118 Brad Ritter | Unlock Potential with Purposeful Adversity

Today’s guest is Brad Ritter – one of the world’s leading experts on performance.  He is the author of the best-selling book, School of Grit:  Unlock Your Potential Through Purposeful Adversity. After graduating from Kokoro camp in 2015, he wanted to find a way to serve others,  help people take control of their lives, and get unstuck. He accomplishes this through a proven system that focuses on your physical, mental, emotional, intuitional, and warrior spirit. His mission is to build a “warrior class” community.  That is why he created the School of Grit.

And that is why I’m excited to bring you this conversation with Brad. You might need a daunting challenge or event to fire you up! For many people it’s always a good reminder to train mentally and emotionally for the real hardships life throws our way. We all have that warrior spirit within and could all use a bit of extra grit!

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

• How adversity unlocks potential
• Parenting the most comfortable generation ever
• Your first purpose must be you
• Training for the world’s hardest civilian event
• Goon squad and hamburger hands at Kokoro
• Learning when and how to ask for help
• Warrior community and accountability

BRAD RITTER
Brad Ritter is one of the world’s leading experts on performance.  He is the author of the best-selling book, School of Grit:  Unlock Your Potential Through Purposeful Adversity.

Episode Transcript

Michael (00:00):
Coming up on this one, we're talking to a man who
survived and thrived in theworld's toughest military style
training available to civilians.
In just a moment, we'll meetBrad Ritter, a leading expert on
human performance and howadversity helps men unlock their
full potential.

(00:30):
Star Wars Main Theme Star WarsMain Theme
Hey guys, welcome back to the men to mastery podcast.
I am your host and founder,Michael Bullock on this show.
We deep dive with experts fromvarious domains to learn how
they handle challenges, hurdles,failures, and apply that to
better themselves, their family,their relationships, and their

(00:51):
businesses.
Speaking of which it's been abit since we got one of these
episodes out in your hands.
And for a number of months, thereason is I've been formalizing
my business owner and executivecoaching that extends from what
I do in the corporate consultingworld.
I combined three decades of Csuite experience with the
tactical precision, teamwork,and leadership I've learned from

(01:14):
guests here on the show and inthe grit of real world training
from the same kind of guys.
Ultimately, it's about your nextlevel business success.
Not only growing your profit,but your freedom, fulfillment,
life, and health.
And in doing that, I've foundthe three most important areas
of any business that needs focusto realize all those things,

(01:34):
growth, profit, fulfillment,freedom, health, all of it, not
just some, but the fullequation.
I've been doing this stuff along time and it's just a blast
to bring that kind of impact toa, to a business, to a man, to a
family, to a person.
So if that may serve you andwhere you're at right now, go
hit the website.
It's a new site at mastery.
coach and let's set up a callwww mastery.

(01:58):
coach.
And if you're watching this oneon YouTube, make sure you like,
subscribe and click the bell toget notifications.
Okay, let's get into it withBrad Ritter.
He's the author of thebestselling book, School of
Grit, Unlock Your PotentialThrough Purposeful Adversity.
After graduating Kokoro Camp in2015, Brad wanted to find a way

(02:18):
to serve others, help peopletake control of their lives, and
get unstuck.
He does that through a provensystem that focuses on your
physical, mental, emotional,intuitional, and warrior spirit.
Over there at School of Grit,his mission is to build a
warrior class community, andthat's why he created School of
Grit.

(02:40):
And as you may know, Kokoro campis that training I was referring
to earlier.
In fact, the latest class justtook place here last weekend in
Southern California, where asmall handful of men and women
had the courage to show up, putthemselves out there, way
outside their comfort zones,much like Brad did eight years
ago, and undertake thatadversity by design, that

(03:01):
engineered chaos, that no matterwhat, will leave them changed
forever.
All right.
Today I have Brad Ritter,founder of the School of Grit,
which he created aftergraduating from the seal fit
crucible called Kokoro.
It's an infamous training, whichis renowned to be the toughest
civilian training in the world.

(03:21):
Brad's also the, the authorof...
Book by the same name, School ofGrit, subtitled, Unlock Your
Potential Through PurposefulAdversity.
I know he's also a husband, afather, an entrepreneur.
Brad, a psych to have you ontoday.
I appreciate it so much.
Welcome.
Yeah, I've been looking forwardto this one, Michael.
Thank you.
I have too.
Hey, let me just dive right inthe subtitle and you know, I

(03:42):
read the book.
I loved it really.
There's, there's a ton we couldtake away here, but I got some
stuff I really want to dive intotoday.
What do you mean by purposefuladversity?
Yeah.
So adversity comes in manyforms.
A lot of times we can't help it.
Adversity is just gonna kind ofpunch us in the face sometimes,
whether that's, you know,unfortunately like a death in
the family, cancer, disease,nature, mother nature being

(04:04):
crazy.
What I'm really talking abouthere is stuff you can invite
into your life.
That's hard, but it's going tomake you better in the end.
So an example of that could bepublic speaking.
I thought people were veryscared of, of, of speaking
publicly in front of a bunch ofpeople, but it's good for you.
And the more you do it, thebetter off you are.
So that's kind of where I'mgoing with that is just, as I
look at.

(04:25):
The culture and kind of thegeneration we're in, we're,
we're in the, the mostcomfortable generation probably
ever.
And it's a little too, a littletoo easy at times.
A little too comfortable.
Yeah, a hundred percent.
Yeah.
Okay, cool.
So adversity sort of by, bydesign versus by, by
circumstance.
By design.
And what you'll find, I think,is the, the more you invite

(04:45):
purposeful adversity into yourlife, you're going to be able to
train yourself physically,mentally, emotionally.
So that when.
Unfortunately, an event happensthat's completely out of your
control.
I'm not saying it's going to beeasy, but I think you're going
to tackle it and have a littlebit of an easier time with it.
If you got some sort offoundation built up.
Yeah, definitely.
My son and I do Spartan racestogether and I saw a little clip

(05:06):
from founder Joe DeSanto Spartanrace the other day, kind of
speaking to the same thing.
He goes, you know, I had allthese years of training of
getting kind of metaphoricallypunched in the face and then got
punched in the face.
350, 000 times during COVID withthis business.
And if I hadn't sort of trainedmyself that way, I wouldn't have
survived.
Exactly.
How old's your son, man?
That's so cool to be able to dothat.
Yeah.
I was going to mention he's he'sjust about to turn 15.

(05:27):
So he's now crossing over intothe adult category.
He ran kids races for a numberof years and crushed that.
So now it's his chance to gointo the 14 to 17 sort of first
tranche of, of adult racers.
And you and I were talking alittle bit off air about.
Seal fit crucibles.
I you've obviously done the bigdaddy that we're going to talk
about.
I did a mini one, but I was, Iwas anxiously looking at their
website the other day to findout how soon I can take my son

(05:50):
to one of those, you know, he'sin that comfort generation.
I think he's got, I think it's16 before I can get him out to a
six or a 12 hour seal fit.
It'll be so good for him.
I wish I would've had that at16.
Are you kidding me?
A ton of fun.
How did you prep for this thing?
I mean, for, for people that maynot know about Cokoro, this is a
50 plus hour.

(06:10):
It's, you know, to the outsideworld, looking in.
Physical crucible.
Obviously, it starts to peelback a lot more than that, but
it is very, very physicallydemanding for more than well
more than 48 hours.
So how do you physically as wellas mentally and emotionally
prepare for something like that?
What did your training scheduleand on ramp look like?
Yeah.
So when I First signed up forit, I was working out, let's

(06:33):
say, but I wasn't doing thevolume necessary that would
require you to just be up onyour feet basically for 50 hours
plus doing every calisthenicimaginable and all the other
evolutions and stuff they throwat you.
So I pretty much dedicated mylife for about six months and
was working out.
So six days a week, Sunday wastypically recovery day, but I

(06:57):
mean, those six days, it was, Iwas pretty regimen, man.
I, I would work out two, threehours a day.
Sometimes that was all together.
If I, if I could carve that muchtime out, a lot of times though,
I had to split it up and kind ofdo an hour or two in the morning
and the rest in the evening.
So I would equate it probably tothose folks who have done a
triathlon and have trained forthat.

(07:18):
Similar, well, similar trainingin regards to the amount of time
you spend is what I'd say.
It was gnarly.
I mean, I was talking to MarkDevine, the founder of it
shortly after I had secured itand he's like, dude, you pretty
much did this totally assbackwards.
Like usually you go, you know,experience the six hour, then
the 12 and then you work yourway up.

(07:39):
And I just.
I just went in with both feetblindly.
Nice.
Yeah.
I think I know you, youmentioned a lot of people in the
in sort of the epilogue of thebook.
And one of those is coach Jimbro.
And one of his books is sort ofabout his experience with CACOR.
I think he mentioned somethingsomewhere sort of two to three
hours a day.

(08:00):
And then a long day, you know,it might be a six hour rock or
something on a, on a Saturday.
I mean, that's a ton of time,especially, I think he mentions
that when he was training, hiskids were grown and he was
overseas for work, so he wasn'treally cutting into the family
time.
How did that look for you?
I mean, this is back in 2015,but what did that look like in
terms of getting your family tobuy into the process for you and

(08:21):
why you were going supportingyou through the training?
Yeah, great, great question.
So it was, it felt very selfishbecause of how much time I was
like, I knew why I was doing it.
You know, ultimately it's for meto make me a better version,
whether that's, you know,husband, father, brother,
friend, whatever.
Sometimes when you're trying toconvey that to your spouse or

(08:43):
other ones, you just, the wordsjust, they aren't there.
Right.
But, but you know, you know,deep down, like I got to do this
for me.
Like I just something about it.
Can't explain it.
I know something's going tohappen there.
And she, she supported me aftera couple of weeks of letting
that sit and knowing that, Hey,this wasn't just like half
marathon I'm signing up for orsomething like that.
This is, you are, you're goingto put in, be put into harm's

(09:06):
way a little bit in a controlledenvironment.
But I told her, like, mentally,this is the part that really got
her, I, I, I, I literally toldher you won't hear from me if
you hear from me, like,something bad happened, like,
they're gonna have, like, I'mgonna have to die, literally die
out there, or they're gonna haveto kick me out, because there's
no way I'm quitting, like, Iwent out there with that

(09:27):
mentality, and that was one ofthe first times, that was
probably the first time in mylife, looking back, that, you I
jumped in with both feet onanything, whether that was a
job, you know, you name it.
I mean, completely committed toit, I guess, other than the
relationship with my wife andkids.
I guess, you know, that'sdefinitely in there.

(09:48):
But other than that, other thanfamily, as far as something I
signed up for that, that was it,man.
I ate, slept and breathed it andthought about it all the time.
Yeah, it seems like you'd haveto.
So I we're talking about theshirt you got hanging from the
event in the background.
I mentioned, so I went and didthis it's a 75 hour event, but
it is not 75 hours of physical.

(10:10):
It's, it's a, it's ramps up anddown.
There's classroom time.
There's self defense, other,other stuff.
So it's, it's demanding in a, ina variety of, of kind of by
design, different ways.
And I know, so going into it,my, my wife was aware that a one
gentleman had passed away at theevent in the past, right?
So that, that was kind oflingering there.

(10:30):
Like it is physically demandingenough that there is, you know,
you're in harm's way.
There's, there is a risk.
And you know, went black for,for 75 plus hours, although they
stream some social mediaupdates.
So kind of, you know, modernworld, you get glimpses of
people.
Oh yeah, he's still there.
He's in one piece.
Still going.
Still going.
Although she, she loves to jokearound when I go do this stuff,

(10:52):
whether it's an, an ultra or,or, you know, some kind of
crucible event, she's like, whydo you pay for these things and
travel to go do them?
Like, just give me the money anda hose and something to beat you
with.
And we'll do it in the backyard.
I get it, man.
My my, my wife doesn't quiteunderstand it either.
And they have hosed me down.
In fact, on the drive andwhatnot, that was part of my

(11:13):
training.
You asked about training.
No, no kidding.
I would go out there and, youknow, the middle of the summer
when I live in Indiana.
So it gets.
It's super humid usually and I'dbe out there with.
Working out and they're hosingme in the face and yelling at
me, trying to simulate that.
Absolutely.
I love it.
Hey, one thing I wanted to askyou I'm not sure if you sort of
explicitly spoke to this as, asyou wrapped up the story in the,

(11:35):
in the book, I think youmentioned coming into it and we
talked a little bit offline, Ithink, or you might've said it
on air that, that the sameinformation didn't exist.
The same communities didn'texist.
Around these kinds of eventsback when you went through it
and you jumped in with bothfeet.
But I think you, you mentionedthat you'd started some training
regimens that were, that youbought, I think, online from one

(11:57):
of the coaches that was there,coach McLeod.
And so he was there live atyour, at your crucible event.
And you kind of mentioned like abit of a nod or a smile or this
or that through the event, whathow did it wrap up?
Did you guys have a debrief oranything from him after you
secured?
From coach McLeod?
Yeah, we shared a beer.
I snapped a picture.
Actually, I have it on my backon my other wall.

(12:18):
You can't see it.
So I still keep in touch withthem.
Cause yeah, funny story.
This is about how social mediacan get you in trouble.
Cause like I said back then, Imean, there were probably groups
and communities, but the SEALFITcommunity and Unbeatable Mind
community, they weren't whatthey are now, as far as how many
people and how many cohorts andall that good stuff.
So for your listeners out there,I had a Facebook account.

(12:39):
I was, I didn't, yeah.
I didn't post, I maybe had onepost in like five years, that
type thing.
So I go out to California, whichis where this event's at.
I snap a picture of myself onthe beach saying something like,
yep, this is the last time I'mgoing to be taken in this view
for the next, you know, 50 hoursor however long I go dark.
And I, and I send it and Idon't, I don't know what happens

(13:01):
afterwards.
Well.
Come to find out coach cloudends up knowing someone who had
responded to that picture.
She was someone that worked at acompany that I used to work for
and it was an HR.
And so it gets even better.
Like they ended up, they went tosenior prom together.
Holy cow.
They, yes, they, yeah, smallworld.
They, they knew each other tothat level.

(13:22):
So I was basically a marked manfrom, from the second I stepped
on to the, to the grinder, so tospeak.
And then like, he, he literallycomes, you know, when someone's
behind you, like, you know,someone's behind you, you don't
know who it is.
So he's behind me.
I don't know it.
And he's got this piece of paperand he puts it in front of me.
And it's, it's, it's thatFacebook interaction.

(13:42):
And he's like, do you know me?
And I'm like, no, sir.
And he's like, you're going toget extra sauce this weekend.
And I'm like, oh, crap, man.
I'm already messing up.
Dude, I just got here.
I don't even know what I'm,like, this hasn't even started.
I'm already marked.
I love it.
Mind games, man.
Mind games.
But yeah, he's a great dude.
He's a great dude.
You just got extra money's worthout of everything.

(14:04):
Exactly.
I mean, that's what I was therefor when I get the full, full
ride.
Tell me a little bit about the,just the extreme sort of highs
and lows that you went through.
And I think one, one of thethings that you mentioned near
the debrief is sort of.
And event like this and thosecoaches are so good at finding
weaknesses.
And so through, through, throughyour story, you mentioned some

(14:26):
of the weaknesses that becameapparent for you to take home
and work on, but just talkingabout some of the highs or lows
or, or kind of, you know, thestrengths aren't as fun as the
weaknesses sometimes.
No, the weaknesses are fun, butI, I will, I'll start with a
high, like the, the, the highwas, I mean, obviously at the
end after securing, cause westarted with about 50 people and
man, I was one of the oldestthere.

(14:47):
I was 35.
At the time I had a little bitof gray hair.
I got a lot more now, but they,they called me grandpa out
there.
That was their nickname for me.
So I, I was one of 25 though, tomake it, we lost half the, half
the crew.
And just when we, when we, whencoach Vine said, you know,
you're secured CACORA class 38,it was just.

(15:08):
I mean, tears of joy, you know,grown, grown men.
We didn't have any women in thisclass.
Unfortunately, it was all men,but yeah, just men just hugging
each other, embracing eachother.
I mean, that was, and still isthe toughest thing I had done up
until this point.
Did your you know, usually youstart off with a height line and
that ends up kind of being oneof your first swim buddies.

(15:30):
Did your swim buddy make it allthe way through?
Yeah, he made it.
Matt.
Matt O'Kipney.
Yeah.
We unfortunately, every once ina while, I mean, I might like
text him once, once a year typething.
So I don't, I don't know whathe's gone on to do,
unfortunately.
I wish we would have kept intouch over the years, but yeah,
it was height line and that wasthe other thing I was, I'm six
two.
So I was in the taller thetaller group, the Clydesdales as

(15:51):
they called us.
So.
Yeah.
It was good.
Freaking heavy.
Yeah.
Heavy.
That, that was the one thing,like we could, we could carry
heavy stuff.
There's, there's no doubt.
Yeah.
So that was, you know, that washigh point, low point.
There were so many, I don't knowwhere to begin, but I'm not a
very good swimmer.
I knew there would be some sortof water competency, had no

(16:13):
idea.
I mean, I can swim to save mylife.
But as far as, you know, beingable to pull off the
breaststroke or, you know, no.
Do I glide in the water?
Hell no.
I drag in the water.
And that just spends energy,man.
So like the pool is definitely alow point.
That was actually the only timeI was.
Ever in the goon squad thatwhole weekend, which the goon
squad for your listeners is youdon't want to be in the goon

(16:36):
squad.
That means you're not up tosnuff.
You're not keeping up with therest of the pack and you need a
little extra remediation.
So they pull you over to theside and they remediate you.
So but I, I was.
I was actually happy because Iwas so tired in the pool.
I could never catch my breath.
I mean, I'm, I'm drinking waterhalf the time.

(16:56):
And when they're like, they'relike, rid her out of the pool.
And I see this small littlegroup that didn't even know it
was over there.
No, you know, cause I'm sofocused on myself and they're
just doing, you know,calisthenics.
I'm like, Ooh, yeah, man, I'llgo.
I'll go do as many pushups asyou want me to do.
Are you kidding me?
I just don't want to go back inthat pool.
Out of the water, get me out ofthe water.
No doubt.
Near kind of near the end of, ofyour story of the journey

(17:18):
through this, those 50 plushours you guys are.
So in this time Mark and theseal fit guys, they had a
facility down in Sanitas,California near the beach.
So they used to kick off andfinish up down there.
Badass facility too, man.
It was awesome.
That place is awesome.
So you guys there's a placewhere you kind of get your, I
think your PT gear back on anddon't even have time to put
socks on, but.

(17:39):
You, you mentioned somewhere inthere that you got to look at
your, your feet and that theywere in good shape that far into
the event, and you almost seemeda little bit surprised by that.
Had, and so I got a reason forthe question, but was that
something you had trouble within the past or why did it
surprise you that your feet?
Yeah, I knew I would gethotspots from time to time on my
feet.
And that was the one thing thatkind of scared me.

(18:00):
I'm like, man, what if I getblisters all over my feet?
And, you know, that would make atough experience that much
tougher.
So I paid particular attentionto my feet and really
experimented around like with.
Everything from, you know, whatlubrication might work on my
feet.
What type of socks do I wear?
One pair, two pair.
I mean, these are little things,but gosh, do they add up through

(18:21):
the course of being on your feetfor over 50 hours?
Right.
Yeah.
Obviously got to take care ofyour feet to the extent you can.
I one of the reasons I wanted toask, I'll share a little story
with you.
So that that event that, that Idid an earlier.
Class of it, one of the guys Imet so I did, I did that event
in April and it's up in Chino,California, right?
So inland, it gets very hotthere.

(18:43):
So Andy Foe and these otherguys, they went through, you
know, what Todd Telkamp was inthis class as well, if you know,
Todd from, from the Kokorocommunity.
And this is middle of thesummer.
And one of the instructors isfrom New York.
So just had no clue.
And right away, he gets theseguys down doing, doing PT and
the asphalt in the parking lotwhere they, where they went to

(19:03):
pick them up.
So they're bear crawling aroundthis parking lot.
And you know, if it's 105outside, this asphalt is going
to be like 130.
And a bunch of them ended upwith, you know, very severe
burns on their hands.
They had to get, you know, themedic to tape up and try to
treat at the beginning of thiscrucible event.
Right.
But Andy, Andy's hands werecompletely fine.
They weren't burned at all.

(19:24):
And, and he attributes a lot ofthat to you know, we talk about
it's more than the physical,it's the, the mental and other
things that he's a tattoo artistand he's really tattooed up.
And so he's got this whole.
Routine of, you know, where youfocus is, is where kind of
things manifest.
And if you don't give attentionto that pain, then your body

(19:44):
won't react by creatinginflammation and other things in
those areas.
And so he was able to kind ofuse that technique to take his
mind off of what was going onwith his hands and they actually
ended up in good shape.
That's, that's awesome.
We, we had a similar incident.
It wasn't that hot, but it was,we, we had to, this was of
course, after eating at an allyou can eat pancake place, they
did feed us and they took us, ifyou could believe this picture.

(20:08):
25 dudes rolling into arestaurant smelling like crap,
dirty, tired.
They've been up, you know,however long on a Sunday
morning, we roll into a privateroom.
We had, we had all you could eatpancakes.
That was our breakfast.
And then after eating andgorging ourselves, we had to do
a burpee broad jumps in the backalley.

(20:29):
So my, my hands were cut upfrom, from all the, the, the
broad jumps and the burpees.
So, man, if the asphalt wouldhave been one Oh five, I don't
know, that would have beenpretty brutal.
Yeah.
You described him in the bookas, as just being completely
hamburger, hamburger hands.
You got it, man.
Yep.
So one of the things I want toask you about, you know, in a

(20:49):
way, this is very much anindividual event, but in a way
it's very much a team event,just like it's physical, but
it's also other things.
And one of the points that youmake in the book, I think you
even mentioned in debrief withwith coach divine.
Sort of the ability to ask forhelp and when pride can get in
the way of asking for help ormaybe asking for help soon

(21:11):
enough.
So you no big spoiler here, butyou had a teammate who was in
bad shape at one point, neededhelp carrying his pack
eventually accepted help and itwas too late.
Eventually it was too late atthat point.
He was, he was already burnedout.
So, you know, just all theseevents are a metaphor and
training for life.
Like you said, purposefuladversity to, to kind of train

(21:33):
for other things.
Where, where's that line?
How do you know when, when toask for help and particularly an
event like this to, to use theevent, you know, the metaphor
itself, where's the line betweenneeding help, just not putting
out enough effort, or you justdidn't prepare for the event
whatsoever as an individual.
Yeah, that's, that's a greatquestion.

(21:54):
I've actually never been askedthat before.
So that's awesome.
I, I think, I think you onlytruly know.
It's like that differencebetween an injury and a
quindary.
They, they prompted us on that,which you're smiling.
So I think you probably had thesame prompt.
Like, is it, is it really aninjury?
Or is it just a nagging thingthat's going to make you quit?
Cause mentally you're just goingto focus on it.
And that's going to be yourreason to get out of this

(22:14):
because of all the pain you'rein.
You know, but as soon as youquit, give yourself, you know.
10 minutes, you're going to belike, damn, I wish I wouldn't
have done that.
I could have made it through.
You know what I mean?
There's, there's a difference.
And on the outside, I don'tthink you can tell.
I think it's just that internal.
We all got that internalchatter, that internal voice
that we're listening to.
And you know, if it keeps comingup like, Hey, maybe I should ask

(22:35):
for help.
Maybe I should, maybe youshould.
So there's nothing wrong withit.
There's nothing wrong for askingfor help, especially at an event
like that.
Because to your point, this is ateam event.
One person's not going to getthrough it.
Rambo, although a great movieis, is BS.
Like there's just not going tobe this one man show.
You know, we need, we need ateam and we're all in life.
It is a metaphor because we'reall on several teams, whether

(22:56):
it's your family work whateverpassion project you might have
going on sports, we're all partsof teams and they all interact
together and together.
The, you know, the, the sum isgreater than the whole time type
of thing.
So yeah, that was one of the biglessons I learned out there
because up until that point, I'dsay I was fairly selfish.
I mean, I just was, even thoughI had kids and was married, like

(23:18):
I had trained, you know, threehours a day forever.
That's.
Yeah, I know why I was doing it,but it still could be looked at
as selfish.
You know, I'm away from myfamily.
I'm away from my kids, spendingtime doing that, this me, me, me
type stuff.
And, and out there, you just,you quickly learned you're,
you're not going to make itthrough unless the team really
comes together and gels.

(23:38):
And, and that, that's hard todo.
A lot of people's egos get, getin the way because they don't
want to, they, they look at itas a weakness to ask for help
and no, it's not, it's not.
It's not a weakness.
It's actually good.
You should ask for help more.
I, I generally think people liketo help people.
So not only is it good for you,it's also benefiting whoever
you're helping asking, causeit's like, cool.
I get to help Michael out.

(23:58):
You know?
Yeah.
That makes me feel good.
You know?
So it's pretty simple.
Yeah.
It's service.
It's a service.
Yeah.
I always kind of wondered thatparticularly an event like this
where, you know, the cadre isalways looking, even when
you've, you don't think theyare.
And I know I, I talked to one ofthem that I want to ask you
about.
And his, his, at the time, hiscomment was I forget, you know,

(24:20):
what the topic was, but it'slike, you just do the standard
and that was it.
Do the standard.
Do the standard.
So that that comment came fromanother, another gentleman you
mentioned in your book,unfortunately lost to the, to
the community in the world lastyear, master chief, Mark
Crampton, cramps, cramps.
Yeah.
Yeah.

(24:40):
Great dude.
I, I had coffee with him when I,when I came back from this 75
hour event I did, you know, thatI would call a crucible and you
know, I was excited to kind ofdebrief it with him.
And, and he was like, so how'dyour, how'd your challenge go?
I can see him saying that too,but man, I, I I'm so fortunate
to have worked with him.

(25:02):
Cause I, I went back to Kikorocamp last summer and, and
actually worked it as a, I wasbasically helping the cadre,
which he was, he was the leadcadre for the, for the evening
shift.
So, you know, whatever hewanted, I mean, you know,
whether it was coffee, like Ididn't care.
I was helped.
I was there to, to help him out.
What a great dude.
What a great dude.

(25:22):
Lost, lost way too soon.
Just, you know, you come acrosscertain people and you just, you
spend even just a little bit oftime with them and you're like,
man, that's a dude.
I, I, I would literally runthrough a brick wall for him.
You know, if, if he was myleader, you know, and it was
such a joy and such a pleasureto get, to get to work with him.
And I tell you what, I'll tellyou a quick story.

(25:44):
I haven't told a lot of peopleand so we're out there, it's
summer, as you mentioned, it'shot.
Okay, and I'm on the night crew,so the day crew is supposed to
sleep in these RVs.
Well, of course, our AC'sbroken.
And there's five dudes in there,in this RV, and it is a hot
sauna, man.

(26:04):
It is a sweat lodge, like, weknow we have to sleep, but
we're, we're literally, we're inour skibbies, and we're just
sweating, just dripping.
And Master Chief Kramps, he, hestops in on us to check.
He's like, what's going on?
And we're like, our AC isbroken.
And he's like, I got to have youguys good to go for tonight.
He's like, follow me.
So we went into his RV.

(26:25):
He cleared out space for us all,man.
We had like, I don't know,seven, eight dudes cramped in
this little RV, but it had ACand it felt amazing and I didn't
care, but that's just the typeof leader he was, you know, it
was, it was you know, themission, the men and then
himself.
Right at the day.
But yeah.
Yeah, no, I didn't realize yougot a chance to cadre with him.

(26:46):
So that's an awesome story.
Thank you.
And I want to, I want to ask youalso if you, if you remember any
stories of him, as you were, ifhe cadre while you were going
through it share, share a quickone kind of in return.
So I think when, when he and I,so this was April of 2021 when I
did that 75 hour event.
So, you know, came back and wedebrief probably early, mid May,

(27:07):
something like that.
And there had been a Kokoro, Iwant to say that March or so
Feb, March.
So Vail Lake, you know, inlandTemecula, California gets very,
very hot in the summer, but italso gets, can get very cold in
the winter.
And so that was, there was likefreezing rain that spring or
whatever you want to call Feb,March in, and so like if you

(27:27):
know, Brian rail, chef, he, he,he froze out of it, you know,
Heather, a lot of people wentdown just, you know, due to the
extreme, extreme cold that we'realready physically very
prepared, but just notnecessarily prepared for that
exposure.
And I remember asking askingcramps, like two things, like to
do the standard guy, but alsothe guy that will, you know,

(27:48):
literally give the shirt off hisback for you.
I was asking him how that he hadcadre that one and he goes, he's
like, I went and gathered upevery jacket, every fleece,
everything we could find.
We, you know, we rocked them toget them warm.
You know, he gave them everytool he could to try to get
people warm and give them thechance to succeed.
But I also remember asking him,I go like, is there a special

(28:09):
MRE?
That you guys would use, likewhen you went to cold weather
training in the military, youknow, more fat or something like
that, that'll keep your bodywarm in cold weather conditions.
You know, did you guys switchout the MREs or anything for
this for this event?
He's like, it's only 50 hours.
Just get over it.
That's so true.
I could see him saying that,man, and I know exactly that,

(28:31):
that event, cause rich Peckhamwho got the nickname Frodo from
another cadre, cause he lookslike Frodo Baggins.
He, he made it through.
So he was in that class.
He made it through, but yeah,they only had like, I don't even
know, five people make itthrough.
It was so bad, you know, theywere supposed to, part of that
is, and it's no secret, but you,you hike Mount Palomar in the

(28:52):
middle of the night.
It's one of the evolutions.
They couldn't do it.
Cause there was snow, there wassnow up there.
Yeah.
That's how cold it was.
Holy cow.
Yeah, it does get cold up there.
How about when you were goingthrough, did you, you have any
cramps memories or was heworking that one?
So my cadre the cadre I wentthrough with completely.

(29:13):
Rolled over, man.
Yeah.
I don't think there's anyone.
Mark James, I think was the onlyone from that original that I
went through.
Cause I went through with likeLance Cummings and taco and a
bunch of dudes.
So yeah.
A lot of guys.
Yeah.
Unfortunately.
Yeah.
Unfortunately I didn't have acramps part of the cadre.
I wish I would have.
I mean, just just a solid dude.

(29:34):
Yeah.
I'll give you one more storyfrom from somebody else.
I want to say this was, so thisis, I don't know if you know Jim
Conquill, 50, 57 is hisnickname.
Yeah, I know.
I know, Jim.
So when, when Jim went andfinally did his Kokoro, which I
think got pushed off by personalstuff, got pushed off by COVID.
So cramps had worked that one.
So he told me a cramp story.
I think this is when they were,might've been hiking or might've

(29:57):
been when they went down to thebeach.
And, you know, he's also one ofthose guys that didn't have to
scream.
You know, he wasn't the guy withthe megaphone or the screamer,
right?
You know, he gave him an orderand the instruction was no
talking and there was stillchatter.
And he just said, you guys arestarting to piss me off.
And that's all he said.
That's all he said.
But you know, they went in thebook and there definitely was a

(30:19):
price to pay.
They're in the book.
Yeah.
You don't want to be in thebook.
That's that's definitely.
Yeah.
I know exactly that evolution.
That was that on.
Mount Palomar, yeah, that's the,it's the silent hike and and he
leads that I got to, I got totake part in that because I was
in the night crew and I drovethe support, there's a support
vehicle, you don't know itbecause I tried to stay out,
headlights are off, but I'm, I'mway in the back picking up.

(30:42):
Casualties is what we call them.
If someone has to drop or theyget hurt or whatever.
So, yeah.
How about kind of bringing allthis together.
And I noticed the, the, the, thebook is coming off the event,
which is the springboard foreverything you're doing with
school right now.
So I want to, I want to jumpinto that.
But I think you say in the book,the event left you forever

(31:02):
changed pretty much in every waywhich, which may be obvious in
itself.
I guess the question I had onthat is where, and when do you
find yourself slipping?
And, and what do you, what doyou do to reel yourself in or
stay accountable?
I love that question becausesometimes we look at, you know,
big figures out there, like, youknow, your Jockos, your David

(31:25):
Goggins or whoever, right?
And you just think these, thesepeople have perfect lives.
They don't.
I certainly don't.
I mess up just like everybodyelse.
I caught, I catch myselfslipping.
I'll give you an example.
Perfect example Christmas,Christmas break, that two weeks
off company I worked for, it waskind of a slower period.
And then most of my clients wereoff, especially that last week.

(31:47):
My wife's a teacher.
She's off for two weeks.
Kids are home.
So I work out of my house.
So I'm used to having no onehere.
So my schedule is completelyflipped.
And I found myself sleeping inlonger.
Which isn't necessarily a badthing, okay, I mean, I'm, you
know, I do try to wake up early,I do wake up early, but I get,
if it's vacation or somethingI'll sleep in a little bit,
sure.

(32:08):
The sweets, man, I'm a sweet guyand with, Oh yeah.
And with Christmas and like, wewere hosting and my wife's a
great cook.
My problem is I only have somany willpower points throughout
the day.
So at the end of the day, likeif all these pastries and shit
are right by me in the kitchen,like it's going down.
I don't, I don't have thosepoints anymore.
Right.
I don't, I don't like thatwillpower is gone.

(32:29):
So I basically got to have itaway from me.
And I just, I find my, I foundmyself sleeping in eating too
much sugary crap and I wasn'tworking out.
Like I normally do, I could feelit, man.
I was just getting edgy.
I felt it.
I would snap a little biteasier, you know, maybe at my
kids or, or, or, or what haveyou.
Cause Hey, I'm not perfect.
And I'm, I'm willing, I'll bethe first one to admit that,

(32:51):
but.
I've at least practiced enoughto where I can witness that and
be like, Oh yeah, I was kind ofan ass there or I shouldn't have
handled that.
So if I do stuff like that, Iapologize, it's back to the,
back to the routine for me.
So, you know, especially withstart of the new year, right.

(33:11):
New routine or new year'sresolutions.
I'm not a big fan of that stuff,but I am a fan of doing a reset
coming off of like a holiday inwhich you've.
Hopefully experienced somethinglike, and I said, hopefully,
cause it's like, Hey man, we allgot to live, you know, you got
to have some fun.
I don't regret it, but it'slike, I got to get back to, to
what I want to do and how I feelbetter.
And I just, I feel better whenI'm up early going through a

(33:34):
morning routine, working out.
Doing my day job, working on my,my, my passion projects,
coaching, like that's what I'm,that's when I'm at my best, not
just watching national lampoonsfor the fifth time and eating
cookies.
I mean, I love that movie, butdude, I just, I felt like a slob
just don't feel good.
No doubt.
How how old are your kids?

(33:57):
My son just turned nine, he'sDecember baby, and then my
daughter's getting ready to turn12 here in a few weeks, so,
yeah.
Yeah, you got some fun yearsahead.
You know, people talk about howkids see everything, you know,
and maybe when they're younger,they kind of pick it up a little
bit more intuitively, or maybethey, you know, they'll model
it, but they don't necessarilyunderstand it.

(34:17):
You know, my, my son, like Isaid, he's, he's 14 going on 15.
Just in the last probably yearor two, like he has just been
sharp as a, as a hawk.
So you'll start to see this withyour daughter.
Right.
And I, I started slipping alittle bit, probably sometime
during, might've been duringthe, the new year's break or
something as well.
I've, I've been doing.
Rounds of 75 hard with, withsome other guys to kind of keep

(34:41):
each other in check and just,you know, really keep the, the
daily routine polished.
And part of that for me alsoworking from home and having a
couple of businesses is gettingup early, get the first workout
of the day and early, you know,get my mind and my body set.
And my son's getting up.
Around, I don't know, 6, 6, 15for school.
And there were a string of dayswhere I wasn't getting up before

(35:03):
he was, I wasn't getting up andgetting it done.
And he called me out.
He's like.
But the point was he got up andI wasn't already in the garage
gym, you know, getting it doneand he called me out on it.
I was like, all right, you know,he saw it.
I already knew it, but time to,time to fix it.
That's the best accountabilitypartner right there is like

(35:25):
your, your spouse or your kids.
I was kind of similar.
So my wife and I have beenwaking up early together,
usually around five 20 and we'lleither go for like a, Just a two
mile ruck, or we'll just hopoff.
I have exercise bikes in the, Ihave a garage gym and we'll,
we'll just do some exercisebikes and then we'll do like

(35:46):
little plank, five minute plank.
Routinely like clockwork, but.
With Christmas, all that went bythe wayside and it's funny,
kids, kids said somethingsimilar, like, what happened to
you guys, like doing stuff forthe morning and we're like, Ooh,
yeah, you're right.
But we need, everybody needsthat though.
Everybody needs someone to callBS on them and.

(36:06):
Or tell them, no, that's notsuch a good idea.
We were talking about that aboutbefore, before this call, like
just having some sort ofaccountability partner.
I know that's quite a popularbuzz term, but just, just
someone that's going to keepyou, keep you honest, you know,
we all need it.
Yeah.
So how, how much of that happenswith School of Grid or, or what
does that community look like?
Tell me about the coaching andthe community.
Yeah, man.

(36:26):
So we're a community for men,women.
I like to say we're, we're therefor people that want to, you
know, better themselves and Ilike to say we're developing a
warrior class.
That's what, that's what we'redeveloping.
I think everybody's got a littlewarrior in them.
And what I mean by warrior issomeone who can take care of
themselves, someone who can takecare of others, and then someone

(36:47):
who knows their God givenpurpose and are not afraid to go
after it.
That's it.
That's what we work on together.
And we, man, we span the globe.
We talk about everything fromnutrition to of course, fitness.
We have calls on that.
We have calls on meditation,breath work.
We have calls on situationalawareness, self defense.
So, I mean, we span, we span itall and it's set up like a

(37:08):
school.
So this is all done over zoom.
It's virtual, small group.
And most of our calls are onTuesdays, Thursdays.
And you attend the calls you canmake, don't attend the ones that
don't interest you.
And everything's recorded.
So it's housed in a repository,but it's pretty sweet.
I love it.
And, and we have some justawesome guest speakers that,
that, that come through every,every month and just learn so

(37:30):
much and then like the magic ofit is kind of what happens
offline.
So we have a private Slackchannel and that's where people
ask questions or maybe they'vegot an issue they're dealing
with and just seeing the tribecome together and And work with
each other is awesome.
And then I, I host A couple ofcalls to where you, some people
call it masterminds.
Some people call it hot seats,whatever.

(37:52):
Hey, we're here.
What do you have in trouble withor what's on your mind?
And we all get together and kindof brainstorm and help each
other out, man.
That's so, it's so much fun.
I love it.
Cool.
No, that sounds super valuable.
How much of it, I know you're,you know, you're also a
certified unbeatable mind.
Individual and group coach.
So how much of a, do you bringthe unbeatable mind coaching and
tools into it?

(38:13):
How much of it is an extensionof that with your, your own
material?
Yeah, I think it's, I think thestuff's like a good foundation.
Cause I do, I do really like thelike the five mountains, the
physical, mental, emotional,intuitional warrior spirit
thing, but then, you know, we,we bring in other things like,
you know, growing grit and.
Self defense and you know, youname it.
So try to try to round outeverything.

(38:34):
We, and we do go into spiritualdevelopment too.
So, Hey, I believe in God and wejust, we explore.
Our relationship with that and Ijust ask that everybody is open
and everybody is, otherwise theywouldn't be part of it.
So it's not, it's not foreverybody.
There's a selection process.
So I interview everybody andthere's a few things I'm looking
for, but those are those arethings for me to know.

(38:55):
And you'll find out at the endwhere the thumbs up or thumbs
down, you know, elections,election you know, I, I know one
of the things you, you mentionedin the book is, is from the
unbeatable mind.
Catalog, if you, if you will, orthat foundation, the big four
of, of mental toughness.
Oh, yeah.
Do you want to talk a little bitabout that, about how it showed
up in Kokoro or, or maybe moreimportantly, how it shows up in,

(39:16):
in School of Grid or, or yourlife?
And, and the one, I don't knowif Jim Bro was kind of spinning
this the same way back then,but.
You know, in recent years, healso talks about the the sort of
unwritten, unspoken fifth one,which is foo focus on, on
others, teammates or the serviceaspect to keep you going
through, through tough times.
Yeah, that's, that's huge.
I mean, so big four mentaltoughness, breath control,

(39:41):
positivity, visualization, goalsetting.
I mean, so here's the funnything.
When I told you I did it kind ofass backwards.
I did, because when I signed upfor Kokoro, I didn't know
anything about.
Unbeatable mind.
I didn't know it all.
That's I, I was just crushingthe physical stuff.
I learned all that stuff outthere.
I'll give you an example.
We were, we were in like a vanand that was one of the very few

(40:02):
times you had time just to sitand sort of reflect, except
you're in a van.
Windows are up, heaters on fullblast, and you're trying to keep
yourself from not going tosleep.
And one of the cadre noticedthat somebody was doing some
tactical breathing.
And I thought, what's thisperson doing?
Why are they breathing likethat?
And I'm like, oh, they're tryingto, you know, regulate their
mind about that.

(40:22):
There might, there might besomething to that.
So I really didn't get intothat.
Whole like self developmentpiece until after that's what
really opened up my eyes.
And obviously I learned aboutfocus on others out there
because as we talked about it,it very much as a team thing,
but there's not a day that goesby I don't use.
The big four of mentaltoughness, and it really does

(40:42):
start with your breath and, andjust being able to take, I find
that if you can, especially instressful situations, if you can
just find time to take a breath,you'll make a clear, more
calculated decision instead ofhaving a knee jerk reaction for
all you parents out there,especially that's young kids.
Try it next, before you go offand, you know, cry about spilt

(41:04):
milk or whatever, like just trytaking a breath and be like, I'm
gonna breathe here.
Just that one second, man.
Sometimes it's all you need.
Can, can make all thedifference.
Absolutely.
Some, sometimes literally lifeor death.
Life or death.
And then, you know,visualization's huge.
I mean, if you can't see it.
You're probably not going to doit.
So you really got to seeyourself doing it, whether that

(41:25):
applies to anything, whetherit's sports related.
I mean, it's something I talkedto my kids about, cause we do
martial arts together and we doTaekwondo.
So I'll have them a lot of timesclose their eyes and perform the
different poomsaes and forms andstuff.
Cause it's like, If you couldsee yourself doing it, like no
big deal when you go to actualpromotion, there's a hundred
people there and you're right.

(41:46):
You're there.
Spotlights on you, right?
But you will have done it.
You can access it at thesubconscious level.
It's no different than giving abig presentation or, you know,
entrepreneurs who are startingthat business.
See yourself being successful,see yourself growing and how
you'd interact with potentialclients.
And I mean, it's great.
Also, you could take that theother way to see yourself

(42:06):
failing.
I don't think there's that muchof a problem with that either,
because it's easy to seeyourself win.
But if you can think about thosefailure points and those
bottlenecks, you can solve forthem ahead of time.
Like, Ooh, maybe I need to surethis up, you know?
Yeah, I could fail there.
So what could I put in place asa backstop or how can I mitigate
that?
Nice.
I last time I remember doingsome tactical breathing before

(42:29):
some public speaking, I wentover to visit a client to speak
to their board.
It's televised.
It's recorded.
It's it's on a websitesomewhere.
Now there were three remoteaudiences and an audience in
person.
And I was I was going to get gason the way there.
And the back of my my suit pantsripped open.
That's classic.

(42:50):
Not much I can do about it atthis point.
I hope the suit jacket coversmost of it.
Just breathe and let's go.
Just breathe and let's, let's gothrough it.
Nice.
How I guess just in terms ofyour foundation or your founding
of school of grit and all thework you're doing there, how.
You mentioned purpose a fewtimes.
We talked about purposefuladversity to start.

(43:12):
How did you know?
So how did, coming out ofKokoro, how'd you know this was
what was next for you or whatyou were going to create and the
community you were going tobuild, how you were going to
serve?
Man, I didn't, it actuallyhaunted me for a while cause
coming out of Kokoro camp.
Mark Devine, he addressed ourclass and he asked a simple
question, two words.

(43:34):
He said, what's next?
I'm like, what's next?
What do you mean, man?
I just trained my ass off ofthis and secured it.
Like, but what he was referringto is, okay, you've done this.
Now, what are you going to do?
Cause it is fairly common.
You see it a lot.
Like people will go after thatfirst marathon train and then
they quit running for whateverreason or what have you.

(43:54):
And then they move on to likethe next shiny object.
Right.
And I, like I said, it hauntedme.
I thought maybe doing moreevents could kind of cure that
bug and there's lots of greatevents out there.
And I've done a few, but itdidn't come, it didn't come
close to that experience that Ihad at Kokoro camp.
And I thought, you know, what,what was it about that?

(44:16):
And I started writing down anoutline of everything I went
through and.
Service to others came up andI'm like, that's it, man.
I got to find a way to serveothers.
I want others to experience whatI'm experiencing at Kokoro camp
without having to go through 50hours of the, of the beat down,
unless they want to, then by allmeans go for it.
Well, let's face it.
Not everybody wants to do that.

(44:37):
Not everybody can do that.
So long story short Mark Scottpodcasts, you know, people of
mine podcasts.
I was listening to it.
He had a dude on by the name ofLarry Hagner, Larry runs a
podcast called the dad's edgeAlliance.
And he, during that episode,I'll never forget it.
Cause I was driving home fromwork and Larry was talking about

(44:58):
how to come home as a dad, youknow, taking that uniform off
and.
Being able to compartmentalizeyour job, leaving it at the
doorstep and then, you know,walking through being, being
that dad, being that, being thathusband.
I struggled with that for awhile.
And You ever listened to apodcast?
You're like, man, this istalking to me.
Like, yeah, that was, that wasit at that time.

(45:19):
So I reached out to Larry andlong story short, had a dinner
with him.
Dinner lasted three hours.
He was a big fan of Mark.
Couldn't believe.
I had gone through Kikoro campwas very interested and he was
talking to me about his vision.
This was five, six years,probably six years ago.
His vision was to have this,this group called the Dad's Edge

(45:42):
Alliance.
And kind of like a membershiptype site.
And he was going to need coachesto handle the, the amount of
clients that hopefully would bepoured in from the podcast.
So I just, I was like, man,that's it.
I raised my hand.
I said, dude, I'll be your firstcoach.
He's like, I'm wanting to, I'mwaiting to find a way to serve
others.
Like, let's do it.
So I became his first head coachand I coached, I coached men.

(46:05):
It was men only group.
I did that for five years.
My, my call, I called my fight.
My call team was a fight club.
We met on Fridays at 10 o'clockEastern.
So shout out to any fight clubmembers out there that might be
listening.
So that's really how I got mystart.
And then fell in love with it.
Just fell in love with thecoaching.
I was sold on what having aconversation like this over

(46:25):
zoom, what that can do.
And I thought, this is it, man,more people need this.
And then I had been working onmy book too.
And and launched the book andpeople just random people.
People like you, like they just,Hey, I read your book, man.
It was awesome.
I'm like, really?
Like, what'd you like?
And they're like, well, andthey, they tell me the specifics

(46:46):
and I'm like, okay, there'ssomething here.
Like I need to take thissomewhere.
And I thought, okay.
The PA I try to look forpatterns in life.
I thought, here's the pattern.
I got the book.
I've done coaching.
I need to do my own coachinggroup, school of grit tribe.
That's how school of grit tribewas born, man.
And yeah, I love it.
I do.
I feel like I'm actually doing.

(47:06):
You know, what, what God's planwas, was for me, because one of
the what's the, I don't want tomess this up.
Someone told me, I can'tremember who said this, it
doesn't matter, you guys canlook it up, but definition of
hell, definition of hell is onyour death bed, death bed,
meeting the version of yourselfthat you could have become, you

(47:27):
know, or I just like, I've,I've, I've also heard it
referenced as like, you go upthe like the heavenly gates, and
they're reading.
You know, everything you've donethroughout life and this
person's just done amazingthings.
Right.
And they're like, and you'relike, who are they talking
about?
That's you.
If you would have done X, Y, Zand had the courage to put

(47:49):
yourself out there and fail,man, fail.
That's failure is a good thing.
We need to embrace that.
Gosh, we need to embrace that somuch.
So people just, they strive forperfection and that's just not
real.
Just get out there and messstuff up, man.
A hundred percent.
Hey, I know that story for sure.
Yeah.
So it's just been a long road,dude.
I, I, yeah, but I've, I've keptmy ear, you know, down and I

(48:09):
believe in the power of puttingpositivity out there and it will
come back to you at some point.
I don't do it because of that,but mark my words, it will.
And just I have a mentor of mineVincent Puglisi.
He calls it the hour of giving.
I don't do it for an hour.
But he spends every morningcontacting people.
Hey, how's your day?
I was thinking about you today.
How many times have you hadthat?

(48:30):
Where you're like, man, I wonderhow someone says to him.
I should contact him.
But, but you don't right now.
I don't, I don't mess around.
If I, if I have that thought, Iimmediately text them like, Hey,
I was thinking about you today.
Hope all's good.
You wouldn't believe how manypeople respond back.
Dude, I was thinking about youtoo.
Or man, I really appreciatedthat.
I was having a shitty day.
And so if it pops up for you,you just reach out, I go with

(48:52):
it.
That's, that's the intuitionpiece, right?
Yeah, I go with it.
I'm, I'm heavy in intuition now,because now that I've aligned
with my purpose, I'm clearing myprinciples and my passion now,
my intuition's working onoverdrive, man, I feel it's
like, so if I really feel it, orif I start dreaming about it,
I'm like, all right, someone'stelling me to do this and like,
I've.

(49:12):
Obviously I believe in God, I'veraised that several times, so I
believe it's God telling me todo this, so I'm going to go down
that path.
But for you, and your listeners,you know, whatever that higher
being is, or whatever youbelieve in, whatever that voice
is, man, go for it.
Right, or ignore it at your ownperil.
Or ignore it at your own peril.
Now, I have to caution you, ifyou're one of those people where

(49:33):
your intuition leads you downthe wrong path multiple times,
that does happen.
It's like that episode inSeinfeld where George, what was
it, opposite day or whatever.
I don't know if you watchSeinfeld, but he basically does
the opposite of everything.
And you know, like that, thatcould work, I guess.
But like, we need to take somesteps back and really look at we
need to peel back that onion andsee why.

(49:53):
Right.
Yeah.
The maybe the antenna is off alittle bit.
It could be off a little bit andthere could be reasons for that,
but we'll see.
Yeah.
Well, I love what you're doing.
Can congratulations on the book,you know, the book itself,
obviously no joke, the crucibleof getting your thoughts on
paper and getting that outthere.
I know that's super valuable.
Just on that note I forgot toask you off air, so I don't want
to put you on the spot here, butare you still doing ebook

(50:15):
versions of that for anybody?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Still ebook versions for sure.
Absolutely.
And yeah, it's available.
On Amazon, Barnes and Noble, allthat, all that good stuff.
Yep.
And then also too, I'm doing a30 day free trial too.
So if anyone's interested in, inthe coaching program, try it on
for 30 days.
Okay, perfect.
Yeah, I definitely want to wrapup on, on that point.

(50:38):
So 30 days awesome school gritscoaching tribe.
That's how does that line upwith the selection process?
Have the, have the intro callwith you and then if
everything's well, you've gotthe trial period.
Yep.
Have the intro call with me.
So my email's brad at school ofgrit.
org, not.
com.
org.
I'm not going to pay for thedomain, at least not yet.

(50:58):
So just send me an email, sayyou're interested.
We'll set up a call.
And Probably take 30 minutes,but just see if it's going to be
the right fit.
And if it is, we'll get youonboarded.
That's a zoom call with a PTtest.
Yeah.
Zoom call.
PT test is optional.
We won't, we won't do that yet,but I, you know what, maybe I
should though.
That, that would be, that'd bepretty sweet.
At least, you know, get thereaction.
The reaction itself could betelling.

(51:20):
That's right.
Just do the do the wholeinterview in a plank.
You know, that probably could, Iprobably could.
Yeah, I tried to implement that.
Yeah, I had, I had a small teamat a company, a couple, a couple
of stops ago, and it was justthree of us.
And I said, you know what?
We need to make these shorter.
Let's just, let's do plank basedmeetings.
So we're only gonna, we're onlygonna meet as long as we can

(51:40):
plank.
I mean, you get to the, to thereal matter pretty, pretty
quickly, right?
Instead of all the pleasantriesand stuff like let's get to the,
like, what's the real reasonwe're on?
Let's drop this 30 minutes downto like four.
Get right to it.
Yeah, I love that idea.
So school of grit.org and Bradat, we'll get links up to all
this stuff a bit.
Yeah.
The show notes.
I know you mentioned socialmedia and it got you in trouble

(52:01):
back did in 2015, I think, whenyou went through, was it 2015
you went through Yeah, 2015.
Yep.
But are you on social media now?
Where, where do people followyou and, and find you other than
the website?
Yeah, I'm, I'm on InstagramYouTube.
And LinkedIn, so just check outSchool of Grit and you'll,
you'll find me there.
So we'll get you get, get yourlinks up to all that stuff too.

(52:21):
And of course the book, as yousaid, I got it off Amazon
anywhere books are sold.
Brad again, congratulations onthe book and, and your tribe and
what you're doing for yourself,your family, the business, the
world.
I appreciate you.
I appreciate what you're doing.
I thank you for coming on.
Likewise, brother.
Appreciate you.
Yeah, man.
Thanks for telling your story.
Keep at it.
And hopefully book number two,we'll get you back.
Oh man, you just scared methere.

(52:42):
Book number two, but absolutely.
I'll come back if I got, if Igot all right, lean into it.
All right.
Thanks brother.
Thanks.
Okay.
That was episode one 18 withBrad Ritter.
You can of course find the showand the show notes at men to
mastery.
com slash one 18 that'll get youlinks to school of grit.

(53:03):
org and all Brad's social.
So make sure you go check itout.
What he's doing to build thatwarrior class community over
there.
I know a few of them personally,and they're just top, top
quality people.
Okay.
And as a reminder on thecoaching side of things, go
check out the new site atmastery.
coach.
www.
mastery.
coach if that can be of serviceto you.

(53:24):
All right, let's get out thereand crush the rest of the week,
guys.
Go get after it.
Yeah.