getting back into my faith and like tapping into a higher power to help sustain me. And so there was this massive storm all around me, but I had become the eye of the storm. And so things had never been so out of control, but I had never been so in control. And so I was thinking clearly, I was making like really strategic

• 3:25:36Speaker 02

  decisions, but at the same time, I was listening to my intuition, which was like, you need to know that you've tried everything. Because one, this is going to stay with your kids. And you know, if the worst does happen, they're going to be, they're going to have to deal with it for the rest of their lives. And two, am I going to be able to know and say that I've tried everything? So he was running out of funding in October, and at that point, our finances had become a mess. And um, he called home and said, I'm running out of funding, like, can I come home? And I basically said, you can come home, but as soon as you get here, I want to, I want to

• 3:26:22Speaker 02

  talk. And so he came home and I sat him down. And I basically took a completely different approach because up until that point, I mean, I definitely developed compassion for him. And I had tried really hard for, you know, this like 18 months that he was going to all these brain clinics. But before that, it was like guilt, shame, condemnation. You know, all of the things that I was feeling, I was basically projecting onto him and I was creating what I was trying to avoid. So the more I would guilt him and shame him, the more bad behavior would come from it. So the more guilt and shame I would throw on, it was just this toxic cycle. So like this, the sort of time where I was reconnecting with

• 3:27:02Speaker 02

  just a greater wisdom of how to handle the situation, I was overcome with compassion for him. And like seeing him for his struggles and for them seeming to be out of his control, where before I always thought like you're, you know, you could figure it out.

• 3:27:23Speaker 02

  And so I just approached him in a completely new way and I said, if you fight with me, I will fight for you every day of the rest of your life, but you have to fight with me. You know, I love you. I will never leave your side. We've, we've got to do this together. And he totally, it, it totally softened him and he was like, what do you want to do? And I said, there's one treatment that you haven't tried. One of our

• 3:27:54Speaker 02

  dear and trusted friends, a couple, uh, had, had gone down this path. So like one other team guy that we had known at the time who'd done this. And his situation was like, you know, more of a crisis situation. Where ours was like very deliberate and we had been, we'd known about it and talked about it on and off for a year, but it seemed crazy. Uh, so I reapproached him about it and I said, you know, to go to Mexico and try this. And he was like, I mean, I'll try it. Like, don't get your hopes up.

• 3:28:30Speaker 01

  I remember saying that too. Like, there's no chance that something is going to work because we've tried all the stuff that we're supposed to. Like guys that, you know, other team guys have gone to and have gotten better or not gotten better. But something that I thought was crazy that I read about seemed like it was crazy. I didn't think that trying something new was going to even slowly or slightly help. But I, you know, I committed just because like I sometimes, maybe like you, I feel like a, a, uh, you know, guinea pig. I'll try anything. If you tell me like it works or it makes me, you know, bigger, faster, stronger, smarter. So, um, you know, I did some research and it started to make sense that,

• 3:29:11Speaker 01

  you know, initially when we're talking about psychedelic medicines, you know, they, they were intended and are intended for medical use, not for, you know, recreational parties, you know, anything could be abused for recreational parties. And so, um, the more I read, the more research I read, I said, that's kind of makes sense. Um, I'll, you know, basically I'll give it a go.

• 3:29:30Jocko Willink?

  When, um, what was rock bottom for you? Like when, when Amber's going through all this, like from the outside looking at you, just seeming like there's just no hope.

• 3:29:43Jocko Willink?

  What was rock bottom for you?

• 3:29:45Speaker 01

  No hope, like no hope, no passion, no drive, anger, frustration, sadness, you know, depression, all of it. Like it just was like, again, going back to what we talked about earlier, didn't want to do the things I enjoyed doing, didn't want to hang out with anybody, didn't want to have a conversation, didn't want to do small talk.

• 3:30:08Speaker 01

  Just all the above, just done. Yeah, just done. And like everything else, I've had, I have days of like,

• 3:30:20Speaker 01

  I don't want to call it joy, but just, you know, up like some uplifting days. But the majority of days were down and, you know, including weeks on end. Some days I didn't want to get out of bed. Like I said, I just shut my phone off where now, you know, we joke about it. As long as you're trending upwards, you're going to have like you said, like you know, but, but yours is different. You're, you know, you get upset over a situation. You know, that's completely normal. I'll still have some down days, but they'll only last like an hour or before they would last for literally days. And, you know, I think that just takes time over, you know, what we've been working on over the last couple of years. But yeah, I was just, I was just checked out of everything medically, you know, mentally, physically, emotionally.

• 3:31:07Speaker 01

  There was no, there was nothing in sight. It was just like flat, clear, you know, not clear, but flattened and really nothing to look forward to.

• 3:31:21Jocko Willink?

  Just real quick, how the hell were you guys paying for like everything? Like just life? Like you weren't working for months on end. How?

• 3:31:30Speaker 02

  Well, it was a struggle. It was a real struggle.

• 3:31:33Speaker 01

  We maxed out a lot of credit cards.

• 3:31:35Speaker 02

  Marcus has, he's medically retired.

• 3:31:38Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 3:31:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I'm at, but I was like,

• 3:31:40Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 3:31:41Speaker 01

  Which was not.

• 3:31:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's not. I mean, but at least it's like groceries, right? I mean,

• 3:31:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, no, it was. And we had, no, we had, you know, we had saved money just from, you know, from the teams and stuff over the years.

• 3:31:53Speaker 01

  I'm trying to think, were you working at the time or no?

• 3:31:56Speaker 02

  Well, Kaden had also gotten our send and was dealing with some chronic health issues and so I was actually pulled away from.

• 3:32:03Speaker 01

  But we were paying out of pocket for a lot of these like medical expenses because most of this stuff, a lot of stuff wasn't covered under insurance. And you're probably dealing with it, well, some of the stuff you're doing, but yeah, you know, luckily we had a lot of these foundations are, you know, are there for like these reasons. So.

• 3:32:21Jocko Willink?

  All right. So we get the deal where we're like, well, this is our last shot. Last shot at the one treatment that you haven't tried yet, which is psychedelic. What is it? Drugs? Psychedelic plants? What do you call it?

• 3:32:35Speaker 01

  We'll call it, yeah, we'll call it psychedelic assisted therapy.

• 3:32:38Jocko Willink?

  Psychedelic assisted therapy.

• 3:32:39Speaker 01

  So the drugs are psychedelics. Psychedelic, mind manifesting psychedelic, that's the meaning of it. Psychedelic drugs are the, you know, the class. The, the way this is going, this medical route, they, they're including therapy in it because what they're showing with the research is that if they, they take the drug and then they bring in the therapy with it, the results are like through the roof. Because the psychedelic really opens your mind up for change. Basically gives you new, like, think of it as if it's snowing and you have like fresh powder and tracks haven't been on the, on the powder yet. That's what psychedelics do. It basically gives you like this new blanket of snow to build your own new tracks.

• 3:33:24Speaker 01

  And you could, you can still build those bad. So you can still build in bad habits. But the idea is if you have that coach or that therapist or that support, you can build new tracks. Like good tracks, good habits. And that's, that's the idea of psychedelic assisted therapy.

• 3:33:39Speaker 02

  At the time, we had no idea what we were signing up for.

• 3:33:42Speaker 01

  I wouldn't even know what we're talking about right now when, when, when I heard about this.

• 3:33:45Jocko Willink?

  Right. But there's a team guy who his wife was like, hey, you need to do this.

• 3:33:49Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, that is the essence of our community is that I would just take care of one another. And so, they'd been there for us in the past and we knew about their struggles. They knew about our struggles, but, you know, thankfully she felt compelled to reach out to me and then I talked to him and then he talked to Marcus and because we trusted and respected them so much. I felt comfortable. I didn't do an ounce of research. I did nothing. I I just convinced him to go, trusted them, got him on the plane, and I literally looked at the steering wheel of my car like, this is it.

• 3:34:25Speaker 01

  I did I did the research and like I said, from what from initially what I thought was, you know, I'll I'll use the term crazy to it started to make sense that, again, these were intended for medical use and, you know, it was stigmatized because we all know it as just crazy, crazy drugs that people around the sixties and seventies, you know, ran around concerts doing, uh, losing their minds. But, you know, they're intended for for for mental health and behavioral health use and now substance abuse and, you know, a host of other things. So, so the more I read, the more it made sense. Um, and I figured, okay, I'm gonna give this a shot.

• 3:35:04Jocko Willink?

  So you get on a plane, you just said you go, what, you drop him off at the airport?

• 3:35:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I'm like, this is it. This is like putting everything on the table. And if it doesn't work, I'm gonna have to come back to the drawing board. If it does work, the best I can hope for is that it buys me some time to find something that's a little bit more comfortable. I didn't think it was like a magic bullet, but I definitely thought that if anything, it'll just buy me some time. Um, and then I went to see him the next day. So I can talk about that whenever, but.

• 3:35:35Jocko Willink?

  Well, yeah, let's get. So you get on a plane. Where and where do you fly to, Marcus?

• 3:35:39Speaker 01

  Coming to San Diego and then.

• 3:35:42Jocko Willink?

  Sweet.

• 3:35:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's not bad. And then, uh, caravan down to a clinic in Mexico, been operating for a long time, a good reputation. Um, we'll keep those separated for now because, uh, one, just kind of, you know, security reasons, guys going down, we like to try to keep the two separated.

• 3:36:02Jocko Willink?

  Wait, what are we keeping separated?

• 3:36:03Speaker 01

  Just us, what we're doing with the nonprofit and then the, you know, the retreats that a lot of the people are going to for these, uh, to do these medicines. So.

• 3:36:12Jocko Willink?

  Got it.

• 3:36:12Speaker 01

  We just don't like to connect the two.

• 3:36:14Jocko Willink?

  I don't understand.

• 3:36:15Speaker 01

  That's okay. That's good. We're just, we'll, we'll talk about it as we go.

• 3:36:19Jocko Willink?

  So, uh, when you say keep these things separated, you just mean like different clinics or something?

• 3:36:24Speaker 02

  Like disclosing the retreat location.

• 3:36:26Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 3:36:26Speaker 02

  Or name.

• 3:36:27Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. No problem. Got that. Okay. Check. Check and Roger.

• 3:36:32Speaker 01

  Sorry, my, my communication skills were terrible there. So I apologize, Jaco.

• 3:36:37Jocko Willink?

  No, it's all good. So you go to this clinic?

• 3:36:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, I go to this place.

• 3:36:40Speaker 02

  With the other team guy.

• 3:36:41Jocko Willink?

  Oh, you're with another team guy?

• 3:36:42Speaker 02

  The one who... No, the one who...

• 3:36:44Jocko Willink?

  He's just escorting you.

• 3:36:45Speaker 01

  He's escorting me and watching.

• 3:36:46Jocko Willink?

  He's just bro-ing out with you.

• 3:36:47Speaker 01

  He's bro-ing out and make sure I'm good. Cause I don't know what to expect, by the way, also.

• 3:36:51Jocko Willink?

  What is the place like? Is this like?

• 3:36:53Speaker 01

  No, awesome.

• 3:36:54Jocko Willink?

  Is it like a...

• 3:36:55Speaker 01

  Like beautiful home, overlooking the water, everything, perfect food, uh, staff.

• 3:37:01Jocko Willink?

  Does it seem like a hospital or does it seem like a...? Does not seem like a hospital.

• 3:37:04Speaker 01

  Does not seem like a hospital.

• 3:37:05Speaker 02

  But it is set up with hospital equipment.

• 3:37:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it's set up with like full medical, you know, you're on EKG, you're on a heart rate monitor, you're doing urinalysis to make sure there's nothing in your system, you're doing blood work to make sure you're not lying.

• 3:37:20Speaker 01

  There's like, there's a whole protocol. And the more stringent you are on the screening, uh, the better the outcome.

• 3:37:30Speaker 01

  Individuals that have trouble with psychedelic medicine, again, is the screening. So if the screening's not done correctly, there can be issues. You screen properly, there's almost little to no issues. And so the more that this whole industry moves forward, it's just gotta be done correctly. And so this place, again, has been running for a long time, had been doing it the right way. Not an underground shaman that is getting drugs from god knows where and saying, here, do this, it's good for you.

• 3:37:58Jocko Willink?

  Getting drugs from Fred.

• 3:38:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, right. And who's making it in his bathtub, exactly. Who was a chemist in high school.

• 3:38:06Jocko Willink?

  How long are you there for? Like, okay, so, so you show up?

• 3:38:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's a, it's a three to five day event. Some are, some are shorter, some are longer. You do this, you know, you do a full, like I was saying, a full intake, a full medical screening. You talk to a psychedelic coach, who's a therapist first, so like a psychologist or like a licensed therapist, who's trained in psychedelic medicine. They prepare you for the experience and... Again, the better outcomes are the ones who prepare the most. So if you can, what that individual does, that licensed professional, is going to talk to you about what your experience may be like, or what you're going through and what you may experience. And the idea is to prepare your, they call it set and setting,

• 3:38:54Speaker 01

  your mindset, get your mindset in the right place to go into these treatments. And so, sometimes you hear about these bad trips. Sometimes bad trips are just that an individual's mindset was not in a good place.

• 3:39:08Jocko Willink?

  They were at a Slayer concert.

• 3:39:09Speaker 01

  They were at a Slayer concert, or, yes, for sure. Or they watched like a nasty movie that they started thinking about during their experience that just turned it sideways. But here's the other thing about bad experiences, what we're learning. Some of those bad experiences, actually many or most of them, especially with team guys and other veterans, they're, they're good experiences. Those bad experiences, they have to go through to get out the other side. So the bad experiences are some of the shit that they may experience as a kid. Maybe there's some sexual assaults that went on as a child. Maybe, you know, maybe they did watch their friend get popped in the head and die right in front of them, and they experienced that on their, you know, on their journey.

• 3:39:54Speaker 01

  So all, all types of that. So those are bad trips, but those bad trips are actually like showing them working through stuff. You know, people may take years doing it through quote unquote "talk therapy" or psychotherapy, you can do that in a few days, done properly. Again, not at a Slayer concert with Joe the Shaman.

• 3:40:17Jocko Willink?

  So what's the?

• 3:40:18Speaker 01

  So you screen, you do, you do some integration, excuse me, some preparation. Again, this is from the therapist, coach. Once that's done, you're, you're given the medicine. And just like you would take ibuprofen, or Tylenol, or Excedrin, or probably a few others that I don't know for a headache, psychedelic drugs are the same way. So there's, you know, Ibogaine, and there's Psilocybin, and there's MDMA, and there's...

• 3:40:52Speaker 01

  What am I missing? Ayahuasca that you're hearing about. So there's all these psychedelic drugs that slightly do, they're similar, but they do something slightly different, but they're all relatively trying to solve the same problem. And so the drug that I experienced was called Ibogaine. And again, to me, you could have told me I was eating Fruit Loops. I'd be like, okay, Fruit Loops. That's, I had no idea.

• 3:41:21Jocko Willink?

  Is it a pill?

• 3:41:21Speaker 01

  It's a, yeah, it's a pill. It's just like powdered pill. It's in, it's in pill form. You take it, dependent upon your body weight. And, but again, it's personalized. So I metabolize shit faster than you might. So what works for me, if I take, I don't know, I'm making this number, 800 milligrams, you may need, you know, 1.2 grams. And just because I maybe metabolize it faster or slower. So it's, it's science, but there's also a little bit of subjectivity to the amount that individuals need.

• 3:41:52Jocko Willink?

  I'm having a flashback of when you were talking about when you were drinking for the first time. And you're like, I don't understand how this is gonna make me like, think any different.

• 3:41:58Speaker 01

  Oh, this is exactly the same. This is probably even worse, because I mean, we're talking about a, we're talking about going on a journey here.

• 3:42:06Speaker 02

  The world's most powerful psychedelic.

• 3:42:07Speaker 01

  And so that's where I was getting at, is that Ibogaine is considered one of the world's most powerful psychedelics. That's why we call it the nuclear option. Not everybody needs to do this. No, no way near, or not even close to everybody needs to do this. But what we're seeing is some of the stuff that I was experiencing, you know, as I was transitioning out of the teams and like the years of like, you know, if you want to call it comorbidity of other things, like, oh, he's a little depressed, and maybe he's got some TBIs, and maybe he's going, you know, going through some shit with transition. And, you know, Ibogaine's good. But for an individual that maybe just going through a little bit of depression, maybe can't get themselves out of, you know, out of a hole,

• 3:42:49Speaker 01

  maybe Ibogaine is not the right thing for it, because it is, it is a really rough journey. And I'm sure, like you said, you've talked to some friends. It's not fun. Like, it's not, it's not joy at all. And anybody who takes that for recreational use. Like, I want to talk to them. And actually, they need to go talk to a psych because there's something definitely wrong with that individual. So. So you take it? Yeah, you take, so you take this medicine, I'm gonna call it a medicine, even I don't think technically we can call it yet, but we're calling it medicines because they are medicines. Um, and then, you know, you lie down in bed, you put, um, like noise cancelling headphones on, uh, you put eye shades on. And, you know, within an hour, you start kind of going into this experience and

• 3:43:35Speaker 01

  for everybody, it's different. Um, but you basically go on a, you know, six to eight to 12 or even longer hour, uh, journey. And for everybody else, again, because it's your mind or my mind, uh, and our minds are different. What I'm going to experience is going to be different from what you experienced or from what, you know, you experienced. And it's working on a few different things. So one is the story, and that's like the psychological piece, the trauma piece where, um, if there are real things that really fucked you up in the past, whatever it is. So a lot of the addiction, right, is coming,

• 3:44:16Speaker 01

  finding out from things that happened in individuals' lives, not just because they like to drink or they like to do heroin or whatever. They're doing it because something fucked them up so bad that they turned to that, whatever it is. And again, we don't need to discuss what. Whatever that is, um, the psychedelic does a really good job. And, and they say it's a jokester too, because it will show you that. And it'll fuck with you too. Um, but the thing is, what you just said, sometimes the only way,

• 3:44:51Speaker 01

  the only way.

• 3:44:54Speaker 01

  The only way to heal is through. And the only way to conquer something is through. Like, you have to face it. We know that. You can't bury stuff. Or if you have an issue with a team guy that you work with, if you just keep burying or put stuff off on the side, it's gonna blow up one day. But if you can take that person and say, "Hey, let's settle our differences. What's going on here? You don't like me. I don't like you. Why? We have to work together." If we don't have that conversation, it's gonna be messed up forever. So that's what the psychedelic does to the mind. It shows you the problem that you're dealing with. And you face it in this 12-hour journey. And it could suck. And for me, it was really tough.

• 3:45:37Speaker 01

  I mean, it was 12 hours of gore and blood and just crap. But when I was done, it literally felt like I just took 1,000 pounds out of a backpack. It was just like, it was just like this relief that I never had before. And all this pent-up frustration that Amber's talking about, that just went away. And for everybody else, it's different. And so what talk therapy or psychotherapy can take five or 10 or 15 years. I mean, I still have friends up in LA that are still seeing a psychologist for 20 years. And I'm like, dude, I can help you out probably in a week. Like, you've been paying this person. It's obviously not helping.

• 3:46:23Speaker 01

  You know, it can do that in a much faster timeframe. And like Amber said, it's not a panacea. It's not a magic bullet. Sometimes you need to go down twice. Sometimes you may need to do it three times. Maybe you need to do it once a year. Everybody's different. But again, I don't want people who are listening to get the wrong idea that this is a one-and-done or it's like a magic pill because everybody would be rushing to do it and think like, again, all my answers will be solved in this bottle right here. It takes a lot of work. The experience itself is gonna suck. It's gonna be miserable. You're gonna cry. You're gonna throw up. Like, you're gonna... Nobody wants to face their rapist. You know what I mean?

• 3:47:08Speaker 01

  So if they were raped as a young child...

• 3:47:13Speaker 01

  And that's what's affecting you for the like, you're gonna face that individual during, and that's, that's pretty traumatic for an individual, right? If they're growing up and their uncle was molesting them for years upon years, you know, upon years. If that's still affecting them in their life, they're gonna face that in their journey, and that's tough. But you know what? You need to face that to move on, and that's what these medicines do. They also work on the brain, so they, they promote neurogenesis, which means like, you know, brain growth, and they, they're turning on parts of the brain that may have not been working before. And I think that's what we're seeing in, in the success for a lot of these guys is if they do have mild TBIs and they're, they have these scarring that we're talking about, and maybe parts of their brain were not allowing them to function well, it is allowing them to function well now.

• 3:47:57Speaker 01

  So, there's a host of things, and, and I don't wanna get into science, cuz I'm way above my pay grade, Jaco, but, you know, this experience was, was radical. It was, you know, did a 180 for me. It was life-changing and life-saving. And Amber actually came in the day after, and I walked down the hallway and I, we just-

• 3:48:18Speaker 02

  Well, first of all, I freaked out because it hit me when I was in the car headed there. I was very uncomfortable, and I was raised, you know, super conservative, and I feel like, you know, I was in the survival mode, and suddenly, like, this peace had come. And, in the car on the way there, I had this moment where I was like, I can't go. I don't know what we've just done. I think what we've done is bad. And I'm too scared to face it. And my girlfriend was like, you have to go. He's asking for you. And we told him you're coming, so you have to go.

• 3:48:57Speaker 02

  And I walked in there so uptight and scared of, oh, it, it was the most nerve-wracking feeling, and I heard him walking down the hall, and I was just like, oh my gosh. Please, please let this have worked. And he came around the hall, and immediately, I could just see that he was back. It was like, it was literally like being reunited with the person that I met. Which is a complete and utter-

• 3:49:31Speaker 02

  Excuse my language, mindfuck. It really, it really threw me in the, in the best ways. And also in the worst ways, because then you start to doubt it and second guess, like it's too good to be true. And like you're just letting your walls down. You're like, oh, don't do that because it's too, it's, this isn't gonna last. So a lot of spouses have experienced that and that mild freak out, you know, was certainly replaced with this feeling of complete relief. And then, how do we maintain this?

• 3:50:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so the first thing I did, I said, Amber, this is exactly, I mean, the first thing out of my mouth was like, this is exactly what the guys need. I say, we keep getting, you know, I keep getting phone calls of, you know, friends that are like struggling like I was. I'm like, dude, I can't take care of you because I can't even fucking take care of myself right now. So when I experienced this, like, that's the first thing I said. I was like, we gotta figure out a way to like, get our friends here and do the same thing. Like, we have to figure out how to raise money because someone paid for me, you know, $4,000 or whatever it was. And so I said, well, how do we, how do we get, you know, our buddies and families that are struggling to do the same thing? She said, I don't know. We said, well, like, we gotta go raise money. Let's, you know, we'll start a nonprofit.

• 3:50:43Speaker 01

  Again, had no idea what we were talking about. We'll go, we'll start a nonprofit, we'll go raise money. And then we'll fund our friends so they could get the same healing that like, I feel like I'm experiencing.

• 3:50:54Speaker 02

  We thought maybe a handful.

• 3:50:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and we didn't, we didn't know. We didn't, honestly, we didn't know. And that's what we did.

• 3:51:02Speaker 02

  Well, then we were contacted by Elizabeth and she said, I want to give to a veteran organization. He actually had his treatment on Veterans Day. So it was really special. And then end of year giving, you know, right after that, in December, made this lady contact Marcus and say, I need a recommendation for a veterans organization to give to. And he goes, you know,

• 3:51:27Speaker 02

  You, we can't give you a tax write-off, but if you pay this clinic, I could get, you know, five of my friends down there for a treatment that could save their life. And she was totally on board, and that's what really launched what has become Vets. But, we don't want to talk about it. We don't want to talk about it because it's so stigmatized and so taboo to say you're struggling. Like, maybe some of our internal friends knew, primarily because the wives were talking, not because the guys were talking. And so, my thing was, I don't want to jinx it. I don't want to, I don't know if it'll work for everyone. I don't know if it'll continue working for us. I don't want to talk about it until 12 months have gone by,

• 3:52:10Speaker 02

  and we've raised money and provided this opportunity for 12 other guys to go down there. And at that point, maybe we'll talk about it. This one's not one for like, you know, PR and stepping out of the shadows. So this was a big deal, but I thought, well, we're just gonna buy ourselves a year here, and get some really good data, and come out with like, a little bit of foundation beneath us. And, his treatment was on Veterans Day, so November 11th would have been the one-year mark. Chad Wilkinson took his life on October 28th. And, we were sitting in his funeral, just days before the one-year anniversary of Marcus, or, you know, right around the same time.

• 3:52:55Speaker 02

  And, we'd been to the Little Creek Chapel so many times for war funerals, and this felt so different. And I was seeing all the same guys that would deploy, you know, with Marcus, and be at all these other funerals, and like, you know, they had more medals, and they had more gray hair, and they had more wrinkles, and they were, you know, getting older and becoming, like, you could see in their faces that like, they were struggling. And, this is the first suicide funeral I'd been to. And I started shaking, like, I had this tremble release response at Chad's funeral, where I was jackhammering, shaking, the whole bench was shaking. People were looking down like, what is going on down there?

• 3:53:39Speaker 02

  And I was just overcome with this conviction of like, if we don't talk, if we don't step out and get out of our comfort zone, more guys are gonna die by suicide, and... We're gonna just do whatever it takes to prevent that because this community and this chapel can't take that. So we're not gonna let that happen.

• 3:54:02Speaker 01

  And so we started, basically just stopped hiding kind of what we were doing and started speaking about it a little bit because we thought, well, if we start speaking about it, you know, and of course, we talked to Sarah, we just said, hey, you know, we're just gonna, we're gonna start talking about this a little bit so people know. So in the unlikely event that an individual is getting to the point where Chad got to, they might pause and go, oh, you know what? There's something I haven't tried, or there's this thing that I heard is working for some individuals after, you know, because mostly, a lot, I mean, most of these individuals are on the same path. Like, they go to NICO, they go to these brain clinics, they're on a bunch

• 3:54:44Speaker 01

  of these mood stabilizers. And then they're like, okay, well, now what? So I, at that point, just said, you know, fuck my career, because I was still like, trying to figure out, like, to get into corporate America and, you know, whatever. I just said, I think this is more important. And if someone is not going to hire me or doesn't want to work with me because we're talking about psychedelic medicines, then like, shame on them. Like, I don't need, I don't want to, I don't want to work with that individual. Like, open your mind a little bit. We found something that works. And that's the story here. The story's not Marcus and Amber running around doing psychedelic drugs or running a cult, which

• 3:55:26Speaker 01

  we were told, by the way, initially, we were running a cult, which is kind of funny. But no, we're, we're, we're trying to heal people. That's all. We found something that worked. And that's what happened. And, and so that was it. We just started speaking about it. We started doing, you know, interview here, interview there, maybe a small podcast, you know, and, and, you know, one thing leads to another. People get interested. People with money want to donate. And

• 3:55:52Speaker 02

  You also know how the community is. Like, what I love most about the community is just this like unwavering commitment to caring for one another. And For every person that comes through our program, because the efficacy rates are so high, they refer back three to five of their buddies. And so it creates a need that we simply, you know, are having really hard time meeting. But to date, we've provided funding for over 600 other operators, not all SEALs. I mean, we serve all branches of special operations. But, you know, it's, it's really taken on a life of its own. And it absolutely started at Chad Wilkinson's funeral. And this just goal of ending veteran suicide.

• 3:56:40Jocko Willink?

  Did you, your original, like, when you first came out and started talking about it, that was after Chad's funeral?

• 3:56:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. At Chad's funeral is whenever I was so convicted of like, everything we do, I'm keeping Chad Wilkinson and Sarah and the kids right here. Because the fallout from suicide, like to survive all these combat deployments and then lose your loved one to suicide, like, oh, I can't even fathom. Like, I was just super convicted.

• 3:57:20Jocko Willink?

  How long did it take to start getting traction?

• 3:57:24Speaker 02

  Almost immediately. Almost immediately. We had gotten traction, mega traction in terms of the need. But what didn't necessarily match that was the donor dollars. It was very stigmatized. I mean, we're talking about four years ago at this point. It was still very stigmatized and unknown. Like, there's a lot of, there's a lack of education around psychedelic therapies, and then there's misinformation around psychedelics. And so to combat those two stigmas, and to also try to combat the stigma of saying you need help. It's been like, you know, pretty dicey.

• 3:58:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's a war on all fronts right there.

• 3:58:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Well, then you go into the, the real fun war of like, military leadership and policymakers and Big Pharma. And VA and.

• 3:58:15Jocko Willink?

  But it seems like it's getting really good traction right now. I- is it, isn't it?

• 3:58:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, because veterans are driving it and the veterans driving it at the tip, tip of the spear. It's the SEAL community and the broader special operations community. And like, I don't know, if I needed to get something done, I'd call you guys.

• 3:58:35Jocko Willink?

  So you've, so the, so the, the charity is called, well, it's got, you got on your T-shirt there, right? It's Vets Solutions.

• 3:58:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions.

• 3:58:45Jocko Willink?

  And it's vetsolutions.org if people want to go and check that out and can they donate from there and all that?

• 3:58:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:58:54Jocko Willink?

  And so what's the plan there on that side of things? Just continue to grow, continue to accept donations, continue to get more people treatment?

• 3:59:02Speaker 02

  Jaco, we get upwards of 10 qualified applications a day needing funding.

• 3:59:08Jocko Willink?

  A day?

• 3:59:09Speaker 02

  And it is so overwhelming. Like, I actually dread it when we have to go through applications. We do it on Mondays. And, you know, you have a cer- we have a certain number of grants or funds allocated. And choosing who gets those funds when everyone is so deserving. It's like.

• 3:59:29Speaker 01

  So we actually, I mean, we actually have to, you know, we had a, like an algorithm built in to like rack and stack who's done the most combat deployments, like what are they going through? So it actually, you know, it ranks the individuals, you know, or if there's like an immediate crisis, they immediately get put to the top and they get a phone call immediately. And so there's a whole, you know, there's a whole system to it because again, of those 10, if we're talking about only being able to support 175 to 200 a year, there's a, you know, there's, most of those people are not getting funding.

• 4:00:02Speaker 02

  There are thousands, tens of thousands that could use it or need it or.

• 4:00:08Speaker 02

  Are trying to access it, but because these are Schedule I substances in the United States, they have to travel abroad. So, you know, one of our, I would say, most effective talking points when we're talking to policymakers and leader, leaders, is that, you know, our nation's veterans are leaving the country they fought for for access to meaningful care. And this is so far superior to anything else that's currently available, at least from my perspective. What I'm seeing is there's healing happening in four key areas of veterans suffering. And so when we were in such a bad way, if you would have given me immediate relief in one of the four areas, it would have been an absolute blessing. The fact

• 4:00:50Speaker 02

  that it provides immediate relief for most people in all four categories is unheard of. So, the first category is psychological trauma. So, anything that's affecting someone, you know, even on a subconscious level, whether it's childhood trauma, repressed trauma, that, you know, they don't even remember, war trauma, whatever the, the source of trauma is, it deals with that. Like Marcus said, it shows you the trauma and then you're able to work through it, confront it, deal with it, put it away, be done with it. There's an anti-addictive benefit, which is really ironic, because these drugs are scheduled as being addictive and like a high potential for abuse. They're actually being used to

• 4:01:33Speaker 02

  treat addiction, but because they're so challenging to even research in the United States, that data's largely missing. So, Marcus and, you know, so many other guys that are going down there, might not have a full-blown addiction, but they have substance use disorder. And so for Marcus, it was alcohol. Some guys go down there because they're hooked on opioids. Whatever the addiction is, it, it like resets, it scrubs and resets those Receptors. receptors. And the addiction, you know, no longer has that brand.

• 4:02:11Speaker 02

  There's a physiological benefit as it pertains to TBI. At Vets, we primarily write grants for Ibogaine and 5-MEO DMT Protocol. That's two of the six psychedelics that we can provide funding for. Most guys are going down there to do Ibogaine and 5-MEO. We're just wrapping up a study with Stanford. The preliminary data is not released yet, but I think that it will show significant improvements in cognitive functioning, neurological functioning. It creates this really incredible neuroplasticity in the brains, the brain's ability to change itself, create new neural pathways, neuronal connections. You know, whatever it's doing in the brain as it relates to TBI is pretty remarkable.

• 4:02:54Speaker 02

  And our Stanford study, I think, will prove that. The fourth thing is a spiritual connection or reconnection. And I think that that's what science will never be able to fully explain. That when someone feels as though they're put on this earth by a higher power and we're all connected and like, you know, we're all humans and we're alive and the grass is alive and the flowers are alive and the animals are alive and you see that you're part of this really incredible, huge ecosystem of purpose and perfection. You feel as though you have a place to belong again.

• 4:03:34Speaker 02

  And you feel this God connection that I think is the answer to a lot of society's issues right now. So psychological, anti-addictive, physiological and spiritual. When you check all four of those boxes, you go home like, I feel pretty good. Now, on the back end of this, there's a lot of things that are really important. So we're screening, another one of our screening categories is like, how committed are you to this? Because we've got guys coming to us that say, I don't know anything about this. My buddy said to do it. And then we've got guys that say, I've been researching this for a year and I've changed

• 4:04:16Speaker 02

  my diet and I'm really committed to working with a coach. Those are the guys that are going to have the best chance for success. The spouse support is another huge factor in overall trajectory and success. So, you know, it's every, the psychedelic just provides this massive reset. And then When you get someone like from fetal position to one knee, like they can stand up and take it from there, especially guys like you guys. So guys are leaving these weeks with this checklist of now what? Because now I feel great again. And so for Marcus and for hundreds of others at this point, you're feeling good and you're feeling like, you know, suddenly you've got

• 4:04:59Speaker 02

  a thousand pounds lifted off of you, you're sleeping better. When you're sleeping better, you're getting up early and getting up early, you can work out now. And you work out, you want to take supplements. You take supplements, you might as well eat right. And it just becomes this sort of like self-propelling biohacking snowball effect in the very best ways. And those are the guys that are going, you know, through these remarkable changes. But for anyone that would think like, oh, you're just going to Mexico to do drugs. Uh-uh. No, no, no. People that are going down there are leaning into the hardest work of their lives and actually having to come face to face with things that they might have been running from for decades.

• 4:05:44Speaker 01

  She's being conservative about the Stanford study too, but it's the results are remarkable, like so remarkable that I think there's going to be a lot of eyes on it once they release it to the public Wednesday.

• 4:05:59Speaker 02

  No, no, no, no. It won't, it won't be published for quite some time.

• 4:06:02Speaker 01

  Won't be published, but we're, we're going up there Wednesday just to, they're going to talk about the results officially. But not just from the reduction of symptoms, like what we were talking about earlier, but also the FMRI's that are coming out before and after are like astounding.

• 4:06:20Speaker 02

  It'll be groundbreaking. It won't just be groundbreaking for veterans. It'll be groundbreaking for contact sport athletes, for

• 4:06:27Speaker 01

  First responders.

• 4:06:28Speaker 02

  First responders, for Alzheimer's patients, for Parkinson's patients, like the, the changes in the brain on the physiological level. I hypothesize that there's not been anything like it to date.

• 4:06:43Jocko Willink?

  Marcus, when you, I'm dragging you back real quick.

• 4:06:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:06:50Jocko Willink?

  What, give me an example of what you see. You said bloody, gory.

• 4:06:59Jocko Willink?

  Number one, do you know that it's psycho that it's psychedelic? Does it or does it feel like it's a real thing? And like, give me just an example, just any example, just so people kind of can connect all these positive things to like, what you see when you're on this journey?

• 4:07:24Speaker 01

  Yes, there you go.

• 4:07:26Jocko Willink?

  I tried hard not to use the word.

• 4:07:29Jocko Willink?

  We're trying not to call this thing trip. I picked that up.

• 4:07:32Speaker 01

  It's funny you say that because, you know, obviously we're around the whole kind of medical psychedelic community now and you hear all these things or how they correct people because, you know, a politician doesn't want to hear like drug, doesn't want to hear psychedelic, they immediately think of Woodstock or, you know, right? So, you know, we've been doing the same thing, like we say this, we don't say that, you know, it all means the same thing. So appreciate that. I'll make a very simple one and one that's not bloody or gory.

• 4:08:01Speaker 01

  My, one of my close friends, his experience is he, he was sitting down and each individual from, from extortion was like dressed in white and would sit down and put their hand on his shoulder and say, hey, man, it's okay. Like, I'm good. Like, you can let me go now. And but he had the conversation with that person. And he would look at him and go, yeah, okay. And then that guy would go. And then another guy from extortion would sit down, dressed in white and say, hey, man, I'm good. Like, I'm good. I'm in a good place. And then that person would go.

• 4:08:42Speaker 01

  And and each person that he was like, obviously having whatever this person was dealing with had to do with all the buddies he just lost on that helo. And once that was gone, again, he, he just dealt with whatever, that was his trauma. It may have been locked back in his subconscious, as Amber mentioned, but that's what he was dealing with in life. And once he faced them and talked to them and they talked to him and they told him he was okay, he's okay. Like, he's not bad anymore. Like, he let, he let that shit go. And I, you know, we hear these stories like over and over and over again and it's.

• 4:09:25Speaker 01

  You know, it's, it's, they're all different, but they're all the same. Um, and I think that's what's, you know, pretty remarkable about it.

• 4:09:32Speaker 02

  I've developed some of my own theories, whether they're true or not.

• 4:09:35Speaker 01

  Amber has theories, Amber has theories as we're finding out.

• 4:09:38Speaker 02

  Science hasn't proven my theories, but my theory is that whatever the trauma response is, it goes back to the origination of the trauma. And some people channel that trauma in ways that society deems unhealthy versus healthier. I feel like what I've seen in the special operations community is that is something in the early childhood has like enabled this sort of like dialing down of suffering, like, like you just, the, the community is able to maintain such suffering. And so a lot of guys I've felt are going way back to childhood and dealing with like sort of repressed things.

• 4:10:19Speaker 02

  And I don't know, Marcus, if you want to tell any of your stories like about your actual experience of going back to actual memories in childhood, but then also to your question, Jaco, on why the blood and the gore, I also feel like when you're in the face of evil, that sort of can stick to you. And Marcus had to get through some really dark, very demonic, you know, heaviness to come out on the other side. And he's been back to do I began since he's like, basically does this annual protocol reset.

• 4:10:58Speaker 01

  Or like every year and a half.

• 4:10:59Speaker 02

  Yeah. And so if he started in the basement of his soul, every year he gets a floor higher. And the last time he did I began, which would be their fourth time, he described it as blissful. So.

• 4:11:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. So it wasn't, it wasn't painful. It wasn't tough. Um, it wasn't angry. And then feel like I was like, you know, fighting demons. You hear a lot of guys, I mean, they talk about literally like fighting demons. It was none of that. It was just, um, just kind of like peaceful and surreal and not, not tough. And what it told me is like, I'm good. Like I, I think I've scrubbed whatever I needed to scrub.

• 4:11:39Speaker 02

  You scrubbed the darkness.

• 4:11:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know, you kind of just got rid of any of the, the garbage that I think was, you know, affecting me. And so, I mean, I'm. I'm like, I'm light now. Like, I don't have nightmares anymore. And, and I think that was like, a lot of the, the blood and gore, or like, you know, you'd go to try to pull the trigger and like, the magazine would fall out, or like, the barrel would melt, like, just all the dumb stuff. Like, I don't have, I don't, I don't have those visions anymore. Um, it is, and some of it is funny. I mean, if you hear some of the stories, you're like, man, that's fucking hilarious, right? Especially like, team guys talking about their funny stories, right?

• 4:12:17Jocko Willink?

  I'm laughing because like, everyone has that dream, like, you're out of bullets, your gun's not working, you forgot your grenades.

• 4:12:21Speaker 01

  Or you punch somebody a hundred times, and they're just like, look at you?

• 4:12:24Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:12:25Speaker 01

  I'm sure you get even more pissed off. You're like, wait a minute, I'm really good at fighting. Why can't I knock you out in my dream? Yeah, exactly.

• 4:12:33Jocko Willink?

  So, we're, we are trying to get this, uh, to as many veterans as we can. That's what you guys are working on right now. And you, you were telling me earlier, you're also looking to take this, uh, in a, in a direction, private as well.

• 4:12:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:12:49Jocko Willink?

  Like, as a, as a privately owned company.

• 4:12:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, you know, as Amber was alluding to earlier, you know, the amount of applications we get a day, those are just from veterans. The amount of individuals that reach out via, you know, Instagram, or Facebook, or LinkedIn, you know, really LinkedIn. You know, and LinkedIn's like a, you know, professional network. So, a lot of, like, a lot of corporate, a lot of CEOs and entrepreneurs, just asking, hey, you know, how do I do this? You know, I heard you talk on so and so. You know, where do I go to find these treatments? Um, can you introduce me to a coach or a therapist? And so, you know, the more of that I saw over the last two years, I just said, Amber, you know, when we started this, we said, hey, we'd help, we want to help our, our teammates first, team guys.

• 4:13:33Speaker 01

  But we want to help, you know, all the special operations, and then we want to help all the veterans, and then we want to help, you know, athletes, like, you know, NFL players, at 99% of the brains they found autopsied. You know, um, from the individuals that have, um, took their own life or all had CTE. You know, we want to help those individuals. We said, you know what? Like, we want to help anyone that is like going through the same thing. And again, it's not everyone. It's just everyone that is struggling the same way. And that was kind of like my vision a long time ago is, you know, I want to start with veterans and help, help our, help our brothers and sisters, but like, I want to help everybody. And, um, it took the interest of some, you know, VC that started donating to vets and just said,

• 4:14:18Speaker 01

  "Hey, I really love what you're doing. Like, I think this is needed. You know, I, I understand personalized medicine. Um, how do we take this and introduce it to the broader population and reach more people?" And I said, "Well, let's work on that." So I've been working on that for a year and we're actually launching this week. And the company's called Tara, T-A-R-A, Tara Mind. Uh, the website will be taramind.com. Um, right now we'll have a, uh, we basically have a landing and info page for people to go to and just put in some information and they'll start getting some, you know, some newsletters and some, some, some info.

• 4:14:56Speaker 01

  But, uh, launching at the end of this year or it'll be, you know, the first couple of weeks of January, uh, we're launching a care navigation, um, and, uh, directory and basically a platform for, uh, for psychedelic, um, retreats, clinics, uh, providers, coaches, uh, basically a marketplace to connect all these individuals. And so the individuals that are reaching out to us on a regular basis and saying, "Hey, where do I go? What do I do?" We're building that platform for them. Got it. And, you know, we're going to provide educational content.

• 4:15:35Speaker 01

  Uh, we're going to vet everything and have, you know, high standards and, and, and protocols that, you know, um, that, uh...

• 4:15:44Speaker 01

  These providers in the US that are doing this, right now it's going to be ketamine, ketamine assisted psychotherapy, because that's the only thing that's legal. So we're just, you know, the, the vision really is to build the, the largest platform in the world to, to connect, you know, all the stakeholders. And eventually, um, we will be collecting data on all these individuals. And we will be going to insurers and making sure at the end of the day that they pay for these, because right now, not everybody can pay $6,000 to go outside the US and do it. Right now, it's like the top 1% can do it. Or if you're a nonprofit, you know, and you raise money for this, you know, then an individual can go. But again, we're supporting 200 people a year. How do you support 20 million? Insurance is going to have to pay for that.

• 4:16:28Speaker 01

  So the idea with Tara Mind is, um, we collect, we, we connect all the stakeholders in psychedelic medicine. And then eventually we go to insurers and, and show them the data and say, hey, this is working. You need to offer this up now as a benefit and pay for these individuals and subsidize these treatments, so.

• 4:16:45Jocko Willink?

  Tara Mind.

• 4:16:46Speaker 01

  Tara Mind.

• 4:16:47Jocko Willink?

  Where'd we get that from?

• 4:16:48Speaker 01

  Tara Mind. Tara is the, um, is, uh, one of the highest, uh, the most, uh, I guess you want to call it, um, important deities in Buddhist and Hindu traditions. And, uh, it's a goddess of, uh, you know, of empathy and bringing people to the light, uh, and those in suffering to bring them to deliverance. So it's kind of a, kind of a, I thought a cool name, uh, especially where it kind of we came from and where we're going and what it's doing to people, so.

• 4:17:25Jocko Willink?

  And the URL was available.

• 4:17:27Speaker 01

  And the URL was available for, I think, $12, actually.

• 4:17:31Jocko Willink?

  Uh, well, it sounds like, like, uh, we're, we're kind of up to date then, right? This thing is launching in a couple of days. We talked about Vet Solutions, vetsolutions.org.

• 4:17:43Jocko Willink?

  You're on social media. You're, you're on, you're at, Marcus, you're at Marcus Capone. Then you guys have, am I right, Marcus underscore Amber underscore Capone?

• 4:17:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:17:55Jocko Willink?

  What's the deal with that?

• 4:17:56Speaker 02

  I started that Instagram page. Listen, we both like low the social media, so we're really not on it that much. But um, we definitely have help with our social media accounts because we want to make sure that we're providing information to others that are interested. Psychedelic therapies are poised to be the next major breakthrough in mental health care. So you know, SSRIs were the last major breakthrough in mental health care.

• 4:18:20Jocko Willink?

  Gee, thanks.

• 4:18:20Speaker 02

  Thirty-five years ago. Yeah. And they're really, you know.

• 4:18:23Jocko Willink?

  Thanks for the SSRIs.

• 4:18:25Speaker 02

  For some they were, but you know, there is that, that warning label on the side of SSRI prescriptions that says, this may trigger like an uptake, up, uh, increase in suicidal ideation. Well, why are we fighting veteran suicide with anything linked to suicide? Like, that's so asinine to me. So as veterans continue to drive this forward in the United States, I certainly feel like psychedelics are poised to come on, on the scene a lot faster than maybe some had initially anticipated.

• 4:18:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, especially with some of the conservative, um, you know, lawmakers that are coming out now.

• 4:18:59Jocko Willink?

  For sure.

• 4:18:59Speaker 01

  Like, you know, Dan, you know, Prince Rose put a, you know, put through an amendment to provide funding, uh, not for veterans, but actually, and this was, I think, a complete surprise for everybody for, for active duty. So he thinks active duty should have access to this if they need it. Um, and of course, you know, Governor Rick Perry, who's been in our corner from day one, um, you know, he helped us pass a bill in Texas, and, uh, he's just been a strong component or proponent of what we're doing. Again, because it's a tool that works.

• 4:19:28Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:19:28Speaker 01

  You know, that's all he cares about.

• 4:19:29Jocko Willink?

  That's, uh, it's really good to see the open mind of people realizing that this thing, and, and that's the same thing I've seen, uh, you know, I've had some good friends, had Dakota Meyer come on here and like, he actually, he, I think, I think I talked about this on the podcast, but you know, he asked me, like, hey, do you think I should do this? I'm like, dude, I have no idea. So I called like, uh, Joe Rogan and Tim Ferriss. And I was like, hey, you know, like, what do you guys think?

• 4:19:54Speaker 01

  They were like, they were like, two thumbs up.

• 4:19:56Jocko Willink?

  They, they actually, no, they both were like, were thoughtful about it.

• 4:20:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:20:01Jocko Willink?

  And Joe had had, uh, Dakota on the podcast and he was like, He was like, yeah, I think I like, I think it would be good for him. And I was like, cool. And I, I said, hey, man, I'm in no position to recommend the stuff, but here's what I got from my friends that know more about the stuff. And you know, Tim Ferriss is, is really involved in, you know, the Johns Hopkins stuff that's going on. So I feel like at least I, you know, I'm never a person that claims to know anything I don't know. I mean, I, I don't ever want to do that, but I've talked to people that, you know, gave the best recommendation from their perspective, which, and, and he went down there and he did it. And he said, it was awesome, man. And it really helped them out a lot.

• 4:20:42Jocko Willink?

  And, and I mean, that guy's been through the freaking wringer, you know, just been through the wringer as, you know, losing his freaking team. And, um, man, and he came back in a, in a much better spot. So, uh, when I see things like that, and then you have like a real conservative, like, you know, Rick Perry just like on board. That, that's just really cool to see. And Dan's obviously, you know, he's got friends that have done it. And, and for, you know, he's, he's taking it forward. So.

• 4:21:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, I think it's true leadership, you know, that's what I say, because again, I don't think, I'm sure this, they were exactly like I was like, this doesn't sound right. This is crazy. And then you do some research, you talk, really you talk to friends and then you have like loved ones that you see have gotten better. It's the only decision to make, but again, to do it the right way. And I'm glad that you talk to people like Tim, you know, and Joe Rogan, and I'm glad they didn't just say, oh yeah, go ahead and do it. Like they were like, well, let's, you know, and we've seen that with some of the retreats because again, we, uh, we write grants for individuals seeking out these treatments. So we talked to a lot of vetted retreats and some, some have actually questioned like, well, wait a minute, it's a combat veteran.

• 4:21:56Speaker 01

  We're not, we're not so sure that we want to take that person because you know, they got PTSD and we're not sure if they're going to flip out. And so, you know, we're, we're dealing with individuals are like, you know, worst of the worst in terms of, um, in terms of like trauma and, and some other things. A lot of these other places are just used to dealing with some people are coming in with, I got some depression or, I mean, I have a little anxiety I want to deal with. So this should be definitely, um, looked at and, um, approached carefully.

• 4:22:26Jocko Willink?

  I got asked a question the other day about. Basically, the guy was like, hey, you know, I'm hanging out with these friends and they're drinking a lot and I'm not really drinking. They're smoking pot and you know, I'm not really smoking pot or when I do, I kind of like waste the weekend or waste the night like, what do you think? Uh, you know, how can I drink less and you know, is it cool to drink sometimes and blah, blah, blah, blah. Right? And I, I started kind of answering the question and I was, I just sort of said, I have seen enough people's lives ruined from drugs and alcohol that I actually, at this juncture in my life, I can't even say like, hey dude, it's okay, you know, have a so. I, I just can't do it. I can't do it anymore. I just, I've seen too many people's lives destroyed from drugs and alcohol.

• 4:23:10Jocko Willink?

  And so when, when I talk about this stuff, it's coming from someone that like is as far, I don't think I could be anymore. Well, I guess I could be a little bit more. I, I, I just think that drugs and alcohol are so bad for you. And I've seen them ruin so many people's lives. I've seen them ruin freaking, how many team guys have you seen just like trash their lives? With just alcohol.

• 4:23:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, you can't count.

• 4:23:31Jocko Willink?

  It's, it's ridiculous. And so I can't get behind it at all. And, and yet, at the same time, I've had plenty of friends that have gone, they've done this. And what I like about what you guys are talking about, it's a hardcore screening. It's not like, oh, you feel a little bad? Okay, let's just jump right into this. It's like, hey, let's try some other protocols along the way and make sure that this is what you really need. And then I don't know if I want to use the term last resort. Cause I don't know if you consider it, guys consider it a last resort, but to me, it's like, okay, I've tried this, I've tried that, I've tried something else. It's been too much time and I'm at a rock bottom and I need help. And this seems like, okay, I need to get in there.

• 4:24:19Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Cause, cause from my perspective, I've seen drugs and alcohol ruin so many people's lives that I just, I just can't get behind it. But you know, here you have something that people aren't getting like addicted to it. It's not, you know, it's not like the seven or whatever you said. Nine freaking.

• 4:24:35Speaker 01

  Prescription drugs.

• 4:24:35Jocko Willink?

  Prescription drugs. Curing addictions. Yeah. Um, so.

• 4:24:41Jocko Willink?

  Appreciate appreciate that side of it and not just throwing this at people just like you know no one should be thrown into situations like this um you gotta go through the proper screening and and then go in the proper facility uh you know you guys are talking about like you know Fred the shaman from Wisconsin or whatever you know whatever this like just going into random places and doing it or at a slayer concert it's not what we're talking about at all um and like I said it seems to have helped it I know it's helped I know it's helped I mean obviously I'm sitting here in front of you and it helped you get back from the brink and I've got plenty of other friends have done the same thing so um awesome to see this kind of progress

• 4:25:23Jocko Willink?

  probably a good place to wrap it up Amber you got anything else?

• 4:25:26Speaker 02

  No I would just say um thank you for having us thank you for having an open mind I know it's you know it's very nerve wracking to publicly-

• 4:25:34Jocko Willink?

  I'm scared of it by the way I'm sorry I'm scared like I I don't want to do anything to my brain I don't want to like I'm scared of it I'm scared of uh maybe it's like that weird like control thing where I don't wanna but like I'm scared what I'm scared of is like I don't want to mess anything up I don't wanna I don't wanna like I feel for lack of a better word bro I feel fine you know so I feel fine so I'm always like oh man I don't I wouldn't want to do that because it makes me scared uh to to mess something up but that's because I feel pretty I feel pretty good right now so I think that um my fear of it is a healthy fear and uh

• 4:26:12Speaker 01

  I think I think that's good though like I think when you approach you know anything with that could be risky like you should approach it with some fear or respect I guess you want to say yeah you know I mean it's like the first time when we were playing with you know demo and some other stuff or you're like ah you know I've been thrown a hundred grenades you know or a thousand grenades like nothing could happen but like actually something really can happen but you approach it with respect and you you take care and you make sure you you tape them correctly and you know you you know you don't pull the you know drop this you know drop the grenade throw the spoon or whatever um you know same same thing with these medicines you know approach them with care only do if you need to if you feel fine and you're good like why um

• 4:26:56Speaker 02

  I've never done a psychedelic no I-

• 4:26:58Jocko Willink?

  You haven't either?

• 4:26:59Speaker 02

  No and I don't feel called to do it I feel like whenever you know you know and um I will say that I've seen it, I've seen these medicines change the lives, like not just help, but literally change the lives, be the, be of, of the difference between life and death for countless operators and for a lot of spouses as well, and there's a lot of trauma to heal. I used to catch Marcus looking out the window with like this thousand yard stare and I would say like, please help me understand what's going on in your head. What are you thinking about right now? And he would say, how much better off you would be without me here? How much easier your, your life would be and the kids' lives would be without me here? And so I feel like anytime you walk up to that line,

• 4:27:43Speaker 02

  you have to have an open mind of like, whatever works. I have totally changed the way I think about what I have been told is a drug versus a plant. Like, my faith is so important to me and I feel like God has given us everything that we need on earth. A lot of these medicines, most of them originate from plants. So, I had to really like check myself and I have thought that something made by man in a laboratory that's prescribed by a doctor in a lab coat is what is the cure. And a plant is a drug. And I've almost like flip flopped that. And

• 4:28:26Speaker 02

  I, I feel like so many of these answers are found in nature and found within us. And so I've just seen replicated time after time again, that you give someone this opportunity with something that's God given and totally unadulterated and you create this reset and connection and like, oh, they're good. They're good. As opposed to like putting a Band-Aid after Band-Aid after Band-Aid. The US government is Big Pharma's number one customer. And so, you know, getting people off of that cycle, this carousel of pharmaceuticals is just unintended byproduct of what we're doing. But man, we are seeing guys and gals really start to live again.

• 4:29:08Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. I didn't even mention that, Jaca. So I was on those, all those antidepressants and whatever, uh, through November 11th, 2017, when I went down for treatment. I haven't touched a prescription since, not anything.

• 4:29:23Speaker 01

  So it's pretty remarkable. And again, my story is like one of hundreds. I'm not, you know, I'm not the only one, which is nice. Good to get rid of all those nasties.

• 4:29:34Speaker 02

  The only other thing that I want to add really quickly is another unintended byproduct of our work is that we've seen this incredible reunification. Just, this is a topic that everyone can generally agree upon is veteran healthcare. And so we're seeing both sides of the aisle like actually come together, actually want to work together, actually like one another again. And so I, I hope that that ripple out effect continues across our nation. I feel like we need healing now more than ever. And it's pretty surreal what's happening. It's an honor.

• 4:30:14Jocko Willink?

  Marcus, any closing thoughts?

• 4:30:17Speaker 01

  No. Just, you know, first off, thank you for having us on here. I know this was a different topic for you. And again, trust me, this was nothing I ever intended out to even think about getting involved in. But I just, I see the power in it. You know, and two, approach these medicines carefully. They're not to be used at the Slayer concert. I think the way we're going about it is the right way. I think the way that these are going to be introduced to the public is going to be done correctly. I think it's going

• 4:30:59Speaker 01

  to be a really medically driven industry, at least first, you know, if it goes other routes, you know, it's not what we're here, what we're talking about. And so I, I, you know, I, I want to just tell people that if they're interested, you know, and they're searching, make sure they do their research, make sure to find vetted providers that've been doing this for a long time, that know what they're doing. Make sure they have a coach, a therapist that understands how these medicines work. And again, you know, it's, it's why we built vets. It's why I'm building Tara Mind. Again, it's to provide access and affordability for, for people. And so.

• 4:31:40Speaker 01

  Last thing, you know, I'll say is that there's, there's hope. So if you're, you know, if you're out there and you're thinking that there's, there's nothing ahead of you, there's, there's no purpose, you know, why are you here? I promise that that is a, that's a temporary thought and 100% you can climb out of that. And once you do, you'll see how cool life can be and to get back to your old self, or maybe invent a, a new, better, better person.

• 4:32:08Speaker 02

  We are living our best life. We really are. And it is such an incredible blessing. I

• 4:32:16Speaker 02

  have to pinch myself every day that this is actually happening. Marcus says I have to get in the final word, which is, there's some accuracy to that.

• 4:32:25Speaker 01

  Last word, last word.

• 4:32:25Speaker 02

  When, something else that I just thought of when you said that is that, you know, part of what we're doing to, to reverse these stigmas, especially around asking for help, is adopting more of a mindset that really, really true strength is vulnerability. I think that our society would say the opposite, but it takes a lot of courage to be vulnerable. And we're seeing that day in and day out of that.

• 4:32:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, if someone, I'm gonna get the last word in. If someone thinks we like coming up here and talking about like all this shit that's gone on and, and think we enjoy this spotlight is fucking crazy. Because we don't at all, but we definitely feel it's necessary. So like, now I don't even think it's about us. I think it's just like this needs to be done.

• 4:33:17Jocko Willink?

  Well, I mean, um, thank you. Thank you for both of you stepping into the spotlight. And I know it's a, a bright spotlight. And I know it's a, a burning spotlight in many cases. You know, when you talk about being at Chad's funeral and, and just knowing that you had to do something and you, you had at least an answer for a lot of people. So thank you so much for, for joining us.

• 4:33:47Jocko Willink?

  Thanks for, thanks for your service. And yeah, Marcus, thanks for your service in the teams and, and for signing the dotted line and risking life and limb. And you know, Amber, I don't get the chance. My wife has always said, like she's, my wife has zero percent chance of coming on this podcast. She doesn't like to talk to anybody. She doesn't, but for you, for all the wives, for all the spouses, that, you know, you didn't put your name on that line, but you put your name on that dotted line. And what the wives and spouses and families and your kids, what they go through is so harsh. And yet you, you're there and you supported and you continue to support. And now you're supporting all the families

• 4:34:32Jocko Willink?

  out there and all the veterans. So thanks for what you have done in the past. Thanks for what you're continuing to do as you help veterans get out of the darkness and move toward light and life. Thanks for what you're doing.

• 4:34:54Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 4:34:54Speaker 01

  Thanks, Jaco. It's been awesome. Thank you.

• 4:34:58Jocko Willink?

  With that, Marcus and Amber have left the building. So, pretty dynamic story of change and a journey that they've been through for sure. Would you, you were sitting in the corner. You were, so you were off camera on that one. Echo Charles, what did you think? Good evening, Echo, by the way.

• 4:35:21Speaker 03

  Good evening. Very interesting. It was funny, even from the beginning, I was relating a lot because like both our birthday, he's one year older than me. Both our birthdays in December. So we entered college later, or we were late, you know, and entered college, played football. And even, and how's this, as far as the, was it you? No, no, him. He was saying.

• 4:35:45Speaker 03

  About alcohol, right? Like, oh, how's this gonna affect me? Like, how can it, you know?

• 4:35:50Jocko Willink?

  You thought that way too?

• 4:35:51Speaker 03

  Yep, with alcohol. I was like, I'd always ask my friends, like, because I didn't start drinking till I was like twenty twenty one. And so I would always ask like, hey, like, can you tell? That you're drunk or can you tell that you're buzzing or are you just buzzing? Then afterwards you remember, oh, I was buzzing or, you know, can you tell? Like, what does it feel like? Kind of a thing. I remember relating very deeply with that small, tiny part.

• 4:36:13Speaker 03

  Also, you're the one who said Andy Stumpf might be one of the bigger wise asses. He is, I'll go in a record, say he's the biggest.

• 4:36:22Jocko Willink?

  Oh, dang.

• 4:36:23Speaker 03

  That was one of the.

• 4:36:23Jocko Willink?

  Getting props from Echo Charles.

• 4:36:25Speaker 03

  Number one biggest wise ass. Yes, fully.

• 4:36:29Speaker 03

  What, uh, you were talking about, you think your mind is more of the serious one. So you know, you're, you were saying your mind is like, you feel okay. So like, you're kind of, would you say scared to take psychedelics? What if it jams you up, right? Like, what if you did take it and it like made you? Because you know how like some people, they're so driven, but because of like something that's kind of off in their mind, I feel like that's kind of you. In real life.

• 4:36:56Speaker 03

  Like, there's something probably significantly like off with you, but it sort of like just by happenstance like works for you. You know, some people are like that. So what if you took psychedelics and then like now you're like, you kind of, you're kind of like more lazy. Or like you don't work as hard anymore.

• 4:37:11Jocko Willink?

  I don't like that idea.

• 4:37:13Speaker 03

  Yeah, I know, bro.

• 4:37:14Jocko Willink?

  So I've even had people say like, oh, you know, you should, hey, man, you know, you should smoke pot. And I'd be like, well, why? Be like, oh, because it kind of take your edge off. And I was like, why would I want to take my edge off? I want to sharpen it.

• 4:37:29Speaker 03

  You're gonna start sending like, um, like Christmas cards now and giving gifts, like, you know, like you're gonna do all that kind of stuff. That's what I think. I think you're gonna be like, man, I've been, I've neglected the emotional elements of friendships of my life for so long.

• 4:37:44Jocko Willink?

  Did you get the Christmas card I sent you?

• 4:37:47Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's what I think would happen to you. That's what I really think. Or are you gonna like start really valuing your rest days? You know, you're gonna start scheduling like two solid rest days. You're gonna start exercising moderation in a bunch of things because it's better for you, like all this stuff. It's gonna, you're gonna change fundamentally.

• 4:38:03Jocko Willink?

  I wouldn't count on anything that you're saying, but to the serious point of what you're saying, like, it does.

• 4:38:11Jocko Willink?

  That that kind of makes like even just where our joking is like a legitimate concern. I wouldn't want that.

• 4:38:17Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:38:18Jocko Willink?

  I wouldn't want to be like quote more mellow.

• 4:38:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:38:24Jocko Willink?

  And and the other thing is you got to remember is we you know me dude, I mean, it's not like I'm walking around freaking, you know, like I go home, play guitar, whatever, watch the sunset. It's all you know what I mean? Like that's normal stuff.

• 4:38:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, fully. What was it? You watched Robocop two?

• 4:38:39Jocko Willink?

  Uh, not sure.

• 4:38:41Speaker 03

  So Robocop two, he's so, you know, Robocop, he's kind of like you, he's hardcore. He just goes hard.

• 4:38:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. Drop your weapons or there will be trouble. Yes.

• 4:38:51Speaker 03

  Exactly right. So in part two, they're like, hey, the Robocop's for, you know, he he does this, whatever he does. And then they're like, hey, he's getting like giving us a bad image. I think like some other company came in or something like that. And she was like, um, hey, let's make them like more appealing, you know, more and more friendly to the public and stuff. And they're right. All these directives and like it jams him up. That's gonna be you, bro. Cause they're right, but in theory they're right, you know?

• 4:39:16Jocko Willink?

  But how did it cause problems?

• 4:39:18Speaker 03

  Like he'd be, he wouldn't solve crimes anymore. He'd like, he'd start saying poems and stuff and like some dumb stuff that doesn't really match his thing, you know, it's like that. You gotta watch it to kind of see. But anyway, that'd be you.

• 4:39:29Jocko Willink?

  So yes, I am not down with messing with what I've got going on right now. And so, but like I said, ten times, I think I said it 48 times, but knowing a lot of guys that have gone through this kind of thing and it definitely, just talking to Marcus, man, you know, and he's like I said to him on the podcast, I'm like, dude, it's hard to even imagine him getting like mad or you know, throwing a coffee cup through a window or what, you know, like this guy, he's, he's chill, he's mellow, he's, and yet he's still doing great stuff. He's not like, he's not getting after it. He's still in good shape, you know, he's still, uh, he's got businesses going. He's a hundred percent on, on, on track on a bunch of different levels. So,

• 4:40:12Jocko Willink?

  you know, and this, this stuff really helped him out. So I'm down, I'm down for if, if it helps people out. For sure. I do think it should be like a last resort scenario. Look, not so close to the edge that the edge is a threat, but you know, try some other things out. Make sure you, you know, make sure your diet's clean. Make sure you're not drinking every night and expecting things to be good in life. If you're drinking every night, you can't expect things to be good in life. Yeah, I'm not saying you're gonna have a bad life, but there's a chance you are.

• 4:40:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:40:41Jocko Willink?

  So, clean up the diet, get off the alcohol. I can't give any advice about the, all the, all the prescription drugs. But, you know, maybe talk to your doctor about how you could get off some, I don't know, man.

• 4:40:56Speaker 03

  He was saying downstairs, and he made a really good point where,

• 4:41:01Speaker 03

  cause some people, they like, you know how you say, and I get it, cause it can seem like this, but some people are, most people with a problem with drinking, they can't just stop drinking. Like, there's just, I'm not saying they can't, I'm just saying there's a lot more to it than just, oh yeah, just stop drinking, you know?

• 4:41:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 4:41:17Speaker 03

  So he was like, we were downstairs talking, right after, uh, right after. So he, he said, it, you can't tell someone who's in the basement, you can't tell them, hey, go on, just go exercise. Oh, just go on the mat. You know, that's kinda hard to do, even for a normal person. So you can't tell someone who's in the basement just to, just to do that, cause that's hard. He's like, let's get them out of the basement first. So he said, if they're out of the basement, then we can start introducing them to the mats, to more exercise, to all this other stuff that's gonna take more work, by the way. So you love jujitsu, I'm sure working out has been a part of your life for a very long time, so it's second nature, I know. But for a lot of people,

• 4:41:58Speaker 03

  especially if they're not into working out, you're saying you want them to work out for an hour a day. Pretty much every day.

• 4:42:06Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 4:42:06Speaker 03

  Like, you know, working out's freaking hard.

• 4:42:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, the other key component of what you're saying is, I mean, if you remember, I, I like tried to nail down Marcus a bunch of times, about like, what did you feel? And what he felt was not, like, not doing anything, like, not motivated to do things. So, that, what you're talking about, the, the basement, like, getting someone to, like, I think, oh, get him to work out.

• 4:42:34Jocko Willink?

  What does that mean? That means you just get up and you work out. Like to me, it's this normal thing, but for a lot of people that might be a big step. Now, listen, it could be a smaller step if you put your mind to it. You know, it's going to help you and maybe you get the rewards for it. You commit to doing it for a certain amount of time. It's like we were just talking to a kid in the locker room. He goes, I just submitted someone for the first time in three years. He'd been training for three years, got his first submission, bro. So remember that was one of the, uh, one of the things I said when someone said, hey, I really don't like jujitsu. How long should I train for? And I was like, train until you submit to, it's train until you submit to someone. Same thing with like working out, like work out until like, there should be some thing that you have to do. Like, can you do a pull up? If you can't do a pull up, work out until you can do a pull up.

• 4:43:19Jocko Willink?

  If you can't, you know, uh, run a mile in less than seven minutes, work out until you can run a mile unless so. I'm just saying, I, those aren't the correct answers, but I'm saying something along those lines because there's no, if you're not feeling the short-term reward, because let's face it, you and me, we get a short-term reward from working out just because we kind of know how it's going to feel later and we know the long-term health benefits. So even a single workout feels good to me because I know the long-term benefits and I know the, I know even the short-term benefits. So it feels good.

• 4:43:59Jocko Willink?

  But if it doesn't feel good to someone and you don't know about the long-term rewards, you don't see that strategic thing, it just wasn't fun.

• 4:44:05Speaker 03

  Yeah, just another thing they're going to avoid.

• 4:44:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, just wasn't fun. So.

• 4:44:09Speaker 03

  Yeah. He said, he said, he mentioned something too, real briefly, but it, it, there's so much to it where he, he said, I forget exactly the, the full context, but he said, um, get your heart rate up and it's like better than most medicine.

• 4:44:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:44:22Speaker 03

  I'm like, man, that's so, that's true. And I used to tell you about this, like, remember when I was like, kind of down for drinking every day or whatever. This was like years ago and. Sometimes you you enter in this funk, you know, and I was still working out and like doing everything, but it's just a funk. You just have a funky day the next day like you're dragging and sometimes it would go all the way into your mind where I would have these real low level mundane feelings of what kind of what he was talking about where it's like, yeah, why bother? Like, why do I even care about this? What? Jiu Jitsu? Like, who cares? Like, bro, what?

• 4:44:54Jocko Willink?

  That's the path that I went down during that conversation of like when death, when you're confronted with death. And then the world moves on and you're like, well, we're all gonna end up in the same spot anyways. So really kind of what's the point, right? And I think that's the place where you could lose, like lose the motivation to do really anything because I'm thinking, dude, we're all gonna end up in the grave anyways. So whatever. And that's a horrible place to be because you forget about all the all the all the beautiful things that are in life. I was listening. I was listening to Jordan Peterson the other day. You know, Jordan Peterson goes off on the like,

• 4:45:39Jocko Willink?

  you know, life is suffering and it's gonna be a nightmare and it's a misery and like, which I get. And you know, you know, it's even, it's not just him saying it's like religion is like all the religions are like life is suffering and the Buddha is like, oh, it's suffering. And I get it. I get it. But man, there's a lot of things in life that are really kind of fun and cool. And look, you're gonna, I think the point of Jordan Peterson is you look, you're gonna have suffering, right? You're gonna have suffering. That's what's gonna happen at some point, right? People are gonna get sick. People are gonna die. Things aren't gonna go right. You're gonna get fired. You're gonna, your business is gonna fail. Like all those things are gonna happen, right?

• 4:46:22Jocko Willink?

  So, but to just blanket say because of that life.

• 4:46:28Jocko Willink?

  It's I'm gonna I'm not just gonna go into Jordan Peterson right now. I'm going against a Buddha. Who they say life is suffering. I'm gonna say, you know what? They're suffering in life, but life is not suffering. There's a lot of cool stuff that happens. There are a lot of funny stuff that happens. You make friends. You say some funny stuff. Y'all laugh. You've been sitting around laughing so hard. That is just you can't even it like hurts your stomach. Have you ever had that happen?

• 4:46:51Speaker 03

  Yes, sir. It's real.

• 4:46:52Jocko Willink?

  Come on, man. Is that suffering now?

• 4:46:54Speaker 03

  No.

• 4:46:54Jocko Willink?

  No, it's not. So let's not take it to the extreme of life is suffering. They're suffering in life and I get that. And we're 100% agreement on that. Who was it? I think Hemingway said.

• 4:47:08Jocko Willink?

  I think Hemingway said.

• 4:47:11Jocko Willink?

  If two people love each other, there can be no happy ending. Which is true, right? You know what I'm saying?

• 4:47:19Speaker 03

  I see what he's saying.

• 4:47:20Jocko Willink?

  Because someone's gonna die.

• 4:47:21Speaker 03

  Someone's gonna die, yeah.

• 4:47:21Jocko Willink?

  And at some point, that other person's gonna be sitting there crying because they lost that person.

• 4:47:25Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:47:26Jocko Willink?

  Although, but that being said, live a happy life. You know, you take care of each other, whatever. You have family, you. You know, you you have grandchildren. Hey, like. Maybe that is a little bit of a happy ending. You know what I'm saying?

• 4:47:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:47:41Jocko Willink?

  So I don't know. I think we're leaning a little bit far into suffering right now. And look, I get it. You know, I get it. Man.

• 4:47:51Jocko Willink?

  Your heart is gonna get broken, you know? And I'm not just talking about, oh, I'm in a relationship. I'm talking your friends die, your heart's gonna be broken. It's gonna hurt.

• 4:48:01Jocko Willink?

  But that's not everything. So. And I think, you know, from what from what Marcus is saying, um, you know, some of that visibility of the the good stuff. Comes by dealing with that other stuff. And that's another thing for me.

• 4:48:22Jocko Willink?

  And I talk about this in Discipline = Freedom Field Manual a little bit, but I think, you know, I've lost friends and I've talked about it and it was straight up giving eulogies for my guys.

• 4:48:40Jocko Willink?

  Like immediately, as soon as they die, you're basically like writing about what you thought about them, how you felt about them and what they meant to you and how awesome they were. Like that is so therapeutic, even though I was doing it as my duty. It also, I recognized that it was a therapeutic thing. I recognized later in life that, oh, like, how did I get through that? Oh, yeah, I wrote about them. And when you write about them, you detach from it. When you detach from it, you get to read and you get to think and you get to think through it, you get to process. And all those things happen by, by writing about, you know, your, your, your friend, your hero, this person, this individual that made this sacrifice. And it's a way of processing this stuff that I think, you know, the term that Marcus used was, you know, you gotta, the only way to get,

• 4:49:26Jocko Willink?

  to get over this stuff is to go through it, right? And that's sort of like you do when you write a eulogy or you write a letter to someone that's passed, or you talk to their parents about them, you talk to their, their siblings about them. Like that is so, such a good way to help move through the pain that you're gonna feel. And you're gonna feel pain. You're gonna suffer, but life is not suffering. There's much more to it and a lot of it's good. So.

• 4:49:58Speaker 03

  Yeah, I heard that everyone that I know that went through psychedelic journey, always even like some people, some people I do isn't the official one, it just takes some mushrooms, but they do it with intention. It's all worked for them. Like I know people who quit drinking. It's weird, but the the two people I know who quit drinking was real surprising too, but slowly by slowly like it came back and then they started drinking again. Not just all of a sudden and they didn't just be like, okay, that was fun and I'm drinking again. It would be like, you know, six months later, they'll be like, I'll just have one. And then it just slowly creeps back in, which actually went in line with what he was saying, where it's like, hey, it's not just a magic pill one time. It's kind of like, it's kind of like, it's like a therapy almost kind of a thing.

• 4:50:42Speaker 03

  Cause it's like, I guess it like rewires your, the way I always saw it was like, all your, the way you regard it, the way you create meaning or whatever has to do with like all your past experiences mixed with how you're, you know, your genetics or whatever. So all your past experiences, ups, downs, traumas, no traumas, like everything kind of creates little meanings with every little interaction. So if those meanings that you created in your head are all jammed up, or even if they're, I don't know, maybe they're, everyone's gonna have different meanings for different things. So what it does is it goes back to those original like meanings that you're making and it just jumbles them all up. And kind of, so you can kind of detach from the way they were formed. So it kind of like, oh, so you can make your, and he made a good analogy with the snow.

• 4:51:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:51:27Speaker 03

  So it's like you can make your own tracks. Be careful though.

• 4:51:29Jocko Willink?

  But yeah, the tracks you make could be wrong.

• 4:51:31Speaker 03

  Oh yeah, because and because some people, they'll just take it recreationally. And they'll be like, oh yeah, it was just a trip and it opened my eyes, but they don't really get any intended like positive outcome. They just, oh, I just wanna, as my little brother's wife said, some people just wanna take mushrooms to fry.

• 4:51:48Jocko Willink?

  And they'll recommend this.

• 4:51:49Speaker 03

  No, that's, no, one time Jade was getting all deep in the, you know, one night. And he's like, yeah, you know, you take mushrooms and do all this stuff. And she's like, why you gotta try to be all intellectual about it? Why can't you just admit some people just take mushrooms to fry?

• 4:52:06Speaker 03

  But yeah, that's a different thing. See what I'm saying?

• 4:52:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:52:10Jocko Willink?

  All right, well.

• 4:52:13Jocko Willink?

  If you want to support this podcast, um, get some Jaco Fuel, get some Jaco Fuel, Pink Mist. Have you had Pink Mist yet?

• 4:52:20Speaker 03

  I have.

• 4:52:21Jocko Willink?

  How do you like it?

• 4:52:21Speaker 03

  It's good, pink lemonade.

• 4:52:23Jocko Willink?

  But it's not your thing?

• 4:52:24Speaker 03

  It's my, it's my jam, just like orange is my jam. So it's like good.

• 4:52:27Jocko Willink?

  Like a secondary?

• 4:52:28Speaker 03

  It's like this, pink mist, I taste it, pink lemonade, oh yeah, good, but we already knew that kind of a thing. It's not like mango where I'm like, ooh, this is freaking mango. Let's say, look, if you go, you have a fruit bowl. And you might be different, but this is just me. I got a grapefruit. I got orange.

• 4:52:45Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 4:52:46Speaker 03

  And I got a mango.

• 4:52:47Jocko Willink?

  You're going mango, huh?

• 4:52:48Speaker 03

  I will eat the orange and I'll be like, cool, I'll have grapefruit or pink lemonade or whatever, or lemon, whatever, good. Fine, but bro, come on, a mango? Mangos just taste better to me.

• 4:52:57Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 4:52:58Speaker 03

  All the other stuff tastes good, mango tastes better.

• 4:53:00Jocko Willink?

  Alright, so we got some drinks, Discipline Go, you can get mango. I'll tell you what, the new, the new tactical tea, which is like iced tea lemonade. A lot of people, and you know what I mean by a lot of people, a lot of people are saying that that might be the one. You also got the new Dax Savage, which is ridiculous.

• 4:53:18Speaker 03

  So basically everybody, so like, okay, so a wise man named Cake Nuts once said,

• 4:53:24Speaker 03

  he's all, everybody's showing up, so in your case, everyone, everybody, he's like, you, me?

• 4:53:29Jocko Willink?

  Everybody.

• 4:53:30Speaker 03

  Everybody.

• 4:53:33Jocko Willink?

  Jacofuel.com, go get some of that stuff, get some Molk, we'll get the, get the ready to drink Molk, which is, I'm telling you what, I got problems with ready to drink Molk, because I'm drinking it way, it's way too easy.

• 4:53:43Speaker 03

  Too easy.

• 4:53:44Jocko Willink?

  It's too easy, it's like boom, but you know what's nice, it's just like a little 30 gram protein hitter.

• 4:53:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:53:49Jocko Willink?

  Which is an unbelievably convenient and joyous thing in life. It's just to be like, you know what, and it tastes freaking good. Pete's son, Keegan, because I don't like vanilla, you know I don't like vanilla, right? It's not my, it's not my jam, as you like to say.

• 4:54:03Speaker 03

  It's real vanilla.

• 4:54:05Jocko Willink?

  But so I was drinking banana, I was drinking chocolate. And at camp, Pete's son Keegan, he's like, it tastes like melted vanilla ice cream. And I kinda didn't believe him, cuz let's face it, even people that don't like vanilla, melted vanilla ice cream is hella good, right? You know what I'm saying, right? You know what I'm saying? That's a hundred percent accurate.

• 4:54:25Speaker 03

  You're correct.

• 4:54:26Jocko Willink?

  It's a hundred percent accurate. So I said to myself, there's no way this tastes like melted vanilla ice cream cuz then it would be hella good. And sure enough, I cracked it open. It's, it tastes like melted vanilla ice cream. It's legitimate.

• 4:54:39Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 4:54:39Jocko Willink?

  It is a legitimate tasty treat. So that's the ready to drink milk. Um, check that out, jockofuel.com, you can get it wah wah. You can get this stuff at the vitamin shop, vitamin shop's got pink mist in it right now. Um, yeah, there you go, jockofuel.com, get some of that, also originusa.com if you need jeans. And look, American made stuff, this is, this is the big thing. All right, cuz there's people all over the world that are enslaving children to make you a pair of pants.

• 4:55:11Jocko Willink?

  And you should not support that. You should support America, which means you should support originusa.com, get jeans, get boots, get hunting gear. The hunt line's out.

• 4:55:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:55:24Jocko Willink?

  Um, get, what else do you need to get?

• 4:55:26Speaker 03

  The new washes of the Delta sixty eight is out.

• 4:55:29Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm getting the two year, I'm gonna get the two year.

• 4:55:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's the middle one, eh?

• 4:55:33Jocko Willink?

  The middle one.

• 4:55:34Speaker 03

  I'm getting them all.

• 4:55:34Jocko Willink?

  You're getting them all?

• 4:55:35Speaker 03

  I freaking like them all, yeah.

• 4:55:36Jocko Willink?

  The thing is about the light one is if it's, if it's the sun out, that's gonna, that's gonna be cool, a lot cooler. You know what I'm saying, cuz sun, dark, whatever.

• 4:55:44Speaker 03

  Yeah, it is more summer vibes ish. Yeah, it's a different look, but I'm ready.

• 4:55:49Jocko Willink?

  Originusa.com, don't forget about gees as well. Cuz once you put on an origin gi, you literally will not wear another gi again.

• 4:55:57Speaker 03

  Yeah, I literally, literally donated all my other gees.

• 4:56:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:56:01Speaker 03

  Like just the other day, actually two weeks ago, yeah, for real.

• 4:56:05Jocko Willink?

  They have no purpose in life.

• 4:56:06Speaker 03

  No purpose.

• 4:56:07Jocko Willink?

  Those old gees, uh, we apologize to the, the receivers of these gees, but at least if they can get them started, then they can become a world champion and gets, you know, get a good gi.

• 4:56:16Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:56:16Jocko Willink?

  Uh, originusa.com, get some of that.

• 4:56:19Speaker 03

  It's true, also Jocko store, if you wanna represent, we got a new shirt out. I talked about it already, but officially I'm announcing it. I'm sending out an email to everybody. The, the, the standard issue, discipline equals freedom. So it's the kind where if you don't have the standard issue, are you even really representing?

• 4:56:37Jocko Willink?

  I know the answer is probably yes.

• 4:56:40Speaker 03

  I know, I know.

• 4:56:43Speaker 03

  No, I'm not sure I want to do it like that, but.

• 4:56:46Jocko Willink?

  What if a dude is just getting after it in seven different fronts and you not got a standard issue teacher? Are you like, hey, you're not really representing?

• 4:56:52Speaker 03

  I know. Do I even have to? You're right. You're right. And look, hey, look, I'm still hypothesizing.

• 4:56:57Jocko Willink?

  For judgmental people, you might not be representing.

• 4:57:01Speaker 03

  Yeah. Or just check it out.

• 4:57:03Jocko Willink?

  That statement actually might piss some people off. I kind of got a little bit pissed when you just said that.

• 4:57:07Speaker 03

  Yeah. That's why I was like, it's kind of like, you know, it's a working, it's a working, uh, what do you call it? Slogan?

• 4:57:12Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Okay.

• 4:57:13Speaker 03

  So less pressure. Either way, it's out and it's good. It's cool. People have been.

• 4:57:18Jocko Willink?

  There's multiple versions of it depending on your, your proclivity to support various units.

• 4:57:26Speaker 03

  Yes. Good way to put it. Unless it's out. There's a lot of good other cool stuff on there. Also the short locker. New shirt every month. Creative designs for like.

• 4:57:35Jocko Willink?

  Was this one last design was, uh, toxic productivity?

• 4:57:40Speaker 03

  Toxic productivity. Down to good.

• 4:57:42Jocko Willink?

  Oh, you got me on a surfboard with like a computer in one hand, book in another hand, papers flying everywhere.

• 4:57:48Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 4:57:49Jocko Willink?

  Discipline goes in the wave.

• 4:57:53Jocko Willink?

  All right. So you can get the short locker at jocko store.com. Go, go. If you want to subscribe to this podcast, do it. Leave a review. So Echo, if you want to leave that little review about Echo where you're like, maybe he should just be quiet.

• 4:58:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:58:06Jocko Willink?

  If you want to say that Echo's best podcast ever was today when he wasn't on it, then you could leave that review on there. We'll be happy about it. Uh, jocko underground.com. Go and, uh, support. Look, we don't own this platform that you're listening to this on unless you're on the underground. If you're on the underground, guess what? We will be there no matter what. We're not going to get kicked off our own platform, right? We made our own playground. Remember that? You know, you get kicked out of some club, make our own club. We got kicked out of some jujitsu schools. Made our own jujitsu school. Might get kicked off a platform? We got our own platform. Jaco Underground.com. If you want to support that, go to, go there, sign up, register. YouTube channel. Check that out. Psychological Warfare, you know. Flipside Canvas, talked about Dakota Meyer today. That's his company to hang cool stuff on your wall. Bunch of books, you know what they are.

• 4:58:51Jocko Willink?

  Only Cry for the Living by Holly McKay. Check that book out. Final Spin. And a bunch of other books I've written. Echelon Front Leadership Consultancy. We solve problems through leadership. We also have an online training academy. Extreme ownership.com. You can't just go to the gym one time and be in shape. You can't just pick up a guitar and take one lesson and know how to play guitar. You gotta get in the game. And if you want to get better at leadership, which will make you better at life. Go to extremeownership.com.

• 4:59:25Jocko Willink?

  If you want to support Marcus and Amber and their, their charity Vet Solutions, go to vetsolutions.org. They are helping as many people as they can. And they need to help more. So go and check that out. Support if you can. And if you want to help service members, active and retired, their families, Gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got a charity organization and she does, she also helps vets. She puts them through a bunch of protocols. One of the primary protocols is the hyperbaric chamber. Like, like 30 and 45 day protocols where you're on clean food.

• 5:00:09Jocko Willink?

  You're getting hormone treatment if you need it. You're getting vitamin treatment if you need it. You're, everything is paid for. That's what she's doing to help out. One of the many things she does, but that's one of the, that's one of the things that she does. So if you want to help that, or you want to donate, or you want to get involved, go to Americas MightyWarriors.org. Another little trip that people can take. Little journey, I guess we're not using the word trip. Another journey that people can take and get a journey in a hyperbaric chamber. You can also take a journey in the wilderness. Heroesandhorses.org, Micah Fink up there, taking people in the wilderness where they're going to find and confront themselves as well. And if you want to follow Marcus and Amber and you want to follow vets, they are at Marcus, at Marcus Capone,

• 5:00:52Jocko Willink?

  at Marcus underscore Amber underscore Capone, and also at VeteranSolutions. And for us on Twitter, on the Gram, on Facebook, Echo's Addict with Charles. I'm at Jocko Willink, of course, be wary, be very wary of the algorithm. And once again, thanks to Marcus and Amber for everything that you have done for the country, for the teams, and what you're doing now for the veteran community. And a special thanks today to all the families, all the families out there, the husbands and the wives, the sons and the daughters, the mothers, the fathers, the brothers and sisters.

• 5:01:33Jocko Willink?

  Thanks to all you families that support our service, men and women around the world. And thank you for waiting and worrying and supporting them through all those sleepless nights. Your families make a huge sacrifice for our nation and we thank you for that. And the same goes to the families of our police and law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, all first responders. Your families support what you provide as families to our first responders, allows them to do their job so that we can live in safety. And to everyone else out there.

• 5:02:21Jocko Willink?

  Look, life is hard. And there is suffering. And it can get dark and sometimes it might seem like there's no way out and it might seem that you're alone. But you're not alone. And there is a way out. And there is light and there is life out there and it is good. But you gotta hang in there. You gotta never give up. And you gotta remember that you are never out of the fight. So keep on fighting. And until next time, Zeko and Jaco, out.