Jocko Underground: There Is More Than One Answer To Almost Every Question

There Is More Than One Answer To Almost Every Question. Should you be on a hard program and risk failure? Or a moderate program that is sustainable. How to get the most out of learning. How to avoid bitterness when criticized. How to get more articulate and better at speaking to people. How to deal with your ex-girlfriend hooking up with your best friend in the same house. 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 the Jocko Underground Podcast, number 90, sitting here with Echo Charles, EC. Yes. Echo Charles. I got some, I got a little something, just a little, just a little something that'll help out. You ever notice there's something like, sometimes you can just catch a little something, it'll help you out a lot. Maybe in Jiu Jitsu, you learn like a little, a little, a little something. It'll help you out. Oh, move your wrist a little bit over here. Hey, put your hips a little bit over here. Just a little something, but it helps you out a lot. This is one of those things.

• 0:30Jocko Willink?

  And it's one of those things that when you hear it, you're gonna go, well, how's that? It's again, it's like Jiu Jitsu, when someone says, hey, you need to put your weight over here, and you're like, how's that really help? And then you start doing it, and you realize it has a big impact. This is one of, kind of one of those things. Something that'll help you out with leadership, it'll help you out with life, it'll help you with interacting with other human beings. Here's what it is.

• 0:51Jocko Willink?

  Drum roll.

• 0:54Jocko Willink?

  Drum roll, please. There's the drum roll. Imagine it in your head, and here's the thing. There is more than one answer to almost every question. That's it. That's one of those things. You just heard it, you think, oh, well, how's that? How's that really make an impact on the world? Let me tell you, if you can import that and implant that into your brain, it is a very good way to free your mind, and open your mind, and therefore have so much more opportunity and flexibility, and wastes so much less time. It's sort of similar, what I was talking about with Dave Burke, when I was saying that you don't always, yeah, yeah. You don't always have to have an opinion. That same, I think we did a,

• 1:40Jocko Willink?

  I think we did a debrief podcast, and I was talking about, you don't have to have an opinion. It's not required that you have an opinion. But this idea that there's more than one answer to almost every question, it helped me out. So much in life and I it's something that I definitely learned in the teams. You know, I can try trace the roots of my thoughts. Some of them traced to jujitsu and then they connect to the teams. Someone could started in the teams and they connect to jujitsu. Someone started in the in the tactics of combat and then they translated to leadership. So I can kind of track trace the roots. This one definitely, definitely I picked up in the teams and I actually picked it up from a planning perspective, like planning a mission. Cause when you're planning a mission in the SEAL

• 2:25Jocko Willink?

  teams, good lord, every single person is a freaking tactical genius in their own mind.

• 2:35Jocko Willink?

  Every single person, not every single, let me, let me rephrase that. Here's, let me make it legit. If you have a platoon of 20 guys, 16 guys, 22 guys, whatever your platoon is, there's gonna be at least one third of them that absolutely 100% think that they know everything.

• 2:53Jocko Willink?

  They're gonna say, you know, one of them's be, we definitely need this, we need to attack this target from the north, period. That's how confident they are, period. They're saying, they'll say that, like, period. And then someone else be negative. We need to attack this target from the south, period. So you get two people that are looking at the same target and they have opposing opinions and they both 100% think that they're right. You got one guy that's saying, we need to bring four vehicles. This is a, we need to bring four vehicles. Someone else like negative. We need six vehicles. Someone else like, no, we should only take three. And they all know this.

• 3:31Jocko Willink?

  We should use helos. No, no, we should definitely not use helos. Definitely not. That's what someone will say. Somebody else is literally saying, we should definitely use helos for this op.

• 3:43Jocko Willink?

  Someone will say, we need six machine gunners. We need, not hey, should we consider, but we need. Someone else will say, no, we don't need, we need, we only need four. Other guys need to be more mobile. That's what they're saying. Stating a fact, what they think is a fact. So everyone has the answer to every question.

• 4:08Jocko Willink?

  And what I realized, 99% of what they were talking about, 99% of what they were talking about, didn't matter. It actually didn't matter. It didn't matter. Cause you know what? You're gonna get to that target and it's not gonna look the way it looked on the map. And you decide, you, yeah, we'll definitely hit from the north. You're gonna get there and there's gonna be a big obstacle there. And you can't hit it from the north. Or you're gonna bring a certain number of vehicles and you're not gonna have enough people to target or you're gonna have too many. It's like, it's, it's all, it's all subject to what actually unfolds in the world. So, early on, I realized, you know what? There's no 100% right answer. So, you got people that are freaking out about the dumbest thing.

• 4:51Jocko Willink?

  And they think they've got the 100% right answer and they, they actually also think that every other answer, every other possibility, every other variable is straight up wrong.

• 5:04Jocko Willink?

  Wrong. That's what they're thinking.

• 5:08Jocko Willink?

  What the, the attitude I got into, the attitude I adopted was, yeah, that'll probably work.

• 5:15Jocko Willink?

  Hey, that'll probably, that'll probably work. You know, like, it's a totally foreign attitude in the SEAL teams. To be like, yeah, it'll probably work. You know, cause everybody wants to be perfect. You know, that'll probably work. No one wants to hear that. Yeah. In fact, it kind of sounds weird to say, right? Hey, like, we're gonna go hit this target. I recommend we hit this target from the north. Yeah, it'll probably work. No one wants to hear probably. So, we over emphasize our confidence to make people believe that we know what's up.

• 5:44Jocko Willink?

  But I got used to that. I got used to that. You know, hey, it'll probably work. Cause 99% of the time, that idea probably would work. And it would work from the north, but it would also work from the south. It would work from the west. It would work from the east. Doesn't really matter. Sure. Could there be some giant channelized area if you come in from the east and everyone's gonna be forced into a small little spot where you could get ambushed and that's not a good idea? Yes, that's definitely possible. But, you know, all the other directions are pretty dang good. You know, they'll all probably work.

• 6:16Jocko Willink?

  And you know what? It might not be the most perfect and it might not be the most efficient, but it'll work and that's fine. It's fine, especially from a leadership position because if you use their idea, you're building up that relationship.

• 6:32Jocko Willink?

  And you're saving time. Instead of arguing and trying to convince someone, you're saying, yeah, your ideal framework, let's use it.

• 6:41Jocko Willink?

  But here's the thing, this isn't just about the team. That's where I learned it. But this, if you can kind of do this with everything. With almost everything. Almost everything has more than one answer. Even these crazy, whatever political road you want to go down, there's always, there's more than one answer. Like anybody thinks they can take some super complex political decision and think that they have the 100% right answer, they're just wrong. You don't have the 100% right answer. You might have a good answer. You'll have, you know what you have? You'll have one that will probably work. It'll probably work, you know, it's probably not going to work that great, you know, because nothing in the government is going to work great.

• 7:26Jocko Willink?

  But you make something, it's probably going to work. Okay, well, let's go with it. Let's try it. But let's not put all of our chips on that, on that one bet. That's not a good idea. So if you as a human being can remember that there's more than one answer to almost every question, it's going to make your life a lot easier. You're going to realize there's more than one way to build a business. There's more than one way to save money. There's more than one way to reduce expenses. There's more than one day, way to cook a steak. You ever heard these people? They tell you there's one way to cook a steak, but I had a lot of different steaks in my day. And look, there's some that are better, but there's also some that are equally as good and they're different. And I'm not turning them away. I'm not saying, hey, I don't want to eat that steak. Take that ribeye away from me. I'm not saying that. I've never said that.

• 8:13Jocko Willink?

  There's more than one way to change the oil of your car. There's more than one way. Oh, you'll like these cut weight. More than one way to cut weight. There's more than one way to gain strength, actually.

• 8:23Jocko Willink?

  There's more than one way to communicate to other human beings. There's more than one way to learn. There's more than one way to grow. Anything. You know, they tried to do this in the SEAL teams with, um, combatives.

• 8:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:37Jocko Willink?

  Combatives. It was like, we need to use this system. And the whole time that I was advocating for a, an evolution in our combatives program, what I was saying, well, everyone wanted me to pin down a system. The system I wanted to use was having an open mind. That's the system I wanted to use. Like, hey, well, let's, let's just continue to evolve and figure out what works and make adjustments as we go. Because there's not just one answer. There's not a system.

• 9:10Jocko Willink?

  So keep that in mind. There's more than one answer. And if you can do that, if you can actually recognize that there's more than one solution to problems, it is an outstanding way for you to free your mind. It'll make everything better. That's what I got for today. Echo Charles.

• 9:29Speaker 01

  So it's like, and this is gonna come as no surprise to you, but I did figure out early on in this speech that, yeah, it's gonna come down to like

• 9:37Jocko Willink?

  Speech? Was that a speech?

• 9:38Speaker 01

  Monologue.

• 9:38Jocko Willink?

  Monologue?

• 9:39Speaker 01

  TED Talk.

• 9:40Jocko Willink?

  Soliloquy?

• 9:41Speaker 01

  So it comes onto your ego, right? Where it's like, oh yeah, this is my way. Cause you bring up like steak, like cooking steaks. That's a big one. Right? Where, um, and I have a, I have a younger brother who's a barbecue guy. Like he's really good at it actually. And by, I'll, I'll tell you straight up. I've witnessed it. Been a part of his barbecue scenarios for many years and he's very good at it. Yeah, GTG.

• 10:03Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  By far. Um, but he's like, no Traeger grills, like anti, I'm anti Traeger, you know? Cause it like goes against the art, I guess. I don't know. He didn't explain why. But so I remember thinking like, oh, because that's his personal approach to barbecuing, you know, and, and Traeger might've been a, I don't know, like it maybe takes away. It's like, you know, when you go digital versus film, kind of a thing on the cameras, you know? It's, yeah, the digital crap. What if people are offended with the digital?

• 10:29Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  No matter its capabilities, you know, who cares about the capabilities? It's just wrong. It's wrong. This is the way, my way, the film. That's the right way. Um, so. Yeah, it can kind of limit you, you know, if you if you stay dogmatic to your one way.

• 10:45Jocko Willink?

  Totally.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  Or whatever. And then so if you were to be able to let go of it, I could think of like literally ten scenarios right off the top of my head that I would be doing. Or one would be doing a lot better in life if you were to just let it go.

• 10:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, the idea of what you just said of adapting, being able to adapt. Let's face it, look, I have a Traeger. Boy, I'm down with the Traeger. And I'm not even down because I use the Traeger. You know who's using the Traeger? Everyone else in my family because I'm not cooking. You know what I mean? Like, I'm sorry. Hey, I get it. Your brother's into barbecuing. It's a thing, right?

• 11:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:21Jocko Willink?

  Leif Babin?

• 11:21Speaker 01

  Yes, sir.

• 11:22Jocko Willink?

  It's like, you know, he's gonna barbecue whatever like it's Wednesday. He's planning to barbecue on Saturday. That's a he's doing mission planning. You know what I mean?

• 11:32Speaker 01

  Prepping.

• 11:33Jocko Willink?

  Going to the store. Prepping me like I'm not doing any of that.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  That's real.

• 11:35Jocko Willink?

  I'm getting a can of chicken. Opening it up, putting mayonnaise in there. I'm eating it. That's what I'm doing.

• 11:40Speaker 01

  You were just telling me.

• 11:41Jocko Willink?

  Takes a minute and forty two seconds and I'm eating and I'm good. I'm not gonna I don't have the patience for it.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  I understand.

• 11:47Jocko Willink?

  Time for it.

• 11:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:48Jocko Willink?

  But like my wife, she cooks on that Traeger.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. Right?

• 11:54Jocko Willink?

  My son cooks on the Traeger.

• 11:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:56Jocko Willink?

  Good to go.

• 11:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's real.

• 11:58Jocko Willink?

  Doing the straight up, uh, the straight up reverse searing, straight up reverse sear. It's no joke, dude.

• 12:04Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 12:05Jocko Willink?

  So anyways, if you have a closed mind and you think, well, there's that's not my way is the only way.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:14Jocko Willink?

  Yada.

• 12:15Speaker 01

  Yeah. So it's in a way, I like the film versus digital and even the Traeger versus, you know, wood. I don't even I don't know that much about barbecue, but.

• 12:24Jocko Willink?

  Traeger is wood. It's wood pellets.

• 12:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's like there's it does kind of what do you what do you call it? Kind of bypasses a certain part of the process of barbecue and I think maybe the traditional part. I don't know either.

• 12:35Jocko Willink?

  Burning your freaking meat. That's what it bypasses.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  But it's almost like, hey, if you're to take a bird's eye view, just be like, hey, let's say you're good at barbecuing, super good at barbecuing, super good, but you're anti Traeger. You know how how much capability you would have if you could do both? If you're both I was into Traeger, I'm into wood fire, I'm into charcoal, I don't know all the different fuels.

• 12:56Jocko Willink?

  Paint.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  All the yeah, you know, even stove top, I do it all because A, they all work.

• 13:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 13:01Speaker 01

  And I'm gonna be good.

• 13:02Jocko Willink?

  And think of how much you learn. You're gonna get better at your main. Uh, technique. Yeah. If, that's like, oh, I, I don't like using.

• 13:14Jocko Willink?

  That is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Jocko Underground Podcast. So if you want to continue to listen, go to JacoUnderground.com and subscribe. And we're doing this to mitigate our reliance on external platforms. So we are not subject to their control. And we are doing this so that we can support the Jocko Podcast, which will remain as is free for all, as long as we can keep it that way. But we are doing this so we don't have to be under the control of sponsors. And we're doing it so we can give you more control, more interaction, more direct connections, better communications with us. And to do that, we are, we're building a website right now where we'll be able to utilize

• 13:59Jocko Willink?

  to strengthen this legion of troopers that are in the game with us. So thank you, it's JacoUnderground.com. It costs $8.18 a month. And if you can't afford to support us, we can still support you. Just email [email protected] and we'll get you taken care of. Until then, we will see you mobilized underground.