Latest / Chris Thrall's Bought the T-Shirt Podcast / Shot On The Battlefield - Gurkha Officer & Helicopter Pilot | Ash Alexander-Cooper

Transcript

Shot On The Battlefield - Gurkha Officer & Helicopter Pilot | Ash Alexander-Cooper · Chris Thrall's Bought the T-Shirt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hello friends.
• 0:02
  Speaker 2: I'm your host, Chris Throuw.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: I'm a former Rulers commando.
• 0:06
  Speaker 3: I've adventured for better and sometimes worse, across eighty countries
• 0:12
  Speaker 3: on all seven continents. Welcome to the Port the t
• 0:16
  Speaker 3: Shirt Podcast. Yes, I actually think you've got a CV
• 0:27
  Speaker 3: a bit like mine. It's kind of, I think.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: The kind of saying it's eclectic, or you could just
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: say random.
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, but I think eclectic is good. Do you
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: think having a wide ranging life view, a holistic view
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: of life is sort of important for understanding who we
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: are and what our traumas have been and obviously the
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: healing process.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: I think, I mean for me, just generally in life,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I just feel like there's an urgency to just try
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: things and do things and experience things, both good and bad.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: And so I've always been that kind of person that
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: would always say yes to do something or volunteer for something,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: whatever it might be, and if it didn't work out
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: or it was unpleasant, then I might have learned something
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: in the process anyway. But you know your reference childhood trauma.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: I mean, I don't consider myself to have complex PTSD
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: in any way, but when I was writing my book,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: I certainly was forced to kind of look back at
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: my early years, and I think one of the reasons
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: why I can't sit still and have to try all
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: these things and do stuff is linked actually to some
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: of those experiences as a child, where there was a
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: risk always or an inherent threat that anything and everything
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: we had, whether it was friends or toys or even
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: the schools we went to, would be taken away at
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: a moment to notice if somebody else chose to. And
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: so I think there's that sort of constant drive to
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: just do more things and experience things just in case
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: sublimately that those things are no longer options or taken away.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: So I think there's definitely a link to those early
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: experiences as to why I have such a random CV
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: that you read out.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, I was just if I'm looking across friends, I'm
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: not ignoring my guest, I'm just putting stuff up on
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: the other screen. There. We're going to come on and
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: talk about your book Mind Mindful Soldier, and we'll come
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: back to our childhood experiences. Ash. I couldn't sort of
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: gather looking at your LinkedIn and your information when you
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: say Elite Forces, could you just expand could you all
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: give us a you know, what was your military career.
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: It's fascinating that you work with the Gurkhas, but you're
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: also a pilot.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so well yeah, I mean again, it's a bit random.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: I joined the Army expecting to do three maybe five years.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: I didn't think of it ever as a career, genuinely,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: And when I was going through training and looking at
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: the different regiments that were available to join, I honestly
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: had no idea quite how many there were. And I
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: was overwhelmed by the number of different types of regiments
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: in different locations, et cetera. And I thought, if I
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: was going to do just a three or maybe five
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: year career, I wanted to look for a regiment that
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: might offer the most interesting experiences in that time, if
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: that was the window that I had. And at the time,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: the Gurkhas were in five airborne brigades. They were airborne
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: soldiers doing parachuting, which had always appealed to me. I'd
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: had sort of parachute regiment cadet leaders back in the
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: day when I was a bit younger, who'd always encourage
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: me that parachuting was a great thing to be doing.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: And they were in Hong Kong. They were doing obviously
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: a lot of the soldier their all from Nepal, so
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: I would have to learn a language, learn a culture.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: They were doing other things in the UK and officers
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: were able to go and do CANDI terrorism work in
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: Northern Islands. So I thought, if I'm going to do
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: that short period of time in the army, then this
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: would be a really fascinating place to be. And I
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: was fortunate to be selected, and that's the regiment that
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: I joined, and that's where it all started. Became a
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: jungle warfare instructor and all sorts of other fun things
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: like that, deployed to Bosnia, Northern Ireland and other places.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: And then opportunities just kept presenting themselves. So I had
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: friends who were off to do the pilot's course. I thought, well,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: that sounds interesting. Never never planned on being a pilot either,
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: but why not let's give it a go, And off
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: I went, and then flew for her for a while,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: links helicopters which have now been retired, which it makes
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: me feel very old. And you see the helicopter you
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: flew sitting outside of Camp Camp Gate as a museum piece.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: But it was a great helicopter. To fly great fun,
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: huge amount of experience doing that, which was very valuable.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: And then the rest of my career that I sort
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: of carried on looking for different opportunities. I did time
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: in the mod which was interesting, let's say, lots of
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: time in operational deployments with various joint users and units.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: Worked a lot with the Americans, worked with a huge
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: amount with NATO. So very very fortunate to have had
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: a very varied career. As you mentioned in the intro,
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: seven years deployed in all the places. So yeah, I've
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: got no regrets for having accidentally stayed twenty two years
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: regular in another four or five years, six years in
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: the reserves. It's been a fascinating journey, yes, the girl.
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: Because all the interm skirkas I should say, always kind
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: of well liked within well within the country, aren't they.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: I did two I ended up doing two power courses
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: for reasons I won't go into, but they certainly seem
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: to be I think they were the biggest alongside the
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: young Powers. They they were the most people on the course.
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: Didn't always like jumping out of aeroplanes though, Is that
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: is that fair to say?
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't say that was necessarily fair. I mean, I
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: know people criticize their lack of air awareness sometimes that
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: they they'll happily jump out, but what they then do
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: when they're under canopy is not necessarily always the most
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: By the book Way to Fly a Parachute, there is
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: a funny story amo being told once about back in
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: Malaya days where they were looking for volunteers to trial
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: a new type of jungle entry where they thought they
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: could fly planes low over the jungle and people would
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: jump out into the jungle with parachutes, and they were
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: looking for volunteers. They went to one of the Gurky
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: units and said that look, we're going to be doing
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: this thing. Planes would fly fairly low of the jungle
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: and then you jump out, and then that's the way
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: we think we could get you behind enemy lines to deploy.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: And they had a really low number of volunteers put
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: their hands up, which they thought was very unusual because
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: girk Is normally stick their hands up for everything. And
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: then they said and here's the parachute, and the rest
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: of went, oh, parachute for the rest of them put
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: their hands up. So actually those that volunteered initially thought
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: they were just going to have to jump out of
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: the plane into the trees. So yeah, good bunch.
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: What about the Is it a myth that when they
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: draw their cookery it has to draw blood?
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: I mean, I certainly, I think it used to be
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: the tradition. I've not seen people do that actively when
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: they've drawn to cut down a tree or get through
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: the jungle. People aren't then cutting themselves before they put
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: it away. So it's a I think it's an ancient tradition.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: But the principle applies in the sense that if a
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: girka draws a cookery in anger, it's because they're going
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: to do something with it. It's not something that they
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: would do likely.
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: Did you get issued one as a platoon commander?
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: Notish sort of issued or you get presented by that.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: So when I joined my first platoon, they said, right
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: now here is your actually got to hear. So I've
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: got my jungle, my jungle cookery with that with the
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: blade painted blacks. There's no shine when you're in the jungle,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: no sun can glint off it and wrapped in in
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: camouflage stuff and that would live on my belt kit
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: for when I was deployed.
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: Wow, So what recommendations would you give me for my
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: Everest summit in April and May with respect. Is getting
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: on well with the Nepalese.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: Well, they're very easy to get on with. I mean,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Nepali people are so kind and so generous, and I
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: talk about it in the book at the end in
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: terms of a really great lesson when you spend time
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: in a country like that that is inherently pretty poor,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and even people who have virtually nothing, they are the
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: most generous people you will ever come across. So they
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: can never do enough for you. They're just lovely kind people.
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: But they're pretty hard, you know they are. They are
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: gritty and determined and they are very very resilient as
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: a nation. But in terms of climbing Everest, and I
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: love the idea of it, but I've got frost damaged
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: fingers and toes and I quite fancy having them still attached,
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: So I don't think I'll ever be going up that far.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: But I know plenty of people who have climbed in many,
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: many cases multiple times, so you should definitely speak I'm
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: sure you are, but speak to a lot of people
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: who have summitted successfully, because there'll be the ones to
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: give you the tips, not the people who nearly got
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: there but didn't quite make it.
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely are there any Are there any taboos
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: that we need.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: To avoid, as in with Nepali people culturally.
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: I lived in Hong Kong, you know, for for a while,
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: and it was it was kind of crazy. My experience
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: was in two phases. First, was completely oblivious as an
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: expat to even the fact that this is a different culture.
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: I don't know why you can kind of get this
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: thing growing up that you think, well, we're all the
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: same and we and in Hong Kong I got to
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: kind of like a midway point, and then just things
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: unraveled and I realized that I didn't even have a
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: clue where I was living, and the differences I'm not
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: saying this is a negative, but the differences between our
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: cultures was so enormous. Even a little things like I
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: used to buy the security guard on the door of
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: my building. If I went out to the seven eleven
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: and get drinks, I'd come and grab them a Coca
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: Cola or something. I didn't realize that's absolutely that's considered patronizing.
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: And so I just wondered if if there's anything I
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: need to be not really I.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: Mean, like a general all in life is just don't
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: be a dick, you know, treat people with kindness and
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: respects because they will do anything and everything for you.
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: And like any language, you know, when if you're not
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: from that place, if you can learn a few words
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: even just please and thank you and good morning and
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: that sort of stuff, it makes a lot of difference
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: because it just shows that you've actually made an effort.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: I think in any any country you go to where
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: if you turn up and you just speak loudly in
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: English and expect people to understand or do what you
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: want it, it'll it's always more difficult. So yeah, just
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: a bit of respect and recognizing that for them, you know,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: the Himalayas and and and ever as specifically as a
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: religious sort of sight for them, they treat it with
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: great reverence. So just being respectful of that is as
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: important as anything else.
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, I'm making roads into the language.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: I have to say.
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: It's it's harder than I thought, But then there we
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: go talking to someone who speaks fluently.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: Well, I used to not anymore. I'm pretty rusty, but yeah,
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: I do. It was fun to learn. It's it's an
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: interesting language and you know, like any thinking, if you're
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: under stress, and obviously in the military in some scenarios,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: in combat situations, it can be stressful if you're being
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: shot at, or somebody's been blown up, or you know,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: people are wounded. And even though the working language language
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: for us in the Gurkhas was English, clearly people are
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: going to revert to their native tongue under pressure. And
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: if you're just chat if you were a bunch of
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: Brits or Americans or whatever in another country, you're not
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: going to deliberately just try and speak the local language
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: if if you're chatting with with people from your own culture.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: So I took it upon myself to treat the learning
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: of a language really, really seriously, because I wanted to
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: be as competent as I could be so I could
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: engage and understand them as best I can. And I'm
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: just a little bit rusty now because it's been quite
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: a few years since I've had to speak Yeah.
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: That's that's the thing, isn't it. When you can put
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: an awful lot of time into learning other languages. I've
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: done it in numerous countries and regions now and come back,
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: come back home for a few months and then you
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: it's you just start to lose it again. It's quite frustrating.
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, so Ash, what what was the idea behind
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: the book? Then I'm just going to show it on
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: the screen again?
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: What what? What stage? I was gonna say, I didn't
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: mean to write a book. It was completely really by accident.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: I had no plan to write a book. So I
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: would pass myself as either a reluctant or an accidental
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: author really, But because I have happened to have had
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: a number of experiences over my lifetime, some of which
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: have been fairly extreme in a number of different ways personally, professionally, etc.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Been very lucky to be a part of some very
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: high performing teams, you know, both internationally as you mentioned,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: in sports, but also in other walks of life. And
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: various friends and colleagues sort of bullied me over a
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: number of years and ground me down and said, look,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: some of these things, if you could find a way
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: to capture them, might help other people. Would you be
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: interested in doing that? And I wrestled with whether that
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: was sort of self indulgent to write stories that were
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: my stories, But I came to a kind of reconciliation
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: with myself that if I could write in a way
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: thematically with different types of trauma resilience and experiences of
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: challenge and adversity and overcoming adversity and succeeding and thriving
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff growth and recovery, if
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: I could find a way to write it that would
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: be helpful to others, and even though they are my
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: sort of stories, they're not about me or for me,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: then I might consider it. So that's what we ended
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: up doing. There are twelve chapters that cover everything from
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: self doubt, fear of failure, imposter syndrome. There are some
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: military vignettes in there because some people want to hear
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: all that relationship breakdowns, loss hour of community and so
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: of the peer support that you can get from that
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: and kindness and respect, etc. So we tackle a bunch
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: of different themes in the book with my ramblings first,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: and then a very good friend of mine now who's
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: an international neuropsychologist with a lot of experience in complex
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: PTSD and neuropsychology generally, but particularly in relation to emergency
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: services and policing. So I partnered with Jess Dr Jess Miller,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: and Jess takes my ramblings and then in Layman's speak,
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: turns them into a clever explanation of what's actually going
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: on in the brain. So when I talk about an
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: incident or an experience that was traumatic or challenging, then
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: she also explained why that is the case, because the
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: brain doesn't cope with these things in the moment. It
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: takes time, and this is what the chemicals are doing.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: Different the bits of the brain have different roles, and
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: she kind of breaks it down in a really easy
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: to understand way to explain why these things are hard
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: and why building resilience is often a painful process, but
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: it's a necessary process to become stronger and come through
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: the other side and be more resilient as a result.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: And then she offers or we offer a number of
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: tips and techniques and practical exercises to help people if
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: they are struggling with those kind of things. So it's
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: not a memoir, it's not a military book. Any military
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: references really are just a vehicle to explain a different
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: type of experience or trauma or challenge. So it's going
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: to live, hopefully in the sort of section of the
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: bookshop that is more the smart thinking, emotional psychology kind
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: of vibe than a memoir or a biography all that
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff. So it should hopefully endure for a
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: long time in wh Smith at the Airport and all
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: those other stores where there's always that section that sort
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: of sits there at the front of the shop that
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: people can pick up. And because it's coming out in January,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: we're hoping it'll be a kind of new Year, new
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: you kind of vibe where people are looking for a
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: different path or a change of approach for them in
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: the new year, and we hope we can help with that.
• 15:08
  Speaker 3: Brilliant I walked through he Throw once and my book
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: was above James Corden's on the best seller list.
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: That was and you didn't put it there, you didn't
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: move it. Yes, no, it's guilty of doing that.
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: It's oh yeah, I mean you've got to turn your
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: book face out when you own the bookshops. But now
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: it made me chuckle because as you well, well, you're
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: probably mixing different circles to me ash. But when you
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: write a book, you're going to have no end of
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: people telling you not to and why are you doing that?
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: And it's the ones that say, well, I'll read it
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: for you and i'll let you know. So when I
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: walk through he throw airport and it wasn't number twelve
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: on the best seller list or something, I was a bit.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I've got a friend who he wrote. He's written
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: a couple of books now, but his first books he
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: now doesn't mention because he's not very proud of it anymore.
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: And he said he was on the plane once and
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: saw the person in the seat a couple of seats
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: away from him reading his book, and there was no
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: photo of them on the book or anything, so the
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: guy would not have known that he was the author.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: He goes, oh, see, you got that book. I was
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: about to get that one. What do you think? He goes, Oh,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: that's a crap. Don't don't buy it, waste the money.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: So his next book did really well, it's won a
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: bunch of awards. But he said, yeah, this is a
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: necessary journey. You've got to be able to take the
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: rough with the smooth.
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, there's there's there's a whole kind of psychological
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: mechanism for dealing with that negativity. And it's a funny world.
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: I'm just a great believer. If you haven't got anything
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: nice to say, just don't say it. You know, Ash
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: doesn't want me said rubbish stuff about well that's mental,
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: it's crazy. But you know, in the world of social
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: media and everything, everyone thinks they've got a voice and
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: that they've got to exercise at every opportunity. And as
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: a content provider, you've got to you know, you you've
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: got to have waste of distance his from that, I suppose.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean we're tracking its sort of progress. It
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: sits in the hot New Releases section and it goes
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: up and it's been up to number two in Amazon.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: Although we did chuckle yesterday we saw it was number
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: three in a section that I've not seen before of
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: death and grief, Like that wasn't a section I was
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: planning beating here. But if it's helping people who are
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: worried about that kind of stuff, then then I'll take
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: any I'll take any bestseller placements.
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: That I ca Yeah, you've got to work with Amazon
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: there a bit to get them to put it in
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: the right categories because they kind of saw the guests
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: Bear Grills. Is he a mate of yours.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we've known each other a long time. Yeah, he's
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: been very supportive. He was one of the biggest bullies
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: actually for making me write the book in the first place,
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: so I blame him partly for this.
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, good stuff.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: It's been very supportive.
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: So I should just go back to the beginning. And
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: so where did you grow up?
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: So? I grew up in the south of England in
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: a fairly small village and went to school locally in
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: near Winchester or in Winchester stuff. And because I could sing,
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: it turned out I managed to get a place in
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: a choir called Winchester Cathedral Choir and sang for five
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: years really in the choir my early years, which was
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: a really interesting experience. We did lots of TV and
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: radio and made a bunch of records, and we were
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: selected for a thing that Android Webber did back in
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: the day called Requiem, which ended up having a single
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: that was taken out of that particular album called Piayaz,
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: which we ended up getting to number two or number
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: three on top of the pops back in the late eighties,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: which was fun. Yeah, So, you know, incredible experience. We
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: traveled the world singing, you know, Vienna Boys Choir in
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: the music line in Vienna and in all the big
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: concert halls in New York and la and stuff. You know,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: pretty fascinating experience really for a a young kid. And
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: when I was writing, I was reflecting on I don't
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: remember ever being nervous. You know, nerves is a thing
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: that you kind of learn as you get older. Right, No,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: we had very little self consciousness in terms of how
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: big a deal some of the things were that we
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: were doing. And when we did the world premiere of Directly,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: A'm live in New York being to sixty countries or something,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: and we were just like, yeah, you know, it's let's
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: just sing. It'd be fine. Now somebody told me I
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: was being being live to sixty countries. You know, on
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: the stage, I might be thinking, oh my god, that's horrendous.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Be far more nervous now as an adult, but I
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: was as a twelve year old or eleven year old
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: or whatever I was at the time.
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's changing for young people.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: Would you agree with all the all the insecurity that
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: comes with social media and all the oversharing and all
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: this kind of stuff. I'd imagine you've probably got a
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: lot of kids with anguality now, Yeah.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: I mean I worry that the chasing of likes and
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: that kind of stuff, and I'm sure it affects adults
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: almost to equally his children, to be honest, but adults
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: in theory have more coping mechanisms to understand that, you know,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: you're not going to get thousands of likes on a
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: thing that you might post or not. I just I
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: do worry that this need for it external validation to
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: make people feel whole is quite a negative thing, or
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: it's a thing that could become very negative for many people.
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm so grateful now looking back that obviously
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: there were no phones, there were no cameras. Really, you know,
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: if you had a camera, it was a big deal
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: that you took a camera somewhere on holiday and you
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: maybe took your twelve pictures and then you had to
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: go down to boots and get them processed, and you know,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: you thought about everything. You weren't taking shots every thirty
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: seconds of your food or this or that. So I
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: do wish that for a lot of kids, for whom
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: this is quite anxiety inducing having this needs to be
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: constantly creating something or being present online for people most
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: of whom you may not even know, but from whom
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: you are relying on validation to feel like you know,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: you're popular or whatever. I do worry about that a lot.
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: Yes, my dream come true is the day when I
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: ditch your social media and the people are asking, well,
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: why have you got it? I'm just I made a
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: you know, I made a promise to myself. I made
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: a certain with respect to my career to get to
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: a certain place, which I still haven't got to twenty
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: years of trying. But it's just for my business, you know,
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: It's just I produce content, and you've got to let
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: people know what you know, what books you're right in,
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: what videos you're making, what mountain you're climbing next, what
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: charity work you're doing. And it's handy. But if I
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: was an individual and I wasn't doing any there's asol.
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: I would love not to have it in my life.
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: I'd love to go for a run and not think, oh,
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: should have put my Strava on.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: And you know.
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: It's I want to come on to that. I want
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: to come on because you mentioned something very special there.
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: And this is the problem why I think we lose
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: a lot of veterans is the externalizing our sense of
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: self worth, and that's that becomes problematic when we're in
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: doctorate into a troop mentality. You you have to look
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: after the troop. I had to be a troupe member,
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: and there's always that imposter syndrome, fear of the other,
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: am I letting everyone down, this kind of stuff. So
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: we'll come on to that. But so that was a
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: fascinating part of your childhood. Ash you mentioned some what
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: were the more challenging parts.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: The challenging thing really was that my father was a manic, depressive, alcoholic,
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: and so family life or home life was pretty unstable.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: If I had probably just the summary word would be unstable.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: Quite a lot of emotional and verbal abuse obviously, lots
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: of drinking, screaming and shouting and smashing things up. So
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: it got to the point that I just stopped going
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: home really as a kid, and I luckily was at
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: various boarding schools, which you had to be at to
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: be in the choir because it was such a full
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: time job really, but I just I worked out that
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: many of the incidents that took place were triggered by
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: me coming home, and so I just thought, if I
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: can not go home, then maybe that'll protect my mum
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: my sisters from you know, being also co recipients of
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: the abuse that we would receive as a result of
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: my arrival back. So that was challenging for everybody really,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: but again it taught me a lot of lessons, as
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: unpleasant as it was at the time, you know, I
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: do write about this that it taught while it showed
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: me firsty that some of the families with whom I
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: stayed when I wasn't going home, you know, and I
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: had some incredibly amazing friends who had lovely families, and
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: just realizing and learning that there was another way that
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: screaming and shouting wasn't necessarily normal, and the abuse that
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: we just got used to was not normal. And when
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: I used to stay with some of these families, it
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: was always slightly disconcerting when like one of one incident,
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: one of my best friends, his dad worked for the
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: United Nations and they lived in Rome in a small
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: apartment that I used to go. I used to draw
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: because it was a sort of artist as a kid
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: would do paintings or drawings to sell enough to buy
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: a plane ticket to go and be able to stay
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: with them. So I would often be in Rome with them,
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: and they were always trying to play tricks on their
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: dad these my friend and his younger brother, and I
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: used to get I used to get so nervous because
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: the stuff they were doing in their dad, which is
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: pretty mean. If it had been my case, I would
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: have been beaten to, you know, every which way till Sunday,
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: and the dad just went, you know, just would laugh
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: like a sort of Father Christmas kind of haughty laugh
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: and just go oh you boys, and it's just like,
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: oh my god. I sort of lived on ten hooks
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: for a while when I was with normal families because
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: I just was expecting this, whatever they did or the
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: things that were said were to would suddenly escalate to
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: an incident, which is all I knew. So there was
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: lots of learning and healing by being part of normal,
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: normal families. And it taught me as well that particularly
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: I was in a lot of sports teams that those
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: friends you know, with whom I was doing sport day
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: and day out on the rugby pitch or on the
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: river or judo dojo or whatever it might be, were
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: absolutely critical. So that friend network. I've always been somebody
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: who tries to stay in touch with as many people
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: as I can and be there for them if anyone
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: else ever needs it, because without that friendship group, I
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: don't know quite where I'd be.
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: Honestly, Yes, the sins of the father, it's a massive,
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: a huge effect. Well can speak personally on young men.
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: I'd imagine probably quite a few of us during the
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: military had similar similar experience. Alcohol is really you know,
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: we don't really address the elephant in the room in
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: this country, do we. You made me chuckle there talking
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: about your friend's dad. I was trying to order something
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: for my brother on Amazon Prime the other day and
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: I put my Amazon Prime on and it said, this
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: is Amazon talking to me. It said hello, piss okay,
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: so I clicked on my profile. It said, piss off, daddy,
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: my son's ten years old.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: Nice touch.
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: All of us in the were just cracked up, and
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: I remember thinking, my god, that that would not have
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: been the response when I was you know, that literally
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: would have been a trip to the head master's office.
• 26:11
  Speaker 3: You know, like you say, a lot of a lot
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: of violence back then. And I think it's great that
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: we can, we can, you know, stop stop that. So Sandhurst,
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: what I take it you you training? Does all the
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: army officers training Sandhurst?
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, everyone goes through there. So it's a year
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: course and then halfway through that is when you get
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: to select the regiment that you'd like to join, and
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: then you go through an interview process and if you're
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: lucky to get your first choice, great, If you're not,
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: then you have a second choice and hope that they'll
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: take you. And if you don't get either of those,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: then you kind of go into a pool, and then
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: there are much larger regiments that take sort of everyone
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: that's left, I suppose. So again, I'm very lucky that
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: the girk Is accepted me, and that was that's where
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: I went.
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: Yes, sorry, Actually I just want to track back a
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: bit because I meant to say I just wanted to
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: boarding schools. Can you tell us, you know, did you
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: experience abuse going on? I don't mean like personally, is
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: it like a thing I'm guessing.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: I mean I was beaten a lot, but it was
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: the seventies and eighties, and I was labeled as a
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: naughty child, which I was. I mean, the idea now
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: that I mean again, I talk about it in the
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: book with hopefully a little bit of humor, about the
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: kind of infments that I was beaten with. Everything up
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: to it, including a floor tile, because that's all the
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: teacher had to hand in the classroom that he'd taken
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: me down to to teach me a lesson. But in
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: terms of I guess we were getting up some more
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: sexual abuse. I certainly was never exposed to any of that,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: and don't know anybody in my friend group who was.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: But there were certainly teachers that many years after the fact,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: one would look back now with the benefit of hindsight, go, yeah,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: there was absolutely no way they should have been teaching.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: But we as kids at the time knew the teachers
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: that you should never be alone with, but nothing was
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: ever you know, we didn't report them anyway. It's just
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: we just knew as a sort of unwritten rule as kids,
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: like don't ever find yourself in a room with mister
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: whoever or whatever. And we just knew there were strange
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: teachers that were not to be trusted, and there was
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: a sort of just an innate code or knowledge that
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: this was not a safe place to be. But you know,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: it was the seventies and early eighties, so nothing really
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: was ever done.
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: Then, ash, do you mind if I ask how old
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: you are?
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: Fifty two?
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, you think you're fair in the years a
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: bit better than me. I'm fifty said, yes, your paper
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: around was obviously easier than mine. So yes, Sandhurst. Does
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: everybody go through the identical training there, despite you might
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: be going to different regiments.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So it's basically management and leadership training generic, within
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: which you learn a bunch of different things, many of
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: which may not be directly relevant to the place you
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: end up, but they're all useful skills in terms of
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: learning lead ship and management. And I think now you
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: actually get some kind of civilian qualification that it the
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: course equates to a an MVQ or something or other
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: that that is a recognized certified level of management and leadership.
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: We certainly didn't have that at the time. But it's
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: a year of sort of foundational learning. But really the
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: main learning happens once you actually go into get into
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: the go into the wild and get your your first
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: batoon or troop and then really learn what soldiering and
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: leadership is all about.
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: What was your nemesis in training? Ash? Mine was always
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: a speed marching and it was short legs, lots lots
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: of equipment. I never I never failed one, but I
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: was I used to just go at the back so
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: I could, so I didn't mess anyone else up.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: I didn't really have any a nemesis per se. I
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: mean I quite enjoyed the whole process that as long
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: as you when I was lucky that I was quite
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: a fit person and always been very sporty, So as
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: long as you could do well in all the fitness
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: tests and you know, you could iron your clothes and
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: turn up on time, it seemed like it was fairly
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: basic admin. Honestly, a lot of the early course is
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: very similar to soldier training. You know, it's just how
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: do you march, how do you clean your shoes, how
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: do you iron your clothes. It was a lot of
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: that was just do as you're told, So I didn't
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: find it hugely challenging. I mean there were exercises where
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: you were tired and wet and pissed off and cold
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: and everything else, which is just part of learning, right,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: you know, digging a trench and in one case, go
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: go on an exercise where I was on the sentry
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: duty and an overseas cadet was tasked I was, I
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: was paired with him and he was tasked to dig
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: the trench or the shell scrape that we were going
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: to lie in overnight. And I came off my two
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: hours or three hours of Century duty whatever it's hessing
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: with rain in the middle of a Welsh forest, and
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: I got there and he was fast asleep, snoring with
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: a shell scrape there was about three feet long because
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: he was really really small, and it's like do and
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: when I couldn't fit in it, but he was good
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: enough for him, so he just like, I'm good and
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: he went to bed, thanks very much. So then I
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: have to dig again. But now we had I mean,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: I'm still really close to a lot of the platoon
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: that we had, and I was actually out last night
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: with a couple of platoon colleagues from way back when
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: we're still very very close. We have a WhatsApp group
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: where the banter is still fierce. You know, it's like
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: we've never left in terms of the way we interact
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: and you know, are very very tight as a team.
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's good. I think I think you appreciate your
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: buddies more, don't you as you get older.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, we were even chatting last night. I
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: was asking if anybody because they had a reunion recently
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: that unfortunately, I wasn't able to go to and ask
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: you if everyone was healthy, you know, because of get
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: to your fourties and fifties and cancer and unpleasant things
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: like that tend to creep up, and there's generally always
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: somebody in a in a friend group or a team
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: that has suffered. But touch words, so far, we all
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: seem to be faring pretty well. So long may that last?
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: Yes? Good?
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: Good? What do you think of a notion like in
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: the Marines, there's a big kind of like Facebook community
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: or groups and this kind of stuff, and there's a
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: lot of these guys why really still just absolutely love
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: love it. You'd think that they was all still serving.
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: I'm a little bit more like, to be honest, I
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: think if Facebook hadn't come around, I wouldn't have thought
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: about the Marines at all. I left in nineteen ninety five,
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: all good stuff, you know, it's a good, good career
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: for a young man. But I've gone on and done
• 32:19
  Speaker 3: an awful lot of other stuff since. But you get
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: this kind of notion that the military makes you, and
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: I'm just wondering what your thoughts are on that. I'd
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: say more the military presents you a platform where if
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: you've got the qualities in you that they sort of
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: they sort of come out, if that makes sense.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: I think probably a mixture. I think it's hard to
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: put a one size fits all on everybody. But I
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: think for some they absolutely know the military where it's
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: on me av Air Force or Marines or whatever do
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: make them, you know, if they've come, particularly from a
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: background where they've not had the stability or structure or
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: certainty about what's coming extent, actually having that opportunity will
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: whether it makes them or just helps them become the
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: people that they are destined to be. And I think
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: it's incredibly owerful community and structure within which people can thrive,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: particularly if they've come from deprived backgrounds or places where
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: opportunities are fleeting or few and far between. So I
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: think for some they've known all along, they always wanted
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: to serve, and they might have innate leadership skills or
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: what have you. But for many that's not the case.
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: And leadership can be learned and can be taught, and
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: it is taught and people some are late bloomers and
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: some arrive on day one. And I remember feeling very
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: out of my depth at Sandhurst because I never joined
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: the cadets souther at school, which was more just a
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: fun club. I suppose there were people who turned up
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: in our platoon and company at Sandhurst, some of who
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: were former soldiers, so they just knew how to do everything,
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: and we all felt incredibly out of our depth that
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: there were people who seem to know everything that was
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: going on and some of us just didn't have a clue.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: So I think, you know, everyone turns up with different
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: levels of preparation, understanding, experience, etc. And I think what
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: Sandhurst and Limpster and other places do very well is
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: take that raw material and then identify the skills that
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: are needed to augment the core product, let's say, to
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: turn it into something that's going to be really valuable
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: where every individual can feel like they've got purpose and
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: teamwork and you know, all the skills they might need
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: to thrive and be successful in their careers.
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: You saw some action ash reading your biography there, You've
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: also got wounded. What people always sort of sort of
• 34:35
  Speaker 3: skirt this when I'm chatting on podcasts and I'm like,
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: hang on the audience, this is stuff they I think
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: we all try to be a bit humble because we're
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: coming from a military perspective, but the audience obviously haven't been,
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: for example, in Afghanistan on the front line with or
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: in my case, an aorthern island conflict with literally with
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: bullets was in past their ears. Could you give give
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: us an example of a hairy moment.
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: I've had a few, and maybe I'm just careless, but
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: I've in my seven years of deployments, I've been shot
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: a couple of times. I've been blown up a couple
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: of times. I've been in a couple of helicopter crashes,
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: incidents and a suicide. Bombers tried to kill me once
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: on my birthday, which was kind, and a bunch of other,
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: you know, more hairy moments, But obviously getting shot was
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: the hairyist, I guess because I was very lucky. I'm
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: very lucky to still be here. I was shot in
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: both legs, also hit with a couple of grenades that
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: exploded rocket propel grenades exploded behind me, so I got
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: pepper with strapped off from them as well. A couple
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: more bullets went through my backpack, which I only realized
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: the next day that just went behind my head, so
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: that was quite lucky. And the bullet my left leg
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: was less than a centimeter above my knee joint, So
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: if I'd always wanted to be taller, but actually if
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: I'd been a little bit taller, that might have met
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: I was lost my leg. So you know, I'm very
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: lucky to have come through those sorts of things. Sadly,
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: have lost many colleagues along the way, not just Brits
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: but other coalition colleagues and partners and friends, probably to
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: the tune of seventy plus killed and many more with
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: life changing injuries. I know far too many widows and orphans.
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: So because I do feel pretty lucky and fortunate to
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: still be here and able to be high functioning and
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: able to support the community, that's why I've thrown myself
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: into doing as much as i can to support various charities.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: I'm an ambassador for RAW British Veterans Enterprise, also supported
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: Combat Stress and GOK Welfare Trust and a bunch of
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: other charities along the way as well, and I've committed
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: to give one hundred percent of all profits from my
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: book to veterans charities, because, as I said earlier, it's
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: not about me. If there's anything that I can do
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: to help those who are less fortunate than me. Then
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: that's kind of what drives me. So yeah, lots of
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: hairy incidents, but I'm still here to tell the tale,
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: so that's always good from my perspective, at least.
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: I've always wanted to ask someone how painful is it
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: when you get shot?
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: But it doesn't thickle. It's a weird feeling of if
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: you blunt traumat I mean you might mayun tried to
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: say it, but have you ever stepped on a drawing
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: pin or unctured something where you know there's this sort
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: of a dull epe. That's the sort of really weird,
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: sort of nauseating feeling of something that's just you know,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: shouldn't be there, that's just that's penetrated. It's a little
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: bit like that, but obviously there's also sort of the
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: velocity in the I mean, it's quite shocking it all.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: For me, it all happened very very rapidly, as you'd expect.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: I was actually hit by two bullets. Thank god, they
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: were both ricochets, so I didn't get the full force
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: of the bullets. I mean, we were ambushed probably within
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: These guys were on a roof and we were just
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: down below in the courtyard, and there ten or fifteen
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: of them were firing or automatic. Luckily they weren't really aiming.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: So sadly one of my colleagues was killed, but the
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: rest of us kind of staggered away one more and
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: those two bullets obviously hit me and knocked me back.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: Was actually the force of that was kind of like
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: just not literally not be off feet. The bullet that
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: hurt the most actually was the third bullet, which just
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: grazed me as it went past on my on my butt,
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: on my button, and because that was phosphorus, you know,
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: it was a trace around the burning from that was
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: the most painful thing. You know. The actual holes that
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: I was leaking from were obviously tedious and needed patching
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: up and stuff and taller caves and what have you.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: But actually the thing that hurt the most was the
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: bullet that had just grazed me like a few layers
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: of skin and was burning. Because phosphorus is a pretty
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: unpleasant thing when when it's burning. That was the thing
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: that hurt the most. And so friends still take take
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: the mickey out of me when I when I was
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: at the time, was saying, please check my ass, check
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: my ask, so I was I couldn't see why something
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: was hurting quite as much as it was, So yeah.
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: Did you get did you have to return to the
• 38:47
  Speaker 3: UK for surgery and this sort of thing or yeah?
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: So they flew me to Hospital Era med in the
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: middle of that firefight. Still actually, much to my chagrin,
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: I was trying to not leave because there's a lot
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: still going on. But I was eventually met of act
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: out and they removed one of the bullets in that
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: local hospital bore deployed and then one of my left
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: knee that was right next to my knee was much
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: more complicated. So I had to get flown back to
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: the UK and went to Cellioak, which many will know
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: well up in Birmingham amazing hospital where they treated so
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: many of the wounded vets that came back from Iraq
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: and Afghanistan. They did an operation over the weekend. One
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: of the best surgeons in the UK kindly did the
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: operation for me, and I run more slowly than I
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: used to, and I've got some nerve damage and can't
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: feel my leg above the knee for that and another incident,
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: but it still kind of works. I'm technically disabled, but
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: you know, when they can pere myself to others, I'm
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: not really I wouldn't call myself disabled, given that there
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: are plenty of people who struggle far more than I do. Yeah.
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, I don't know where I'd rather be, Afghanistan or Birmingham,
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: you decide. So, yes, fascinating. And your chopper. Are you
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: allowed to refer to it as a chopper or as
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: that americanism?
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: Call it what you're like?
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: Okay, your bird? Did you did you fly that in combat?
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: I flew in Northern Island. Yes, it was operational deployment
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: because of where I did most of my flying down
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: in south I'm off quite a lot, but across the
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: Lord of Island supporting the police. So it's pretty pretty
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: interesting flying. A lot of it was at night, as
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: you'd expect. With the weather big as it is in
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: the UK and Ireland, a lot of the weather requires
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: us to fly extremely low level, which is always good fun.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: Quite dangerous if you're flying very low level with power
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: lines and birds and the like, and obviously you're close
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: to the ground if anyone wanted to shoot at you.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: But really really fun flying and a great team and
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: a amazing experience. So I feel very fortunate that I
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: was given that opportunity.
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: Yes, what year was this sash?
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: This was late nineties, early two thousands.
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: Okay, I'm just trying to think we were there in
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: eighty nine in Belfast. What role is the links then?
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: I mean it's not a true carrier.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: Is it? No? It is, well, it was. We would
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: always fly in pairs and we could take between six
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: and nine troops per helicopters. You'd pick up multiples basically,
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: so half sized platoons, and you'd drop them, pick them
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: up and drop them off. And generally everything we did
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: was primarily to escort police who weren't allowed to go
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: anywhere without military escorts. So you know, if they had
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: to deliver a summons to a known terrorist who needed
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: to go to court, they wouldn't be driving down the
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: road to go and deliver the summons and post it
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: through the door. So those sort of things would require
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: quite big operations where we would fly and drop the
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: military patrol off and then the police person would be
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: escorted safely or securely to the address and then we'd
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: have to extract them afterwards. So a lot of stuff
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: like that happened, things that would be completely abnormal in
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: any normal domestics that the situation, the police wouldn't have
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: to be flown by military helicopters protected by twenty or
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: whatever blokes. But that's kind of how it was.
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: Yes, I want to come on and chat about the book,
• 41:57
  Speaker 3: and but before I do so, I'm also fascinated to
• 42:03
  Speaker 3: ask about your music and your sport. But before I
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: asked that, can you just give us a rundown seat?
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: What was it?
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: Obi?
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: And a few things. I mean, just if you spend
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: enough time away and you're part of some brilliant teams,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: then if you're the commander, then sometimes you'll get honored
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: for that work. So I don't really.
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: You're you're being very humble. It's m b Ob sorry,
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: and the I mean the Bronze star. How how how
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: does one end up receiving that was.
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: For work in Afghanis? Start with with some Americans over time?
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: Okay, yes, tell us about the award winning musician.
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: Well, that goes back to my quiet days. So not
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: only did we do all these things with Lloyd Weather
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: and sing around the world, but we that that album
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: that we made in the Beatles studio in abby Road.
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: My studios is in abbey Road, which is pretty cool
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: in itself. That record ended up going triple platinum, so
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: that was pretty cool. So that was you know, we
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: have silver, gold, and platinum discs for for those for
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: those things, so that sort of technically makes it award winning.
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: I guess, yeah, people triple platinum artist.
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean I didn't write it. I just was
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: one of the singers. But but it's pretty you know,
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: it's quite a cool thing to have been part of,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: which I said as a kid, you just kind of go, yeah,
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: well we're off to New York to sing and we'll
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: do a thing and then we'll come back and quite
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: special things.
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: Really yeah, absolutely, And it's also it's those kind of
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: things in life. I love you. You recorded a record
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: in the Beatles studio.
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: I mean that's just who was a band that I loved.
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: I grew up with the Beatles because my mum loved
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: the Beatles, so you know, you you know, your early
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: music tends to be your parents' music, and so to
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: be in there in the studio where they recorded. The
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: one that just brings to mind was Twist and Shout,
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: where it's quite an echoey recording if you if you
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: know it, it's because the studio is so big, and
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: obviously back then the microphones weren't able to completely sort
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: of lock down the fact that this studio that they
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: were in was so large. But yeah, incredible experience to
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: be recording where one of my most favorite bands at
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: the time were. And I still have a brick from
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: the Cavern Club where they used to play in Liverpool
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: before they knocked that down. I've got a brick with
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: all its providence and this was where the Beatles first played.
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: But it's just kind of fun. What.
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we were in is it Southport? There's rangers in Southport?
• 44:34
  Speaker 3: Aren't there?
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: I've not been.
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we I think we ended up on the ranges
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: in Southport one time. So me and me and my
• 44:41
  Speaker 3: OPO decided we were going to go into Liverpool and
• 44:45
  Speaker 3: find the Cavern and then someone said it's it's now
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: a car park. It's there. Okay, they did have, you know,
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: a replica or available that we went and had a
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: drinking r So what from your military career, what are
• 45:04
  Speaker 3: the biggest takes or the biggest take towards where you
• 45:08
  Speaker 3: are now kind of leadership wise or lessons wise.
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: Well, I think because of the experiences I had in
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: uniform in some pretty interesting and unconventional or sort of
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: complex situations or environments where you could not predict from
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: one moment to the next what was going to happen.
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: You know, we always, as you'll know well, would plan
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: meticulously for any mission or operation. But that adage of
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: no plans lives contact with the enemy. I think that's
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: as applicable in life as it is for those in
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: the military. And the advice I would give to people
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: who are thinking about how they can be more resilient
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: or cope with the vagaries of life which are moving
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: faster and faster and faster than the world is not
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: slowing down around us, and many things that we might
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: have used to control or been able to control, we can't.
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: I think the best bit of advice I would have
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: for people is embrace the complexity, except that in complex
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: situations it's inherently unpredictable and you don't You will never
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: know all the answers in advance, and so think of
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: those situations where the answers are not necessarily clear as
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: opportunities rather than risks. But we as humans default to
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: see risk and threat when we don't know the answers.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: That's just how we're wired. And what my experience has
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: taught me in some combat and other situations was where
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: the answers are not yet written. That is freedom. Obviously,
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: you're going to have boundaries that you can't do stuff illegal,
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: and there's certain guardrails within which you have to operate.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: But if you can mentally accept that it's going to
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: be messy and untidy and unpredictable, and think about how you,
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: as an individual or a company or your organization or
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: your team, can be the people or person to take
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: advantage of that opportunity where you know that most of
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: the other people also facing the same thing will not
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: act and will not take advantage because they go, oh
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: my god, I don't know what to do, and then
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: they'll just do nothing or they will be so you know,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: paralyzed by not having the answers. That's a massive opportunity
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: in all walks of life. And so for me, when
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: I think about resilience, it's, if I had to sum
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: it up as a way to explain it, resilience is
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: the ability to adapt and learn in the face of adversity.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: The key bit is that last word, really adversity. It's
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: very hard to build resilience or become resilient if you've
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: never struggled. And as unpleasant as struggle is, and I
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: you know, as you and many listeners i'm sure just
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: in life have gone through many struggles. It's those struggles,
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: after the fact, if you come through them in one
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: piece or batter them bruised, but you come through them,
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: that is how you build your resilience, not least because
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: you'll be able to better appreciate the times when things
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: do go well. And if you've never failed, it's much
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: harder in life to be resilient.
• 47:48
  Speaker 3: I think, yeah, absolutely, it's a sort of paradox, that,
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: isn't it that we're kind of taught to shunner adversity
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: in hard times? And I say it about addiction, says
• 47:59
  Speaker 3: a thing that ever happened to me? It was, it was,
• 48:02
  Speaker 3: you know, it was the Divine putting a challenge in
• 48:05
  Speaker 3: my way because I was going the wrong way in life.
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: And the byproduct of coming through that challenge is you've
• 48:13
  Speaker 3: got to reorder a few things, and not least of
• 48:17
  Speaker 3: which you come out of it grateful for this existence,
• 48:20
  Speaker 3: not seeing it as a you know, as a sort
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: of burden or a struggle yeah.
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: And I think we all as much as we when
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: we go through something hard or we appreciate something more
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: from somebody's act of kindness. I must do more of that.
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: I must be kinder, I must do these things. We
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: are inherently quite lazy as humors, I think, and you
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: do often default to just doing what you know. So
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: I tried consciously remind myself to either do the things
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: that I know made a difference to me in life
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: when people gave me an opportunity, or they trusted me
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: to do something where they didn't really have any right to,
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: but they took a punt and they gave me the child.
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: So the feeling that I still remember viscerally of being
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: trusted to do something in a place that might have
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: been beyond my rank. Really but my boss said, look,
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: I believe you can do this as all as you
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: don't invade another country or created an international incident. I
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: trust your judgment to go and do the right thing.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: Those kind of lessons or experiences I do try and
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: take into my professional life now, you know, bringing on
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: junior colleagues and giving them the opportunity to make mistakes
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: and learn, but with the support and mentoring in guidance
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: that you can bring because they'll remember that feeling of
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: how they were trusted and given the opportunity, and then
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: they'll do the same to people below them when it's
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: their time.
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: And we were going to talk about the sports. Sorry,
• 49:35
  Speaker 3: we'll stay on the we'll stay in this area. But
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: what were the three sports you've played at World championship level?
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: So I did well. I did England rugby as a schoolboy,
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: although I stupidly turned down my final trial because I
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: was doing rowing as well, trying to juggle both things.
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: But represented England as a schoolboy at divisional and so
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: South level, played at Harlequin's in my year between school
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: and go to university. Also rode for Grit Britain and
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: then represented Grit Britain. Also in jeuathlon. I did a
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: bit of triathlon as well. My swimming wasn't good enough,
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: so if I wanted to get in the World Championship team,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: I had to drop the swim and then do jewathlon,
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: which is basically replacing that first long swim with a
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: longer run. So it was run bike run, and I
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: was never brilliant at any of it. I mean, I
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: fully admit that in My best placing was ever that
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: I had was twentieth in the world. But I was
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: pretty happy with that because I'm not a natural runner
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: and not a natural cyclist. But I just wanted to
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: try and see what I could do. And it's quite
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: intoxicating if you do manage to represent your country, either
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: in uniform in the military or representing your country right,
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: But in sports, it's just it was a really nice
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: community and the sports that I was in, it was
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: all about the team and that was quite, as I said,
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: in toxicating and addictive to try and be part of.
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: So I was lucky enough to dabble in a few
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: different things. Never went to the Olympics or anything like that,
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: but you know, to have gone to European in World
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: Championships a few times, was that was pretty fun.
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the old swimming. If you're not if your body
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: is not designed, you know, if your body's not naturally
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: leaning towards it, you can try as hard as you like,
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: but you can only get so far. That's where I
• 51:17
  Speaker 3: do triathlon. My ten year old does triathlon as well,
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: and I've made you know, he's smacking out front crawl now.
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: I'm so proud of him. Because it took me. I
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: taught myself from YouTube when I was about forty eight.
• 51:31
  Speaker 3: It's finally one of those things. All my life, I
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: just wanted to swim front crawl, and I've never really
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: made an effort to do it. And then finally I thought, right,
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: I am going to do an iron Man or ended
• 51:44
  Speaker 3: up ended up within I think within two years of
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: going to the swimming pool to teach myself to swim,
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: I ended up doing a quadruple iron Man. So there's
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: a lesson for your friends. You know, it's never too late,
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: and it's actually and none of it was odd if
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: I was completely honest. But my body actual, I'm quite
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: broad shouldered, so I think that's a bit of resistance.
• 52:10
  Speaker 3: My head is probably larger than normal, so there's always
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: it's always trying to sort of push my feet down.
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: I've got small hands and feet and short arms, so
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: I'm not pushing a lot of water behind me, and
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: my body fat is sort of almost non existence. So yes, however,
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: if you hit the pool twice a week, you just
• 52:35
  Speaker 3: even within you know, these constraints that I've got, you
• 52:39
  Speaker 3: do get better, don't you.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I lost one for a while. I mean I'm
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: now working on increasing my body fat so I'm more
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: like a walrus. So I'm hoping that if I can
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: get a bit more float it might improve things. I
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: do remember a race once. It was a national selection
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: race for the Great Britain team, and it was a
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: sea swim. You had to run down the beach in
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: Balmouth and then go out to a boy swim along
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: the beach for seven to fifty back again it in
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: and I remember getting to the nearly the turnaround point
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: and I was feeling all right, and then I just
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: looked across and saw my colleague from also the Army team,
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: and she was having a shocker. I mean, I didn't
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: know this until artis, until we discussed it, but I
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: saw her and she's normally miles ahead of me, and
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: when I saw her, I was like, oh my god,
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: I'm keeping up with her. This is amazing son. The
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: second half my swim was one of the best swims
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: I've had, because I suddenly had this confidence that actually
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: I could do it. Unknowns to me, she was having
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: an absolute shocker and she'd been hit by waves and
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: that's why she was being slow. But she said when
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: she saw me, it just killed her. She was like,
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: oh my god, am I that bad? But today Ashes
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: just caught up with me. So it's funny how mentally
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: these things can make a big difference. I had one
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: of the best races and she had one of my worst,
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: all for the same interaction.
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: What do you take away from sport?
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: Ash? What? What?
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: What thing do you get from it that you take
• 53:51
  Speaker 3: forward in your life? All you've incorporated in teamwork, teamwork
• 53:55
  Speaker 3: and trust.
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: I mean I particularly some of the sports like rowing.
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: You know you are your body is absolutely dying when
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: you if you put everything into it, and as part
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: of a team, whether it's a pair or a four
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: or an eight that you might be in, you know
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: that every other person is putting their bodies on the
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: line as well for the collective good. And that was
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: again from a very early age being part of those
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: teams and sports where it wasn't about you as an individual.
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: You had to be part of something bigger. I think
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: that's probably the biggest takeaway that I've that I've carried
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: on in life, that it doesn't matter how well you
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: do what shouldn't you know? If you're part of a team,
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: it's you've got to be doing stuff for the collective
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: good in business and in sports and other things. So yeah,
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: that teamwork, trust and the friendship that comes from doing
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: hard things with other people and succeeding or failing or both,
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: because it was always a journey.
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: Have you thought about rowing the Atlantic or anything along
• 54:46
  Speaker 3: those lines.
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: I've thought about it. I mean, yeah, I quite like
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: the idea of it, but it's been done so many
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: times as not sure whether it's I mean, if I
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: could raise a bunch of money for charity, then it
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: would be worth doing. But I wouldn't do it just
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: to say that I've done it. For anything I do now,
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: that's extra. It's got to be for some much bigger
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: purpose if I can raise a ton more money or
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: raise awareness about a topic or a thing. But I'm
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: definitely itching to find something to do in the next
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: year or two that is extremely enough that generates interest
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: that will make it worth doing. But I'm not ever
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: going to do something just to say I climbed this
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: or I wrote that. That's not really kind of how
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: I'm wired. Yeah.
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, No. I rode the Atlantic simply because I've I've
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: read books about ocean going adventures or all my life,
• 55:30
  Speaker 3: and I just wanted to experience, you know, I just
• 55:34
  Speaker 3: wanted to experience that kind of unique ocean passage.
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so.
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: Who who? Who is your book? I know you said
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: it's a clectic I know. I would imagine probably most
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: people could pick it off the shelf and get quite
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: a lot from it. Is it specifically aimed at, say,
• 55:56
  Speaker 3: for example, you know, depressed people or underachievers or overstressed.
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: No, not really, but it's designed to be accessible to
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: anybody and everybody. One of the early working titles I
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: had was actually walking Wounded, which I thought was quite
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: clever play on words because I was technically walking wounded,
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: but I was shot. But actually what I was trying
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: to get at was that all of us in life,
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: regardless of what we do in life, are all technically,
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: I think, walking wounded in some way or other. We're
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: all picking up niggles and injuries, mental or physical along
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: the way. We're getting stronger as result of it, We're
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: hopefully learning, and you know, we just keep going. But
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: it ended up being called mindful Soldier. That's fine, But
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: the people that have read it so far are all
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: very very different. I've got single moms with disabled children
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: who are struggling to just cope with the pressures of that.
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: People who've got chronic depression who've read it, Soldiers, veterans
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: who've read it, disabled sports people have read it, business leaders, authors.
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: I mean, everybody who's read it has been extremely common
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: actually so far, but they've all connected with it, but
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: in a slightly different way. Different people are pulling different
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: things from it that relate to them. So unless you're there,
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: would say narcissistic. Unless you're the most confident person in
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: the world, I think most of us will have had
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: some form of imposter syndrome at some point. So as
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: a chapter that talks about that, the fear of failure
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: or perception of failure and self doubt, there's a chatter
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: on that. You know, if you haven't wondered if the
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: thing you're doing is the right thing, or if you
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: should do something because your brain is trying to convince
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: you that maybe it's easier just not to do it.
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: We've all been there. I think we've all had relationship breakdowns.
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: I'm sure. Unless you happen to have married your childhood
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: sweetheart and it's been sunshine and roses ever since, you know,
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: it's just real life happens, and so we want this
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: book to be a real life guide or not a bible,
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: but you know, some sort of guide that you can
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: take on the journey with you and then depending you
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: only have one thing right now that's relevant, but if
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: that can give you some sort of solace or inspirational
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: motivation or tips and techniques to help you get through
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: the thing that is the most acute right now that
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: you're struggling with, and as a result of getting through that,
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: you'll be more resilient, then that's what we want to achieve, clearly,
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: what to raise as much money as we can for charity,
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: and that's really what's driving me. So you know, I'm
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: happy to promote it everywhere I can because it's not
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: for or about me. But I'm very lucky that my
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: original publisher went bust not once but twice, which is
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: pretty special. But my new publisher is far more professional
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: and absolutely brilliant, and they not only agree to honor
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: all of the pre orders, of which there were tens
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: of thousands of pounds worth of orders, the original orders
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: of the original publisher, they're going to order all of those,
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: which is amazing, but they also gave me an advance
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: I didn't ask for, so on day one I can
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: give checks to the charities without having sold another copy
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: and say, right, this is my intent, is that every
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: single penny that I make from this I will be
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: donating directly to you. So that feels good, and hopefully
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: that in itself is a story or a differentiator that
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: will make the book of some interest to people that
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: might want to understand why, why we've even done it?
• 58:54
  Speaker 3: So mindful Soldier, what does being mindful mean to you? Ash?
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure there's lots of victory definitions about
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: what mindful this is, and being mindful for me, this
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: is about just giving ourselves the opportunity to take time
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: that's sorry word, not indulging, but giving ourselves permission to
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: just think about the things that impact us. And for me,
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: I became much more mindful. I think of my body
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: and those around me during COVID, where I don't sit
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: still normally, and I've traveled more than six months this
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: year in all all over the place, so I'm never
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: kind of in one place for more than a few minutes.
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: So COVID was actually really good for me, and I
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: was very lucky not to get sick, you know, seriously sick.
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: I had to do a bunch of time locked in
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: hotel rooms to try and go and see my door
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: through in Australia, which was just challenging, but it was fine.
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: But being forced to actually be stable and settled in
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: one place for more than ten minutes was probably the
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: best thing that I could have happened to me at
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: that time in my life. It just reminded me of
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: how much impact act there is when you add external
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: stressors and stress inducers, whether it's traveling or even drinking.
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: I can see now that I'm an avid garbage watch
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: user that it only takes a couple of drinks. I
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: can see my heart rate change, or my sleep patterns
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: get worse, or you know, there's things that I'm now
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: much more obvious to me about how I should be
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: taking care of myself. Then it's obviously by did to
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: that I can be better able to help people think
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: about how they might take care of themselves if they
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: haven't really got to that point where they are making
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: time or feel like they have time to be mindful
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: about themselves and the things that happen around them.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, you kind of cover what I was going to
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 3: ask you. In fact, I will ask you anyway. So
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 3: for people listening, it's a funny thing. Actually, I was
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 3: in the sauna the other day at the gym and
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 3: the lad was chatting with the lad next to me,
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 3: and he was saying, Oh, it's hot in here sort
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 3: of thing, and I got talking about marathon discablers, and
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 3: I told him, I said, it's fifty two degrees. It
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 3: was fifty two degrees when I ran in the Sahara,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: and and he was he was sort of super impressed
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 3: with that, to the point where and he said something like,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 3: I would never do anything like that. And I'm not
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 3: saying that everyone's got to go out and go running
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 3: or climb out. Of course, of course everyone's got But
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: I was just thinking, I wonder how I wonder, I
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 3: wonder how much that limits your your outlook on life
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 3: and then your subsequent let's call them achievement or experiences
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 3: is a better word.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: So what what.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 3: Would you say, ash to people out there that are
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 3: kind of hesitant to get out there and live that
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 3: live their dream and do do I mean, sorry, I
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 3: just say one thing more. I've lived a life of
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 3: adventure for one reason. It's the easiest way for me.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 3: You know, it's you know, I ran the length of
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 3: the United Kingdom and Cultural Marathon every day carrying mar
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 3: Bergen full the camping gear. That was like thirty six days.
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 3: I didn't have to be doing this. It was brilliant. Yeah,
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 3: I was fortunate that I had some money in the
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 3: bank to sort of do it. I've traveled extensively because
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 3: it's just way more fun than sort of being stuck
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 3: stuck here. And I guess it's hard to sort of
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: get across to people that are maybe you know, living
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: with a bit of fear and that or may be fear, it.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: May just be that life there's a lot of stuff
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: that causes you to be fixed, you know, whether it's
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: kids and commitments that mean that you can't just take
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: time off to go and do fun stuff. So I
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: would I would never criticize people for not being adventurous,
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: but if there's ways that we could help people think
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: that it doesn't have to be a massive expedition to
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: be adventurous. There's lots of things you can do locally
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: every day that one could constitute or describe as being adventurous.
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: So I've got a friend who does a great podcast
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: called the Everyday Adventure podcast called Nicky Bass. She's a
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: veteran and she runs. She's a mad surfer, kean surfer,
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: and she's all about the outdoors stuff. So every day
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: she tries to do something that is adventurous, either for
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: herself or for the people that pay to be coached
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: the mentored by her. And I love that idea that
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: every day can be an adventure of sorts. It doesn't
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: have to be navigating Denial or running across America or
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: whatever it may be. There's everything that we can do.
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: We just have to make time. But again, life is
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: can very easily overtake us or overwhelm us, and we
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: just get stuck in the well. I'm going to get online.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: I'm up early, so I'm going to get online. I'll
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: start doing emails. And you realize that you didn't go
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: for a walk. We lost our dog earlier in the year,
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: after seventeen and a bit of years, which is amazing.
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: Never had a dog live that long. And she was
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: the thing that you looked at every first thing in
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: the morning, and you go for a walk, and then
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: after you go for a longer walk, and then she'd
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: obviously forget that she'd had any walks at all, then
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: demand another one in the evening. But you just got
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: outside because you could not mean if the dog would looking.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: But I want to go out, Come on, let's go
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: and do something. And I use that as an example
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: that I always felt better, regardless what was happening in life,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: from having just gone outside and seen how excited and
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: happy she was to be sniffing around and seeing rabbits
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: and squirrels and stuff. So you know, for her that
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: was her adventure and for me, I wouldn't say it
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: was adventure, but just doing something that took me away
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: from the computer was all it took on a daily basis,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: a few times a day to just recalibrate and not
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: be overwhelmed by an inbox that never ends or the
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: pressures that we very easily sort of succumb to or
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: find are overwhelming day to day. Absolutely.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 3: As final question, I'm asking this on behalf of my
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: audience that will say, Chris, why didn't you ask him
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 3: that pallunteer. Do you still have a role with them
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 3: or was that no?
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: I worked with them for a number of years that
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: I left there is actually twenty twenty one I now
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: work I need the international business for a company called
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: d Drone by Act, and it's basically airspace security, but
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: think all things counter drone. So we protect stadiums, hostile borders, airports,
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: nuclear sites, presidents, prime ministers, sporting events. It's really really
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: varied super yachts. So we are the company globally that
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: is not just stopping the bad drones flying, identifying and
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: then hopefully stopping the bad drones, but also maybe the
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: good drones to fly. So if you are a medical
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: company that is using drones to deliver medicines, or you're
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: an Amazon delivery company, then we help people protect that
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: lower air space to make sure that the things that
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: should be flying can fly safely and the things that
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: shouldn't be flying don't interrupt those other things, Like if
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: you're a prison, you would be very nervous about drugs
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: or weapons or that kind of thing being flown in
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: and we can help all of those different types of
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: organizations understand the nature of the threat. And as you'll
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: have seen from the media, even in the last few weeks,
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of illegal activity happening that is closing
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: airports and disrupting data. Today, life so we're kind of
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: front and center of that. So it's pretty busy, which
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: is why, as you can probably hear, I've got a
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: colder that I'm a bit run down from having done
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: so much travel around the world this year, because it's
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: just growing, it's doubling, it's not tripling every year at
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: the moment.
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 3: Do you have any celebrities employee services plenty? Yeah, Yeah, fascinating.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 3: I just wanted to touch on Palenteers kind of ever
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 3: increasing presence, for example, within our military.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: And.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 3: What your thoughts, what your thoughts are on having essentially
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 3: the if I just say, for our friends own the
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 3: running of our military, the day to day running of
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 3: our military kind of contracted out to a private company
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 3: of what do we call them Silicon Valley billionaires.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: I mean, I wouldn't say it's strictly correct to say
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: that they are running the day to day of the
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: military parent here, like many other companies that are contracted
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: to defense, provide capabilities that are designed to help streamline
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: your ability to understand availability of spare parts for example.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: I mean some of the things that they do in
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: the US, I think now in the UK a little
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: bit having an inventry that understands that for every vehicle
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: or aircraft or thing that is flying or driving, it
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: is made up of thousands, if not millions of parts.
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: Cataloging every single one of those parts to identify that
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: if you want to try and make sure that you
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: have more planes, or more tanks or more things available
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: more of the time, then that sort of infantry management
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: stuff actually can be very very helpful because we are
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: always struggling, certainly my years in defense any way of
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: having availability of the things that you need when you
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: need them, where you need them. So capabilities that can
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: help improve the outcomes for soldiers, say as an airman,
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: and then ultimately enable enter their emissions. I would certainly
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: not says a bad thing. I know what you're getting
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: at in terms of the fear that there are large
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: companies with outsized influence politically potentially who people are worried
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: about privacy and just monopolizing different parts of the market.
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: But you know, for all the headlines that volunteer and
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: others get, I mean, there are plenty of other technologies
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: that are also equally relied on that are all trying
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: to do similar things in terms of make our soldiers
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: Saying as them and Marines safer and more effective.
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 3: Okay, Ash, Yes, brilliant. Well I wish you all all
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 3: all the best with mindful soldier friends. I'm just getting
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 3: it on the screen again. There you go, ready for
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 3: pre available in.
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: All good read all good bookshops today. Yes, get copy.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: And you're helping veterans with every purchase, so that'd be great.
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: If you want to.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 3: Join, absolutely, Ash, just stay on the line so I
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 3: can thank you properly, but for the purposes of the recording,
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 3: massive thank you. Congratulations on your achievements and what you're
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 3: doing in now for the veterans community friends at home.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 3: Hope you enjoyed this chat as much as I did.
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 3: If you could like and subscribe, that would be absolutely amazing.
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 3: And just to say, we've got two places left on
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 3: our art tick Legends trip, So if you fancy coming
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 3: up to the Arctic with me and my team of
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 3: former Rule Marines commandos the first week of March, we'll
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 3: be teaching you how to ski and survive up there,
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 3: and then we'll be trucking or skiing from cabin to cabin.
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 3: Send me an email if that if that interests you
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 3: and take care much love friends, Thank you for listening
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 3: to the Bought the t Shirt Podcast?
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 2: Please like, subscribe, and share, and don't forget to follow
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 2: me on social media use the name Chris Throll, Instagram,
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 2: Chris dot Throll.
• 1:09:44
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• 1:09:56
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• 1:09:58
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