August 28, 2025 • 56 mins
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In this powerful episode of Security Halt!, host Deny Caballero sits down with Green Beret Cody Halfpop to share his incredible journey through military service, Special Forces selection, and life after the uniform. Cody opens up about the grit it takes to earn the Green Beret, his experiences on deployment, and how mentorship shaped his career.
The conversation takes a deep dive into the challenges of military transition, addressing the mental health struggles many veterans face, including substance abuse and the silent battle of suicide within the community. Cody emphasizes the importance of physical fitness, resilience, and strong connections to overcome adversity.
Together, Deny and Cody highlight the life-saving work of the Special Forces Foundation, showing how community, mentorship, and purpose can change—and even save—lives. This is more than a story of service; it’s a call to action to support those who have sacrificed for our nation.
👉 Don’t miss this inspiring conversation. Follow, like, share, and subscribe on Spotify, YouTube, and Apple Podcasts to stay connected with more stories that matter.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Securepodcast is proudly sponsored by Titan's
Arms.
Head over to the episodedescription and check out
Titan's Arms today.
That before yeah, I had a fullepisode that like literally we
talked for 40 minutes, then hitrecord.
Then hit record, then hitfucking record, then I'm like
you know you might run to getback, can?
Speaker 2 (00:22):
we revisit that last six, seven, eight conversations.
We can skip the one in themiddle.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
I just want to pause right now and kind of reflect on
something you said 40 minutesago.
Just restart.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Just say it verbatim one more time, because I really
thought it was that important.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
It was so impactful.
Restart.
Cody Halfpop.
Welcome to Security Hot Podcast.
Thanks, man.
Glad to be here.
Absolutely.
It is amazing to sit down withsome of your friends and get
some background information.
I did my homework, so a lot ofpeople from 10th Group had a lot
of things to say, somefavorable.
(00:57):
We'll just go through the list.
Cody Half Poop I don't care forthis man.
I was one of your priorteammates, sounds right?
Cody Cody, you're interviewingthat asshole.
And the list goes on and on.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
I did find one person .
You haven't found anything thatsurprised me yet.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
No man.
Everybody I reached out to andtalked to and it's evident when
we opened up the morning threadsfor a lot of the initiatives
that you're started for theSpecial Forces Foundation
Everybody has great things tosay about you and I have yet to
meet a more welcoming or warmerindividual in my time coming out
(01:39):
of the military than you.
Good sir, you are truly afriend of a friend, a Green
Beret's Green Beret, and it's anhonor to have you here to talk
about the great work that you dowith Special Forces Foundation.
I know that praise andadmiration is not something that
any of us are used to, buttruly what you're doing is
saving lives and you're takingan individual, doing something
(02:02):
that a lot of people are willingto do, which is one person at a
time, one situation at a time,and getting involved from from
the grassroots type of ofmovement.
Everybody's waiting for a big,big overarching foundation to
come in and just save everybodyand and that's not happening,
it's the human connection that'sreally.
(02:23):
That's really what's saving allof us.
We were talking earlier beforewe started reaching out to our
friends.
That's really stemming the tideand often enough, when we're
struggling, we fail to even heedthat warning, and we need to,
we need to talk about that.
So today, before we dive intoall the great things that you're
doing for the Special ForcesFoundation, I want to dive into
(02:43):
your story.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Why did you start service and what led you to
become a Green Beret man?
It's a loaded question, I guess.
I think, like a lot of us, weprobably came from either mommy
or daddy didn't love us enoughor some sort of family.
We come start broken right.
So it's the draw Mostly goodfamily family, but sure get like
abandonment stuff.
You know, parents, dad, um, itwas a really good wrestler back
in iowa, damn, you have to be, Iguess.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Um yeah, that's a big state for wrestlers man it is.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
It is I'm probably the worst in my family.
My brother's a two-timenational champ.
He's coached several nationaltitles.
My brother, my cousin, is athree-time all--American and
then he's a head coach at acollege called Grandview and
they've won 12, 13 nationaltitles.
They're just a crazy powerhouse.
I was successful but not nearlytalented enough and I, you know
(03:39):
you look at getting ready to goto college and stuff like that
and I I looked at some schoolsand probably could have got some
scholarships to some degreewhatever.
But I realized I was going tobe a really good wrestler after
four or five years and I stilldidn't know what I wanted to be
when I grew up.
Spoiler, I still don't knowwhat I want to be when I grow up
, but I fought the army four orfive years and this is pre-9-11.
(04:03):
So, I joined in 2000 2000,thought I would figure out after
four or five years get somecollege money and then uh, and
then know, what I wanted to bewhen I grew up.
Obviously, 9-11 kicked off.
I was a signal signals,intelligence linguist, crypto
linguist.
My first duty station wasgermany and we sat in a basement
listening to headphones and itwas the worst.
I I'm an outside soldier.
(04:25):
I need to play outside.
A lot of people really enjoyedthat job.
It wasn't for me.
We had a commander come outduring our Monday formations
regular Army stuff and hey,there's this program called
Special Forces Assessment andSelection.
We'll be here to talk to youguys.
If you did get selected, you'dleave the unit and I raised my
(04:46):
hand.
I was like what's that?
And they had me leave the unit.
Nice, change your MOS.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
So when selection.
You speak multiple languagesright, Poorly.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Yeah yeah, several Like a great green beret.
Oh yeah, heck.
Yeah, yeah, I can.
I can upload with the best ofthem.
Now I learned the linguistprogram taught me Korean and
French.
You know, I grew up I grew upin high school Spanish, and then
I taught, became pretty solidby teaching English, and then
(05:27):
when I was stationed in Germany,of course all the crowds
thought I was one of them.
So I was like I better learnthis because they all keep
talking to me.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
I mean, yeah, you wouldn't stick out in Germany.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
No More so in.
Africa and Korea, though.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Oh my God, We'll get to that later, but what was the
selection like for you?
I mean?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I think we all after, like, reflecting on your career
, selection was the easiest part.
I mean, it was the easiest partof the q course.
Q course was the easiest partof your career.
Yeah, it was tough.
Uh, land nav, you know, as a,as a linguist, uh, I didn't,
hadn't done a lot of land now Ihad rocked my ass off getting
ready for selection.
I did that 100-miler, 9-miganin high, as my train up and we
(06:12):
were a bunch of signalsintelligence nerds.
So we did it by the numbers,not just gridded it out.
We went through the program ofhow you train for 100-miler and
whatever.
So the rucking was fine.
Land nav, I didn't know how todo.
I was a death star on the lastday through a, you know,
combined method of running theroads where I knew I could get
(06:34):
away with it Allegedly AllegedlyFor legal reasons that's a joke
.
Prove it.
I go the way of getting a tabrevoked or something.
For the most innocuous thing Iwould deserve to get my tab
revoked for, you know, anti-heropodcast.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I need you to pull this tab.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yeah, they, I uh.
Then you know, like I think ithappens a lot of guys suddenly
the map became three-dimensionalfor me and I realized those
little squiggly lines andcircles meant, meant something,
and figured it out.
And then, you know, on the nextphase I struggled was sgt.
I wasn't an x-ray, so I didn'thave sopsy, and that was before
they did the uh, soft skill mosis like prep.
(07:12):
So I was dumbfounded that allthese guys just knew 7-8.
They just knew the rangerhandbook and I was on fire guard
taking extra shifts reading andtrying to learn like how you,
how everybody just knows thisstuff and I think I got so pink.
I'm surprised you didn't hearanybody hear about that.
We tried to kick that guy outand sut.
They're like he doesn't knowshit.
(07:32):
That guy's an idiot.
There's nothing about being aninstrument or whatever.
They were 100 right.
I think we got a trajectory upthroughout like he's not smart
at this, but he works hard.
So damn it, he works really,really hard.
Yeah, yeah and q course off to10th group was there from, I
think, out there in 06, likesummer fall 06, um just went
(07:52):
right into the iraq.
Groundhog day deployments oof um, and then we did like four or
five of those, and then we wedid that africa yeah, the swap
pulled some of those yeah thatwas, I know, third group, didn't
wasn't a super fan of those, Ithink.
Uh, we loved them in 10th group.
Yeah, it was fun, like we werecompletely talking about away
(08:15):
from the flagpole, so it waslike a largely choose your
adventure.
But we were building like thoselow cost, low altitude bundles
like doctrine, like figuring itout like okay, well, that made
that 55 gallon drum boil explode, so we won't do it with that
next time, we'll do it the otherway.
We built base camps.
You know, like Pappy Jones islike a legend in at least in the
(08:37):
Charlie committee or Charliecommunity.
I think he was a Bravo actually, but he had written the A camp
manual.
It can't possibly be inpublication anymore Cause it's
super racist.
It's got like all the deadbodies have like Chinese hats
with X's on their eyes and stufflike that.
It's.
Those are the illustrations.
However, as you kind ofremember the early days of
(08:58):
appointments you would deploywith your books, like your, your
Q course books, and that's whatwe did in Africa.
It was like page one kill thegooks, like oh, okay, next, next
, next, next, until we got tolike building belts, bands and
zones with with triple strandconcertina and, uh, it's cool as
a Charlie.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
It was super fun logistically and in base camp
and stuff that's one part of thejob that people don't talk
about or really explain.
Like you hear the 18 Bravo andyou just like, ah, weapons, 18
Charlie, it's a demo explosionsand it's like dude, it's out of
all the MOSs, it's.
It has so much more.
Like your charge of so muchshit.
(09:38):
That is not sexy.
Property book, logistics,supply like everything that
nobody wants to do gets shuffledonto your plate for sure.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
And then we try to shove it onto the echoes.
If it touches wires, it toucheselectricity, like that's echoes
, man for sure I'm pretty surethis is your job, dude I would.
I would tell a student becausethen I was an 18 char Charlie
instructor after that for a fewyears and I would tell them no
one is going to say you're agood Charlie because of demo
(10:09):
ever.
Yeah, sorry, man, they're goingto say it because you're Jesus
the carpenter building stuff oryou procure things, you find a
way to get stuff.
And that's what people aregoing to say you're a good
Charlie, for Demo is the easiestthing that we do, certainly the
most fun, and you can get nerdyand good at it.
But no one's going to be likedude, he built charges so good
(10:31):
that dude stole an entiregenerator from a fob and got our
honor.
You know that's the stuffthey're going to brag about.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
That's absolutely the truth.
It is a job that has a lot ofresponsibility that nobody wants
to take on, that nobody wantsto master.
But if you master all thosethings, your detachment will
flourish, the team will lookreally good.
But again, you'll never get anyof the praise Like Hazmat.
Nobody wants to do that shit.
(10:59):
But I'm going to get yourequipment to country.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
It's the worst Hazdex .
And building that pallet,getting yelled at for putting
the wrong thing on the going tothat.
What do they call it?
Not JMPI?
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Oh man, this is obviously yeah, JI.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
JI obviously not a good Charlie.
You probably heard a lot ofthat if you did your back check.
But you go into JI and you'retrying to bribe, coerce these
customs like to just get yourstuff in the isu or on the
pallet and get out of thecountry dude, that's.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
That's the non-sexy stuff that nobody talks about.
Like a large, large.
Your career is going to befilled with these moments of
complete misery, just trying tocoerce somebody to let you put
something in the back of a truck, a plane, so you could go on
about your business like it's anall-day event.
(11:52):
Like I remember for one of ourmissions, our 18 bravo decided
that he was going to argue withthe ji inspector and it got to a
point of like a back and forth,a back and forth, and he
thought he was going tooutregulate this guy and show
him on his book like where thebatteries didn't have to be
there and I'm as the warrant onthe team.
(12:12):
I'm just like.
You know what.
You're going to have to learnthis the hard way.
Like, rather than like tryingto like appease this guy, you're
going to fight him onregulations.
This is a DOD, he's going todick you down.
This is a DOD, he's gonna dickyou down.
And sure enough, he sat theretrying to prove a point,
couldn't prove it, and then theguy just looks at him and is
like, okay, I'll come back whenI get done with everybody else,
and it's like fuck that's brutal.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
I had a buddy, ryan, who used to say adults only
learn one way the hard way.
Good, 100% true.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Did you do your entire time in the same company,
in the same battalion, or wheredid you move around through?
I grew up.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
B210, second time Bravo company, just shy of maybe
8 years, that's solid, maybeseven, some change.
Uh, oh, six to to early, tobeginning of 14 is when I went
to uh to swick and then, uh, Icame back from swick at I would
have been at 17 years, um, andwe went to third battalion.
(13:14):
If you don't know, 10th groupmade a war battalion and a jset
battalion for a number of yearswhich was really unhealthy.
I mean, you know, j-sets areharder than combat, j-sets
produce like the better MOS,like stuff.
So I mean, and then you gotguys that are you know cuckold,
they're watching their buddiesgo to war and they like, oh, I'm
(13:37):
doing another J-Set, justsitting there in the parking lot
and then you know it's likedark, we'll probably start dark
soon.
But they both killed themselvesat alarming rates.
The j set guys did it in a lotnicer cars because they were
making that j set money.
I mean, this is the reality ofit.
But, um, yeah, so I came backto third battalion.
(13:59):
I was like hell, yeah, I'mgetting in on that j set money.
I mean, you know I'm not, Idon't know this stuff very well,
but whatever, we did one likeepisodic engagement to Eastern
Europe, and then we went toAfghanistan for the rest of the.
So I was like, oh hell, that'sLisa, that's what I know.
Whatever, damn it.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Yeah, go ahead.
Sorry, yeah, it did it to me.
It doesn't make sense.
I don't know how it made senseto our senior leaders, but yeah,
there's guys want to go tocombat and jay sets do prepare
you to know your job.
Everybody gets a chance likeget reps.
Like it makes no fucking sense.
It makes no sense.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
This is, this is gonna piss off some a lot Bravos
.
But having done almostexclusively combat until I came
back from SWCC and I had a Bravoon my team, I had never in my
career been like dude.
That guy's a really good Bravo.
It's just not something Ithought about, it's just like
whatever.
Until I did that J set and Iwatched this poor bastard.
(15:01):
The partner force shows up withthe wrong weapons.
Their ammo count is notaccurate, so he's on the fly
coming up with a new POI fortraining, like with a round
count, with the drills, and hehad you know all this
infrastructure book.
And I saw that that wholecompany who had been just doing
J sets over and over all kind ofhad that infrastructure in
place.
I was super impressed.
They had the ammo stuff figuredout to move across all these
(15:24):
Eastern European countriesthrough the different regs.
It was like that's what reallybrought into focus how easy
combat is Like.
The worst case scenario is youhave to drive to your SOTIF and
go unload a Connex and then comeback.
It wasn't like well, this onehas to go to Romania but it has
to get through Czech Republic,so you'll have to do this for
that.
And these Bravos like had thatdialed in and then just the
(15:46):
range stuff, everything.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
So yeah, super impressed, and that's something
that our guys are trying to.
I guess they're navigating thisright now.
I mean, there's, you know,afghanistan is over, guys are
having to fight for J-sets againand understand the importance
of their primary skill sets,like I think the GWAT did us a
great disservice into thinkingthat the only thing that we were
(16:09):
built for was to go kick indoors and engage enemy on the
battlefield just a hundredpercent all the time and you
forget that you're supposed tobe the unconventional fucking
masters, like by with andthrough, especially for the guys
that had those really awesomesexy missions early on where
you're operating with thekatahas very elite force and
(16:32):
you're you're.
You don't have to do the wholetraining part of it.
You're getting these guysstraight from the task force
scorpion ready to go spun up,trained, and it's like, oh all,
all right, cool, we can just gohit targets all day.
There's something to be saidabout what the guys are doing
now, like they're getting backto what it means to be a Green
Beret.
At least I hope so.
I envision the force developingand strengthening those skill
(16:58):
sets that were not necessarilylost but maybe relegated to,
like the you know, the backsidetraining time At least I hope,
man.
I think that Look at like thefourth the whole fourth
battalion construct.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Yeah, I mean, it's like that used to be an ODA.
An ODA used to be good enough,but yeah, we got so wrapped in.
We had to create an additionalwhole system to do the things
that every oda would missionplan and do before you know,
yeah, oh, that that team's onthe softly or they're on the mle
rotation, whatever.
Now it's like we have wecreated a whole battalion to to
(17:34):
do those things again, it's wildyeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
And everything and everything's changing again too,
man.
Everything's changing again too, man.
Everything's.
You know, the force is gettingsmaller, leaner, so they're
having to adapt and shutterteams.
But that's not unusual.
That's happened before.
Like shit, we used to havefucking a whole bunch of
different groups and then thosegot shut down.
So it's like people are alwayswondering and you always hear
(18:00):
like the rumor mill of, like youknow, I heard it all the time
when I was still in like oh,they're going to shut down teams
, and it's like no, that'llnever happen.
And then, lo and behold, a fewyears later, I'm already out and
they're like they did it, crazysons of bitches.
They actually did it and I'mlike not bad.
I mean, you got to prioritizewhere you can put people.
(18:24):
I think he's rolling.
Yeah, exactly, man, when youwere going through your career,
did you ever pause and reflectand say like man, maybe, maybe,
I'm not going to do this forever?
Like did you always know you'regoing to do it all the way
through the retirement, or wouldyou always find yourself having
a little bit of conflictedemotions about that?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Uh, well, like I told you when I first came in, I was
gonna do it for five years, getthat gi bill and then bounce uh
.
And then I think, uh, uh, warstarted.
I was like, well, when this,this war thing ends, I'll, I'll
get out.
Uh, we came back from rotationin 2010, I think, or I was right
, maybe it was before we did the.
(19:01):
It was like on OND, operationNew Dawn in.
Iraq, where we were going toshut it down the first time and,
uh, I came back, I think beforethat rotation or yeah that was
going to 10 years.
That's your decision point.
Everybody tells you if you, ifyou go by beyond 10, you got to
do 20.
Uh, at least was the the wisdomthat I didn't question.
(19:23):
So I and I had, we didn'tdidn't love the leadership.
Obviously, like you know,didn't love the mission anymore
it was cool, kicking doors andall that stuff.
uh, and I had a mentor, a guy bythe name matt mcguffin, tell me
like, hey, man, leadershipchanges.
We value this leadership thingless and less.
The company sergeant, major andcommander are gone in a moment
(19:45):
you'll see.
You know, like, uh, in themission, change, just give it,
give it a pause and think aboutthat.
I did and I stuck it out and,um, then at that point I was
kind of committed, at least inmy mind, and SWCC was, uh, what
13, 14 years was?
Uh, don't, not a fan of brag,no offense to you know folks
(20:09):
that love that place.
But um, the mission, that liketeaching future Charlie's, like
when you know, like you get MOSphase, you're, you're probably
going to make it Right, you'reprobably going to make it Right.
And so I had a touch point ofevery 18 Charlie.
It gave me like, and I thoughtI was, I had a good grasp on
what it meant to be that aftereight years of team time and I
(20:32):
really liked that idea ofgetting a touch point with every
single 18 Charlie in theregiment for that three years.
I just got some feedback theother day from someone who said
he hated me as an instructor, Ithink.
I think he thought I was tryingto fail him.
He make it hard for him.
He didn't realize I wasactually giving him another
chance at time.
Fuse, he's like he's making medo another mission or whatever.
(20:54):
I guess he told me his buddywas like dude, you know, he
hooked you up Like he didn'thave to give you a third mission
and you passed.
Like it was myself and anotherguy was teaching with their
Chuck Longson fifth group guy.
But he just told me thatyesterday on the phone and I was
like, oh, no doubt that most ofthe students thought I was an
asshole.
I have no doubt that's a that'sthe case.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
but yeah, it's crazy, man, like I want to dive into
this for a little bit.
Mentorship like a lot of timeswhen we're doing something to
develop somebody or helpsomebody, see the problem set
from a different angle, it cancome across like fuck, that
guy's picking on me, like, andcertainly when you have to do
like, make hard calls of likehey, maybe you have what it
(21:38):
takes, but maybe I, I want youto restart this phase.
You know those hard calls likethey seem when you're on the
other side as a student.
You're like fuck that guy.
But they don't see if somebodydoes see value and worth in that
individual In that moment Ithink every young man I
certainly had that situation asa young 18 Bravo with a cadre.
(22:00):
It wasn't until years later thatI realized, oh shit, that guy
gave me a pass, like he helpedme, he hooked me, the fuck up to
get back in like good graces.
I was like, oh shit, like it'suh, it's something that it, it,
it's almost missed on us untilwe get older.
We realized like, fuck man,like that person was mentoring
us, like in your career, liketell us, like dive into that,
(22:23):
like what was it like going backand being a mentor and
developing the next generationof great 18 charlies I love that
.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
I think what you said spot on.
Mentor, you know, I think beinga green beret is teacher.
Uh, like, a lot of my familyare educators.
Maybe that's a cultural thing,but I I love that aspect was the
teaching aspect, the men in.
I say teaching, I think you'reprobably more accurate
mentorship, and so you know he'sa charlie cadre, especially
(22:48):
like um.
First I started teaching likethe logistics, construction
portion.
This was like the first sixweeks.
You get a lot of time, theseguys like study halls, like all
day in the classroom you go outand build um and then, during
like the last weeks of build you, you build some project out at
camel call or whatever, but it's, it's long days, you know,
(23:09):
probably six in the morning tilla lot of times like 10 at night
and that's what you're doing ismentoring.
Like, yeah, well, we don't, wedidn't bring whatever, whatever.
Guess what?
You didn't do it on the loadout.
Figure it the fuck out.
Man like the building's got tobe built like well, if we go
back, like you're gonna go twoand a half hours there and back,
go get that stuff.
And then, nope, like figure itout, man, you missed it on
(23:31):
loadout, it wasn't on the pallet.
Like that's on, you don't dothat again.
Um, and then you know, like theend you finish the build.
And then we would, if theyfinished early, I'd call them
team sergeant projects Like allright, hey, you're going to
build a movie room, like getsomething, a projector, we can
hit on the ceiling.
You're going to build thewhatever, add more outlets, add
more.
You know, hey, we want toupgrade from the piss tubes to
(23:54):
like an actual pisser with adrain.
You know it's like that.
And then I moved on to the FTXat the end, which is missions,
mission, it's like that.
But yeah, and then I moved onto the ftx at the end, which is
missions, mission, mission,mission, and that was super
rewarding.
So out there at uh, camp snyder, the bravos and charlies you, I
remember this.
Q course, bravos and charlieswere like the most contentious,
always fighting, and then itturns out you're the two always
(24:15):
in the arm room together.
You're like bfs on the team.
It's so fucking true, man, Ihad completely forgotten about
that until I got back there asan instructor and the Bravos and
Charlies would be arguing andbitching about shit.
I was like, oh yeah, that'sright.
Believe it or not believe it ornot, you two are going to be
like bros, and it's going to be.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
This episode is brought to you by Titan Sarms.
Head on over to titansarmscomand buy a stack today.
Use my code CDENNY10 to getyour first stack.
I recommend the lean stack too.
Start living your best lifeTitan's Arms.
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Speaker 2 (24:53):
You against the entire rest of the team, fucking
with your stuff, fucking up theinventory, the mall.
They're going to be screwing itup.
You're going to get over it now.
But trust me too, you got, it'sgonna be.
You're gonna be okay on theother side that's so fucking
true, man.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
It becomes a dynamic duel for good and bad.
Um, yeah, a lot of fondmemories, but to your point, the
mentorship man.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
That's.
That's what I the charlieteaching charlie course was
extremely rewarding.
One of the more rewarding partsI ended up doing 24 years and
one of the more rewarding partswas that and I worked with
awesome dudes.
I always try to be the hardestworking guy on a team, something
your research might contest no,that actually came through that
(25:40):
guy's really good at coming upwith ideas for other people to
do, but I think I have a plaquethat says that somewhere.
Most of you are like that guy'sreally good at coming up with
ideas for other people to do,but I think I have a plaque that
says that somewhere.
But I worked with guys that adude named Aaron Huntington goes
by Moose because he's the sizeof a moose, but he, the guy,
could outwork.
I couldn't outwork the guy.
(26:00):
I would show up an hour earlyto work on some random project
on a weekend to improve our teamhouse that we had out work.
I could not work the guy.
I would show up an hour early towork on some like random
project on a weekend to likeimprove our team house that we
had out there, and he'd show uptwo hours early and already have
like the cabinets built anddone.
I'm like I cannot outwork thisdude.
Like I think I'd set up all thepackets for the students and
then I'd find out that he'dalready done the other half like
before.
Yeah.
So the other half like before,yeah.
(26:25):
So it's cool to work with dudesthat like that that you're
trying to outwork guys.
You know, because I mean youget on, and when you're on a
team like that, it's also superrewarding.
But that was like a place whereI was, where there was so many
dudes that I was just strugglingto try to even just keep up and
feel like I was pulling myweight that's a that's the truth
about this profession.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
It's it's like the theme of this week.
Everybody I talked to that's agreen beret.
Like the good, genuine peoplealways say that exact same or
share that sentiment, like I wasalways trying to like, fit in
and and keep up with the rest ofthe guys to be just as good as
they were is, by and by andlarge, like we've we served with
(27:01):
some amazing individuals likeor we had brushes with with guys
at schools we went to, you know, go to free fall, go to
Sephardic.
Wherever you go sniper school,you meet individuals are larger
than life and it's it remindsyou like to humble yourself to
being just being there in that,you know, in that team room, in
that company area, with peoplethat are just absolute quiet
(27:25):
professionals, always lookingfor work.
I don't think it ever hit melike really the importance of
that phrase and every, everyinstructor or every you know
team sergeant or senior on yourteam at some point has said that
like always be looking for work, no matter whether it's in the
shoot house or in the fuckingteam room.
Always be looking for work, nomatter whether it's in the shoot
house or in the fucking teamroom, always be looking for work
, but at the same time, thatsame message can lead us into
(27:49):
some really, really bad mentalhealth spaces.
For sure we can work ourselvesto death.
And 24 years, man, that's not.
You lasted longer than GWAT.
Yeah, don't, I know it.
I want to.
I'm sorry to I and that's notyou.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
You lasted longer than GWAT.
Yeah, don't, I know it.
I want to.
I'm sorry to.
I want to.
I'll just go to that.
But I wanted to say likesomething I've been reminding
guys as they get out um, justtalk about the dudes you worked
with and whatever I.
I started saying, um, we werein a saturated market of heroes.
Oh, that's perfect, yeah, inthat timeframe.
And so it gets lost, especiallywhen you just get yelled at by
(28:27):
these old black ladies on yourlast day in the army, just just
berating you like you're thebiggest piece of shit in the
world.
And, uh, it's the same onesfrom the camp we'll call chow
hall, same ones from your youknow SRP.
Every time they just yell atyou, just feel bad about
yourself, uh, and then they handyou a flag and you're like,
well, if you go, and a sticker.
Now you get the sticker too,right?
(28:48):
And a pin for your uh, iraq war.
I served at and and you justfeel like it.
I don't know.
For me it was demoralizing thatlast day where they just hand
you the flag and you're like off, you go, like next, and but
I've been reminding people likeif, uh, saturated market heroes,
if, if you told 10 year olddenny like who denny would be,
(29:11):
or you just explain to him dennytoday's career, life and
whatever denny, little dennywould be jacked to the tits.
Dude, can you imagine like whatthat who?
He looks at that guy as anabsolute fucking hero.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
He did what.
I actually went back in timeand I explained to my
10-year-old self that now I'm a41-year-old podcast host for a
D-list podcast, and heimmediately tried to kill
himself.
No, don't do it.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
No, you gotta go back to the other stuff too.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
man, you gotta like god this is what we've become
apache bearded fuck.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
No you're making me face my own shit now.
Thanks, danny geez.
So hi, thinking about the thehigh times now.
Now I gotta look at where I'mat right now.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
It's discouraging oh, man, yeah, I immediately
started fading away like in a uh, back to the future.
It's a obscure time travelreference, no, but you're right,
dude, that, uh, that'ssomething I do.
I don't take that lightlybecause you know, young man kids
you're always.
I spent a lot of time in mytroubled youth like wondering,
(30:31):
like fuck, will I ever get outof this situation where I'm at?
What am I going to frigginghave in life?
And like, just the fact that Igot to serve with some of these
individuals that you know somearen't even here anymore, some,
some are.
You know I got an 18 Delta.
It's a PA who is phenomenal.
I've got friends that you knowprobably weren't the best team
(30:55):
sergeants but on the backside,now that I'm older and we can
reconnect and talk, you realizethat I owe my entire career to
some of the mentorship that Ireceived from him, some of the
first, like you know, thingsthat he put into motion so I
could go learn what it reallymeant to be a Green Beret Like
we truly have, like some of thegreatest veterans and people in
(31:16):
our Green Beret community, whichis something that like makes it
so easy to want to partner upwith.
You know the great organizationthat we're now going to you
know spend some timehighlighting, which is Special
Forces Foundation.
Man Like, how did you findyourself serving our community,
green Berets, with thisfoundation, our community at
Green Berets with thisfoundation?
(31:37):
So?
Speaker 2 (31:37):
2020, which I tried to get out in 2020, I had an ass
cancer scare so they made mestay in.
And then, because of COVID, Icouldn't get my butthole probed
to find out that I was a falsealarm and, just like a lot of
dudes who've gone to Africa andAfghanistan, you just, you know
you shit blood and sometimes youcan't trust a sneeze or a fart.
(31:58):
You know you shit blood andsometimes you can't trust a
sneeze or a fart.
You know.
Let's just you know.
But the VA is going to give metens of dollars a year for the
rest of my life, so we're prettymuch even, but I had that scare
and so I stayed in.
I ended up taking the bloodmoney, had another good mentor
tell me hey, dude, you're goingto fight cancer till you die, or
you don't have cancer, buteither way're probably gonna med
board.
So take that blood money untilyou get through.
(32:19):
Whatever this is going on and Idid and whatever ended up in
there for like three, four moreyears.
But in that, so in that 2020time space, I was, my retirement
had fallen through um, I hadmoved over to our advanced
skills company to teach um somehuman stuff and we had eight
suicides in six months from fromfrom just our community there
(32:41):
in 10th group, uh.
And when uh, joey Pfisterkilled himself, I had been from
my company and I knew a lot ofguys who were not totally
connected anymore.
I hadn't heard from in a while.
From that, from it was uh fromtwo four rival company, and so I
, from that from it was uh fromtwo four rival company.
And so I, I just called,started calling dudes from that
(33:02):
team in that company to let themknow.
You know, at that point we'dalready seen a lot of suicides.
But I thought, man, I'd, I'dlike them to hear it from from
me or from one of us, instead oflike on facebook two-thirds of
the way through a bottle, yeah.
And so I, I called a lot ofthose guys and that's where it
started.
Some guys, whether they weredoing really well, really poorly
(33:23):
or more likely somewhere in themiddle, a lot of the common
theme was hey, man, good to hearfrom you.
I haven't heard from anybodysince I got out and I was like
shit that was eight years ago,that was 10 years ago, and I
thought, man, we are really.
We say where the brotherhoodbegins, but, man, we really turn
it off when a guy leaves.
And I've, I've come to a pointto give us, us as a regiment,
(33:44):
some grace, because you know it,we know it's devastating when
you come off the team thread.
You know it's time, but it's,it hurts, man, but the team
thread goes on.
They go on to the next mission,the next appointment, whatever.
I don't think they intend toforget or leave you, it's just
(34:05):
it's busy, op tempo is high andI think what happens is, you
know, and I think, from my ownreflections, like it's been five
years, it's been six years.
I think of danny, I think ofwhoever, and I'm like, oh man,
if I call him now, I think andmaybe I think of him because I
need a place to stay for a jobinterview or I need like
something or whatever, but I'mlike, well, I don't, can't call
him now.
He's going to think I wantsomething and and the reality is
(34:27):
like, like I think both of uswould, are like dying to hear
somebody needs something from us, like in, like if you could
tell yourself like, go ahead,need and be needed right, like
so need things, guys are dyingto help.
We leave the end of our careerwhere we're kind of problem
solvers more than actions on,but we're figuring out like if
you can't get ammo there, gohere, go this way.
(34:49):
If you can't get through that,talk to these folks, you're
going to go parallel chain forprocurement.
Whatever you solve problems andyou connect people with folks.
And whatever you solve problemsand you connect people with
folks and you're less of theless of the you know lead on FID
, you're less of the lead on onmission.
You know you're, you're theproblem solver and so you're
dying to help dudes out and soand you lose that overnight kind
(35:14):
of when you, when you get outand so, um, you know that's my
first kind of things like needgo ahead and reach out and need
those people.
But so that kind of thing islike need go ahead and reach out
and need those people, but sothat kind of struck a chord of
like I'm going to just going tostart calling dudes as they come
up, like even if I'm talkingshit, which is like anytime your
name comes up I'm usuallytalking shit.
So you know, I'm going to giveDanny a call after I talk shit
about him for 20 minutes so I'mgoing to.
But uh, but yeah, I'll callsomebody and like, hey, dude, I
(35:36):
was just talking shit about youtoday with so-and-so or redacted
, you know, and then just calland see how you're doing, see
what you're up to.
Man, I saw on LinkedIn you'rein California now, I see
whatever.
So I started calling guys.
And when I started calling guysI did run into guys that were in
crisis or that needed somethingwho won't share that it doesn't
(35:57):
come up, and whatever crisis orthat needed something who won't
share, that they just itdoesn't come up and whatever.
And so our warrior care programcare coalition stuff.
I had a good friend, oldteammate, company mate, scott
Kaluska.
He works there, phenomenal guy.
But I was reaching out to himhey, this guy's in trouble, what
can I do?
It's not kind of what you guysdo.
And then through that heconnected me with Paul Watson,
with the Special ForcesFoundation, and so between those
(36:18):
two I kept asking I got a guyin crisis, I got a guy who needs
some behavioral health, I needsome whatever.
And then Paul talked to Ignacio, the founder of the foundation,
and they're like hey, man, howabout this?
Stop asking.
Just say yes, we'll figure outhow to pay for it and we'll get
you a business card.
We'll slap you on the website,we'll give you some credibility
(36:38):
to it.
But just say yes and we'llfigure it out.
If you need a credit card from,we'll do that, but do it.
And so that, um, that's kind ofwhere, where it started, and
like I appreciate the praise youyou stacked on me at the
beginning, I really don't butthe uh, I say it a lot and and I
know most guys who do thisstuff will will echo it Like um,
I'm glad it has a good optic,I'm glad it looks good, better
(37:00):
than smoking meth or man in theglory holes down here at the
truck stop Another big hobby ofmine, obviously.
But uh, I do entirely like thiscalling dudes and checking on
guys trying to stay connectedLike it's, it's for me right,
it's what makes me feel like I'mstill in the fight, man, you
(37:22):
know, because it is demoralizingwhen you get that flag and that
sticker and that in and, youknow, you just feel like
unneeded anymore.
So it's, it feeds me so andthat's why I didn't call guys.
I said it before we startedrecording.
But uh, if we all just calledtwo dudes a week, just pick two
dudes, doesn Doesn't matter.
Someone you haven't talked toin a while, it doesn't have to
be someone you're worried incrisis, like whatever.
(37:43):
Just call two dudes a week andbullshit.
Talk about you know, talk shit.
Talk about the near miss DUI.
Talk about the you know whateverCondone it, we don't condone it
Absolutely not Like, talk about, like that chick that you know,
whatever, whatever that thingis, um, cause you'll find guys
that aren't doing well, oryou'll find guys what they need,
(38:04):
or you'll figure it out Likeyou were talking about your
buddy.
You'll sort it out togetherLike man, we're both struggling,
we're both burned out, we'reboth whatever Um, and it's as
much for that person that you'recalling it as it is for you to
get that connection.
I think if we all just calledtoo it's like a pyramid scheme
or whatever, but it expands weall called two dudes a week, we
(38:25):
would change the trajectory ofthis suicide epidemic and the
other stuff.
That's not there, but it'sgoing that way through a slow
burn like the alcoholism.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Yeah, dude.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Terrible relationship with alcohol.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yeah, that's been the one that's really really
fucking just killed me, reallyfucking hurts.
I've lost two friends toalcohol now and I didn't.
I was ignorant I think a lot ofus are of how dangerous it is.
(38:58):
I certainly grew up in the teamroom culture of having drinks
and I dealt with my own issueswith alcohol when I was
struggling, used it and dependedon it really heavily.
I'm lucky that I was able toidentify it and walk away from
it.
But some people it has a deathgrip on us.
And, man, if you're listeningright now, if I could just get
(39:18):
you to do one thing and that'sjust just look at your
relationship with alcohol, justhow often you're drinking it,
what you're, why you're drinkingit, if it leads to worse
feelings of depression andanxiety in your life, maybe take
a break, maybe walk away fromit for a little bit.
You don't have to do it forever.
I'm just saying like explore,be willing to walk away just for
(39:40):
30 days and explore.
Is it the best thing for you?
I'm more vocal about it now.
Like I said, haven't lost morefriends to it, and it's just.
I don't want any of you any ofyou listening to struggle with
that or have to get that news ofyour friend drank themselves to
death in an empty house, justsurrounded by empty frigging
(40:00):
bottles of vodka.
Like that's horrible.
That's how.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
None of us should ever go out to this this way
None of us, so yeah it is like aI mean a lot of reasons to give
it, but I'll, you know, ifnothing else, like only and I've
, unfortunately, you know,through this work, and so like
they're, fortunately, whatever.
I've encountered a lot ofsuicides.
I've seen the stats, I've seenthe numbers and I've met a lot
(40:23):
of these guys personally.
There's only two examples andtwo instances that I know, of
all the suicides that were not aguy that was drunk at the time,
only two, and that's over,anecdotally, or my like call it
caseload or or touch points.
I mean that's over probably acouple hundred Um and so only
(40:46):
two man.
That's pretty, pretty powerful.
And so you know I'm not ateetotaler.
I'll have, you know, drink hereand there, uh, maybe even turn
in and turn up at a gala or ballto some degree.
But but I had to certainlychange my relationship with
alcohol to your point.
You know I watched that was thecommon thread with a lot of
(41:06):
guys and then I found myselfdoing it right, like uh yeah
drinking to feel emotion,drinking to go to sleep?
yeah, drinking because it was arough day, a frustrated day.
And then you, the threshold forthat lowers.
The ride home was traffic Likenow that's my reason to like
whatever it's.
Just it was that like dudealcohol, they say it's an
(41:27):
unhealthy coping mechanism.
Right, it's a coping mechanism.
It works, man.
It's like damn near a hundredpercent effective.
It'll deaden the emotions,it'll get you through, it'll
help you fall asleep, for sureyeah but it works, man, it works
.
It causes so many other worsethings.
It's it's poisoning your brain.
(41:48):
It's ruining your relationshipwith your wife and kids, whether
you know it or not.
Uh, because it's it's.
You're dependent on that thing,uh, and it's just deadening you
.
Put in the work, man, dosomething, do something better.
I love that Like, if nothingelse, do it for 30 days, first
off.
You can't cut it out Anythingout for 30 days.
Yeah, it's probably a goodindicator that like, oh man,
(42:10):
this thing has a grip on me.
Um, but I said, and I had to100% change my relationship with
alcohol and and, uh, I don'tknow a lot.
I feel like a lot of peopledon't get out on skates in the
retirement phase.
Yeah, they say it's like thehardest thing you did in your
career and and I I'm inclined tobelieve it like it is more and
more through, like time showsthat, um, yeah, it's, that's
(42:32):
what it's turned to and it's uhyeah that's a big one.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
Yeah, it's, it's.
The transition is not easy.
No one gets through it on theirown.
So if you're looking forresources, assistance, head on
over to special forces,foundationorg, connect.
Be willing to reach out.
It is for green berets by greenberets.
You're not going to get halftruths.
You're going to get people likecody that are willing to
(43:00):
connect with you.
So please reach out.
There are so many avenues wecan help.
The one thing we won't do is wewon't pay for your xbox life
membership.
We'll pay for your steamaccount, so just know that up
front.
No, we're not going to pay foryour gym membership, although if
you have a whoop strap and wantto get involved with a
community of individuals thatwant to work out in our
(43:21):
community on whoop, uh, the codeis right here and I am proud to
be pushing this initiative,because one of the things that
we can do to start feelingbetter, it's just getting out
there and moving.
Be willing to work out, bewilling to go out for a walk, a
run, a jog, a light rock move towork out.
We want to go out for a walk, arun, a jog, a light rock move.
When we get out, that's usuallythe first thing that we put on
(43:46):
pause working out.
I know I certainly did, becauseyou know the VA is going to
tell you like oh, you can't dothat, you're too broken, and a
lot of us listen to that.
But I will tell you one of thegreatest things you can do to
improve and enhance yourwell-being is physical fitness.
No, you don't have to be aCrossFit guru.
No, you don't have to go backto the gym and Eagle lift, but
you can do something.
Just move a little bit, bewilling to go out there.
(44:07):
And as an added bonus for theentire time we're doing this, I
want to be doing some freegiveaways.
Some are small, some are goingto be big.
I'm going to give it away atConcept Row Machine.
That's going to be the firstbig one through August.
Join us and you'll be in therunning for that.
I'll throw in some swag fromcompanies like I don't know
Softly, maybe Born Primitive.
(44:28):
No official sponsorship.
I just like what they do and Ilike what they create.
I'm willing to buy it and sendit to you.
Why, you ask?
Because I'm selfless.
That's why.
Speaker 2 (44:40):
It's honestly, go outside, get outside, touch
grass and back to working outthat two-year like retirement
window or whatever it is.
Now is a year, 18 months,whatever, whatever.
A lot of guys get sucked intothat trap of not a lot of guys
get sucked into that trap of notso like and that's another like
(45:00):
.
That's what.
At least for me, it was like Idon't have a reason to get up in
the morning, so like I'll stayup a little later and I'll have
a couple more and a couple more.
Speaker 1 (45:09):
This episode is also brought to you by Precision
Wellness Group.
Getting your hormones optimizedshouldn't be a difficult task,
and Dr Taylor Bosley has changedthe game.
Head on over toprecisionwellnessgroupcom.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Enroll and become a patient today and uh, and then
you don't have, like, you're notgoing to the gym because you're
not trying to outwork yourteammates, because you don't
have teammates anymore, you'reoff the team.
You know, uh, yeah, yeah, like,just go outside, let sun touch
your eyeballs and and and getyour fat ass back in the like
dude, you tell me those peopleyou talked about softly, you
(45:45):
know, doug keysweater amazingdude yeah, never much cared for,
but we worked together in theCharlie Committee.
He was affectionately known asthe student hugger, so you
probably won't hear studentstalk bad about him.
Every Joe is a go for Doug.
I'll just lay and talk shitabout Doug.
I'm going to tag him on thisreel, please do.
(46:06):
I talked to Doug quite a bit.
Doug's been awesome.
Doug helped me out with theSurvivor like family from a guy
that was that passed not toolong ago, the guy that used to
say adults only learn one way ofthe hard way.
Yeah.
Got to get Ryan Groh.
His son was getting ready to goto selection and Doug was like
ship we'll, I'll cover it, we'llget it in there fuck yeah which
(46:28):
was super good for him.
I think he threw in one for meas well, so I was messing with
it, not enough.
But I bring him up becausedoug's probably coming up on 50
and probably the fittest he'sever been in his life.
Um, and that's a flex man likeI'd like to.
My wife is a fit stud.
You met Jess.
Speaker 1 (46:48):
Yeah, she's amazing.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
She's a freak Like at this point that's who I should
probably be trying to competewith to get fit, strong, healthy
.
But you know she she pushes bigon.
Like you can live a long time.
If you lift weights and moveyour body, you can live a long
time.
And one of the like for meanyway.
Like my, um, my kids.
We had them as geriatrics, soyou know I retired last year.
I'm coming up on a year.
They're six and nine.
They won't remember I was inthe army yeah, nor will I
(47:15):
because of the TBI's.
So that's helpful.
Jess will be the guardian ofthe secrets, but like I'd like
to.
That's one of my favorite thingsabout this.
I get to do stuff with them.
I'm at their sporting events.
You know my son had some likestuff going on at school last
year.
Year before I guess I could bein the classroom almost every
day to like right the ship andwhatever, and so like wanting to
(47:39):
live longer and do stuff withthem.
That's a hell of a motivator.
And so like, get fit, getoutside, like live.
Like you know, even if yourkids are now in their 20s, like
a lot of dudes when they retire,right, cool, now you can go
party with them, you can go onvacations with them, but not if
you're going downhill circle anddrain and becoming like that
(48:03):
that 60s, 50s and 60s whereyou're like well, I'm 50 and 60.
Speaker 1 (48:07):
I hurt him in pain, well move get out of pain, do
the work.
Yeah, yeah, it's important toprioritize this.
And the other thing is likemental health and physical
fitness go hand in hand.
You wake up and you look in themirror and you don't see that
young Green Beret that you oncewere.
Look, you're not going to getthe body of a fit 25-year-old
(48:31):
green beret by sitting on thecouch.
And getting fit for your agegroup doesn't have to be going
back to what you used to looklike or what you used to lift
like in your 20s.
Be fit and be competent in thegym, moving your body, doing
things that normal, everydayAmericans should be able to do.
You should be able to run acouple miles and feel good
afterwards Americans should beable to do.
You should be able to run acouple of miles and feel good
(48:51):
afterwards.
You should be able to go to thegym and work out and not have
your whoop strap or Apple devicegoing Call 911.
911.
And heart disease, diabetesthese are all things that can
get mitigated by just being moreactive.
So if we start looking better,feeling better, because our
fitness is getting better, thenwe're not we're less likely to
experience big bouts ofdepression.
(49:13):
It's a no brainer.
Man Like there's.
And the one thing that I willsay man, like it's a community
environment, going to the gymCrossFit gym or conventional gym
you're getting around otherpeople Like I.
I didn't know it at the time,but when I started working out
here like I, I was like man,like I feel better because now
I'm interacting with otherpeople.
(49:34):
I'm not sitting in this virtualspace and then walking into an
empty you know living room afterI'm done recording.
Like I have an environment ofother human beings, other green
berets I don't even know thatthere was a a few green berets
in the areas and you connect,you.
It's like we are prone tofinding each other in this space
, man.
Speaker 2 (49:51):
So challenge yourself .
The community is like that'swhat we lose right overnight
when we get out.
Um, there's another parallel Iwant to draw between that
physical health and mentalhealth.
But first, uh, you losecommunity.
So you got to find something.
We had a guy, uh, um, go downto having trouble.
Alcohol, alcohol, superdepression moved for one of
(50:11):
those where the wife gives himan ultimatum.
Yeah, personal opinion on that.
If your wife's giving you anultimatum it's probably too late
.
So he moved down to Texas, outof here, out of Colorado, and no
community, new job.
She ended up leaving him anyway.
So he's no community.
He's going through that divorce, you know, custody stuff I
(50:37):
think was mostly pleasant.
But he turned to the bottledrinking a lot and it's became
just compounding right Startaffecting work relationship with
his son, you know.
And so we sent him to Warrior'sHeart down there, which is
phenomenal program.
I would say the gold standardfor, in my limited knowledge,
but the gold standard forsubstance abuse and PTSD.
It's really operator-centric.
They do first responders,military, whatever.
(50:59):
But now I feel bad.
The guy's name is a stud, tomSpooner.
Tom Spooner, there you go.
Tom does that.
He's a former CAG dude.
Tom Spooner, there you go.
Um, tom does that.
He's a former CAG dude.
Uh, it is.
Guys get down there and firsttwo weeks is a rough like, or
the first week maybe, like thisdude, like this is stupid.
And then we're batting.
(51:19):
Damn near a thousand guys wholean into it are coming out.
Life's changed, chinshipsrebuilt, and I could give you
some awesome anecdotes of guyswho completely turned life
around.
Who it was, their relationshipwas over, their kids wanted
nothing to do with them and nowthey are like super dad.
(51:40):
That is the most impressivething about them right now is
how much of a family man thewife was like.
You can go to this thing, butwhen you get back, we're getting
a divorce, no matter what, andthey come back and they are that
.
They are crushing life.
They are super couple, superdad like.
And it's not just that one, Imean, I could probably name you
four or five.
Yeah.
So that place is incredible.
(52:02):
But this guy got out of thatand he he joined.
He's like I need to work out.
That's it like I startedworking out when I was down
there.
I need to work out.
He joined a uh, it's called f3.
It's like a christian men'slike faith, fellowship, fitness,
I think, is what the three f'sare for.
And he joined it and he waslike embarrassed telling me
about it.
He's like I don't know, let'sjust like.
He's like there's some regulararmy guys, some cops, he's like.
(52:25):
But, dude, I really like it likeit's cheesy to some degree yeah
, and so like finding thatcommunity in the gyms a pretty
easy way to do it well, like no,but yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 1 (52:39):
I need to take my own advice because I've been
putting on the uh retirement 15,jess is already telling me that
it's about time well, uh, luckyfor you, have a friend that
loves you and cares for youdeeply.
Because, cody, Half Pop, orHalf Poop, as your friends
affectionately know you, you'regoing to get a Whoop membership
for free.
That's what we do here onSecurity Hot Podcast.
(53:01):
Give me your address and I'llsend you a Whoop and a
membership so I'll pay for youryear and your device.
Oh, big deal.
That's what we do here insecurity.
Speaker 2 (53:11):
I don't care what go ahead.
I don't care what everyone elsesays about you.
I think you're a good dude man.
I appreciate you.
I don't care what every guywho's ever served with you, met
you, worked with you, says aboutyou.
I think they're all wrong and Ithink you're a good guy they're
always in the comment section.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
Yeah, I think the only.
No, I can't.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
I think the only other green brands hated more
man, I wondered if it was gonnacome up and shit on that guy for
a while.
That's it that's it.
Speaker 1 (53:42):
that's the only one.
Oh man, gosh, guys again,please join our whoop community.
Cody is going to get our firstfree strap of membership because
it's how we roll in the SpecialForces Foundation and you know,
I'm just a selfless guy and Ihave tons of cash because of
OnlyFans.
So I will continue makingOnlyFans content unless you
(54:05):
start supporting the show andplease consider sponsoring, or I
will continue making content.
The last thing you want is towalk in and see my content on a
family member's phone.
I'm just saying it could bethere.
It could happen, your feetfinder stuff's pretty good
Premium subscriber.
(54:26):
You can find me on there.
It's Petite Feet, petite Feet,76.
Cody, thank you so much forjoining us today.
Man, it's been a blast.
You're a remarkable human beingand great Green Beret, and you
can't find anybody in thecommunity that has anything
negative to say about you.
Man, I'm honored to work withyou in this endeavor and
continue fighting the greatfight which is to stop veteran
(54:49):
suicides, specifically withinour Green Beret community,
because for the last 20 years,we have sent some of our
nation's greatest to go do someinsane tasks and we need them
around.
You should never be losing yourfriends or more friends after
combat.
So if you're a Green Beret andyou're looking for help and
(55:09):
assistance, please reach out tothe Special Forces Foundation.
You can go tospecialforcesfoundationorg or
click the link in the bio, clickthe link in my podcast bio or
the Special Forces Foundationbio and we can get you connected
to somebody like Cody or LowellCopper and they will point you
in the right direction, becausethe brotherhood doesn't end when
(55:30):
you get out.
The team room is far bigger andgreater on the outside.
So we're all here for you andI'm telling you if you're
struggling with your transitionright now, just know that this
next chapter is going to be justas good, if not better, as
there's so many great things tobe excited about.
Thank you all for tuning in.
We'll see you all next time.
(55:51):
Until then, take care.
Securepodcast is proudlysponsored by Titan's Arms.
Head over to the episodedescription and check out
Titan's Arms today.
Securepodcast is proudly sponsored by Titan's
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Head over to the episodedescription and check out
Titan's Arms today.
That before yeah, I had a fullepisode that like literally we
talked for 40 minutes, then hitrecord.
Then hit record, then hitfucking record, then I'm like
you know you might run to getback, can?
Speaker 2 (00:22):
we revisit that last six, seven, eight conversations.
We can skip the one in themiddle.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
I just want to pause right now and kind of reflect on
something you said 40 minutesago.
Just restart.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Just say it verbatim one more time, because I really
thought it was that important.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
It was so impactful.
Restart.
Cody Halfpop.
Welcome to Security Hot Podcast.
Thanks, man.
Glad to be here.
Absolutely.
It is amazing to sit down withsome of your friends and get
some background information.
I did my homework, so a lot ofpeople from 10th Group had a lot
of things to say, somefavorable.
(00:57):
We'll just go through the list.
Cody Half Poop I don't care forthis man.
I was one of your priorteammates, sounds right?
Cody Cody, you're interviewingthat asshole.
And the list goes on and on.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
I did find one person .
You haven't found anything thatsurprised me yet.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
No man.
Everybody I reached out to andtalked to and it's evident when
we opened up the morning threadsfor a lot of the initiatives
that you're started for theSpecial Forces Foundation
Everybody has great things tosay about you and I have yet to
meet a more welcoming or warmerindividual in my time coming out
(01:39):
of the military than you.
Good sir, you are truly afriend of a friend, a Green
Beret's Green Beret, and it's anhonor to have you here to talk
about the great work that you dowith Special Forces Foundation.
I know that praise andadmiration is not something that
any of us are used to, buttruly what you're doing is
saving lives and you're takingan individual, doing something
(02:02):
that a lot of people are willingto do, which is one person at a
time, one situation at a time,and getting involved from from
the grassroots type of ofmovement.
Everybody's waiting for a big,big overarching foundation to
come in and just save everybodyand and that's not happening,
it's the human connection that'sreally.
(02:23):
That's really what's saving allof us.
We were talking earlier beforewe started reaching out to our
friends.
That's really stemming the tideand often enough, when we're
struggling, we fail to even heedthat warning, and we need to,
we need to talk about that.
So today, before we dive intoall the great things that you're
doing for the Special ForcesFoundation, I want to dive into
(02:43):
your story.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Why did you start service and what led you to
become a Green Beret man?
It's a loaded question, I guess.
I think, like a lot of us, weprobably came from either mommy
or daddy didn't love us enoughor some sort of family.
We come start broken right.
So it's the draw Mostly goodfamily family, but sure get like
abandonment stuff.
You know, parents, dad, um, itwas a really good wrestler back
in iowa, damn, you have to be, Iguess.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Um yeah, that's a big state for wrestlers man it is.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
It is I'm probably the worst in my family.
My brother's a two-timenational champ.
He's coached several nationaltitles.
My brother, my cousin, is athree-time all--American and
then he's a head coach at acollege called Grandview and
they've won 12, 13 nationaltitles.
They're just a crazy powerhouse.
I was successful but not nearlytalented enough and I, you know
(03:39):
you look at getting ready to goto college and stuff like that
and I I looked at some schoolsand probably could have got some
scholarships to some degreewhatever.
But I realized I was going tobe a really good wrestler after
four or five years and I stilldidn't know what I wanted to be
when I grew up.
Spoiler, I still don't knowwhat I want to be when I grow up
, but I fought the army four orfive years and this is pre-9-11.
(04:03):
So, I joined in 2000 2000,thought I would figure out after
four or five years get somecollege money and then uh, and
then know, what I wanted to bewhen I grew up.
Obviously, 9-11 kicked off.
I was a signal signals,intelligence linguist, crypto
linguist.
My first duty station wasgermany and we sat in a basement
listening to headphones and itwas the worst.
I I'm an outside soldier.
(04:25):
I need to play outside.
A lot of people really enjoyedthat job.
It wasn't for me.
We had a commander come outduring our Monday formations
regular Army stuff and hey,there's this program called
Special Forces Assessment andSelection.
We'll be here to talk to youguys.
If you did get selected, you'dleave the unit and I raised my
(04:46):
hand.
I was like what's that?
And they had me leave the unit.
Nice, change your MOS.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
So when selection.
You speak multiple languagesright, Poorly.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Yeah yeah, several Like a great green beret.
Oh yeah, heck.
Yeah, yeah, I can.
I can upload with the best ofthem.
Now I learned the linguistprogram taught me Korean and
French.
You know, I grew up I grew upin high school Spanish, and then
I taught, became pretty solidby teaching English, and then
(05:27):
when I was stationed in Germany,of course all the crowds
thought I was one of them.
So I was like I better learnthis because they all keep
talking to me.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
I mean, yeah, you wouldn't stick out in Germany.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
No More so in.
Africa and Korea, though.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Oh my God, We'll get to that later, but what was the
selection like for you?
I mean?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I think we all after, like, reflecting on your career
, selection was the easiest part.
I mean, it was the easiest partof the q course.
Q course was the easiest partof your career.
Yeah, it was tough.
Uh, land nav, you know, as a,as a linguist, uh, I didn't,
hadn't done a lot of land now Ihad rocked my ass off getting
ready for selection.
I did that 100-miler, 9-miganin high, as my train up and we
(06:12):
were a bunch of signalsintelligence nerds.
So we did it by the numbers,not just gridded it out.
We went through the program ofhow you train for 100-miler and
whatever.
So the rucking was fine.
Land nav, I didn't know how todo.
I was a death star on the lastday through a, you know,
combined method of running theroads where I knew I could get
(06:34):
away with it Allegedly AllegedlyFor legal reasons that's a joke
.
Prove it.
I go the way of getting a tabrevoked or something.
For the most innocuous thing Iwould deserve to get my tab
revoked for, you know, anti-heropodcast.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I need you to pull this tab.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yeah, they, I uh.
Then you know, like I think ithappens a lot of guys suddenly
the map became three-dimensionalfor me and I realized those
little squiggly lines andcircles meant, meant something,
and figured it out.
And then, you know, on the nextphase I struggled was sgt.
I wasn't an x-ray, so I didn'thave sopsy, and that was before
they did the uh, soft skill mosis like prep.
(07:12):
So I was dumbfounded that allthese guys just knew 7-8.
They just knew the rangerhandbook and I was on fire guard
taking extra shifts reading andtrying to learn like how you,
how everybody just knows thisstuff and I think I got so pink.
I'm surprised you didn't hearanybody hear about that.
We tried to kick that guy outand sut.
They're like he doesn't knowshit.
(07:32):
That guy's an idiot.
There's nothing about being aninstrument or whatever.
They were 100 right.
I think we got a trajectory upthroughout like he's not smart
at this, but he works hard.
So damn it, he works really,really hard.
Yeah, yeah and q course off to10th group was there from, I
think, out there in 06, likesummer fall 06, um just went
(07:52):
right into the iraq.
Groundhog day deployments oof um, and then we did like four or
five of those, and then we wedid that africa yeah, the swap
pulled some of those yeah thatwas, I know, third group, didn't
wasn't a super fan of those, Ithink.
Uh, we loved them in 10th group.
Yeah, it was fun, like we werecompletely talking about away
(08:15):
from the flagpole, so it waslike a largely choose your
adventure.
But we were building like thoselow cost, low altitude bundles
like doctrine, like figuring itout like okay, well, that made
that 55 gallon drum boil explode, so we won't do it with that
next time, we'll do it the otherway.
We built base camps.
You know, like Pappy Jones islike a legend in at least in the
(08:37):
Charlie committee or Charliecommunity.
I think he was a Bravo actually, but he had written the A camp
manual.
It can't possibly be inpublication anymore Cause it's
super racist.
It's got like all the deadbodies have like Chinese hats
with X's on their eyes and stufflike that.
It's.
Those are the illustrations.
However, as you kind ofremember the early days of
(08:58):
appointments you would deploywith your books, like your, your
Q course books, and that's whatwe did in Africa.
It was like page one kill thegooks, like oh, okay, next, next
, next, next, until we got tolike building belts, bands and
zones with with triple strandconcertina and, uh, it's cool as
a Charlie.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
It was super fun logistically and in base camp
and stuff that's one part of thejob that people don't talk
about or really explain.
Like you hear the 18 Bravo andyou just like, ah, weapons, 18
Charlie, it's a demo explosionsand it's like dude, it's out of
all the MOSs, it's.
It has so much more.
Like your charge of so muchshit.
(09:38):
That is not sexy.
Property book, logistics,supply like everything that
nobody wants to do gets shuffledonto your plate for sure.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
And then we try to shove it onto the echoes.
If it touches wires, it toucheselectricity, like that's echoes
, man for sure I'm pretty surethis is your job, dude I would.
I would tell a student becausethen I was an 18 char Charlie
instructor after that for a fewyears and I would tell them no
one is going to say you're agood Charlie because of demo
(10:09):
ever.
Yeah, sorry, man, they're goingto say it because you're Jesus
the carpenter building stuff oryou procure things, you find a
way to get stuff.
And that's what people aregoing to say you're a good
Charlie, for Demo is the easiestthing that we do, certainly the
most fun, and you can get nerdyand good at it.
But no one's going to be likedude, he built charges so good
(10:31):
that dude stole an entiregenerator from a fob and got our
honor.
You know that's the stuffthey're going to brag about.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
That's absolutely the truth.
It is a job that has a lot ofresponsibility that nobody wants
to take on, that nobody wantsto master.
But if you master all thosethings, your detachment will
flourish, the team will lookreally good.
But again, you'll never get anyof the praise Like Hazmat.
Nobody wants to do that shit.
(10:59):
But I'm going to get yourequipment to country.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
It's the worst Hazdex .
And building that pallet,getting yelled at for putting
the wrong thing on the going tothat.
What do they call it?
Not JMPI?
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Oh man, this is obviously yeah, JI.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
JI obviously not a good Charlie.
You probably heard a lot ofthat if you did your back check.
But you go into JI and you'retrying to bribe, coerce these
customs like to just get yourstuff in the isu or on the
pallet and get out of thecountry dude, that's.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
That's the non-sexy stuff that nobody talks about.
Like a large, large.
Your career is going to befilled with these moments of
complete misery, just trying tocoerce somebody to let you put
something in the back of a truck, a plane, so you could go on
about your business like it's anall-day event.
(11:52):
Like I remember for one of ourmissions, our 18 bravo decided
that he was going to argue withthe ji inspector and it got to a
point of like a back and forth,a back and forth, and he
thought he was going tooutregulate this guy and show
him on his book like where thebatteries didn't have to be
there and I'm as the warrant onthe team.
(12:12):
I'm just like.
You know what.
You're going to have to learnthis the hard way.
Like, rather than like tryingto like appease this guy, you're
going to fight him onregulations.
This is a DOD, he's going todick you down.
This is a DOD, he's gonna dickyou down.
And sure enough, he sat theretrying to prove a point,
couldn't prove it, and then theguy just looks at him and is
like, okay, I'll come back whenI get done with everybody else,
and it's like fuck that's brutal.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
I had a buddy, ryan, who used to say adults only
learn one way the hard way.
Good, 100% true.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Did you do your entire time in the same company,
in the same battalion, or wheredid you move around through?
I grew up.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
B210, second time Bravo company, just shy of maybe
8 years, that's solid, maybeseven, some change.
Uh, oh, six to to early, tobeginning of 14 is when I went
to uh to swick and then, uh, Icame back from swick at I would
have been at 17 years, um, andwe went to third battalion.
(13:14):
If you don't know, 10th groupmade a war battalion and a jset
battalion for a number of yearswhich was really unhealthy.
I mean, you know, j-sets areharder than combat, j-sets
produce like the better MOS,like stuff.
So I mean, and then you gotguys that are you know cuckold,
they're watching their buddiesgo to war and they like, oh, I'm
(13:37):
doing another J-Set, justsitting there in the parking lot
and then you know it's likedark, we'll probably start dark
soon.
But they both killed themselvesat alarming rates.
The j set guys did it in a lotnicer cars because they were
making that j set money.
I mean, this is the reality ofit.
But, um, yeah, so I came backto third battalion.
(13:59):
I was like hell, yeah, I'mgetting in on that j set money.
I mean, you know I'm not, Idon't know this stuff very well,
but whatever, we did one likeepisodic engagement to Eastern
Europe, and then we went toAfghanistan for the rest of the.
So I was like, oh hell, that'sLisa, that's what I know.
Whatever, damn it.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Yeah, go ahead.
Sorry, yeah, it did it to me.
It doesn't make sense.
I don't know how it made senseto our senior leaders, but yeah,
there's guys want to go tocombat and jay sets do prepare
you to know your job.
Everybody gets a chance likeget reps.
Like it makes no fucking sense.
It makes no sense.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
This is, this is gonna piss off some a lot Bravos
.
But having done almostexclusively combat until I came
back from SWCC and I had a Bravoon my team, I had never in my
career been like dude.
That guy's a really good Bravo.
It's just not something Ithought about, it's just like
whatever.
Until I did that J set and Iwatched this poor bastard.
(15:01):
The partner force shows up withthe wrong weapons.
Their ammo count is notaccurate, so he's on the fly
coming up with a new POI fortraining, like with a round
count, with the drills, and hehad you know all this
infrastructure book.
And I saw that that wholecompany who had been just doing
J sets over and over all kind ofhad that infrastructure in
place.
I was super impressed.
They had the ammo stuff figuredout to move across all these
(15:24):
Eastern European countriesthrough the different regs.
It was like that's what reallybrought into focus how easy
combat is Like.
The worst case scenario is youhave to drive to your SOTIF and
go unload a Connex and then comeback.
It wasn't like well, this onehas to go to Romania but it has
to get through Czech Republic,so you'll have to do this for
that.
And these Bravos like had thatdialed in and then just the
(15:46):
range stuff, everything.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
So yeah, super impressed, and that's something
that our guys are trying to.
I guess they're navigating thisright now.
I mean, there's, you know,afghanistan is over, guys are
having to fight for J-sets againand understand the importance
of their primary skill sets,like I think the GWAT did us a
great disservice into thinkingthat the only thing that we were
(16:09):
built for was to go kick indoors and engage enemy on the
battlefield just a hundredpercent all the time and you
forget that you're supposed tobe the unconventional fucking
masters, like by with andthrough, especially for the guys
that had those really awesomesexy missions early on where
you're operating with thekatahas very elite force and
(16:32):
you're you're.
You don't have to do the wholetraining part of it.
You're getting these guysstraight from the task force
scorpion ready to go spun up,trained, and it's like, oh all,
all right, cool, we can just gohit targets all day.
There's something to be saidabout what the guys are doing
now, like they're getting backto what it means to be a Green
Beret.
At least I hope so.
I envision the force developingand strengthening those skill
(16:58):
sets that were not necessarilylost but maybe relegated to,
like the you know, the backsidetraining time At least I hope,
man.
I think that Look at like thefourth the whole fourth
battalion construct.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Yeah, I mean, it's like that used to be an ODA.
An ODA used to be good enough,but yeah, we got so wrapped in.
We had to create an additionalwhole system to do the things
that every oda would missionplan and do before you know,
yeah, oh, that that team's onthe softly or they're on the mle
rotation, whatever.
Now it's like we have wecreated a whole battalion to to
(17:34):
do those things again, it's wildyeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
And everything and everything's changing again too,
man.
Everything's changing again too, man.
Everything's.
You know, the force is gettingsmaller, leaner, so they're
having to adapt and shutterteams.
But that's not unusual.
That's happened before.
Like shit, we used to havefucking a whole bunch of
different groups and then thosegot shut down.
So it's like people are alwayswondering and you always hear
(18:00):
like the rumor mill of, like youknow, I heard it all the time
when I was still in like oh,they're going to shut down teams
, and it's like no, that'llnever happen.
And then, lo and behold, a fewyears later, I'm already out and
they're like they did it, crazysons of bitches.
They actually did it and I'mlike not bad.
I mean, you got to prioritizewhere you can put people.
(18:24):
I think he's rolling.
Yeah, exactly, man, when youwere going through your career,
did you ever pause and reflectand say like man, maybe, maybe,
I'm not going to do this forever?
Like did you always know you'regoing to do it all the way
through the retirement, or wouldyou always find yourself having
a little bit of conflictedemotions about that?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Uh, well, like I told you when I first came in, I was
gonna do it for five years, getthat gi bill and then bounce uh
.
And then I think, uh, uh, warstarted.
I was like, well, when this,this war thing ends, I'll, I'll
get out.
Uh, we came back from rotationin 2010, I think, or I was right
, maybe it was before we did the.
(19:01):
It was like on OND, operationNew Dawn in.
Iraq, where we were going toshut it down the first time and,
uh, I came back, I think beforethat rotation or yeah that was
going to 10 years.
That's your decision point.
Everybody tells you if you, ifyou go by beyond 10, you got to
do 20.
Uh, at least was the the wisdomthat I didn't question.
(19:23):
So I and I had, we didn'tdidn't love the leadership.
Obviously, like you know,didn't love the mission anymore
it was cool, kicking doors andall that stuff.
uh, and I had a mentor, a guy bythe name matt mcguffin, tell me
like, hey, man, leadershipchanges.
We value this leadership thingless and less.
The company sergeant, major andcommander are gone in a moment
(19:45):
you'll see.
You know, like, uh, in themission, change, just give it,
give it a pause and think aboutthat.
I did and I stuck it out and,um, then at that point I was
kind of committed, at least inmy mind, and SWCC was, uh, what
13, 14 years was?
Uh, don't, not a fan of brag,no offense to you know folks
(20:09):
that love that place.
But um, the mission, that liketeaching future Charlie's, like
when you know, like you get MOSphase, you're, you're probably
going to make it Right, you'reprobably going to make it Right.
And so I had a touch point ofevery 18 Charlie.
It gave me like, and I thoughtI was, I had a good grasp on
what it meant to be that aftereight years of team time and I
(20:32):
really liked that idea ofgetting a touch point with every
single 18 Charlie in theregiment for that three years.
I just got some feedback theother day from someone who said
he hated me as an instructor, Ithink.
I think he thought I was tryingto fail him.
He make it hard for him.
He didn't realize I wasactually giving him another
chance at time.
Fuse, he's like he's making medo another mission or whatever.
(20:54):
I guess he told me his buddywas like dude, you know, he
hooked you up Like he didn'thave to give you a third mission
and you passed.
Like it was myself and anotherguy was teaching with their
Chuck Longson fifth group guy.
But he just told me thatyesterday on the phone and I was
like, oh, no doubt that most ofthe students thought I was an
asshole.
I have no doubt that's a that'sthe case.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
but yeah, it's crazy, man, like I want to dive into
this for a little bit.
Mentorship like a lot of timeswhen we're doing something to
develop somebody or helpsomebody, see the problem set
from a different angle, it cancome across like fuck, that
guy's picking on me, like, andcertainly when you have to do
like, make hard calls of likehey, maybe you have what it
(21:38):
takes, but maybe I, I want youto restart this phase.
You know those hard calls likethey seem when you're on the
other side as a student.
You're like fuck that guy.
But they don't see if somebodydoes see value and worth in that
individual In that moment Ithink every young man I
certainly had that situation asa young 18 Bravo with a cadre.
(22:00):
It wasn't until years later thatI realized, oh shit, that guy
gave me a pass, like he helpedme, he hooked me, the fuck up to
get back in like good graces.
I was like, oh shit, like it'suh, it's something that it, it,
it's almost missed on us untilwe get older.
We realized like, fuck man,like that person was mentoring
us, like in your career, liketell us, like dive into that,
(22:23):
like what was it like going backand being a mentor and
developing the next generationof great 18 charlies I love that
.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
I think what you said spot on.
Mentor, you know, I think beinga green beret is teacher.
Uh, like, a lot of my familyare educators.
Maybe that's a cultural thing,but I I love that aspect was the
teaching aspect, the men in.
I say teaching, I think you'reprobably more accurate
mentorship, and so you know he'sa charlie cadre, especially
(22:48):
like um.
First I started teaching likethe logistics, construction
portion.
This was like the first sixweeks.
You get a lot of time, theseguys like study halls, like all
day in the classroom you go outand build um and then, during
like the last weeks of build you, you build some project out at
camel call or whatever, but it's, it's long days, you know,
(23:09):
probably six in the morning tilla lot of times like 10 at night
and that's what you're doing ismentoring.
Like, yeah, well, we don't, wedidn't bring whatever, whatever.
Guess what?
You didn't do it on the loadout.
Figure it the fuck out.
Man like the building's got tobe built like well, if we go
back, like you're gonna go twoand a half hours there and back,
go get that stuff.
And then, nope, like figure itout, man, you missed it on
(23:31):
loadout, it wasn't on the pallet.
Like that's on, you don't dothat again.
Um, and then you know, like theend you finish the build.
And then we would, if theyfinished early, I'd call them
team sergeant projects Like allright, hey, you're going to
build a movie room, like getsomething, a projector, we can
hit on the ceiling.
You're going to build thewhatever, add more outlets, add
more.
You know, hey, we want toupgrade from the piss tubes to
(23:54):
like an actual pisser with adrain.
You know it's like that.
And then I moved on to the FTXat the end, which is missions,
mission, it's like that.
But yeah, and then I moved onto the ftx at the end, which is
missions, mission, mission,mission, and that was super
rewarding.
So out there at uh, camp snyder, the bravos and charlies you, I
remember this.
Q course, bravos and charlieswere like the most contentious,
always fighting, and then itturns out you're the two always
(24:15):
in the arm room together.
You're like bfs on the team.
It's so fucking true, man, Ihad completely forgotten about
that until I got back there asan instructor and the Bravos and
Charlies would be arguing andbitching about shit.
I was like, oh yeah, that'sright.
Believe it or not believe it ornot, you two are going to be
like bros, and it's going to be.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
This episode is brought to you by Titan Sarms.
Head on over to titansarmscomand buy a stack today.
Use my code CDENNY10 to getyour first stack.
I recommend the lean stack too.
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Speaker 2 (24:53):
You against the entire rest of the team, fucking
with your stuff, fucking up theinventory, the mall.
They're going to be screwing itup.
You're going to get over it now.
But trust me too, you got, it'sgonna be.
You're gonna be okay on theother side that's so fucking
true, man.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
It becomes a dynamic duel for good and bad.
Um, yeah, a lot of fondmemories, but to your point, the
mentorship man.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
That's.
That's what I the charlieteaching charlie course was
extremely rewarding.
One of the more rewarding partsI ended up doing 24 years and
one of the more rewarding partswas that and I worked with
awesome dudes.
I always try to be the hardestworking guy on a team, something
your research might contest no,that actually came through that
(25:40):
guy's really good at coming upwith ideas for other people to
do, but I think I have a plaquethat says that somewhere.
Most of you are like that guy'sreally good at coming up with
ideas for other people to do,but I think I have a plaque that
says that somewhere.
But I worked with guys that adude named Aaron Huntington goes
by Moose because he's the sizeof a moose, but he, the guy,
could outwork.
I couldn't outwork the guy.
(26:00):
I would show up an hour earlyto work on some random project
on a weekend to improve our teamhouse that we had out work.
I could not work the guy.
I would show up an hour early towork on some like random
project on a weekend to likeimprove our team house that we
had out there, and he'd show uptwo hours early and already have
like the cabinets built anddone.
I'm like I cannot outwork thisdude.
Like I think I'd set up all thepackets for the students and
then I'd find out that he'dalready done the other half like
before.
Yeah.
So the other half like before,yeah.
(26:25):
So it's cool to work with dudesthat like that that you're
trying to outwork guys.
You know, because I mean youget on, and when you're on a
team like that, it's also superrewarding.
But that was like a place whereI was, where there was so many
dudes that I was just strugglingto try to even just keep up and
feel like I was pulling myweight that's a that's the truth
about this profession.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
It's it's like the theme of this week.
Everybody I talked to that's agreen beret.
Like the good, genuine peoplealways say that exact same or
share that sentiment, like I wasalways trying to like, fit in
and and keep up with the rest ofthe guys to be just as good as
they were is, by and by andlarge, like we've we served with
(27:01):
some amazing individuals likeor we had brushes with with guys
at schools we went to, you know, go to free fall, go to
Sephardic.
Wherever you go sniper school,you meet individuals are larger
than life and it's it remindsyou like to humble yourself to
being just being there in that,you know, in that team room, in
that company area, with peoplethat are just absolute quiet
(27:25):
professionals, always lookingfor work.
I don't think it ever hit melike really the importance of
that phrase and every, everyinstructor or every you know
team sergeant or senior on yourteam at some point has said that
like always be looking for work, no matter whether it's in the
shoot house or in the fuckingteam room.
Always be looking for work, nomatter whether it's in the shoot
house or in the fucking teamroom, always be looking for work
, but at the same time, thatsame message can lead us into
(27:49):
some really, really bad mentalhealth spaces.
For sure we can work ourselvesto death.
And 24 years, man, that's not.
You lasted longer than GWAT.
Yeah, don't, I know it.
I want to.
I'm sorry to I and that's notyou.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
You lasted longer than GWAT.
Yeah, don't, I know it.
I want to.
I'm sorry to.
I want to.
I'll just go to that.
But I wanted to say likesomething I've been reminding
guys as they get out um, justtalk about the dudes you worked
with and whatever I.
I started saying, um, we werein a saturated market of heroes.
Oh, that's perfect, yeah, inthat timeframe.
And so it gets lost, especiallywhen you just get yelled at by
(28:27):
these old black ladies on yourlast day in the army, just just
berating you like you're thebiggest piece of shit in the
world.
And, uh, it's the same onesfrom the camp we'll call chow
hall, same ones from your youknow SRP.
Every time they just yell atyou, just feel bad about
yourself, uh, and then they handyou a flag and you're like,
well, if you go, and a sticker.
Now you get the sticker too,right?
(28:48):
And a pin for your uh, iraq war.
I served at and and you justfeel like it.
I don't know.
For me it was demoralizing thatlast day where they just hand
you the flag and you're like off, you go, like next, and but
I've been reminding people likeif, uh, saturated market heroes,
if, if you told 10 year olddenny like who denny would be,
(29:11):
or you just explain to him dennytoday's career, life and
whatever denny, little dennywould be jacked to the tits.
Dude, can you imagine like whatthat who?
He looks at that guy as anabsolute fucking hero.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
He did what.
I actually went back in timeand I explained to my
10-year-old self that now I'm a41-year-old podcast host for a
D-list podcast, and heimmediately tried to kill
himself.
No, don't do it.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
No, you gotta go back to the other stuff too.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
man, you gotta like god this is what we've become
apache bearded fuck.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
No you're making me face my own shit now.
Thanks, danny geez.
So hi, thinking about the thehigh times now.
Now I gotta look at where I'mat right now.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
It's discouraging oh, man, yeah, I immediately
started fading away like in a uh, back to the future.
It's a obscure time travelreference, no, but you're right,
dude, that, uh, that'ssomething I do.
I don't take that lightlybecause you know, young man kids
you're always.
I spent a lot of time in mytroubled youth like wondering,
(30:31):
like fuck, will I ever get outof this situation where I'm at?
What am I going to frigginghave in life?
And like, just the fact that Igot to serve with some of these
individuals that you know somearen't even here anymore, some,
some are.
You know I got an 18 Delta.
It's a PA who is phenomenal.
I've got friends that you knowprobably weren't the best team
(30:55):
sergeants but on the backside,now that I'm older and we can
reconnect and talk, you realizethat I owe my entire career to
some of the mentorship that Ireceived from him, some of the
first, like you know, thingsthat he put into motion so I
could go learn what it reallymeant to be a Green Beret Like
we truly have, like some of thegreatest veterans and people in
(31:16):
our Green Beret community, whichis something that like makes it
so easy to want to partner upwith.
You know the great organizationthat we're now going to you
know spend some timehighlighting, which is Special
Forces Foundation.
Man Like, how did you findyourself serving our community,
green Berets, with thisfoundation, our community at
Green Berets with thisfoundation?
(31:37):
So?
Speaker 2 (31:37):
2020, which I tried to get out in 2020, I had an ass
cancer scare so they made mestay in.
And then, because of COVID, Icouldn't get my butthole probed
to find out that I was a falsealarm and, just like a lot of
dudes who've gone to Africa andAfghanistan, you just, you know
you shit blood and sometimes youcan't trust a sneeze or a fart.
(31:58):
You know you shit blood andsometimes you can't trust a
sneeze or a fart.
You know.
Let's just you know.
But the VA is going to give metens of dollars a year for the
rest of my life, so we're prettymuch even, but I had that scare
and so I stayed in.
I ended up taking the bloodmoney, had another good mentor
tell me hey, dude, you're goingto fight cancer till you die, or
you don't have cancer, buteither way're probably gonna med
board.
So take that blood money untilyou get through.
(32:19):
Whatever this is going on and Idid and whatever ended up in
there for like three, four moreyears.
But in that, so in that 2020time space, I was, my retirement
had fallen through um, I hadmoved over to our advanced
skills company to teach um somehuman stuff and we had eight
suicides in six months from fromfrom just our community there
(32:41):
in 10th group, uh.
And when uh, joey Pfisterkilled himself, I had been from
my company and I knew a lot ofguys who were not totally
connected anymore.
I hadn't heard from in a while.
From that, from it was uh fromtwo four rival company, and so I
, from that from it was uh fromtwo four rival company.
And so I, I just called,started calling dudes from that
(33:02):
team in that company to let themknow.
You know, at that point we'dalready seen a lot of suicides.
But I thought, man, I'd, I'dlike them to hear it from from
me or from one of us, instead oflike on facebook two-thirds of
the way through a bottle, yeah.
And so I, I called a lot ofthose guys and that's where it
started.
Some guys, whether they weredoing really well, really poorly
(33:23):
or more likely somewhere in themiddle, a lot of the common
theme was hey, man, good to hearfrom you.
I haven't heard from anybodysince I got out and I was like
shit that was eight years ago,that was 10 years ago, and I
thought, man, we are really.
We say where the brotherhoodbegins, but, man, we really turn
it off when a guy leaves.
And I've, I've come to a pointto give us, us as a regiment,
(33:44):
some grace, because you know it,we know it's devastating when
you come off the team thread.
You know it's time, but it's,it hurts, man, but the team
thread goes on.
They go on to the next mission,the next appointment, whatever.
I don't think they intend toforget or leave you, it's just
(34:05):
it's busy, op tempo is high andI think what happens is, you
know, and I think, from my ownreflections, like it's been five
years, it's been six years.
I think of danny, I think ofwhoever, and I'm like, oh man,
if I call him now, I think andmaybe I think of him because I
need a place to stay for a jobinterview or I need like
something or whatever, but I'mlike, well, I don't, can't call
him now.
He's going to think I wantsomething and and the reality is
(34:27):
like, like I think both of uswould, are like dying to hear
somebody needs something from us, like in, like if you could
tell yourself like, go ahead,need and be needed right, like
so need things, guys are dyingto help.
We leave the end of our careerwhere we're kind of problem
solvers more than actions on,but we're figuring out like if
you can't get ammo there, gohere, go this way.
(34:49):
If you can't get through that,talk to these folks, you're
going to go parallel chain forprocurement.
Whatever you solve problems andyou connect people with folks.
And whatever you solve problemsand you connect people with
folks and you're less of theless of the you know lead on FID
, you're less of the lead on onmission.
You know you're, you're theproblem solver and so you're
dying to help dudes out and soand you lose that overnight kind
(35:14):
of when you, when you get outand so, um, you know that's my
first kind of things like needgo ahead and reach out and need
those people.
But so that kind of thing islike need go ahead and reach out
and need those people, but sothat kind of struck a chord of
like I'm going to just going tostart calling dudes as they come
up, like even if I'm talkingshit, which is like anytime your
name comes up I'm usuallytalking shit.
So you know, I'm going to giveDanny a call after I talk shit
about him for 20 minutes so I'mgoing to.
But uh, but yeah, I'll callsomebody and like, hey, dude, I
(35:36):
was just talking shit about youtoday with so-and-so or redacted
, you know, and then just calland see how you're doing, see
what you're up to.
Man, I saw on LinkedIn you'rein California now, I see
whatever.
So I started calling guys.
And when I started calling guysI did run into guys that were in
crisis or that needed somethingwho won't share that it doesn't
(35:57):
come up, and whatever crisis orthat needed something who won't
share, that they just itdoesn't come up and whatever.
And so our warrior care programcare coalition stuff.
I had a good friend, oldteammate, company mate, scott
Kaluska.
He works there, phenomenal guy.
But I was reaching out to himhey, this guy's in trouble, what
can I do?
It's not kind of what you guysdo.
And then through that heconnected me with Paul Watson,
with the Special ForcesFoundation, and so between those
(36:18):
two I kept asking I got a guyin crisis, I got a guy who needs
some behavioral health, I needsome whatever.
And then Paul talked to Ignacio, the founder of the foundation,
and they're like hey, man, howabout this?
Stop asking.
Just say yes, we'll figure outhow to pay for it and we'll get
you a business card.
We'll slap you on the website,we'll give you some credibility
(36:38):
to it.
But just say yes and we'llfigure it out.
If you need a credit card from,we'll do that, but do it.
And so that, um, that's kind ofwhere, where it started, and
like I appreciate the praise youyou stacked on me at the
beginning, I really don't butthe uh, I say it a lot and and I
know most guys who do thisstuff will will echo it Like um,
I'm glad it has a good optic,I'm glad it looks good, better
(37:00):
than smoking meth or man in theglory holes down here at the
truck stop Another big hobby ofmine, obviously.
But uh, I do entirely like thiscalling dudes and checking on
guys trying to stay connectedLike it's, it's for me right,
it's what makes me feel like I'mstill in the fight, man, you
(37:22):
know, because it is demoralizingwhen you get that flag and that
sticker and that in and, youknow, you just feel like
unneeded anymore.
So it's, it feeds me so andthat's why I didn't call guys.
I said it before we startedrecording.
But uh, if we all just calledtwo dudes a week, just pick two
dudes, doesn Doesn't matter.
Someone you haven't talked toin a while, it doesn't have to
be someone you're worried incrisis, like whatever.
(37:43):
Just call two dudes a week andbullshit.
Talk about you know, talk shit.
Talk about the near miss DUI.
Talk about the you know whateverCondone it, we don't condone it
Absolutely not Like, talk about, like that chick that you know,
whatever, whatever that thingis, um, cause you'll find guys
that aren't doing well, oryou'll find guys what they need,
(38:04):
or you'll figure it out Likeyou were talking about your
buddy.
You'll sort it out togetherLike man, we're both struggling,
we're both burned out, we'reboth whatever Um, and it's as
much for that person that you'recalling it as it is for you to
get that connection.
I think if we all just calledtoo it's like a pyramid scheme
or whatever, but it expands weall called two dudes a week, we
(38:25):
would change the trajectory ofthis suicide epidemic and the
other stuff.
That's not there, but it'sgoing that way through a slow
burn like the alcoholism.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Yeah, dude.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Terrible relationship with alcohol.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yeah, that's been the one that's really really
fucking just killed me, reallyfucking hurts.
I've lost two friends toalcohol now and I didn't.
I was ignorant I think a lot ofus are of how dangerous it is.
(38:58):
I certainly grew up in the teamroom culture of having drinks
and I dealt with my own issueswith alcohol when I was
struggling, used it and dependedon it really heavily.
I'm lucky that I was able toidentify it and walk away from
it.
But some people it has a deathgrip on us.
And, man, if you're listeningright now, if I could just get
(39:18):
you to do one thing and that'sjust just look at your
relationship with alcohol, justhow often you're drinking it,
what you're, why you're drinkingit, if it leads to worse
feelings of depression andanxiety in your life, maybe take
a break, maybe walk away fromit for a little bit.
You don't have to do it forever.
I'm just saying like explore,be willing to walk away just for
(39:40):
30 days and explore.
Is it the best thing for you?
I'm more vocal about it now.
Like I said, haven't lost morefriends to it, and it's just.
I don't want any of you any ofyou listening to struggle with
that or have to get that news ofyour friend drank themselves to
death in an empty house, justsurrounded by empty frigging
(40:00):
bottles of vodka.
Like that's horrible.
That's how.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
None of us should ever go out to this this way
None of us, so yeah it is like aI mean a lot of reasons to give
it, but I'll, you know, ifnothing else, like only and I've
, unfortunately, you know,through this work, and so like
they're, fortunately, whatever.
I've encountered a lot ofsuicides.
I've seen the stats, I've seenthe numbers and I've met a lot
(40:23):
of these guys personally.
There's only two examples andtwo instances that I know, of
all the suicides that were not aguy that was drunk at the time,
only two, and that's over,anecdotally, or my like call it
caseload or or touch points.
I mean that's over probably acouple hundred Um and so only
(40:46):
two man.
That's pretty, pretty powerful.
And so you know I'm not ateetotaler.
I'll have, you know, drink hereand there, uh, maybe even turn
in and turn up at a gala or ballto some degree.
But but I had to certainlychange my relationship with
alcohol to your point.
You know I watched that was thecommon thread with a lot of
(41:06):
guys and then I found myselfdoing it right, like uh yeah
drinking to feel emotion,drinking to go to sleep?
yeah, drinking because it was arough day, a frustrated day.
And then you, the threshold forthat lowers.
The ride home was traffic Likenow that's my reason to like
whatever it's.
Just it was that like dudealcohol, they say it's an
(41:27):
unhealthy coping mechanism.
Right, it's a coping mechanism.
It works, man.
It's like damn near a hundredpercent effective.
It'll deaden the emotions,it'll get you through, it'll
help you fall asleep, for sureyeah but it works, man, it works
.
It causes so many other worsethings.
It's it's poisoning your brain.
(41:48):
It's ruining your relationshipwith your wife and kids, whether
you know it or not.
Uh, because it's it's.
You're dependent on that thing,uh, and it's just deadening you
.
Put in the work, man, dosomething, do something better.
I love that Like, if nothingelse, do it for 30 days, first
off.
You can't cut it out Anythingout for 30 days.
Yeah, it's probably a goodindicator that like, oh man,
(42:10):
this thing has a grip on me.
Um, but I said, and I had to100% change my relationship with
alcohol and and, uh, I don'tknow a lot.
I feel like a lot of peopledon't get out on skates in the
retirement phase.
Yeah, they say it's like thehardest thing you did in your
career and and I I'm inclined tobelieve it like it is more and
more through, like time showsthat, um, yeah, it's, that's
(42:32):
what it's turned to and it's uhyeah that's a big one.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
Yeah, it's, it's.
The transition is not easy.
No one gets through it on theirown.
So if you're looking forresources, assistance, head on
over to special forces,foundationorg, connect.
Be willing to reach out.
It is for green berets by greenberets.
You're not going to get halftruths.
You're going to get people likecody that are willing to
(43:00):
connect with you.
So please reach out.
There are so many avenues wecan help.
The one thing we won't do is wewon't pay for your xbox life
membership.
We'll pay for your steamaccount, so just know that up
front.
No, we're not going to pay foryour gym membership, although if
you have a whoop strap and wantto get involved with a
community of individuals thatwant to work out in our
(43:21):
community on whoop, uh, the codeis right here and I am proud to
be pushing this initiative,because one of the things that
we can do to start feelingbetter, it's just getting out
there and moving.
Be willing to work out, bewilling to go out for a walk, a
run, a jog, a light rock move towork out.
We want to go out for a walk, arun, a jog, a light rock move.
When we get out, that's usuallythe first thing that we put on
(43:46):
pause working out.
I know I certainly did, becauseyou know the VA is going to
tell you like oh, you can't dothat, you're too broken, and a
lot of us listen to that.
But I will tell you one of thegreatest things you can do to
improve and enhance yourwell-being is physical fitness.
No, you don't have to be aCrossFit guru.
No, you don't have to go backto the gym and Eagle lift, but
you can do something.
Just move a little bit, bewilling to go out there.
(44:07):
And as an added bonus for theentire time we're doing this, I
want to be doing some freegiveaways.
Some are small, some are goingto be big.
I'm going to give it away atConcept Row Machine.
That's going to be the firstbig one through August.
Join us and you'll be in therunning for that.
I'll throw in some swag fromcompanies like I don't know
Softly, maybe Born Primitive.
(44:28):
No official sponsorship.
I just like what they do and Ilike what they create.
I'm willing to buy it and sendit to you.
Why, you ask?
Because I'm selfless.
That's why.
Speaker 2 (44:40):
It's honestly, go outside, get outside, touch
grass and back to working outthat two-year like retirement
window or whatever it is.
Now is a year, 18 months,whatever, whatever.
A lot of guys get sucked intothat trap of not a lot of guys
get sucked into that trap of notso like and that's another like
(45:00):
.
That's what.
At least for me, it was like Idon't have a reason to get up in
the morning, so like I'll stayup a little later and I'll have
a couple more and a couple more.
Speaker 1 (45:09):
This episode is also brought to you by Precision
Wellness Group.
Getting your hormones optimizedshouldn't be a difficult task,
and Dr Taylor Bosley has changedthe game.
Head on over toprecisionwellnessgroupcom.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Enroll and become a patient today and uh, and then
you don't have, like, you're notgoing to the gym because you're
not trying to outwork yourteammates, because you don't
have teammates anymore, you'reoff the team.
You know, uh, yeah, yeah, like,just go outside, let sun touch
your eyeballs and and and getyour fat ass back in the like
dude, you tell me those peopleyou talked about softly, you
(45:45):
know, doug keysweater amazingdude yeah, never much cared for,
but we worked together in theCharlie Committee.
He was affectionately known asthe student hugger, so you
probably won't hear studentstalk bad about him.
Every Joe is a go for Doug.
I'll just lay and talk shitabout Doug.
I'm going to tag him on thisreel, please do.
(46:06):
I talked to Doug quite a bit.
Doug's been awesome.
Doug helped me out with theSurvivor like family from a guy
that was that passed not toolong ago, the guy that used to
say adults only learn one way ofthe hard way.
Yeah.
Got to get Ryan Groh.
His son was getting ready to goto selection and Doug was like
ship we'll, I'll cover it, we'llget it in there fuck yeah which
(46:28):
was super good for him.
I think he threw in one for meas well, so I was messing with
it, not enough.
But I bring him up becausedoug's probably coming up on 50
and probably the fittest he'sever been in his life.
Um, and that's a flex man likeI'd like to.
My wife is a fit stud.
You met Jess.
Speaker 1 (46:48):
Yeah, she's amazing.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
She's a freak Like at this point that's who I should
probably be trying to competewith to get fit, strong, healthy
.
But you know she she pushes bigon.
Like you can live a long time.
If you lift weights and moveyour body, you can live a long
time.
And one of the like for meanyway.
Like my, um, my kids.
We had them as geriatrics, soyou know I retired last year.
I'm coming up on a year.
They're six and nine.
They won't remember I was inthe army yeah, nor will I
(47:15):
because of the TBI's.
So that's helpful.
Jess will be the guardian ofthe secrets, but like I'd like
to.
That's one of my favorite thingsabout this.
I get to do stuff with them.
I'm at their sporting events.
You know my son had some likestuff going on at school last
year.
Year before I guess I could bein the classroom almost every
day to like right the ship andwhatever, and so like wanting to
(47:39):
live longer and do stuff withthem.
That's a hell of a motivator.
And so like, get fit, getoutside, like live.
Like you know, even if yourkids are now in their 20s, like
a lot of dudes when they retire,right, cool, now you can go
party with them, you can go onvacations with them, but not if
you're going downhill circle anddrain and becoming like that
(48:03):
that 60s, 50s and 60s whereyou're like well, I'm 50 and 60.
Speaker 1 (48:07):
I hurt him in pain, well move get out of pain, do
the work.
Yeah, yeah, it's important toprioritize this.
And the other thing is likemental health and physical
fitness go hand in hand.
You wake up and you look in themirror and you don't see that
young Green Beret that you oncewere.
Look, you're not going to getthe body of a fit 25-year-old
(48:31):
green beret by sitting on thecouch.
And getting fit for your agegroup doesn't have to be going
back to what you used to looklike or what you used to lift
like in your 20s.
Be fit and be competent in thegym, moving your body, doing
things that normal, everydayAmericans should be able to do.
You should be able to run acouple miles and feel good
afterwards Americans should beable to do.
You should be able to run acouple of miles and feel good
(48:51):
afterwards.
You should be able to go to thegym and work out and not have
your whoop strap or Apple devicegoing Call 911.
911.
And heart disease, diabetesthese are all things that can
get mitigated by just being moreactive.
So if we start looking better,feeling better, because our
fitness is getting better, thenwe're not we're less likely to
experience big bouts ofdepression.
(49:13):
It's a no brainer.
Man Like there's.
And the one thing that I willsay man, like it's a community
environment, going to the gymCrossFit gym or conventional gym
you're getting around otherpeople Like I.
I didn't know it at the time,but when I started working out
here like I, I was like man,like I feel better because now
I'm interacting with otherpeople.
(49:34):
I'm not sitting in this virtualspace and then walking into an
empty you know living room afterI'm done recording.
Like I have an environment ofother human beings, other green
berets I don't even know thatthere was a a few green berets
in the areas and you connect,you.
It's like we are prone tofinding each other in this space
, man.
Speaker 2 (49:51):
So challenge yourself .
The community is like that'swhat we lose right overnight
when we get out.
Um, there's another parallel Iwant to draw between that
physical health and mentalhealth.
But first, uh, you losecommunity.
So you got to find something.
We had a guy, uh, um, go downto having trouble.
Alcohol, alcohol, superdepression moved for one of
(50:11):
those where the wife gives himan ultimatum.
Yeah, personal opinion on that.
If your wife's giving you anultimatum it's probably too late
.
So he moved down to Texas, outof here, out of Colorado, and no
community, new job.
She ended up leaving him anyway.
So he's no community.
He's going through that divorce, you know, custody stuff I
(50:37):
think was mostly pleasant.
But he turned to the bottledrinking a lot and it's became
just compounding right Startaffecting work relationship with
his son, you know.
And so we sent him to Warrior'sHeart down there, which is
phenomenal program.
I would say the gold standardfor, in my limited knowledge,
but the gold standard forsubstance abuse and PTSD.
It's really operator-centric.
They do first responders,military, whatever.
(50:59):
But now I feel bad.
The guy's name is a stud, tomSpooner.
Tom Spooner, there you go.
Tom does that.
He's a former CAG dude.
Tom Spooner, there you go.
Um, tom does that.
He's a former CAG dude.
Uh, it is.
Guys get down there and firsttwo weeks is a rough like, or
the first week maybe, like thisdude, like this is stupid.
And then we're batting.
(51:19):
Damn near a thousand guys wholean into it are coming out.
Life's changed, chinshipsrebuilt, and I could give you
some awesome anecdotes of guyswho completely turned life
around.
Who it was, their relationshipwas over, their kids wanted
nothing to do with them and nowthey are like super dad.
(51:40):
That is the most impressivething about them right now is
how much of a family man thewife was like.
You can go to this thing, butwhen you get back, we're getting
a divorce, no matter what, andthey come back and they are that
.
They are crushing life.
They are super couple, superdad like.
And it's not just that one, Imean, I could probably name you
four or five.
Yeah.
So that place is incredible.
(52:02):
But this guy got out of thatand he he joined.
He's like I need to work out.
That's it like I startedworking out when I was down
there.
I need to work out.
He joined a uh, it's called f3.
It's like a christian men'slike faith, fellowship, fitness,
I think, is what the three f'sare for.
And he joined it and he waslike embarrassed telling me
about it.
He's like I don't know, let'sjust like.
He's like there's some regulararmy guys, some cops, he's like.
(52:25):
But, dude, I really like it likeit's cheesy to some degree yeah
, and so like finding thatcommunity in the gyms a pretty
easy way to do it well, like no,but yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 1 (52:39):
I need to take my own advice because I've been
putting on the uh retirement 15,jess is already telling me that
it's about time well, uh, luckyfor you, have a friend that
loves you and cares for youdeeply.
Because, cody, Half Pop, orHalf Poop, as your friends
affectionately know you, you'regoing to get a Whoop membership
for free.
That's what we do here onSecurity Hot Podcast.
(53:01):
Give me your address and I'llsend you a Whoop and a
membership so I'll pay for youryear and your device.
Oh, big deal.
That's what we do here insecurity.
Speaker 2 (53:11):
I don't care what go ahead.
I don't care what everyone elsesays about you.
I think you're a good dude man.
I appreciate you.
I don't care what every guywho's ever served with you, met
you, worked with you, says aboutyou.
I think they're all wrong and Ithink you're a good guy they're
always in the comment section.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
Yeah, I think the only.
No, I can't.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
I think the only other green brands hated more
man, I wondered if it was gonnacome up and shit on that guy for
a while.
That's it that's it.
Speaker 1 (53:42):
that's the only one.
Oh man, gosh, guys again,please join our whoop community.
Cody is going to get our firstfree strap of membership because
it's how we roll in the SpecialForces Foundation and you know,
I'm just a selfless guy and Ihave tons of cash because of
OnlyFans.
So I will continue makingOnlyFans content unless you
(54:05):
start supporting the show andplease consider sponsoring, or I
will continue making content.
The last thing you want is towalk in and see my content on a
family member's phone.
I'm just saying it could bethere.
It could happen, your feetfinder stuff's pretty good
Premium subscriber.
(54:26):
You can find me on there.
It's Petite Feet, petite Feet,76.
Cody, thank you so much forjoining us today.
Man, it's been a blast.
You're a remarkable human beingand great Green Beret, and you
can't find anybody in thecommunity that has anything
negative to say about you.
Man, I'm honored to work withyou in this endeavor and
continue fighting the greatfight which is to stop veteran
(54:49):
suicides, specifically withinour Green Beret community,
because for the last 20 years,we have sent some of our
nation's greatest to go do someinsane tasks and we need them
around.
You should never be losing yourfriends or more friends after
combat.
So if you're a Green Beret andyou're looking for help and
(55:09):
assistance, please reach out tothe Special Forces Foundation.
You can go tospecialforcesfoundationorg or
click the link in the bio, clickthe link in my podcast bio or
the Special Forces Foundationbio and we can get you connected
to somebody like Cody or LowellCopper and they will point you
in the right direction, becausethe brotherhood doesn't end when
(55:30):
you get out.
The team room is far bigger andgreater on the outside.
So we're all here for you andI'm telling you if you're
struggling with your transitionright now, just know that this
next chapter is going to be justas good, if not better, as
there's so many great things tobe excited about.
Thank you all for tuning in.
We'll see you all next time.
(55:51):
Until then, take care.
Securepodcast is proudlysponsored by Titan's Arms.
Head over to the episodedescription and check out
Titan's Arms today.
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