538: The Legendary Speech on How Leaders Should Lead. Major C.A. Bach Back, 1917.

This is Jocko Podcast number 538 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. Major Christian Albert Bach, more commonly referred to as Major C.A. Bach, born in 1870, entered the U.S. Army as a private in the 13th Minnesota Infantry. A little later, by the time he deployed to the Philippines for combat in the Spanish-American War in 1898. He was a sergeant by that time. Fought with the 13th Minnesota on the right flank of the U.S. line during the Battle of Manila, August 13th. And the right flank became the most contested terrain during that battle. 13th Minnesota suffered the highest casualty rate of any American unit in that battle. He continued to see combat in the Philippine-American War for the next few years after that, Where Sergeant Bach was promoted and commissioned to become a second lieutenant. And then after the Philippine-American War, he transitioned to the regular army, served in the 7th Cav. By the time America entered World War I, Bach was a major. And based on his experience, his combat experience from fighting in the Philippines, he started off the war, World War I, training cadets that were to become officers and to go into company command. Eventually, he did join the fight overseas. He was awarded the Silver Star, the Army Distinguished Service Medal. And then after the war, he continued to serve in the Army until he retired in 1934 after 36 years of service. He, after retiring, became a military historian. He became an author. He put out some books about the history of war. Specifically, I think his most popular book was about the 4th Division and its achievements in World War I. But the most enduring thing that he passed on was not something actually from his books. It was a speech that he gave to graduating students that were about to become officers or go into command as officers, company command, in Fort Sheridan in 1917. So this is right before we got into World War I. He was training officers, and he gave this speech about the principles that he had learned about leadership when he was in combat. So let's hear how Major C.A. Bach told Young Leaders to Lead. He says this, In a short time, each of you men will control the lives of a certain number of other men. You will have in your charge loyal but untrained citizens who look to you for instruction and guidance. Your word will be their law. Your most casual remark will be remembered. Your mannerisms will be aped. I always thought aped was like a modern slang word for imitating. That's what he means. Your mannerisms will be aped. Your clothing, your carriage, your vocabulary, your manner of command will be imitated. So he goes out of the gate. You're being watched. You're being watched. And the way that you behave is the way your team is going to behave. When you join your organization, you will find there a willing body of men who ask from you nothing more than the qualities that will command their respect, their loyalty, and their obedience. That's a very high bar. Hey, look, nothing more than the qualities that command their respect, their loyalty, and their obedience. They are perfectly, and by the way, I forgot to say this. So this speech is something that you can find little pieces of this speech throughout all different areas of military leadership. It's all kind of infused in various organizations, especially in the Army, but it's infused a little bit in the Air Force as well. So a lot of things might sound a little bit familiar, and it's because they're rooted. Because this speech became very, very famous inside the military. They are perfectly ready and eager to follow you so long as you can convince them that you have these qualities. Hey, they'll follow you as long as you're a badass. When the time comes that they are satisfied, you do not possess them. You might as well kiss yourself goodbye. Your usefulness in that organization is at an end. From the standpoint of society, the world may be divided into leaders and followers. The professions have their leaders. The financial world has its leaders. In all this leadership, it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate the element of pure leadership, that selfish element of personal gain or advantage to the individual, without which any leadership would lose its value. So what he's saying there is, you know, if you're a banker, there's a certain amount of, what do they call it, personal advantage, personal gain that you get by being a leader in a bank or in a financial industry or in a trade. You get a certain amount of gain from that. Then he says, it is in military service only where men freely sacrifice their lives for a faith, where men are willing to suffer and die for the right or the prevention of a wrong that we can hope to realize leadership in its most exalted and disinterested sense. Therefore, when I say leadership, I mean a military leadership. Now, there's a couple things to navigate there. Number one, if you think military people, military leaders don't do things for personal gain, you're completely wrong. I've talked about that since day one. And if you know anyone in the military, they can definitely tell you about bosses that were looking to get promoted. That's the main thing they're looking for. They're looking to get the best possible situation for themselves, right? So that's not true. And also in the civilian sector, when people do the right things for the right reasons, they will end up more successful. And look, are there people that do bad things, do the wrong things, and try and give themselves personal gain? Of course there are. But I'm just saying that exists in the civilian sector, and it exists in the military sector as well. And you see it. You get to see it when it falls apart in the civilian sector. Some guy that's been embezzling, some guy that's been falsifying contracts or falsifying documents or falsifying what they're doing for from their financial perspective or they're egotistical trying to make like all those things come out and they don't come out when they win. In most cases, they come out when they lose. Now, look, does someone do people occasionally pull it off? You know, some guy builds up some fake ass company or is abusive and just kind of gets it done and makes money. Yeah, it happens. It happens. Eventually, usually they get found out. You know, but it does happen. So keep that in mind. It's not quite as pure as he mentions here. But what he does say, and I will, so I'm going into that one a little bit hard, but he says, what we hope to realize is leadership in its most exalted form. So he's admitting it too. Like we hope to see the pure leadership. Yeah, it's ideal. Yeah. Continuing on. In a few days, the great mass of you men will receive commissions as officers. These commissions will not make you leaders. That's a little newsflash there, second lieutenant. That commission does not make you a leader. They will merely make you officers. They will place you in a position where you can become leaders if you possess the proper attributes. But you must make good. not so much with the men over you as the men under you. Oh, dang. Okay. Okay, so we in the game now. You know what I'm saying? It doesn't matter what your boss thinks of you. What do your boys think of you? What do your troops think of you? That's how you become a leader. It's always interesting because you ever heard somebody talk about, you can't get away with the way we used to be able to do things. Can't leave like that anymore. Almost in a negative way. That's not true. People act like, oh, when I was in, somebody got out of line, smack them upside the head. It's like, oh, yeah, you did that. You weren't a good leader. You know what I mean? Even me, I did that. When I was an E5 mafia, my leadership style was definitely more harsh than it was as I got older and more mature and had better examples. so the fact that you have to make good with your troops and earn their respect and earn the position of leadership that's what this is about even in 1917 and by the way he's bringing back you know experiences from 1898 like this is old school stuff can I ask you something send it do you remember or know when you first became in charge of other people well in my it was interesting even in my first platoon i was the primary comms guy and so there was one guy that was my guy like subordinate he was my subordinate technically yes and when was this like your first year this was my first when i first got to a seal platoon okay so okay so comms guy what was his position name or whatever he was secondary comms secondary primary primary okay and separate okay so so you you had to tell him what to do from time to time oh yeah for sure and he would really he wouldn't really tell you what to do so it was it was it was it was it very like tangible and established that you were his boss yeah that was it was yes it was the change like you're the primary comm guy okay yep 100 okay and then do you remember i guess that might okay do you remember when you were in charge of like more than just one guy like when you got either promoted or you know Yeah, so I guess once, you know, when you're a little bit of a fire team leader, which I didn't usually do because I was a radio man. So, you know, my fire team would always have the lieutenant in it. So I'd have an officer in my fire team so I wouldn't be the fire team leader. So it wasn't really, I guess when I got to trade at, or sorry, training cell at team one, and we'd go on trips, and I would be like in charge of a trip. Is that like permanent or is that just part of the rotation? Okay, okay, that's what I mean. Like where you're like established, like permanent. And that's the thing I was going to say because even, you know, when you're like you've heard me tell a story about when DC took over the platoon and put me and another guy in charge to run the op. But that's not really what you're looking for. You're looking for like technically, according to by the book, You are now in charge of these individuals. Yeah, exactly. You're their boss. Yeah, and even though that happened all the time on a temporary, like, oh, you're running this op, or you're in charge of clearing the backside of this target, or you're in charge of this OP, observation point. Like, getting put in charge of that stuff a lot. Or like, you're the dive supervisor for this dive, or you're the range safety officer for this range. All those things are leading. Like, hey, I'm giving the range brief. I'm making sure that everything's squared away. If something goes wrong, I'm in charge. On a dive, like, hey, I'm making sure that everyone's showing up, making sure that everyone's diving expected. I'm in charge of the overall safety. So, you know, you're in charge of things. But to go straight up by the book, it wasn't really until I got commissioned and I went to team two, and now I'm in a platoon as an assistant platoon commander, and I have a squad of guys. Oh, okay. Actually, you know what? This question could very well apply to even when you're temporarily in charge. So I personally have a very hard time, I have to admit this to myself, telling people what to do, like being their boss. Like, hey, you go over here and make sure this is done. I always feel like I shouldn't be bossing nobody around. Yeah, and I would say even when I was like the primary comm guy, bossing people around has never been something that I did much of. Yeah. It's never really, and you've heard me say this when I talk about relationships. Everything that I did in the military is based on relationships and listening to what people have to say. And I was never like, this is what we're doing, boys. Or like, hey, Echo, you need to be here at this time. I'd be like, hey, we're launching around here. When do you guys think we should show up? Yeah, and that's part of it. As a matter of fact, I wrote in Leadership Strategy and Tactics. I told a story in Leadership Strategy and Tactics where my guys, there was like a guy that showed up almost late, not quite late, and then we forgot a piece of gear. And I told the E-5 mafia and the leadership of the platoon, because I was a platoon commander, but I told the LPO. I was like, hey, if anything like this ever happens again, I'm going to run everything. meaning like i will micromanage everything and i and i told them i want to do that but i'm not going to i want to and they were like we got a boss we got a boss and never had any issue ever again but but to your point like i was never like okay here's what time we're mustering and here's what gear you need to bring and you know i never did that kind of stuff i would say like hey guys here's the op we got what time do you think we need to be here what hey what gear this is what we're doing you know make sure we got the right gear for it yeah so you know i was never really like telling people to and again does this apply when you're doing an immediate action drill and desert warfare training and you go peel right no that's a different thing it's like a different scenario yeah yeah fully so i guess my so and you're right though now i'm like reflecting now where even now you like sometimes my daughter will be like oh uh something about blah blah Jocko's your boss. I don't care what she says, but when she says it, it gives me a very specific feeling like I want to correct her. Not because Jocko's not my boss. It's not that. It's just that it doesn't feel like it. I don't feel like I'm following your orders all the time. I don't feel like it either. I don't feel like I got to check. So it doesn't feel like a boss scenario. Well, I don't really consider myself your boss. The weird thing is I don't even though we just came back from the muster. I use the term subordinate a lot. I don't actually consider anyone to be my subordinate. Right. Which is a weird thing. I don't look at anyone and think, oh, that person's a subordinate to me. I just look at other people and go, oh, they've got this part of the mission. They've got this part of the task. I've got this part of the task. We're going to work together, cover for each other, and make sure that it gets done. That's the way I view everybody. And by the way, even no matter where I am, even out in walking around the streets, I don't look at other people like, oh, I have a nicer car than that person. They're subordinate to me or inferior. Inferior. Inferior. I look at them like, oh, yeah, that person's probably doing something cool and probably has some skills that I don't have. So I don't really consider anyone to be a subordinate. Yeah. Yeah, and it doesn't feel like it. It just feels like back in those days when you get promoted. Okay, actually, this is more appropriate to when you're temporarily in charge, actually, now that I'm thinking of it. Because at one moment, you're part of the team. I think that's why. Because I always feel like we're kind of doing this. Let's say, okay, me and Connor, we'll say. Let's say we're going out on a video shoot. Actually, this happened. We went on a video shoot. And I got, like, the camera. I got this other stuff or whatever. And I'm like, technically, I could carry everything. He wouldn't be carrying it. We have to go down this canyon and all this stuff or whatever. I felt uncomfortable telling him, hey, can you carry this? Because I know technically I could carry it. So why would I tell him to carry it when I can do it kind of a thing? It's like I'm bossing him around like I'm this boss. It felt very uncomfortable because I see him. We're both kind of making this video, so why would I order him around right now? See what I'm saying? Yeah. But then isn't there like an element of that that you have to like overcome? Because it would help. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's the thing. you prioritize the mission a little bit. Yeah. But also, you don't say, hey, come over here, grab these three bags and carry them down. You go, hey, man, could you give me a hand with these things? Yeah. Right? That's not really an order. Yeah. And in fact, if you picked it all up yourself and you started walking, most people that you interact with would be like, hey, let me grab one of those bags. That's how it is every single time. Yeah. Yeah, I go into all things. But yeah, that's exactly how it turns out. And that's why I know that it's kind of an issue because I'm like my discomfort for quote unquote bossing people around or telling them what to do or whatever is keeping is like hindering the like the mission and the efficiency. Yeah. And again, I don't want to sound like I don't want to. I'm not sitting here making a claim like I haven't been like, hey, grab that table over there. You know what I mean? Like, of course. But I would say that to anyone. You know what I mean? Like, I don't care if you were the Admiral or you were the new guy. If I was like, had to pick up this piece of equipment and put it on the pallet, I'd be like, hey, Admiral, can you grab that? You know what I mean? Like, it's not that big of a deal. So I think as long as you're doing stuff for the good of the mission, I think people recognize that. Yeah. I got it. I got it. I'm not like, hey, Admiral, can you load my bags while I sit over here with my feet up? and I'm also like hey new guy can you grab my bags while I sit over here with my feet up each of those those are equally disgusting yeah I think it's like a reframe I guess because I I don't know maybe I'm traumatized maybe like some old bosses or whatever had that high horse kind of vibe to them you know and it's kind of you know sometimes you get the impression like oh this person's telling me what to do in that tone just for the sake of like flexing their authority in front of people or something like that. By the way, there are times when you're in charge where you're making the call. I can think of millions of times where okay, this is going on, this is going on, this is going on, this is an option, this is an option, this is an option, and I go, alright, do this. And everyone goes, cool. Usually there's enough time and space where everyone kind of realizes like, oh, there's advantages and disadvantages that we need to go one direction or the other. And when I feel that right there, it's like, okay, here's what we're doing. Yeah, you know what I'm thinking, and you're laying out these perfect scenarios where I'm like, wow, that's how, you know, that's the jam right there. And when I think in my mind of the past, I think I'm like envisioning these very real experiences that I've had where I see someone just get put in charge and they turn into a whole different person and start ordering people around and like, you know, with their chin up and just sort of, you know, just quote unquote running stuff, you know, like really embracing the boss role. and I remember thinking probably I would rather die than look like that see what I'm saying? So I'm like all scared or whatever You're a little feeling shy Yeah or something But like I said I think there's absolutely appropriate times to do it and I think you just need to be aware of that I think I gotta frame it where like your whole vibe comes off just like how you said where it's kind of like hey we're all like doing it and sometimes bro I'll tell you I'm in this position sometimes too where some of us kind of need direction since you have a more of a mental grasp on the whole thing it's like right it's best coming from you you know it's like hey there's a hole right there can can you feel that oh perfect because i was looking for something to fill you see what i'm saying for sure where if yeah i guess i gotta just frame it like that more but from the leadership perspective if i'm running if i'm telling you what time to show up what equipment to bring i'm telling i'm giving you every possible order that i can number one you have no you don't learn anything you don't take any initiative and you're like well i'm just gonna wait until jaco tells me what to do so that's bad and then when i really need something you don't it's just another it's it's order number 49 out of you know 50 and who cares as opposed to like oh you kind of figured out what you're bringing i go hey one shot you need to get today is this you're gonna get that shot but if i told you to do all these other things and get this other shot too you're like I can't be surprised when you weren't able to do it or you didn't do it or you didn't understand the priority of it. Right, right. It's just the way it is. Yeah. Carrying on. Men must and will follow into battle officers who are not leaders. But the driving power behind these men is not enthusiasm, but discipline. They go with doubt and trembling that prompts the unspoken question, what will he do next? Such men obey the letter of their orders, but no more. Of devotion to their commander, of exalted enthusiasm, which scorns personal risk of self-sacrifice to injure his personal safety, they know nothing. Their legs carry them forward because their brain and their training tell them they must go. Their spirit does not go with them. That's people that are just not good leaders. When people aren't good leaders, there's no spirit, right? They're not going to take extra personal risk. They're not going to do more. They'll just kind of do what they're told. And what are the chances that you as a leader are going to be able to tell everyone exactly what it is they need to do all the way to the nth degree? The chances are zero. They're going to be in situations where they're going to have to change. They're going to have to step up. They're going to have to do more than what you told them to do. And if you don't have good leadership, they're not going to be able to do it, and they're not going to do it. continue on, great results are not achieved by cold, passive, unresponsive soldiers. They don't go very far and they stop as soon as they can. Now he gives the contrary. Leadership not only demands but receives the willing, unhesitating, unfaltering obedience and loyalty of other men and a devotion that will cause them when the time comes to follow their uncrowned king to hell and back again if necessary. That's leadership as opposed to following people that aren't leaders. You will ask yourselves, of just what then does leadership consist? What must I do to become a leader? What are the attributes of leadership and how can I cultivate them? Leadership is a composite of a number of qualities. Among the most important I would list. Self-confidence, moral ascendancy, self-sacrifice, paternalism, fairness, initiative, decision, dignity, courage. And now he rattles through them. Self-confidence results first from exact knowledge. Second, the ability to impart that knowledge. And third, the feeling of superiority over others that naturally follows. All these give officer poise. Now it's interesting. I'll continue. To lead, you must know. You may bluff all of your men some of the time, but you can't do it all the time. Men will not have confidence in an officer unless he knows his business, and he must know it from the ground up. So what's interesting about this is you've heard me say a thousand times, if you don't know how to do something, you don't pretend like you do. and he's singing that, but he's like eliminating the fact that there might be some stuff you don't know. He's like, you got to know. You got to know. And what's interesting is when you talk about confidence, like if you're feeling confident going into a jiu-jitsu match, what makes you feel confident? Is it a pep talk? No. Is it a go? Drinking a go before you compete? No. So what gives you real confidence before you compete? You practiced. You practiced hard. You trained hard. You rehearsed. Those are the things that give you confidence. And by the way, that confidence follows through in leadership because if you have trained and you prepared and you study, you feel confident. And people are going to see that. And that's a good thing. And again, of course, we're not letting this flow into arrogance. but it is, you know, we're not following people that lack confidence. We don't like to follow people that are egomaniacs, but we don't want to follow people that are scared and lack confidence. Confidence is a good thing. The officer should know more about paperwork than his first sergeant and company clerk put together. He should know more about messing than the mess sergeant, more about diseases of the horse than his troop farrier. He should be at least as good a shot as any man in his company. So that's kind of a tall order. And I'm going to tell you, I never knew more about admin than my admin people. I never knew more about the logistics than my logistics people. I never was, you know, never. There was always people in a platoon that are going to be a better shot than you are. So that's a tall task there. If the officer does not know and demonstrates the fact that he does not know it is entirely human for the soldier to say to himself to hell with him He doesn know as much about this as I do And calmly disregard the instructions received Yeah this is a tough one man Like I not I don agree with all this The way I break this down, the way I've always broken this down is, you ever heard the thing that there's no such thing as stupid questions? Well, there are. especially if you're in a leadership position and you have neglected to do the basic groundwork to understand the fundamentals of the situation that you're in. Those are stupid questions. Those are the things that people will lose faith in you. If you go out and you shoot the sniper rifle of the sniper and you don't shoot as well as him, the sniper doesn't go, what a piece of shit. No. He goes, yeah, well, the boss is out here. He's not going to be as good. If you don't know everything about programming a certain radio, the radio man's like, oh, he's a loser. No, that's not true. But if you come out and you see the sniper rifle and you go, what's that? Or you pick up the radio. Yeah, yeah. You know, what weapon is that? Well, bro, you don't even know what sniper weapons we have? Or you pick up a radio and say, what radio is this? Like I understand you don't know the detailed how to program four levels into the radio, but for you to pick up the radio, hey, this is good. Good UHF radio. Good. It's got embedded crypto in it. Great. Like knowing the basics, knowing the fundamentals is where is what you need to do. And listen, occasionally you're going to get caught off guard. Maybe you have to raise your hand. There's something you don't know. It's okay. But to not to do that on a regular basis is a problem. but to think that you're going to know it more than your radio man, it ain't happening. You think you're going to know more than your sniper, it ain't happening. You think you're going to know more than your medic, it ain't happening, man. Those people went to a year-long school to figure that stuff out. You're not going to be better than them. But if you've got stupid questions that shows you haven't even put forth the effort, that's going to be a problem. Continuing on, there is no substitute for accurate knowledge. Become so well informed that men will hunt you up to ask you questions that your brother officers will say to one another, ask Smith, he knows. And not only should each officer know thoroughly the duties of his own grade, but he should study those of the two grades next above him. A twofold benefit attaches to this. He prepares himself for duties which may fall to his lot during any time in a battle. He further gains a broader viewpoint which enables him to appreciate the necessity for the issuance of orders and join more intelligently in their execution. Totally agree with that. Always know what the next couple levels above you in the chain of command have going on and what their job is. And by the way, I would say two levels down as well. Right? One or two levels down. I used to actually teach one level up and one level down. Maybe it's like 1.5 and 1.5. Because, again, you should know how to pick up that radio and make comms with it, but you probably don't know how to troubleshoot it. You should know how to fire some rounds on that sniper weapon, but you might not know how to dope it in. So there's a difference. And up the chain of command, it's like, oh, I can definitely make communications with the overhead assets, get information from them, but I probably don't know how to plan the whole stack of aircraft that are up there. So like a one and a half up and down the chain of command is probably a good spot to aim for. Not only must the officer know, but he must be able to put what he knows into grammatical, interesting, forceful English. He must learn to stand on his feet and speak without embarrassment. I am told that in British training camp, student officers are required to deliver 10-minute talks on any subject they choose. That is excellent practice. For to speak clearly, one must think clearly, and clear, logical thinking expresses itself in definite, positive orders. Absolutely. So a lot of this stuff I'm thinking in regards to, like, my kids, I just thought of this thing. And you can be kids, whatever. But so, you know how your kids will have like arguments, right? Like, hey, I want to stay up late or I want to do a sleepover tomorrow, right? And sometimes we're on the fence about it. Like, yeah, you know, I want them to have these experiences or blah, blah, blah. But it might not be a good idea for X, Y, Z reason. But you're on the fence. If you could do an exercise. Actually, I'm going to do this. I'm like thinking out loud kind of. Make them present an argument. Yeah, in front of everybody. See what I'm saying? Great. And then ask questions. I mean, look, not like full-on freaking interrogation mode or nothing, but really kind of you're rooting for them, but ask them some challenging questions. Like, hey, I think I'm going to do that because I get arguments all the time. Not terrible, but like. Yeah, there's a lot of – that's great. And I had my kids present cases at times. Oh, bro, I kind of like that idea. Like they want to get a phone to present the case. Perfect, yep. and there's a lot of things that you can do that with. Very, very helpful. So the idea of standing up in front of everyone to me is because my kids, they'll present their case as of right now. Their whole thing is presenting their case and sometimes I'm like, no, it's kind of impressive. You know, like, oh bro, have you ever seen that video? It's a video, it's like a dash cam, not a dash cam looking out, but looking in at the driver and the passenger and then they had a girl, a daughter, six, seven years old, in the back. there at a drive-thru. And the mom's like, oh, can I get a coffee and this and that? And so the mom's in the driver's seat making the order through the drive-thru. And the dad is in the passenger seat and the daughter's in the back. So the mom says, oh, can I get a coffee and blah, blah, blah. And then the girl goes from the back, she goes, oh, can I get a cookie? And then the mom goes, no, honey, we have a cookie at home. And then the dad's just kind of looking at the drive-thru And the girl goes, well, we have coffee at home. And the dad, you look at the dad go in the passenger seat. He's like, bro, he had no, you know, he's kind of like, bro, she has a point. He kind of made that gesture. And then the lady's like, she's thinking about it. And she didn't get mad. Props there. She didn't get mad. She's like thinking about it a little bit frustrated. But she's like, she pauses and she goes, and can I get a cookie too? You see what I'm saying? It's like, bro, kids will have an argument. But if you can add that little layer of talking in front of people and making a clear case, see what I'm saying, while you're talking, that's good. Because there's that whole thing with, you know, public speaking is one of the biggest fears or whatever phobia. So you can help them get over that. The young age can be very helpful. Oh, yeah. I like it. Continuing on. While self-confidence is the result of knowing more than your men, moral ascendancy over them is based upon your belief that you are the better man. Again, this is kind of opposite of what I just said. I don't see other people as subordinates or inferior. But I think I get where he's coming from, and I'll get to it in a minute. He says, to gain and maintain this ascendancy, you must have self-control, physical vitality, and endurance, and moral force. You must have yourself so well in hand, even though in battle you will be scared stiff, you will never show fear. For if by so much as a hurried movement or a trembling of the hands or a change of expression or a hasty order hastily revoked, you indicate your mental condition, it will be reflected in your men to a far greater degree. so i think what he's doing there is he's setting them up you ever you ever had like a coach or or or a parent say like you're better than that yeah i think that's what he's setting up is like hey be better than that yeah be like behave in a way you know this is actually something i tell young military people like when you're part of this unit you represent this unit and everything you do people look at it at what you do and how you behave and they put that on this whole unit including by the way guys that died act accordingly is what i tell them act accordingly and so that's what he's saying i think you have to be careful obviously you're walking around thinking you're better than other people that's terrible, but to elevate yourself to say, hey, you're better than that. You need to behave to the highest possible standards. Standard. Exactly. Yeah, that's all I got. I mean, you know, let's face it. This is old school. You know, so the presentation might not be as, you know, finely tuned as it could be like today or whatever. But yeah, the, if you do, yeah, like take that, taking the high road, holding yourself to a high standard because, hey, bro, people are looking. You got to, you know, you got to kind of set the example. So make sure that example is high standards. You know what I'm saying? Like it feels like, yeah, I feel like that, that checks out there. Yeah. And, and one thing he says that he gets to later, you know, unless you, he's saying like, oh, you know, you need to, don't change your order. But he talks about later, like when you make a mistake, you have to change. So don't get, you don't want to get locked into something just because you said it. Now that's what we're doing. Continuing on in garrison or camp. Many instances will arise to try your temper and wreck the sweetness of your disposition. If at such times you fly off the handle, you have no business to be in charge of men. For men in anger say and do things that they almost invariably regret afterwards. Boom. Don't lose your temper. An officer should never apologize to his men. Also, an officer should never be guilty of an act for which his sense of justice tells him he should apologize. So, I mean, I totally disagree with not apologizing. I think when you mess up, you should absolutely apologize. That being said, it's almost a trick, right? He said you should never apologize because you should never do anything where you have to apologize. But, hey, since we're not perfect, if you do screw up, you should absolutely apologize. And I've heard that today. I've heard people say that. Never apologize. Like, you should never have to apologize to your kids or you should never have to apologize to your team. Like, I call bullshit on that. You make a mistake, apologize. Hey, I screwed this up. Yeah, it feels like a lot of times the no apology or, you know, you got to know everything or whatever. Because, you know, a lot of us, like, we kind of need, if we're going to follow somebody, we need an element of consistency there. You know, you don't need some wishy-washy, you know, person that doesn't know what they're doing, quote-unquote. So it's almost like they're trying to maybe over-index on that element of perfection. Like, you got to stay, you know, and even if you mess up, which we all do, it's like you can't let them see you sweat. You can't, you know, it's like almost like that vibe. Yeah, got to be careful with that. It comes out so much better when you just, when you screw up. Everyone sees when you screw up. They see it. It's not like they don't see it. They see it. So just apologize, take ownership, and move on. Another element in gaining moral ascendancy lies in the possession of enough physical vitality and endurance to withstand the hardships to which you and your men are subjected and a dauntless spirit that enables you not only to accept them cheerfully, but to minimize their magnitude. That's legit. You got to be in freaking shape. You got to be able to handle it physically. Not only so that you can accept it gleefully, but you're like no factor. You can minimize its magnitude. This is a great one. Make light of your troubles. Belittle your trials, and you will help vitally to build up within your organization an esprit whose value in time of stress cannot be measured. So you got some big problem going on? no factor you like donna i do like that one it's like that you know i always refer mentally back to the jujitsu incident where i like i was trying to cross my leg over whatever and i kicked you in the face hard like this was a straight up strike to the face to the point where i had to say oh i was like oh wait pause the roll you know like hey are you okay you're like what what happened you didn't feel it didn't even notice it happened okay all right that's some cool stuff we're not we don't notice that we're not admitting what is your is your heel okay yeah well shin okay yeah what happened you said your heel hit something are you good because yeah yeah yeah i caught a couple uh i caught like legit like two freaking hardcore knees to the face yeah that's all that from noah by the way yeah last round scenario know so it was you know all right last one i think we did 10 rounds it was it was getting crazy and everyone's getting kind of nuts but it was but you know towards the end everyone's kind of like de-escalated a little bit but then i'm like you know i'm all right last round boys and but it was you know the little flashes you get when you get hit yeah i got one and then I kept going, got another one. Double. And then I felt blood and I was like, I was hoping it wasn't a cut. It wasn't a cut. It was just a bloody nose. But I had a pretty good shiner. Yeah. Thanks, Noah. Good job. But I tried to make light. I couldn't keep going because now I was bleeding. And you want to get blood all over the mat and the whole nine yards. But yeah, as much as I can, I'm going to belittle my trials. Good idea. moral force is the third element to gaining moral ascendancy to exert more force you must live clean you must have sufficient brain power to see the right and the will to do the right be an example to your men i think that's what that all boils down to you know there's a we have to watch out you know we have to watch out that we're not believing that we're better than people because a lot of this if you if you have the wrong personality you're going to take this and you like the person that you go to the restaurant and you order a steak and Caesar salad and then you've got someone else and they order a steak and Caesar salad but then they pull out the croutons and you're eating the croutons and they think they're better than you as a human. You know what I mean? Yes, I do. They're like, oh, type 2 diabetes much? Yeah, yeah. Like, we've got to watch out that we're not taking all this stuff to where we feel like we're better than other people. Yeah, fully, Brad. And that's like, and that example even is actually, I mean, that was a fun example, you know, the croutons. But even that example is impactful. So, again, we'll go back to the kids real quick. So, I know a person that we know. I'm not going to say his name. He's a fitness guy. He's into fitness and stuff. And he'll compete in certain things. so in preparation I think it was in preparation like you know the family would go eat dinner and he had a young daughter and so when he would eat dinner his dinner was different than the rest of the family's dinner and the daughter unbeknownst to him felt this overwhelming guilt that you know because he's obviously eating the correct stuff she's eating the incorrect stuff he's eating broccoli and a skinless chicken breast exactly right and to the point where the daughter wound up having a slight like disorder from it as a result and she admitted this later or whatever and yeah so you think you know like no no no I'm not pressuring nobody I'm just doing my thing or whatever but you can kind of give off that vibe if you're not careful and people can smell that vibe people can smell your intent and if you and your heart believe that you're better than them you got a problem it's going to be problematic you know if we're out at the bar hey man like like even when i go out somewhere right and people are drinking alcohol which i totally disagree with drinking alcohol i don't i literally do not think i'm better than them you know what i mean i'm not like i'm like oh they're they're you know they're gonna have a good time and i you know probably not thinking too much about the future but they're living in in the moment props to that you know what i mean i don't think i am better than them yeah and that is definitely something that can happen so that's what this whole like a lot of this list right here you have to watch out for because even when i think i know you know you know it's a classic example actually jiu-jitsu jiu-jitsu when i am better than someone at jiu-jitsu and i've told this to many people when you're better than someone at jiu-jitsu you're not a better person you've just trained a little bit more jiu-jitsu than that you know what i mean it doesn't make you better. You're not a better human. You're not a better athlete. You've just been training longer than somebody. And that's a very good thing to keep in mind. People are in various stages of their ascension. In that particular thing. In that particular thing, which you or they may or may not care about, by the way. They may not care. At the muster, I was talking about bowling. Because Dave Burke beat me in bowling. But I was talking about in different ecosystems, people judge things differently. And one of the things, you know, in every ecosystem, they have different things that they judge differently, right? The, you know, I brought up if you're a biker and you've done time, it's kind of like more respect. If you're a banker and you've done time, it's like your respect goes down. You might not even have that job anymore. And depending on what ecosystem you're in, oh, you know, people really care about it. I was like bowling is one of the examples I brought up. And then I remembered as I was on stage, I remembered that Dave Burke and our families together went bowling. Hell yeah. And Dave beat me in bowling. Hell yeah. And, you know, I'm like, if there's, being beaten in bowling is really, I don't know what's at the bottom of my list. But it's way down there. You know what I'm saying? It's way down there. It's way down there. But if someone's into bowling, they're like, oh, this guy's that good at bowling. Whereas I literally don't care at all. Not in no part of my brain, any part of my brain, do I say, damn, like respect. What was your score? I have no idea. I have no idea. Dave was beating me. And he beat me. Hey, real quick. My wife's good at weird stuff. I think she's good at like billiards, like pool. Oh, pool. In England, they have a game called snooker. Yeah, snooker. So she played snooker all the time growing up. She plays darts. She'll like beat you at weird stuff. Or she'll try to until you have to go aggro. It's kind of respect. Darts, dude. Oh, yeah, darts. She'll crush. Maybe she's a Brit, you know. Why? That's all. Oh, yeah. and they go in a pub and play darts like it's going on a style. Oh, yeah. I remember American Werewolf in London. That was like a big thing. Yeah, darts. Or what's the soccer TV show right now on Apple TV? I don't know. Yeah. What's in there too? Real quick, back to the famous dart scene. Oh, on this show. Yes, on the show. Okay. I didn't know that. Back to belittling your own trials. so that can help yourself even as an individual in life too for sure by the way and actually probably more i remember when i first got wind of that where i was in it was my third second third jiu-jitsu tournament dean lister was coaching me first match of the of the tournament and i was like we're kind of battling with this guy chris we know him he i haven't seen for a few years. But anyway, we're going, we're battling back and forth. And I was kind of getting tired. So my pace started to slow down. And Dean Lister, he's coaching me up or whatever. And he goes, you're not tired. And bro, I just became not tired all of a sudden. Because it's true, because I kind of allowed myself to accept it that, oh, I was getting tired. So let me slow down my pace, kind of a thing. But I was not even nearly as tired as I probably in real life was. Where it's like, It was that mental gray area where you have the choice to accept or reject, you know? Reject. Exactly. Delittle that. Delittle that. Continuing on. An officer can be a power for good or a power for evil. Don't preach to them. That will be worse than useless. Live the kind of life you would want them to lead, and you will be surprised to see the number that will imitate you. A loud mouth profane captain who is careless of his personal appearance will have a loud mouth profane dirty company. Remember what I tell you. Your company will be the reflection of yourself. If you have a rotten company, it is because you are a rotten captain. Self-sacrifice is essential to leadership. You will give, give all the time. You will give of yourself physically for the longest hours, the hardest work, and the greatest responsibility are the lot of the captain. He is the first man up in the morning and the last man at night. He works while others sleep. Boom. You will give of yourself mentally in sympathy and appreciation for the troubles of men in your charge. This one's mother has died and that one has lost all his savings in a bank failure. They may desire help, but more than anything else, they desire sympathy. Don't make the mistake of turning such men down with the statement that you have troubles of your own. For every time you do that, you knock a stone out of the foundation of your house. Your men are your foundation, and your house of leadership will tumble about your ears unless it rests securely upon them. Finally, you will give of your own slender financial resources. You will frequently spend your own money to conserve the health and well-being of your men or to assist them while in trouble. Generally, you get your money back. Very frequently, you must charge it off to profit and loss. Even so, it is worth the cost. That's it, man. Self-sacrifice. And you know what? This is one of those things where everybody notices it. and the one way you can diminish it is by chiming in about it. You know what I'm saying? Like if I say, dude, I had to stay here until midnight last night. Like you already know. Like you showed up to work in the morning and the things that had to get done that weren't done when you left and you know how much time they take and you show up and they're done, you know it. You know I at least stayed until 10, maybe 11. You might not know that, but I want that last little bit of credit for midnight. The best way to diminish the credit you want is to ask for the credit you want. Keep your freaking mouth shut. And whether that's the physical, like, well, I was actually carrying this much weight on that. Or whether it's the mental, well, you have no idea what it's like answering to the headquarters all day. Or the time, well, I had to come in even earlier than you did. No matter what the thing is that you want that little bit of credit for, don't ask for it. Hide it. Freaking hide it if you can. You can't hide it, though. They're going to know. Just have faith that they're going to know, and everything's going to be okay. The next one is paternalism. When I say that paternalism is essential to leadership, I use the term in its better sense. I do not now refer to that form of paternalism which robs men of initiative, self-reliance, and self-respect. I refer to the paternalism that manifests itself in a watchful care for the comfort and welfare of those in your charge. soldiers are much like children sorry there, my army brethren soldiers are much like children you must see that they have shelter, food and clothing the best that your utmost efforts can provide you must see that they have food to eat before you think of your own that they each have as good of a bed as you provide before you consider where you will sleep you must be far more solicitous of their own comfort than your own solicitous of their own comfort than your own You must look after their health. You must conserve their strength by not demanding needless exertion or useless labor. Team comes first. And by doing all these things, you are breathing life into what would otherwise be a mere machine. You are creating a soul in your organization that will make the mass respond to you as though it were one man. That is a spree. and when your organization has a spree you will wake up some morning and discover that the tables have been turned that instead of your constantly looking out for them they have, without even a hint from you taken up the task of looking out for you you will find that a detail is always there to see that your tent, if you have one, is properly pitched that the most and cleanest bedding is brought to your tent that from some mysterious source, two eggs have been added to your supper when no one else has any. That an extra man is helping your men give your horse a super grooming. That your wishes are anticipated. That every man is Johnny on the spot. And then you have arrived. And you've heard me say, take care of your people and your people will take care of you. And that's exactly what that is. It's exactly what that is. You take care of your people. they're absolutely going to take care of you and they're going to do it with pride. Next, you cannot treat all men alike. A punishment that would be dismissed by one man with a shrug of the shoulders is mental anguish for another. A company commander who, for a given offense, has a standard punishment that applies to all is either too indolent or too stupid to study the personality of his men In his case justice is certainly blind And this is, I, oftentimes, I would have guys that would do something stupid. And I didn't need to do any punishment to them. Like, I literally didn't need to do anything. They were punishing themselves. you know they were horrified by what they had done and but what you got to be careful of then other people that are like well man he kind of got a slack jaco doesn't care about that so you'd have to find how you talk about it so that everyone understands that a grievous thing happened and it can't happen again but at the same time to like mutilate a guy's soul when he's already freaking feeling terrible himself. Right. It's like the it's like this idea of punishing somebody for almost like revenge versus like actual solving a problem. See what I'm saying? Yeah, if you can tell the guy is so beat up internally because of the shame and the embarrassment, the this, and the anticipation of getting fired, like just going through something psychologically and you can tell, it's kind of like okay, we can kind of rest assured this guy learned his lesson kind of a thing but if you're like no no he needs some kind of like pain that i inflict on him it's like different like your own ego yeah yeah it's like it's it's the difference between doing it for like the group and the system versus like making it about yourself kind of a thing not good how do you feel about um like group punishment collective punishment is what they call it yeah yeah uh it depends it depends there are times when it's when it's necessary. There are also times when it's stupid. It just depends on the situation. Occasionally, and sometimes it elevates to collective punishment, meaning like, okay, this guy got in trouble, and now this guy got in trouble. And hey, listen, if one more guy gets in trouble, you're all going to pay. You see what I'm saying? One guy forgets a piece of gear, cool, that guy's going to show up an hour early for the next two weeks. Another guy forgets a piece of gear. Okay, that guy's showing up. By the way, next time this happens, everyone's showing up. You see what I'm saying? So sometimes the group needs to police itself. And if the group isn't policing itself, then I got to police the group. You see what I'm saying? Because our goal is that the group, the gang polices itself is what the goal is. The gang polices itself. That's what generally happens. That's why when I was a platoon commander or I was a tasking commander, I didn't have to go and police the group when someone showed up late. I didn't have to say a damn word. It was getting handled. Someone forgets a piece of gear. I didn't need to go and do a gear inspection. It was getting handled. So it didn't really ever. Usually things for me did not elevate to group punishment. I did tell that story with my guys that almost showed up late and forgot a piece of gear. And there was a little bit of a spotlight on us for what we were doing at the time. And so unacceptable. and that's why I escalated immediately to a threat of like group punishment which was me running things because when I'm running things bro it's on you know you want to talk about showing up early bro we're doing dry rehearsals for the rehearsals to rehearse see what I'm saying they did not that was a great group of guys but I remember the acting leading petty officer at the time and who's a great dude who I always had a great time with and did a great job in combat but I remember the look on his face when I said like I'm going to run this you could see he was like dude we do not want this we do not want this at all he was like hey boss boss we got it won't happen again and probably a week before this I had said like hey let's get here tomorrow like I don't know 6.30 and he was like how about 6.45 or something like that and I go bro you trying to squeeze 15 minutes of liberty out of me Jack That group punishment, at first, I always thought that, hey, I think this is like abuse. You shouldn't do this because it causes secondary problems. So like, okay, Pop Warner football. We do. What was the name of your team? The Titans. The Kalora Rams. The Rams. And then Kalora Raiders when you move up to midgets. It's Pee Wee's and midgets. Anyway, so we did this drill where we're doing sprints. but when you do sprints in football, sometimes they want to condition you mentally as well. So, you know, the count, right? Set, down, hut, hut, hut. Right, that's football. So the first hut is one. Second hut is two. So sometimes the count will be like on two. And if you go on, if you do a false start, it's a false start if you don't go on the correct thing, right? If it's on two, you say set, down, hut, and someone jumps. That's jumping off sides or a false start, right? So it's to train you with that as well. So if the quarterback says, hey, in the huddle, hey, it's on three, you guys got to focus, you know, because once you hear the first huddle, it's almost automatically you go. You see what I'm saying? So you can run into that issue. So you train it in practice. But they train it in practice when we do the sprints for conditioning. So you're kind of physically, you see what I'm saying? You got to lock in, bro. So if someone keeps jumping off sides, and every time someone jumps, like the whole team now, You got freaking however many, 60 guys or whatever, lined up across the whole field, and we're all doing sprints for conditioning and mental change. So if one guy jumps, bro, anytime they see the one that's like, okay, the coach goes, okay, it's on three. Everyone's already ready. All right, bro, someone's going to jump. Of the whole team, no one's going to jump? Bro, impossible, right? So we're all like, fuck. And if someone jumps, now we've got to back up five yards. So now the sprint is five yards. You see what I'm saying? So it compounds. So it's like, oh, my gosh, very stressful. So anyway, if the same guy starts jumping off sides too much, like if he does two, three in a row, people start getting mad, right? But it messes with the guy, so now he can concentrate even less. Like, it's hard. It's like a compounding thing for that guy. So after a while, the coach is like, all right, bro, freaking everybody do push-ups. Everybody. But except for the guy who jumped off sides, you got to watch. So everyone, like, hates him. I remember thinking, hey, I see what you're doing. but now even when we're done with conditioning everyone hates that guy now. We're less of a team. See what I'm saying? But when you think about it like one more step it's kind of like no, no, no. Your lack of focus, your shortcomings are affecting the whole team. The whole team has to go five yards back. Not just you. See what I'm saying? So you've got to lock in. It kind of trains you. And plus everyone being mad at you is part of the punishment. But it's psychological and social. See what I'm saying? It's not like... That's like in Full Metal Jacket when he gets caught with a donut and everyone else is doing push-ups and he's just eating the donut. You know what I'm saying? Exactly, man. Collective punishment. I dig it. Yeah, higher is the time for it. Yeah, and that's what... I think that's spot on how you're like, hey, if you're doing it through a very specific methodology... It's an escalation. ...for a reason, yeah, yeah, it makes sense to me. Check. Back to the book. Study your men as carefully as a surgeon studies a difficult case. when you are sure of your diagnosis, apply the remedy. And remember that you apply the remedy to effect a cure, not merely to see the victim squirm. That's what you were talking about. It may be necessary to cut deep, but when you are satisfied as to your diagnosis, don't be diverted from your purpose by any false sympathy for the patient. Hand in hand with fairness and awarding punishment walks fairness and giving credit. Everybody hates a human hog. when one of your men has accomplished an especially credible piece of work see that he gets the proper reward turn heaven and earth upside down to get it for him don't try and take it away from him and hog it yourself you may do this and get away with it but you have lost the respect and loyalty of your men sooner or later your brother officers will hear of it and shun you like a leper in war there is enough glory for all give the men under you his due the man who always takes and never gives is not a leader. He is a parasite. There's another kind of fairness. That which will prevent an officer from abusing the privileges of his rank. When you exact respect from soldiers, be sure to treat them with equal respect. Build up their manhood and self-respect. Don't try to pull it down. For an officer to be overbearing and insulting in the treatment of enlisted men is an act of a coward. He ties the man to a tree with the ropes of discipline and then strikes him in the face knowing full well that the man cannot strike back. Consideration, courtesy, and respect from officers toward enlisted men are not incompatible with discipline. They are parts of our discipline. Without initiative and decision, no man can expect to lead. So, I mean, this is just obvious. And again, people think, oh, back in the old days, they were so hardcore. No. Here's a guy pre-World War I, this document is pre-U.S. involvement in World War I, and he's saying do not insult. Do not be overbearing. Treat people with respect. In maneuvers, you will frequently see when an emergency arises, certain men calmly give instant orders, which later on analysis prove to be, if not exactly the right thing, very nearly the right thing to have done. You will see other men in emergency become badly rattled. Their brains refuse to work or they give a hasty order, revoke it, give another, revoke that. In short, show every indication of being in a blue funk. Regarding the first man, you say that man is a genius. He hasn't had time to reason this thing out. He acts intuitively. Forget it. Genius is merely the capacity for taking infinite pains. The man who was ready is the man who prepared himself. He has studied beforehand the possible situations that might arise. He has made tentative plans covering such situations. When he is confronted by the emergency, he is ready to meet it. He must have sufficient mental alertness to appreciate the problem that confronts him and the power of quick reasoning to determine what changes are necessary in his already formulated plan. He must also have the decision to order the execution and stick to his orders. So again, he's saying, hey, someone's going to make a quick call. It's because they planned for it, which is good. That's good. And he's going to make it even more solid here. Any reasonable order in an emergency is better than no order. The situation is there. Meet it. It is better to do something and do it wrong than to hesitate, hunt around for the right thing to do. and wind up doing nothing at all. And having decided on a line of action, stick to it. Don't vacillate. Men have no confidence in an officer who doesn't know his own mind. Occasionally, you will be called upon to meet a situation which no reasonable human being could anticipate. If you have prepared yourself to meet other emergencies which you could anticipate, the mental training you have thereby gained will enable you to act promptly and with calmness. And I'll go one step further than that. which is it's not just mental preparation. It's getting put in scenarios that are crazy and complicated and having to figure out what to do. You get better at that. So that's what I got to see running the advanced heel training is you put a guy, the first time he gets put into a chaotic situation, disaster.com. Locks up, doesn't know what to do, freaks out. Then you put him in another situation. and maybe obviously you tell them like, hey man, take a step back. Hey, assess what's happening. Get up to a little bit of high ground. Look around. Don't try and figure everything out at once. Make a very small decision. Okay, try it again. They'll do a little bit better. They'll do a little bit better. And eventually they learn the protocol to get through these complex emergencies that happen. So it's not just mental training. It's like a physical thing that you have to do. And just like you can teach someone an arm bar for three months with PowerPoint, the first time they do an arm bar, it still won't be there. You got to do it. Continuing, you must frequently act without orders from higher authority. Time will not permit you to wait for them. Here again enters the importance of studying the work of officers above you. If you have a comprehensive grasp of the entire situation and can form an idea of the general plan of your superiors, that and your previous emergency training will enable you to determine that the responsibility is yours and to issue the necessary orders without delay. Understand what the mission is. The element of personal dignity is important in military leadership. Be the friend of your men, but do not become their intimate. your men should stand in awe of you not fear and I tried to find if there was like an alternate meaning of awe and there is it doesn't quite mean alternate meanings are like less profound you know what I mean? It's not like awe it's like oh yeah like heavy levels of respect almost reverence but not quite reverence but we're approaching it we're looking up to this guy He's close to the ideal. Exactly. Exactly. You know, because again, you got to be careful. If your like goal is to have people, if you think people should stand in awe of you, that's not going to go well. But if you think people should respect you and see how you behave and respect your actions, that's good. If your men presume to become familiar, it's your fault, not theirs. Your actions have encouraged them to do so. And above all things, don't cheapen yourself by courting their friendship or currying their favor. They will despise you. If you are worthy of their loyalty and respect and devotion, they will surely give you all those things without asking. If not, nothing that you can do will win them. So this is the classic case of trying to get everyone on the team to be your buddy. And if you do that, you're not holding the line like you need to. It is exceedingly difficult for an officer to be dignified while wearing a dirty, spotted uniform and a three-day stubble of whiskers on his face. Such a man lacks self-respect, and self-respect is an essential of dignity. There may be occasions when your work entails dirty clothes and an unshaven face. Your men all look that way. At such time, there's ample reason for your appearance. In fact, it would be a mistake to look too clean. they would think that you were not doing your share but as soon as this unusual occasion is passed set an example for personal neatness kind of a big deal and then I would mention courage moral courage you need as well as mental courage that kind of moral courage which enables you to adhere without faltering to a determined course of action which your judgment has indicated is the best one suited to secure the desired results. You will find many times, especially in action, and he means combat action, that after having issued your orders to do a certain thing, you will be beset by misgivings and doubts. You will see or think you see other and better means for accomplishing the object sought. You will be strongly tempted to change your orders. don't do it until it is clearly manifested that your first orders were radically wrong. For if you do, you will again be worried by doubts as to the efficacy of your second orders. I have a little bit of beef with that. My beef with that is you make a call, and he says to wait until it is clearly manifested that your call was radically wrong. To me, that's a little bit much. I don't need to see clear manifestation And I don't need to see radically wrong I can see strong indications That this is a bad move Now You ever heard me say Plan your dive, dive your plan There's a reason for that And that doesn't only apply to diving Most of the time We plan, we brief, we rehearse Sticking to that Is a smart move And thinking that you're going to make some quick adjustments and it doesn't go well. Plan your dive, dive your plan. Now, if you're diving your plan and you see that it is clearly wrong, maybe not radically. What is it? Radically what? Maybe not radical disaster, radically wrong, but you start going, oh yeah, this is not effective. You don't need to wait until it's crystal clear. You can be like, oh yeah, this is not going well. And what you can do, this doesn't mean you need to stop and do something totally different. But you can start making some small adjustments to mitigate your bad call. Every time you change orders without obvious reason, you weaken your authority and impair the confidence of your men. Have the moral courage to stand by your order and see it through. Again, if you're telling someone to do something and it's not working, you should have the humility to be like, oh, this is a bad call. Stop what you're doing. Come back over here. moral courage further demands that you assume the responsibility for your own acts that'd be a good idea for a book wouldn't it assuming responsibility for your own acts if your subordinates have loyalty have loyally carried out your orders and the movement you directed is a failure the failure is yours not theirs yours would have been the honor had it been successful take the blame if it results in disaster don't try and shift it to a subordinate and make him the goat that is a cowardly act so there you go when you make a mistake you need to take ownership of your mistake let's say goat that means scapegoat yeah he means scapegoat not goat grace of all time Clarity. Furthermore, you will need moral courage to determine the fate of those under you. You will frequently be called upon for recommendations for promotion or demotion of officers and non-commissioned officers in your immediate command. Keep clearly in mind your personal integrity and the duty you owe your country. Do not let yourself be deflected from a strict sense of justice by feelings of personal friendship. If your own brother is your second lieutenant and you find him unfit to hold his commission, eliminate him. If you don't, your lack of moral courage may result in the loss of valuable lives. So moral courage, I mean, I've actually recently been hearing that a lot, that expression, moral courage. So that is just in the spirit of understanding. That's doing the right thing even when it's uncomfortable, painful in the short term. Yes. And doing the right thing even though there's a heavy price to pay and it's not a physical price. Courage, physical courage is like I'm going to do this thing and I could die. Or I will get hurt or whatever. There's huge sacrifices that I might have to make to make this thing happen. Moral courage is like, oh, I might get in trouble. I might, you know, have to answer to the man. You know, I might get canceled from this thing that I'm supposed to be doing. All those things would be moral courage. And it's, correct me if I'm wrong, but it has to be based on doing, quote unquote, the right thing. Yes, doing the right thing, 100%. Because regular, even like, it doesn't have to be physical courage if it's courage. Like, I don't know, freaking having courage, like a hard talk with somebody or something like that. That's not necessarily moral courage. That's just like, hey, sack up. Or if you're going to ask for a raise, all this stuff. Moral courage is like a whistleblower. Yeah, standing up for somebody, like a bully or something like this. That's moral courage. Now, if the bully is going to kick your ass. It's both. It's a little bit of both. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, and I was about to talk about moral injury, right? And this is when things happened where this is the, you know, I really first started hearing this from General Mukayama. You know, he's very involved with the moral courage thing, or sorry, the moral injury thing. This is when something happened that you witnessed, you participated in, and it was, you did the wrong thing. And now you have a moral wound because you feel like you did the wrong thing. Maybe you feel like you should have stood up. Maybe you felt like you didn't take the action you should have taken. And it didn't have anything to do with physical courage. Like, oh, I'm a coward because I didn't do this thing. I'm a physical coward. But, oh, this thing happened and I didn't report it or I didn't stop it from happening where I should have. And, you know, if, you know, in Vietnam, you know, the My Lai Massacre, right? If someone was there and they didn't participate in it, but they didn't tell people to stop, they might have a moral injury because now they feel the guilt of not doing the right thing. They know they didn't have the moral courage to stop it. Continuing on. If, on the other hand, you are called upon for recommendation concerning a man whom, for personal reasons, you thoroughly dislike, do not fail to do him full justice. Remember that aim is the general good, not the satisfaction of an individual grudge. I'm taking for granted that you will have physical courage. I need not tell you how necessary that is. Courage is more than bravery. Bravery is fearlessness, the absence of fear. The nearest, the merest dolt may be brave because he lacks the mental, the mentality to appreciate his danger. He doesn't know enough to be afraid. Courage. You ever tell you about my fearlessness in Africa? No, I don't think so. So Leif and I were in Africa and we were working with a company down there. And after we worked with the company, we went to like a park. And the parks down there is where the elephants, the rhinoceroses, the lion's tigers. Straight up safari. Safari park, right? Yeah. So we go to this safari park. And it's a long drive. We're in Johannesburg. And we drive. And I'm in the vehicle. And we're talking because we're with a guy, great dude. And we're all talking and carrying on. And it's like a three, four-something hour drive. And at some point, we were driving, and there was, like, this beautiful sunset. Sure. And I go, oh, dude, let me, like, get a picture of the sunset. You know, it's like looking out over the planes, right? So I'm like, hey, and I tell the guy that's driving, I'm like, hey, you know, will you stop the car so I get a picture of the sunset? And he's like, yeah. So he stops the car, and I just, like, get out of the car, and I kind of, because, you know, I don't want to take it through the window or whatever, I get out of the car and I kind of line up and get a couple shots, walk around a little bit, check it out, get a good angle. I get back in the car and we start driving. Well, it turns out that during our conversation, I had missed the fact that we had entered this park. And he just thought, dude, Jock would just, he'll just deal with it. Like, he just got, like, he's, I guess he'll take on whatever. Lion, you know, hyena, whatever. He's ready for it. Like, John was like, because, but what I, but I saw when we left, you go through, like, a gate. And it's like, do not get out of your car. You are entering the safari zone. You are, you know, there's all these dangerous animals. They will kill you. We literally drove by a sign that said that. So I just rolled, got out of my car. Sorry, you know, whatever. Taking some pictures. and it wasn't until like I guess later on that night they're like yeah dude you just kind of just got out of the car and I was like well what do you mean? they're like this is an open because it's weird in Africa all the animals are in these game reserves there's no like a lion that's just walking around in the clear in the public because they'll kill people right? you think it's that way Like in America, like there's a moose walking out through like a town. Yeah. Like you see that, right? You know, you see a grizzly bear walking, like digging through garbage. Like that's the way it is in America. But in Africa, it's not like that. Partially because these are like, like not that I don't even know what's more ferocious, a grizz or a damn lion or, but, but they keep them all like cooped up, you know? Yeah. Not cooped up because the land reserves are huge. Yeah. Like there, it'd be like if we put a fence around our public lands, you know, if we, if, if we put a fence around freaking Yellowstone and we're like, Hey, you know, the, they can't get out and you can't go in and went even, but what the crazy thing is it was like Jurassic park. Like once we got to our little cabins where we stayed, there's an electric ass fence like there and it's like Jurassic park, you know? and I didn't realize I was just in the clear just walking around so so to put it the way he put it I was a adult yeah a mere dolt because I lacked the freaking mentality to appreciate the danger at all and I think Leif was kind of like well you know like and and actually his wife Jenna was with us too it's kind of like hey Jocko just goes hard yeah this is what we're doing you know hey let's Go. No, I'm not tough. I just dumb Not courageous Just too stupid to know any better So that one of those moments where but luckily nothing happened And then like five minutes later we see rhinos like for real And, boy, those rhinos, dude, they look like they were going to – they look like if they wanted to. You don't stand a chance, bro. I made eye contact with it. And we're in a car. We're in like a Land Rover, right? and I make eye contact with this thing and I was like, this thing can completely kill not just me and not if I get out. Like I felt like if it got fired up, it doesn't matter you're in a car. I mean, this thing, I don't know how much they weigh, but they're as big as a car and they got a freaking giant ass horn. Yeah. You know, that thing will kill you. Yeah, and he didn't look happy, bro. He looked pissed. He looked pissed. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. That was a weird thing because most of the time when I make eye contact with something, And I'm kind of sizing them up, and I'm kind of feeling pretty good about it. You know what I mean? Not this time? No. No. Did not feel good about that. Makes sense. But it was badass. In that Jurassic Park where you got in the camp thing, there was, like, straight up activities going on out front, you know? Hey, have you ever seen a giraffe? Do you know what a giraffe's primary weapon is? What? Do you know how they defend itself and how they, like, fight and kill and all that stuff? I don't know, but if I were to guess, I would say the feet. Nope. the legs bro they use their head and they swing their head on that long ass neck and like hit shit oh like a wrecking ball yeah like a wrecking ball yeah like a wrecking ball and then i went with jason gardner we went to a damn uh special um zoo in nebraska and we got to feed like rhinos and stuff but the the damn damn you wouldn't want to get hit in the head with that no yeah No, a lot of these, I mean, yeah, a lot of these animals, like, you know, you see them on TV and you're like, yeah, cool, that's freaking crazy. But then you see them in real life, you're like, bro, this thing is way bigger than I thought. Like, way bigger. Yeah. And wider. Yeah, and they have a different strength than humans. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Like, when you wrestle, like, any animal, it just feels stronger than a person. Yeah, like, even my little dog is, like, pretty impressively scrappy for, you know, its size. Yeah. Oh, yeah, pound for pound. Pound for pound, animals are just kind of stronger than us. Hey, whatever happened to the picture? The picture, the picture, the picture. The sunset. Oh, I'd probably have to go look for it. I could find it. Oh, you still have it? Yeah, I'm sure I do, yeah. I'm sure I have it. It's a good pick. Luckily, I'm alive. Yeah, no shit. Leif was about to film me getting just brutalized. Actually, it's funny. That was a good one, too. Like a damn elephant. We were in a Land Rover, an elephant. I don't want to exaggerate. An elephant came close to us. You know what I mean? And real close. And bro, if that thing wanted to kill you, you don't stand a chance, man. If that thing just had one fake out, which the fake out would be, I'm going to walk close to this Land Rover, and then when I get close enough, I'm going to knock it over and kill everyone inside. I mean, some of us would be able to run away. You know? Yeah, yeah. Can't get everybody if they're scattering. Yeah. I don't think they were able to get everyone because it was just one. But I videoed that too. Yeah. It was pretty interesting. The weird thing about elephants, when they're moving, they're so big, they look like they're moving in slow motion. They're huge. Oh, yeah. In Honolulu back in the day, an elephant got loose from a show. I remember that. Hell, yeah. I remember that. You don't want to mess around. I'm scared of elephants. I understand completely. Because I was in Thailand, and I went to an elephant park, and it's not cool. Like the elephants are not happy. They're chained up and they probably get beaten. But I didn't know that going into it. I went into it like, oh, cool, elephants, right? And I was feeding the elephants. They give you like, you can buy bananas, right? So I buy some bananas, going to feed the elephants. And these are not big, giant elephants. These are like kind of smaller type elephants. And I start feeding the elephants. And they start getting, like, they want what I got. and finally I was kind of running low and I was close to this elephant you know elephants their head is sort of vertical like their head is vertical right and I was standing right in front of its head and it bucked and it threw me through the air it threw me through the air I had no I had no I had nothing for it I had nothing for it dang so it assaulted you Yeah, it kind of was old to me, and I was like, yo, I want to leave here. But that's why I don't mess with elephants. They're mean. I'm a thousand percent with you, and I feel like this was pretty much a whole lot. When they got after it? No, no, no. That was in Honolulu. So I only was in Honolulu for like five years. But yeah, it jammed up a guy, too. I don't know if he did it. I think it might have killed him. I don't know. I forget. But there's video of it. I've heard this. I don't know if this is. I've heard this for a long time. So I don't know if it was just some internet rumor, because this is pre-internet rumor for me. But I heard that in Africa, if, like, an elephant kills a person, they have to kill all those elephants. Because it just learned, like, they all just learned, like, oh, we don't need to take shit from these little ant things. I heard that. I've heard that before. So. Huh. The, yeah. Bro, I don't mess with any wild animals at all. I think it's like, you know, like, we get into this almost, like, collective complacency. kind of like, oh, yeah, they're like pets at the zoo, like a petting zoo. You know, and they forget that, like, no, brother, a freaking giraffe, like, just like how you said. Like, they look kind of cute and pretty or whatever. You know what a big sucker is in America is moose. Because, you know, moose, they kind of look a little bit dopey and friendly. Yeah, they're kind of cute. Like, they're the meanest of those type of animals. You know what I mean? Not as mean as a grizz, but, like, they will kill you. Like a moose will It will run roughshod All over your head Roughshod Mooses is one of those animals that I was surprised on how huge those are Like a moose And I've never seen a polar bear But there was like this video Saying oh five animals that are way bigger In real life or something And it showed a polar bear next to like a person I was like bro that's like AI Then you go look it up at the numbers And you're bro that thing is freaking like it's huge yeah it's like a monstrously huge polar bears are like the the most like legit if you're going out bro like if i'm going out i'll take that polar bear like just let's go in the glory you know what i mean it's like pretty impressive yeah like that thing's just gonna that that thing you know when you imagine us imagine a cherry you know when you eat a cherry imagine a cherry when you take a when you take a whole cherry and you bite it that's what your head is to a like one shot it's like crunch boom like it's just game over yeah man don't mess with the animals yeah I was getting I was hunting with Dudley and we were we were going after an elk and then there was a mountain lion that was going after it and we kind of were behind it it was like Bro, if that thing wanted to get you, you wouldn't know it, man. It'd just grab you by the head and just give them big-ass claws. Yeah, even small mountain lions can, like, jam you up pretty hardcore. Yeah, although there was one article about a guy, like, beating up a mountain lion, and it was kind of in the headlines. And they showed a picture of it. It was like a large cat. Like a large house cat. Yeah, I didn't see that. And hey, bro, like a large house cat, that thing will jack you up. It'll have all kinds of scrapes towards your eyes and stuff. Oh, yeah. So the, and I run, you know, I have a canyon by my house. It's like trails is where I go get my road work from time to time every day. But the, um, there's not mountain lions, but they're those like a Bob Bobcat. Exactly. And I saw one and they're like, pretty cool. I wasn't scared of that thing, bro. I was like, bro, I would kill that thing. Like if it came down to it, I would win. But it just like how you said, you know, like a house cat, when they get real aggressive and scratch you. Yeah. Oh, that's going to suck. cat like one like if it caught a vein or something oh you could die for sure oh yeah but yeah they're not they're not impressive like how you see on like i don't know movies or whatever well that's tv but then the mountain lion thing but the weird thing is you ever heard rogan when rogan talks about like chimpanzees like they go for your eyes like your your testicles and stuff like out of the gate they're just chewing your face off i wonder if a cat knows that too you know what i mean like is a cat like oh i'm going for eyes yeah because then you're you're screwed yeah they they kind of have this kind of thing to them where they they got things figured out a little bit more than like a random dog just the vibe i mean yeah like dogs dogs will bite your arm or your leg kind of that's partially because that's how they were trained but also they're just like when you watch a dog fight another dog they're going for the back legs like incapacitate it right yeah No, I didn't notice that. But if it knew, but also a dog doesn't have the dexterity to go after your eyes like a cat. Yeah. A cat one slash at the eyes, you're in trouble. You're screwed. And not to mention, you could grab onto your face with one, like with three paws, and you just get at the eyes with the other one. I don't know if they have the ability to do that, though. You know what I mean? They're pretty freaking agile. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Even like a dog. No, I don't mean the ability. I know they have the physical ability. do they have the cognitive capacity to recognize that that would be a real game changer? You know what I'm saying? Like a real game changer. Never mind. It's like trying to bite your eyes. Yeah. I bet we would know if they did that. Because Rogan seems to know with confidence, by the way, that the chimps are just going to get in there. Yeah. The chimps. But maybe that's because they're similar to us and they know how to win a fight against each other. Feels like it. Yeah. Like they would just get in there. Yeah. Yeah. yeah dogs are kind of dumb comparative not dumb but they feel kind of dumb comparatively speaking yeah but there's a whole spectrum of dogs yeah i know like some dogs are they're so smart like you ever like i'll like i'll taunt my dog and thankfully she knows that they're like i'm playing but you know it's trying to bite you it's like it's chomping at every little thing even like feints you know like she's like reacting to feints but cats it feels like they kind of know what a feint But the weird thing is, you ever seen people throw cheese at a cat and a dog? Like, randomly throw a piece of cheese at a dog, and it just, like, immediately bites, eats it. And the cat, it, like, discombobulates them, and they fall over and stuff. I understand that. Yeah, it's a whole thing. Okay. It's a whole thing. See, man, that's why I don't mess around. It's unpredictable. That's what I'm saying. The animals, the animals. All right. Back to the book. courage however is that firmness of spirit that moral backbone while fully appreciating the danger involved nevertheless goes on with the undertaking like if i would have known what was outside of that vehicle i wouldn't have gotten out of it bravery is physical courage is mental and moral you may be cold all over your hands may tremble your legs may quake your knees may be ready to give way. That is fear. If nevertheless you go forward, if in spite of this physical defection you continue to lead your men against the enemy, you have courage. The physical manifestations of fear will pass away. You may never experience them but once. They are the buck fever of the hunter who tries to shoot his first deer. You must not give way to them. A number of years ago, while taking a demolitions course, the class of which I was a member was handling dynamite. The instructor said regarding its manipulation, I must caution you gentlemen to be careful in the use of these explosives. One man has but one accident. And so I would caution you, if you give way to fear, that will doubtless beset you in your first action. If you show the white feather, if you let your men go forward while you hunt a shell crater, you will never again have the opportunity of leading those men. Jack. Use your judgment in calling on your men for displays of physical courage or bravery. Don't ask any man to go where you would not go yourself. If your common sense tells you that the place is too dangerous for you to venture into, then it is too dangerous for him. You know his life is as valuable to him as yours is to you. Occasionally, some of your men might be exposed to danger which you cannot share. A message must be taken across a fire-swept zone. You call for volunteers. If your men know you and know that you are right, you will never lack volunteers for they will know your heart is in your work, that you are giving your country the best you have, that you would willingly carry the message yourself if you could. Your example and enthusiasm will have inspired them. And lastly, if you inspire to leadership, I would urge you to study men. Get under their skins and find out what is inside. Some men are quite different from what they appear to be on the surface. Determine the workings of their mind. Much of General Robert E. Lee's success as a leader may be ascribed to his ability as a psychologist He knew most of his opponents from West Point days Knew the workings of their minds And he believed that they would do certain things under certain circumstances In nearly every case, he was able to anticipate their movements and block the execution You cannot know your opponent in this war the same way But you can know your own men you can study each to determine wherein lies his strength and his weakness which man can be relied upon to the last gasp and which cannot and he closes it out with something that has been adopted by the military by the army know your men, know your business know yourself and that's what we got know your men, know your business know yourself such a great document and so much is so applicable today because it's all based on human nature and technology changes and environment change and business changes and combat changes but at the end of the day we as humans our nature doesn't really change and Colonel Christian Albert Bach died in 1944 but left us these lessons we can still apply today of course you also mentioned physical vitality critical part of leadership to be able to endure physically and you know what sometimes people think that they can just rise to the occasion you know what I mean hey if I really If I really needed to do it, I could do it. That's actually not freaking true. You might be able to do a little bit more. A little bit more. But if it comes down to it, and you've got to do a rope climb, and you haven't been climbing ropes, and you haven't been doing pull-ups, I don't care how bad you want it. You can't get up that rope. You've got to carry somebody. You've got to buddy carry somebody. You can do it for, you know, maybe do it for 30, 40 meters. Then you've just got to start going uphill. What happens? You get your muscle failure, right? That's a real thing. Muscle failure. It doesn't matter how much mental will you try to summon to make something happen. It ain't happening. It ain't happening. Where you need to use your mental will is in the preparation. You've got to prepare, which means we need to lift. We need to run. We need to sprint. We need to train jiu-jitsu. We need to surf, swim, rock. We need to get after it. That's what we need to do. When we do that, by the way, we need fuel. I recommend Jocko fuel. You need protein. You need milk protein. Powder. Ready to drink. The whole nine yards. You need energy. We got you covered. You need hydration. We got you covered. You need supplementation. We got you covered. Joint warfare. We highly recommend. Super Krill Highly recommend Every day Time War Highly recommend Every day That's what we're doing If you want to get on the path Check out DracoField.com Sounds like you need some Cold War What do you got going on over there? You okay? You alright? I feel like I Coughing up a storm You're even making yourself You're going to have to edit People won't hear it Because you're going to edit it out No But you've caused yourself A couple edits here That's an extra labor For Echo Charles I don't feel like I'm sick in any way. I feel like I inhaled something. You know, you inhale something, like some dust or something. Something physical. Okay, yeah. That's what it feels like. That's annoying. JockoFuel.com. Go to your store. You can get it. We're all over the country now. Appreciate the support. It's weird. In this modern age, people know exactly what's being sold in the store. They know. So every time you roll in and you grab yourself an RTD, ready to drink, as they call it, where you grab a bag of protein powder delicious horchata flavor. Wait, is there really horchata? Yeah, we just made horchata. Wait, is that the... There's a pro series and then there's the OG. Okay, alright. Dang, that's interesting because my kids freaking love that. I was unfamiliar with it. I heard it, yeah, but I never had any and then we, this was maybe I don't know, two months ago, something like this and they got it. I was like, oh, bro, this is kind of different. I dig it. The thing that's, it's very sweet. Like, it ain't healthy. The regular horchata. Yeah, the real deal. You know, but our horchata, tasty. What is it, like a cinnamon scenario? Yeah. It's horchata. Yeah, like cinnamon. So, you know how you have the, the point here is that that's a good move. Because, you know, the fruity cereal one, right? And I remember thinking, oh, that's a good idea. But my favorite cereal milk remnants scenario is Fruity Pebbles. Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Oh, okay. We're good with that, Orton. Oh, I didn't know we had it. Now I know. And, you know, we're good to go. That's why we're here, man. Check it out, jockofuel.com, or go to a store and get yourself what you need. Also, check out originusa.com and get yourself some American-made gear. By the way, women's jeans. Yeah. It's been a long time coming. but the women's jeans, women's jeans, check them out. My wife got one of the prototype pairs and they were already good to go. Yeah. I saw a video. Favorite jeans, favorite jeans, by the way. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. That makes sense. Oh, because that's all mine are. You know Katie from Echelon Front? Yeah. She gave me like a rundown of why those women's jeans are the best jeans. She went full. She gave me every detail that there was, like things that I don't even know. Bro, that was my whole point. The fit, the whole nine yards. The video that I saw is like, you know, I don't know, maybe four or five ladies wearing the jeans. And, bro, they're just giving the report. And I'm like, bro, there are so many more elements to jean fit and all this other stuff compared to like a guy's jeans that I'm aware of anyway. So, you know, I got my one, two, three elements of criteria. I'm kind of good to go. Yeah, GTG. Oh, yeah. But for the females they got, she was telling me. I can't even remember what she was saying. Like, it was a list of excellence. A list of excellence. She's an athlete. She's a jiu-jitsu player. She's telling me why they're so good. It makes sense, too, because, let's face it, generally speaking, the female body has more curves and angles and all this other stuff than, let's say, generally speaking, a male body. That makes sense because in the video, they're like, oh, it fits here, but a lot of times it doesn't fit here when it fits here. But this one fits here and here, so it's like the ratios. We're a little bit more intense, I think. And by the way, 100% American made. And are we selling them for $480 the way other companies try and sell American made jeans? No, we're not. We're not. They are in the zone. So check out originusa.com. Plus, you got jeans for you, geese for you, rash guards for you. This is what we do from the ground up. American made. No communism. communist free jeans. It's important. A lot of people, so you don't know it. A lot of people, they're putting on communist infused jeans. You know what I mean? And then they're wearing communist and that communism is infusing into their body. Next thing you know, they're a slave. Someone puts on a pair of origin jeans. Freedom is infusing into their body. And they go out and take ownership of the world. That's what we're doing. So check out originusa.com. Get some American made gear. It's true Yes also Jocko Stor In full effect at this time You know we got the new get after it out That was kind of clever You look close on that one it looks clever There's layers I think I told you this The layers are tape The layers are JP Danell Putting tape on his helmet that says JP Because I was like Hey put JP on your helmet Because I want to be able to see you on the battlefield So you can handle shit So when you told that story I was like okay That's a cool story Actually JP told the story So I was like Oh yeah That's pretty legit And then When I saw the actual picture Yeah Of JP's helmet JP has that helmet Yeah So I figured Sharpie Or something like this And I'm like cool And just you know Never gave a second thought But when I saw the actual It was like with this black tape It's like tape I was like oh that's a good look right there Plus JP gets after it Let's face it There's a video called JP getting after it There's a reason why I was like JP Put JP on your helmet so I can see you. Because I might need you to get after it in a certain way. Exactly right, man. At a certain time. And he's the kind of MF-er that will get after it. Yes, exactly. Factually. JP, the freaking get-after-it instrument in this case. You see what I'm saying? So yeah, I took inspiration from that whole scenario and the get-after is made in tape. Looks dope. Yeah, yeah. So that's the new one. Also, you know, good. We got an updated good. we've got to update discipline equals freedom. It's kind of just kind of good to go at this point. Yeah, GTG as they say. All on JockoStore.com. Shirt Locker. Subscription. New design every month. People seem to like it. Guys at the Muster we just got back by the way. Guys at the Muster were like they didn't know. They're like hey I saw a shirt that said sugar coated lies and it had that symbol you know that X-Fight symbol. I was like yeah bro that's the one from the Shirt Locker so the design's a little bit more what creative we'll see outside the box we'll see but anyway check it out if you click on the top where it says shirtlocker you can see kind of what it's all about and yeah man if you want to subscribe to that get it we got some books put your legs on by Rob Jones we got need to lead by Dave Burke I've written a bunch of books extreme ownership, dichotomy leadership, leadership strategy and tactics just one goes freedom field manual and a bunch of kids books So check all those out. Also check out primalbeef.com. You need steak. So if you go to primalbeef.com, you can get steak delivered to your house. Also Colorado Craft Beef can deliver steak to your house. So check out primalbeef.com. Check out coloradocraftbeef.com. Echelon Front, we have a leadership consultancy. We solve problems through leadership. If you need help inside your organization, go to echelonfront.com. If you want to come to one of our live events, go to echelonfront.com. And also, if you can't come to one of our events, you can go to ExtremeOwnership.com and you can learn the skills of leadership online. So check that out. And if you want to help service members active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help Gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's an amazing woman who had an amazing son, and she now has an amazing charity organization. If you want to donate or you want to get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. also please check out heroesandhorses.org and finally Jimmy May's organization beyondthebrotherhood.org and if you want to connect with us check out jocko.com and then on social media I'm at jockowillink echoes at echocharles just don't spend too much time there because it ain't healthy it's a monster thanks to all the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines deployed right now in harm's way around the world, protecting us and our freedom. We are grateful. We are also grateful to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, and all other first responders. Thank you for protecting us here at home. And everyone else out there, we got some lessons today. Keep your emotions in check. have self-control and have physical vitality which you got to work for and you got to earn. Make light of your troubles. Belittle your trials. And of course assume responsibility for your own actions. The people that you lead they ask nothing more than that. So go get after it. And that's all we got for tonight. And until next time This is Echo and Jocko. Out.