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April 7, 2025 24 mins

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In this fun but impactful episode of the Comeback Chronicles, Terry tells the story behind the story of getting on a Survival Reality Show - representing all of Boy Scouts of America!  Riddled with absolute gold nuggets, this episode will entertain and inspire, and leave you with a feeling of hope.  You're here for a reason!

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Speaker 1 (00:03):
If you've been stuck in fear, self-doubt, your past
failures and you're ready tobreak through your comfort zones
to finally reach the pinnacleof success in every area of your
life, then this podcast is foryou.
Here's your host, Terry LFossum.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hey, terry L Fossum here and welcome to a very
different episode of theComeback Chronicles podcast.
So I have a lot of peopleasking me how I got on a
survival reality show and why inthe world would I wear my
Scoutmaster uniform while doingso.
So this episode, I'm going totell you the story behind the

(00:45):
story behind the story that ledto all of that, and you don't
know how that turned out.
I'll expose that at the veryend.
So here's the deal.
Have you ever watched any ofthose survival shows?
I used to watch Survivor justall the time, boy.
Every episode I'd watch thatshow and I've watched a lot of

(01:05):
them.
I enjoy those shows, but Ialways swore that I would never
be on one.
Have you seen what they makethem eat?
You know as much fun as I havewatching them, and I do a lot of
stuff in the outdoors by myselfall around the world.
It's kind of what I do for fun,not that no, I don't think so,
but here's what led up to it.
Okay, first of all, I was reallyblessed in business.

(01:28):
I was part of the top fractionof 1% of the entire direct sales
industry in the world.
Life's going pretty good andI'm single, I'm kind of living
the good life, and then lovegets in the way a lot, doesn't
it?
Have you noticed that, see?
I fell in love with thisamazing young lady and her three
amazing boys.

(01:50):
Well, I ended up marrying saidyoung lady and her three amazing
boys, because when you marry amom or dad, you marry the entire
family right, which isfantastic.
That was great news for me.
I love kids.
I always have, which isfantastic.
That was great news for me.
I love kids.
I always have, so fantasticwe're on Now.

(02:10):
When I did so, though, I knewthese boys needed to have a
positive male role model.
They needed one very badly, andI wanted to be there for them.
So I called up my partners inbusiness and I said guess what,
I just retired.
And they're like wait what?
Yeah, I just retired, see, I'vegot one chance to turn these

(02:32):
little boys into honorable men,and I'm not going to screw that
up.
I can always make money.
You can always figure that out.
I got one shot here, man, andI'm not going to blow it.
So I spent the next severalyears basically raising these
kids.
That's what I did.
I'd walk them to school everysingle morning.
I'd be there when they got homefrom school, whether they liked

(02:53):
it or not, you know.
Okay, let's look at yourhomework all the things that a
dad does.
And that's how I spent the nextfew years Now while they're in
school.
I wrote some books, but Iwouldn't ever promote them
because you have to go traveling.
And again, I got one job andthese boys needed me very, very
badly.
So that's what I did, and fastforward a few years.

(03:18):
Oh, by the way, I became theirscout master.
I'm an Eagle Scout, and theyounger two twins were in Cub
Scouts.
So when it came time for BoyScouts, I crossed over with them
, as they say, and I spent sometime as an assistant scoutmaster
with them, and then thescoutmaster asked me to take
over.
In all honesty, I really didn'twant to, but again, I had to

(03:40):
step up, because these boys arewatching to see if I step up or
not.
So I stepped up and becametheir scoutmaster as well.
What a blessing that ended upbeing.
It's one of the best things, ifnot the best thing, I've ever
done.
Just amazing.
I got to help so many youngboys grow up to be honorable men
.
What an honor, what an honor.

(04:02):
And it's still.
I mean, you can tell just bythe tone of my voice how I feel
about it.
So it's fantastic.
But fast forward a few years.
Both those twins are turning 18, getting their Eagle Scout
pretty much in that order Ifyou're in scouting.
You just giggled because youknow that deal.
See, at 18 is the cutoff andtoo many wait until way too soon

(04:25):
towards their birthday and gettheir eagle only at the last
minute, which was the story ofmy two boys.
But they've got their eagles,scott, they're moving on to
different things.
So now I'm praying to God.
Okay, god, what is it that youwant me to do next?
Whatever it is, I'll do it.
You lead, I'll follow.
Be careful what you ask for,because check this out.

(04:50):
I came down to my computer myoffice one morning came down to
my computer checking my email.
You know, not a big deal, right?
Every day I get this email fromsomething called Metal Flowers
Media Casting Company.
I'm like okay, and I open thisemail and it says something to
the effect of this is MetalFlowers Media Casting Company.

(05:10):
We're casting a brand newtelevision survival reality show
, prime Time on Fox Network,pitting 10 of the top survival
experts in the country againsteach other, all the while
bringing along a complete novice, somebody who's never even
camped out in their backyardbefore.
And we think you'd be great.

(05:32):
Now I'm thinking, okay, cool,first of all, which one am I?
Wait what?
And then next, let me ask yousomething.
If you get an email out of theblue like that, what do you
think?
It's fake?
Right, it's spam.
Of course it is.
I'm waiting for it and pleasesend me $10,000 to Nigeria,

(05:53):
kindly.
But there's a phone number.
And I called up my wife and Isaid man, here's what I just got
and it sounds like a fake to me, but I'm going to make the
phone call.
So I called him up.
That phone call ended up being atwo-hour interview and like, oh
my gosh, this is real.
So like, okay, you know, here'sthe problem I told.
I said I'd never be on one ofthese shows.

(06:15):
I don't want to do it, I havezero desire to do it.
But here's the problem.
If you're praying to God, okay,god, whatever it is you want me
to do, I'll do it.
You lead, I'll follow.
You can't say no.
I mean, if you've been waitingfor a sign there, it is right,
an email out of the blue to beon a survival, really.
So there I was.

(06:35):
I had no choice, but severalproblems with that.
First of all, I found out lateron who my competitors were.
I was going to be the oldestcompetitor on the entire show.
Let's see, this was about what?
Seven years ago it's about 53years old, something like that.
Okay, 53 years old going on toone of these things.

(06:58):
Okay, and I'd had a decentlysedentary lifestyle for the last
little bit of time Actually,mostly since I married into
these kids.
I used to do crazy stuff aroundthe world.
But so, oldest person on theentire show.
Now, next, I found out who mycompetitors were going to be
People like a Marine ScoutSniper.

(07:19):
This is one of the baddest dudesI've ever met in my life.
He has seen a lot of action indifferent fun-filled parts of
the world.
We've got a bunch of specialforces guys.
You've got a fourth-degreeninja black belt that I'd seen
on Naked and Afraid All-Starsall except for the fuzzy parts.

(07:39):
You've got let's see amercenary who helped take out
Saddam Hussein.
You've got military survivalexpert trainers.
That's what they do for aliving.
And you've got me.
So let's add on to that.
They wanted me to represent allof Boy Scouts of America wearing

(08:01):
my Scoutmaster uniform.
No pressure there, right?
No pressure at all.
See, suddenly it took on awhole different world.
I don't mind looking like anidiot, I'm used to it, it's okay
.
But suddenly I'm representingall the Boy Scouts of America.
And let's also be honest inthat.

(08:22):
I'm not that good of a guy.
I'm prior military, I'm anoutdoorsman.
I will admit there's profanitythat comes out of these lips
upon occasion and depending onhow much I stubbed my toe, maybe
a decent amount.
And now everything I do,everything I say, if I screw up

(08:42):
everything, people will judge.
All of Boy Scouts of Americanow called Scouting America by
me.
Now that's a whole differentpressure.
And I told my wife I don't wantto do this.
I don't want to, but I don'tfeel I have a choice.
And let's add on to that.

(09:05):
I knew I wasn't going to win.
You know, let's be honest, hereI'm not going to win, but I
called the entire thing blindfaith.
I even told them when I got onthe show look, I know I'm not
here to win, I get that.
Okay, no delusions of grandeur.
But I feel like I'm here for areason.
I want you to pick up on that.
I feel like I'm here for areason.

(09:27):
I really want you to listen tothat for a second and
internalize it for yourself.
I think I'm here for a reason.
Now, I don't know what thatreason is, but I feel like I'm
here for a reason.
Now we get into the show andfirst of all oh, by the way I
mentioned, the survival expertswere all going to have a novice,

(09:49):
somebody who's never evencamped out in their backyard
before.
Thus the name of the showKicking and Screaming.
It's currently, at the time ofthis, recording on Prime Video
again, right now matter of fact.
Now let's talk about the novices.
So there I am, I am the BoyScout, I am the Scoutmaster, in
uniform, even with my cutelittle neckerchief, and my

(10:12):
novice that they assign to me ispink and blue hair, fully
tattooed up, tongue ring,atheist, admitted sex addict,
online video gamer.
Now, why would they do that?
Because that's good TV, right.
There's going to be conflictinvolved there, and they weren't

(10:33):
completely wrong.
But here's the deal, and I'mgoing to give scouting a little
pitch here.
I usually do because ittransformed my entire life.
I've seen it transform a wholelot of other lives.
What they didn't understand isthat's what we do.
That's what I did as ascoutmaster.
I would take kids from alldifferent backgrounds, race,
color, creed, religion,socioeconomic.
We don't care.
We don't care about their past,we care about their future.

(11:01):
That's our job is to lift themup.
Baden Powell, the founder ofScouting, taught us that there
is good in every kid.
He said, boy, that's what hedid.
But in every child there's goodin every person.
It's our job to focus on thatgood, not on the bad, not on the
things that separate us, butthe things that bring us
together.
God, there could be a littlebit more of that in the world
today, couldn't there?
So that's what I did.

(11:22):
Natalie was my partner and shewas a partner because let's look
at it this way.
First of all, let's look at itfrom her standpoint.
Okay, all of us survivalistsare standing up on this hill,
you know, looking as cool as wecould possibly look, it wasn't
hard for the rest of them, Forme, well, I'm me all right, and

(11:45):
we're standing up there and theyall the novices come in on a
boat and they see us allstanding there.
You know what Natalie wasthinking.
She is looking at all thesestudly guys and gals, rough,
tough, and the fat oldScoutmaster, hi, you know.
She was thinking please, god,don't give me the Scoutmaster.
Okay, she was an atheist.

(12:06):
She was still thinking it,because there are no atheists in
foxholes or on survival.
Reality shows perhaps.
Please, god, do not give me thefat old scoutmaster.
Please don't give me the fatold scoutmaster.
Please don't give me the fatold.
And what did she get?
The fat old scoutmaster.
Happily, she looked at the goodin me too, and the good in her
is that she's a good person,y'all, and she is smart and

(12:27):
she's strategic and she wastough and she wanted to win.
And we worked together notperfectly, because we are both
human beings and we did get intoit but when we did, we both
decided to separate ourselvesfor a little bit and then not
look at the things that we'refighting about, but rather the

(12:48):
thing that would bring ustogether.
We wanted to work together, wewanted to support each other to
win the show.
I'm there for a reason.
I don't know what that reasonis Interesting.
Now, throughout the show andI'll admit it was kind of fun in
its own sort of way Now, did weeat nasty things?

(13:09):
Yeah, we really did eat nastythings, watched the show, did we
go through some hardships?
Sure, I lost 25 pounds on thatshow, but I also was walking
into our little camp area.
They was all camping together,camping, surviving together, and
I walked in one day and theMarine Scout sniper Brady.
And I walked in one day and theMarine Scout sniper Brady, who

(13:30):
I mentioned, one of the baddestdudes I've ever met.
He's also just a great, greatguy, amazing man.
He looks at me and goes Terry.
And, by the way, I got to sayI'm thinking you know, again I'm
the old guy, I'm tired.
He goes, terry.
You probably got the bestattitude of anybody I've ever
met in my life.
Huh, I'm there for a reason,you know.

(13:53):
A lot of times we think we'renot making a difference in the
world, and you might not thinkyou're making a difference in
the world, but you are.
You are.
One of the phrases I use isthat we are all preachers by our
every word and deed.
We are all preachers by ourevery word and deed.
It doesn't matter how loud wespeak.
Our actions always speak louder, whether we realize they're

(14:16):
doing it or not.
Our actions are always speakinglouder.
Your actions, both good and bad, are speaking loudly and you
are having an effect on people.
It might be worth keeping inmind, as we're going out there
every single day and just beingaround people.
So we're going on.

(14:38):
And we go to the firstcompetition, right, where, okay,
somebody loses this, they'regoing to be slated, maybe to be
out of the show.
Every single one of us ispraying please don't let me be
the first one, right?
That's what I can tell you.
All of those competitors yousee on any of these competition
shows, that's what every singleone of them's thinking Please
don't let me be the first one.

(14:59):
And that's what I'm thinkingBecause, again.
Oh great, yeah, the scoutmaster, he's out of there.
But we weren't.
In fact, we almost won thatfirst competition by a few
seconds, and thank God we didn't, because nobody noticed.
We almost won that firstcompetition by a few seconds.
They noticed the winner.
They didn't notice us andthroughout Natalie and I kept

(15:22):
doing just fine and we keptwinning a decent amount.
And we just started thinkingdon't look at us, don't look at
us.
I'm just the fat oldScoutmaster, don't worry about
me.
But we kept making it throughand making it through.

(15:42):
Now, at one point we did fightand we fought.
I mean, the cameras loved it,right.
As soon as we start going at itwhile we're going at it, it
doesn't matter, okay.
Another important thing toremember it doesn't really
matter.
We're hungry, we are sleepdeprived, we're under a lot of
stress.
Look, something's going to setus off, okay, and we go at it.
But I taught Natalie at thatpoint something I learned in

(16:04):
scouting there are four stagesof team development.
Listen, please listen to this.
Four stages of team developmentforming, storming, norming and
performing.
Now, I tell you this for areason Forming you just get
together the honeymoon stage,right, maybe, of your
relationship.
Storming the team.

(16:25):
You're going to fight, okay,whether it's a corporate team or
if it's a marriage or just budsor whatever.
You are going to fight and youwant to.
Here's why the next stage isnorming.
You start getting together andaligning and then performing.
So I came back to Natalie andsaid guess what?
I got great news, what?
We're in the middle of numbertwo.

(16:46):
Yes, we are.
No, that's not what I mean.
We're in the storming stage andas long as we can get through
this, we want to win.
See, the storming stage is nota stumbling block, it's a
stepping stone, as long as youdo it with love and respect.
And that's what we did.
And after that listen, this isimportant we became the most
winning team on the entire show.

(17:07):
If you never go through thatstorming stage, then you're
never really going to be honest.
It's just going to be niceties,it's going to be platitudes,
it's going to be avoiding theissues that are truly bothering
you.
So storming is okay, whetherit's at the corporate setting or
the philanthropic setting orwhatever it is.
It's okay In fact, you want toas long as you do it with love

(17:32):
and respect.
So we keep doing all right.
We keep doing all right.
We keep doing all right.
It comes down to the final threeteams.
Now, the final three teams wereled by, first of all, myself,
the Marine Scout sniper, and Ben, the US Air Force survival

(17:52):
instructor, also a youngstrapping man, great dude, just
a fantastic guy.
And it's us three and ourpartners who are all obviously
very strong or we wouldn't bethere, that's for sure and it's
a competition that we're allgoing at each other to see who's
going to be the final two.
And I'm looking at those guys.

(18:14):
Look, let me be honest with youy'all, as I always will be.
I'm looking at them going.
I don't have a chance, whichreminds me, by the way, I first
met them when we got there.
I met those two guys,befriended those two guys, but I
met them.
I saw who they were.
I called my wife at that point,that's before we went into the
jungle, and I told her who I hadmet and I told her I do not

(18:36):
have a chance because that's mycompetition.
And then there it is, a littleover a month later, I'm going up
against those two Are youkidding me?
And, to my amazement, and alsobecause of the help of my
partner, no-transcript Marine,the Marine scout, sniper, and

(19:03):
Claire, by the way, the beautyqueen, who also just a great
person.
There's so many amazing peopleon there.
I just loved almost all ofthose people and the other ones.
God loves them.
So doesn't matter what I think,right?
So also another point I guess itcomes down to the final two and

(19:23):
we're getting one of those sideconversations they do on these
shows, you know where theyinterview you and they're asking
me first of all.
They're asking me man, howhungry are you?
You got to be starving?
I mean, it's obvious I'd lost alot of weight.
You got to be starving.
No, I'm not.
I'm not hungry at all.
Like wait, what are you talkingabout?
No, I'm not.
I decided not to.
I've decided not to be hungry.
Is my body depleted?

(19:45):
Sure it is, but my mind is notand my attitude shall never be.
So.
That's just an interestingpoint.
That you really do have mindover matter, not just me, you do
too.
But the important one at thispoint is they're saying wow,
it's down to the final two.
You could win the show, youcould do this.

(20:05):
How terrible would it be if youlost?
I said it'd be fantastic.
And they're like wait what.
I said it'd be fantastic.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
What are you talking?

Speaker 2 (20:19):
about.
Look, I told you when I came onhere I didn't think I was here
to win, no delusions of grandeur.
I told you I was here for apurpose, and that purpose might
be to help them win.
And if that is my purpose forbeing here, fantastic Glory to
him, not me, you know.

(20:40):
Now, I don't care whether youbelieve in God or the universe
or whatever.
You got to believe that you'vegot a purpose and you've got a
reason for being here.
And I believe you do have areason for being here.
Maybe you don't know what it is, Maybe you think you know what
it is, but you really don't, butyou do have a reason for being

(21:04):
here.
Well, it came down to the finalbattle, and it was indeed the
Marine Scout sniper Brady and meand our two novices and it was
mostly the novices and my novicecame through with flying colors
and we won the entire show.

(21:26):
You know, to me it was less,truly.
I mean, I was flabbergasted.
Again, I'll shoot straight withyou I was flabbergasted.
I couldn't believe that I won afreaking survival show.
And because I didn't, we did.
We did, Natalie and I didScouting.

(21:48):
And I did because they trainedme up, God and I did because man
, it's all things with Him andthe fact that, in so doing, the
important part to me wasn't thatI won the show, but rather I've
been able to go around now andspeak at countless scouting
events and help raise millionsand millions of dollars for a

(22:09):
cause that's very important tome.
I've been able to help kids whowill never know that I existed,
but because I did, they got anopportunity they might not have
gotten otherwise.
And I want to turn this backaround to you, because it's less
about me and my survival showand what I was able to do, but
rather the point is you'remaking that difference.

(22:33):
You may not even know it.
You have affected people whohave affected people who may
never even know that you existed, will never know your name, but
whose life you changeprofoundly, forever.
You have a purpose.
Now, a lot of people say lookfor that purpose, find that
purpose, and I think that'sgreat.
Do it, Go for it.

(22:54):
But even if you feel likeyou're flailing, like you're
lost, like you don't know whatyour purpose is, and maybe,
maybe feeling like you don'tknow what your purpose is and
maybe feeling like you don'treally have one, like there's
really no reason for you evenbeing here.
I want to tell you just havefaith.

(23:19):
Whether you believe in yourselfor not, believe that there's a
purpose that you are here, forWhether you know what that
purpose is or not, whether youhave any clue, the difference
you're making in your life ornot.
I want you to focus in on thefact, the fact that you do have
a purpose, whether you know itor not.

(23:39):
You are performing that purpose, whether you know it or not,
and you are making a differencein the world, whether you know
it or not.
You are performing that purpose, whether you know it or not,
and you are making a differencein the world, whether you know
it or not.
Focus on that and have your ownComeback Chronicle.

Speaker 1 (23:57):
This has been the Comeback Chronicles podcast with
host Terry L Fossum.
Subscribe, like and leave areview and share on your social
media to help Terry share hisamazing, positive message.
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