117: What to Do When You Have Bad Luck. Tactfully Question Leadership. Tyrannical Leadership Proven to Work. Ratting on Your Boss.

0:00:00 - Opening 0:00:20 - How to question leadership, and respond to someone questioning your leadership. 0:09:10 - Problems with exhaustion in Jiu Jitsu. 0:20:33 - Steve Jobs was know to be a tyrant of a leader sometimes. Can that work for me, too? 0:33:48 - How to lead people who are older and/or more experienced than you. 0:38:26 - What to do after you've pushed your team too far, and into negative attitudes. 0:49:19 - Does Jiu Jitsu truly relate in a real life fight situation? 1:02:02 - Should you ease into getting in shape? Or go Level 9 hard core? 1:23:44 - Why not to draw hard lines in the sand. 1:29:40 - Should you tell the truth about your bad boss to your boss's boss? 1:44:55 - How to deal with bad luck and not catching a break. 1:48:26 - Support 2:07:47 - Closing Gratitude. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

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

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jocko Podcast number 117 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Echo.

• 0:07Speaker 01

  Good evening.

• 0:09Jocko Willink?

  And we're doing a Q and A tonight, first one in a while. Had a bunch of other guests and books and whatnot. So Q and A. Let's go.

• 0:20Speaker 01

  Cool. First question. Jaco from 115 podcast number 115 as a leader. How best to respond to someone like Corporal Meyer? When he brings up good questions in in a brief that need to be addressed without derailing the brief? And calling your competence slash authority into question?

• 0:41Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so what he's talking about is on podcast 115 with Dakota Meyer, which if you haven't listened to it, listen to it. It's long and it's very, I don't know. It's it's awesome. Anyways, in part of that podcast. Dakota is getting told how they're going to conduct this operation and Dakota raises some points and says, what about this? What about that? And what about this other thing? And they don't listen to them. And so the question here is if you're in charge, you're the leader. And you get someone that brings up these questions during a brief during the plan that you need to be that need to be addressed. How do you do it? How do you handle that properly?

• 1:22Jocko Willink?

  Okay, well, first of all, and the most important part of this is if you involve your team in the planning itself. You won't have these questions come up during the brief. They'll come up during the planning. So that's that's the ultimate and best way to solve this problem. You don't plan in a vacuum as the leader and then present the plan to the troops. And expect that you're going to have the perfect plan. You did is only your brain working on it. What about everyone else's brain? What about everyone else's perspective? They have experience and they have knowledge that you don't have. So. And if you involve them in the planning, then they ask you those questions early and you figure out what the right answers to those questions are. So that's how you solve the problem right there.

• 2:03Jocko Willink?

  Now, if it happens that for whatever reason, you're you didn't have the opportunity to do that, or you didn't do it well enough, or whatever the case may be. And now you start getting questions on your plan while you're briefing. Well, first of all, if they ask you questions that you don't have answers to. Then that that that could indicate that you're wrong, actually. You could actually be wrong. And not a lot of leaders like to feel that way. But you should actually be happy that someone on your team is pointing out something that is going to make the plan better as a whole. So there's that. And and it's really easy if someone if you're in a brief and someone brings up a point that you didn't think of and it makes sense. Well, then you can implement that into the plan.

• 2:49Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so that. Now, you might think that it hurts your authority. Right to say, hey, that's a good point, Echo. I I didn't think of that. Let's implement you might think or feel like that's going to make you look bad, but it's the opposite is actually true. If I go, no, Echo, hey, the plan's already completed. You weren't there for the planning, so just be quiet. That's the guy that no one respects. That's the guy that's not looking good as a leader, and that's a person that's losing authority. So you don't look weak if you listen to members of the team, whether they're junior or senior. It also shows that you're incompetent. If you because you because you missed a part. Obviously, the question is pertinent that they asked, or I should say, if the question is pertinent and it is a good point.

• 3:34Jocko Willink?

  Then it shows that you missed an important angle of the plan. So. Open your mind, open your put your ego in check and incorporate it in there. Now, this this can also happen if there's something that you know that you're right on. But something that you know that you're right on. If there's something like that.

• 3:57Jocko Willink?

  And you and this, you know, maybe you get one particular individual that keeps pushing back and keeps pushing back.

• 4:03Jocko Willink?

  And you you might have to in those cases say, you know what? Hey, Echo, let me let me talk to you after this brief is over and I'll explain to you exactly why we're doing it this way. So that way it doesn't derail the brief because it might take a longer explanation than you want to. You know, for instance, the typical SEAL briefing was we try to keep it 50 minutes to an hour. So if you have got to if you've got to spend eight minutes pulling up a different map and explaining some detail of the terrain to this guy that has a protest to what you're saying. You might say, hey, listen, when we get done with this brief, I'll pull you aside. Let me show you the let me show you the terrain map and you can see exactly why we're using this insertion route or whatever the case may be. Uh, so.

• 4:41Jocko Willink?

  You can do that if you have to. And even then, they might end up having a point that you didn't see, and then you can say, okay, well, I didn't see that. Now we have to give everyone a quick, a rebriefing on some change in the plan. But again, none of this will happen if you bring your subordinates in and you let them. First of all, let them do the planning. That's ideal. Let them come up with a plan or let Echo come up with a plan. I'm not coming up with a plan. You go come up with a plan. I'm gonna check with you and make sure that the plan is going in the right direction. Make sure it's not totally off track.

• 5:11Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 5:12Jocko Willink?

  And then you'll incorporate all these things and I'll have a better view of the plan. I can stand back and be the tactical genius as we talk about in the book Extreme Ownership. Like, that's how you do it. So, that's the answer. At least is an answer.

• 5:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:30Jocko Willink?

  Maybe other people have other answers.

• 5:33Speaker 01

  Seems to make sense to me. Yeah, that's that hard. It's hard, right? When you, when you, it's one of those things you always gotta be conscious of when you have a plan or whatever. And someone, for lack of a better term, pokes holes in it. And be like, hey, what about this? What about this? And then you have those two elements that you gotta keep in mind where it's like the fact that it's your plan and then the plan. You know, the effectiveness of the plan.

• 5:57Jocko Willink?

  You mean your emotional attachment to the plan?

• 5:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:59Jocko Willink?

  You gotta keep the emotional attachment to the plan in check versus the actual effectiveness of the plan.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:05Jocko Willink?

  And people have a hard time doing that. And what's cool, what's cool is once you break away from that mindset, then it's really easy just to be, and, and everyone just kinda knows, oh yeah, Jocko's, he's got an open mind. He'll listen to you. As opposed to someone that has a closed mind, everyone goes, oh, you can't, you can't get anything by this guy. He's just gonna keep, doesn't even help to point things out because he won't listen. And then guess what? You're using one brain versus 20 brains. And more important than the brain power, the perspective, the different perspectives. Because the guys on the ground or the guys with the technical knowledge and the tactical knowledge, they're gonna know things that you don't know. That's the way it is. You can't know everything that they know. And so if you shut down all those different perspectives, you're looking at something from one angle.

• 6:50Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 6:50Jocko Willink?

  And do you see the whole complete picture when you only look at something from one angle? No, you don't.

• 6:54Speaker 01

  No, sir.

• 6:56Jocko Willink?

  Use those other perspectives.

• 6:57Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 6:59Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 6:59Speaker 01

  Self correcting machine. If you can let go of the ego, the taking it personal.

• 7:05Jocko Willink?

  Well, when I was in the SEAL Teams, I called it the emotional attachment to the plan.

• 7:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:09Jocko Willink?

  Cause I'd see these people come up with plans and they would be so addicted to their own plan only because it was their own plan. Not for any, not for any tactical or strategic or operational reason whatsoever.

• 7:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 7:19Jocko Willink?

  They just liked it because they thought of it.

• 7:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's natural.

• 7:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's very, it's very natural.

• 7:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:24Jocko Willink?

  And there's some element of, of benefit to that, right? Because if you're passionate about your plan and I'm passionate about my plan, as long as we can eventually come to compromise, then we've put forth the best idea. Cause I don't want you to not be passionate about your plan while you're planning it. I want you to really come up with the best plan that you really believe in.

• 7:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:42Jocko Willink?

  And, and it's interesting, you know, you talk about poking holes, right? Poking holes in the plan. And we all know that it's very easy to sit back and poke holes in the plan. And what I'm telling you to do as a leader is to absolutely do that. Not be a jerk. No, no, and I'm talking as a leader. If I, if I let you do the planning, then it's easy for me to sit back and poke holes in the plan.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  Right.

• 8:02Jocko Willink?

  Which is good. It's good because we're going to come up with, we're going to fill those holes.

• 8:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:06Jocko Willink?

  Once I poke the holes, we're going to fill them and we're going to know that they're taken care of. Also, as a leader, from a, from a perspective point, you think, hey, Jocko really knows what's going on. He was able to find these holes in the plan. The real reason I was able to find him is just because I was not totally at, at miniscule detail with the plan. You were.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:28Jocko Willink?

  I was up at altitude, relaxing, looking around.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's kind of, I don't want to say cheating, it's not cheating, but.

• 8:34Jocko Willink?

  It is cheating. It is cheating. It is cheating. It's that much easier. It's so much easier to sit back and do it.

• 8:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:41Jocko Willink?

  And, and let things go that way.

• 8:42Speaker 01

  Like when, you know, when you watch a movie and you have like some critique, the movie's outstanding. And then you have some critique, yeah, they shouldn't have chose that guy for that role or whatever. Meanwhile, the movie is like groundbreaking, whatever, you know? So it's easy to poke holes in the movie. Meanwhile, like, yeah, yeah, when it's done, you're all like poking holes at the little imperfections. Do that all the time. Makes sense. I dig it.

• 9:04Jocko Willink?

  Does that happen with your videos? Is that what?

• 9:08Speaker 01

  Probably.

• 9:09Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 9:10Speaker 01

  Anyway, next question.

• 9:15Speaker 01

  We have been training jujitsu for two months now. We started actually rolling a few weeks ago from our knees on the mat. Like not starting from standing, basically. I've trained for and executed multiple marathons, competed, completed a number of Tough Mudders, trained hard in CrossFit, hiked, biked, swam. And nothing compares to the total mental and physical exhaustion I feel after training jujitsu. How can I combat this? Time, train more, supplements, just suck it up? When I get home, I'm so beat and the next morning I wake up feeling like I was hit by a bus. I know that feeling, by the way.

• 9:57Speaker 01

  Despite the exhaustion and still sucking at it, it's super fun.

• 10:02Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so that's the jujitsu.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  That's the jujitsu.

• 10:05Jocko Willink?

  And, okay, so there's a couple of things here. Yes, it's gonna take some time. You're gonna have to train. You train more, your body will become conditioned to it. That's probably number one. Number two is, and this is so hard for people to do, relax. It's really hard. It's really hard for people to do, especially when you first start out. I realize that the way you get to a point when you start to relax is when the capability of your technique surpasses the capability of your strength. So if I know that I can escape your choke attempt

• 10:47Jocko Willink?

  by holding your hand and pulling your thumb and pulling your arm off, and that's what I know, that's what I'm gonna do. When I realize that I can use a technical escape of swimming my arm in and then placing my hips on the ground and then scooting away from your choke, I'll do that instead. But until we figure out the techniques, all we have is muscle. So the way you do is you just have to keep training and keep training. And you can try... Can people actually, when they try and relax, do they actually get... You tell me. So I always tell people, like, relax more. Like, someone will say, "I just can't relax." And I'll be like, "Relax harder."

• 11:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:29Jocko Willink?

  But, but it's it's so hard for people to relax because people say, oh, when I relax, I just get submitted.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:36Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 11:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:37Jocko Willink?

  So, but if you relax, you'll at least be aware of what's happening. And if you relax, you can think about the technical, the technical movement that you're supposed to do to escape.

• 11:49Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. Yeah.

• 11:51Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I feel like, just like how you said, though, if you don't know the move, you're just gonna go with what you know and it's gonna be to spaz in one way or another. You know, if you, if a guy's on you.

• 12:04Jocko Willink?

  Is spazing ever effective?

• 12:07Speaker 01

  Well.

• 12:07Jocko Willink?

  Because I, because I'll go and say, yes.

• 12:09Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 12:10Jocko Willink?

  Sometimes I have to spaz and Dean calls me out on that a lot.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  Well, here's the thing.

• 12:14Jocko Willink?

  And all good defense, you just spaz.

• 12:16Speaker 01

  Well, but your spaz has a, has a big, more than a sprinkle of technique in it, though. That's the thing. If, like you, and I told you this one time, you know how like if you say, yeah, you're strong and that's kind of an insult in jujitsu? Because like saying, yeah, you're strong, but you don't have technique. It's kind of like, that's what you're implying. But, and I said this to you one time, I was like, you have like strength, you're strong. And you were like, not defensive, but you were like, no, I have technique or whatever. And I was like, yeah, I know that. I was like, shoot, that sounded bad. I mean, you have technique. We already know that. You've been trained for 25 million years and you have good technique. But with that technique is like a lot of strength in there. Like when you, um, there's like stuff, oh yeah, when like if, if I'll be in side control on, on top, on you.

• 13:01Speaker 01

  And you have this like, first off, your hands are in the correct spot just to begin with.

• 13:05Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 13:05Speaker 01

  Just to be, and you can just kind of get your leg in real easy every single time. Like I can't stop it, stop it. And I'm not weak, I'm not weak, but it's like the strength of that move.

• 13:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 13:16Speaker 01

  Is like, oh, it's unstoppable. And that's when I said it, I was like, you, you're like strong. When you do a technique, it's like, it's a strong technique.

• 13:22Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And I would say though, there's a lot of, I would say it's probably 70% technique and 30% strength. Which which may confirm what you're saying. That thirty percent strength is still more than if someone has seventy percent technique, but they have only ten percent strength to back it up.

• 13:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, fully. And even saying it's, you know, seventy percent technique, thirty percent strength. I mean, that's gonna vary from time, from moment to moment, or experience to experience. So if you're spazzing, even that's gonna be a spectrum, like how much strength did you use versus technique kind of thing.

• 13:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, cuz you can't spazz for a long time.

• 13:58Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 13:58Jocko Willink?

  Because then you'll just be tired and you'll just be gassed, yeah.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  So when I say you're strong, here's the thing, the fact is you're strong. Regardless if you have technique or not, you can lift a lot of weights, you're big, try grab, like I'd, I'll grab your wrist and when you break the grip of the wrist, it's way more violent than the typical person. You're a strong person, so there's no denying that. I know it sounds like an insult to whatever. But nonetheless, back to the point, yeah, if, so if you, if you have strength going in, before you gain all that technique over the, over the years, just like how you said, that's what you're gonna use. So the key is here, I think, is to consciously, and it's not easy, consciously focus on the technique, consciously like remember, okay, where am I? I'm in half guard right now? Cuz you know how like in the beginning, when you first learn the, the positions,

• 14:45Speaker 01

  you're like, half guard is real clear, guard is real clear. When you start rolling around, you're halfway upside down, maybe you're twisting, maybe your arm's in the wrong spot across your body or something like that. You kinda don't remember, oh wait, I'm in half guard right now. Or I'm upside down, but I'm in, you know, I'm on his back still, whatever. So you don't, it doesn't just stick in your mind what position you're in. But if you can do that, then it starts to get, getting routine. So now, after that, you can figure out, okay, am I safe here? Cuz that's why you spazz, that's why you, you can't relax, cuz you don't know if you're safe or not. So you're just trying to move and, and get out of there, or, or, you know, get that submission, hurry up before he does something.

• 15:22Jocko Willink?

  You know where this applies to life? This applies to life in, when you're interacting with other people. And you start to, let's say you and I are having a disagreement about something.

• 15:35Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 15:35Jocko Willink?

  Right? And you start getting the upper hand on me. And instead of me trying to use a technique to get out, all I do is go, that stupid echo, you're dumb, or something like that, right? I just start interrupting you, cutting off, raising my voice. I'm actually losing now. And I don't, you know, but I'm relying on.

• 15:56Jocko Willink?

  Brute force.

• 15:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:57Jocko Willink?

  As opposed to technique.

• 15:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:59Jocko Willink?

  Now, it could be also like we talked about earlier, it could be that I'm wrong. And if instead of admitting that I'm wrong, or, or taking, like you're saying, relax and looking at the technique and saying, you know what? Echo has a point here that I can't debate against. He's right and I'm wrong. I need to admit that. Same thing if you came up with an idea for the plan and your idea was better than mine, or you had a point that I needed to bring into the plan, unless I, unless I can relax and actually pay attention, then I'm not going to be able to do that. So that's how, well, that's one of the many ways when I always talk about jujitsu applying to life. This is another example of where, hey, if the argument starts to escalate and you're using brute force to get out of it,

• 16:42Jocko Willink?

  you're not winning, just like you're not winning in jujitsu. It's, it, you're going to gas out and you're going to, you're going to lose.

• 16:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:49Jocko Willink?

  Don't use brute force.

• 16:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 16:52Jocko Willink?

  Not even 30%. Well, maybe sometimes.

• 16:55Speaker 01

  30% is okay.

• 16:55Jocko Willink?

  The other thing is, the other thing that's hard and it's, well, it, it's, it's attached to what you're saying. Don't have death matches every time.

• 17:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:05Jocko Willink?

  Right? Don't like, you find a partner and just be like, okay, let's try and make sure that we're not using so much strength. I can roll with you or with Dean or with Andy or whoever for a long time. And, and it's, you know, we're sweating, we're tired, but we're not using all this strength. We're not walking off the mat with a, with, with like burned out muscles.

• 17:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:28Jocko Willink?

  It's a diff, it's more of a cardio, I would say, than, than a strength thing. When you get to a higher level because you're, you're just movement, it's movement that's happening. You know when to, you know, when someone's going to accomplish something and if you're going to fight it with muscle, you're going to, you're going to end up losing.

• 17:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it goes back to the time thing where I was asking, is it more time? And the answer is yeah, it's more time because like you, you learn that. And again, like where you. Knowing where to be and where not to be, where you're safe and where you're not safe in jiu jitsu is a big deal. So you know how like, okay, let's say, and I know this with you, because let's say if I pass your guard. Sorry, you let me pass your guard. I don't know. You don't spaz and like, you know, like in a tournament where the guy's like really trying hard not to let you settle in guard.

• 18:14Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 18:15Speaker 01

  So that's a different scenario, of course, but you never do that. You, it's like you get to a point, pass your guard, once you kind of get there, you just, you settle and you're, you're kind of relaxing. Because you, it seems like anyway, that you know, you're not in danger for a submission. So that's kind of really where the focus is. It's not the fact that, ooh, he passed my guard. Oh no, that's terrible. It's not that. It's okay, now what technique do I need to implement to keep myself safe? And the more you know about jiu jitsu, the more you realize it doesn't take a huge amount of energy to, to implement that technique. It's usually just like an arm position, make sure his hip is like over there and not over here. And that's kind of, that's it. That's pretty much it. But if you don't know that, you're like, oh man, you're using your whole body to get out of there, kind of thing. And that's, that's where you-

• 19:00Jocko Willink?

  You're leaving no reserves in a military perspective. In the military, you're always supposed to keep your reserves as long as you can.

• 19:06Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, you're just using it all up.

• 19:07Jocko Willink?

  Trying to spaz out and get out of a dominant position. You're also attacking a dominant position. When you're spazzing to try and get out, you're, you're just going crazy trying to get out of this confirmed position. I mean, across the side or the mount, those are positions that are really, sure, there's a transitional time when you should definitely spaz to try and get out. Once that's surpassed, well now you're just, you're just expending energy.

• 19:29Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yes, defense is already up.

• 19:31Jocko Willink?

  Check your diet too. If you're like really sore and everything, make sure you're getting enough protein, make sure you're getting enough fat. Make sure you're getting, maybe get some, uh, get some super krill or some, or some joint warfarin or both. Because you, you, your body needs it. So just other things to try and put off that.

• 19:50Jocko Willink?

  Soreness and the pain.

• 19:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:52Jocko Willink?

  Alright.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, all that twisting.

• 19:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there's definitely.

• 19:55Speaker 01

  You know?

• 19:56Jocko Willink?

  Well, yeah, it's hard on your joints.

• 19:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, not hard.

• 20:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, I guess not.

• 20:01Speaker 01

  If they get a workout, you know, they get a workout that you won't be getting doing other stuff.

• 20:05Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 20:05Speaker 01

  Unless, yeah, it's, you know, construction or something, you know, something like that, same thing, you're gonna get joint stuff. That's how. But, yeah. Keep it, supposed to be fun. The death matches, though.

• 20:15Jocko Willink?

  Death matches. Yeah, white belt death matches.

• 20:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:18Jocko Willink?

  Probably. Um. I would estimate forty percent of all injuries in jujitsu come from white belt death matches. Is that, you think that's a good number?

• 20:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, if not higher.

• 20:28Jocko Willink?

  If not higher.

• 20:29Speaker 01

  Yeah. Full on, yeah.

• 20:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 20:33Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 20:35Speaker 01

  Next question. You talk about, you talk about empathy and perspective and building relationships as a leader. But I look at leader, a leader like Steve Jobs, who's known for his hostile attitude toward people. Isn't that being? Default aggressive like you talk about? If I'm more naturally that type of leader, should I go with it? If it worked for Steve Jobs, shouldn't it work for me?

• 21:00Jocko Willink?

  So. That's a good question, and. I haven't actually read the book about Steve Jobs, and I think there's probably more than one, but there's one that's real popular, real thick, and someone gave it to me and I have it and I will someday, but I haven't read it yet, and I've heard it's really good and all that, and I've. That being said, I've, I've. Heard the same things about. You know, Steve Jobs' leadership style, he was real tyrannical, and I pulled a couple of things here just from. Well, here we go. In his book about Jobs. Time at Next and Return to Apple. The second coming of Steve Jobs. Alan Deutschman described Jobs' rough treatment of his underlings.

• 21:43Jocko Willink?

  He would praise, this is a quote, "He would praise and inspire them, often in very creative ways, but he would also resort to intimidating, goading, berating, belittle, belittling, and even humiliating them."

• 21:56Jocko Willink?

  So, and there's another article by Ronald Reggio, who's a PhD in psychology and the article came from Psychology Today and it says, "He was obsessively controlling and given to fits of rage, throwing tantrums and yelling at employees and board members. He could tear down someone's ideas or the person himself in a public display. Some have said he took credit for others' ideas and his confidence led to a sort of over-the-top arrogance."

• 22:31Jocko Willink?

  So, the guy's kind of tyrannical. One time when they were putting together the Mobile Me application and it wasn't working well, and Jobs told the team that was putting it together, "You've, when it wasn't working, you've tarnished Apple's reputation. You should hate each other for having let each other down."

• 22:51Jocko Willink?

  So, okay, so first of all, let's look at the fact, and you've heard me say this before, that people's strengths are their weaknesses and their weaknesses can be their strengths. So, in Steve Jobs' case, obviously, some of this stuff, some of his weaknesses that we're talking about here were also strengths because he was totally beyond driven, right? He was completely obsessed with, with doing good and all that. And, and he pressed toward his vision extremely hard. He was relentless in trying to make things happen. And again, those are very positive characteristics. If you've got someone that's really driven and they're driven to the point of almost being obsessed, and you, you take that and those are kind of good characteristics. But when they go too far, this is why it's dichotomy,

• 23:36Jocko Willink?

  this is the balance of leadership, right? When, when you go too far, you become a tyrannical leader, which is not good. It's not good for a team and it's, and it's, and a team that is subjected to that kind of attitude will not perform as well as a unified team, period. Period.

• 23:53Jocko Willink?

  So, the guy was clearly hostile. And at the same time, clear, clearly, he was one of the most successful business leaders in history, right? So, would you look at him and say, "Okay, well, maybe I should be that way. Maybe I should be a tyrannical leader?" And I would say to that, "No. You do not get to do that. And here's why. Let's look at some other characteristics that Steve Jobs had."

• 24:22Jocko Willink?

  First of all, he was perhaps the foremost technological visionary in the history of the world. Right? I mean, he had a vision of technology that very few people in the history in the world have had. And I will go a little bit more narrow. I think he understood things on another level when it came to technology. That the part of how human beings would interact with technology. That's the part that I think he really had just incredible vision for. He realized like, oh, these people will want a computer in their house and they'll want it to reflect the way they live and they're gonna want music in their pocket. They're gonna want all of their music in their pocket and they're gonna want

• 25:05Jocko Willink?

  a phone that can do, you know, he had this vision of how people would interact with technology that I don't think too many people had. So, so that's number one. Number two, he had a phenomenal feel for design. Right? For design and how to merge form and function together in in an aesthetically pleasing and oftentimes stunning way. Right? If you look at the design and that's uncommon, especially for someone to have that feel for design and still have a massively technical background, right? So, so that again, we're, we're, we're making a person that's like 1% of 1% of 1% already. On top of that,

• 25:50Jocko Willink?

  he got into business, his business at the right time, in the right place. He had the right background. On top of that, the guy could speak well. The guy was very articulate. Right? He was very articulate with his vision. If you, if you watch his keynote speeches that he would give at the whatever it is when they have the Apple convention. What's that thing called? The Apple convinced. Yeah, they have that thing. Well, he'd get up on stage and he'd talk about stuff and he would articulate that and he would do it with real clarity and he was very convincing and he was very captivating. And people were, you know, they'd say Apple's a cult. Yeah, yeah.

• 26:29Jocko Willink?

  They'd follow that guy. So he had all those skills, those world-class skills, and I'm not using that term lightly. I'm talking world-class skills. And then there are all those world-class skills are combined together into one package, one human being. And there you got, you got Steve Jobs. So he's got all those advantages and then on top of that, he's had some luck along the way, right? He had some luck in his timing and his upbringing and the exposures that he got. And being exposed to computer programming and those things back in the day was rare and he got lucky in having that unfold for him.

• 27:08Jocko Willink?

  So he had all these things going for him that helped propel him and his company to the top. So now if you're thinking, maybe you should use his leadership style. The, the, the questions that you should ask yourself is, are you a one in a billion technological visionary or visionary of any kind? The answer to that is likely no. And if you think it's yes, maybe you should check your ego a little bit. Then you have to ask yourself, do you have an eye for design? An artistic eye for design like, like Da Vinci or Michelangelo?

• 27:50Jocko Willink?

  If you have that, you, you, you probably don't. If you think you have that, maybe you should check your ego again. Are you a gifted speaker and storyteller and can you convey your vision with total clarity to big, giant groups, broad groups of people?

• 28:08Jocko Willink?

  And if you think you can do that, again, you should check your ego. Can you count on luck? Or do you want to count on luck? To to close the gaps in some of those other areas? So. If you could do all those things, if you answered yes, 100% to all those questions, then okay, maybe you can get away. With being a kind of leader that Steve Jobs was. But if you're a normal person, if you're a normal human being. Then maybe you should try and be a good leader. And maybe you should be a leader that builds relationships and forms cohesive teams and coalitions that help you drive your mission forward despite the ups and downs of whatever. Business you're in.

• 28:53Jocko Willink?

  So.

• 28:56Jocko Willink?

  That's it. Steve Jobs had a lot of other things that made him successful.

• 29:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:03Jocko Willink?

  And leadership. And and he I'm gonna eventually read the book, but. He clearly had some people around him that. That. Utilized. That skill, the skills that he did had and have and moved, helped move him forward, right? Other people at the company, other people early in in Apple. Saw that, hey, you know what? This guy, he might be a little bit hard to deal with, but he's got some things that we won't find anywhere else. So let's prop them up and let's move forward.

• 29:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:32Jocko Willink?

  And that's, that's the way it works.

• 29:34Speaker 01

  Yeah. I think they call that survivorship bias where like. You see.

• 29:40Jocko Willink?

  Oh, you see a successful guy and you.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, he did it that way, so let's do it that way. Um, but yeah, you you kind of don't see all the other factors or whatever. Almost like you, if you really think about it, if Steve Jobs were to be like in these tyrannical ways or whatever, if he were to be less like that, maybe there would be more success. You see what I'm saying? But he was so strong in these other areas that it kind of like mitigated the effects.

• 30:01Jocko Willink?

  You know, there's, there's businesses that are successful because they're a successful business model. And in the he have really bad leadership.

• 30:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, and even that can't mess it up kind of thing.

• 30:10Jocko Willink?

  Yep, even the bad leadership doesn't, it's the the the model is so good.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:15Jocko Willink?

  Which is a little bit contrary, because you know, I always say leadership is the most important thing on the battlefield, but in the business world, if you have a phenomenal idea. Then you can you can be successful on that idea alone. Now, that is that is a unicorn. That is one of those rare things where you have something that's that incredibly different and stands out from the crowd so much that it's going to be successful no matter what. You know, when the when the early gyms, MMA type gyms, if you had one, you were successful. Didn't matter what kind of leader you were because you had you had it. And and now there's competition. And if you're not, if you don't have good leadership and you're not putting forth a good product amongst all the competitors, you're gonna have problems.

• 30:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:56Jocko Willink?

  You're gonna have problems with it.

• 30:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, and the more I kind of listen to you and Leif, the more I realize that even then the like, it's almost like you have to have a minimum level of leadership. Like, you don't be have to be perfect if you have the one of these situations where the product of the business model is so good. But still, even your leadership can mess that up.

• 31:16Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah, you can absolutely destroy it.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, like you're in a situation where like now no one wants to work for you. Now what? Oh, yeah, good, nice MMA gym. You don't have any, you gotta work there.

• 31:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 31:26Speaker 01

  You know, the whole time and you can't, you know, so it's gonna kind of fall apart after a while. So maybe like in the beginning it'd be good, but it'll fall apart because of your lack of leadership or something.

• 31:35Jocko Willink?

  And you you can see that. I mean, who's the guy that just got removed from Uber? I'd have to go into, I'd have to really drill down on it, but the CEO of Uber got removed.

• 31:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:47Jocko Willink?

  And you know, the business model's awesome.

• 31:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:52Jocko Willink?

  And they still remove the CEO. Why? Because there's there's issues there.

• 31:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 31:58Jocko Willink?

  And so, well, it's a great business model, but we still need good leadership.

• 32:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:03Jocko Willink?

  So, yeah, like you like I'm I'm basically confirming what you just said. The good business model will get you to a certain level, but then to get to the next level, you're gonna need leadership. And that's why leadership is the most important thing on the battlefield.

• 32:17Speaker 01

  So what the moral don't necessarily be tyrannical.

• 32:23Jocko Willink?

  No, in fact, don't be tyrannical. Don't be. And I'm not saying that there's not times where you have to have a little tyrannical flair. Cause there there may be times where you need to where you need to flare up a little bit.

• 32:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:37Jocko Willink?

  But it should be rare.

• 32:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:39Jocko Willink?

  It should be rare. The problem is it becomes a crutch for people and then they just continue to do it more and more and more and more and then. It doesn't work.

• 32:46Speaker 01

  It's like it's kind of like drugs to the like when you like when you flare up on someone. And and you win or whatever, you know, you kind of like it.

• 32:54Jocko Willink?

  It worked.

• 32:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, it worked and you kind of like it feels good, feels powerful. So I think some people. That's how you know, so they'll do it and it'll work and they'll be like, yeah, I will need that little.

• 33:04Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And what's even worse is like when you when that's where you you learn from someone. That's what you saw and then you do it and you go, oh, it worked for me too. And all I have to be is. Treat people bad and be a jerk and yell and. The my subordinates will do what I tell them to do and they will. Right? A subordinate will, if you bark at them and scream at them, they're gonna do what you say at the moment. The problem is what kind of team have you built? That's the problem.

• 33:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:29Jocko Willink?

  What is that subordinate gonna do when you're not there? They're gonna do everything they can to to cut corners and and really they don't care about, they don't care about you. They don't want to do a good job for you. And so when you're not there, they're not gonna do a good job for you.

• 33:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:41Jocko Willink?

  So you get addicted to yelling and screaming, but. It it doesn't work in in the broad sense of what you're trying to make happen.

• 33:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, slowly falling apart. Next question. I'm 26 years old. I'm currently an undercover detective. I've recently been told that I'm being promoted to sergeant. Over our department's Investigations Division. I've been the youngest person to hold that position in our department's history. All the guys I'll be in charge in of are much older, some in their late 40s. How do I, as a younger leader, lead them? How do you demand and earn respect from an older group? I'm ready for the job and know what the job entails, but I'm nervous to lead a group of nine people that are all older than me.

• 34:26Jocko Willink?

  So I'm, I've answered this question over and over again, and I'm gonna do a quick job of it here just because people may not have gone back and listened to all, all the other podcasts, but yeah, I've listened, the answer's always the same. And it's always the same, whether you're a young person leading old persons, whether you're an old person leading young per people, whether you're a woman leading men, a men leading, man leading women, whether you're coming in from a different department into a new department that you don't know anybody, whether you're going into a thing that you don't have experience, it's like all the same. Basically what it is, you're going into a leadership position.

• 35:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:03Jocko Willink?

  That's what it is. Be humble, listen, take advice, build relationships, keep your ego in check. Also, the, one of the reasons I pulled, did pull this question, I was like, how do you demand respect? Well, the answer is you don't demand respect. And if you don't, if you do demand respect, you'll get anything but respect from people.

• 35:21Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 35:23Jocko Willink?

  So, so get that out of your head. You earn respect and how do you earn respect? You respect them. In this case, you respect their experience, you respect their knowledge, you respect it. They've been doing it for a long time. You have respect for it. And when you show respect for them, they're gonna respect you back. Now, none of this means be passive. Right? This doesn't mean cower down. No, you, you still have to lead, you still have to step up. But it does mean be humble, be open minded, be proactive, listen, ask questions, ask for opinions, decentralize all aspects of operations, including the planning, which we already talked about.

• 36:07Jocko Willink?

  And then with all those things, set a high standard. And then the final. And most important, well. I don't know, it's equally important, I'd say.

• 36:18Jocko Willink?

  Work harder than everyone else and expect nothing in return. That's it. That's it. You're the boss. You better be, you better be at work before everyone and you better be. Leaving work after everyone. And that's how you develop a reputation of being a hard worker and being a hard worker. In its own right, garners respect from most people. There's, there's a fraction of losers. That are like, oh, Echo, he works so much, it's, it's so lame. Like, no.

• 36:49Speaker 01

  Why? Cause I'm making him look bad or something like that?

• 36:51Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. Oh, he's, he's just, he's, yeah. Like, there's a small fraction of people that, that might think that way. But, but, no, you work harder. You, you put in the time, you put in the effort, you study. You read what you're supposed to read, you get the professional knowledge that you're supposed to get. You don't impose that on people.

• 37:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 37:10Jocko Willink?

  But you have it. Cause your, your book knowledge, when you start off in this situation, your book knowledge isn't as strong as the experience guys. In this case, you know, in the, in the law enforcement, the guys that have been in the streets. They know stuff that you don't know.

• 37:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:23Jocko Willink?

  So, you. Study what you can, but you keep an open mind so you can listen to. What their experience says.

• 37:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Like, don't impose on them. Wait, when you say, don't impose it on them, does that mean, don't impose them, like, make them?

• 37:39Jocko Willink?

  It's like this, Echo, uh, section four two. Alpha of the document says that we're supposed to use this methodology when we do this. You should know that methodology, you should understand why that methodology is important. But if you say, hey, Jocko, we don't do it that way, and here's why, I shouldn't be like, well, I'm telling you, it's by the book.

• 37:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:57Jocko Willink?

  It's by the book. Now, if it's by the book because it's, there's an ethical reason, okay, well, that makes sense. But if it's by the book because. That's what the book says. By the book.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or you know the guy who's like, who works extra hard, but he kinda, in a way, throws it in everyone's face, how hard he works, you know, don't be that guy.

• 38:15Jocko Willink?

  That's, that's an important thing. It's a very important piece. Don't, you don't step on people's toes with this stuff.

• 38:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:20Jocko Willink?

  That's wrong. Don't do that.

• 38:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's junk.

• 38:25Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 38:27Speaker 01

  Xwesh, Jaco, I'm extremely driven and have high expectations for myself and my team. It appears that now I may have pushed them too hard.

• 38:39Speaker 01

  And they're developing negative attitudes. I feel like you're going to say, play the game and develop relationships with them. But should I really just ignore who I am?

• 38:53Speaker 01

  Should I try to be someone different than myself?

• 38:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, you called it question person, whoever asked this question. You called it. I, that's exactly what I'm gonna say. I'm gonna say you need to play the game. Look at what your current path has done. Look at what you, the real you, look what it's done. The real you has created a negative attitude with all your team. That's the real you. So, is that what you want to perpetuate? Creating negative attitudes against your, with your team? And by the way, they're just getting started. And if you think negative, if you think you're gonna keep acting the same way and the negative attitudes are gonna somehow miraculously turn positive, that's not happening. They're gonna get more negative.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:37Jocko Willink?

  So... When people have negative attitudes, I saw somebody quoted this the other day on, on social medias, on Twitter. Someone, you know... The quote was like, "No, no, no, it's not my fault when I, my subordinates have a bad attitude," or something like that. And about, a bunch of people responded, "You should read the book Extreme Ownership." Because it absolutely is your fault. It is your fault. If your team has a bad attitude, it's your fault. You're the leader. You own the attitude. If their attitude is bad, then it's, then it's actually your fault. Now, this is not to say that you can't have a bad apple on the team. That's completely possible. And who's responsible for getting rid of the bad apples? You are. You're the boss. Because the fact of the matter is, you might have a bad apple on your team.

• 40:21Jocko Willink?

  You might even have two bad apples on your team. You don't have 14 bad apples on the team. When you have 14 battles of apples on the team, guess who the problem is? It's you.

• 40:32Jocko Willink?

  So here's what you do, little, little tactical advice. Try and get some perspective from them. Try and understand where they're coming from, what challenges they face, what's pulling them off track. And when you do this, you kind of take ownership of it in your approach. So you say, hey, guys, I, I realize I don't think I'm really seeing things from your point of view. And I need to, because I'm here to support you. And without you performing well, then we fail. So I think I need to do a better job of supporting you and I can only do that if I know what your issues are. So I can do my best to get them fixed. So what can I do better to help you? Right? So now they're going to start telling you all here's, well, here's, there's this problem and there's that problem.

• 41:17Jocko Willink?

  And then what you do is you listen to their problems. You actually listen to their problems. You don't say, hey, quit complaining. No, you actually listen to their problems and then you actually see what you can do to mitigate their issues. And as you do that, guess what's happening? You're actually forming a bond. You're actually forming into a team because you're working together to solve issues. Again, I, it, it sounds really simple, right? But clearly here's someone asking this question. Now again, like if you have some members of the team that are, that are actual negative complaining whiners, then you might have to get rid of them.

• 42:01Jocko Willink?

  And, and that's part of being a leader is knowing when you have to get rid of someone.

• 42:08Jocko Willink?

  You, you know, I, sometimes people, they, they take the extreme ownership attitude and they say, you know what? I'm the leader. I own everything. I'm extreme ownership. And if someone's not performing well, then that's my fault.

• 42:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:22Jocko Willink?

  That's my fault. I need to coach them more. I need to, I need to do, it's my fault that my team member is not doing well. And that's correct. It is your fault. It's your responsibility to train them, coach them, mentor them and do whatever else you can do to fix them. But at the end of the day, if they still are not competent at their task and you've done everything that you can, it's, you're responsible to get rid of them. That is also a part of ownership. So. Yeah, like I'll have someone complaining that they've got all this, you know, one of my team leaders. Like they're talking about their subordinate team leaders, the one of my this, this guy's, he's just a bad leader. Oh, why is he still here? They, oh, your team, that team isn't doing well because they have a bad leader. Whose fault is that?

• 43:06Jocko Willink?

  Well, it's the leader's fault. No, it's your fault. You're in charge of the leader.

• 43:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:10Jocko Willink?

  It's ridiculous. So. Back to the original question. You're. Uh, whatever you called it, you're who you actually are is not working well. He probably is thinking he's a Steve Jobs type, hey, what you call me, we gotta do this. But it's not working. And he's not in a unicorn business model that's still making a ton of money regardless. So what does he have to do? Play the game, build the relationships. See the perspective of your team so that you can actually. Form a team.

• 43:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:47Jocko Willink?

  Be a better leader. That's basically what I'm saying.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. So they, and it's interesting. The, you know, you know what they call framing, you know, you frame something, something in a certain way to make it kind of sound a certain way, whatever. So he said extremely driven and have high expectations for myself and my team. It appears. That now I may have pushed them too hard and they're developing negative attitudes. So. Having extreme, being extremely driven and having high expectations doesn't equal.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  Driving them too hard so they develop that negative attitude. Those are two different things, you know, you can still be extreme. So.

• 44:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you can absolutely have extremely high expectations. You can be driving extremely hard and you can still have a. Incredibly positive attitude with your team.

• 44:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:35Jocko Willink?

  No doubt.

• 44:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. Good point. So, and then it gets equated into that's just who I am. So he just kind of put it all into one ball and without one. There's no other kind of situation. It's just not how it is. So. Apparently you might be committed, he might be committed to being all of these things and that's who I am and that's kind of it, you know, kind of thing. And. I think that's like the mistake plenty of people make. We say this a lot where people will be like, hey, I'm just straightforward, you know, take me, take it or leave it kind of thing and be like, okay, but you're gonna. In your case, lose, you know, in your, in your situation.

• 45:10Jocko Willink?

  That's the big piece. Is that in their case, they're gonna lose?

• 45:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:15Jocko Willink?

  So, let me ask you this question. If you're so driven, and you have such high expectations, that you wanna win so bad, but the way you're performing as a human being and as a leader, is gonna make you lose, then what are you supposed to do? You change the way you behave. You become a better leader.

• 45:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:38Jocko Willink?

  That's what you do.

• 45:39Speaker 01

  Yes, sir. So you take, and this is total speculation on my part, but you keep, okay, so this equation that we're presented with, being extremely driven, keep that. High expectations, keep that. Pushing your team hard, keep that. I would say too hard, and that's gonna be a judgment call from day to day, for sure. Um, but there's a part in here that's more implied, that you're being an asshole. Somewhere in here, you're being an asshole. How about you take out that part? Take out the being the asshole part, and then keep everything else. See how that goes?

• 46:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 46:10Speaker 01

  Cause you kinda know when you're being a dick. You know what I'm saying? Unless you're like not being honest with yourself.

• 46:15Jocko Willink?

  There, there's some people that don't. There's some people that don't get it.

• 46:20Jocko Willink?

  There's some people that don't get it.

• 46:21Speaker 01

  Oh, right, cause it's like, you know how like when you don't, like some people, they just can't step outside of themselves and be like, hey, if you said that to me, I wouldn't care, kinda thing, and be like, bro, you know, you're not me and I'm not, yeah, you're right.

• 46:35Jocko Willink?

  They can't detach. There's absolutely people that, that don't know. They're socially

• 46:43Jocko Willink?

  incapable of receiving, you know, clues, social clues.

• 46:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:48Jocko Willink?

  Social cues from people.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:50Jocko Willink?

  You know, they don't see the look in their face when they're talking to them.

• 46:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's true. I mean, I'm thinking of like three examples right now.

• 46:57Jocko Willink?

  There's all kinds of examples.

• 46:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, also, then that would go back to what you're saying, how you say get input from them. You know what I'm saying? So you gotta kinda, yeah, so, yeah, you can do it, man. It's a solvable problem.

• 47:07Jocko Willink?

  Oh, this is a very solvable problem. And I've seen people solve this problem. I've, I've helped people solve this exact problem. And the weird thing is, they think. And it's part ego, but it's also part, they're just their own person. They think they're doing a great thing. Like, they think that they're driving everything that they're doing in their mind, they're just awesome. For being, for pushing so hard. It's just the way I am and all that stuff. And they think it's awesome. But again, if you wanna win so bad, then you have to play the game. You won't win by abusing people. You won't win with a team anyways. You won't. It won't happen.

• 47:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:55Speaker 01

  It's no use being the best dancer if you're not invited on the dance floor.

• 48:00Jocko Willink?

  I'll leave that one with you.

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No worries. Cool. Next question. Actually, that problem is so solvable that you could, this is possible, where you could just show just that much, um, like more, I don't know, caring or respect, just that much and do it for like two weeks. Just the idea that, just the fact that you're doing it now. People will be like, hey, wait, he's showing a little bit more.

• 48:23Jocko Willink?

  Here's the thing, here's the thing. If a person has an ego, which this person could very well have a big ego, because that's why they have these high expectations and that's why they're so driven, because they just, they, if they have that kind of ego, that's the person that you can't help. Because they just look at the team and say, those guys should be harder workers.

• 48:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 48:43Jocko Willink?

  Those guys aren't working as hard as me. They're not as focused as I am. They don't care as much as I do. So, so everyone else on the team has a problem.

• 48:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:54Jocko Willink?

  But, but I'm perfect. And you can't, you know, look at how driven I am, look at how focused I am, look at how high my expectations are of myself. But if, if you can, here's another thing. If your team cannot relate to your expectations, like they don't even, they don't even see them as realistic or achievable or anything, what good, what good are your expectations?

• 49:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:15Jocko Willink?

  What good are they? They're not any good. They don't make any sense.

• 49:20Speaker 01

  Next question. Dear Jaco, I've been watching some of your YouTube links with great interest.

• 49:28Jocko Willink?

  Must be a subscriber to the YouTube channel.

• 49:30Speaker 01

  Yep. Watching those videos. I'm sure you're extremely busy, but I have a question. Which if you have time, I would greatly appreciate your reply. I have taken jiu-jitsu.

• 49:42Jocko Willink?

  Very polite opening, by the way.

• 49:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, very much so. Okay. Let me incorporate that approach. I've been, I've taken up BJJ Jiu-Jitsu recently in London.

• 49:55Speaker 01

  In the UK. So, uh, so a beginner. I know you're a great advocate of the system, but my basic question is your opinion. Does it truly relate to real life fight situations? I'm a man now approaching my mid 40s in pretty good shape. And I'm looking to focus on a martial art that would help me if I ever need to defend myself or my family. I love the discipline and humility of BJJ and as a workout. I know, and I know the philosophy of BJJ is that most fights end up on the ground and it's here that BJJ excels. But what of the other guys or what of the other guys who might be standing around, ready to battle, bottle you or kick you in the head once you're grappling on the ground, etc.

• 50:41Jocko Willink?

  Again, this is a question that first of all, we, I've answered this a lot of times.

• 50:47Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 50:47Jocko Willink?

  But I'll answer it one more time.

• 50:48Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 50:52Jocko Willink?

  Jiu-Jitsu is the best place to start. You should also learn boxing, wrestling, kickboxing. This is all in Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. So if you get that book, this will be laid out for you very well. Does, so, so yes, that's what you should start studying with. This guy, mid 40s, needs, wants to learn something, yes, start with Jiu-Jitsu. Does it relate to real life, real life situations? Yes, it does. It absolutely does. I've been in them. It's extremely effective. And you can see that over and over again, speaking of YouTube. You can see how effective Jiu-Jitsu is in real fights. Now.

• 51:32Jocko Willink?

  It's important to remember that for self-defense, the grappling arts in general should be used primarily to get away. To avoid going to the ground. Right? Like when you bring up, oh, well, what if there's other people that might be there? You, you should, why are you on the ground? Jiu-jitsu will give you the best opportunity to get up off the ground. That's what it gives you. And then you can get away from the people that are getting ready to sma- stick you with a bottle, smashed bottle, or getting ready to kick you in the head. If you don't know jiu-jitsu, guess what you're doing? You're on the ground and you're getting kicked in the head and you're getting stabbed with a bottle. That's why you train jiu-jitsu. So you can get up off the ground, not so you can take someone to the ground. Because by the way, and I've said this before,

• 52:15Jocko Willink?

  if your goal is to punch me and you're standing at a punching distance or a striking distance from me, I can just run away. That's my self-defense. I can get away from you.

• 52:25Jocko Willink?

  So that's why we train jiu-jitsu.

• 52:30Jocko Willink?

  That, that's the primary, that's why you should start with it. Because otherwise, I'm just gonna get away from you. If you're not gra- if once you grab me though, I can't get away from you anymore. Now I have to be able to, to handle myself. That's why I know jiu-jitsu. So I can handle myself. Once you've grabbed me, if you're not grabbing me, I can just get away from you. I can just run away from you.

• 52:50Jocko Willink?

  If you don't want to run away because it's gonna hurt your pride, well then guess what? That's, that's why you train all the time. I mean, now, now we go back and forth and we can talk about all the negative things that will happen if you get into a street fight, like the fact that you can get hurt, you can get stabbed, you can get shot, you can get sued, you can get arrested, you can ruin your life, you can do, all these horrible things can happen if you get in a street fight. So, so, so that's why my advice to you is to avoid street fights. That's what you do. And by the way, that's why you work on your awareness. That's why you make your, your, your, your wife and your children aware of what's going on around them, to pay attention to what's happening in the street. It's one thing that was interesting when I was in Australia and I was in a nice part of Australia. There's, and I was talking to some people about it, you know, there's just a very relaxed atmosphere.

• 53:36Jocko Willink?

  Where I was, I was standing in a very nice part of Australia. There's a very relaxed atmosphere. When you're in America, there's a heightened atmosphere. There's a heightened awareness you have to have. And depending on where you are, and it's the same thing, I'm sure in Australia, I only went to the nice part. I'm sure you could go to some, some tough areas where you better be more aware of what's happening. But teach your kids, because some kids don't know the difference. Maybe you don't even know the difference of what to look out for, what kind of people you need to watch out for in the street.

• 54:10Jocko Willink?

  So work on that, and then, yes, train. And you're in UK, and of course, I've said this before. If you're truly in a situation where you feel threatened on a regular basis, well, then what you need is a firearm. Because if someone's gonna attack you with a knife, or with a bottle, or themselves having a gun, the only, jiu-jitsu isn't gonna help you. Boxing is gonna help you. A screma's not gonna help you if someone has a gun. So, yeah. And, and by the way, oh yeah, if you're in a knife fight and you know some screma, that will help you. But what if the other guy's better than you? What, what if there's two of them?

• 54:51Jocko Willink?

  The minute you put two people against one, the odds of winning are just extremely low. Extremely low. Does it happen? Yes, it happens. Can you knock someone out? Yes, you can. That's why you train boxing.

• 55:05Jocko Willink?

  So, yes, again, train some jiu-jitsu. Start there and go, and keep going and don't stop.

• 55:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, it seems like this question always comes from a place where they just assume all these things. And those things are, I'm gonna choose to get in a fight with someone, bring it to the ground, in the middle of the street or in the club. I don't know, wherever, wherever there's potential other attackers with bottles and kicks to the head. And so all these things are just assumed, kinda like, yeah, you take jujitsu, now you can go to the club and get in fights and win all the time. It's kinda like, that's kinda where the question's coming from. Where, you said, yeah, it allows you to get up, and so basically, it allows you to control your situation, your fight scenario.

• 55:46Jocko Willink?

  More.

• 55:47Speaker 01

  Yes. And I would even say, it allows you a lot more to control it. Cause even if, even if you do take it, let's say you take it to the ground.

• 55:57Jocko Willink?

  I meant more by a little bit.

• 55:59Speaker 01

  More than nothing.

• 56:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 56:01Speaker 01

  No, yeah, I'm saying a lot more, cause really, when you think of it, and I try to, granted, yeah, even like, at a beginner level. So let's say, okay, if you choose to engage with someone in some kinda fight, right? It's up to you how heavy you wanna take that fight. You wanna go to ten, you go to ten. You wanna go to just one, you can go to one. So if you wind up on the ground, which is the worst place to be if you don't know anything, on the ground.

• 56:29Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 56:29Speaker 01

  And that's aside from how you said, if the guy has a gun and shoots you, that's, you're talking about, that's not even a fight scenario, that's, you know. So you wind up on the ground.

• 56:36Jocko Willink?

  It's a gunfight.

• 56:37Speaker 01

  It's a gunfight, yeah.

• 56:41Speaker 01

  If you know boxing, you're gonna have almost no control over that scenario.

• 56:47Jocko Willink?

  Oh, it's on the ground, oh, yeah, yeah. Your boxing is, your boxing is not worthless.

• 56:53Speaker 01

  Marginalized, we'll say.

• 56:55Jocko Willink?

  But it's heavily marginalized.

• 56:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:57Jocko Willink?

  Heavily marginalized.

• 56:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, same thing with, you know, kickboxing and whatever, so. There's that. If you know jujitsu, just a little bit of jujitsu, if you're on the ground, you have control of the fight more, depending on your level, whatever. So, if you, if you're at that point, still facing a threat of someone with a bottle, or kicks to the head or whatever, while you're on the ground, compare it, if you know jujitsu, versus if you don't know jujitsu, you're still saving way more control.

• 57:23Jocko Willink?

  Way more.

• 57:24Speaker 01

  So, meanwhile, like the boxing situation, or karate situation, whenever, it's gonna, gonna be less effective in, in controlling your situation. Now, if you don't look at it like that, like, if you look at it like, okay, this guy's squaring up to me, now I wanna mess him up as, as quickly as I can, then, okay, you know, like, you can do boxing and just take it to ten, but you don't have the option of taking it from one, two, three, or nothing like that.

• 57:49Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, but the other thing is, like.

• 57:53Jocko Willink?

  It's hard to knock someone out.

• 57:55Speaker 01

  That's the second part.

• 57:57Jocko Willink?

  It's hard to knock someone out. Does it happen? Yeah, it does happen and it can happen to you too. It can happen to you too. It's but it's hard to knock someone out and it's it's risky as soon as you start saying, okay, you and I are gonna just trade punches. There's a risk for for both of us. There's a risk for me. The assurance of me being able to handle the situation the way I want it to go by closing the distance with you, getting control, getting a hold of you. If I'm trained and you're not, you're you're you're done. You're done. That's the way it works.

• 58:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, and then even then, that's like if you choose for this guy to be done. So if you're if your sole purpose is to keep yourself safe.

• 58:38Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you could just put the guy to sleep and walk away.

• 58:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:40Jocko Willink?

  Or gently lay him down.

• 58:41Speaker 01

  Or just be like, Mount, I'm not even hurt. I'm not gonna put him to sleep, nothing. Mount, you see a guy, you can see the guy coming with a bottle or whatever, way more if you know jujitsu.

• 58:50Jocko Willink?

  So well, there's the whole thing of when you're just used to the physical contact.

• 58:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:55Jocko Willink?

  The the the bodies clashing and grappling.

• 59:01Speaker 01

  Less shocking.

• 59:02Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 59:04Jocko Willink?

  So, yeah, train jujitsu. Then train boxing, wrestling, kickboxing. And of course, now people will be like, what about judo? Yes, train judo. What about sambo? Yes, train sambo.

• 59:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:13Jocko Willink?

  What else? What else do I need to do? What about Krav Maga? Sure, train it.

• 59:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, train everything.

• 59:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:19Jocko Willink?

  I'm down. Start with jujitsu.

• 59:21Speaker 01

  What you said on a real general level is the most critical thing is like when someone gets a hold of you like and you put this into perspective a while ago when you were like, yeah, if someone wants to fight you, walk away or run away. He's like, but then you said all these scenarios, you run away, you go away. You want to keep yourself safe? You you don't be there.

• 59:38Jocko Willink?

  The best thing to do to avoid the the getting punched, falling on the curb, dying, getting stabbed, getting kicked, getting stabbed with a bottle, getting arrested, getting lawsuit, getting all those things happening. The best thing to do, run away, walk away.

• 59:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, leave fully. And then you said, but what happens when you can't run away?

• 59:56Jocko Willink?

  Cause the guy grabs you.

• 59:58Speaker 01

  There it is.

• 59:58Jocko Willink?

  There you have it.

• 59:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, so yeah, so it seems like, yeah, I'm gonna train boxing so I can do self defense. Oh, no, you want to fight somebody. That's what you want to do. You want to punch people in the face.

• 1:00:07Jocko Willink?

  Well boxing.

• 1:00:08Speaker 01

  Jiu Jitsu, I mean.

• 1:00:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I mean, but boxing is a is a skill that everybody should have. Not everyone, good people should have because there's two critical things on that that you learn from boxing is how to punch people and how to avoid getting punched.

• 1:00:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:23Jocko Willink?

  And how to keep your guard up, right?

• 1:00:24Speaker 01

  Fully.

• 1:00:25Jocko Willink?

  Those are important. Those are really important skills to have.

• 1:00:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, fully. But what what I mean is if you're starting from nothing and you're like, okay, I'm gonna um, you know, I'm gonna choose to address my self-defense.

• 1:00:36Jocko Willink?

  You have, you have a fantasy that you saw a guy on YouTube that was clearly a boxer knock up, knock out two people in a street fight and you're like, that's what I'm gonna do.

• 1:00:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:00:47Jocko Willink?

  And what you actually watched was a guy that was a Golden Gloves boxer.

• 1:00:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:51Jocko Willink?

  Who is sober, knock out two drunk idiots.

• 1:00:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:56Jocko Willink?

  And guess what? A Golden Gloves boxer will do that. Have you ever sparred with a Golden Gloves boxer? They're freaking good. They're freaking good.

• 1:01:03Speaker 01

  No kidding.

• 1:01:03Jocko Willink?

  They're they're they're they're uh, you know, like a black belt in boxing.

• 1:01:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:09Jocko Willink?

  And they will knock out two drunk guys all day long.

• 1:01:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, it's weird too, cuz he kinda.

• 1:01:16Jocko Willink?

  But if one of those, if a third drunk guy or even that first drunk guy grabs a hold of the boxer.

• 1:01:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:22Jocko Willink?

  And just and gets him to the ground, the boxer's gonna be in trouble.

• 1:01:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:26Jocko Willink?

  That's the way it is. We and this isn't like my thoughts. This is facts.

• 1:01:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:30Jocko Willink?

  This is like, I guys, I talked about this in discipline, in the field manual. It's like, look, there's no conjecture. It's not like I wonder what would happen. No. We know what happens. We know what happens when two people fight. And and you can watch all the different various types of styles going at it and you can watch what happens.

• 1:01:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:52Jocko Willink?

  And sure, you can find the rare video where, hey, this boxer knocks out a couple drunk people or or or even, hey, the boxer knocks out the Jiu Jitsu guy. Does that happen? Yes, it can absolutely happen. That's why you train boxing too.

• 1:02:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. Next question. I've not been working out regularly regularly for several years now. Obviously, I'm fat and lazy, but I wanna get after it. So the question is, should I go all in level nine destruction maximum madness? Or ease into it at level three cruising edition? Respect.

• 1:02:28Jocko Willink?

  Uh, all right. Well, this, there's a couple of different approaches now when I hear this. First of all, you don't want to get hurt, right? And you also don't want to make yourself try and do things that are so hard and so painful that you can't do it repeatedly. So if you just destroy yourself, Matt, what do you say? If you destroy yourself, level nine destruction, maximal madness, but then you can't work out for two more weeks? Well, guess what? What'd you do in the mean? No, let's say realistically, you got DOMS.

• 1:02:58Speaker 01

  DOMS, sure.

• 1:02:58Jocko Willink?

  Right? Delayed onset muscle soreness. Let's say you did so many burpees that your legs, you couldn't sit down without your legs being in pain. So now, so you take, so you take three days, four days. Have you ever had DOMS so bad that you took four days off?

• 1:03:16Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:03:17Jocko Willink?

  Okay, let's say you take three days off. What did you do during those three days? Did you hold the line? Did you stay on the path? Or were you eating Cheetos?

• 1:03:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:03:27Jocko Willink?

  And drinking Coca-Cola? That's what you were doing. So if you destroy yourself to where you can't stay on the path, that's not good. You want to stay on the path.

• 1:03:37Jocko Willink?

  I think doing something that you can handle, or maybe something just beyond what you can handle, every single day is more important. So going at a level, not, not cruising level, not level three, but let's, let's find a solid level five where you can, you're pushing yourself. I write a thousand words a day when I'm writing. And do the equivalent of that, right? The reason I write, because if I said, okay, tonight I just, today I just have to write 5,000 words, that's five hours. Yeah. Well, do I have five hours today? No, I don't. I can squeeze out 52 minutes, though, and get a thousand words written. That I can do. So that's, that's what I think you need to do. You need to get consistent.

• 1:04:19Jocko Willink?

  If you bite off more than you chew, than you can chew, you, you, you might very well choke on it. So, so don't, so don't do that. So pick something realistic. Do, do people say that?

• 1:04:31Speaker 01

  That's the first time I heard it, so I'm impressed.

• 1:04:34Jocko Willink?

  If you bite off more than you can chew, you might choke on it.

• 1:04:36Speaker 01

  Did you make that up or you get that from somewhere?

• 1:04:38Jocko Willink?

  I think I, well, I just, I don't know. I think I made it up.

• 1:04:41Speaker 01

  It's good.

• 1:04:41Jocko Willink?

  But I'm sure someone will be like, no, this guy said it in 1978.

• 1:04:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, you heard it still.

• 1:04:48Jocko Willink?

  That's the beauty of it.

• 1:04:49Speaker 01

  Still good.

• 1:04:49Jocko Willink?

  So pick something realistic, like something that you can handle and then get after it. Then the other thing here is he doesn't talk about his diet at all. And that's clearly equally important and you have to change.

• 1:05:05Jocko Willink?

  Your diet if you're gonna change your life and you're gonna change your health. So stop eating sugar, stop eating processed foods, no more soda and juices and no more Gatorade.

• 1:05:15Jocko Willink?

  Just to start with, right? Or whatever it is, whatever it is that you're doing, uh, whoever asked this question. Whatever, you know what you're doing. If you're eating donuts. Wrong. Don't, don't eat donuts anymore. Stop. Just stop eating those. Get rid of that sugar sweetness craving thing.

• 1:05:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:34Jocko Willink?

  And then just keep making your diet cleaner and cleaner as time goes by.

• 1:05:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:38Jocko Willink?

  So. That's what I think. Is there any time that it's good? Cause sometimes.

• 1:05:47Jocko Willink?

  I think it's good when people do go like, all right, man, I'm done.

• 1:05:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:52Jocko Willink?

  Like I, whatever happened, they went up the staircase and they, they, they got all tired and they say, you know what? I'm done.

• 1:06:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:01Jocko Willink?

  It starts tomorrow, but I think in those cases, most of the time, who was it? Who was it that we were talking to?

• 1:06:08Jocko Willink?

  Talking to someone, someone that they, or I was talking to someone that their first thing they tried to do, they couldn't do at all. Like they tried to run three miles and they were like, you know what? Can't do it. Can't run three miles. It might've been that guy. There's a guy that's losing a bunch of weight on the interwebs. Oh yeah, that's what it is. I think he's down in Texas. But he's trying to lose a lot of weight and the first time he went, tried to go for a run, didn't happen. Didn't happen. So he had to just run less. He had to just walk, actually.

• 1:06:42Speaker 01

  Start slower.

• 1:06:43Jocko Willink?

  So yeah, you, you start. With what you can do. But there is a little bit of.

• 1:06:51Jocko Willink?

  There is, there is, I would try, I would say this, keep this one in the, in the back of your mind. There is the whole thing of like, you know what, I'm changing my life right now. You go home, you get the garbage can out, you bring it into the kitchen, you throw away the Twinkies, you throw away the Pop-Tarts, you throw away the, the, you pour the, the crappy soda down the drain and you get on the path and you just don't look back. That's a good thing to do too.

• 1:07:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:16Jocko Willink?

  But again, if that person's 300 pounds, they're not gonna be able to do. I mean, they're gonna push themselves. Yeah, they could push themselves too hard, I guess. So you just gotta be careful.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, so, and that is funny when, um, when I'm kinda looking at the question, I'm like, well, obviously you wanna start slow, right? Obviously, but then, I don't know, you hear about these guys, just like how you said, they're just, they throw everything away. They were like, I'm a different person right now.

• 1:07:42Jocko Willink?

  I think, I think we're, we're, we're crossing streams here, or I am. There's diet, and then there's like workout.

• 1:07:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:50Jocko Willink?

  Because diet, you can pretty much go cold turkey today.

• 1:07:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, it lets, and you may or may not be able to relate to this, but if you go straight extreme on your diet, like all of a sudden, you're hit with these, the byproducts of changing your diet, especially if you, if you'd like, like Mountain Dew every single day, right? And you just all of a sudden, boom, stop drinking Mountain, you'll go through stuff that you might not expect, like the craving will hit you so hard.

• 1:08:16Jocko Willink?

  Guy on freaking minimal doses of Mountain Dew, no.

• 1:08:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, basically, basically.

• 1:08:22Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna say no, just stop, stop drinking Mountain Dew, you don't need it.

• 1:08:25Speaker 01

  I, yeah, and I dig it.

• 1:08:26Jocko Willink?

  And you're gonna go through withdrawals, right? You're gonna go through caffeine withdrawals and sugar withdrawals, you're gonna get the, the, the keto flu and all those things are gonna happen and it's gonna be rough, but.

• 1:08:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, but don't just say it like that, it's gonna be rough, but that's all. Hey, bro, seriously, if you go into that and you experience these types of things, and it's gonna apply to everything, by the way. Any big change that you make where you, you have to deprive yourself of these bad things that you've become kinda addicted to or whatever. You're gonna go through all kinds of changes, and that goes for workout too, by the way. Cause like, just the soreness alone, oh dang, I wasn't expecting the soreness, or I'm like tired now because the workout like was. Kinda hard. It's like, oh shit, I wasn't expecting that. I was expecting to feel great after my workout, how everyone says or whatever. So you're gonna run into all these little things that no one tells you about. And then it's like, well, I didn't sign up for that little part of it. And then what about that little part? And then you're gonna.

• 1:09:13Jocko Willink?

  Again, I think the diet thing, I think you're wrong. I think the diet thing, I think if you're, I think it's very, I think it's easier, in fact, to just be like, I'm done. It's not like, okay, you know what? I'm only gonna eat a quarter bag of Cheetos a day from now on. I don't think that works. I think you gotta be like, no, no, no, no Cheetos, not no Cheetos in my house. But I do think that you could work out so hard that you're so sore that you, that you say, oh, man, I'm just too. Like, kinda like the jujitsu question earlier on, like, you could be, what if someone's so sore that they can't do their job, right? And they're just sore all day at work. Well, that's not cool. So I think for diet, you can, you can go cold turkey, or actually cold steak, or hot steak.

• 1:09:59Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:09:59Jocko Willink?

  And then I think for working out is the one you, you, you figure out what you can do and you push a little bit harder, but you don't go level nine maximum destruction madness.

• 1:10:11Speaker 01

  I think you're wrong respectfully.

• 1:10:13Jocko Willink?

  And which part do you think I'm wrong on?

• 1:10:14Speaker 01

  The diet. I think if you go extreme with your diet, I think that it'll work for some people, for sure. But depending on who you are, but I think you're more, if you go extreme with the diet, you don't like slowly phase out the bad things in your diet.

• 1:10:28Jocko Willink?

  You know what's interesting? Uh, I don't know if you remember, I read a letter a while back on the podcast about a guy that had read Way of the Warrior Kid and he like, fixed his life.

• 1:10:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, man.

• 1:10:39Jocko Willink?

  That guy did what you're saying. He just made little changes. He made little changes along the way. So maybe it's person, it's probably personality. In fact, let's just go ahead and say it's personality. Some people are gonna just have to get the damn Cheetos out of their house, all of them.

• 1:10:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:56Jocko Willink?

  And some people say, you know what? I'm only gonna have this one cup full of Cheetos every day.

• 1:11:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:02Jocko Willink?

  And even. And that's okay. But, but here's where you gotta be careful. You may lie to yourself.

• 1:11:08Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, big time.

• 1:11:09Jocko Willink?

  And you can lie to yourself. You can lie to yourself and be like, ah, you know, I don't really have that, that, that big of a deal today if I just have two cups of Cheetos instead. Nine cups of Cheetos later.

• 1:11:20Speaker 01

  But you still have them.

• 1:11:21Jocko Willink?

  In Cheeto dust.

• 1:11:22Speaker 01

  See, and respectfully, I don't like your Cheetos example.

• 1:11:26Jocko Willink?

  Why?

• 1:11:26Speaker 01

  Because you're like. I'm gonna allow myself to, okay, don't allow yourself Cheetos, that's not how small of a change you're gonna make. If you're not gonna eat Cheetos anymore, you're not gonna eat Cheetos anymore. I'm saying like if you go extreme on your diet, let's say you eat-

• 1:11:38Jocko Willink?

  But, but wouldn't you say, what you're saying is, hey, I'm gonna change my diet, okay? I used to eat, every day I'd eat a whole bag of Cheetos.

• 1:11:52Jocko Willink?

  And now I'm only gonna eat one cup of Cheetos from the bag a day. That's improvement.

• 1:11:57Speaker 01

  It is improvement.

• 1:11:58Jocko Willink?

  And it's a small improvement. And if I could do that, then why, why is that not okay?

• 1:12:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay, if you choose to do that, but I, okay, now we're going into the specifics of a certain person's, you know, thing. I, I would say this, this is more along the lines of what I'm thinking as far as specific examples. If you're gonna go, if I'm gonna eat one bag of Cheetos, obviously that's not all I'm eating, I'm eating other stuff.

• 1:12:19Speaker 01

  I'm, the small change is, I'm not gonna eat Cheetos anymore, I'm gonna cut out Cheetos, that's it. I'm still not eating that good, you know, I'm gonna cut out Cheetos. Or, let's say, I get, you know, drive-through every day, three times a day.

• 1:12:34Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:12:35Speaker 01

  I won't get drive-through anymore, or all-

• 1:12:37Jocko Willink?

  That's a big change.

• 1:12:39Speaker 01

  Not necessarily, depending on what you get.

• 1:12:42Jocko Willink?

  Going from three drive-throughs a day to, to zero, how's that not a big change?

• 1:12:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a big change, I guess.

• 1:12:47Jocko Willink?

  How is going from like, and there's certain people, actually I was talking to someone, uh, the other day that had lost a hundred and fifty pounds, uh, female. And it was interesting, her nutritionist, she hired a nutritionist. And the nutritionist said, okay, what are the foods you can't live without?

• 1:13:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:05Jocko Willink?

  And we'll work around those.

• 1:13:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:13:07Jocko Willink?

  That's a pretty cool thing.

• 1:13:08Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:13:08Jocko Willink?

  And what she said was, I need cheeseburgers and fries. So, then what she got told was, something along the lines of, okay, you can have cheeseburger and fries on Friday.

• 1:13:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:13:20Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 1:13:20Speaker 01

  That's what I was saying on the weekend.

• 1:13:21Jocko Willink?

  Instead of, you know, this, this whole thing of, I can never eat it. Now what I'm saying is, there are people, and I think I'm one of these people, where it's like, oh, if I have cheeseburgers and fries today, well then I might as well just get a mint chocolate chip milkshake with it.

• 1:13:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:35Jocko Willink?

  And if I did that tonight, then you know what, tomorrow morning, hey- After you get done training, maybe you know that cheeseburger was good yesterday. So maybe it's my own personal weakness, but for me, I I'd prefer to be just like on the path.

• 1:13:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:13:49Jocko Willink?

  That's why the eighty twenty rule, and I talked about this in the field manual, the eighty twenty rule, maybe it works for some people, and I guess it does work for me. But I'd rather just be straight on the program.

• 1:13:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:59Jocko Willink?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:14:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:14:00Jocko Willink?

  And and then, and you know what, you know, Tim Ferriss has that thing where, or he's talked about that thing where he goes six days hardcore. Strict, and then the seventh day, you literally eat whatever you want as much as you can.

• 1:14:16Speaker 01

  And I agree with that.

• 1:14:17Jocko Willink?

  Tried that.

• 1:14:18Speaker 01

  I have, and it's really, really good.

• 1:14:20Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:21Speaker 01

  Because you feel really, really good, not only physically, but just about the whole day. I'm on the program and you kind of know, and on that, on that cheat day, you do, they call it the cheat day. You eat whatever you want and you don't feel any guilt at all. Even when you're on the eighty twenty, it's like you have to be coming off a real strong week to like be.

• 1:14:43Jocko Willink?

  To feel good about the cheeseburger.

• 1:14:44Speaker 01

  Free, like.

• 1:14:45Jocko Willink?

  Cheeseburgers are good, too.

• 1:14:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. And that's not even really that bad of a cheat day.

• 1:14:50Jocko Willink?

  Oh, really?

• 1:14:51Speaker 01

  A cheat day is like.

• 1:14:51Jocko Willink?

  Fries.

• 1:14:52Speaker 01

  Fries, then you're starting to go into it for sure, but the, I'm like, you know, a cheat day, cheat day, like ask Tim Hilt. It'll be like for real, like a whole thing of donuts, a box of cookies, yeah, whatever you want, straight up, whatever you want.

• 1:15:06Jocko Willink?

  This is disgusting.

• 1:15:07Speaker 01

  Here's the thing, though, with when you, when you start to eat healthy and you then you try to eat a whole box of donuts, you're after like one, two, three, maybe six, eight donuts, you're gonna be like.

• 1:15:17Jocko Willink?

  Have you ever eaten six donuts?

• 1:15:19Speaker 01

  Easy.

• 1:15:20Jocko Willink?

  So you've eaten six donuts in one sitting?

• 1:15:21Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh, you know those, I think they're called intimates, old fashioned, they're, you know, an old fashioned donut is.

• 1:15:26Jocko Willink?

  Little chocolate donuts.

• 1:15:28Speaker 01

  No, you know what?

• 1:15:28Jocko Willink?

  You're talking about a full sized donut.

• 1:15:30Speaker 01

  Straight up, they're kind of a little bit bigger, too, you know. You know, um.

• 1:15:37Jocko Willink?

  Oh, man.

• 1:15:37Speaker 01

  You know that.

• 1:15:38Jocko Willink?

  I can't even fathom eating six donuts. Ever since I started talking so much smack about donuts.

• 1:15:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:44Jocko Willink?

  I know, I can't, literally can never have one again in my life.

• 1:15:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, you're not allowed, for sure, a hundred percent.

• 1:15:48Jocko Willink?

  A hundred percent.

• 1:15:49Speaker 01

  Like, not even, yeah.

• 1:15:51Jocko Willink?

  They don't have a bite.

• 1:15:52Speaker 01

  Even if you were like, if someone was like, hey, just bite this.

• 1:15:54Jocko Willink?

  Bummer, cuz when I was a little kid, my parents would buy the chocolate donuts, the Hostess chocolate donuts.

• 1:15:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, this is cool.

• 1:15:59Jocko Willink?

  Covered in chocolate, those things are good.

• 1:16:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:16:02Jocko Willink?

  I can't even have one of those again.

• 1:16:04Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 1:16:04Jocko Willink?

  Maybe if I did the six day cheat program.

• 1:16:06Speaker 01

  Nope, even then, you can't.

• 1:16:08Jocko Willink?

  I can't do it.

• 1:16:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, you know what an old fashioned donut is, right? It's like a.

• 1:16:13Jocko Willink?

  Just a donut with a hole in it, right?

• 1:16:15Speaker 01

  No, it's called old fashioned donuts. They're like, um, it's, they're kinda glazed and almost like a, not, they're not crispy, but they're kinda hardy, are hard and.

• 1:16:23Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:16:23Speaker 01

  On the outside, and then they're regular soft donuts on the inside. And they have this glaze over them. Okay, so I think it's, I forget the name, I think it might be Entenmann's. But they have old fashioned donuts where they're not as hard, but they're kinda hard and they're just bigger. Anyway, those are my favorite ones and I used to get chocolate milk and heat up the chocolate milk. So it's like hot chocolate and donuts and, oh yeah, easy money. Like, I'll eat two boxes of those, for sure, or I used to, not anymore. Oh, yeah. So, the point there is, on the cheat day, you just go.

• 1:16:53Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no.

• 1:16:54Speaker 01

  Like, no shame, but after, the thing is, you can't just eat donuts four times a day or three times. You just don't feel good, like your stomach gets all upset and the more healthy you eat, the more it's gonna be like that. So the longer you're on the path, you start, like, if you ate some donut, like, oh, the other day, we went to the Belmont Park and I ate some ice cream, some mint chocolate chip ice cream.

• 1:17:13Jocko Willink?

  Was it good?

• 1:17:15Speaker 01

  Fine, it was good, but, you know, all the kids are doing it, whatever.

• 1:17:18Jocko Willink?

  I had some loose tracks the other night.

• 1:17:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, you eat a big, large, double, you know, what, after, after that, you're like, bro, I don't feel right, you know? So unless you're just committed to eat it, cuz I don't know, you don't wanna waste it or something like that, you're gonna be like, oh, my cheat, your cheat day's not gonna be that bad, is what I'm saying.

• 1:17:33Jocko Willink?

  Oh, okay.

• 1:17:34Speaker 01

  But you still do have that freedom.

• 1:17:36Jocko Willink?

  Make it happen.

• 1:17:36Speaker 01

  Depends on what it is, yeah. Yeah, yeah, you could pound some chili fries or something like that.

• 1:17:41Jocko Willink?

  I don't like chili fries. All right, so, yeah.

• 1:17:45Jocko Willink?

  Maybe, what's the verdict then?

• 1:17:47Speaker 01

  I think just in the like, middle of the road, not the whole starting light thing.

• 1:17:51Jocko Willink?

  I said balance. So you're saying balance as well. I'll tell you though, man, if that balance doesn't work for you, you're gonna have to step it up. You're gonna have to go hardcore. I'd give yourself two weeks, two weeks for a balanced approach on the diet side. If you can't get your shit under control in two weeks, you gotta go hardcore. You gotta get in there with a garbage can, throw away the Twinkies, throw away everything else that's crap in your fridge. And go hardcore. And start with a fast too, right? Hey, a fast is awesome.

• 1:18:23Speaker 01

  If you know what to expect, it's good.

• 1:18:24Jocko Willink?

  Wait, I don't even know that there's that much to expect. Don't eat for a day.

• 1:18:28Speaker 01

  If you've never done it before, it comes with little stuff.

• 1:18:31Jocko Willink?

  There's no little stuff. Don't eat for a day. There's not.

• 1:18:36Speaker 01

  Take it from a normal human being, this little stuff that if you're not, if you go in and not prepared for it, then you're like, oh, I don't know.

• 1:18:44Jocko Willink?

  I actually think the more you think about it and prepare for it, the more psychologically hard it is. Just be like, oh yeah, you know what? I woke up this morning, I haven't eaten last night, cool, I'm not gonna eat until tonight.

• 1:18:54Speaker 01

  Every time I.

• 1:18:54Jocko Willink?

  That's a fast.

• 1:18:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, so when I plan it like that, when I'm like, I'm not gonna eat till this, then I go through little stuff. But if I just have, if I'm too into work and I'm only drinking coffee and I forget, I'm like dang, if, if I eat now, I haven't ate for like, you know, 12 hours. Then I'll be like, oh, I'll just go another three, that's my 15, cause it's like 15, right? 15 hours is when your body starts to kinda shift over to like, I think, I think 15. If I, whatever it is. So I'll just wait that shower and it's like, cool, done. But if I plan it, that's when, yeah, I don't know. But it depends on who you are, man.

• 1:19:27Jocko Willink?

  But that's a good way to kick things off.

• 1:19:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:29Jocko Willink?

  It's a good way to kick things off and get like, jump onto the path.

• 1:19:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:34Jocko Willink?

  Just jump on with a fast.

• 1:19:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:36Jocko Willink?

  Hey, go see your doctor or whatever. Do you have to go see a doctor to fast 24 hours?

• 1:19:41Speaker 01

  I think you should. If you've been.

• 1:19:43Jocko Willink?

  Probably, yeah.

• 1:19:46Speaker 01

  Fat, lazy, you know? Especially if you're older or something like that. I think seeing a doctor is always.

• 1:19:52Jocko Willink?

  Get a personal trainer.

• 1:19:55Speaker 01

  Depends on what you mean by help.

• 1:19:56Jocko Willink?

  The woman I just talked to, she's like personal trainer and nutritionist, hired them both. Lost a hundred whatever pounds. So I think she was in excess of 300 pounds.

• 1:20:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:07Jocko Willink?

  And when I met her, she's completely normal, right? Like, you know, completely like you wouldn't even suspect that she had any weight trouble in her life.

• 1:20:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:15Jocko Willink?

  That's pretty amazing.

• 1:20:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:16Jocko Willink?

  So hire the trainer, hire the, the, the nutritionist.

• 1:20:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think so. I think that helps. I always looked at it like, why would I hire like a trainer or something like that when I can kind of look up that stuff? But here's the thing, I went in with this bias like, cause I kind of had a background in it.

• 1:20:37Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:20:37Speaker 01

  So I'm like, why would I, I can just go look, but I'm looking it up, but I have all this other knowledge.

• 1:20:41Jocko Willink?

  Maybe same rule, you try it for two weeks, see if you can keep yourself on the path. And if you can't, you gotta bring someone in, right?

• 1:20:50Speaker 01

  Here's what I like. Hire a trainer, but not like the kind every day. It's like a once a week trainer who can get you on a little program.

• 1:20:57Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:57Speaker 01

  And kind of, you know, it's gonna depend on who you are, straight up, you know, who can keep you on.

• 1:21:03Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and that's the biggest point of all this. And I've said this a billion times, like you know what you need to do.

• 1:21:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21:10Jocko Willink?

  You know what you need to do. You know, you know what you need to do. If you can't get yourself to do it, maybe you need to get someone to help you do it.

• 1:21:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21:18Jocko Willink?

  The weird thing is, like nutritionists and stuff, you can get nutritionists that could come to you and be like, okay, we're gonna go put you on a low fat diet, you know? Which would be really not good.

• 1:21:27Speaker 01

  Seen you in the wrong direction.

• 1:21:29Jocko Willink?

  I don't know how many, you think there's still nutritionists that are doing that right now?

• 1:21:32Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 1:21:33Jocko Willink?

  Oh yeah, I know there are. I know there are actually. They're, they're out there. So you gotta be careful of that.

• 1:21:38Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 1:21:40Speaker 01

  Next question.

• 1:21:43Speaker 01

  Last thing that I'm not gonna draw it out, but you said, you know what you need to do? And one time you said, imagine what your day would look like, like if you, like everything you did.

• 1:21:57Speaker 01

  Was you did the things that you knew you're supposed to do kind of thing.

• 1:22:00Jocko Willink?

  Well, the the the full the full statement is if you wrote down tonight, what you were supposed to do tomorrow.

• 1:22:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:09Jocko Willink?

  And then you did the things that you were supposed to do.

• 1:22:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:22:12Jocko Willink?

  Imagine how that day would feel and imagine what you'd get done in that day.

• 1:22:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:16Jocko Willink?

  And then imagine if you did that every day for a week.

• 1:22:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:20Jocko Willink?

  And imagine if you did that every day for a month and then you did it for a year and imagine where your life would be. Your life would be in a completely different trajectory.

• 1:22:27Speaker 01

  Completely.

• 1:22:27Jocko Willink?

  Completely different.

• 1:22:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:29Jocko Willink?

  And that's true with working out. That's true with nutrition. That's true with business. That's true with education. That's true with knowledge. It's true with everything.

• 1:22:37Speaker 01

  Everything.

• 1:22:38Jocko Willink?

  So you kind of know what we're supposed to do.

• 1:22:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:40Jocko Willink?

  I I thought you were gonna say some people don't know what to do. And that could be the case. Some people, they've never worked out before.

• 1:22:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:47Jocko Willink?

  And if you're a person that's never worked out before, you probably need to bring someone into the game that's gonna help show you how to work out. If you've never done any reading about eating and you have no idea what's gonna be good for you, you're probably a person that might need to bring someone into the game to help you get over that.

• 1:23:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it still completely goes with exactly what you said. It's like you know what to do. And even to help that, you know what not to do. Like when you're you're about to make a decision, I'm gonna do this or not do this, like you know which one is you should or shouldn't do. So let's say I don't know anything about working out, but I know I have to get in shape. We all know, you know, we all know when we gotta get in shape. So.

• 1:23:25Jocko Willink?

  Then you know you gotta hire somebody.

• 1:23:26Speaker 01

  You know you gotta do something. You know that you shouldn't just be like, oh, well, I'm not gonna do it. I don't know. I'm not gonna do it.

• 1:23:31Jocko Willink?

  Things to do tomorrow. Get a trainer.

• 1:23:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:33Jocko Willink?

  Join a gym, get a trainer.

• 1:23:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know what to do. Okay, this is what you could do. Find out what to do. There you go.

• 1:23:40Jocko Willink?

  Exactly.

• 1:23:40Speaker 01

  In that case, so yeah, it makes sense. Sometimes when you put things in, just say stuff, just put it on the table. It starts to make sense. Next question. I'm a veteran of the infantry and when I took over a fire team, for the first time, I made the mistake of drawing hard lines in the sand. This immediately alienated members of that team that had been together for some time. I did not make that mistake again, and I definitely learned from my experience.

• 1:24:11Jocko Willink?

  So clearly, there's not a question there.

• 1:24:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:13Jocko Willink?

  And and I forget pulling this out from, I get a lot of emails and messages and all that. But I thought it was a good point to bring up to say, you know, this idea of drawing hard lines in the sand and what that does to your leadership position. It's it's it's a difficult, it's usually not a good thing to do. If you draw a lot hard lines in the sand, and eventually you realize that they're either unrealistic or people can't maintain them. You have set yourself up for failure.

• 1:24:45Speaker 01

  What is that exactly like drawing lines?

• 1:24:46Jocko Willink?

  So it's like, no matter what, we will not.

• 1:24:50Speaker 01

  Gotcha.

• 1:24:51Jocko Willink?

  Blah, blah, blah, blah.

• 1:24:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's the line, no cross that.

• 1:24:53Jocko Willink?

  What?

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  Got it.

• 1:24:54Jocko Willink?

  We will, we will win every single road march that we do as a fire team in this while we're while we're here on this training thing. Okay, well, guess what? That's a, that's hard. There's other, there's some other fire teams that are also want to win. And and so you've drawn a hard line to send, that's not really a good example.

• 1:25:16Jocko Willink?

  A good example is like, no matter what, we're going to muster every morning at four thirty in the morning. No matter what. And you know, then the guys are out on patrol until two thirty eight in the morning. And now the next morning, you go, no matter what, I said, no matter what. Well, it's it's not good for them. It's unrealistic. So you drew a hard line in the sand, and now you got to back it down. So and all you have to do is soften the statement a little bit. Hey, guys, to the best of our ability, if we can, we're going to get here every morning at four thirty for muster. There's a little, there's a little room to play there, right? And that's, that's fine. So again, I, there's, there's not a lot of, there's not a question here. But one of the reasons I think that

• 1:26:02Jocko Willink?

  that I that I wanted to talk about it was because I think people look at me and even hear me on a peripheral level. And they think, oh, I bet Chalk would just lay down the hard lines.

• 1:26:15Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:26:16Jocko Willink?

  It's my way or the highway, right?

• 1:26:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:19Jocko Willink?

  And and the, the, the opposite is actually true. And the reason that I.

• 1:26:27Jocko Willink?

  Came to that conclusion was because I worked for leaders like that and I hated working for leaders like that. So I tried to never be a leader like that.

• 1:26:41Jocko Willink?

  And there's a dichotomy, right? There's a huge dichotomy. Because this doesn't mean that you're not driving and pushing. This doesn't mean that you're not saying, hey, we're gonna be the best whatever, we're gonna be the best task unit here. Doesn't mean you're not saying, hey, look, we're not gonna rest until we've done what we're supposed to do. Doesn't mean that.

• 1:27:03Jocko Willink?

  But man, you gotta find that balance.

• 1:27:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:07Speaker 01

  It does feel like that with you. That you're like, it feels like that, but when you're one, I mean, it, my experience obviously is and we're under no like extreme circumstances. But just like, just like the simple stuff, like it really does seem like you wake up at four thirty in the morning. Every single morning, do or die.

• 1:27:26Jocko Willink?

  Well, that I did, that I do. Unless, like, there's some times where I get home at, like, I remember a little while ago, I got home at one o'clock or two o'clock in the morning. And that's basically my cutoff zone. If I'm getting less than four and a half hours of sleep, then I'll be like, oh, yeah, and I'll wake up and I've been like, hey, I only got two and a half hours of sleep last night. That's not enough. I'm going back to bed.

• 1:27:50Speaker 01

  Right. That's it. And that's what I mean where.

• 1:27:51Jocko Willink?

  I've tweeted that out before.

• 1:27:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:53Jocko Willink?

  I'm too tired.

• 1:27:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I get, yeah, that's, that's what I mean.

• 1:27:57Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:57Speaker 01

  So it's like when, when that happens, it almost like he catches you off guard, you know? When you, when you, when you did that, I mean, obviously not like, oh, Joko's daughter's tricky. It's not that feeling at all. It's just kinda like, oh dang. You do have that flexibility when, you know, when it's the correct thing, kinda thing.

• 1:28:15Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you have to.

• 1:28:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're not a slave to your, uh, rigidity.

• 1:28:21Jocko Willink?

  Well, what you're saying is I don't draw hard lines in the sand. Taking it back to the question.

• 1:28:27Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly right.

• 1:28:29Jocko Willink?

  But it's real easy to go down the slippery slope of like, well, you know what? I actually didn't eat real good yesterday, so I probably need some more sleep to recover today.

• 1:28:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:28:39Jocko Willink?

  Really?

• 1:28:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, I am, I'm, it's a rest day, so I might as well turn on the TV. Oh, you know what'd be good with TV? Maybe some popcorn. Oh, you know what'd be good with popcorn? Maybe some cheese sticks.

• 1:28:51Speaker 01

  It's a rest day, right?

• 1:28:52Jocko Willink?

  Going down the wrong path.

• 1:28:54Speaker 01

  It's slippery, that's what I'm saying.

• 1:28:56Jocko Willink?

  I guess the, I guess the opposite of the, of the, of the path is the slippery slope.

• 1:29:02Speaker 01

  Exactly, right?

• 1:29:05Speaker 01

  Next question. Hi. Scenario.

• 1:29:08Jocko Willink?

  That's actually a legit way to think of it, too.

• 1:29:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:11Jocko Willink?

  If it's a legit way to think of things, if you're on the path, when you know what the path is, as we talked about with Tim Ferriss, if you're on the path, which you know, well, when you step off the path, it's a slippery slope.

• 1:29:24Speaker 01

  Yep, big time.

• 1:29:25Jocko Willink?

  Off the path is a slippery, slippery slope. And what'd you just say? The popcorn can lead to cheese sticks, can lead to M and Ms.

• 1:29:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:34Jocko Willink?

  That's the slippery slope right there.

• 1:29:35Speaker 01

  Yeah. And sometimes you slip so hard that you just plunge deep

• 1:29:42Speaker 01

  off the path.

• 1:29:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:44Speaker 01

  Fall off the wagon, land hard.

• 1:29:47Speaker 01

  Scenario. My team leader's boss came to me and asked my opinion on my horrible team leader.

• 1:29:54Speaker 01

  The boss, my boss's boss. Wanted my opinion. So what do I do? Praise him to make the team look good and maintain my relationship with my, with the team leader? Or tactfully tell the truth and build a relationship with the boss, with my boss's boss?

• 1:30:09Jocko Willink?

  That's a good question, isn't it?

• 1:30:10Speaker 01

  I think so.

• 1:30:11Jocko Willink?

  This is, and it's a really tough position to be in.

• 1:30:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:14Jocko Willink?

  Because you have to be careful and you have to be balanced. And there's a couple of things to think about. First of all, no one likes rats.

• 1:30:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:20Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 1:30:21Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:30:23Jocko Willink?

  No one likes rats, but at the same time, you kinda also have to think about what's best for the team. On top of and kinda the opposite of no one likes rats is no one likes brown nosers. No. But at the same time, you have to build relationships up and down the chain of command. And one of the toughest things about this and what you have to be so careful about is that you don't know what kind of relationship the boss and the team leader have. You don't know. For on one end of the spectrum, they could be friends. So if you say something bad about him, that's going right back to the team leader and you're in, you're, you're gonna have a hard time. Worse position. You're in a much worse position. Also, they could be enemies. And

• 1:31:05Jocko Willink?

  supporting the team lead to the boss could actually make you look stupid, right? Make you, make you look bad. And, and it's important to say here.

• 1:31:19Jocko Willink?

  Is it the optics of like, I don't wanna look bad? Is that what I'm talking about? Cause that's what I just said, like it'll make you look bad, it'll make you look stupid. The reason that you're trying to look good is because you wanna do a good job, because you want the team, because you want the mission to succeed. That, that's what's important. And you don't care. I don't care if I have to eat crow. I don't care if, so, so I don't mind looking bad if it's for a good reason. I don't mind my ego taking a ding if it's for the right reason. But this could actually hurt the way I do my job. Because now my boss, my boss, sorry, my boss's boss thinks I'm kind of an idiot.

• 1:32:01Jocko Willink?

  And so that means when promote comes time for promotion, even though I might be the best guy, I'm not getting promoted because I was the guy that was too blind to see that my team leader was an idiot.

• 1:32:10Jocko Willink?

  So I would be very careful and fairly neutral.

• 1:32:17Jocko Willink?

  In what I said, especially to start with, right? So, you know, if the, if the boss says, hey, how's that team leader doing? My response would be like, oh, you know what? We get the job done. There's, that's so non-committal, right? Uh, what about the team leader? Is he, is he a good leader? I, I think he's, I think he's got a pretty good hold of what's going on, right? So that's, that's, there's room to interpret that in any direction, really. I think he's got a pretty good hold, or I think he's getting a hold of what's going on. Or another one would be, well, hey, how's your team leader? I think our performance kind of shows where we're at.

• 1:32:56Jocko Willink?

  Right? So you're not, you're not giving away. And those are, those are, like I said, those are subtle and those are very open things that you could respond to and

• 1:33:06Jocko Willink?

  and I think the more your boss probes or the, sorry, the more the team boss, team leader's boss is probes, the more you could open up a little bit, still with caution, but as you see what the boss's opinion is, you could open up a little bit more and share a little bit more of the truth, very tactfully, or if

• 1:33:30Jocko Willink?

  or you could go in the other direction, right? If you says, oh, you know, that's my best guy and I've known Bill forever. Yeah, Bill's, I brought him here and Bill's gonna be, he's going places. So are you gonna derail that guy? You, you, you can, but you're probably gonna derail yourself too. Cause that guy has a legitimate relationship with him.

• 1:33:51Jocko Willink?

  So

• 1:33:53Jocko Willink?

  the, that's a tough situation and, and I would say the best thing to do in this situation is remain as neutral as possible. And again, you know what? There's, there's someone that's listening to this right now that's going, oh, Jock was kind of a, Jock was kind of a wimp. And if I was there, I'd just tell the truth. Okay. So let's, let's talk about that. Let's talk about what happens, cause I've been in that situation more times than I can count, where my boss was kind of an idiot and I get asked by his boss, hey, how's this guy doing? So let's say you rat him out. Well, does that mean that the boss gets fired immediately? No, it just means that your team is less respected. It means that you get less support. It means, and if you do get ratted out, by the way, where do you end up now?

• 1:34:37Jocko Willink?

  You end up in a bad situation where your boss knows that you ratted him out to his boss. You're hated. Yeah. You're hated. So, I wanna win. Let's go back to that point. I wanna win. So, does it help me win if I rat out my boss, or if I rat out my team leader to my boss? Does it help me win?

• 1:35:01Jocko Willink?

  It could. It could if your boss happens to be completely aligned with what you're thinking. He also happens to have a replacement ready. That's more squared away. That's another thing. You get rid of one bad team leader, now you get a new team leader. How do you know him? Who's that? Who is that person? Where'd they come from? The devil's, what is that saying? The devil you know is better than the devil that you don't know. So, if I have a team leader that's not doing a good job, whose fault is that?

• 1:35:30Jocko Willink?

  Mine. Yeah! I can help my team leader. Especially if my team leader's weak, I can help them become strong. I can help teach them tactfully, not stepping on their toes. I would rather, rather than rat my team leader out up the chain of command, I would rather fix my team leader. I would rather help my team leader become better. Support him. And by the way, when you do support your team leader and they become better, and now they do come up for a promotion, what do they know in the back of their mind? They know that you helped them. They knew, know that you got them there. Guess who's getting promoted now? You are. Now, why am I so concerned about getting promoted? It's because I wanna, wanna outdo everyone else? No, that's not why. Cause you wanna win. Cause I wanna win. I want the team to win.

• 1:36:14Jocko Willink?

  And if I thought that you, Echo, would do a better job if you became team leader instead of me, I'd be like, hey, I appreciate it, but Echo would do a better job than me. He should be the team leader.

• 1:36:24Jocko Willink?

  So...

• 1:36:27Jocko Willink?

  And, and also, if you're real, this is what happens. If I'm really a person, this, this, this, this is what I'm getting at. If I'm really a person that really wants to get promoted and that's my main goal. I wanna get promoted, that's my goal. What do I do with the team leader? Rat him out. I throw him under the bus. So, that's the person that we all hate. The person that rats out the team leader, that, that says, oh, that guy's doing a terrible job, I'd do a much better job, and gets that guy fired and now I get promoted. What do we all think of him? We all think that guy's a turd. Now, it, it, as opposed to someone that says, you know what, our team leader's weak, needs help, needs support. I'm gonna help him. I'm gonna support him. I'm gonna do the best I can.

• 1:37:08Speaker 01

  Wait, are you saying to tell the boss this?

• 1:37:10Jocko Willink?

  No.

• 1:37:10Speaker 01

  Or just have that attitude?

• 1:37:11Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, to have that attitude. Like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna throw him under the bus. Now, if we have a guy that's horrible, that's tyrannical, that does a horrible job, that abuses people, then we get to a situation where you say, you know what, boss? There's some problems.

• 1:37:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:26Jocko Willink?

  So if you have that one, which doesn't really, well, this guy says horrible team leader. So if this is a horrible team leader, that's irredeemable, irredeemable qualities, and it's negatively affecting the team, because he kinda makes it sound like make the team look good. So there's, there's, there's still a possibility that the team is doing okay.

• 1:37:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:45Jocko Willink?

  Even though they have a horrible leader, because they are such good troops. I would see that sometimes. A platoon has a bad leader, but there's great guys in there, and the platoon leader is smart enough just to be like, okay, I'm gonna let them kinda run with it. They'll be successful.

• 1:37:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:59Jocko Willink?

  So, my, my goal usually is to help the person above me in the cha- well, it's always to help the person above me in the chain of command. Can you get to a situation where someone is so bad that it's negatively affecting the whole team, and you can't win because their position? Yes, well, then you need to step up and do something about it and say something about it. Do it tactfully, do it slowly. Don't overcommit to your statements early on, because if you do, you might say something that is out of line.

• 1:38:29Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:38:31Jocko Willink?

  So, that's, it's a tricky situation. There's no definitive answer. You have to weigh these things out.

• 1:38:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:38:38Jocko Willink?

  Generally, if you can help someone win, you're gonna win. Generally, if you help someone win, you're gonna win. If it's so bad that they're just bringing down the whole team, and you cannot win with them in that position, you might need to say something.

• 1:38:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, especially if everyone on the team kinda feels the same way. It's gonna be a little bit easier to be like, hey, you know?

• 1:38:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:00Speaker 01

  And be straight.

• 1:39:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, but even if everyone, if we, if we have the gang mentality, right? Like, hey, man, the boss sucks. You know what? He's, team leader's horrible. He doesn't know what he's doing. Hey, guys, you know what? We could sit here and complain about it, or we could actually try and, like, make him a better leader.

• 1:39:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:39:17Jocko Willink?

  What do you guys say, think of that? And then, cause hey, we could try and get a replacement for him, but at least he listens to us right now.

• 1:39:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:24Jocko Willink?

  Or whatever, you know, at least he, at least he understands the job. Hey, let's try and, let's try and prop him up. Let's try and get, you know what, let's get rid of him, but let's get rid of him by teaching him a lot so he gets educated so he can move on and get promoted. And then we'll have a good relationship with him.

• 1:39:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:37Jocko Willink?

  And then the team will get more support and then we can do our mission better.

• 1:39:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, I guess he kinda gotta understand what makes him a quote unquote horrible leader, right?

• 1:39:46Jocko Willink?

  For sure, for sure.

• 1:39:47Speaker 01

  So like, what if, what if I don't like him because I don't like his tie? I don't know, I don't like his hairdo, you know, I just don't like him, we don't, we don't come from the same side of the tracks, I don't know, whatever the thing.

• 1:39:55Jocko Willink?

  Well, one of the things that would be, like if the guy's arrogant, right? The guy's arrogant, well, how are we gonna bring him down? How are we gonna bring, well, how we, not, not bring him down, like bring him down from his job, but how are we gonna bring down his ego?

• 1:40:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:09Jocko Willink?

  How are we gonna mellow him out? You know, and that could, that could be a long project.

• 1:40:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:14Jocko Willink?

  That could be a long project.

• 1:40:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, so just like you said, is like, is it damaging the, the performance kinda thing?

• 1:40:21Jocko Willink?

  Yes. That's the most important thing, is what is our performance like?

• 1:40:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:26Jocko Willink?

  Can we bring this guy around?

• 1:40:29Jocko Willink?

  Good question. I'm sorry, there's no definitive answer, but at the same time, there's, so, leadership is, is an art.

• 1:40:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. And why did the?

• 1:40:41Jocko Willink?

  It's an art and science, but it's an art.

• 1:40:43Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:40:44Jocko Willink?

  This is a case where the artistic part is gonna be more important.

• 1:40:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. The dichotomy, art and science. Remember on Bloodsport how he called martial arts martial science? He called it martial science, the guy, what is his name? Sensei Tanaka. Come on, bro, Bloodsport, Van Damme.

• 1:41:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, I know, I know what the movie is.

• 1:41:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, he called it martial science.

• 1:41:03Jocko Willink?

  Familiar with that, too, too familiar. Even as a kid, I thought those movies were really cheesy.

• 1:41:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was kinda cheesy.

• 1:41:10Jocko Willink?

  Like so, like a lot, a lot of MMA, well, I guess from my age MMA, guys, you know, I was into Bloodsport. You know? Even when I was a kid, I wa, I wasn't thinking Bloodsport was like legit. I don't know why.

• 1:41:23Speaker 01

  I thought it was. None of the, the dim off of the bricks.

• 1:41:27Jocko Willink?

  I thought Rocky was more legit.

• 1:41:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, Rocky was dope.

• 1:41:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I thought, I thought that. Rocky was more legit than Bloodsport for me. Bloodsport seemed fake.

• 1:41:37Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, I guess.

• 1:41:39Jocko Willink?

  Right?

• 1:41:39Speaker 01

  It just seemed extreme, I guess. Cause pl- plus, I think with Bloodsport, the rumors circulated that that guy was real. Like that was real, you know? So you're like, oh, sure, it's a movie, cool. Made it fun, but it was real in real life.

• 1:41:51Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. I, I, I, yeah. Again, I, I, I wouldn't say I, I hated Bloodsport. But like, I haven't seen it enough to know that the guy referred to martial arts as martial science.

• 1:42:01Speaker 01

  That was early on, early in the movie when Van Dam's teacher.

• 1:42:05Jocko Willink?

  You know, it's your typical movie, right? There's a, there's a, a guy. He's getting beat down or whatever. He goes through his training process. There's a, there's a montage.

• 1:42:15Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:42:15Jocko Willink?

  Like in, uh, like in Team War, Team America World Police, there's a montage, training montage, and then he comes back and, and wins.

• 1:42:23Speaker 01

  Badass.

• 1:42:23Jocko Willink?

  There's, there's like most of your fight movies.

• 1:42:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:26Jocko Willink?

  You know? Montage.

• 1:42:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, he gets beat down early, you know, he trains, he becomes awesome, but then there's the arch enemy who's trained too.

• 1:42:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:34Speaker 01

  But still a bully and he has to beat him. Same thing with Karate Kid.

• 1:42:37Jocko Willink?

  But you're leaving out the montage part. The training montage.

• 1:42:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:40Jocko Willink?

  Which is very important.

• 1:42:43Speaker 01

  You're the best, or no, that's Karate Kid. You, you ever seen the movie Never Back Down?

• 1:42:48Jocko Willink?

  No.

• 1:42:48Speaker 01

  Okay, so you wouldn't, you'll never watch this movie. It's, it's.

• 1:42:52Jocko Willink?

  It's MMA, right?

• 1:42:53Speaker 01

  It's MMA.

• 1:42:54Jocko Willink?

  Cause I remember when it came out.

• 1:42:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it's, it's basically Karate Kid. It's, it's literally like Karate Kid, but just MMA now. And a little bit more cheesy, maybe a lot more cheesy. I thought it was good though, I enjoyed it, I watched it more than once.

• 1:43:06Jocko Willink?

  Doesn't he learn from like a master jiu-jitsu guy or something?

• 1:43:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, Brazilian guy who play, is played by an African guy. The guy on, um, you remember Gladiator? You know Gladiator, right? Russell Crowe. And you know the black guy in there, the African guy?

• 1:43:18Jocko Willink?

  Vaguely.

• 1:43:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, he, um, you know, the one, yeah, his main friend. He's the guy, but he's a Brazilian guy.

• 1:43:24Jocko Willink?

  Oh, okay.

• 1:43:25Speaker 01

  It doesn't match, cause he doesn't have a Brazilian accent.

• 1:43:26Jocko Willink?

  I was gonna say, how's his, uh, Portuguese accent?

• 1:43:29Speaker 01

  No, still African. But nonetheless, you know, on paper it might seem cool, but it came out kinda cheesy. I liked it though. You know, they over emphasize like all the things like he goes to the party and the party is just crazy. Anyway, yeah, look into it. Nonetheless, yes, science and art, I dig it. You kinda have to, I mean back to the question, you have to kinda wonder why the boss is asking your opinion too. Is it just a general probe like, hey, how you guys doing? How's the boss doing kinda like that? Or is it, we have some concerns about your team leader, what up, you know, kinda thing?

• 1:44:04Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and even that, you gotta be careful.

• 1:44:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:06Jocko Willink?

  Cause they could lead you down that path.

• 1:44:09Jocko Willink?

  Maybe.

• 1:44:09Speaker 01

  Maybe they're probing you.

• 1:44:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, maybe the team leader said, hey, you know what? I don't trust this guy.

• 1:44:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:13Jocko Willink?

  See what he says about me, right? And then you go in and you go, hey, I've heard some bad things about this guy. What do you think of him?

• 1:44:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:20Jocko Willink?

  I'll tell you what, you're right. That guy's a turd.

• 1:44:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:23Jocko Willink?

  A turd with ears.

• 1:44:27Jocko Willink?

  Uh, yeah.

• 1:44:28Speaker 01

  You guys used to say that stuff. A lot of team guys say turd. That's a team thing, huh?

• 1:44:32Jocko Willink?

  I think, I think it came from buds at some point.

• 1:44:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:35Jocko Willink?

  It was, you'd get called turds.

• 1:44:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:44:37Jocko Willink?

  Quite a bit. And then a person that was kind of maybe just, just not a very good individual would be a turd with ears.

• 1:44:49Speaker 01

  Never heard that one.

• 1:44:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:50Speaker 01

  In Hawaii, they say doo doo boy. Same thing.

• 1:44:53Jocko Willink?

  Doo doo boy?

• 1:44:54Speaker 01

  Doo doo boy, yeah. But obviously not in any kinda discipline setting.

• 1:44:58Jocko Willink?

  We got one more, one more question.

• 1:45:01Speaker 01

  Yes, next question. Last question. Jocko. I've been disciplined, working hard and staying focused, but I've hit a, a run of bad luck and I can't seem to get a break.

• 1:45:17Jocko Willink?

  Well, first of all, you are lucky.

• 1:45:23Jocko Willink?

  Because if you're capable of, of working hard, then that's a blessing. That's luck.

• 1:45:33Jocko Willink?

  Because there's people all over the world that don't have the ability for any number of reasons. Many of those reasons being just bad luck, that they can't work. So right out of the gate, you're lucky that you can get up tomorrow and you can go to work. Now, you say you can't get a break.

• 1:45:58Jocko Willink?

  And maybe you're getting unlucky with your career or your personal life or your business.

• 1:46:07Jocko Willink?

  So what are you gonna do?

• 1:46:12Jocko Willink?

  Are you gonna give up?

• 1:46:15Jocko Willink?

  Are you gonna surrender? Are you gonna assume that because you didn't catch a break today? There's no way you'll catch one tomorrow or next week or next year?

• 1:46:29Jocko Willink?

  Are you going to leave it all to chance?

• 1:46:35Jocko Willink?

  Or are you going to do everything in your power to force luck your way? To create opportunity, to to shift the hands of fate?

• 1:46:50Jocko Willink?

  And even then, if the break never comes? Even if you roll across the finish line of life bruised and bloodied and empty handed from the fight, at least you know.

• 1:47:07Jocko Willink?

  You know that you went after it as hard as you could.

• 1:47:15Jocko Willink?

  And you gave life everything you had.

• 1:47:23Jocko Willink?

  And you know, in the end?

• 1:47:26Jocko Willink?

  You might still be unlucky.

• 1:47:30Jocko Willink?

  That could happen, but I would much rather be an unlucky soul that fought until the end and died with my sword in my hand.

• 1:47:44Jocko Willink?

  Than an unlucky soul that submitted.

• 1:47:50Jocko Willink?

  Bowed down, gave up and surrendered.

• 1:47:57Jocko Willink?

  So stop waiting to get lucky. Stop waiting for a big break. Instead, be thankful, truly thankful for what you do have.

• 1:48:16Jocko Willink?

  And go out there and fight and battle and brawl to make your own luck.

• 1:48:28Jocko Willink?

  And I think that's

• 1:48:31Jocko Willink?

  all I've got for tonight.

• 1:48:36Jocko Willink?

  So Echo.

• 1:48:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:48:38Jocko Willink?

  Speaking of fighting hard.

• 1:48:41Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:48:42Jocko Willink?

  Is there anything you know about that can help us? Stay in the fight?

• 1:48:48Speaker 01

  Stay in the fight, continue fighting hard.

• 1:48:50Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 1:48:51Speaker 01

  Sure. First thing you need to do is take care of your body habitus.

• 1:48:59Speaker 01

  I use that word wrong, but body habitus is like your like your habitat on your body. Anyway, take care of your body is what I meant.

• 1:49:10Speaker 01

  Including but not limited to your joints.

• 1:49:14Speaker 01

  A lot more important than I thought from the beginning or at in the beginning. So how you do that is super krill oil, Jaco has super krill oil. Jaco is krill oil called super krill oil. Another supplement called joint warfare. These are good for your joints. Don't neglect them. That's how you stay in the fight, straight out. Get them at originmaine.com. Also, you wanna increase your capacity and capability in the fight. Physically, mentally. You take new product called discipline. It's called discipline.

• 1:49:51Speaker 01

  It's not discipline itself, it's called discipline. Anyway, it's cognitive and physical enhancer. Force multiplier. Mental plus physical. The the sum is greater than the parts.

• 1:50:06Speaker 01

  Anyway, originmaine.com, that's where you get them. Uh, really good. They also have Gies and rash guards there at origin main. And they are all made in America. I don't know if you know this, it's a big deal. He does good work over there.

• 1:50:19Jocko Willink?

  From the dirt to the shirt.

• 1:50:21Speaker 01

  Yeah. Cotton is even grown in America. And that's very important. See what I did there? Um, yeah, Gies rash guards, compression gear, pants, compression pants, spats. All there. Also, or just speaking of origin, we have an immersion camp, jujitsu immersion camp. All levels of jujitsu are welcome to this, by the way. What about kids? Kids welcome to that one?

• 1:50:48Jocko Willink?

  I don't think so.

• 1:50:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, cuz.

• 1:50:50Jocko Willink?

  I don't think they have the capacity for kids there at the camp.

• 1:50:53Speaker 01

  Shoot, they're asking me that.

• 1:50:56Speaker 01

  Interesting. Nonetheless, all levels, even if you don't have any jujitsu at all. In fact, last time, there was a group who didn't have, or I think it was like, some didn't have any jujitsu.

• 1:51:06Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no jujitsu.

• 1:51:07Speaker 01

  And it just came, went on the, like, you know, like, some of the stuff you learn, if you don't have any jujitsu, it's like, okay, that's not gonna fit into my knowledge, because you have no knowledge. So it's like, that's not, I don't understand this quite yet.

• 1:51:17Jocko Willink?

  We did like, we did the like, the fundamentals class for him.

• 1:51:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:51:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, and even during, um, like, while it was going on, I, I had a group on the site of like, a good, like, 12 people. And we're just doing just the basic fundamentals.

• 1:51:33Jocko Willink?

  No jujitsu. Yeah, for sure. All levels. And by the way, if you're a beginner, yeah, that's cool. But also, if you're good, you'll also get some awesome training there.

• 1:51:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, everybody.

• 1:51:44Jocko Willink?

  Great guys there.

• 1:51:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. Huge, good spot.

• 1:51:46Jocko Willink?

  Cool, yeah. It's all, it's up in Maine.

• 1:51:49Speaker 01

  Echo Lake. Are we on Echo Lake this time?

• 1:51:52Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah, we are on Echo Lake this year, yeah. Echo Lake.

• 1:51:55Speaker 01

  Layers.

• 1:51:55Jocko Willink?

  Echo's got his own lake.

• 1:51:58Speaker 01

  Sure, Echo Park, Echo Lake. Dang. Nonetheless, yeah, so, yeah, originmaine.com, you can look and see all that stuff. And, uh, you know, if you want something, get something. If you wanna come to the emergence camp, come to the immersion camp. I'll be there. Jock, are you going?

• 1:52:12Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I am.

• 1:52:14Speaker 01

  You're so mad last time, you couldn't do, like, your rib.

• 1:52:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:17Speaker 01

  Your rib, right?

• 1:52:17Jocko Willink?

  My rib was jacked. This year, it won't be jacked.

• 1:52:20Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no, it's all good, Brad, you're the man. Either way. Also, for fitness gear, you wanna vary up your workout? You wanna implement new movements? Kettlebells?

• 1:52:33Speaker 01

  Do you do kettlebells? I know, Jock, you do kettlebells, I know that. But that's the question.

• 1:52:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you do.

• 1:52:38Speaker 01

  Mike Granchi, right? Mike, uh, this guy, you know, he's a brown belt, or black belt, I forget, up in Carlsbad area. Anyway, I've known him for a long time. I used to work with his sister. I don't even know if he remembers that. But, so, watching, you know, you know who Jeff Clark is?

• 1:52:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, so he's under him. Um, he hit me up, he's like, hey, I wanna get into kettlebells now. He's like, I'm looking at the on it ones or whatever, you know, asking the advice, here's the thing, I'm not an expert on the kettlebells, but I do know this, don't get nuts with them. But don't go too light either, though. I bought a kettlebell for my daughter, she's five now. So it's just, it looks cool, it's like the one of the little-

• 1:53:15Jocko Willink?

  24 kilograms.

• 1:53:16Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:53:19Speaker 01

  No, man. Anyway, the smallest one.

• 1:53:22Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:22Speaker 01

  But when I picked that up, I'm like, no matter what fitness level I'm at, this isn't gonna do much for me, so don't go too light, is what I'm saying.

• 1:53:28Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:53:30Speaker 01

  Nonetheless, get them from Onnit. Go onnit.com/jocko. There's some good stuff. Lot of options there. You think you're stuck in a boring, whoop, jocko workout. Super hard, but boring. You're gonna fall off that wagon. Maybe. I don't know. Depends on who you are. But if you want to vary it up, go onnit.com/jocko. Get some, there's some good fitness gear. Also,

• 1:53:52Speaker 01

  when you're getting any of the books that we review on this podcast, I got them organized for you on jockopodcast.com. Click on the top, Books, Book section. Think specifically it says Books from Jocko Podcast. Got them organized by episode, including Rob Jones' Journeys Journal, by the way. Pretty much anything that we're reading, I'm gonna put it on there for access, easy access. And it happens to support, takes you to Amazon. Boom. Get your book. Two-day delivery, one-day delivery, eight-hour delivery sometimes. And, you know, if you're gonna do other shopping, continue on. Do you. Be you.

• 1:54:33Speaker 01

  Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already. iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Spotify.

• 1:54:43Speaker 01

  Stitcher. I already said Stitcher.

• 1:54:46Speaker 01

  Everywhere.

• 1:54:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, everywhere.

• 1:54:47Speaker 01

  Whatever you listen to podcasts on, subscribe.

• 1:54:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:50Speaker 01

  Seems obvious, right? Also, YouTube. If you are interested in the video version of this podcast, you wanna see what Jocko looks like, if you care. You wanna see what I look like, if you care? Which may be a little bit more of a thing, because like, apparently I don't sound how I look. I still get that, by the way.

• 1:55:06Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. No, I just talked to a guy about it the other day.

• 1:55:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:55:08Jocko Willink?

  Yes, yesterday.

• 1:55:10Speaker 01

  That'll never go away, huh?

• 1:55:11Jocko Willink?

  Nope.

• 1:55:12Speaker 01

  Until everyone has seen me.

• 1:55:16Speaker 01

  No one sees me. Anyway, if you're interested in that YouTube video version of this podcast, also excerpts, take little chunks of the podcast and post them, so you can share them, so they don't have to listen to two and a half, three hours of a whole podcast to get one lesson, one specific lesson.

• 1:55:33Jocko Willink?

  That's on a YouTube channel.

• 1:55:34Speaker 01

  On the YouTube channel.

• 1:55:34Jocko Willink?

  And you just made a new video.

• 1:55:36Speaker 01

  I did, yeah. I'm making more videos now.

• 1:55:38Jocko Willink?

  Time is running out.

• 1:55:39Speaker 01

  Time is running out. That was an important one. You know, the, you know, so I'll choose little excerpts or whatever to be like, you know what, this one to me hit harder, this little message that you said. And that one was, because it is one of those ones, because you know how the old saying where it's like, yeah, we know we had to have a limited time on this earth, but we don't act like it, you know, that whole thing. And really, when you think about that, that's more true than I think most people realize. And, you know, that's why people go through like midlife crisis, right? You know, they hit a certain age and they're like, oh my gosh.

• 1:56:11Jocko Willink?

  And get a Corvette.

• 1:56:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, I gotta, I gotta get it back. I don't know. You know, it's that scrambling situation, you know? You're trying to scramble to get, get more in. But, you know, there's gonna come a time you can't do that.

• 1:56:22Jocko Willink?

  There's a little old school footage in there, in that video.

• 1:56:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:56:26Jocko Willink?

  Too. Of, if you wanna see me when I was, I don't know, like 13 or 14.

• 1:56:34Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:56:35Jocko Willink?

  Maybe, yeah, I was probably 14. I'm gonna guess 14.

• 1:56:38Speaker 01

  Bronson's Children.

• 1:56:39Jocko Willink?

  Bronson's Children.

• 1:56:41Speaker 01

  Was that Bronson's Children though? That was straight up it. Because you went through phases, right?

• 1:56:46Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, okay, well, it would be hard to identify fully the actual, because we had a bunch of different names. One of the names of the band was Rage of Discipline.

• 1:56:57Speaker 01

  Rage of Discipline.

• 1:56:58Jocko Willink?

  Rage of Discipline.

• 1:56:59Speaker 01

  Wait, it was never Disciples of Discipline?

• 1:57:01Jocko Willink?

  No, it was not. It was not Disciples of Discipline. It was Rage of Discipline. And it was, it was Struggle, it was Lock and Load, which is really militaristic for someone that wasn't in the military to be like, my band's called Lock and Load. I realize how cheesy that is now.

• 1:57:17Speaker 01

  No, that's pretty dope, actually.

• 1:57:19Jocko Willink?

  Well, I don't know, but anyways.

• 1:57:21Speaker 01

  Rage of Discipline's real military-ish. See, bro, you were you even before.

• 1:57:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, that's what, that's what, the guy who got the video footage from Elgin James, he, when he comes on the podcast, he's like, yeah, I'm gonna tell people. He, I actually just, spoiler alert, because he's like, I can't wait to tell everyone that you had a band called Rage of Discipline when you were 14 years old.

• 1:57:40Speaker 01

  I know, yeah.

• 1:57:42Jocko Willink?

  And I was kinda laughing about that.

• 1:57:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, so you're in the making from the beginning.

• 1:57:48Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, I guess you could say that, but you know, also, I also look back and think, well, man, I did some dumb stuff when I was a kid.

• 1:57:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, you didn't get a handle on the discipline till later, but you know, the seed was there. You know, like a little rattlesnake, you know how they say they're the most dangerous because they can't control the venom? They don't have the discipline, but they want the discipline, that's what I think.

• 1:58:10Jocko Willink?

  That's what I was like, a little rattlesnake.

• 1:58:11Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:58:12Jocko Willink?

  Interesting.

• 1:58:13Speaker 01

  You're right. Nonetheless, you can see these videos on YouTube.

• 1:58:16Jocko Willink?

  Well, the video is a cool video, yeah.

• 1:58:18Speaker 01

  Thanks, Jaco.

• 1:58:18Jocko Willink?

  Good job, Echo Charles.

• 1:58:19Speaker 01

  Thanks. Trying to do more videos. Also, Jaco's store, it's called Jaco's Store, this is where you can get Discipline Equals Freedom shirts. There's that word again, discipline. You know? Iconic one. Also, rash guards on there. Women's stuff on there, hoodies on there. Beanies, here's the thing, beanies have a little bit more of a process, but they're being approved and you know, there's gonna be some beanies on there, new shirt is out.

• 1:58:48Jocko Willink?

  Just in time for summer. Good job.

• 1:58:52Speaker 01

  Hey, man, they're there, you know?

• 1:58:53Jocko Willink?

  They'll need them down in Australia, New Zealand.

• 1:58:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:56Jocko Willink?

  For the summertime down there.

• 1:58:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:58Jocko Willink?

  The southern hemisphere.

• 1:58:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, in Hawaii.

• 1:59:01Jocko Willink?

  You're wearing a new shirt today.

• 1:59:03Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 1:59:03Jocko Willink?

  Is this out?

• 1:59:04Speaker 01

  Back to the book, it's out.

• 1:59:06Jocko Willink?

  It's out, it's available.

• 1:59:07Speaker 01

  Thing is, I didn't say anything, I just kinda snuck it on there. So some people got it.

• 1:59:11Jocko Willink?

  So it's live?

• 1:59:12Speaker 01

  It's live, been live for a day or two.

• 1:59:14Jocko Willink?

  Back to the book.

• 1:59:14Speaker 01

  Back to the book, it's actually good, the front of it has a book. On the back has all the titles that you've reviewed.

• 1:59:21Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 1:59:23Speaker 01

  It's a good one, anyway, you wanna see what that looks like? Jacostore.com. If you want something, get something, it's a good way to support. Also, Psychological Warfare, if you don't know what that is, it's an album with tracks that each track is engineered, it's not music tracks, Jaco tracks, engineered to help you through any moment of weakness that you may stumble upon or that might stumble upon you. Actually, you shouldn't say stumble upon you, cuz that kinda gives the ownership to like, oh, it happens to me, you know what I mean? If you hit weakness, you hit the weakness. Like you, you stumbled on the weakness. You can't blame the weakness, you blame you, see what I'm saying?

• 2:00:02Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 2:00:03Speaker 01

  So any moment of weakness that you happen to stumble upon. There's a track for that procrastination waking up early, the diet stuff falling off the diet wagon. You want to eat some donuts because they're free at work. It's wasteful if you don't eat them. It's disrespectful to the person who bought them.

• 2:00:22Speaker 01

  And you're, you're, you're gonna eat them. That's weak. Stay on the path. And if you need a little spot, psychological warfare, you can get it on iTunes, Amazon Music, various, wherever you can purchase MP3s. Boom. Get it from their psychological warfare. It's a good one. Good way to support too, by the way.

• 2:00:41Jocko Willink?

  Good way to support. Also, if you need some more support, you can get Jocko White Tea. And I've got some bad news and good news. Bad news, they've started testing for Jocko White Tea. So they started testing. They're worried, you know, they see guys just dominating and they're thinking they're probably on Jocko White Tea. The good thing, that's the bad news. Good news is, doesn't matter. Can't test for it. All natural. It's all natural. No one can believe that a fully natural substance can, can raise any human being's deadlift to 8,000 pound minimum. But there it is.

• 2:01:18Speaker 01

  It is.

• 2:01:19Jocko Willink?

  Factual. Factual. All right, books. All right, books. You can get some books. Way the Warrior Kid. This is the book for kids. The book for kids. See the feedback. Go on, go on social media, go on Twitter, go on Facebook, Yboha, and see kids studying, see kids doing pull-ups, see kids doing jiu-jitsu, see kids getting after it. That'll tell you right there. So many parents have said, I can't believe my kid now wants to study. They post little pictures of kids making math flashcards. That's what I'm talking about. Imagine if you get your kid to do math flashcards voluntarily. Boom. So that's what I'm talking

• 2:02:03Jocko Willink?

  about. And now there's Way the Warrior Kid 2, Mark's Mission. In this book.

• 2:02:10Jocko Willink?

  Uncle Jake teaches young Mark and he really teaches the rest of us how to control his temper, how to work hard, how to be frugal and smart with money. There's a little entrepreneurial activity in the book. He also learns how to take care of his gear. He learns how to save his money. He learns how to deal with insults and with verbal abuse and he learns to overcome his fear of failure. That's a lot to learn in one book. Yeah. But it's there. The lessons are there and it's done in a simple, clear way that only Uncle Jake knows how to do.

• 2:02:49Jocko Willink?

  And speaking of entrepreneurial warrior kids, don't forget about Aiden. Young Aiden, he's only 12 years old, but he has a business. He's making soap from goat milk from goats on his farm.

• 2:03:02Jocko Willink?

  And he's not just making any soap. He's making good soap. He's making Jaco soap. You can order it at Irish Oaks Ranch dot com. And the motto, which I thought of not giving Aiden any credit for this. He didn't think of this motto. I thought of the motto. The motto is stay clean. So yeah, get yourself some Jaco soap.

• 2:03:24Jocko Willink?

  You can also get a book called The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual and that's another book. The feedback is awesome. The feedback is awesome. People that get that book and they get on the path. They get stronger, healthier, smarter, more disciplined. They're getting better and they live a better life. And that's awesome to hear. So if you or someone you know needs to know how to get on the path and stay on the path, then the field manual is for them and it'll help them do just that. And for the audio version. It's not on Audible because then you can't have an album with tracks.

• 2:04:06Jocko Willink?

  The audio version is on iTunes, Amazon Music, Google Play, other MP3 platforms. So if you want the audio version, get that.

• 2:04:18Jocko Willink?

  Also, obviously, there's a book called Extreme Ownership. It is combat leadership. These are the lessons that we learned in combat, translated into leadership principles for business and life. And you know what? Still on the Amazon charts right now is number 17 on all Amazon charts for books read or something like that. So, yeah, you gotta dig that. It's still selling and, and, and also announcement, just went over a million copies sold. Yeah, which is pretty legit. So thanks, everyone, for, for doing that, for buying some books, some copies of the books. And by the way, you don't sell a million copies of a books, of a book on just hype.

• 2:05:01Jocko Willink?

  And, and we didn't do it through paid advertising, which I don't even know if you could do it through paid advertising. The book sells because of the word of mouth. So everyone that listens to this podcast buys the book, spreads the word, gets it for other people. You're the reason that that book is selling so well still. So thank you all for spreading the word, telling people, get it for them, get it for their team. Up and down the chain of command, Extreme Ownership, pick it up.

• 2:05:31Jocko Willink?

  Furthermore, Echelon Front, that's my leadership and management consulting company. We solve problems through leadership. That's what we do. And that is how all problems get solved through leadership.

• 2:05:44Jocko Willink?

  So it's me, it's Leif Babin, it's JP Denell, it's Dave Burke. You can email [email protected] or you can go to the website echelonfront.com. And of course, we are approaching the muster. This is the most dynamic leadership conference ever of all time. Tickets are selling. We've already kind of expanded the floor in the location that we have in DC as much as we can to accommodate more people, but I'm telling you, it's gonna sell out. We're only doing two musters this year. One is in Washington DC, May 17th and 18th,

• 2:06:27Jocko Willink?

  and one is in San Francisco, October 17th and 18th. So come, learn, hang out, get your pragmatic leadership skills. And also, it's important to know that there's no green room, there's no backstage. We'll be there hanging out, answering questions, talking, eating, working out, and hanging out with everyone that shows up. So, join us there. You can register at extremeownership.com and also on extremeownership.com. There's a document that we put together. So, some people, they want to come to the conference. They need to run it up their chain of command. And they kind of say, "What should I say up my chain of command? I want my chain of command to pay for it," which is awesome.

• 2:07:12Jocko Willink?

  And the chain of command should pay for it, because they're gonna get back a much better leader in their organization. But we put a document on there, you can, you can click on the link, the little, what's that, the little link? I guess it's called a link. Sure. It's called Creating Leaders at Every Level, and that's also on extremeownership.com. We'll see you there. We'll see you at the muster. And until we do see you at the muster, you can find us interacting and conversing and cruising

• 2:07:43Jocko Willink?

  on the interwebs, on Twitter, on Instagram, and on that

• 2:07:53Jocko Willink?

  is at Echo Charles, and I am at Jocko Willink. And thanks to those of you out there in uniform around the world on foreign lands, in the sky over our heads, and on and under the high seas, protecting us from the evil of the world. Thank you. And thanks to police and law enforcement, to the firefighters and paramedics, and all of you first responders. Thanks for taking care of us and our families when we need it most. And to everyone else out there.

• 2:08:29Jocko Willink?

  The nurses and the doctors working all hours to heal us and the teachers trying to educate our youth and the guys hanging drywall and pouring concrete and roughing in plumbing and electrical and the farmers growing crops and the factory workers building products and the fishermen and the lobster man and the longshoreman and the bankers and the advisors and the salespeople and the waitresses and the cooks and the dishwashers.

• 2:09:01Jocko Willink?

  To all the men and women across the land in every job in every capacity that show up every day. Thanks for listening to us. And thanks for doing your job and doing it well and doing it with pride.

• 2:09:19Jocko Willink?

  And thanks for working hard to make your own luck and to make your part of the world a better place.

• 2:09:29Jocko Willink?

  By going out there.

• 2:09:32Jocko Willink?

  And getting after it. And so until next time, this is Echo and Jaco. Out.