WE CHAT WITH GREEN BERET DEREK NALADINI

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stories of Special Forces Operators Podcast. Listen to
some of the bravest and toughest people on the planet
share their stories, Sit back and enjoy.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome back everybody. Today we have a great guest, Derekndalini
NA DA l I n I. Retired from the Army
in twenty seventeen after twenty years of active duty, including
thirteen years as an operator in the first Special Forces
Operational Detachment DELTA. Here in his MBA and joined the
executive team of a medium sized tech firm, which he
helped position for acquisition. After the company sale, Derek found

(00:48):
himself drawn to veteran health and wellness issues and chose
to focus on music rehabilitation. We're actually going to be
I think he's releasing our record here in a couple
of months of roots rock and rolls the genre. So
as you liked the interview, I'm sure you might be
interested in listening to his music as well. So kind
of the idea we're going to be talking about today,
folks is veteran health wellness. Some of his experiences. What

(01:12):
did the experience of Special Forces? How did it change
Derek over the course of time, We're going to find
out more about that before we get started. You know
what to do, share, subscribe if that I like button,
you don't like it, that's not waste any more time
walking to the show, Derek not only any Welcome sir,
thanks for having me, Thank you for being here, Thank
you for your service as well.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
Yeah, thanks for your support. It was a great job
and joined doing it.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
We're going to find out because they were in you
were an interesting group there. So this is the first
question I always like to ask. Everybody tends to haitable.
Not everybody. I guess some people actually never wanted to
be in Special Forces and they wound up there. But
I guess for you, the question would be what motivated you?
Was it Ramble? Was it Green Berets with John Wayne?

Speaker 1 (01:58):
What was it?

Speaker 2 (01:58):
For you?

Speaker 3 (01:59):
It was my father?

Speaker 2 (02:01):
Oh really?

Speaker 3 (02:02):
Oh yeah, it was my father. And my father was
a man. He was a big deal to me. He
was a superhero. He's a He was a former Marine
and he was an age thirty four pilot in Vietnam
and then resigned his commission to take a contract position
with Air America and blew. He flew in support of

(02:27):
the program in Laos, supporting the among tribesmen.

Speaker 2 (02:31):
Wow. Yeah, so you motivated you to get into the
military thing, that's what you wanted to do as a
young boy. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:38):
He never said it. He never said it.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
He didn't.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
He didn't have to. You know, I'm a I have
a really I have a soft spot for marines.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
Doc.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
They're they're there, and I mean this sincerely. They're they're
they're different. That culture, the way marines are a culturated.
It's beyond spreed corps. I mean they come by there
a spreed corps. Honestly, that marine for life etho, that's
a thing. And you know, I was raised by a

(03:11):
marine in you know, in the best sense of it.
So it was just part of our just our exchange
as you know, father and son, and as I was growing,
you know into a man, his marine experience and his
combat experience in the Marine Corps was just something that

(03:34):
permeated our environment.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Was your mom worried about you going to military?

Speaker 3 (03:41):
I don't think so.

Speaker 2 (03:42):
No.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
I mean my mother was happy that I was doing
something that made me happy. You know. She was wonderful
that way, you know, just like my father, And we
could talk about my mother whenever you want. Just like
my father, inspired me, and I mean that sincerely inspired
me to join military. You know, my mother was an artist,

(04:04):
a really good one, so and she inspired the artistic
side of of of my life. And you know, she
just wanted her son to be happy doing what he
was doing.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
And I know we talked off before the interview a
couple of days ago. We're going to get into that too,
the important aspect of creativity and artistry for special forces.
So I'm looking forward to that conversation and a little
cool too. Yeah, do you have siblings? I can't remember.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
I have a younger brother.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
Okay, did he join military as well?

Speaker 3 (04:36):
Or no, he didn't. He was a civilian really, So.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
I guess my first question then is you got out
of high school. I'm assuming then does that immediately went
into the military. Is that what you're going to do
or did you kind of check it out? Did you
check out the Marines first? Before he even went to
the army.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
We were a department of the Navy family, you know,
because of you know, the Marine Court being within the
department of the Navy. Of course, I actually went to
go be a I enlisted. My first enlistment was a
four year push in the Navy. I went to go
be a seal, but so I back up going to

(05:14):
college non negotiable in the Natalie household. That was helped
that shalt go to college. And so they packaged me
up and sent me off to Penn State and that
I just that wasn't my thing at the time. So
I left college and went straight to the Navy recruiting

(05:37):
office and I got classified to be what's called a
Cryptologic Tech Interpretive CTI. This is nineteen ninety two. That
was a at the source at the time, it was
called a source rating, one of many for the seals,
so they didn't have a special operator rating, the so
rating at the time, you chose a rating that was
a source rating for seals, and you went to basic,

(05:58):
went to a school, got your rating, and then went
to BUDS and CTI was a really was a great, compelling,
interesting intel job. The problem was that my mother was
not a US citizen. So when they did my background check,
every member of your immediate family has to be an

(06:20):
American citizen. So I ended up getting a job as
a personnel clerk for four years. Left and you know,
hoping I just would go in and my mom would
get her citizenship and I would reclassify and go off
the buzz. And that didn't happen while I was in
the Navy, So I got out. I joined the reserves

(06:41):
as a CB, was a builder in the reserves very briefly.
And then my mother got her citizenship. And during that
period of time, I've met a couple of retired rangers
and those guys were something else. Man. I spent time
with those guys, and I said, Man, wherever those guys

(07:02):
came from, I want to go there. And so when
my mom got her citizenship and I could get through
a background check, I went back on active duty, but
this time went to the Army recruiting office and got
what was called a RIP contract at the time, Regimental
Doctor Nation program, and went when army you know how

(07:25):
to write my father, think about that as a former,
you know, going and being you know, being an officer,
getting you know, getting a college degree good, getting a
commission good, going to the Navy and doing something cool.
They're good. Become a seal good right in you know,
in a family, in that family that was oriented towards
the partment naming all of that good. Dropping out of

(07:48):
college not good. Enlisting not good. Right by the time
I got to an Army recruiting office, I was from
Mars as far as.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
My dad, pah, and your own family. Yeah, let me
ask you if it's hopefully it's not too personal, but
is it a motivating factor for your mother to get
citizenship because you hung up on the intel job?

Speaker 3 (08:10):
I don't I don't recall that being the case.

Speaker 2 (08:13):
Okay, there was.

Speaker 3 (08:16):
I'm positive, I don't know all the details of that.
There were delays in her in the bureaucratic process, and
I'm not straight on what any of that was. She
didn't get her citizenship until about ninety seven, and man,
she'd been in the States for three or four decades
by then. That's a queen.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
Yeah, okay, I just wasn't sure. She saw that hanging
you up, and she thought, I gotta get this thing done. Okay.

Speaker 3 (08:42):
Oh no, it was in process, the way they tell
it to me, it was in process for some time.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
And was your dad. I'm always curious about backgrounds and
special operators, but is your dad? Was he Italian Italian?
Or was he more Americanized by then already like second generation?

Speaker 3 (08:59):
Or oh yeah, what a yeah, what a story? So
he was born both of my parents are from Europe.
I'm a first generation American. So my mother was born
in a town in Ireland called Dalkey, out near outside
of Dublin.

Speaker 2 (09:15):
Irish and Italian, oh boy, okay.

Speaker 3 (09:19):
And my father was born in Florence, Italy, both of
them born in nineteen forty, so right into rationing, world warship,
rationing and all of that. But my father, you know,
was born right into war torn Italy and you know,
bombings and all that kind of stuff when he was small,
spent a lot of time in British boarding school and

(09:40):
then a lot of time in British boarding school up
until about age fifteen, and then my grandmother moved him
in my one of my inns to the States.

Speaker 2 (09:51):
Interesting during Mussolini days, I guess.

Speaker 3 (09:55):
And then I want you to think about this for
a second. The northern Italians are, you know, at least
that's sort of the way it was described to me,
was that it's northern and southern Italy or I think
perhaps a bit different as you would expect, you know,
just to My grandmother was Scottish, so you know, my

(10:15):
family had a very British orientation, you know, with my
grandmother coming from the UK, and so you know, he
I want, you know, imagine this kid, you know, being
raised in an upper class Northern Italian you know, Tuscan home,

(10:35):
being educated in British boarding school and then landing in
New Brunswick, New Jersey in the fifties, right at age fifteen.

Speaker 2 (10:49):
Not easy. No, that's a culture shock for it. British
boarding school in Brunswick, you couldn't get more opposite.

Speaker 4 (10:57):
I don't think the way my father well is the
difference between British boarding school and public school and New
bruns with New Jersey in the fifties was they were
worlds apart.

Speaker 2 (11:08):
Oh man, interesting, that's an interesting path. So let's go
back to you now. So you went into the Big
two Army. I guess you went there, they met the rangers.
Was that was that? It was that the fire? The
fire got lit at that point you said, I got
to become a ranger.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, I mean seals and Delta operators
and you know, c I A people and all these
kinds of shadow things or you know, that's that's an abstraction,
you know when when you're on the civilian side of that.
I think when I met the rangers, that was the
first time the this mythical you know, group of people

(11:48):
started to become real to me. There were human being.
It was the first human beings from the ranger regiment
I'd ever met.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
What was it about them?

Speaker 3 (11:55):
As you liked, man, they're in they are They understood
each other immediately. They didn't know each other before that,
and they just as rangers. There's a thing, right you
just when you deal with a ranger, when a ranger
deals with a ranger, you you know what to expect
from each other right now. That shared experience comes with

(12:20):
a set of standards, and there's a rapport that comes
with that immediately. So at work, those guys had an intensity.
They had a cohesion and intensity and it was very natural.
It wasn't an affectation. They just flowed just they got
into their space and they just handled stuff. Their sense
of humor was fantastic, biting, mean, funny as hell.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
That was British.

Speaker 3 (12:47):
God, they were just so funny and I mean, like
not nice to each other, right, like just pick on
each other, and you know they were Somebody had to
explain it to me when I got to Battellion, Like,
I asked, why is that guy always fucking with me.
And the guy was like, what is your problem? I said,
I told you the problems. This guy's bucking with me
constantly because you can't understand if he didn't like you,

(13:11):
they he wouldn't do that. That means he likes you, right, Like,
welcome to battalion.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
Man, that's introduction, all right? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (13:20):
Yeah, And these guys, these guys had this thing. They
just had a rapport and they had a way of
interacting with their environment that was impressive, and their confidence
and it was all very natural, very very comfortable and
in control of their space. And they just put out
a capable masculine vibe that I'd never seen before. And

(13:41):
I wanted to, you know, I wanted to share whatever
experience forged them into that.

Speaker 2 (13:50):
Yeah. Like that It makes me think of those two thoughts.
I'm trying to see which one I'm going to go with.
Let me go once with your dad here for a second.
So once you've done all those things, you kind of
I don't know if it was a true separation from
your dad or mom, and maybe they were just weren't
as happy as they could have been anywhere if you
were in the Navy. But once you became Special Forces there.

(14:10):
Did your dad become curious? Did he kind of wanted
what are they like over there? Oh?

Speaker 3 (14:17):
Yeah, well let me I'll be let me just be
candid without getting into you know, sort of you know details,
I guess. You know, our family life was not perfect.
We didn't get along all the time. It wasn't you know,
there was there was plenty. There was plenty of strife.
You know, as we all grew and went through each

(14:40):
chapter of our lives. There were times when we were
a very cohesive, loving, connected group of people, and then
there were times when we ate each other's guts out.
That's just the truth of the matter, and that's okay.
I think that that mixed bag turned, you know, set
the conditions for me to you know, I've said in

(15:03):
the past, you know, my parents really pretty much custom
made me to custom made me to do what I did,
you know, in all things. And I think the older
I get and the farther away from those days I get,
the more it looks to me like it was largely
really pretty good. So it was by the time, you know,

(15:29):
I had a period of time where I was kind
of lost, man, right, you know, I joined the Navy.
I didn't become what I wanted to become. I settled
for what I could get. I had a break in service,
and I kind of floundered around. And this this is
a I think meaningful it was. It's at least personally meaningful,
says I, selfishly being not doing what it is you want,

(15:53):
not doing what it is one wants to do, fulfilling
their intended purpose in their own mind, you know, in
their own heart, is at least in my case, really
set the conditions for being for being lost. And I
did a lot of looking. And you know, my mom
didn't get her citizenship one minute before she was supposed

(16:13):
to get it, you know. And you know, as a
man of faith, I have come to accept happily things
happen in you know, in my Creator's time. For the
secular in your audience. Please forgive me. I will never proselytize,
but you know, things happen in the timing they they
happen in whether they just they just need to happen

(16:33):
that way. So nothing, the conditions didn't get set one
minute sooner than they were supposed to for any whatever
drivers of that situation were by the time that by
the time I could walk into an Army recruiter office

(16:53):
and say I'm looking forward to signing my RIP contract,
and you know he, you know, got Tom laughing at
me and saying, well, they that's what they all say,
you know, the recruiters like they all say that. I'm like, okay, well,
super you can either give me that or all go
back to Sully Plumbing, Supplism and depot, I mean whatever.

(17:14):
And you know, he said, okay, let's we'll figure this
out and we'll try and make it happen. You know,
when I went and told my father that I had
been I'd gone high and right for a few years,
you know, enough that you know, he said, for the
love for the loveball that's good man. Just finish something,
Just finish something. And he was so exasperated with me

(17:36):
at that point. I think I'd probably been wandering around
the planet for five to eight years, and so he
was skeptical, justifiably, I think, to be fair to him.
And it was when I I think when I got
he didn't understand and I'm you know, what civilian does,

(17:59):
what civil and understands Army basic training, What civilian really
understands airborne school, what civilian understands what they call RASP. Now,
I mean, who understands what RASP is or what RIP
is or what being a ranger is or they don't.
You know, my dad didn't wasn't you know. He was
a banker at that point in time. He didn't understand

(18:20):
the aches of the army process to become a you know,
to get a black bereat it was a black bearry
then and then became the temporary to become a ranger.
And you know the difference between going to range a
regiment and going to Ranger School. And he didn't understand
any of that.

Speaker 2 (18:36):
For him.

Speaker 3 (18:36):
It became real when he and I try to say
this without getting emotional, when he came out of the
bleachers at at when he came out of the bleachers
at Ranger School graduation and pined that tab on my
shoulder was when he got it. But brother, I I've

(19:00):
been in the Army a year, year and a half
at that point.

Speaker 2 (19:03):
Interesting, that's a very powerful moment, special moment for youuge
I'll never forget.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
Oh yeah, standing there with him, and I just wanted
him to I wanted to deliver, you know, for my
own for my old man so badly.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
You know, It's something we've all doince funny, no matter
how old you are, whether you're fifty, sixty or seventy,
it never goes away. Okay, right on, It's really funny.
I have seventy year old clients. Their dad's still alive
between ninety three, and they still want validation from their dad.
It's amazing. Seventy years. You've been around a long time,
but you still still do. It's like, all right, it's

(19:42):
a powerful thing. It really is amazing. I'm glad you
got it though, Oh totally yeah, And sometimes people don't.
I guess. Well, now I'm trying to see if I
should ask this question, but I guess I will anyway.
I just had a curiosity the marine culture. You mentioned
how different it was. Was it the same for the
rangers or was it justly different?

Speaker 3 (20:04):
I just I feel like Marines and Rangers are are
pretty similar in terms of ethos and pathos, and I
don't want to disrespect the Marine Corps by drawing any
sweeping conclusions here. I will say that my interactions with
Marine infantry men and my interactions with Marine Force reconnaissance guys,

(20:27):
and then later when they stood it up Marine Marsok guys.
I felt we felt very much like birds of a feather.
But because there's an intensity there, you know, there are
no excuses Marines Rangers. There is a standard, and I
think we shared that Rangers are absolutely they are wonderful

(20:51):
to each other. They take care of each other. You're
never gonna win. You're never gonna win. Ever, if you
go up against an assault force of Rangers, you might
hurt some, you might kill some, but goddamn it, man,
you're just not gonna win, because when they're together, they're
pretty much unbeatable. But part of that is that the

(21:14):
expectations in the train, like you fight build up to
that moment, are brutal. They are really really hard on
each other because that's what you need them to you.
I'm not gonna be I don't mean to be prescriptive,
but you need the Ranger regiment to bring it when
you need the Ranger regiment, you need the Ranger regiment

(21:36):
to bring it. When you need the Marines, you need
the Marines to bring it. And those are just two,
you know, groups of war fighters that don't really accept excuses,
and they don't accept weakness, and they don't accept half stepping,
and I think that we all got each other, we

(21:57):
understood each other in that regard.

Speaker 2 (22:00):
It's interesting. I know I've had the conversations with a
couple of other guys. I don't know if you know
Steve BELLISTERI green Beret. No, I don't think I do.
I think he has if he runs he runs some
group shoot. Sorry Steve, I forgot the name of it.
But anyway, we were talking about that because sometimes they're
concerned about the selection process and the training, and some

(22:22):
people think it's too hard, and a lot of guys
are worried. Hey, hey, you can't you can't dilute this
because it doesn't get softer in the warfield just because
you want to make it a little easier here. It's
not going to translate out there. I don't know, what
do you think about that?

Speaker 3 (22:37):
Yeah, you know, I've I've got a number of tattoos,
as you can see on the screen for those who
who haven't fancy. One of them is on the back
of my hand, which is to remember a special moment.
If you look up RASP r ASP on the internet
and watch it anything about RASP, there's a there's there's

(23:02):
a period of time in selection for the Ranger Regiment
where you go to a you go to a piece
of real estate on whatever they're calling Forth Benning. Now,
please forgive me for not knowing it's in all SINCERETI
I just don't remember what it's called now, but when
I was there, it was called Fort Benning. And there's
a portion in the training areas in Fort Benning that

(23:24):
is dedicated to a regimental selection into Regimental pre Ranger.
And you live out there in a circle called the
Circle of Woe, and that's a circle of sand bags,
and you live in that thing in formation that's and
it's about two feet tall, no, it's not even maybe

(23:45):
a foot and a half sand bangs. And there's one
entrance at the bottom of the circle of Woe, and
that's the only way you're allowed to go in it,
in and out of it, even though you can step
over the side of it. And you live inside the
Circle of Woe like a farm animal with the rest
of the guys. And then you leave the Circle of
Woe through that one and entering exit an entry point

(24:08):
in an orderly way. So it's in retrospect, there's a
way to get thirty six dudes out of there, you know,
through that and off to do what they need to
do rapidly, as long as they learn to work together.
And then doing land navigation all day and all night
and getting scuffed up, getting smoked, getting hazed, getting challenged,

(24:31):
you know, in the ways that you know are essential
to a very well considered assessment. In selection, Grom and
I learned in the Circle of Woe, there's a point.
There was a point at which it just became impossible.
There was a point at which what they were, the
challenge that was imposed was impossible until we clicked. There

(24:59):
was It was just we'd been at it for some
time and it was down to that last handful of
guys and I just say guys because it was just
all guys were there. It was just all guys at
the time, and it was so bersark and so impossible.
And we were in the middle of an evolution and

(25:21):
one dude looked over at another dude. It was two
or three in the morning, and he just they made
eye contact. And the one guy when they made eye
contact that once that connection was established, it was that
spark because it's impossible, but we're together, and something in

(25:46):
that moment was as we can do this together. It's
unmanageable by yourself. It's totally unmanageable the second you figure
out who you can count on and who can count
on you, and what counting on each other looks like.
And they're looking for a specific mix of people who

(26:09):
get that. And we were inside the circle of Woe
being subjected to a smoke session. I remember one guy
had to do. So. They pulled the guy out and
they had him do they they had him do something
where he had to hold a certain amount of weight
and the cadre said, look, if you drop you, if

(26:31):
that hits the ground, I'm going to scuff your guys
up all night long. And this dude is standing outside
of the circle of Woe and we're standing there a
parade rest watching him, and you can see the muscled
failure start setting in, and you could see the emotion
on his face because we've already been through the ringer

(26:51):
and he doesn't want to subject his guys to that anymore.
And I'll try to say this without getting emotional. One
dude information looked at him and said, he said, hey, brother,
don't worry about it. We got you. We're good for it.
And another guy because and he was trying to hold on,

(27:14):
he was going into muscle failure and it wasn't wet.
He weren't saying give up, it's okay to give up.
They were saying, don't you worry about us. We got it,
We're together, we got it. And sure enough, muscle failure,
being what it is, hit the ground and scuffed us up.
And somewhere through that berserker mode man, one guy looked

(27:37):
at another guy and that connection was made. And that
group of guys was the group of guys that went
on the bus a week later to battalion together. Because
as soon as we forge that bond inside the circle
of woe, when we realized that we have each other
and we will prevail together, we will endure together and

(27:58):
we will prevail. We will endure together, and we will
as a unit prevail. And that was an amazing moment
and I'm so blessed to have experienced that.

Speaker 2 (28:11):
Man, that's fascinating. Do you think the instructor at the time,
I don't know what you'd call him. Do you think
he saw that moment. I'm sure he's seen it before.

Speaker 3 (28:22):
Oh, they look for it, Yeah, they know what they're
looking for.

Speaker 2 (28:25):
So once they saw it, they say, these guys are.

Speaker 3 (28:27):
Ready, We're good.

Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yeah, yeah, that's fascinating. Man. It takes a lot. And
I guess we're gonna get to this question later on too,
is who was Derek going in and who was Derek
coming out? Because I'm sure you're not the same person
going in or out. You have to forgive me again,
I'm not as astute when it comes to the levels

(28:48):
and what you guys go through. It gets complicated for
me when I talk to soft guys sometimes it gets
complicated for that. So RASP seems to be related to
the seventy five or seventy fifth Ranger Regiment. Yep. And
now is that that's separate from the Delta Group or
is that the same thing? Is it? Is the unit
separate or how does that operate? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (29:09):
Yeah, it's different. So the fifth Ranger Regiment and the
Special Forces Groups really the entire service. You can source
you know, you can go to selection from anywhere in
the d d okay, but the unit, A lot of
guys from the seventy fifth Ranger Regiment and from the

(29:29):
Special Forces Group go to selection for the unit.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
And on the seventh that RASP is in the seventy
fifth was.

Speaker 3 (29:39):
No, no, you will have right, so go to basic.
I think a recruiter comes around. It changes depending on
what's going on in the DoD at the time, but
you know they take volunteers to go try out and
so go to basic, go to Airborne School. At some

(30:00):
point I can't I don't know what I went through.
It was you got a RIP contract. Then for a
while it was what was called an Option forty contract,
which was to RASP, and then it's then there's always
been this in between times where they just go to
they go to the basic training and I think they
look for volunteers. They've got a recruiting, they've got recruiters

(30:21):
in the in the seventieh Ranger Regiment, and then they
volunteer to go to regimental. The Regimental Assessment and Selection Program,
I think is what RASP stands for. I'm not positive again,
I'm a RIP guy Regimental Adoctrination program, but RASP is
what it is now and what happens is then you go,
you go through RASP, and if you make it and
you get your tambaret, you go to Ranger Battalion one

(30:44):
of the three battalions, or to the headquarters and then
once you're there, you get on the mL the Order
of Merit list to try out for to take the
pre Ranger PT test. Because the Ranger Regiment can really
for standards rfs, you can fire you if you can

(31:04):
make it, get your tambaret, but you can be fired
and send out to the you can be released for standards.
There's the Army standards and then there's the Regiment's Blue
Vocal Standards, which is a whole different set of standards
you have to adhere to you and one of the
things that you have to do is stay in regiment
is you have to go to Ranger School. So you've
just become a ranger when you join, get your RASP
and get to the seventy fifth Ranger Regiment. You are

(31:26):
a Ranger. You are a regimental Ranger. But in order
to stay in the seventy fifth Ranger Regiment, you have
to graduate from Ranger School. You've got to get your
Ranger tab. You don't get your Ranger tab, you don't
stay in regiment. You get RFS. And the Ranger and
Ranger School is a leadership school and they have a

(31:47):
very powerful formula there that works very well and you
get your Ranger tab. And if you get your Ranger tab,
then you can stay in regiment you know, for some time.
Now what happens is guys who go to the seventy
fifth Range regimen and they can stay for a while
and they become team leaders and squad leaders and platoon

(32:08):
sergeants and they can go and assess or they can
go to assessment for the unit for Delta, and at
that point then that's the Delta selection, Assessment and training
process is a separate thing. Now, last thing I'll tell
you is then you've got green breads, you've got someone
who's been in the army for some time. Then they

(32:30):
go to it changes. They sometimes they have something called
the SF Baby program, which is more the officials of
the X ray program, where you can take someone off
the street, you know, if they've got a certain amount
of experience and capability and they can go straight, you know,
go through basic training they are born, and then go
to SFAs Special Forces Assessment and Selection, and if they

(32:52):
make it, then they go through what's called the Q
course and then go on and join in ODA. That's
the case. Whether usually what happens is you've got somebody
who's been in the Army for some time, whether they're
an enlisted, an enlisted person, or an officer. And then
they go to s FAS and if they make it
through s F A S and then they go into
the Q course and they get a new MS Military

(33:12):
Occupation Specialty and then join an ODA in a Special
Forces group and then from there, oftentimes green berets will
will will assess for.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
Delta, what made you decide to go for the unit?

Speaker 3 (33:33):
You know, my father was a shadow warrior. That was
there constantly. In my mind, that's a standard that was there.
And you know, you don't you don't join the army,
you don't join the United States Army Special Operations Command
and not hear about Delta. You hear about it pretty
much immediately in the Ranger Regiment because we they support it.

(33:55):
They you know, they there's a relation, there's a working
relationship there and that that's just out there. You know
that is out there, man, right, and it just kind
of for a number for those of us who go there,
it just calls to you, man, interesting, it just calls

(34:15):
to you. I don't have a better answer than that,
and then again I do, here is one better answer
you see these guys before you join the unit, and
you don't know what it's like. And you when you
meet your first you know, operator who used to call
them ordinary guys who can do extraordinary things. You meet something,

(34:36):
You meet one of those guys and you're like, man,
what does it take to become you know that you
just want to know, you just want to try. For me,
it was it was actually the fear of not trying.
It was the fear of being so intimidated by the
mystery of the unit and the you know how hard

(35:02):
it was. That I thought to myself, the only reason
I wouldn't try for it is because I was just
too afraid to fail. So I went there motivated by
pure fear and a desire to not be afraid to fail.
I also, at that point had a certain amount of
shame energy. I mean, we had my family was a

(35:25):
mix of wonderful and you know, some things that we
probably wish we could have done differently. And I had
a certain amount of you know, from those lost years
and some of those rougher times in my relationship with
my folks, with my family members. You know, I had
a certain amount of shame energy too that I wanted
to z out by trying to accomplish something great, so

(35:54):
that that wasn't you know it was. I call it
shame energy. I call it the ambition to shame. So
I had I was fueled by a lot of that.
I think that if I was doing it now, I
would go in with a with a with a growth
mindset as opposed to you know, a very you know,
a limited mindset or coming from a position of deficiency.

(36:15):
But at the time I kind of felt I was
making up for a significant rearrage in my own character,
in my own experience to that point that that propelled me.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
Yeah, you know. It's interesting as in psychology, there's a
couple of concepts, one by Adler called the inferiority complex
and that had that term has a weird term in
today's world, but basically means we're always striving to be
better and that's a motivating factor for human beings. And
another concept is the pain pleasure concept. I think they
call it the fancy whereas the dual hydraulic model, which

(36:53):
means basically we're driven away from fear or pain and
we're driven towards pleasure. And they believe that one believes
Basically that's what motivates us to do everything. You know,
you're in a relationship, it's causing a lot of pain.
I'm the hell out of here now. I'm looking to
see pleasure in a relationship that can provide me something.
So it's interesting when you say that, because, yeah, that

(37:14):
could be a huge driving force for a lot of humans.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
Yeah, I appreciate you saying that, and to put a
perhaps a more refined point on it, or a more
warm or fuzzier point on it. You know, the aspects
of my relationship with my folks, you know, really helped here.
Because my father made me run my first mile when
I was nine. My father would make me work out.

(37:39):
My father always made me embrace my fears. I you know,
if I was afraid of the dark, I had to
face it literally if I you know, I had childhood
bronchi distant asthma that got in my way as a runner.
So he went and taught me how to run. And
the expectation was I take everything and face the head on.
I mean, based on what we've discussed with my dad
to this point that I mean, when did he not

(38:01):
do that?

Speaker 2 (38:02):
Right?

Speaker 3 (38:02):
So part of it was, you know, a longstanding, well
established expectation where I saw something going on in my
life that you know, was some scary, big, hairy, audacious,
scary you know goal then taken on.

Speaker 2 (38:21):
Absolutely. That's that's a testament to you because it's a
lot of strength and willpower and resilience as well. And
also I got content. I was just talking to a
Navy seal about self efficacy, which is the belief in
that you can do something. They found out that's much
more powerful than self esteem. You know, I just you know,
I'm like myself, I'm a nice guy. Well that's not
going to get you into the unit, but the belief

(38:43):
that you can do things that'll get you into the
unit if you truly believe you can do it, and
you truly believe you can endure whatever it is that
you have to endure like you did in the circle.

Speaker 5 (38:52):
Well I think it was circled. Well yeah, you circleld. Okay,
so we're gonna I started heading out of your time.
But I guess before we head out of there, do
you remember your first deployment? And then if you don't mind,
if you don't mind sharing a time, any kind of
operation deployment that you can share of course that stood

(39:15):
out to you in some capacity.

Speaker 2 (39:16):
This is probably the difficult question you'll have today because
there's so probably so many either where it was good, bad, funny, sad,
whatever you feel like sharing. But the first one is
what was your first time out there as a unit guy?
Were you like, oh crap, here we go or were
you excited? What was your what were you thinking?

Speaker 3 (39:36):
The only fear I had was of letting the guys
down on target. I wanted to do my first hit.
I wanted to get that first hit under my belt
with as a member of as a member of the
team I was assigned to at the time and really deliver.
And I needed to know what that was like. I

(39:58):
needed to get on target and deliver. I mean, by
that time, we had done hundreds of iterations of CQB
and tens and tens and tens of thousands of rifle
and pistol rounds, hundreds of charges, hundreds of flash bangs,
dozens and dozens of jumps in training. I needed to

(40:22):
get on target with my team and bring it and
get that behind me. So that was the only thing, Brother,
I was afraid of. I was afraid of getting on
target and Murphy holding the door open for me on
the way out of the ready room, and you know,
I just needed to face the enemy and face Murphy

(40:43):
and get into combat with my team alongside my troop
and my team and get that get that done.

Speaker 2 (40:49):
Did you Yeah? Yeah, yeah, that's good waiting for that part.

Speaker 3 (40:54):
Oh yeah, it's great. I mean they are just fluid, fantastic, fluid, graceful,
amazing warfighters. Man. You've just never you have never seen
anything like like operators clearer building. There's just nothing like it.

Speaker 2 (41:16):
Let me ask you this. He came up as you
were talking. I interviewed a MCV SAG who became a
friend of mine a couple of years ago. He made
this interesting point that I've never thought about, but he said,
the very first time he was deployed as a MACV
SAG he went into I was actually the first combat

(41:36):
he missioned. He had and when he was getting in there,
it's kind of a weird thing, but he was kind
of in a helicopter. It's kind of like Apocalypse Now,
which kind of thing over the louse, and he was
getting ready to be dropped and he said to himself,
it's okay to shoot these people. They're going to shoot
you back, and I thought, wow, that's a pretty interesting
He said, how old were you? He's like twenty two.

(41:59):
I'm thinking, shit, twenty two. You're in the middle of Laos.
And the story goes wild after that because he had
the whole jungle opened up, he says, and they had
they had an ambush set up for him, and they says,
they were just tracers flying everywhere, and it was just
a disaster for him. But thankfully, obviously he's alive. But
that was an interesting question. I don't know if you

(42:19):
ever had that in your head when you were first
in combat. Uh. Yes, interesting.

Speaker 3 (42:27):
You know, when you go through the process in the unit,
that's what you do, right, you're a gunfighter.

Speaker 2 (42:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (42:33):
I would like to speak to the humanitarian aspect of
it before we wrap this up, because I think it's
critical for a listener to understand that reality. But you
you know, you expected Delta operate or to be able
to make you know, what I call the nightmare shot.
You know that's you know, aggressor holding an innocent person

(42:53):
airplane icon fines. You don't get to flinch, you don't
get to miss, you don't get to choke. You have
got to put that round where it needs to be.
The first time you pull the trigger. I became a sniper.
You're cold bar shot at any distance, hostage rescue quality,
you know, shot. You have to make that shot and

(43:17):
in order to be able to get on your belly
with a behind a three thirty eight Lapua sniper rifle
and put around, you know, through through cockpit glass on
a on an airliner into a target as your guys
are getting ready, you know, to secure that airplane. You
have to you can't miss. Let's put it differently, you

(43:40):
have to be positive you're going to hit it. Every
shot counts in that unit. So by the time we
get on target, we've done so much shooting and we've
we have seen that side picture and engage target so
many times and been ruthlessly evaluated for our ability to
hit that hit the extra or the ten ring at least,

(44:03):
you know, getting on target is that's a minute a man.
That's a minute a man's shot. That's a pretty easy
shot to take. But you don't even think about it
that way. Some tense stuff don't even think about it
that way.

Speaker 2 (44:15):
They have to do it. That's interesting.

Speaker 3 (44:18):
Humanitarian part is brother, what one of the first things
that occurred. My first appointment was with the unit was
Iraq in the winter.

Speaker 2 (44:28):
And Iraq what year? Rock, What year was Iraq? Five?
This is an five Wild West Days? All right. We've
had several of you guys that went in there. That's
why I keep hearing the wild West Days was kind
of crazy.

Speaker 3 (44:43):
Yeah, you know, the coldest I you know, the two
times I've ever been, you know, the coldest I've ever
been to Coula West was once was its election, you know,
and another time was in the desert in a rock. Man.
It's cold out there, Chaz Louise, it's cold, and I hit,
you know, we hit the target, got into the house,
and what they would do is that they would put

(45:05):
everybody in one or two rooms and just heat one
or two rooms instead of the whole house because there's
no central you know, in most people's place, they don't
have central heating and air conditioning. So in the winter time,
they're in the prayer room or something like that, the
whole family, and you know, maybe there's some people in

(45:26):
a couple other rooms here and there, and then they're
heating that with space heaters. So you know, you hit
a prayer room with eight or twelve souls in it,
and your bad guy, excuse me, your adversary is somewhere
in the middle of all of that. I mean, I've
I've gotten you know, I've hit targets with my mates
where we you know, secured the target we were supposed

(45:50):
to secure, and I've literally just gotten to my domination point,
get my hands on the bad on the adversary, and
I'm getting ready to you know, getting ready then to
cuff him and find myself standing there within a rocky
baby between my feet that I didn't know was asleep
on the floor, And thank god I didn't step on

(46:13):
that child, right, because there are just people in there.
You know, we hit a target, you know, we hit
many many targets where there were children, you know in
those you know, in the mix, you know, and women,
and you're just your heart goes out to those people, Doc,
and it becomes pretty clear pretty quick that you're you know,

(46:36):
we went after an IED, We went after many IED networks,
but one of those networks was just blowing people up
in the middle of intersections in Moses, killing ten fifteen
people at a time. And when you finally find that
guy and you put a set of cuffs on him
and haul him out to take him to jail. It
really is hard to escape the feeling that maybe, for

(46:59):
a few weeks, that's an intersection in that city that's
not going to get blown up. And that was the case.
We would get certain note leaders and then things would
die down for a few days or a few weeks while,
you know, while the net, while the you know, the
Alcada network was reconfiguring itself, and there were many many
times out there when we really, I certainly felt like

(47:23):
we were you know, for the targets we hit that
disrupted people's lives, there were just an incalculable number of
times where we were standing up for people who couldn't
stand up for themselves, and you really feel that after
a while.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
I appreciate you sharing that because that's I think it.
Hopefully it changes the image some people still have about
special forces being automatons and robots, and but it's not
about that. There's a lot of emotions that go in
there that you'd probably suppressed in some capacity to be
able to do your job. Yeah, we're going to get
to that in a few minutes as we talk about
transitioning out and TBI and all those other things that

(48:03):
we're going to talk about as well. I think it
looks like you covered a mission, so that ends that
portion of the questioning. I wanted to ask you kind
of curious, did you prefer or did you care if
it was I don't know what your deployments were. Obviously
we'll keep it as general as possible, but did you
care if it was jungle dry Afghanistan. I've had guys say,

(48:27):
you know what, I hated Iraq because it was kind
of like a town. You never knew where everybody was at.
You couldn't tell they're behind a building, and Afghanistan was
kind of weird. I've had guys who hated the jungles too.
Any preference for you or did you care? What?

Speaker 3 (48:43):
Essen man? That's a really that's a fun question. I
didn't care. I've worked, I've been in all those environments.
I'm proud to be able to say I've been in
all those environments. The jungle is, you know, it distills
down in part to the field craft. You know, jungle field.
You mentioned mac v Stog. We revered those guys. You

(49:04):
know I'm old enough to I'm old enough. You know
my father flew those guys, My dad them very cool
and to compromise Delz's you know, compromised and Saigon. And
then we had some guys in our unit at the
time who were mac V SAG veterans. We were we

(49:28):
really respect We had a lot of respect for those
guys because when we joined the army we wanted to
be like them. Those were the guys who set the standard, right,
I mean, the unit's founder came from that right back
with and the rest of those guys came from that
whole thing. Billy Wall, all those guys, well not Billy
Wall wasn't in the unit, but some of the other
guys were in MACV SAG who went to the unit,

(49:49):
and you know they were they were SAG guys. We
really respected them, you know, in a big way.

Speaker 2 (49:58):
Forget what was the question, no, No, you answered it well,
you said you had no preference in which the environment.

Speaker 3 (50:05):
The environments you know, you got to get to Afghanistan.
I've never seen mountains like that in my life. I'm
glad I experienced it. I'm also glad that I'm not
humping gear up and down those things anymore. I'm plenty
of guys probably got tired of it, and I think
Afghanistan became wearing for a different set of issues that
I don't have the political I just don't have the

(50:27):
interest in politics and policy anymore to get into that.
But I think that the you know that became arduous
for a different set of reasons. Iraq became arduous after
a certain point in time, you know, due to sort
of certain policy expectations and that sort of stuff.

Speaker 2 (50:42):
You know.

Speaker 3 (50:43):
The unit's mission essential task list is refreshingly straightforward. You're
not sending the unit out on something generally, you know,
unless unless you need them to accomplish this list of
things to a nofail mission standard. There was mission creep, there,
no doubt about it, as these things went on longer
and longer. But I did notice that having spent the

(51:04):
preponderance of my time in desert environments, it does impact
the field craft that we employ as soldiers. And I
think when I look back on my time, my field
craft was definitely inspired by life in the desert, whereas
my father's field craft was inspired by a career in

(51:24):
the jungle. And those are very different skill sets.

Speaker 2 (51:28):
That's right, Shaperry, Oh, it was not happy. How about
the jungles. I could stand those god damn mosquitos all
the time.

Speaker 3 (51:36):
Oh, dude, the longest five kilometers I have ever walked
in my life. I walked five kilometers in Iraq. I've
walked five kilometers in parts of Africa. I've walked five
kilometers here in this neighborhood. The longest five kilometers I
have ever moved in my life was in the jungle.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
That seems to be the resonating theme. Nobody likes it,
that is work man. Yeah, it's interesting you mentioned about
the field craft because I know Dick Thompson was the magpiece.
So I had interviewed friend John stryker Meyer and he
was telling me about that. Now you had to really
know this stuff. Man. When he gets into that field
craft conversation, it was just insane. When he could hear

(52:17):
the people breathing and you saw this little twig and
it's like, I got oh, those guys are the real deal. Man. Yeah,
that was insane. So let me do this. I guess
we're getting ready to head out of the area. You're
done with the unit. I know this is like a
tip of the iceberg stuff. We could be here for
five weeks. We were out of the unit now and

(52:37):
I can't remember, and I apologize. Did you end up
going for the three letter agency route? Did you get
out just do something else on your own? I can't
remember that.

Speaker 3 (52:46):
I did some work. I did some work when I
got out that that. I did some I did some
work in in in the National Capital Region in a
contrary capacity for for about four years or so.

Speaker 2 (53:06):
Got it so? And then when you got out of that,
I'm assuming that's when everything's That was it for you? Right,
I've done with this life. I need to transition into
another life. What was that like for you? Because at
that point, you're done, right, You're done with this world? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (53:24):
Gotcha. I was a gut check. I reached the moment
where I realized I had stayed too long in the business.

Speaker 2 (53:32):
Okay, too long? What made you think about that? What
was that you felt too tense? You felt tired of it?
What was it that you got maybe that feeling?

Speaker 3 (53:43):
I was working in a couple of scenarios that had
a certain level of human resources rigor to them. That
was I just didn't have I was not able to
make space for the kinds of I wasn't able to

(54:06):
make space for the social requirements in those organizations. I
felt that I was an enervating force being there. I
think I was tired and strung out and burnt out
because I had spent a number of years doing low
visibility work that I'm not able to discuss. That was

(54:28):
really tough to that was it was tough, Yeah, but
I had to that had a certain there was an integration,
There was an integration requirement. I came out of that
pretty disregulated and did not understand what a disregulated nervous
system was. Didn't understand that I had didn't understand TBI

(54:51):
properly at that at that time, and then went straight
into these other organizations and they were kind to give
me a spot on the team, but I was I
was an enervating force at that point.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
That m'd be a nice segue into the tv I
component of it. So tell me a little bit about that.
What did you when was the first time you realized
that was an issue and what did you do?

Speaker 3 (55:20):
Yeah, I graduate school. I was sitting there trying to
get through even work. So I'd work all day long
and then I'd sit down and try to get through
peer reviewed literature. Didn't know how to process peer reviewed
literature properly yet anyway, and I'm trying to get through it,
and I, you know, I would space out for quite

(55:41):
some time. I didn't understand at that at the end
of the day the way my brain damage at the
time was manifesting that I was running out of cognitive
bandwidth by a certain time of day. I didn't know
anything about that cognitive bandwidth, ego depletion, the kinds of
things you want to I didn't realize that I needed
to stop at a certain point in time and reach

(56:02):
reset and recharge. I just kept hard ranging my way
through everything. And they warned me at they warned me
at Walter Reed's National Trap at Center of Excellence that
I was never going to be able to work hard
enough to overcome my cognitive bandwidth issues as a result
of my traumatic brain injury. I've seen the pictures of

(56:22):
the damage. I know what it looks like, you know,
in me, And it just took me a few years
to figure out how to live with that stuff. And
it was a process of establishing a stack of health
and wellness protocols.

Speaker 2 (56:39):
I was.

Speaker 3 (56:40):
I had a fairly and I share this with a
lot of guys. Chris free by the way, talks about
alistatic load. I didn't. I wish I had known Chris
free Bragg back then, so I could have become acquainted
with the idea of alistatic load. That's assuming I would
have listened to him back then. Again, all things happened

(57:00):
in the time it need to happen in But I
had hormone imbalanced problems and I had to go on
hormone supplementation. I went on peptide therapy for quite some time,
which was helpful. I got on you know, a protocol sleep,
you know, sleep medicine and that sort of thing, and
caught up on sleep and got my hormones optimized eventually,

(57:21):
and the peptides helped me with a number of things
until they went away. They're gone now. I think the
FDA I did something about that, and now that's off
the table. But I'd gotten through that stuff and then
some of the other protocols advanced Stella Ganglia block dual level,
dual side Stella ganglia block with ketamine was very helpful.

(57:42):
I did one of the Mexico retreats. Super helpful therapy,
very helpful, very helpful. I'm blessed to have a wonderful therapist,
a lot of quality time with my wife man, getting
caught up on my marriage and being a full time husband,
those kinds of things. Just gradually working on regulating my

(58:04):
nervous system and regulating myself and balancing myself out mentally, emotionally, physically,
and spiritually. But Doc, that took five to seven years
to figure out.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
Wow, a long time.

Speaker 3 (58:16):
Yeah, Well we were the I mean we were on
the leading edge of that. I mean our generation was
kind of the first to start.

Speaker 2 (58:24):
Well, think it's about right. Yeah, Doctor free who's been
around doing this for about a decade now, a little
less than that, something.

Speaker 3 (58:30):
Like that, you know.

Speaker 2 (58:30):
Yeah, so did you go visit Doctor By the way, folks,
we will have Doctor Freeze episode will be coming up
as well, so if you haven't seen it or heard it,
actually might be before this one. I can't remember. Actually I
think it's before this one, so you can go back
and catch doctor Free's interview. We are looking to interview
doctor Palanko, who does work with Ibogain down in Mexico,

(58:52):
and then also doctor Parsley who works with sleep. We're
hopefu to get him on to the show as well.
It's not all just about stories, Derek, we also wanted
to help out the soft community whichever way possible. Yeah. Good,
So it's great. Let me ask you this. Then, that's
great because it seems like it really helped you. The
hormonal component, the peptide, the therapy. Well, how that transition

(59:18):
you into music then? Is that when you start feeling
like I'm good now I want to do something creative again,
something that inspires me. How did that work? So?

Speaker 3 (59:30):
I played music when I was younger. I was a
guitar player. I loved music. You know, of all the
things I ever used to self medicate, the one I
never kicked was music. When I had that moment when
I was still doing you know, as a civilian, but
doing you know, doing some work for the you know,

(59:54):
the folks in the NCR, you know, I kind of
had a moment where I I sort of knew it
was coming. I knew I needed to make a change,
and I just I was sitting there looking just looking
through my playlist. I mean, I could go to the
moon and back and not listen to the same song.
I've got so much music on my It's funny because

(01:00:19):
it's true, dog, you know, I thought to myself. Man,
you know I'd gotten through graduate school with brain damage.
I was like, okay, well you know I can nug
my waist from anything. Jeez, what if I when you
go back to what I learned from my dad, right, like,
if you're wondering about it, like I was wondering about it,

(01:00:42):
like I can't do it, go ahead, go ahead and say, Derek,
go ahead and say to yourself you can't do it.
Go ahead and do that. Because we're sitting here thinking
and you're saying, you know, you need to make a change.
Music's fantastic. Now's a good time to change. What if
I went to me school? Well, what music school would
take me? Well, you just don't know, man, until you

(01:01:05):
drop a packet to take the long walk. What are
they going to say? No? And I, you know, I
put it in Berkeley. The Berkeley College of Music has
a great online program. I couldn't move to Boston at
that age. I just couldn't pick my family up and
move them. I'm still working and you know here in Florida,
and they have a great online program. It's all of

(01:01:25):
the professors who teach at campus also teach in the
online program. And it's awesome. So I tried and they
let me in. There was there were a couple of
issues that, you know, One was I needed to change.
Two was when I received the info dump on my
on my injuries. They said to me, look, you're your

(01:01:51):
TBI is such that you've got there's a significant there's
a there's a reasonable chance that you'll experience early on
set dementia. And my mother at that point was in
the early stages of vascular dementia by the time. In fact, interestingly,
the same year that I got that, that that doc

(01:02:14):
discussed that with me, was the year that my mother
was officially diagnosed as having an atrophy portions of her
brain as a result of mascular dimension And I just
didn't want to accept that. I figured, let me push,
let me push myself and try something very different and

(01:02:34):
make my brain learn something different. And you know, I
have to confess to being a bit flippant about it.
I could put on a rucksack and walk, and I
could stay up all night, and I could go without
chow for a while, and I could you know, I
could do all kinds of things. I drastically underestimated how
difficult it would be to learn an entirely new skill

(01:02:57):
at that age with brain damage drastically underestimated out challenging,
that would be thrilled. I did it, but I had
a lot of days man, where I was positive. I
sucked at everything I touched.

Speaker 2 (01:03:15):
How was it?

Speaker 3 (01:03:15):
I was?

Speaker 2 (01:03:15):
You feel now about it?

Speaker 3 (01:03:18):
It's empowering. I don't. The guitar is never done making
you learn it. Ever, you know. I had an instructor.
I was like, norm, I don't. I got a professor.
I was like, norm, I don't know what I'm doing.
He gave me feedback on an assignment. I turned and
he's like, this is great. You did this and this,

(01:03:38):
and we're not covering this for another three weeks. And
I was like, no, come on, like I don't know
what I'm doing. And he goes Derek. None of us
think we go over because I don't know. I don't
think I know what I'm doing half the time. That's
welcome to being an artist, Welcome to being a musician.

(01:03:59):
We're constantly looking for the lost chord. You know, interesting,
and the life of learning is man. I love getting
out of bed and just working the problem. It really
is a blast. It pales in comparison to sharing that

(01:04:20):
output with people and sitting in fellowship with people and
showing the secrets of the fret board or sitting with
that's you know that I you know, I like to
give free lessons when you know, when when the opportunity
presents itself, and sit with a guy or fellowship and
and show them things and say, look, let me help you.
You know, you can go to school on me here

(01:04:40):
and we can cut you know, a year half a
year of aggravation out look at this and that's a
lot of fun. But getting up every day and working
the problem creatively, getting up every day and saying to myself,
I'm an artist is just an enormous blessing. Man.

Speaker 2 (01:05:00):
It's a big challenge for redefining the identity like that. Yeah,
it is.

Speaker 3 (01:05:06):
I just calls you. I don't know what I'm doing.
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
It's funny because I know when I talk to therapy clients,
a lot of times people don't. They don't push themselves
like you have. You know a lot of people don't.
And it's really you made the word. You said the
word empowering, and I think that's one of the benefits
of it is being able to you know what I've
been at the same job for a while. Everything's kind
of mundane. And that's when I recommend, why don't you

(01:05:33):
try something you've wanted to try and see how it goes.
If it's playing music, if it's oil painting, if it's
jiu jitsu, if it's pickleball, whatever the hell it is,
try something and try to get good at it. Doesn't
mean you have to be a champion, doesn't mean you
have to be van go, but try to be something
good and see how it feels, because that sense of

(01:05:54):
accomplishment is so empowering.

Speaker 3 (01:05:56):
As you mentioned, Yeah, yeah, yeah. When I said in
the studio, I mean most three quarters of my band
it's called Chasing Eights, chasing the apall chasing a creative
concepts like chasing the eight ball. You got to sync
the eight ball in pool in order to win, right,
I mean, that's what you're going for, so Chasing eates

(01:06:17):
and seventy five percent of that band is veterans. We
were in the studio. You know, one of the one
great thing about music is the community. It just is
a wonderful tribe to be a part of. That's been
my experience. They've welcomed me in even when I was
positive I had no business being there, and they were like, hey,
welcome aboard, come on, let's go, and we'd love to

(01:06:40):
have in work together on these you know, creative challenges together.
They've been wonderful. So that community is great. The other
thing about it that's great is having that engagement constantly.
You know, we were in the studio and the songs
on this first record are songs that I wrote a
long time go, and they've been sitting waiting to be

(01:07:02):
published for years. Man, these songs are twenty twenty two
years old. And then you know just sat untouched during
the war. I mean I recorded the demo, the demos
for the cofeyright application in two before my first deployment,
you know, when I was still in the third third Platoon,
Bravo Company, first Range of Battalion, Bravo Company, third Platoon, Barracks,

(01:07:26):
you know, writing the last two songs and then recording
the demos at elevated basement studios in Savannah and O
two and then coming back and just giving the CDs
to my guys, just giving them to them because they
loved music. I loved that they loved music. We loved
music together and when I sat in the studio with

(01:07:47):
the rest of the band and our producer was a
dear friend of mine, Derek Jones from Mega Tracks, there
was a moment at which I saw those songs transform
into their own thing. They this group of people took
these songs and they become became their own thing. Those
were no longer my songs or songs that I wrote,

(01:08:08):
you know, so that I could play them in coffee
shops I need. I They became their own thing. And
that moment when that group of people carried those songs
off to take on a life of their own through
that process was such a cool thing to watch and
that collaboration, especially with vets. I mean, vets are wired

(01:08:33):
because of the whole the way they train. I think
veterans would be surprised the similarities between the way they
train and learn in the military and the way you
train and learn in creative verticals, At least where my
experience with guitar and limited bass and piano work is concerned,
it's very similar. The muscles require to get make that

(01:08:56):
workers super similar. The last thing is that and another
thing that you know it's similar to is is that
is you've gotta You gotta give your audience something. If
I'm taking from them, it doesn't work. It's giving them
an experience, giving them a feeling, giving them a song,

(01:09:18):
giving them a line, giving them a hook musically. That
is really really cool when you watch somebody groove. Watching
somebody groove to a piece of art you made with
your buds is such a neat experience, Man's real. And
that's giving. It's not take. I mean, that's a selfish pleasure.

(01:09:41):
My mom used to describe watching somebody enjoy something like that.
You know, she would describe that as a selfish pleasure.
She's a very sweet lady. She's a very giving lady.
But seeing people's response to good creativity, intentional creativity, particularly
when it's done collaboratively, is just to give. We learned

(01:10:02):
this in Berkeley. It's in respect to the audience. It's
about them, and you do it well when you give
them something that's meaningful to them. And that's a very
soldier thing, man, it's a very ranger Delta soldier thing
to do.

Speaker 2 (01:10:20):
That's interesting. You hit some good points. I know we're
down in our last few minutes. I just wanted to
make sure that for the audience to understand too, or
to know at least from the world I live in psychology.
It's kind of interesting because you've mentioned two key points
to think for a lot of soldiers out there, the
importance of community engagement is huge. You need that support system,
and you've gone from one brotherhood to another in a way,

(01:10:43):
which is fascinating. That's definitely something that's very helpful for
individuals is to connect mentally, physically and spiritually in a way.
COVID took a lot of that out for people for
a little bit, a little bit, and then we got
it back. And actually it's kind of interesting as we've
seen huge drops on social media over the last two years,
about a drop of twenty to thirty percent of the engagement,

(01:11:06):
and then sary to suspect they're suspecting that way, they're suspecting,
and people are just going back out, going back out
to engage people in real life, seeing the body language
talking to them. We know it activates certain parts of
your body. I don't know if you ever heard of
the Vegas nerve. Yeah, okay, activates the Vegas nerve. Just
connecting with people and it shuts down, slows down the

(01:11:27):
sympathetic nervous system. So it's really interesting to see that.
And the other part I see if you agree with this,
Courage is not only for you to go after your target,
to pass selection, to do the things you did in Delta,
which definitely is courageous, but courage also takes to do

(01:11:47):
something you're afraid of doing. Learning a new skill like music,
going to a band even though you thought I'm not good.
That takes the courage that people don't see. You know,
they don't look at it that way. Even getting your MBA,
you have to believe in yourself that you can accomplish that. Right,
Am I far off on that? Right?

Speaker 3 (01:12:08):
No, you're not. It was I mean I and I
said this to somebody else. I said this to Ryan
Fuguit on Combat Story. I went to graduate school because
I thought I couldn't do it.

Speaker 2 (01:12:19):
That's a yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:12:22):
I mean, I wish I had better reason for that,
but it was. It was. It's not and it's not
because I'm a good person. It's not because I'm I
just in order to live in my own skill. Again,
I was raised by somebody who was like, you're afraid
of the dark, go walk in it, man, right, you're
you can't, You're you're gasping when you're running. Then train,

(01:12:44):
then do it. You know, my father laid that out
there and I'll be grateful to him forever, you know,
for that And as soon as it entered my and look,
I needed the business skills I was getting ready to do.
I was doing some things where I had to have
the skills and I didn't have them. And I didn't
want to be a boat anchor to my team. But
you know, i'd be lying by the mission if I
didn't say me grad school. I mean, uh, all right,

(01:13:08):
just try it. And I'm you know, I'm glad that
I did it. I would like to say that. Yeah,
if you want to get a sense of what I
was talking about about giving, you know, to someone and
what what that looks like. You know, I did a
lot a lot of deployments with a lot of great people,
and we tried to unify each other and unify folks

(01:13:28):
out there, you know, on the battlefield, you know, around
the cause that we thought was right. And look, the
results are a mixed bag. I wouldn't change a thing.
But if you want to know, like the power of music,
I watched rock and Rio footage of Guns n' Roses

(01:13:49):
just unify like one hundred hundred and fifty thousand people,
you know, a decade decade, a decade decade and a
half ago at and Rock and Rio, and that's five
dudes on stage bring an entire stadium of people together
who most of them didn't know each other. But if
you want, I mean the most beautiful example of that
that I've seen recently, And this is what I mean

(01:14:09):
about giving. You've got to give something to these people.
And if you want to know what that looks like,
pull up the footage of cold Play doing Fix You
at Glastonbury this year where Michael J. Fox was on
the stage playing Watch cold Play at Glastonbury twenty twenty

(01:14:31):
four Fix You. It's on YouTube, and you will see
a sea of people unified around the pathos of a song.
I've never been on a combat operation in my life
that brought together that many people that hormonious. It's powerful stuff.

(01:14:51):
And being part of music now means that I could
be a part of that kind of energy, you know,
And and that's just just a great thing to have
a shot at.

Speaker 2 (01:15:04):
Man, that's a great point and we do need it
in today's society more than ever. It seems like we
need to unify much more. That's fascinating. Yeah, I remember
I saw a little clipper that Michael J. Fox a
cold interesting stuff. Okay, my last question, it's a fun
question for you. If you had any musician that you

(01:15:25):
would want to rock out next to on a concert stage,
like Michael J. Fox got to, who would you want
to play next to? Oh?

Speaker 3 (01:15:33):
I would love to play guitar for Beth Hart. Really,
oh man, She's just the greatest vocalist in rock and rolls.
She's awesome. Scott, you know Scott Taruley. He was my
instructor at Berkeley, my private instructor, and he's the lead
guitar player in Chasing Yates with me. And he said
the same thing if I got it, He said, if

(01:15:54):
I got a chance to tour as Beth Heart's guitar player,
I would I'd drop everything I'm doing. I would I
would play alongside that Heart.

Speaker 2 (01:16:02):
Well, like to you have one more question. Anybody from
the past that you would want to play with? Kiss
guns and roses. I guess anybody at all from the
past that you would have liked to go back in
time and play with.

Speaker 3 (01:16:17):
Back in time. I'd like to play rhythm guitar with
Malcolm Young. I'd love to see his rig. I'd love
to see his settings. I'd love to Yeah, if I
could sit down and play in the round with Malcolm Young,
that would.

Speaker 2 (01:16:35):
Be cool, very nice, very cool. Well, Derek, I can't
thank you enough for this great time together. I really
learned a lot.

Speaker 3 (01:16:44):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:16:45):
It was awesome. I learned a whole about a lot
of stuff. Folks. I hope you learned as much as
I did. I know you were inspired as much as
I was. Well, you know what to do, folks. Oh,
by the way, check out Chasing Eates. If I remember correctly,
Chasing Eights records coming out, I think August September, right around.

Speaker 3 (01:17:02):
There, September, October.

Speaker 2 (01:17:03):
September October. So hopefully you can pick that up. They
can listen to that, and you know what to do. Share,
subscribe it that I like button, you know, we like
it everybody, and try something you've never tried before. I
see how you do