Embracing Identity: A Veteran's Journey Through Transition with Kairi Saraya

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When Kairi Saraya walked into our studio, a wave of stories untold and life experiences unbeknownst to many came with her. As a former Air Force veteran turned advocate, Kairi's tale isn't just about service to the country, but also about the courage in serving her true self. Today's heartfelt discussion unveils the complex fabric of the transgender community, with Kairi guiding us through her personal odyssey towards acceptance. We uncover the nuances of gender identity, the societal hurdles, and the internal battles faced during such a profound transformation. Embracing one's truth can be a tumultuous path, yet here, Kairi exemplifies resilience and the power of living an authentic life.

Parenting is no small feat, and it takes on an added dimension of complexity when intertwined with mental health challenges and a transitioning parent. Kairi opens up about retaining the essence of fatherhood through her transition, striking a delicate balance that maintains family bonds and respect for everyone's role within the familial unit. As we traverse the alarming intersection of suicide rates among veterans and transgender individuals, we confront the dire need for emotional literacy. Together, we stand firm in our mission to dismantle misconceptions and advocate for support systems that recognize the individual stories and struggles, emphasizing the vital importance of connection and support.

The conversation then extends beyond the personal and into the societal, examining the strides in military inclusivity and the role of performance rather than identity. Kairi's initiative within the gaming community showcases the therapeutic potential of virtual worlds as sanctuaries for veterans seeking camaraderie and understanding. Our episode is a testament to the strength found in shared experiences and the unity of purpose within these communities. As we navigate the topics of sports, gaming, and the importance of emotional literacy, we celebrate the collective journey of growth and understanding, honoring the diverse paths that lead us to become the best versions of ourselves. Join us in this episode for an enriching exploration of life's complexities and the beautiful spectrum of human identity.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:43):
All right, welcome back everybody to another
episode of the Do-Hard Thingspodcast.
I'm your host, jt leadershiptrainer, speaker, adventure
coach, founder of the Do-HardThings Nation, and I'd like to
welcome you to another episode.
This podcast is about learning,growth, leveling up so you can
be the best version of yourself,achieve your highest potential
and be the role model that ourcountry desperately needs us to
be.
In today's episode, we haveKairi Sarayah.

(01:05):
How are you doing, kairi?
Doing good Surprise.
I'm super excited about thisepisode.
We ran across each other nottoo long ago and I was surprised
.
I'm not going to lie, we'll getinto that here momentarily, but
I'm glad you're here.
We're going to talk about yourjourney with being transgender.

(01:25):
I have some questions and Iknow this is going to be a
fantastic episode.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
I'm all for it.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
Awesome.
But before we get into today'sepisode, real quick, make sure
you smash the subscribe buttonso you're notified of future
episodes.
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Go over to iTunes.
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Take a few minutes If you'vegained any value.
I know you might be a Spotifylistener Maybe you're watching
us on YouTube but go over toApple iTunes.

(01:53):
Leave us an honest review.
They really do go a long way toexpanding our reach and
audience.
That means a lot to mepersonally, so, thank you.
Share it with a couple of yourfriends.
There's no doubt that what wetalk about today will be useful,
insightful, beneficial tosomeone out there.
Take a screenshot, share itwith a couple of your friends.
Our contact information is inthe show notes.

(02:14):
If you have a question for meor a comment, or a Kyrie you
want to reach out, all thatinformation will be in the show
notes, so check us out there.
This episode is sponsored byLions Guide.
Lions Guide is a growth agency.
We feel that everyone is aleader and we make leaders
better.
Sometimes you feel like beingthe one in charge can be
incredibly overwhelming Withoutthe right support.

(02:36):
You can feel like you're hardlykeeping up with demands.
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Maybe you find yourselfoverwhelmed and rather than
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Well, it doesn't have to bethat way.
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(02:57):
We'll fly out to you and host aworkshop to help you dominate
and scale on your team.
So go to wwwlionsguidecom.
I'm the high performancedevelopment director there and
I'm on the team and we're hereto serve.
This episode is also brought toyou by UARD, the University of
Applied Research and Development.
We help veterans obtain theirbachelor and master's degree in

(03:20):
emergency management.
You study abroad in New Zealandfor a short trip or a longer
trip up to three months.
It's a fully funded VA program.
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This is specifically forveterans.
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That's the goal for every newstudent.

(03:41):
It's nontraditional distancelearning, so it's very flexible,
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(04:01):
Project link.
You can also go towwwuarduniversity.
Reach out to me directly.
We can get you in contact withan academic advisor see if this
is right for you.
But it's too great of a programto just, you know, not pay
attention to you.
So go check it out.
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And finally, if you need some DoHard Things merch or gear, hats
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(04:21):
That's how you can support theshow, show the world that you do
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I got this awesome Do HardThings hat.
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We got all sorts of stuff toget you motivated and all high
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Thank you for everything thatyou do to support and all the
behind the scenes stuff.
Everything that you see herecould not do it without my

(04:42):
wonderful wife, so all right.
So a little bit about Kyrie.
Kyrie Saraya is a former UnitedStates Air Force veteran,
specializing in intelligence andworked in special operations.
Kyrie is a parent lover, gamer,transgender, dreamer, board
president and executive directorof veterans gaming and mental
health mission.
And, kyrie, I'm excited to haveyou here today.

(05:04):
Thanks for being here.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
Thanks for having me on.
I'm super excited to just havesome free flowing thought, and
even if it reaches one personthat can help them in some way,
shape or form, then I'm all forit.

Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I had reached out to you,I think, via the Millennial
Veteran Group.
I was just trying to connectwith veterans, do some research,
just trying to connect as I'mcreating some programs for
transitioning veterans.
And you'd booked a call and, tomy surprise, when we hopped on,
I'm like whoa, what's this?

Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yo yes absolutely.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
I was like what's going on here and we had a
fantastic conversation and if Isay something, just preface the
conversation today.
If I say something off-putting,offensive, out of line, please
let me know.
I'm generally curious about thetopic here and I think for me

(05:56):
personally it was like oh wow,what a great opportunity.
Because in my 44 years on thisplanet, my knowledge and
communication, I don't know muchabout the transgender community
.
It's a big topic in society,especially as I approach the
tail end of my military career.
There's a lot of policies inplace and I'm just like there's

(06:18):
a lot of things happening and Idon't feel like I know much
about this and it's easy to.
I know it because I've hadconversations like this is a
mental health issue.
This is like what is going on.
This is so weird.
It's counter to my religion andmy politics and, as we were
talking before I came on today,or before we started this, today

(06:40):
we need to have theconversation about love and
acceptance and sharedunderstanding of what it means
to be transgender, and withunderstanding we can make better
decisions and have betterconversations and have more
gratitude and appreciation andunderstanding.
So that's why I'm personallyexcited about today's

(07:00):
conversation.
So where do we start today?
How do you want to start thisoff?

Speaker 2 (07:04):
I can kick it off with my preface too, like I
don't want you to take this thewrong way, but you don't have
the power to offend me andnobody does.
So like questions are totallynatural.
Most people don't wake up andsay, oh, I'm the other gender,
like ah, that makes it makesense, so it's.
I don't want to say it'sunnatural, it's out of the norm.

(07:26):
So like questions are totallynatural and I'm not one of those
people that are on the edge ofmy seat like waiting to be
offended at something you say oryou know.
I don't buy into that type ofculture either, because I come
from a perspective ofunderstanding.
I mean, I stumbled into thisrealization by accident when I

(07:47):
started my journey.
It was not to be nonprofitstreamer girl, I wanted to be
the big time streamer guy.
I had no clue.

Speaker 1 (07:57):
Well, I think you bring a great point because I
think people are scared to havethe conversations because of
cancel culture.
Everyone is so like triggerhappy about trying to gun people
down in regards like sociallyand put people down and we're
tiptoeing around a lot of likedeeper conversations and I think
it stifles understanding.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
I love the mindset of you can't offend me, right,
because that means that you'rein a really positive mindset.

Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yeah, and I don't.
I don't like cancel culture.
I think it's pretty lame, likeit started, as most movements do
, organically and from a placethat was seemingly pure, but
it's developed into a weapon andit's a silencing tool.
And you know who else silencedpeople Hitler.
You know that's not the freedomI fought for, my, the freedom

(08:45):
that I understand, the freedomthat I fought for, the freedom
that you fought for, that everyveteran out there fought for, is
the freedom to do as you please, as long as you ain't hurt
nobody else.

Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:57):
Say.
I mean, if you got hate in yourheart, let it out, dude, let's
hear it.
We don't have to agree and I'mnot here to change people's
ideals or ideology and like whatthey believe is and isn't.
You know, because I just am, Idon't know how else to say it.
I mean, you know, it's like mybest friend, one of my best

(09:18):
friends literally told me like,dude, I can't see you as
anything other than a dude in awig, but I still love you.
And I sat on that for like twomonths, like man, that really
bothers me, like why does itbother me so much?
Like why can't he see me as thewoman that I feel, like I am?
And then it dawned on me like,oh, but I still love you.

(09:39):
That's the only part thatmattered in that whole sentence.
Like he doesn't have to agreewith how I see things and how I
present, and because he's notsaying don't do it.
He's a veteran too.
You know he fought for thatsame freedom.
Go for it.
Do you think, girl?
It's just how he sees me and it, you know it doesn't coincide
with his religion, which is fine, you know, I understand that.

(10:01):
But I do want to be atrailblazer in some regards to
lead to a better path ofunderstanding.
Like, when I came out, I reallyfell in this hole of you know,
you come out and you're justbreaking out of this mold of
what people think you are, andthen I found myself falling into

(10:21):
another mold of what I thoughtbeing transgender was.
And then I had to have a someinterpersonal conversation and
realization and then I was likeyou know, these people that I'm
following on Twitter and stuff,like I don't agree with them.
I'm pretty conservative in alot of things and you know,

(10:42):
comparatively to them, they'reall, like you know, defund, the
police,anti-dissacelioritarianism.
Like you know stuff that theyhave no idea what they're
talking about and I just don'talign with that.
So it dawned on me like I don'thave to fit any other mold, I
can just beat.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
How did you, how did, when did you learn?
Or how did this come about that, hey, when was the realization
that you know what I amtransgender?
Can you describe that processfor us?

Speaker 2 (11:11):
All right, I'm going to try to make a super nuanced
story a bit shorter.
I had at the time I was stillJcard on Twitch.
I was a streamer and I wasstarting to develop a community
and then that little gaggle, itwas literally called Jcard's
community toilet, Like it wasjust a joke.

Speaker 1 (11:29):
But was this before the military, or during or after
?

Speaker 2 (11:31):
This was 2021, after the military, mid mid 2021.
I had already been on this likeendeavor of finding healing in
myself and then, once I foundhealing, I wanted to share that
with people.
I wanted other people to feelthe joy that I finally achieved
because, like I have eight and ahalf years of alcoholism under

(11:52):
my belt, I know what chasingthat dragon is and I finally
caught it.
And I caught it when anindividual, a former Navy SEAL,
came to me and said hey, dude,three nights ago, when you had
me on your stream, I just wantedto let you know that was the
night I planned on ending mylife and the only reason I

(12:12):
didn't was because you saidhello to me.
That's all it took.

Speaker 1 (12:16):
I was like wow.

Speaker 2 (12:17):
So I knew there was something bigger going on.
I was already on this endeavorof helping people.
I wasn't quite to the stage oflike, let's do a nonprofit, but
this certain individual came tome and I didn't know what to do.
They said you know, jay, I'm inmy fifties, I have my family

(12:39):
will never understand it andI'll make up a name for all
intents and purposes, but mywhole life I've been Danielle
and I've felt like a Dan and Iwas like what?
I don't know anything aboutthat, like I don't.
I couldn't figure out a way tohelp them.
So I came up with an idea.

(12:59):
I was like what if?
What if?
I went live dressed as a womanand didn't tell anyone, just to
show them that, like, the rightpeople in your life will stay,
the wrong ones will go, it'llsort itself out and it'll cut
your own bad fruit off of yourtree in the process.
So I called my girl, kelly.
She lives 45 minutes away.

(13:19):
She got here in 30 minutesafter.
I said Kelly, I need you toturn me into a woman and she
came over with all her makeup,she brought a wig, she brought
everything.
And you know, I, like a dudewould.
I'm sitting here like, oh, dude, like woman, like this is going
to be funny man.
But I like to say I fuckedaround and found out because I

(13:43):
went down the hallway, looked inthe mirror and looked and I was
like, oh, and then it was likethis weird, weird feeling of
like what is that?
And I can't deal with that.
I got to go stream right nowand I did.
I went and streamed and it wentwell, that she now lives his

(14:05):
life as he.
But then I was like what theheck was that feeling?
What did I just experience?
So I went on like a three, fourmonth deeply introspective and
public journey of likequestioning what did I like so
much about seeing?
That was why did I finally feellike at the time I was 29?
Why did I finally feel at 29that I saw a version of me that

(14:29):
I could love?
And it was questions that Iasked myself like is it some
weird Freudism?
Is it filling the void of nothaving the woman in your life
that you desire?
Is it fetishizing yourself?
Like all these reallycritically objective questions.
And after I went through thewhole list at my you know I

(14:55):
tried to fight it I was like Idon't want it to be.
I don't want it to betransgender.
I don't want to be transgenderbecause at the time, I didn't
know what that entailed.
I was scared of it, but Iultimately concluded live on
stream.
That's what it was like.
My exact words quote fuckingshit, dudes, turns out I'm
transgender.
Like I had no clue.

(15:16):
Here we are.
We'll figure it out as we go,but that's how I stumbled into
it.

Speaker 1 (15:23):
What was that journey like?
Is you know?
What do people, your closestfriends, say?
What did your family say?
Were you?
You?
Were you still married at thispoint in time?

Speaker 2 (15:33):
No, I got divorced back in 2013.
Um, I was single at the time.
My family they did not take itwell, Actually, they didn't take
it at all.
They dropped me immediately,you know, which was kind of
funny.
Eight and a half years oframpant, addiction and rehabs
and all this stuff, and but thethe, the one line is like I feel

(15:55):
more feminine inside thanmasculine.
They're like no, we're out.
We're just kind of silly if youthink about it, but I've lost a
couple of friends over it, youknow, because they don't get it
and they don't want to get it,and I can't like that's not,
they don't have to get it.
I can't make them want to getit.
Like, if they love me for who Iam, they would stay.

(16:16):
The right ones will stay andthe wrong ones will go.
So that's truly what I believe.

Speaker 1 (16:24):
Yeah, absolutely.
So what was the biggest?
What has been the biggestchallenge for you coming out and
and embracing this as your,your identity?
What has been the mostchallenging aspect of this?

Speaker 2 (16:47):
Really being 30 years old and really finally finding
who I am.
Like I just had no clue who Iwas at all, my place in the
world, what my role is, where Ibelong.
And then I I couldn't find itand then I was like I'll just
make it, I'll just make where Ibelong.

(17:08):
I think the hardest thing,truthfully, was the family.
That's weighed on me prettyheavy.
You know, I have children and Itried and tried and tried to
put it off but, like through HRTand stuff, changes started
happening and they were noticingchanges so I had to sit the
kids down and that was prettyhard.

(17:29):
I was really scared of that.
They're 10 and 11 and likenobody has a guide for parenting
, let alone how to tell yourkids you're trans, like, hey,
your dad feels like a woman.
Yeah, how?
I mean, I'm always going to betheir father, first and foremost
.
Like regardless of if I go by,she, her, you know, feel more

(17:51):
feminine.
I'm always going to be theirfather and I made that clear to
them that's my role in theirlife.

Speaker 1 (17:57):
So this might be a so nuanced question.
You're always going to be theirfather.
Why not mother?

Speaker 2 (18:06):
I feel like mother is a title that I didn't earn.
Because, like mother to me islike you carried that baby, you
created that, like it takes twoto tango and both parties take,
take their place in creating ababy.
But a woman carries that babyand just states it for nine
months and then delivers a baby.
And if I just come in like oh.

(18:26):
I'm trans, so I'm a mother now,like I just number two yeah.
I don't know.
For me personally, like forother dichotomies, it may work
perfectly well, that's you know.
It could be totally different,because there's no one size fits
all with this.
It is very nuanced, like yousaid, but to me it just felt
like I was taking away fromtheir birth mother, and I don't

(18:48):
want to do that.
I'm not here to take.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
No, that's, that's a it's very interesting take on
that and I curious on that Noware you, are you attracted to
other females?
Men both.

Speaker 2 (19:05):
That's a good question, because I asked myself
that I was like well, what doesthis mean for my sexuality?
Well, it doesn't mean anythingfor my sexuality, it's not
correlated with it.
Now let me tell you, the datinggame has been pretty sweet ever
since I came out because Istill like I have my preference

(19:26):
as a guy I had explored andexperienced.
I guess if you had to put alabel on it, I would be
considered pansexual.
I don't really care aboutlabels, Like you know I.
What does that mean for thosethat that may not fully?

Speaker 1 (19:39):
understand what that term means to my understanding,
and don't crucify me if I'mwrong Listener?

Speaker 2 (19:45):
I don't know.
You can't crucify me if I'mwrong listeners out there, but
to my understanding it is thatit's more about hearts, not
parts.

Speaker 1 (19:53):
Yeah, you don't, you don't, you don't really see
gender, you just love orattracted to the person.

Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, kind of like, kind of, but that's almost like
saying I don't see color and Idon't buy into that either.
Like, like, yeah, I see color.
I see the adversity in us.
I see our differences.
I see the different uniquestruggles that each color has
had to go through.
So I don't know it's.

(20:21):
It's like I'm I'm struggling tofind words for it.
I realized that there was amisconception that even I had
being the transgender person,because you have your, you have
your hearts, not parts thatmentality, but you still have

(20:41):
your preference, almost like aspectrum.
You know, if this was zero to100, you know it would be like
100% women, trans women, becauseI like femininity, I figured
out that that's what I like.
And then men, you know, ormasculinity, would be like lower
on the spectrum.
That's not not there.

(21:02):
I'm open minded.
I have some guy could come inand sweep me off my feet one day
.
It would surprise me, but it'spossible.
I mean, shit, I didn't.
If I can wake up one day belike, oh, I'm trans, like
anything is possible.
But I know what I like and Iknow my preference.
I did explore as a guy andfound where I landed on that

(21:23):
scale and then realized thatthose two really don't have
anything to do with one anotherand I thought that my dating
pool would be so small.
A trans woman who dates womenand Jay.
Let me tell you something theyjust love that shit.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
That's awesome, that's awesome it's, it's been
pretty great, oh, we're good.
Well, let's go.
Let's rewind back to your kidsNow.
What did your kids say themoment?
Just describe that moment likewhere were you?
Were you dressed like when you,when you saw them?
Or you dressed like you'redressed now, or what did?

(22:02):
No, I was seen for us there.

Speaker 2 (22:05):
Yeah, sure, I was still in this like interim of
like.
I was dressing when theyweren't around and presenting as
they weren't around, but whenthey were around I was male, you
know, presenting as a guyrather, because the reason I
correct that is I think there'smale and female, that's science.
I'm always genetically going tobe a male, like the X Y

(22:26):
chromosome, male puberty.
That's what I went through.
It's always going to be thecase.
But I think man and woman issomething different, and this is
just my personal belief, mytake on it.
I I sat them down and I saw itas a unique opportunity because
they're very close in age andthey're almost like twins.
So their their whole life, upto 10 and 11 years old.

(22:50):
Well, they were.
I guess there were nine and 10at the time.
They've always been hey guys,do y'all want to do?
Y'all want to do this or whatdo y'all think about?
What a y'all?
And it was a unique opportunityto sit them down one on one and
give them some sense of self.
And so I sat them down one byone, and I did my daughter first
, because I knew she would be alittle easier to go about she's.

(23:14):
She's younger, but she's alittle bit more mature, as as is
often the case with little boysand girls.
I had my Facebook pulled up,kairi Saraya, and I was like hey
, I want to talk to you aboutsomething.
I'm not really sure how to goabout it.
Just know that I love you and Iwant you to understand as best

(23:40):
I can explain what I'm about totell you.
There's no wrong answer here.
Anything you say stays with us.
You can say whatever comes toyour mind in this conversation.
Right now we're on level ground.
But do you see this girl?
Do you see this girl and mydaughter?
She was like yeah, and I saidthat's me.

(24:08):
She was like OK, so can I playwith your wigs.
I mean like, what's the deal?
Like she was so good with it.
She like she didn't care, youknow, she took it really well
and we had a conversation about,like I realize I just feel more
feminine than you likemasculine.
You know I've done the wholemasculine thing.
I've been a guy.
I kind of conquered thatmountain and it led me to

(24:29):
December 21st of 2020.
That was the night I tried toend my life.
My name used to be Justin Idon't care about dead name Like
oh, don't use my dead name.
Like what you're going to denythe past, like that was who you
were.
So I don't mind bringing him up.
And Justin was tired man.
Justin couldn't do it no moreand it was Kairi's time to shine

(24:52):
.
I think she's always been inthere.
When I did that deepinterpersonal introspection I
came to, I came to realize likethat feeling I had in the mirror
at 29 years old, I'd had itbefore, I'd had it as a young
seven year old child, wellbefore like sexual maturity.
So that's that helped meeliminate.

(25:13):
Is it something sexual?
I had it again in my teens andI had a pretty traumatic
childhood.
I mean I could probablyremember 10 things total from my
childhood.
But this day, clear as day man,I was at my buddy Shane's house
.
I lived in Pittsfield, mass.
We were going snowboarding on aSaturday.

(25:33):
I just got a PS2 and I wasshowing him Kingdom Hearts, like
I remember all of it, and therewas a character in the game
called Kairi.
And when she came on the screenI'm like 13, 12 or 13 at the
time and that feeling hit me andI'm standing there with my
buddy and my butt tightened up,like oh so uncomfortable, like
how do you deal with that at 13?
I didn't know what it was, butI'd had that feeling before.

Speaker 1 (25:58):
And what was?
What was the feeling.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
I still yet to put it into words accurately.
The best I've come up with is Avery strange, unfamiliar,
uncomfortable comfort.

Speaker 1 (26:17):
An uncomfortable comfort.
What was the uncomfortableaspect of it?
Because it was like what isthat feeling?

Speaker 2 (26:22):
What does that mean?
And what, what, what's going oninside of me?
And then you know the machoismof a guy, or the guy that was in
me, you know, in the, the egoand pride that I carried with
that was like you know, not, not, you know, that's, that's,
that's wussy man, you know, thatis like I saw it as weak, like

(26:44):
I saw it as weak, and then I waslike whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Are you telling me and this wasmy thoughts to myself are you
telling me you see women as weak?
Well, you go in there and havea baby.
You go in there and do yourthing, you know.
So it really led me to likereally check in myself and where
I had some deep beliefs, likedeep seated beliefs, just from

(27:07):
indoctrination and how I wasraised, of like traditional
roles.
But I'm here to tell you, man,tradition and heritage is dead
people's baggage and I ain'there to carry that.

Speaker 1 (27:22):
So did you see the character?
Like where you like, inspired,like you just saw yourself, like
?
Did that character like the wayyou're dressed now?
Is that what you took on andembodied Like?
What was it about thatparticular character?

Speaker 2 (27:37):
I would say maybe at first, but like just the scene
that she's brought up is she'sjust shown as like she's shown
as love in a nuanced kind of way, and then she gets cut off from

(28:01):
the main character and theyfall apart in the video.
And that video is the intro toKingdom Hearts.
I it was almost like itpersonified my internal struggle
, because Kairi's always been inthere.
I just didn't know her.
I didn't want to know her, Iwas afraid of her, I didn't want
to think about it.
That's why I repressed it andthen my subconscious held onto

(28:23):
it until it was like here you go.
Just to fully answer yourquestion, because I kind of went
around about, way I'd say, inthat regard.
Yeah, I did try to embody herin the beginning, but then over
the course of time I did find meand what I felt was how I

(28:46):
wanted to present.

Speaker 1 (28:50):
So bottom line, I guess we're rewind just a little
bit.
This is you telling yourdaughter your daughter had no
really issue with it.

Speaker 2 (28:57):
Right.
She was basically like, can Iplay with her wigs?
Can we do makeup together?
Like she was with it and my sonhe's a year older, but he
didn't.
I had the same conversation,sat them down, the same way,
we're on level field, and Ilooked at him and I said do you
see that girl?
And he said yeah, I said that'sme and he didn't get it.

(29:20):
He was like what, almost likeit kind of broke my heart and
away because I could see it likeyou're my dad, how can you be a
woman if you're my dad?
How could I be?
Until I realized like, dude, Ican still be your dad, even if I

(29:41):
present feminine Cause.
Like let me tell you, I had avery successful MMA career.
I did special operations andthis motherfucking weird come
off real quick if somebody needsto get up at E, you know what
I'm saying.
So like I still have that, thatinstallation in me to like
protect and teach him man stuffwhich would be not PC.
These days I don't care aboutPC, you know what I mean and I'm

(30:05):
not here to offend you bysaying that.
So that's where I kind of drawmy line in the sand with like
cancel culture If there's abetter way to say it.
Please educate me If I can sayit with more nuance.
I'm all ears for it.
That's the best way I know howto put it.
But he didn't get it.
And even a couple months in,like I'd walk through the

(30:30):
kitchen and he'd be at hiscomputer you know, we're just
kind of doing our own thing andhe would look and then double
take and be like, oh, and Ireally don't.
I can't understand the fullscope of the effect it's gonna
have on him until later on inlife when he can articulate and
fully fathom.
You know the whole picture.

(30:55):
My only goal as a parent was toset out and let them know that
they're loved and know what loveis Cause I know I'm gonna screw
up as a parent, I know they'regonna need therapy.
Looking where I came from, theygot it pretty good.
And as long as they know whatlove is and that they are loved
unconditionally, then Iaccomplished my job.

Speaker 1 (31:18):
Well, I commend you cause you're still here, right?
You talked about that brushwith, you know, suicide ideation
and going down that path, right, and I've walked that path
myself and it's a horrible placeto be and you know that's so.
Commend you for owning it, andyou know.

Speaker 2 (31:36):
And thank you for sharing that too, man, cause
your story does have power.
I mean, I truly believe andthis is coming from somebody
that doesn't really believe inanything any higher.
You know, I think we're here ona rock flying through space by
chance, but I truly believe thatnobody should ever feel the way

(31:58):
that I felt that night, or theway you felt that night, the way
anybody felt the night, thatthey were so close or even
attempted that.
It's just, it's inhuman to feelthat way and I don't want
anyone to ever have to gothrough that, if I can help it.

Speaker 1 (32:16):
It's a great way to describe it it's inhuman.
It's the lowest feeling youcould possibly feel, dude,
beyond that.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
I can put myself back there and it is so scary, like
I'm not.
I'm not going to get emotional.
I'm going to try not to atleast, but I was.
I was doing the same thing Idid every night for eight years
drinking alone, listening to thesame sad songs, watching the
intro to like Save and PrivateRyan, just self triggering,

(32:49):
spiraling.
The algorithm had me down to aT.
It knew what songs I wanted anda song came on and a line
played that said in that momentI don't even think twice the end
of a shattered life.
And I said that's it, I'm done.
And it was so scary Because Iwasn't scared, I wasn't full of

(33:13):
hate, I wasn't full of pain, Iwas devoid of emotion.
And that is inhuman, becausewe're creatures of emotion,
whether you like it or not.
We're creatures of connectionand we feel, whether you like it
or not, and we're not taughthow to feel.
I didn't know how to feelproperly.
I stood up, I went and grabbedmy weapon and I'm proficient

(33:35):
with a weapon I can assure youit was loaded, I put it in my
mouth and did not think twiceand I pulled the trigger and to
this day couldn't tell you whyit didn't go off.
So if I can prevent even oneperson from ever feeling that
way, then my mission isaccomplished.

Speaker 1 (33:59):
I appreciate you sharing that.
That's incredibly powerful andI'm glad it didn't go off.
I'm glad that you're heresharing your story because this,
you know, maybe the story is toinspire, motivate others right,
Give them a sense of hope, andI know especially I mean this
ideation, this suicide ideation,is affecting our society, but
it's incredibly imbalanced withthe veteran community.

Speaker 2 (34:21):
Yeah, did you see that recent study that the real
number could actually be 44 aday?

Speaker 1 (34:27):
Yeah, and that's alarming because 22 is a lot.
Yeah, oh my gosh.
Yeah, we're going in the wrongdirection.
Absolutely, absolutely.
Well, I've got some frequentlyasked questions here, so I'd
like to hit you up with some ofthose.
Why don't transgender peopleget counseling to accept the

(34:52):
gender they were assigned atbirth?
Why can't you just accept it?
I hear this one come up inconversation with this lack of
understanding, right?

Speaker 2 (35:01):
You know, I've never been asked that, I've never had
a phrase that way.
First of all, I'm offended.
No, I'm just kidding, that's agood question, I mean.
So here's the thing I neverexperienced gender dysphoria and
for those that don't know, it'sthe feeling of being the wrong
gender.
At birth, like I realized, Ifelt more feminine than

(35:24):
masculine, had the freedom to doit, and I was like, ok, I'm
going to do that because that'sthe country we live in, the
freedom to do it, because it'snot hard.
Nobody, I'm not out heretelling people to be trans or
think like me or like this transagenda.
That may or may not exist.
I'm just doing me, man.
But why don't trans people getcounseling?

(35:47):
You know?
I think that, as the officialanointed leader of trans people,
joe, I think I guess, if I haveto, there would be two ways to
answer it, because for me, Inever experienced gender
dysphoria to the point whereit's physically painful to see

(36:07):
yourself in the mirror and belike I hate this body part or
this because it's masculine orfeminine.
Or I never experienced that.
I've always been like, you know, I've got a pretty decent bod.
I've never had any problem.
You know, putting backs onmattresses.
You know what I'm saying.
So it was like I never had thatpart to deal with and so it was

(36:28):
actually relatively recentlythat I had it really explained
to me, like what genderdysphoria is, and it's like this
deep, it's beyond a feeling,it's beyond an experience.
It's this profound intuitionthat it's wrong, like you know

(36:51):
how you have some things thatare hard grained in you of like
right and wrong.
Like it's wrong to kill someoneand if you went and killed
someone you'd be like this is sowrong to do it.
That's what they would feellike.
But looking at their body andI'm sure there is counseling

(37:12):
that is sought after, but whydon't they just accept the way
they are?
Well, who says they have to?
That is our freedom in thiscountry to be able to transition
, if that's what makes you feelbetter.

(37:33):
Like I'm of the mind that ifyou can handle your business,
whatever you do to your body andput in or take out of your body
is your business.
That being said, I've yet tomeet one successful heroin
addict.
So I mean there's lines, notlines of heroin, but lines in
the sand.
That's a really interestingquestion.

Speaker 1 (38:00):
Because that's the.
I guess the root of thisquestion is is that if you're
trans, you got a mental healthissue.
That's how I read that.
Maybe I'm wrong, someone outthere can correct me.
But when I hear that or that'sjust the conversation that I
hear it's like they're justconfused.
They're mentally ill.
There's just something notright in their brain.
That's why they're confused.

(38:21):
They should just go seekcounseling.
Why are they going through thiswhole process of changing
themselves with hormone therapyand all the actual medical
process?
If someone chooses to go downthat path, why don't they just
seek counseling?

Speaker 2 (38:36):
Well, if you look at the DSM-5, they actually don't
qualify gender identity quotedisorder is what they used to
call it as a disorder anymore,because it was falling under the
classification of mentally ill.
I don't know off the top of myhead where it falls under, like
gender dysphoria, but as Iunderstand it, gender dysphoria

(39:03):
was added to diagnose and treatthose transgender individuals
who felt distress at themismatch between their
identities and their body.
The new diagnoses recognizedthat a mismatch between one
birth gender and identity wasnot necessarily pathological.
It shifted the emphasis andtreatment from fixing a disorder
to resolving distress over themismatch.

(39:24):
So I guess I would, until I canreally chew on that and have a
solid answer.
I guess I would answer yourquestion with a question to try
to better understand in me who'sto say they have to like, who
would you be to say they have toaccept their gender identity

(39:47):
and just being mismatched atbirth?
Who's to play God in that role?
And then, at the same time, Iwould say if you have something
in you that feels right or wrong, like, if you find something

(40:07):
that's wrong, if you're anythinglike me, you wanna fix it.
That's what most people I thinkwanna do is fix what's wrong.
It's just inherent in ournature as human beings.

Speaker 1 (40:18):
Yeah Well, I think the argument is hey, you're born
with a penis, you're obviouslya man.
Act like a man.

Speaker 2 (40:24):
Right.

Speaker 1 (40:26):
You should be a woman , right, and you should be doing
woman things right, and so Ithink that's kind of where like
who's to say right?

Speaker 2 (40:32):
Right, and I think that's where it comes in.

Speaker 1 (40:34):
And then you go with the Bible right.

Speaker 2 (40:35):
It's biblical right.
I've read the Bible quite a fewtimes, kinda find some holes in
it, but anybody that adheres orbelieves in the Bible, dude,
that's their freedom to expressthat belief.
That is the freedom I foughtfor, even if I don't believe in
it.
I signed that blank check up toand including my life to be

(40:55):
able to for anyone to be able topractice that within the
boundaries of this nation.
I appreciate that question.
That is a really interestingquestion.
You got any more of those inthe pocket?

Speaker 1 (41:10):
The other one I have.
This is probably more personal.
You know, Sure Kind ofconfusing to people, but like,
when you're in the public, whichrestroom do you use?

Speaker 2 (41:18):
So when I first came out and the first time I ever
went out I was so torn Causelike I don't want any problems,
I don't want no issue, I'm notlike I don't want anyone to be
like oh my God, a guy's in thegirls room.
But if you look at Matt Walsh'ssentiment of like, you have

(41:39):
this.
I'll make up a percent, butit's like very, very 0.0
something percent amount oftrans people.
Trans people that would go andthen expose themselves to
someone in the opposite genderrestroom or the gender that they
identify with.
Anybody exposing themselves ina restroom is wrong.

(42:00):
That's not just exclusively atrans privilege, so like.

Speaker 1 (42:05):
Yeah well, I'm at the urinal, someone's turning at me
and like just I don't, I don'tmean, I don't mean.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
Yeah, like anybody doing that is wrong, but it's
framed, you know, because it haskind of become a political
football.
It dawned on me also thatpersonal restrooms are probably
a direction we should head in,just for multiple reasons
sanitation, privacy, you know, Idon't know logistically how

(42:32):
realistic that is.
I mean, if you've got a placeholding a thousand people, it
makes sense to have a restroomwith X amount of toilets in it
so people can come and go.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
But Well, I go to the gas station often.
Right, you got to stop.
You're getting some gas.
You go in.
There's two.
There's obviously two bathrooms, one with the male marker, one
with the female.
But I've been in situationswhere there's like three or four
dudes waiting in line, but youknow that there's no one in the
female bathroom and it's likeRight.
Well, why don't we just havetwo bathrooms?

Speaker 2 (43:01):
Why does it have to be designated that way?

Speaker 1 (43:03):
I'll just go in there you know I don't care and I'll
apologize to a woman if sheopens.
If I open the door, walk outand she's there, I'm like I'm
sorry, I gotta head to go.

Speaker 2 (43:12):
Yeah, I mean when nature calls.

Speaker 1 (43:14):
Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (43:15):
You know, bathrooms also used to be black and white
man bathrooms can change.
You know, what I mean.
True, yeah, not to say thatit's like equatable, like, ah,
trans have it like the blackpeople had with slavery, but you
know, just to point out thatthe whole idea or the dichotomy
around bathrooms can change Forme, I think.

(43:36):
I think I have a privilege inthat, like I do pass, quote,
unquote I don't know if thatterm flies anymore, I don't know
what's like on the up and up,but the way it was taught to me
is passing privilege.
Like if somebody looked at methey would see like, oh, that's
a woman.
Until I spoke and I'm like yo,so like I can get in and out of

(43:59):
a woman's restroom and they haveno issue and I finally came to
realize that.
But then there's people thatdon't exactly pass, so to speak,
but they still want to becomfortable in their gender
identity.
I think it applies to all thatlike, just like you said, it

(44:19):
should just be bathroom, not sobut you tend to go to the female
bathroom because you can passit off, because you look more.

Speaker 1 (44:29):
You look yeah, I'm told that's a privilege.
You look very nice.
I mean you look like.
When I saw your photo I'm likeI'm, you know Kyrie's coming on,
and then I heard your voice.
I'm like whoa what.
But your physical features, youlook, you know, very feminine
and very much like a woman.

Speaker 2 (44:45):
You thank you.
I appreciate that you wouldn'tbelieve the amount of open mouth
stairs I've got, because, likeon LinkedIn, I don't really post
about being trans all thatoften because it doesn't, it's
not pertinent to business.
Like, man or woman, you'restill equally capable in most
circumstances, if not all oflike getting a job accomplished.
So then I'll get into meetingsof people that know me through

(45:07):
LinkedIn only and then I'll belike, hey, how are you?
And they're like, hey, it takesa minute.
You see the wheel spinningright.
Like what.
I love those moments becauseI'm able to break that barrier
down and be like, hey, what's up?
I mean, if you got questions,they're totally cool.

Speaker 1 (45:28):
Yeah, no.
I love the fact that you're soopen-minded and willing to
educate right and help the restof us understand what's going on
, because we have questions.
I think the open-minded peopledo and, like you said, for me, I
genuinely want to understandsome of these things so I can be

(45:48):
just more open-minded andinclusive.
And I wasn't always that way.
Sure, I wasn't.
Now, follow up question what doyou think about the?
Because we're talking aboutLinkedIn, so I'm seeing pronouns
used all the time and the useof pronouns, and there's some
organizations that are kind offorcing their employees to use

(46:09):
pronouns and lead with pronouns.
What do you think about that?
Because there's someapprehension to that.

Speaker 2 (46:14):
I think it's pretty lame, like it's really not
relevant to the workspace.
It's more of a virtue signal atthis point of like.
If somebody is straight up adude, I guess, or maybe that's
even offensive, I don't care Ifsomebody is straight up a dude

(46:36):
and like their guy all the waytop to bottom, but then they've
got like he, him.
I'm so virtuous in that becauseI identify and I'm an ally with
you.
But for me they do help, cause,like if you heard my voice
versus seeing me, you might belike do I call you man or ma'am,
or you could just ask.
That's where we need to get,just to the point where you can

(46:58):
just ask and it's not likeoffensive.

Speaker 1 (47:03):
Yeah, so don't force people to use it.
But if you choose to identifyand make it known that's what
you'd like to be called, thenthat's appropriate yeah.

Speaker 2 (47:11):
I mean I think there's other other signifying
things, but it is very nuancedand, you know, I think the
pronouns were like a organic,organically developed as a thing
to help identify people, butthen developed into something
that was like virtue signalingand then it became blanket

(47:33):
corporate.
You know, one size fits all tothe point where it's.
You know, the pendulum alwaysswings and there's going to be
pushback from both sides tillyou find a happy medium.
And the pushback on that is,like you know, it's on the polar
opposite of mine.
I don't deal with that mentalillness stuff, like you know.

(47:55):
So it's just it's super complexand really irrelevant.
That's the whole thing.
Like, my gender is soirrelevant and the big scheme of
things, and so is yours really,cause it's not, like people say
, gender identity.
I don't like that, cause it'snot my identity.
I'm Kyrie, I'm that dude in awig, I'm that chick, I'm that,

(48:19):
whatever you want to call me,cause what you say doesn't
define me.
I do know that I'm a goodperson.
I'm here to spread love.
I have flaws, cause I'm human,but I know that I'm out there
trying to prevent the next one.
When it comes to veteransuicide, I'm trying to prevent
anyone I can from ever feelingthat way.
At the end of the day, that'swhat matters.

(48:40):
But at our current state ofdevelopment, I do feel like I am
in a position to be atrailblazer, to lead by example
of education to people likeyourself and maybe some
listeners that are like I don'tget it, I'm uncomfortable with
it.
That's fine, but beinguncomfortable promotes change.

(49:03):
Change promotes growth.

Speaker 1 (49:07):
Absolutely.
That's what the whole do hardthings, you know, nation and the
mantra is all about.
Right, it's like facing thesedifficulties and you know, from
this perspective, it'sunderstanding, having an
understanding challenging yourown beliefs.
And I like to think of you knowwhy did I have a lot of that
vocabulary growing up in thosethoughts?

(49:27):
Cause before I joined themilitary, I mean, I had a lot of
just things that I said thatI'm ashamed of.

Speaker 2 (49:36):
Oh, me too.

Speaker 1 (49:38):
And you know, when I joined the military and I'm like
you know, and I'm working withall of these different variety
of people, I'm like that's allBS.
That was fed down, you know,from someone else that was came
from tradition closed mindedness, you know, and it's just not
true.
It's like it's, it's ridiculous.

Speaker 2 (49:58):
I'd be willing to bet , just based on your demeanor
and how you carry yourself, thatyou know, just like I do, that
when you're in that foxhole, itdoes not matter Credence or
creed, clearance, race, religion, gender, that shit does not
matter.
What matters is you know thatperson has your six while you're
covering them.

Speaker 1 (50:18):
Can you do your job?
Can you do your job?
And so this is a great segue tomy next question, and we're
almost at an hour, so we'll exithere toward the door here soon.
But do you think that themilitary should accommodate for
transgender individuals?

Speaker 2 (50:38):
Hmm, well, I don't think it like.
I don't think being transgenderis gonna inherently make
somebody any more or less ableto do their job, and in fact I
think now this is a corporateside of me trying to come out
and give a corporate answer butit's truly how I feel.
Like if you have a personthat's transgender let's take in
this example, this theoreticalyou have a guy that feels like a

(51:00):
gal and they would feel a lotbetter if they were able to be a
gal.
Don't you think they'd be ableto do their job better if they
felt better?
Because if that's the case,then that's to say, women
shouldn't be serving in themilitary.
If you say like, oh well, transpeople couldn't, shouldn't
serve, like I can still go outthere and I can still kick ass,

(51:25):
just like any other trans person, cis person, whatever person, I
think labels are lame, you knowit's whether the person can do
their job or not, and I don'tthink that has much inflection
on their gender, aside fromaccommodating to the extent of,
if they want counseling, havecounseling readily available.

(51:46):
Mental health is a like.
Understanding your mentalhealth is a key aspect to
dealing with it so that you canheal from your past, because we
all have pasts we need to healfrom.
Accommodation is to the extentof like HRT and gender-affirming
therapy and gender-affirmingtherapy, hormone therapy and

(52:07):
sexual reassignment therapy, Iwould say yeah, because it's so.
It's so few and far between Ifyou look at like the numbers.
As long as, as long as there'smy whole, my whole takeaway is
this I don't think anybodyshould transition in search of

(52:29):
something.
I think they should know whothey are like.
I could still be Justin and behappy.
I did this because I have thefreedom to do it.
I mean, I don't.
I don't see why not?
I mean, do you see any holes in?
Why or why not?

Speaker 1 (52:42):
I Think the and I'm looking at this from a commander
perspective you know, whatever,whatever that comes down the
pike, your policies came downthe pike.
I think that's a good thing.
I think that's a good thing.
I think that's a good thing.
You know well, whatever,whatever that comes down the

(53:05):
pike, your policies came down.
You know there's a lot ofbriefings and whatnot to you
know troops, hey, this is what'shappening.
There's a lot of like,disgruntled, like, oh, but the
same thing happened when I was acombat engineer and they let
females join, right?
Oh, the girls can't, do theytry to be remarkable soldiers,
mm-hmm.
My initial concern is how doesthis affect unit cohesion?
Because you have those peoplethat you know group, like, you

(53:27):
know my, my own ignorance,growing up in a vacuum, joining
the military.
And how does that affect unitcohesion and what?
There will be some challengesinitially, until it becomes more
.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
Accepted.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
Yeah, yeah, I was making special accommodations
because there's, like the whole,not there.
So when you're going throughthe therapy you're non
deployable and someone's gonnareally slack and.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
I did not know that.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
Yeah, from my understanding now it could be I
could be wrong.
There's this is.
This was a few years ago, Idon't know some things that have
.

Speaker 2 (54:00):
I'm gonna look that up.
That's interesting, I didn'tknow.
That made you know.
I mean that that affects doyour job.
Yes, yes, you know the, thecore principle of what we both
have common ground on.
You know, I would submit to youthat that person that may have
that ignorant upbringing and isunwilling to change, maybe the
bad fruit on the tree that needsto be cut over, the transgender
person that just wants to becomfortable, because if you're

(54:21):
in the foxhole with that personand they're like I Got this
black guy behind me, I ain'tcovering him.
Yeah, they, they're not doingtheir job.
Yeah, the only thing thatmatters is that uniform and
decisive victories over theenemy.

Speaker 1 (54:35):
Yeah, yeah, and I and I think that's just the, the
trailblazing that's gonna haveto be done going forward.
I, I've seen it, you know, inthe, in the, in the grand scheme
of, like, you know, theentirety of the army you know I
participated in for 27 years butthe just how far we've come In
that short amount of time withintegrating females and

(54:56):
homosexuals and now transgender.
It's been quite remarkable andmy own Initial biases have
changed, having served side byside and having understanding.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
Dude, how wild was it when dadd got repealed.
That was my prime time when Iwas in and, like all these
people that I knew were like ohyeah, I'm gay and I'm like what?
I had no clue, because my gayart doesn't work.
And then I'm like, oh well,there's still my homie.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
I had no clue.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
Yeah, it definitely changed some preconceived
notions that I had, because,like I look back on these things
and, like you know, this wasn'texactly my sentiment.
But if you take an example of,like man, I put a bunch of
queers out there, they're justgonna be foking each other into
barracks and but they're not,they're there to do their job.
Yeah, you know, I mean whathappens behind closed doors.

(55:48):
If you ain't hurt nobody again.

Speaker 1 (55:50):
They're offended.
Now I don't want to hit on me.
What I'm not good looking.
Yeah, what's up.

Speaker 2 (55:56):
Dude, my, my staff sergeant.
Funny story the very firstwords out of my drill sergeant's
mouth.
When I got to basic we had torun in and put our hands on a
bed, on a cot, and I had one.
And Gillis, if you're out there, I'm never gonna forgive you
for this.
Right at the last day, three,two, one.
Another hand grabs my cot.

(56:16):
I look over, I'm like what areyou doing?
What are you doing?
What are you?
I'm freaking out.
He comes over to me Is beforeDADT was repealed.
Now my drill sergeant lost hishat mid basic training, just for
the record.
Uh, he says, are you homosexual?
And I was like no sir, it's fun.
A different bed, you know.

(56:37):
He's like I had to move bed.
I got top bunk and then fourweeks later I got flipped out of
my bunk when we got raided.
So, gillis, love you but I hateyou.
That was how my basics started.

Speaker 1 (56:53):
Oh man, yeah, uh.
So one one more question, thenI like to talk about, um, you
know your organization.
Another another topic thatcomes to mind is often talked
about is Transgendersparticipation in sports.
You're seeing this.
This happened where, uh,someone you know, biologically

(57:13):
born a male, is now competing infemale sports and dominating.
What do you, what is youropinion on this?

Speaker 2 (57:20):
So this is probably where I get cancelled by a lot
of people.
Uh, that's fine, this is justmy belief.
Uh, because it's scientificallybased.
There is there's two lines,there's equality and there's
fairness, and those two linesshould not ever cross.
If I'm a male and underwentmale puberty and had the male
advantage of More bone densityand bigger heart and more lung

(57:43):
capacity, like there arebiological advantages physically
, and male over female to docertain things.
Um, if we take the swimmer, forinstance, because everybody
cared about swimming for a weekand then didn't, um, there's
reason why she went from 247thin the nation to number one in
the nation overnight, becauseshe had a biological advantage.

(58:08):
And that takes away from thosewomen, the biological women that
have been busting their asstheir whole career just to be
blown out by a dude.
This biologically A male, likethat's what needs to be
understood, as I am biologicallya male and it doesn't matter
what I do and it doesn't matterwhat I do.
That's always going to be thecase.
That doesn't mean I can't be awoman, um, I think.

(58:33):
And then then you get into, like, combat sports.
That's where it gets dangerous.
Um, I mean, if you, if you'vegot somebody that's biologically
female and then biologicallymale and they want to fight each
other and they're both in andhave full consent.
Have at it, sell all thetickets you want, but as long as
they fully understand the risksinvolved.
Um, I I don't know the answer,because I I don't know if there

(58:55):
should be their own trans lead.
I don't know, I I just knowthat I shouldn't go compete in
female sports because it wouldbe unfair, not to say there's
not females out there that couldkick my ass or blow me out of
the water.
But I'm just saying from abasic starting point, the
fundamentals.
I believe there's an advantagein that and I don't think that's

(59:17):
fair.

Speaker 1 (59:18):
Hmm, no, it's interesting to hear your
perspective on that, becausethat's been a hot topic for for
a while and I, I would, I wouldagree with you.
I think we need to come up witha, with a different solution,
because I, I believe,biologically say the same thing.
So, um Well, tell us about theveterans gaming and mental
health mission.
You're the board president,executive director of this

(59:38):
awesome community You've puttogether, so tell us a little
bit about that.

Speaker 2 (59:41):
Yeah, man, uh, what if I told you the video games
could save the lives of ourbrothers and sisters?
That's an easy sell, dude,because Through gaming we bridge
the gap of connection betweenpeople that would otherwise
never meet, and in that wedevelop friendships and we find
camaraderie, almost a sense likeLike when we were in the

(01:00:04):
uniform back in the day, like wehave our people, like we fly a
flag.
It's a different flag, whateveryour game may be, whether it's
a guild or a clan or or whateverthat game calls it your group,
your people, your home people Um, I just I know what helped me,
because I'm not a therapist, I'mnot a psychologist, I'm not a

(01:00:26):
psychiatrist.
I never try to purport myselfto be one and I don't ever want
to try to purport myself to beanything.
I'm not.
But I know what worked for meand I know I needed a lot of
healing and I found a lot of itwhile I was gaming, streaming on
twitch and Meeting people thatI would otherwise never, ever
meet in this life, becausethey're all over the world and

(01:00:46):
they've enhanced and enriched mylife in so many ways.
I mean, when my family droppedme, my, my birth family, I felt
so lost and then I realized,well, I've got a family.
I've got a family in thisgaming group that I have.
So then I went on further todevelop programs like the
peer-to-peer support programcompletely confidential,

(01:01:09):
peer-to-peer, like exactly whatit says.
Peer-to-peer support, justHand-selected individuals that
would rather hear about yourstory than hear about your
funeral.
Because they have love in theirheart and they care.
And Our short time in existence.
We're only about two years oldnow.
I don't have a tally off thetop of my head.

(01:01:32):
I know our KPIs are lookinggood For the amount of tickets
answered.
I believe in proactivesolutions rather than the
reactive, so I believe in aavoiding ever getting to the
point of crisis intervention,and we do that by having our
gaggle of people and in ourdiscord.
Where Somebody's falls, we'reall there to pick them up.

(01:01:55):
Doesn't matter who you are,don't matter if we like each
other or not.
If you're down on one kneecarrying your cross, I will help
you carry it with you because Iknow you would do the same for
me, and that's that camaraderie.

Speaker 1 (01:02:09):
Yeah, that's the.
You know veterans transitioningthat's one of the.
The difficulties is findingthat sense of community and
camaraderie that you had in themilitary and you know, so I love
that.
That.
You know you got thiscommonality with video games and
you know a community together.
How many, how many people arein your community right now?

Speaker 2 (01:02:29):
So in our discord we have let's see I'll give you an
exact number at this very momentwe have 742 people.
We're looking at a couplethings that could make us
Exponentially bigger pretty muchovernight by the thousands.
But we've helped a lot ofpeople within and outside of

(01:02:50):
that because in those 742 peoplethey're fired up, they're
inspired, they've they foundhelp and healing.
They believe it when I tellthem peace is possible, because
they found it just through mymethod of Talking about it.
That was the hardest andeasiest thing I've ever done,
just talking about my feelings,because we're not taught how to

(01:03:11):
feel, we're not taught how tocope.
But you got to feel in order todeal.
You got a deal in order to heal.

Speaker 1 (01:03:18):
Yeah, that's it.
That's a topic I brought upquite a bit and I've had some
some guests on.
Talk about your emotions, right.
Generally, men, if you hademotions, think of emotions as,
like the 64 pack box of CrayolaMen are carrying around the
little eight pack, probably thebigger crayons, and Women tend
to have like the 16 pack.

(01:03:39):
They're a little bit, they havea bigger emotional vocabulary
and what I've learned is beingin like, expanding your vocation
, your vocabulary in regards tothe emotion that you're feeling,
enables you to just be more intouch with yourself.
For and then it's okay becauseyou know Upringing and the
military on top of that, likeyou stuff your emotion away.

(01:03:59):
Right, you got to go, you gotsomething, you got, you got a.
The mission right.
And I think that's where wefall short is not having Good
understanding of our emotionsand being in touch with them,
and I appreciate you bringingthat up because I think that is
a challenge for a lot of people.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
I think if we got to the bottom of that, it would
solve a lot of the pushback ofthe transgender.
It would solve a lot of thetransgender nuance, because it
all boils down to feelings.
Yeah, and like you said earlier, like I don't understand in
some regards I don't get it, andmore or less words, and like
how could you?
How could you get it?
Because you're not trans as faras I know.

(01:04:35):
Yeah, so as you know, so, likehow could you understand that?
But if you have some baselineof, like, some fundamental
understanding of emotions, yeah,the last example I'll give will
quit.
I was geospatial intelligenceanalysis before I went special
operations and in that I learnedthat there are this has now

(01:04:57):
been declassified but there isnot 255 shades of gray.
There's 256 shades of gray inthe color spectrum and then
there's black and then there'swhite, and I'm gonna be willing
to bet that the answer liessomewhere in the gray rather
than black and white.

Speaker 1 (01:05:12):
Yeah, it's not just binary, it's.
Yeah, there's lots of differentshades there.
Yeah, now with your community,you guys all play the same game,
like we're all over the place.

Speaker 2 (01:05:21):
We got we got our our people that play like dungeons
and dragons.
We got our people that playboard games.
We got our people that kind offollow whatever I'm playing my
flavor of the week.
We got our our first firstshooter players.
We got a ton of Call of Dutyplayers.
I can't do cod did just Kind ofa little triggering for me,
like the.
The acoustics are prettyrealistic in that game.

(01:05:43):
So yeah, last time I tried toplay cod Call of Duty, I want to
relapsing for two weeks goingoff the rails.
It was not good.

Speaker 1 (01:05:51):
It's a primarily PC console Mix of everything all
over the place.

Speaker 2 (01:05:55):
I mean, what we really thrive on is things that
are cross-platform, which hasbecome in the norm.
Thank God, like Doesn't matterwhat you got, you can play with
all your friends.
Yeah, you know, fortunatelyit's going that avenue.
And you know, just today Iinvited a gal that you know she
primarily plays mobile.

(01:06:15):
We got mobile players soon.
Man, as long as you're thereand you know that we're there
for you, that's all that matters.
That's the game.
It kind of becomes secondary.
The gaming is the bridge to getyou in.

Speaker 1 (01:06:26):
Yeah, that's great.
So do you got?
Do you invite?
Is?
Is anyone welcome?
Is it veterans only?
What?

Speaker 2 (01:06:32):
is your community.
You know, the only stipulationis 18 and over.
I I vehemently believe inprotecting the children.
Yeah and I don't ever want to belike we talk about traumatic
shit, man, talk about heavystuff, and I don't ever want to
be the reason a kid is like,introduced to the banality of
mankind, and then they havetheir own, like, oh my god, my

(01:06:53):
veil is shattered and you knowthat's not my place.
So 18 plus, but the scope isveterans, gamers or people that
care about mental health.
That's a pretty wide scope.
Anybody that wants in, you'rein.
That's.
All you need to qualify is thatyou want to be there.

Speaker 1 (01:07:11):
That's awesome.
Well, how do people get a holdof all?
Put your links in the, in the,in the chat, but how do people
get in contact with you and inthe community?

Speaker 2 (01:07:20):
Um, primarily our discord is where we operate.
We're we're looking atbranching out into a few other
avenues, but that's where it allprimarily goes down right now.
If you're not familiar withdiscord, it's akin to slack,
it's it's like a open sourceSocial media platform, if you
will.
There's text channels and voicechannels and that's it like it.
When you first look at discord,you you might kind of be like

(01:07:42):
oh my god, what is all this?
But you just you have your textchannels where it's all text
based chat, and then you haveyour voice channels where I can
hop in and if you see mechilling in there, you can jump
in and hey, what's up, dude?
How?
much was up with you, just kindof walking into the building, if
you will.

Speaker 1 (01:07:58):
Yeah, very cool, very cool.
I've got discord.
I haven't misrounded a wholelot and uh, but he does.

Speaker 2 (01:08:04):
I just think man another social media platform
like Well, if there's one I like, well I would say if there's.
If you had to pick one,traditional, I would go with
linkedin, but non-traditional.
I think discord is the way ofthe future because you can do
everything that zoom does, youcan do everything the facebook
does, you can do everything thattwitter does Is, uh, all in one

(01:08:24):
place and it's just a goodamalgamation of keeping your
gaggle together.
And, um, it's, it's as simpleas discordgg.
Slash, vgmh.
Put it in your browser.
It'll take you right to it.
Awesome, and I'll personallysit down with anybody that needs
to learn discord and show themthe ropes.

Speaker 1 (01:08:43):
Yeah, that's awesome.
I appreciate, uh, appreciateyou taking the time Before we go
because we're gonna move thetoward the exit here.
The uh.
I always like to hand the micoff to my guest to ask me a
question.
So what, what question do youhave for me?

Speaker 2 (01:08:56):
Yeah, yeah, how dare you?
I would ask you what is a woman?

Speaker 1 (01:09:06):
Oh, oh man, this is the toughest question yet.
Possibly, I don't know.
I feel like, um, I hopefully Idon't step on this.
I mean, I think of a woman.
Wow, that is a really goodquestion.

Speaker 2 (01:09:21):
That's just Matt Walsh.
You buddy, you did I mean.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
I guess I think of a woman, as it's probably gonna.
I don't.
I don't know how to answer thisin this current cancel culture,
but I think of someone that's.
I think what comes to my mindis someone that's biologically
born, a woman who, oh my goshit's very nuanced you might

(01:09:48):
you've stumped me.

Speaker 2 (01:09:50):
I can help you out here.

Speaker 1 (01:09:52):
I'll.

Speaker 2 (01:09:53):
Because I'm not gonna leave you to sink.
Um, matt Walsh was very cleverin that question and he thought
he was the most clever person onthe planet which it was very
clever Only because you can'tanswer something that's Abstract
.
You can't in almost alloccurrences Scientific,
theoretical, etc.

(01:10:14):
You can't quantify an abstractand the concept of man and woman
is exactly that.
It's a concept, it's somethingmade up Like there's male and
female.
That's that's your science.
But man and woman, what is awoman?
How do you answer somethingthat doesn't exist because it's
not real?
It's an abstract concept.

Speaker 1 (01:10:37):
I guess I think of, like you know what I, what I
have been grown to believe, whatwomen are, right, they're the
ones that, like you said,biologically they reproduce,
they're the nurturer in thefamily, they, they, I do see
that, you know, in arelationship between man and
woman, there are certain roles,that they mutually support each
other.
They, they, each have strengthsand weaknesses and they, they,

(01:10:58):
you know, bring them together tomake a dynamic team.
That's traditionally what Ithink of a woman as, um, yeah,
that's, that's a.
I'll be thinking about that one.
Chew on that one for a minute.

Speaker 2 (01:11:12):
I'm gonna be chewing on yours too, because it.
Can you rephrase it one moretime for me, what you asked me
earlier, because it kind ofkicked my ass.

Speaker 1 (01:11:18):
Yeah, uh.
And so what is?
Why don't transgender peopleget counseling to accept the
gender they were assigned atbirth?

Speaker 2 (01:11:29):
That's such a good question.
That's that's what I wastalking about earlier the holes
that I want to find in me.
That's a hole I just found andI'm gonna patch it, I'm gonna
put a lot of thought into it andI will come up with something.
I hope you don't hate me forputting you on the on the
limelight like that.

Speaker 1 (01:11:47):
No, no you're good, I .
I mean, I love being challenged.
You know, that's really gonnachallenge my thinking, because
it's like that's such a broad,like there's so many different
angles.
You could attack that withright um so yeah, it's a new
host it is.
I think, you know, I immediatelythought of, like my children,
my wife.
I thought of like all thepowerful women.
I mean, what instantly came tomind Was the women in my life

(01:12:07):
that I love and the ones that Ireally respect and I've had,
I've been fortunate to haveamazing like women leaders in
the military and In my community.
I think of, like you know, myco-host on monday's, angie
betrand.
You know that we co-host themonday morning, do hard Things
show, and just all of the otherwomen that are out there,
stephanie valdivia, like thepowerful women that are role

(01:12:30):
models.
That's what instantly came tomind.
It's like powerful, strongwomen.

Speaker 2 (01:12:36):
Does it help if I use my girl voice?
Hey, no.

Speaker 1 (01:12:47):
No, I'm something that you want for sure, and uh,
it really makes me think and um,so, no, I appreciate you coming
on in in educating me and uh inour audience and for those
listening, like if you have aquestion you want to reach out.
We'd love to hear your feedbackon today's conversation and
shoot us a question.
I could see more questionsarising.
Love to have you maybe come backagain To maybe answer some of

(01:13:09):
those questions and I'm sure,well, we can continue the the
conversation and just reallyappreciate everything that
you're doing.
And, yeah, I, I what afascinating topic and just thank
you.

Speaker 2 (01:13:21):
Hey, thank you for giving me the time of day and
thinking enough of me to evenhave me on.
I mean, coming from where I was, I can tell you that I was
veritably a loser, a quitter, aliar, a thief, like all of these
bad things that I used to be Inmy addiction and in my time of
being down.
And if I can find a way out ofthat and get to where I'm at now

(01:13:44):
, I truly believe that anybodycan, and if that's, if nobody
takes anything else from this,but that like believe in
yourself and I know that soundscorny, but if, if the loser that
was Justin can do it, you cantoo.
Yeah, just transition, dude.

Speaker 1 (01:14:06):
That goes all back to doing the hard thing right,
having courage, facing fear,punching fear in the face and
being congruently you, and thatthat you know, unfortunately
there it like, goes back to justfacing your fears and there's,
there's no, there's no shortageof judgment and opinions out
there, no matter what you do.
So and we live in a countrywhere you know, for the most

(01:14:30):
part, pretty free I say the mostpart because there's some
things you can't do, but for themost part I mean we have it.

Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
We are tremendously blessed to live in this nation
27th most free country on theplanet, but that's still pretty
high.
Yeah, I was gonna.
I was gonna throw one morething out there and it just
slipped away from me, but it wasgood.
It was what you were saying,not when you said punching fear

(01:14:58):
in the face.

Speaker 1 (01:14:58):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2 (01:14:59):
That's so key man.
Um, what other people think ofyou, like your fear of what
others may think of you.
What someone thinks of you isnone of your business, mm.
Is what you think about youthat matters, because, at the
end of the day, when you layyour head down on that pillow
and you have nothing but you andyour eyelids, what you think
about you is the only thing youshould be thinking about.

Speaker 1 (01:15:24):
Absolutely 100, and I think that's a great way to end
the show, and so we appreciateyou guys listening to this
episode.
If you're listening to this,just thank you.
You're someone that, uh, that'sleveling up, open minded,
growth minded, and if there'sanything that you gain from this
podcast, reach out.
We'd love to hear from you.
Feel free to reach out to Kyrie.
Keep doing hard things.

(01:15:45):
We'll see you guys in the nextepisode.