Jocko Underground: It's Harder Than It Looks. Acting, Podcasting, Speaking. Filtering Disinformation.

It's Harder Than It Looks. Acting, podcasting, singing, performing. Adding massive value no matter your rank / position. Filtering Disinformation. How to avoid coming across too harshly. Boy Scouts and Eagle Scouts. Discipline at an early age. Favorite books. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

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

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is the Jocko Underground Podcast number 48, sitting here with Echo Charles. And was thinking through sort of, let's call it the lifespan of the podcast that we do called the Jocko Podcast. And there was a while where, a little while in the beginning, and someone asked me about this the other day, there was a little while in the beginning where we were considering, I was considering, instead of doing it once a week, doing it like once every two weeks, maybe even once a month. And we sort of talked about that. We, we, we kind of broached that topic a little bit on the podcast itself. And I think that was me kind

• 0:45Jocko Willink?

  of trying to socialize that idea a little bit with the people of saying, hey, this is not a real sustainable workload of the amount of effort that it takes to put into doing the podcast. And by the way, doing this podcast, doing the Jocko Podcast and this podcast and the Unraveling Podcast and the Warrior Kid Podcast, like all these podcasts, they're not really my, my primary job. So there's people that have a, like the primary thing that they do with their life is do a podcast, but this isn't really.

• 1:21Speaker 01

  Oh, like other people do podcasts?

• 1:22Jocko Willink?

  Other people that do podcasts, like that's what they do in their life is they do podcasts. That's kind of it. You know, which is cool. This is, this is one portion of what I do. And so the workload is not like, oh, one podcast a week was a lot. I don't know if I can handle it. It was that one podcast a week, plus the bunch of other things I have going on. It didn't seem like it was sustainable. And so I was kind of, I was kind of, you know, socializing the idea with the people of like, hey, you know, we're maybe thinking, well, the feedback was not good from the people. They were like, no, hell no. The first

• 2:06Jocko Willink?

  person I told about it was, was a guy, was, he was a guy I was working with through Echelon Front, and he was like a big listener to the podcast. I don't know how deep we were. We maybe were like 50 deep or something like this. But when I started to tell him, I was like, hey, we're thinking about going to once, you know, once every two weeks, maybe once a month. He was like,

• 2:26Jocko Willink?

  I don't, I don't know if that's a good idea. He was, he was saying it as if I was cutting off oxygen to people. So that made me rethink it. Some of the feedback we got. But yeah, the work, the workload is tough because there's no, there's no staff. There's no one like helping to prep. There's no one doing any research or anything like that. Uh, and so, so that's, so, so we just kind of stuck, stuck it, stuck to it, you know? And then after a little while, after like another probably 50 podcasts, I said to myself that this, the, the, the discipline that was imposed upon me by forcing myself to do this thing

• 3:12Jocko Willink?

  was hugely beneficial. It was making me read more. It was making me write more. It was making me think through things more. It was making me question myself and what I knew or what I thought I knew. So essentially there's a lot of things that I've thought about and put out that I never would have put out if I hadn't have been squeezing on my brain to put it out. There's a lot of books that I wouldn't have read and wouldn't have known anything about if I wouldn't have been saying, hey, I owe a podcast. So therefore I have to read this book because otherwise maybe I'd be, you know, watching, uh, Netflix. And, and, you know, eating popcorn in front of the television for four hours, but no, I'm reading a book for four hours.

• 3:58Jocko Willink?

  What am I doing on a Sunday? I'm reading a book. What am I doing on a Saturday evening? I'm reading a book. What am I doing Saturday day? I'm reading a book. What am I doing Monday afternoon? Oh, I'm prepping. So the, the, the benefit that that's given me has been great to put myself in a position where I kind of have to do this stuff and. I think right now we're gonna keep pushing. Um, now, we, you know, explore some other topics that interest me. But yes, there are other, there are other topics in the world that I'm interested in and that have influenced me and that I've learned from besides just war.

• 4:39Jocko Willink?

  Now, war obviously is my primary mode of thinking. Is that weird?

• 4:47Speaker 01

  Well.

• 4:48Jocko Willink?

  A little bit weird.

• 4:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, for the normal person.

• 4:50Jocko Willink?

  If I'm gonna, if I'm gonna make a comparison, I'm almost always gonna go to war. I'm always, almost always gonna think about some kind of war because the comparison is like, okay, here's an example. We're gonna, we're gonna be able to see the example very clearly because it's gonna be a life and death scenario. This is gonna be a pressure leadership situation, like war is good for that. And that's why I kind of think that way. But I also have gotten things from, things that aren't war, from other aspects of life. From jujitsu is another huge one. But, you know, from surfing, from playing music, from listening to music, from just from other activities and other things and other people in life that I've met along the way. So, you know,

• 5:33Jocko Willink?

  maybe some people will be like, I don't want to hear about that stuff. And that's okay, right? That's what I understand. There's gonna be some people that just want to hear about war. Cool. That's cool. There might, maybe I'll make, maybe we'll make some podcasts that they might not want to listen to. You know, we've had some musicians on here. We've had photographer on here. We've had, we've, we've had business people on, we've, so we've had some other people on the podcast. But

• 6:00Jocko Willink?

  it's okay. Cause I, I think if I'm starting to do something that I'm not, or if I, if I'm chasing something that I'm interested in, then I'm happy about it. And I pursue it and I would look and I'm gonna learn more. And if I learn something, here's the cool thing, just like a book, if I pick up a book to do the podcast on and I get 20 pages into the book and I'm like, this is not gonna get me anywhere. It's not gonna, I have nothing to pass on to anybody from this, then I'm not doing it. Well, if I decide to think about doing a topic and I decide, hey, you know what? Maybe this isn't like, there's nothing to learn here. There's no broad lessons for, for the people. I'm not putting it out. So.

• 6:42Jocko Willink?

  Nah, I think we just keep driving, we will keep driving down this road. We don't know what's up ahead. I legitimately don't know what's up ahead as far as topics, as far as like subject matter, as far as human beings that we bring on or that come on. I don't know. I don't know where it ends up because I'm not, I'm not sure where the road goes, but it has been a long, strange trip this far.

• 7:10Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, I feel like the good, and this is me speaking from an audience member perspective and a fan, where, you know, there's a lot of interesting books and, you know, whether they be about war or not, there's a lot of interesting people, whether they be military people, present, past, or not. But I think that what I'd always really enjoy or learn from or both is kind of your take on all of it. Where, you know, you know, colder than hell, right? Cool, good book, you know? I don't know that I would read that book just on my own, as if you didn't exist. I don't know.

• 7:52Speaker 01

  But hearing it from you, yes, of course, yes, made it like, oh, that's interesting. And, you know, heavy and like all this stuff, but what really, what I really was a fan of was your take on it. And the fact that I could, or someone, I mean, in this case, it's me, where I could ask questions to clarify, what do you think about this element of that? Or how does this apply to you or me or whatever? Like, I feel like that part really has the value of it, which kind of goes in line with kind of what you were saying. But even more than that, and rewind back to you talking about doing it once a week. It kind of put in my head where, you know, how, you know, in the beginning, when we first started,

• 8:33Speaker 01

  a lot of people, a lot of people would, and I really mean it, a lot of people would ask me, hey, like, how do I start a podcast? So much where I put a page on the website saying, this is how you start a podcast. Here's all the equipment or whatever. So I didn't have to, you know, answer the questions all the time.

• 8:50Speaker 01

  So let me ask you, like, how hard is it to do this podcast? Like, as far as hardness goes, I know this is a very specific podcast where you gotta read and do all that stuff. But like, just consider that maybe it wasn't that much work for you, but just, I don't know, maybe arbitrarily, just sort of think. Generally speaking, how hard is it to do a podcast, doing it versus like, seeing it from the outside, what you'd expect?

• 9:11Jocko Willink?

  It's probably a lot harder than it seems like it's gonna be. And, and, and I think the weird thing is, especially now that the, that there's so many different podcasts and there's, look, there's millions of podcasts and maybe, maybe 10% of them are good. Right? Which, which what that means is, so let's say there's a million, I think there's more like, more than a million, but let's just say there's a million, and 10% of them are good. That means there's 100,000 good podcasts to listen to, and you're not even gonna find them. And so if you're jumping into the podcast scene right now, it's gonna be really difficult to get people to start listening to your podcast because

• 9:53Jocko Willink?

  they've already got 999,000 other podcasts, or sorry, they've got 99,000 other podcasts in their download that they're gonna listen to before you get in the game. So I think now it's really hard because there's very little return on investment for having a podcast because the chances of people listening to it are relatively small. Now, if you're doing your podcast because you wanna do it and because you enjoy talking to people and, and you're doing it for yourself, cool, I think that's awesome. And I think that's a great way to go about it, that's, that is kinda how we went about it. We happened to get into the game when it was easier to get into the game,

• 10:36Jocko Willink?

  and we got freaking great support from Tim Ferriss and Joe Rogan, you know, giving us some, giving us some props out of the gate, which kinda brought us up to speed real quick, very lucky for that. But.

• 10:52Jocko Willink?

  And then we just kinda stayed there cuz it wasn't really any other podcast that was like what we're doing. So, yes, I think it's harder than it than it seems. I'd say it's like, you know, oh, I'm gonna be a stand-up comedian. Seems real easy, not real easy. I'm gonna be a, what else, what else looks easy but isn't so easy?

• 11:17Speaker 01

  News anchor.

• 11:18Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna be a news anchor. I could do that.

• 11:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, you just freaking read something or say something about the weather.

• 11:24Jocko Willink?

  Something about the weather. Uh, I think even actor.

• 11:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, acting is big.

• 11:29Jocko Willink?

  Cuz people think, but when you see someone that sucks at acting and occasionally, you know, someone that's some kinda star athlete will get put in a movie. Sometimes they pull it off.

• 11:40Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 11:40Jocko Willink?

  But sometimes they don't.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:42Jocko Willink?

  And you, oh, acting is harder than it looks.

• 11:47Jocko Willink?

  That's a sad statement, but it's true.

• 11:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:50Jocko Willink?

  So I, I think maybe podcasting is like that. I think, I think Rogan definitely makes a lot of people think. Cuz he's, he's one of those people that, you know, when you watch a good surfer, you're like, dude, I think I could, you know, I think I could do that. Because that person's making it look so easy and Rogan makes it look real easy cuz he's just kinda cruising through these conversations.

• 12:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:13Jocko Willink?

  And then you go, oh, you get into a conversation with someone and it's not going somewhere. Joe Rogan is a black belt at finding a place to pick it up and maneuver it and listen and, and push back but not too hard and, and give resistance enough that it makes the person work, which gives more information. Like, he's just a pro. And it seemed cuz he, he's so good at it that it seems kinda like it might be pretty easy.

• 12:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:40Jocko Willink?

  So, you know, the, hey, I'm just gonna kinda do what Joe Rogan does is a real, uh, it's a real ambush waiting to happen to your ego. I'll tell you right here.

• 12:49Speaker 01

  Man, that is so, so true cuz like, especially if you've been following him from the beginning where. You know, when they started, they were on this like the most rudimentary live streaming website. It's called something Justin TV, or sort of Justin dot TV or something like this where him and this guy Red Band, Brian, they would like, and Eddie Bravo would be on there somewhere, and they're just talking and they're like, you listen to it, I'm like, why am I listening to this? Even though it is kind of fun to listen to, it's this guy's talking trash and having fun making jokes and stuff. So even that then, like even that, he had skill in that, which is literally unseen. Like even him making like dumb jokes on the fly or whatever, they're kind of funny. He's a comedian, so he knows how to do that.

• 13:31Speaker 01

  So, and as he evolved, just, and it seemed really natural too, where he just got more and more into the conversational kind of part of it. But at the same time, it wasn't like this prepared performance like you might see on TV or something like this. And you know, some people, they can do a performance on a play or something like this. And you'd be like, oh, he nailed that. I don't think I could do that or a singer or something. But a conversationalist, man, it's kind of like the better they are, the less you see of the craft, you know? And, and to most of us, we were like, oh man, that'd be the best job ever. All I gotta do is nothing. Basically, basically just be me and talk to these freaking cool people or whatever. So, yeah, like, man.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  So when we started, um, when you would talk, you're like kind of the same way where you're just literally the exact same person off the mic as you are on the mic. But when you get on the mic as a normal person, it's like, oh, you're

• 14:29Speaker 01

  you're on the mic now and it's way different. Just like how you said, the actors, like, you know, I can act and once all the cameras are on and everyone's watching you and the microphone's in your face and you're like, oh, like, bro, you don't know what to do. It's like, yeah.

• 14:41Jocko Willink?

  At Echelon Front, when we're making like, uh, videos at Echelon Front for, for training, for putting out word. And everyone's joke is like, is everyone knows what they're gonna say and then the camera hits record. And everyone just goes into brain lock and it takes nine takes to get a forty five second video.

• 14:59Speaker 01

  It's true, bro. That's real. You know, so that's like a skill. It's one of those unseen skills, you know? And it's really, really critical. So. Um, so that's what I noticed. And then here's when I really noticed it when we started and then a lot of people that we know, um, they come to me and ask me, hey, I want to start a podcast and all this stuff. And I'm thinking to myself, oh yeah, I know, I know how you feel. Freaking like when I heard Joe Rogan freaking, I wanted to start a podcast like my dream career would be that right there. Just sit in my own house or my basement or some place that I made up and talk to my friends and talk trash and just get paid for that. This is the best job in the world.

• 15:36Jocko Willink?

  You kind of do have your dream job in a way.

• 15:37Speaker 01

  Yep, I do. It's even better because there's no pressure. I can just let you talk, you know?

• 15:44Speaker 01

  But so I understood, but they'd be like, hey, what advice do you have or whatever? And that's what I would say. And here's another phenomenon that I would see where some people, some people, they embrace the cameras and all that. And then they act like a different person. It's like all of a sudden they're this like dramatic expert now, you know? And it's like, bro, he doesn't sound right. So that and then, um, and then the other main thing as far as advice that I would give, and I still would, will give is like, you gotta keep doing it.

• 16:16Jocko Willink?

  Well, okay, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna say this because a lot of the people along the way that we saw that would like start a podcast and then would stop.

• 16:25Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 16:25Jocko Willink?

  And it's probably good that they stopped. It's, look, there's a lot of people that started podcasts along the way. And like they would tag us, hey, just did our first episode or whatever. Tell us what you think or something like this. And I'm talking, this is like five years ago. This is, and I listened to him and be like, you know, hey, sounds good, whatever. I'm, I'm not like, I don't even know who the person is. What I'm gonna say like, hey, what I'd recommend is your format. You know, I wasn't gonna do this. Like you, you, because also I never think that I'm gonna be right about stuff. I don't think that, I don't even think, I don't think and didn't think I was right about the, our podcast. Like, hey, I think this is gonna be the big, you know, this is gonna be,

• 17:05Jocko Willink?

  people are gonna really want to listen about the freaking Holocaust and the Holocaust and, and prisoner of war camps. It's gonna be great and lovely. People like, I, I didn't have that feeling. I thought some people might like to listen to it. So I wasn't going to tell someone that had done a podcast like, well, I don't think people are gonna want to listen to this because I'm not normal and I don't know. I don't know what normal people are gonna want to listen to. So I think what you're saying is, You're not gonna get traction. Very seldom are you gonna get traction quickly. But also, there's a chance you're just not gonna get traction. There's a chance that whatever you're doing, maybe isn't that, it doesn't appeal to people.

• 17:47Jocko Willink?

  And, and what really sucks about that is there's a chance that you, whoever you are, don't appeal to people. When you're in that mode, whatever mode you're projecting, cuz you're right, like, like I said, at Echelon Front, like, will, when we hit record for some one minute video, like, I just say what I would normally say and I'm done. There you go. It was like, oh, I did it once. Hey, you wanna know about decentralized command? Blah blah blah, I'll say it. And then, cool, press stop and walk away.

• 18:14Jocko Willink?

  Some other members of the team, they like get in the mode of like, okay, I need to say something, you know, profound, or, or I need to put a little zing on it, or whatever. And then they're not being themselves, then it's hard to do. It's hard to pretend to be someone else and.

• 18:30Speaker 01

  Not to mention that, you know.

• 18:31Jocko Willink?

  And they get jammed up. And we laugh at them. It's a fun, no, I'm saying like, they laugh at themselves too. They laugh at themselves too.

• 18:38Speaker 01

  Well, you know how you said in stunt driving or whatever you guys learned?

• 18:41Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 18:42Speaker 01

  Uh, where you gotta focus on, like, if you're trying to shoot a gap, or, or make it through a gap, you gotta focus on the gap. Don't try to avoid the cars or the sides.

• 18:48Jocko Willink?

  Don't look at the car you might hit.

• 18:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:50Jocko Willink?

  You'll hit that car.

• 18:51Speaker 01

  So when you're on, on the, on camera or something, if you start trying to not mess up, bro, you're gonna be messing up all the time, man.

• 19:00Speaker 01

  But, I don't know. Yeah, it's, um, that's, that's an interesting thing where it's like, it's way harder than it looks. And it's almost like you won't even believe it until you do it. It's like, oh, of course it is. Like, acting, that's such a good example, cuz I did some acting before. So have you, SAG member?

• 19:20Speaker 01

  Um, and I thought, ah, I'm not.

• 19:22Jocko Willink?

  Is the main acting that you did, the movie that you made?

• 19:25Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, you know, a bunch of.

• 19:26Jocko Willink?

  Did you do more than that, that I don't know about?

• 19:28Speaker 01

  No, all the acting, I don't even, you know about.

• 19:30Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so this is acting that you did for your own, uh, for your own work?

• 19:35Speaker 01

  For a movie I did, yeah, that, yeah, my own movie, and then, just like, even little videos, let's face it, I'm freaking acting in that thing. Lower level than you, I understand, yeah. But nonetheless, nonetheless.

• 19:49Speaker 01

  The point is, it doesn't matter. When the cameras roll and everyone's looking at you and then you gotta memorize lines, you gotta project a certain emotion, whatever, you know? Until you jump in there, but like, yeah, it's, it's almost impossible to understand that how much harder it is than it looks.

• 20:07Jocko Willink?

  I would not wanna have to memorize so many lines like every week for, if you're on a TV show, like when I was, when I was on Billions and those guys had all these lines. I had to memorize like four lines, bro. And they were lines that I already used in my regular life. It wasn't like, so they were like, you know, just basic stuff that I already said. So it wasn't like some weird character I was playing. I was just being me.

• 20:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:32Jocko Willink?

  And I, and even that, I was kinda like, uh-oh. Uh, cuz I showed up, I didn't know you actually had to memorize. I thought, I thought acting, I thought the whole thing was kinda more. That is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Jocko Underground Podcast. So if you wanna continue to listen, go to jacood underground.com and subscribe. And we're doing this, we're doing this to mitigate our reliance on external platforms. So we are not subject to their control. And we're doing this so that we can support the Jocko Podcast, which will remain as is, free for all, as long as we can keep it that way. But we, but we are

• 21:15Jocko Willink?

  doing this so we don't have to be under the control of sponsors. And we're doing it so we can give you more control, more interaction, more direct connections, better communications with us. And to do that, we are, we're building a website right now where we'll be able to utilize to strengthen this legion of troopers that are in the game with us. So thank you. It's jacood underground.com. It costs $8.18 a month. And if you can't afford to support us, we can still support you. Just email assistance@jacood underground.com and we'll get you taken care of. Until then, we will see you mobilized underground.