At a turning point in his career as a US Naval Officer, Captain L. David Marquet was given command of the worst-performing submarine in the fleet, the USS Santa Fe.
During his command, Captain Marquet managed to turn the Santa Fe from the worst performer in the fleet to the best. Famous author Stephen Covey spent time on the Santa Fe and called it "the most empowering organization he'd ever seen.
Captain Marquet's "secret" was that he was able to transform his crew from a group of followers to a group of leaders. In 2009, Captain Marquet retired from the Navy and began bringing his intent-based leadership method to the corporate world. He's been able to help some of the largest companies in the world transform and grow.
His first book, Turn the Ship Around, was called the “best how-to manual anywhere for managers on delegating, training, and driving flawless execution” by Fortune Magazine. His latest book Leadership is Language uncovers the linguistic traps that imprison leaders and teams into outdated thinking that can turn costly and even deadly in many situations.
Captain Marquet came onto the Warrior Soul Podcast to impart his knowledge onto the small unit leaders and veterans who've now found themselves in the civilian corporate world.
In this conversation you will learn:
You can find Captain Marquet's book Leadership is Language here: https://amzn.to/2tfLQ6G
You can also find Turn the Ship Around, Captain Marquet's first book here: https://amzn.to/2S90WU2
In his famous work, "On the Shortness of Life," the stoic philosopher Seneca wrote, "It is not that we have a short space of time, but that we waste much of it. Life is long enough, and it has been given in sufficiently generous measure to allow the accomplishment of the very greatest things if the whole of it is well invested. But when it is squandered in luxury and carelessness, when it is devoted to no good end, forced at last by the ultimate necessity we perceive that it has passed away before we were aware that it was passing.So it is—the life we receive is not short, but we make it so, nor do we have any lack of it, but are wasteful of it."
Time is your most precious possession. It is more valuable than your money, your house, your car, or anything else you own. Yet we waste it so frivolously.
In this episode, I give you practical tips to get more out of your time and manage your day effectively.
Low testosterone is a problem that plagues many men as they get older. It is particularly a problem amongst the veteran community and especially amongst combat arms veterans.
The reasons for this range from poor lifestyle choices to the wear and tear that the profession has on the body and the brain. Low-level traumatic brain injuries, inflammation, and poor digestion all add up to become a detriment to testosterone production.
My guest today is Nick Koumalatsos, Marine Special Operations Veteran, author, filmmaker, and entrepreneur. Nick has been chronicling his battles with low testosterone and his use of hormone replacement therapy on his YouTube channel.
Nick has teamed up with Core Medical Group to bring some amazing resources to treat Low T to the veteran community. In this conversation, we break down the causes of low testosterone, how to fight it, and what to look for in a good HRT clinic.
To learn more about Core Medical Group, head over to https://www.coremedicalgrp.com/nickveteran
Learn about Nick's Testosterone Replacement Journey: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDu9J9feuOOqxREKm5g7ytl0v-zlgJTUQ
Today, we continue Marine Raider Week with the second part of my interview with Josh Honsberger.
In this episode, we cover:
Josh Honsberger is a Marine Special Operations Veteran, trainer, author, and entrepreneur. He is the coauthor of USMC Prep, Raider Prep, and Recon Prep along with Nick Koumalatsos.
Josh served for 13 years in the United States Marine Corps. He spent five years as an infantryman, 3 years as a weapons instructor at Quantico, and 5 years with Marine Special Operations Command (MARSOC).
In this episode, Josh and I discuss how he got into MARSOC, the hurdles he had to overcome, and the training he did to prepare. We'll be following up this episode with a follow on tomorrow about Josh's career in MARSOC, a catastrophic injury that ended his career, and how he pieced himself back together.
Learn more about Josh and Nick's Marine Raider Prep programs at https://www.nickkoumalatsos.com/raider-prep/
Everyone talks about the "pursuit of happiness" as if happiness is the end-all, be-all of living. One question hardly anybody ever asks themselves is whether or not happiness should be the aim in the first place.
Here's the deal: chasing happiness hardly ever brings you true happiness. Doing something meaningful, on the other hand, leads to a happier life, or it allows you to deal with the trials and tribulations of life more effectively. According to Viktor Frankl, the author of Man's Search for Meaning, meaning comes from doing something meaningful, and people find meaning in one of two ways:
1) dedicating themselves to a cause higher than themselves
2) dedicating themselves to someone other than themselves
In this podcast, I talk to you about the mistakes many veterans and civilians make in pursuing happiness, and how you can lead a better life by chasing meaning instead.
Read the article attached to this episode at: https://wp.me/pabO9v-4By
Low testosterone is a massive problem amongst men in the modern age, and it's particularly prevalent amongst men in the veteran community.
In this episode, I discuss things you can do before you head off to an HRT clinic and try to get testosterone replacement therapy. This is not to say that you should never opt for HRT. There are many men who actually need this therapy.
Nevertheless, HRT comes with a price. You will become dependent on those exogenous hormones and your natural testosterone production may shut down permanently.
It's worth the try to try to fix it naturally before you opt for exogenous hormones.
Additionally, if you do opt for HRT. my recommendation is that you find a doctor who knows what he or she is doing. There are many doctors who are barely qualified providing HRT therapy.
Nick Koumalatsos is a friend of the show who served as a Marine Raider. Nick is currently working with a reputable HRT clinic to provide HRT at a discount for veterans. You can learn more about this by watching this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYNGT13j4Bc
Schools teach us WHAT we need to learn without ever teaching us HOW. This is absolutely insane because learning is the one skill that could help you to improve your life in every single way.
Memory and speed reading expert Jonathan Levi joins us today to discuss the secrets he's learned about learning faster and more efficiently. Levi is an entrepreneur and angel investor who founded the Super Human Academy. He's also one of the top performing instructors on Udemy.
In 2015, Jonathan gave an inspiring Tedx talk on this subject which you can view at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtQzuwnyW6E
You can access all of the resources discussed in this episode on the show notes at http://www.warriorsoulagoge.com/podcast-show-notes/jonathan-levi
I've been appearing as a guest on a number of podcasts lately, and one of the questions I get often is "what would you tell your 20-year-old self."
Being 40, and running a podcast where most of the audience is in their 20s, I think about this a lot because I don't want you all to make some of the same mistakes I made:
So I decided to put together a list. This episode gives you five things you can start doing in your 20s so that you can dominate your 30s and beyond.
Every couple of weeks, I take questions from the Warrior Soul audience and I give you my take on everything from fitness to relationships and self improvement.
This week we cover:
Check out the show notes for this week's episode to get the resources at http://www.warriorsoulagoge.com/podcast-show-notes/ama-january-2020
In 2014, Matt Litrell decided that he needed to make a change. Since he'd gotten out of the Marine Corps, he hadn't been doing much except for drinking and sitting on his couch. Staring at his 9mm pistol, his demons started putting ideas in his head.
Then he got an idea. Matt decided that he was going to ride his horse across the country from Camp Lejeune, NC to Camp Pendelton, CA. In addition to that, he was going to use the ride to raise money for the Semper Fi Fund.
Matt Litrell started a Facebook page called The Long Trail Home to raise awareness about what he was doing, and to his surprise, thousands joined.
He began his journey, along with his riding partner Ray by wetting his black mustang's feet in the Atlantic coast of North Carolina. Then he and Ray headed south toward Georgia and then turned west. Seven months later, he wet his horse's feet on the beach near Camp Pendelton.
Along the way, Matt met many amazing people, including his future wife and many fellow veterans. This episode details his story and the work he's currently doing with veterans at the Valhalla Ranch in Colorado.
Corporal Jason Dunham sacrificed his life to save the lives of his fellow Marines by throwing himself onto a live grenade. That act of heroism led to him posthumously receiving the Medal of Honor, the first Marine to be given the nation's highest military award since the Vietnam War.
Jason Dunham's story of sacrifice and bravery is a story that will go down as legend in Marine Corps history. Generations of Marine recruits will learn Dunham's name as an example of physical and moral courage.
Jason Dunham will also be remembered through the men he saved. PFC Kelly Miller and Lance Corporal Bill Hampton were with him that day and would have likely been killed by the blast that Dunham's body absorbed.
Both of them, wracked with survivor's guilt, still go through their own battles, but have come to see Jason Dunham's sacrifice as a gift.
Today, filmmaker David Kneiss is working to bring Corporal Jason Dunham's story to film in a documentary called The Gift. This project originally started shortly after Corporal Dunham's death, but the pain was too much to bear so close to the tragedy.
Kneiss, who had a chance meeting with Dunham on a flight prior to his death, kept in touch with the Marines from Jason Dunham's unit. He decided that 2020 was the year to bring the project to life.
Now Kneiss is raising money to continue filming and hopes to bring the documentary to the screen within the next two years.
I brought David onto the show to talk about Corporal Jason Dunham's life, the Marines he saved, and this amazing project.
If you would like to contribute to the Gift Documentary, click here.
Finding the time to exercise is one of the biggest problems plaguing Americans today. Work, family, and other obligations often keep people from finding the time to work out and eat right.
Here's the thing, there are only two assets that truly matter in life, your mind and your body. Money, possessions, and property are important, but you cannot survive or thrive without being in good mental and physical shape. If you aren't finding the time to exercise, you are selling yourself short in other areas of your life.
In this episode, I give you 5 easy things you can do to find the time to exercise in 2020. These are practical things that you can begin implementing immediately after the show that will cost you little to no money to do.
Small actions can change your life and the more you find the time to exercise, the more you'll be able to find confidence, capability, and determination in other areas of your life.
Every New Year, millions of people set goals that they will never reach. While many commentators say New Years resolutions are useless, the real problem has nothing to do with setting resolutions. The problem is that we often set goals that don't carry a great enough meaning to follow through on. Even if a goal is set up perfectly under the SMART goal criteria, you won't get far with it if there isn't enough meaning behind it. Change is difficult and to create the change you need, you'll need to set a goal that motivtes you everyday for the long term. This video will help you to create a process to set meaningful goals for yourself in 2020
Walt Gragg is a United States Army Veteran, former lawyer, and military fiction writer.
His latest book, The Chosen One, follows the story of an unassuming holy man who gives rise to a worldwide Islamic fundamentalist movement that takes over the world and leads to a battle of epic proportions. The storyline also follows several characters in different theaters of the battle, including a Marine Force Recon officer who is tasked with delaying the Chosen One's forces until US reinforcements can arrive.
This is Walt Gragg's second time being on the show. Last time, he came on to speak about his first book The Red Line.
The Chosen One is action packed, enormously detailed, and captivating. It's characters, particularly the Mahdi, an Algerian cleric named Mohammed Mourad, and Marine 1st Lt. Sam Erickson, are enthralling.
Walt Gragg's books not only bring entertainment, but lessons for the avid military reader. There are many leadership lessons through it's pages and the detailed descriptions of the weaponry and tactics used are outstanding.
In this conversation, Walt Gragg discusses his writing process. He delivers solid advice to aspiring authors, and he gives us some insight as to his next project.
You can purchase The Chosen One here: https://amzn.to/2PZxOxe
I had someone ask me a few weeks ago, "looking out at a world with so much evil and so much bad, how could you believe in God and how can you get excited for something like Christmas? How could you put so much effort into your ideals"
This is a tough question. I've been in this person's position before and shared the same mindset.
I am by no means the wisest man in the world, but I have lived a good amount of life and this is my best answer:
It is precisely because this world is an imperfect place, because I know that evil exists, and because I know that there are things like suffering in this world that I hold onto my beliefs and ideals.
This is why I joined the Marine Corps in the first place, and why I run this podcast. It's why I pray everyday, why I take care of my body, and why I work so hard to spread this message. It's why I believe God put me on the path to do all of these things.
It's easy to become negative. It's easy to tell someone off, exact revenge, and it's easy to try to make this world more worse off than it is. The harder thing is to work on building this world into a better place, to lift people up, and to free yourself from negativity by forgiving.
We all need to hold ourselves to higher standards because the world is the way it is, especially within the warrior class. That's because we know that evil exists.
We're the ones who need to be strong because, paraphrasing Travis Manion, if not us, then who?
That is why I choose to believe in God. That is why choose to hold myself to higher ideals, and that is why I love the Christmas holiday.
It's a time when, in the face of evil, we can remember ideals like goodwill to all and peace on earth, even if they are ideals that might never be reached.
Wherever you are, and whatever you believe, my prayer for you is that you see a deeper meaning for you being here. Not an easy life, but a life that allows you to see all the good you might do if you open your eyes and your heart and dedicate yourself to something bigger than you.
Not just during this Christmas season, not just for a period, but through your life.
Merry Christmas and a happy holiday season to all of you.
Like many stories we bring to you on the Warrior Soul Podcast, the story of Craig and Fred begins on a battlefield. Battlefields are known to be places of horror, sacrifice, and death. They are also the sources of some of the greatest stories ever created.
Craig and Fred have a great story. It's the story of a US Marine, named Craig Grossi, who found a little dog in Afghanistan whom he named Fred. That dog worked his way into Craig's heart, and into the heart of his fellow Marines. Then Craig decided to bring Fred home to the United States.
The book, Craig and Fred has inspired thousands of people from across the country and across the globe.
I've been lucky enough to befriend Craig and Fred the Afghan, and to get to know both of them. I can say that both have huge hearts and a desire to help others gain the same stubborn positivity that made their story so great.
This is why I bring Craig Grossi onto the show each year around Christmas time. It's a story that can unite us in such divisive times and it's a story that can lift us up.
Brian Tally woke up one day with near paralyzing pain in his back. Brian is a Marine Corps Veteran, and like many veterans, he was in the VA System.
He went to the emergency room in excruciating pain, where he was given a cocktail of painkillers and then sent home.
The pain got worse, and Brian Tally found himself back at the hospital. Eventually, he underwent surgery and doctors found that he had a staff infection in his spine.
Brian's situation was worsened by the neglect of the VA Emergency room, and he was told that the VA would give him damages.
Then, they broke the news to him that the VA was not liable because one of the doctors who worked on him was an independent contractor. He had to sue them under state law, but they didn't give him this information until the statute of limitations for California was up.
Brian was left high and dry, but he's not going down without a fight. Now, Brian Tally is working to save other veterans from this loophole with the Tally Bill.
Kevin Meier is back on the show this week. Kevin is the creator of the very popular Pure Bullfit channel on YouTube.
Kevin's channel is centered on calling out bad actors in the fitness industry, while simultaneously giving his followers valuable advice for their own fitness journies.
Kevin is also a fellow veteran of the United States Marine Corps, and he is a man of the utmost integrity when it comes to bringing the best to his audience and his clients.
In this conversation, we discuss fitness as we head into our 40s, SARMs, steroids, and holding the fitness industry accountable for bad advice.
Human beings have been using psychedelic plant medicines for thousands of years. Often, those medicines were used as a way of helping the subject to reconcile experiences he or she had gone through.
But over the past century, psychedelics became stigmatized and prohibited. Seen as a major threat to society, the US Government took them off the table for anyone seeking to use them as medicine by making them a schedule one drug.
Recently, however, many are seeing psychedelic plant medicines like ayahuasca and dmt as a viable therapy for those dealing with trauma.
Jesse Gould of the Heroic Hearts Project is a US Army Veteran and former investment banker. He started the Heroic Hearts Foundation after having his own transformative experience with ayahuasca in Peru.
The Heroic Hearts Project takes veterans to Peru after extensive preparation to partake in their own healing psychedelic ceremonies.
To learn more about Heroic Hearts, visit https://www.heroicheartsproject.org
In 2016, Brandon Straka felt like the world was ending. President Donald Trump had just been elected, and as a gay man, he believed that the United States had just elected a regime that would oppress him and his values of tolerance and equality for all.
As the viral video he released nearly a year later explains, Brandon identified as a "liberal" because he rejects racism, the marginalization of any human being based off of gender or sexual preference, and tyrannical group think.
But as he looked around, he didn't see tolerance amongst the left. What he saw was a growing hatred for middle America, consistent attempts to marginalize people because they had white skin, and an irrational demonization of heteronormativity. Some on the left were even turning their sights against black men and gay men who didn't tow the line.
Increasingly disillusioned with what he once considered his tribe, Brandon decided to walk away from his identity as a leftist and the Democratic party. With it, he created the #walkaway movement, made up of those increasingly disillusioned with the direction that the political left in the United States is taking.
If you are a regular listener of this podcast, you're probably wondering "why is Chris going political?" Let me explain.
The mission of this podcast is to empower US Military Veterans to live their best lives. Many amongst our audience are headed to University campuses around the country, where they will continually have the values that they've fought for demonized. My fear is that as these young men and women go forth to continue their educations, they will be marginalized and told to sit at the back of the class and shut up, as many leftists have advocated.
If you disagree with me politically, that is fine and completely encouraged. I don't hate you. Like you, I reject racism, bigotry, and marginalization of anyone based on their sexual preference.
But I also believe in America, in religion, and on the value of equality regardless of race.
And for those reasons, I believe that it is my duty to bring Brandon's story to this community. If that causes me to lose listeners, then so be it.
If there is one thing that will determine whether or not you can be successful at anything, it's this: your ability to delay pleasure in favor of pain.
It's impossible to know what life has in store for us. Keith Murphy, US Army Veteran, certainly did not know what life had in store for him when he went out riding on his motorcycle one day.
He was hit by a woman who wasn't paying attention to her driving. He lost a leg, and his life was changed forever. At that moment, Keith had a choice: to allow the situation to break him or to allow the obstacles in front of him to make him stronger.
Luckily, Keith came in contact with the Adaptive Training Foundation, an organization started by former NFL Linebacker David Vobora after he was inspired by US Army Staff Sergeant Travis Mills, a quadruple amputee who lost his limbs in the war in Afghanistan.
The foundation runs a 9 week course that's built to empower those with physical disabilities through exercise. In that 9 weeks, Keith was rebuilt and transformed.
Today, Keith is not only continuing his career as a truck driver. He's running Spartan Races and climbing mountains because of this amazing organization.
In this interview, we discuss Keith's transformation with himself and his trainer, Alex Barham, a US Marine Corps veteran who works with athletes at the Adaptive Training Foundation.
You can donate to this amazing cause by heating over to http://www.adaptivetrainingfoundation.org.
Nick Bare is used to "embracing the suck." Completing US Army Ranger School can drive anyone to the ends of their endurance, but Nick rose to the task as a young Army infantry officer.
While he was in the Army, Nick Bare started Bare Performance Nutrition, a supplement company.
Entering as saturated market, Nick had to figure out a way to differentiate his brand. He did that with the Nick Bare YouTube Channel, which detailed his life as an Army Officer.
Soon his brand started taking off, and Nick and his brother had to begin scaling things up.
In this interview, Nick Bare reveals how he started BPN during his Army career and what he's doing now to grow.
Nick also discusses his new foray into endurance training, and how he deals with the wear and tear on his body.
To learn more about Nick, head over to his website: https://www.bareperformancenutrition.com/
And be sure to check out his YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/barelifenutrition
Pain, emotional or physical, drifts finds it's way into all of our lives at one time or another.
Regardless of how pain enters our lives, it leaves its impact. That impact can be devastating.
Pain can drive you to the ends of your sanity and to the edge of your strength, but pain can also make you stronger.
In this episode, Chris talks about how he deals with his chronic physical and emotional pain in his life.
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