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The Mentor Sessions: Doctor Said I'd Never Be Strong Again | Big Sarge Proved Him Wrong · The Mentor Sessions

• William: I had one doctor told me I was never gonna do anything physical again in my life. He said, You're you're too hurt to do that. Now I should have looked at the doctor who was three hundred and forty-five pounds, extremely obese, having problems breathing when he was walking, and taking it at that time what his what his value was, and he was talking about himself. He could never do it. But me, I'm a totally different animal. BigMike Coyle: None of us become who we're meant to be alone. Every story has people who helped write it. So let's talk about them. Welcome to the Mentor Sessions. BigMike: Today we are happy to have William Big Sarge Hansen. Big Sarge, thanks for joining us today. I'm excited to talk to you. You and I have some shared loves in in the strength training and the in the strongman heavy lifting. if you're gonna lift, lift heavy. so William: Yes, right. BigMike: why don't you go ahead and tell us about yourself and and how you got the name Big Sarge? William: that's a fun story. so I grew up in a very patriotic household. My my family has a legacy. Every single generation has had someone serve in the military and either been wounded or killed or been in been in a combat type of zone since the Civil War. That's when my generations came, my family came over from Europe, and so lot of them joined the Marine Corps, some joined the army, et cetera, et cetera. And so when I was growing up, you know, that was kind of like a a little bit of an ex some of us are gonna join the military. You know, I joined the Marine Corps out of high school, my brother joined the army out of high school. I have a niece right now that's actually serving in Kuwait. So I mean, like I say, it's a generational family type of tradition that we serve this country. my father was he was a principal, he was a coach, he ran one of the largest orphanages in Mexico, and he had a quote, he had the John F. Kennedy quote on his back wall that says, Ask not what you can what your country can do for you. what you can do for your country. and the idea of service has been something that we've always done. so growing up I I joined the Marine Corps right out of high school. I did all kinds of different duties from I did Marine Security course, embassy duty, I was an instructor for a little bit, then I went reserves Started going to college, got activated for Desert Storm, served in Desert Storm, served in for about a week or two in Somalia, and then came home and ended up leaving the Marine Corps in the reserves after 10 years. rejoined after nine eleven, I tried to rejoin the Marine Corps and the recruiter You know, I had gotten out in nineteen ninety six when if you remember President Clinton said, Hey, we're trying to cut back on the military, so we're gonna give you guys an opportunity to get out. And you can get your benefits, etc., but we're we're cutting the numbers. So I was like, Hey, I already served. By this time I was a high school coach, I was coaching football, I was coaching wrestling, I was a US history teacher, I had several kids. And I was thinking, you know what, this is the perfect time to get out. I've served my country. I've done the right thing. And 9-11 hit. And so I walk into the recruiter's office, and first thing the guy goes, he goes, Hey, Sergeant Hansen, love what you've done, love the fact that you served. However, we are looking for 17 and 18-year-old guys. We are not looking for 35-year-old, 36-year-old retreats. And so when that happened, I was like, okay. And he gave me a sticker. He goes, Here support the Marine Corps, have a great day. And as I'm walking out the door, the guy for the National Guard recruiter's office patted me on the back and said, Big Sarge, come on over here and just join the dark side. And so that's where the nickname came from. It was a little bit of a a pun at the time because I was in dad bot mode. I was not in powerlifting mode. And so walked into the recruiter's office and left there, signed the papers. he introduced me to my first unit. Yeah, this is William Big Sarge, and the nickname kinda stuck. then I did a tour in Iraq where we were doing convoy security. I did a tour in Egypt where we were doing the peacekeeper mission. And then the last tour that I was doing in Iraq, I was involved in it what's basically an accident, a car accident. we were going on a mission. They we would do these seventy two hour missions. in which you would start at your starting spot and we would do security like the old covered wagon trail and we would be the cowboys doing the security around it for no any Iraqis, any people doing any terrorists, things along that line. And I was in the last vehicle in the convoy, I was covering the rear for everybody, and An explosion happened right next to us, and we're going 60 miles an hour. We had been on the road for 72 hours. So everyone's a little bit tired. You know, we have had a ton of monsters. We are wired and tired, and you know you've probably been in that situation before in your life. And my driver does what anybody does when you are have that type of situation. You know, you're tired, and all of a sudden a loud sound, a loud bang. A loud explosion hits about ten yards to the left of you. So he yanked the wheel the opposite direction. And we end up crashing into a brick wall going about 60 miles an hour. And I put my face into the bulletproof glass and then snapped my head back, and I hit the metal that was back behind my head. And I don't really remember anything that happened for the next two or three days. they s a lot of the people that were with me, they said, Hey, you're you were talking, you were eating, you were sleeping, but you weren't really making a lot of sense. My roommate goes, Hey, I've got a 300 pound gorilla. we have to babysit because he has a concussion. So I mean that was the joke. And ended up waking up with the worst headache I've ever had in my entire life. I got checked out, but you know they don't have an MRI machine out in Iraq. So I moved my head to the left to the right, it hurt, but it was like I was okay. So the doc the medic gave me here here's some paint pills. Now I don't want to sound like I'm anything special. Everybody there was on some sort of different pain pills So I started taking pain pills and survived about twenty more missions with these injuries. When I got to Fort Hood, they I was finally able to get a MRI, get an X ray, get some scanning done on my body, and they realized you fractured four vertebrae in your neck. You had a traumatic brain injury in your head. You had what would be like a level three concussion. one of my doctors later on said from looking at my scans, he said, if it had been now and you would have been in the NFL, you would have been out for six months from the from the concussion protocol. and then I had had several herniated discs in my lower back. And I had torn a muscle in my lower back, the extender muscle that's on the right side. So here I am in Fort Hood, realizing I've got all these injuries. than that was fine, perfectly fine. I I didn't have any other stresses in life. I'm the father of four daughters at that time. And so I people always ask me, Well, what was your PTSD? we hear about PTS and PTSD and all this sort of stuff. And I was my whole thing was I didn't want to leave my daughters without a father. I had been involved in their lives since I've the whole time I I had been very active as a dad. I loved on my girls and we we would go do things, yeah. And my girls were in their thirties and late twenties now, and they still, hey dad, let's go out to eat, let's go do this, let's go do that. I'm involved in my kids' lives. And my my main fear was I kind of white knuckled figuring, hey, I'm hurt. What else if I do something stupid? in the field. So I was always hyper focused, always hyper active, making sure that I was doing everything right, because that was the last thing I wanted to do. make my kids in some way an orphan or make them without a father. Once I got back and went to I went to six months of rehab up at Fort Lewis, came back at home, and they basically had me on ho house house recovery. And I don't know if you've ever heard some of the military guys what they do, you know, especially guys who are in the reserves or in the guard, you know, they don't want to keep them on active duty because it's super expensive. So they They bring them they bring them home and then they they kind of hand it off to the VA. Well the VA basically they doubled the amount of prescription pain pills they that the the medics had given me. And so by the time I left Fort Hood, I had a Costco bottle of pain pills that I was taking on a daily basis just to get through. And I realized I was becoming more depressed. BigMike: I was speaking with someone earlier this week and we were talking about medicine and you know, and I know for guys like you and I who enjoy strength training and and the physical activities, William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: football, and being active and when you're hurt so bad that you you're You can't do that. And then William: Right. BigMike: when they're just popping you pull of full of pills, you're just masking the not just the physical pain but the mental pain because I know for me, so when I was in law enforcement I had two back surgeries, I I hurt my lower back. And after the second one they told me that I can't I won't be able to go back to work, and I won't be able to lift heavy anymore. And Being told those two things alone. Now one, going back to work, not only did was that my livelihood, but I did enjoy my job. I I enjoyed doing what I William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: did. But going back to not being able to lift and lift heavy and using that that recovery method to help me heal, not just physically but mentally, it was just shattering my world. And, you know, for me, this was in Utah in the winter, so the cold and and not being able to be out and do things. So I I get what it's like to need the pills, to excuse me, to mask the pain and so you're not in pain so you think you can function, but you know, like when you said, I don't wanna just I your your stress came from leaving your daughters This when you're in that situation, you have that same stress because now you're not you may be there physically, but you're not there mentally. William: people don't understand what a fulfilling thing that is, is hey, I'm being service of the community. I'm being of service to my neighbours, I'm being service of my family, because I am helping them keep have peace. I'm helping them not be hurt. And that's a similar thing with the military. Is I'm protecting the freedom. I am protecting the opportunity to be an American. And when I got home from Fort Lewis, I did for about six to nine months everything that the VA doctors told me to do, which was take these pain pills, eat a little bit, and just relax. You're and I had I had one doctor told me I was never gonna do anything physical again in my life. He said, You're you're too hurt to do that. Now I should have looked at the doctor who was three hundred and forty-five pounds, extremely obese, having problems breathing when he was walking, and taking it at that time what his what his value was, and he was talking about himself. He could never do it. But me, I'm a totally different animal. And so I was doing that and it was messing with my head. I'll be I'll be the first person to say that. I I had I changed, I became more of a recluse. I was locking myself away from my family. And one night, did something silly. I got mad. I got flashpoint mad, which I never get mad. And I never get I never yell at my daughters and I yelled at her. I was like, what are you doing? Now I'm a big boy. You know, I'm over six foot tall. I'm a I'm two hundred plus at this time I was two hundred and eighty pounds. I'm a big boy and I'm your dad and I'm yelling. And my daughter did something amazing. She didn't scream and run away. She didn't yell back. She didn't just start falling, which you know a lot of people would do. She took a look at me and she walked up and she put her hand out and touched my cheek. She goes, Dad, what's the matter? You haven't been you since you've been home. And I don't know about you. Broke my heart. And in my mind, I was like, I'm gonna do whatever it takes to be dad to her again. And we talk about being physical. I called my father up, and we're talking about mentors. My father is my my mentor. He was always the person who I, if I had a life decision, if I had something, he was the person I tried to emulate because I wanted to be like my dad. And my dad was a a coach, a high school teacher. he had won two state championships, one in Illinois, one in Texas. He traveled and went wherever God wanted him to go. we he ended up running and starting an orphanage down in Mexico. And when he passed away, he they had seen thousands upon thousands of orphans he had taken care of. And just as many thousands upon thousands of spoiled US kids got the opportunity to see what service is like. And they got the opportunity to serve others. And that was that's his legacy is that he taught people how to help and how to be there and how to be the people that you can count on. And so whenever I had a situation, I would call him, I'd ask him. And his first thing that he said to me was Bill. You you wrestled, you played basketball, you played baseball, you did all these different things growing up, you lifted weights. When was the last time you did something? Physical. I was like, okay. And so I said, I'm gonna try and figure this out. The next morning I get on Google and I type in veteran needs help and I call. You know, at that time there's only about five or six different outfits out there that were helping veterans, and I called them all. Hey, I'm here, I have I'm having some problems, I need some help. That was before the VA call line, that was before all that stuff. And so and then I waited because no one was at their phone. No one no one answered. It was all voicemail. And I go, okay, now what do I do? Well, 17 minutes later, one of the people called me back. That was Wounded Warrior Project. That's the reason why I do a lot of things with them, because when my moment of need came, they were there. And so from there Talk to the guys, telling him a little bit about what my situation was. He goes, Listen, I'm in town. I'm about forty-five minutes away from where you're at. Let's meet up, let's go grab a lunch. So that's what we did. We we met up, talked for about forty five minutes, fifty minutes, and he goes, You know what? Your father's right, you're an active guy. Why don't we we have this thing called a soldier ride, which is a bike ride. you get a chance to meet other vets, you get a chance to go get some exercise in. It's happening next week. And in my mind, I'm going, It's a bike ride. How hard is it to ride a bike? I used to ride a bike all the time when I was a kid. Well, that was, you know, before I was in my thirties and you know, another extra hundred pounds, et cetera, et cetera. BigMike: And and and a TBI and fractured back and yeah, I William: Yeah. BigMike: I could just imagine sitting on a on a bike seat with your back messed up like that, so William: yeah, and so i I ended up going with them and I went down there and it was a life-changing experience because here I am thinking I'm all alone with some of my thoughts. here's all these other guys who are having similar thoughts or who are having similar fights, and we got an opportunity. To talk, to to hang out, and to get to know each other. And then we got a chance to ride the bikes, and the first day was 17 miles, and I was like, Okay, I am not ready for this. But I did it anyways, and then we did 20 miles, and then the final ride was twenty-five miles. But the opportunity was, hey, we're gonna get you to do something physical. And while I was on this bike ride, one of the guys goes, Hey, have you ever heard of the Tough Mother? And I'm like, No, what is that? It's a ten mile run up Lake Tahoe Mountains, and you go over all these obstacles and stuff. And I'm like, that sounds crazy. Sign me up. And so I went and did this. Now, to me, the average person who is in good shape, not great shape, good shape. Let's just go good. does it in about three hours. Okay? I'm in less than good shape. when we talk about mentor, half of the things with mentorship and with other things is the mental positioning BigMike: your mind is faster to quit So when you have a good mentor William: Exactly. BigMike: and and and someone that can remind you, hey, you are capable of so much more. You know, give it one more step. Give it give it give it one more day. You can do William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: this. So yeah, you need that person, you make a valid and a great point. William: Well, you have have the right mindset with all of this. And so I went into this saying, I don't care how long it takes me, I'm gonna finish this. And it ended up taking about five and a half hours. And there were several times where your brain is going, Okay, you did enough. You can quit. But my mind was like I didn't cross that finish line. And I went through and I finally crossed that finish line. And I was like, Okay, I get it. Remember in the Lion King, and this is one of the conversations I have with a lot of people that I mentor, especially veterans and people who've done tough things already. I said, Remember in the Lion King when Simba is feeling down, he's feeling worthless, he's feeling, Hey, I I don't have anywhere to go. I am not the person that my dad expects me to be. I'm not this, I'm not that. And the monkey comes around and smacks him up in the head and goes, I know where your father is, he's right over here. Look into the pool, and he looks into the pool and he sees a reflection. And and the guy goes, No, look deeper. And as he's looking deeper, his father comes out and says, You are the king. You are, and I would tell you are the rightful man. You are you have the opportunity to be the right person. Remember who you are. And I would tell I tell vets all the time, remember who you are. Remember, you've gone through Bukamp. You did so many different hard things. You know, if you were at 3-1, you you did the hills up and down. If you were in Okinawa, you did this, you did that. You know, if you were in the army, you did the desert, all the different things that you did in the military. If you were in Iraq, you you were able to handle business being shot at. And you were able to defend your unit. You were able to defend your life. Remember that. And that that's the attitude that I would tell people. And my whole attitude in this whole thing was remember who you are. You've done this stuff tough stuff things before. I had a Costco bottle Dunked them all into the toilet. Got rid of I got rid of the PTS medication, the anti anxiety medication. And I went cold turkey because that's what I needed to do to get off that stuff and to change. I needed to get myself physical again. and so I went and did something that's gonna sound kind of crazy for a strong man. I did yoga for a year. BigMike: No. William: yeah. Well for me the flexibility BigMike: th combining William: doing the doing it in the heat, doing it in BigMike: Yeah. William: where I had I had to bring gallons of water just to survive and towels and I would sit myself in the back of the class and I I would apologize to the person next to me. Hey, I'm gonna be a sweater. Just ignore me. You do your you do all the the the warrior three with your leg over your ear and all that sort of stuff. I'm just gonna do the best I can. BigMike: I have to throw in a funny aside here. So when I in in Utah where I I was in law enforcement, when you start out in like the correction side or in the jail where I did, you go through that portion of the academy and then when you wanna go back and get patrol certified, I'd already been on the job fourteen years when I went and did that. kinda like you when you walked back in the recruiter's office and and you went National Guard, you you already had all this experience and knowledge and training under your belt. And you know, we're back into PT and stuff like that. And you do peer evals, the funniest and really the only negative comment my peers left for me and it touched me because how ridiculous it sounds is Mike's a big guy and when we do PT he sweats a lot, so I never wanna have I I never wanna help him with joints with partner stretching. I looked at it and I looked at him and he knew which one I hit by the way I looked at him and he goes, Yeah man, I don't get it either, but I mean thanks for all you do for these guys and it just cracked me up so much. So when you brought up sweating, like I don't think people understand just how much when a big guy starts sweating, it's like opening up the the hose gate, the floodgates. On the field, you know. William: Floodgates. It is what it is. I I got lucky and you gotta remember back at that time there was a lot of pro American sentiment going on. And if BigMike: Where were you living at this time? William: I was in Sacramento at this time BigMike: Okay. William: and there was a a CrossFit gym there in that was local in town. And he was having it he he basically said if you are a returning returning veteran and you want to do your first year I will have it at an extremely reduced price. And so basically what it ended up being was everyone else is paying for like a hundred bucks a month to go there and I end up paying like twenty bucks a month. And I did CrossFit for a couple of years, but that was how I started lifting weights. I started coaching. I started getting involved with that. fast forward back to my life is I was finally able to work back at the back at the school. So I had been a school teacher. I taught US history. I coached wrestling. I had coached some football. I coach track and field, mostly the field events, shot put, discus, things along that line. And I was working in California and Education codes, a lot of the jobs that were at the schools, they are like grant funded. I went from being a school teacher and I took a job that was a higher paying job that was basically the dean of students. So I would deal with the discipline, I would help have the student student parent teachers evaluations with the teachers saying, Hey, Johnny isn't showing up to school. we need them to show up to school. And I did that for two or three years after after I started coming out of it and ended up leaving that job when they cut the pole program in the state. And at that time I got an opportunity to run my own type of rehabilitation program. I asked first by Wounded Warrior Project if I would run a training class for people to go do a tough mudder. Because everyone knew I had been a coach. Everyone knew I knew knew about weights. Everyone knew I was I was doing all this stuff in California. So the guy from for the health and wellness said, Hey, can you run a a a workout class and then take them to do a tough mutter? So I was like, sure, but I need to I need to do a couple of things. I went and talked to the guy who had the CrossFit gym, and I was like, hey, is there any time I could have? And so he said, Well, Wednesdays, we normally end our day six to seven. We don't have anything seven to eight. We can give you seven to eight, and we can give you Friday five to six. And I was like, Great. He goes, but before you can teach here and and do anything, and you can be under our insurance. I need you to get CrossFit certified and I need you to get rehab certified because you're talking about working with a lot of injured people, and I want you to get rehab certified. So I got CrossFit certified, it took me three months to get CrossFit certified. Then it took me another three months to get rehab certified. So I got both of those things going. I started teaching CrossFit classes after I got CrossFit certified, then I started working with the different veterans after I got rehab certified. And that kind of changed the the trajectory of my life. I went from myself healing, and again, this is one of the things I had had conversations with my dad about. He was always saying, If you want to help yourself, help others. if you feel like you're over stressed over this, the more you gotta help others, you will BigMike: Okay. William: see a how okay, it's not that bad. And number two, the more you help others, the more the better you feel about yourself that you can handle tougher situations. And so I started helping others. I started rehabilitating others, and I went and started my own LLC in California. And got had disabled veterans of America Wounded Warrior Project, another group. They all would bring they would send me different wounded veterans from the Sacramento area, and they would come and they would train with me for an hour, or I would go to their house or I would go we would go and meet up at a park, we would do something, and I started working through their injuries. And getting them better. And we started getting ready for tough mothers. So I ended up taking four groups of people and doing tough mutters with them where we would do about a three month train up and we would get them in shape. So I ended up doing like seven tough motors in my time. And Spartan races and things like that. And so I thought that was really cool. And then I did another soldier ride, and which they're like, Yeah. One the guys was like, Man, I really would like to do the Tahoe Century. And I don't know if you've ever been to Lake Tahoe before, but that is all mountains. BigMike: Yes, Lake Tahoe is a very mountainous area. I've I haven't gotten to sit there and enjoy it, but we we drove that route one time from Utah to Northern California and seeing it and it is amazing. The scenery's amazing. the beautiful part of the story you're sharing to me is first off how you found healing and service for others. And William: Uh-huh. BigMike: so much when we are in depression, in despair, dealing with our physical and mental pain, we do become a recluse. we feel like we're gonna burden other people or no one understands me and and we become a recluse. But then when we give outside of ourselves that helps us William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: and And think outside of ourselves. You know, like when you're talking about your daughter coming up and and you seeing how your actions, how your pain and stuff like that was causing her pain and how that William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: that changes you. Like that is so powerful that like all of a sudden it's like, okay, wait, I'm not the only one hurting from this. going to CrossFit, you see up on the board, you know, and and you know, I'm just gonna go off one of the the famous CrossFit benchmarks, Fran, and you see how hard William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: that is. And even as you scale it, it's still a tough workout, right? William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: But what you find is doing it with people there, those people that are finished early, but going and picking up people and helping them cross that finish line, William: Yeah. BigMike: but when you're going through those moments and and it's I'm sure it's the same kind of thing being in combat, when you go out beyond the wire, as they say. You know you're not doing this alone. You have this shared experience with other people. And it this is something I've been thinking about is the beauty of that shared experience. how that helps you, either in good times, you know, a a good memory or a bad, how important it is that you realize you're not doing this alone. So you're talking about building tough mutters with people and it's like, hey, this is gonna suck, but it's gonna suck for all of us. William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: And that helps you enjoy it a little more. William: that was why they did the video where they showed me doing the train up for people and then we they we had that whole group of seventeen people who did the tough mutter. for those of you that who are just hearing this and have never had a ch opportunity, in Netflix and Wounded Warrior Project did a series that was called Wounded to Battle Back Home and I was one of the guys who was in there And they basically filmed me training people up. They filmed us at the tough mutter. They filmed us finishing. And they basically told told part of my life story. And and the idea of doing things together is so important. It's such an awesome motivator for people. And when you're talking about mentoring people, there's a lot of times You as the mentor might be going, Hey, listen, I'm too screwed up to help someone else. And I tell people, No, that's that's opposite the opposite reaction you have to meet. Because there's only been one perfect person in this world. Okay? How many billions of people have ever been in this world since since it time began? There's only been one. And there's been good people. And your your opportunities to help people changes you the tr trajectory of your life. No matter what. It's gonna change your trajectory of your life from something being negative to something being positive. And like I was saying, we got the opportunity, you know, doing things together as a team. we did I had twelve guys. Who wanted to do the Tahoe Century bike ride? But two of the guys were in hand carts. So hand cycles. So they're using their hands like this. And if you bend the Tahoe, those are mountains. So the question becomes how are we, the ten guys who are ambulatory, how are we gonna help get them up the hills? So we spent six months of training, number one training our leg strength so that they we We ourselves can get up the hill. Number two, training our bike balance so that we could be on the bike and push him up the hill when he needed it. And then the third thing is being able to, okay, I've done it for ten minutes, let's rotate so so Mike can rotate into my place and he can grab it. And how are we going to do this as a team and get people up? And do a century mile, which is a hundred miles. doing things as a team and understanding I can get your legs in shape, I can get your body in balance. one of the things you probably talked about with being a coach and and being a police officer, being a correctional officer. When you want to change your life, you have to do something tough. you have to move outside of your comfort zone. You have to move and do something that's going to be tough. That's the reason why CrossFit, especially at the beginning, was is so successful. It's a very successful. way of training people. You're always doing something different, always having tough workouts, always doing this sort of stuff. It's when they when they got away from doing things that an average person can't do. there's no reason for me at at the age of s nearly sixty to do a handstand push up. There's no reason. All I can think of is okay, I'm gonna fall on my head and re-injure my neck. And I'm not gonna want to do it. And when they went to making those things the most important things instead of doing cleans, instead of doing push-ups, instead of doing box jumps. went off the It's being able to help people get to the next level. Get people physical again, get people moving again. I'm sure you've heard this term before. And I use this with a lot of my clients. I say motion is lotion. And the more that you move, the more your joints get motion, the more your body gets motion, the more your life gets motion and get moving. And we need all that sort of stuff. Like I said, I want to do exact I want to be similar as he was. And there you know, he had made mistakes in the past and he recovered, revamped, and did something and did it to the best of his ability. You know, I've made mistakes in my life where I feel like I had to recover, revamp, and do things to the best of my ability. It might be in a little bit different direction, but it's in I'm doing things the best as I can. I'm working with people all the time. I'm working with vets and I'm working with clients who I'm trying to get the best out of them. When people come to me wanting to get trained, and I'm I'm gonna sit them down for the first hour and we're gonna talk and I'm gonna say, Okay, I'm gonna ask this question all the time. Are you hurt or are you in pain? BigMike: Right. So I had a high school football trainer, he put it this way. He goes, and this is after I I tore some ligaments in my knee. He goes, Hey, hey Big Mike, I I'll tell you in this job I've seen two types of injuries. I've seen oh's and boo boos. And and I said, Okay, well what's this? And he goes, You know, is this an U or a boo boo? And William: Is is this you being sore? Is this your BigMike: Right. William: muscle going, Hey, we haven't done this in a long time? I don't like this your your knee is is tweaked or you have a tear or you have something being injured, yes sir. BigMike: you were talking about how we have to go back and reinvent ourselves, right? And and do William: Yes. BigMike: th do hard things. I I was reflecting as you were mentioning that on the times I would talk to some of the the inmates and some of the people that I was trying to help out and work with. And you know and I know you know this 'cause you had to go go cold turkey on on the pain meds and and the psych meds. When you are addicted for so long, that's that's that's your norm, that's your baseline, right? And watching them come out of that baseline, coming out of that norm, going through the the the dope sickness, and then trying my best to help them understand, like, one, yeah, you feel miserable right now. And and I would say this is how we all feel out here living lives, because we don't get to numb ourselves. We're trying to be people and once you could tell once someone accepts that like okay I can't if I want to recover, if I want to be better, as you put it, want to reinvent, I have to accept that pain in my life. I have to William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: get past this threshold in my life. William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: And those that are successful are the ones that understand, okay, I have to get past this pain. And then they understand that like every day is remembering how hard it took to get past that that pain threshold. William: I have some clients who just and some people who I just simply want to lose weight. Okay. And I help them with losing weight and things along that line. And I go Is that chocolate cake worth it? At nine o'clock at night. Did you do enough burpee? Do you BigMike: The answer's always yes. William: want to go do the burpees to burn this thing off? Well with some people it is, but with other people, I mean, if this is your goal and you decide that you're going to self sabotage it, you do realize that you're going to have to now go twice as hard the next time I went from CrossFit to strongman because of all the BigMike: the answer's always yes, chocolate cake. but i it's William: You BigMike: it's all a matter of like You don't have to eat the entire cake right now. if you give yourself a little slice as a as a treat or as a reward, that's not something to beat yourself up, but it it does tell you you're going to have to work for it a little harder on the back end and William: Right. I told my clients and said, okay, when do you need this gold mine? What, is the timeline? You know, and as a military guy, you know, I went to NCO school, I to senior NCO school. And one of the, one of the lessons that they taught us was when you're planning a mission is how to backwards plan. So that, and I use that in every single amount of my coaching. I've used this in every single amount of. Any of the projects I have in my life is okay. I need to have this ready by July 4th. What do I have to do on July 3rd, July 2nd, July 1st to be ready by July 4th? Okay, I have three months to get ready for this. Okay, that means that I could do a little bit less every single day. But if I have only two weeks to do this, that means I gotta do a little bit more every single day. That whole backwards planning. when I went to Strongman, I didn't realize exactly how much my diet, how all this sort of stuff was gonna take place or take effect to me until I was like, okay, I see now what I need to do. Like the first time I did it, you know, I started off, was, know, I was about 280 pounds. I was a strong dude, but I wasn't focused on on the list, the mechanics, all that sort of stuff. I just got invited basically, hey, we're having the strongman competition. You want to try it? like, sure, why not? And I did well on two of the events and two of the events I sucked at. And so was like, okay, now I know what I need to do to get better. And I like the idea of lifting really heavy stuff. And I was like, okay, this is good. I went to America's Strongest Veteran the next year, which happened to be the first year of COVID. And that was fun. You know, having to do everything in a mask. BigMike: Right. William: That was weird. But I mean, we had my first competition where I was really serious and seriously trained for it. And so I'm doing this in about 290 pounds. I got about 33 % body fat. And I'm like, okay, I'm doing it. And then one of the guys who's there who I'm talking to the guys, cause I don't know anything about the training that you can do. All I'm doing is I'm watching Brian Shaw YouTube videos on how he BigMike: Right. William: trains and he's a freaking nature. It's okay. BigMike: Yeah, those gu those the professional strongmen are f are freak freaks of nature, you know. William: Right, and so I'm thinking, okay, I can't do this, I can't do that, so I'm actually talking to a bunch of different competitors, what are you doing, how are you doing this? And one guy is like, well, hey, if you wanna move fast, you gotta have a big ass. So I mean, we gotta get, you gotta get bigger. So the next year, I ate a lot more and wasn't as smart in how I ate. BigMike: Right. William: And I show up there at 310. But now I've got 34%, 35 % body fat. I'm like, crap. And I did okay, but again, I didn't place anywhere near the top. So after I finished that event, I was like, okay, what do I need to do to be better? And again, first person I reached out to was my father. Now, dad was a basketball coach. He had coached some football, but he mostly coached basketball. And he's like, With this weights and with the lifting you've got to have a cardio base BigMike: those of us who who like to to lift heavy, sometimes we neglect the importance of cardio, you know. William: Right, and he basically says, need to, he goes, if you don't want to do this stuff, he goes, go at a slow pace at like a six or seven angle, eight angle on a treadmill and just build yourself up, build your legs, remember when you were in high school and we were at a school in Alabama that really didn't have that much weight. We had a bunch of gaudless, remember, remember the old gaudless machines? BigMike: I remember Nautilus, yeah. Yeah. William: Yeah, so we had a bunch of Nautilus machines. BigMike: Exercise of the future right there. William: Right and we were doing some of those machines and but for our legs he was like there's this hill right out here and he would have us running up and down the hill and that was one of the best things for me he goes remember when we used to run the hills not only was it working your cardio but it was getting your explosiveness getting all this other stuff when i was a freshman in high school Freshman early 80s. Okay We had the opportunity my dad we were in Garland at that time. He took me up to an Oklahoma State Strength and conditioning clinic that they had He had they had this little guy there who was five foot seven, five foot eight, just a ball of energy and a ball of muscle. And he's like, okay, we're gonna take these two boxes. And he starts teaching, talking about box jumps. And I never heard about box jumps. And so this is gonna help your explosion. And so he takes two 20 inch boxes, put them so it's 40 inches high. You're going okay the backup running back jumps up and does a split box jump So one foot's on one side one foot on the other side at 40 inches My guy was named Barry Sanders So I remember One of the fun things was when I was a freshman in high school seeing Barry Sanders doing box jumps and going okay This is what I'm need to do if I'm gonna be a wrestler. I end up wrestling And played some basketball played some football, but you know wrestling was my I ended up taking state in Illinois in 86 and I was a heavyweight and I was doing box jumps because I remember my dad taking me up there and Seeing these and he was he was like, okay, After that I started I started incorporating doing box jumps again to my strength training. And by incorporating that cardio base in with my lifts and being dedicated, I mean, my poor wife, I mean, I was out of the bed five mornings of the week I was my alarm clocks going off at four or five and So BigMike: yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. William: I would have that as my breakfast and before my pre-workout and we get in the car and I drive to the gym and Do a good two two and a half hour workout before I go to work You know that had to be at work by seven o'clock in the morning. So I'd go and get that workout in two hours. Literally half the time I am either jumping in the shower or jumping in the pool or something to try to get a little bit sweat off of me before I go see my clients. But because I was incorporating all that cardio in, running hills, doing box jumps, doing the walking on the treadmill, the next year, which was the first year I took third in the nation, my body went from a 310 with about a 34, 35 % body fat to I was 330 and I was at a 22 % body fat. So I gained muscle by incorporating cardio, increasing the amount of food that I was eating. but also throughout my body fat. And I did that for that year, the next year I took third again, and then the next year I competed at the Arnold's. And that was a great opportunity because they only had eight guys, the top eight guys in the world were there for masters or over 50 masters, heavyweight type of guys. And there was this guy from chili who was like this monster six seven three hundred and ten pound monster and he's just like picking things up like they're like their toothpicks and Here you know these other guys had these big old stones and so I mean it was it was a phenomenal opportunity So the idea was that it's a 700 pound deadlift for reps. We had 60 seconds to see how many we could do. And I was able to get four up at that time in 60 seconds. And so it was a fun opportunity to do these sort of things on the Arnold stage. And then after that, I got injured while I was there. I hurt my knee, I hurt my back, and I... It was one of those things where was like, okay, I'm gonna take this next year off. Tried to take the next year off, ended up doing the Army 10-Miler, because my wife wanted to do an Army 10-Miles. So going from strongman to doing 10-Miles running was a fun little transition. BigMike: Yeah, especially with the hurt knee and hurt back. William: But I did it. Now I did it stop. I slowed down. I did the Ranger Shuffle for half of it. You know, then I walked some, then Ranger Shuffle, then walked some, then Ranger Shuffle. But I finished the Army 10-Miler in the time period. And then I got asked by USAA to be part of their wounded veteran team. And we did the high rocks. I don't know if you've ever heard that, the 10 events. BigMike: I I have heard of High Rocks and High Rocks scares me more than CrossFit just 'cause I I know how intense it is. for those William: Whoa! BigMike: that if I if I understand right, you you there's ten events and in between each stage you're doing a a c one kilometer run. You know, William: kilometer. Yes sir. BigMike: and and so you're doing like a kilometer run and then you're doing so many calories on a ski erg or so many calories on the on a on a windine. Yeah. William: on the roller and then you do a heavy, heavy farmer's carry. Then you're doing a sled push, then you're doing a sled pull. I had, so I was part of a team, so I only had to do two things. I had to do the sled pull. And so that was like three and a half pounds on the sled. And I had to yank, yank the sled pull and yank the rope. And then I did the, then I had to do a kilometer. And then I had to do a hundred wall balls. But you had to hit depth every single time. So your butt's having to hit a box. So, you know a lot of people do wall balls, they only like three quarters of down. You know and so BigMike: Right. William: you had to hit, you had to hit that. And then you had to hit the target. And you had to hit the target with enough, with enough force that it registered the light. So I mean, by the time I was done with that and then that kilometer I was done. But I mean, people who do that sort of stuff for all eight events, My hat's off to you. know, but I mean, I'm still a big boy and to be able to do this sort of stuff because we really haven't got a chance to talk too much about my family life. So my family life is I had six daughters, the ages are 35 through 17 and God decided. So when I first returned from war the va when they took a look at me they said hey just so you know it looks like that your brain wiring and your your nerves and everything in your in your neck there's some pinches there's some other things you're not going to be able to have kids probably because of all the the rewire and everything that's going on in your neck and in your in your brain And I'm like, great, I already have kids, already have daughters, I don't need to worry about it. Well, God has a sense of humor. And here I am, I'm going to turn 59 this year and I'm going to have, I'm a five year old boy. So I have six daughters and one boy. And so I have to be as active as I possibly can be because he's a five year old boy. So that means we're climbing, we're playing ball, we're doing all this sort of fun things. BigMike: Right. Right. William: And I don't, I'm sure you understand, I'm sure you've heard this. When you're a parent or when you're a mentor and when you have someone that you've worked with, You hope that they do better in life than what you did. You hope that that person does better in their life than you did with your life. BigMike: those of us that are parents we love to watch our children succeed more than we have, you know, and and and get there and do it that's such a great point William: no. BigMike: know, I I enjoy it so much and I I enjoy talking with people. I also enjoy just sitting back and listening. you've shared so much about your life, and how your mentors helped you get there and how you've taken that on to pass on, which is important because instead of just receiving it all, you've given it back. You're coaching, you're you're you're an educator, and you're helping people find themselves, especially especially people when physically they're broken, but you're helping remind them that they're not mentally broken and that they're William: Right. BigMike: not going to be doing this alone and they're going to accomplish things that are much bigger and better than them. And So yeah, Big Sarge, you killed it today. I really appreciate the time that you've spent with us William: you wanna talk. BigMike: Yeah, hearing so much about your father and I I loved how every time you had a challenge you knew right to go back to and that was your dad and and to kinda get you back where you need to be. So aside from your dad, is there a certain mentor you wanna just give a shout out to? William: Well You know, I've had a lot of different people in my life who I've taken the good and the bad and I've been able to filter the bad out. had a person who I worked for in California by the name of Paul Space. And there were several things. He's passed away, but he was a gentleman and another gentleman by the name of Jack McBurney. These are both guys who I looked up to. And I learned so much from, now they were not perfect people, they made mistakes, and I'm, as they say, I've tried my best to take the wheat and separate it from the chaff. And so those were two guys who I really appreciated in my life and I learned a lot from. I look at right now people who I learned from. learned from my wife, Kimberly. She was in a bad situation, came out of it, came out of it strong. And she is now doing so much good for the people who she's involved with, the people at her job. She takes care of children. She trains up people to be there, takes care of, to take care of these kids. And she makes sure that they're okay. You know, I look at the way that my daughters have grown. My first wife passed away from cancer. And BigMike: I'm sorry to hear that. William: so she had a nine year battle with cancer. And my first four daughters, they had to survive not only their mom, fighting cancer but their dad coming home who had gone to war and had been deployed and came home semi messed up himself. And so they had to deal with both of those things and so I shout them out That's not an easy situation to grow up in. And I look at the way that they are doing great things with their lives, how they're helping people. It might not be the way that I would do it but you know what? I'm not them. God hasn't moved to help them the same way God has moved me. My dad told me one time, because I told him, I said, felt bad that I hadn't worked in the orphanage like my brothers and sisters had. And he simply said, Bill, God didn't call you to do this. God called you to help vets. Remember that. He goes, whenever you're here, you're trying to be as helpful and as caring as you possibly can, but you're here to visit. Your ministry is helping vets and helping people who are hurt. That's where your ministry is. BigMike: Right. William: And too often, you know, we get caught up and I'm BigMike: We get William: not doing as much as this person. I'm not doing as much as that person or I'm doing something different. And it's. BigMike: It's a it's a comparison drain. William: Right, and you can't compare. there's 200 million people in America, give or take, a couple of hundred million. You know, that means that there's 200 million ways to live life. You know, as a Christian, I want them to do certain things, to love God, to follow his word. But God's path for you might be 180 degrees different from My path. You know what saying? But as long as you're following and you're doing the best that you can. Jesus said the most important thing was to take care of your Jerusalem, then your Judea, then worry about the rest of the world. And I try to incorporate this whenever I'm giving a speech for any of these organizations or anything. And your Judea is your family. Your Jerusalem is your family. It's the people that you come in contact with on a day-to-day basis. How are you dealing with your Jerusalem? Are you making sure that that is good? Then your Judea is the people at work, the people that you come in contact with, your kids' team or your football team or your church or whatever. How are those people woven into your life? How is God woven those people into your life? And how are you supporting them? How are you being a good friend? How are you being a good mentor? How are you displaying Christ? How are you displaying the word? How are you displaying this to them? And how far are you going up? And as far as the rest of the world, I'm sorry. I don't care if you like Trump, hate Trump. That's 3 % of your life. Right now BigMike: Yeah. William: we're spending 90 % of our life worrying about all this stuff instead of the 97 we should be in, which is your family and your community. And if we take care BigMike: You it's it William: of our family and community, then everything else works out great. BigMike: Yeah, and you can even break that down a little further, that your Jerusalem is yourself and your Judea is your family. And then, you know, you're just getting more and more into the the minutia it. But you can't help other people. And and I know you know this from your deployments. you can't help people if you yourself are not capable to help. If you're not there mentally, if you're not there physically, you know, We talk about self aid when it comes to a traumatic injury, you know, being able to take care of yourself. one way to look at it is when the when they're giving the pre-flight and the oxygen mass drop from the ceiling, you gotta William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: put it on yourself first before you try to help anyone else because you're no good dead. we've talked so much about so many things about helping people, but we've also talked a lot about helping yourself, getting yourself there physically, getting yourself there mentally. William: Mm-hmm. BigMike: And before you can be there for anyone, before you were able to be there for your your sweet little girl when she put her hand on your cheek, being able to be there for yourself to say, I need to heal, I need to get better. So, Bill, I appreciate all your time today. What a what a great conversation and you know I bet we we'll have to pick this up again and and revisit some more of these topics because these are the important life lessons that we all need to come back to. And thanks for being here with us today. I appreciate it. William: thank you. Hey, I appreciate it. BigMike: Hey, thanks everybody for tuning into the mentor sessions today. We we hope you enjoyed the chat as much as Bill and I did. So thanks everybody. please remember share your thoughts in the comment section. share this video and like it and comment and please subscribe. we gotta get these messages of mentorship out to the rest of the world. So thanks for joining us and we'll see you next week on the mentor sessions. William: Looking good. See you guys.