Latest / The Chris and Mike Show / #99 - Alicia Shields - Mrs. Arizona USA to Global Advocate

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#99 - Alicia Shields - Mrs. Arizona USA to Global Advocate · The Chris and Mike Show

• 0:12
  Because it allows me to relax. Hey, boys and girls, what's
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  going on? It's the Chris and Mike show and
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  today we have a super special guest, Mrs. Arizona in the mix,
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  Alicia Shields. Welcome to the show, Alicia.
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  Welcome, Alicia. Thanks for coming on.
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  Good morning. Thank you.
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  Excited to be here. Right, so we were talking before
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  the show started because I thought she was she was working
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  towards becoming Miss Misses Arizona, but she's actually
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  already misses Arizona. So egg on the face.
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  Tell us a little bit about that. How did you achieve that and and
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  where do you go from here? Sure.
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  So Missus Arizona, it's part of the worldwide pageant system.
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  So I'm Missus Arizona USA and I will be competing for Missus USA
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  in July. The state pageant is more of an
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  interview process. If there's multiple candidates,
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  it's all panel interview. You talk about what your
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  platform is and then they decide on there and then you spend the
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  majority of the year working on your platform and then you get
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  to the big competition, the pageant in July.
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  Can you run just for the Arizona or do you have to be misses
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  something like the county or the city or?
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  So with this particular pageant system, you're the state and
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  then you if you become Misses USA, then you compete at at like
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  a worldwide level. OK, wow.
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  That's awesome. That's really cool.
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  Congratulations. Thank you.
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  That's a big. Deal.
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  So what's what's, what's your platform?
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  So my platform is Veteran Mental Health.
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  So I'm working towards destigmatizing mental health and
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  helping veterans who many have PTSD get the resources that they
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  need and get plugged into those resources and get involved with
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  organizations that will help them work through their PTSD and
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  continue to serve. That's awesome.
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  Right on. So you help them not only while
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  they're in the service, but when they get out.
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  Very cool. Cool.
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  Right on. And your your father's a
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  veteran, was a veteran. Yeah, So my dad was killed in
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  the Beirut bombing of 83. He was a Marine.
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  He was killed during his service.
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  So that my family's a Gold Star family.
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  Right on. And then you're you.
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  And when you talked about Patrick, your husband, he was a
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  Navy, Navy veteran. Correct.
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  Yep, he was a crypto tech in the Navy.
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  Really. How long?
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  How long was he in the Navy? So he did like 4 years active
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  and then four years reserve or something like that.
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  So eight years total. Right Hon, Right.
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  And just so people know, you are in the, in the Phoenix area, you
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  have two, two kids or three, I forget, 3.
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  Three, they're all grown up. What's Yeah, they're growing up,
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  right? What are the ages?
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  1513 and 11. Wow.
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  So when we, when we worked together, I don't even remember
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  how long ago that was. They were just, they were all
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  yeah, they were small. Yeah.
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  Yeah, that's awesome. I can't believe I've got one
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  that's going to be driving the streets of Phoenix soon.
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  Is that is that Giovanni? No, Caitlin.
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  Really. Yeah, Why don't you get the girl
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  driver first? Giovanni might actually drive
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  before her. We'll see, really.
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  Maybe. Is she one of those kids that's
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  not excited about it? No, she's very excited.
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  She thinks she's going to jump in the car the minute she gets
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  her license and drive to Ohio to see my parents.
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  Really fantastic. Yeah, that'll happen.
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  That would be fun, though. You know, if I'm like, hey,
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  where you going? Ohio.
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  Yeah. For my first drive.
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  Right. Well, I mean, think about
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  though. That's like when I learned how
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  to drive. My grandmother taught me in the
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  back, in the back streets of between Pleasant Plains, IL and
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  Abington's, which is kind of the Quad Cities area.
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  And it was like legit, it was all backwood stuff.
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  So you know, super wide streets, county roads anyway.
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  And she had this giant, I don't know what it was like a green
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  Oldsmobile or something. And she taught me like, because
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  you still had the like the little tip of the car hood,
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  right? And so that tip of the car hood,
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  I had to line it up with the center lane and I had to be 10
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  two. There was one time where I
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  brought this hand down and I got Christopher.
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  What a dark I'm. Like I'm like what?
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  She's like, hold hands on the string wheel.
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  Oh my goodness. OK, I'm sorry.
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  And Mama Kay said that the speed limit was for experienced
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  drivers, so you couldn't even go the speed limit.
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  You had to go like 5 miles an hour under.
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  Yeah, see, see like. We're being passed by a
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  Winnebago. I don't care.
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  We're safe. Right.
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  My grandmother taught me the cruise control and I was allowed
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  to go 5 miles over the speed limit because it's oh.
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  That's funny. Because it's County Road.
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  Yeah, yeah. And that's where I learned too.
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  Yeah, yeah. I think what scares me the most
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  is her, her self-awareness. It's the funniest thing.
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  She can walk into a room, be in there for a minute, walk out and
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  tell you what everybody was wearing shoe color and
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  everything. But if somebody was walking
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  toward her to kidnap her, she would miss all the red flags,
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  really. So we're like, this is great
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  that you're going to be able to tell the police what the
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  kidnapper looked like to the detail, but you can't recognize
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  that it's about to happen and get away.
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  Yeah, that's that's a conundrum. I'm aware of that personality
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  type. I have a family member that's
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  very much like that. I mean, she's very creative.
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  This is my artsy girl that's in all of the musicals and plays,
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  and she's just like La La la in her own world.
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  That's crazy. So now when it comes to teaching
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  her to drive, who's going to teach her?
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  I don't know. We haven't battled that out yet.
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  See, I would now number one, we bought Jake a stick, right?
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  Skyler's a different story, but we bought Jake a stick which
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  which prevented him from being able to text and drive.
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  Right. Oh, that's smart.
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  So I thought so. I thought because, because
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  years, a couple years ago, well, actually before he got in the
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  Marines, so how many years ago that was now he, he ran into a
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  CenturyLink truck in the HOV lane on the freeway.
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  And then I've, I've later found out it's because he was messing
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  around with his phone. But when he first started
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  driving, right, that was, you know, because you had to use
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  both hands and both feet like he just couldn't.
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  And that's why we did that. So, you know, Skylar, that the
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  phones weren't as prevalent when she started driving.
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  So it really wasn't a concern, you know, even though it's kind
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  of destroyed, I think 4/4 vehicles in her day, you know,
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  back on what? She's good now.
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  But you know, that was a chaotic time of life.
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  But so hey, this is the Christian Mike show.
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  We're on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
• 7:24
  Make sure if you're just joining us, go to those to go to those
• 7:26
  social media sites that give us a follow, Drop us, drop a
• 7:29
  review, you know, subscribe to the platforms because you'll be
• 7:31
  able to know when Alicia's show pops.
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  And there's several reasons why we have her on the show #1 where
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  she's Mrs. Arizona, which is pretty legit, especially how
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  many people like, went and applied for that role.
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  Did you do you know? No.
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  OK, so you can't can't be like I was chosen out of 15,000
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  contestants when? You went to the final
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  competition though, How many? So it was.
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  Yeah, Well, the one in July there will probably be about 50
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  of us since there's 50 states. But the the the way that the
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  state one is run because it's panel interview, you do those
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  separate with the panel so you don't actually go up against
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  like you're not standing in a room with everybody.
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  OK, you just go and sit down and then you have 5 people drilling
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  it basically. Yes, yes.
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  OK. And now, so is it all scheduled
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  times or like is everybody backstage in a line or how it
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  kind of explain how that works? Yeah, so you actually can do it
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  via Zoom. So you're not even in the same
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  physical location because the panel is located in different
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  locations. So you know, to save on cost is
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  my assumption. It's.
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  Easier to just now, right? Yeah, exactly.
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  Same concept. Yeah, right on.
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  So what do you do for fun there, Alicia Shields?
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  Oh, what do I do for fun? So I've gotten really heavy into
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  weightlifting. I'm doing my first bodybuilding
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  show in August. Nice.
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  I've noticed, I've noticed that you're bringing the boxing and
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  stuff which you know the neck doesn't allow me to box like
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  otherwise because I've always wanted to work out.
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  I think boxing is a great workout, is it not?
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  It's a wonderful workout. I bought into a boxing gym
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  because I love it so much. Right on.
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  OK, that explains that explains the concert promoting then nice
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  job. Yes, I just thought you were
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  there because you were you were hitting me up like, oh, you
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  should come workout, come workout.
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  And unfortunately it was the the timing was when I have little
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  man and then the whole the whole divert of the the degenerating
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  vertebrae thing. I'm like, I don't, I don't, I
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  don't think this is going to be good for the Mac.
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  You know, yeah, it's the gym I was working out at and then I
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  bought into it, so. That's cool.
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  That is cool. So so what's the what's the gym
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  called? Because you might as well plug
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  it. Box out.
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  Box out OK and it's in box. Out in Chandler.
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  OK. In Chandler, yeah.
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  And then we also have a nonprofit called Box Out Project
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  where we focus on kids, women's empowerment and veterans.
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  Nice. OK, so let's talk.
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  Let's because I want to, I want to talk about the stuff you do.
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  So let's, since we're on the box out thing, let's talk about that
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  program. What is that?
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  What's that involved? What does it entail?
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  How do you help people? How to can people reach out to
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  get more information? All that kind of jazz.
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  Sure. So Box Out az.com is the website
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  for the gym itself and we have a couple pros that fight out of
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  our gym and then we have a whole bunch of amateurs and then we
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  have people that just come to the classes because they want to
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  stay in shape. All of our classes are coached
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  by people that have been in the circuit, so former pros, active
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  fighters. So it's really cool Box Out
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  project. We found that a lot of people
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  that get into boxing are experiencing a lot of other
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  things, whether it's addiction or some other depression, other
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  mental health type things. And there's a lot of evidence
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  that boxing and working out in general is really good for your
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  mental health. There's actually been there's
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  actually been studies about how non contact boxing.
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  So classes help improve PTSD. So Box out Project takes the
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  things that I know from the medical side of the world and
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  then uses our coaches so that we can take at risk youth and train
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  them. And a lot of bullying happens in
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  the schools. So teaching, teaching people how
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  to deal with that and then women's empowerment for obvious
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  reasons and then focusing on the veterans is really where my
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  passion is. And what's really cool is I'm,
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  I'm finishing my psych NP in July also, it's going to be a
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  busy time of year, right? And we're, we're putting a
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  clinic in the back of the boxing gym.
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  So I'll be able to do therapy, Med management right there.
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  And it's called In Your Corner, behavioral health and Wellness.
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  That's cool. So for people that don't know,
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  because people don't know because we didn't really drop
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  your your life resume, Yeah, and you just dropped something went
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  over my head. So why don't you back back up a
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  little bit and just explain to people who you are and your
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  medical background and all that kind of stuff.
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  So that'll help understand as we continue down the our
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  conversation here this morning. Sure.
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  So I got into nursing a very long time ago.
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  I've been a nurse for many, many years and I went the leadership
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  route. So I was a chief nursing officer
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  for a while and I was able to make some good impact.
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  That's why I went the leadership route.
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  I wanted to be able to make systemic changes and I was able
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  to do that. But then I started to get a
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  little burned out with healthcare.
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  I started teaching for a while and then I got really heavy in
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  the humanitarian world doing both nursing and planning and
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  security, which planning and security was great because they
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  got to do all of the planning of operations and then I could go
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  on the operations as a nurse, which was really cool.
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  What I realized while I was out there, not only is there a huge
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  gap with veterans, there's a huge gap with disaster survivors
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  and mental health. Yeah, see, that's kind of stuff
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  that I've seen. Like you'll, you'll go, you'll
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  go to places and and you'll drop down on Facebook.
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  Like, you know, I don't remember the last place you posted
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  because obviously there's so much stuff that's on socially,
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  but you were in another country and, and like, not so much
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  always disaster cleanup, but you're just there to help and
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  and do your thing. Yeah, Uganda was the last one.
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  OK. And what did you do in Uganda?
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  So in Uganda, this was with veterans without orders.
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  We set up Sawyer water filters. So a lot of people don't have
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  access to clean water and it leads to malaria and other
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  gastrointestinal gastrointestinal disorders and
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  absenteeism from school. So the kids aren't getting the
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  education they need. So Sawyer has developed these
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  super easy water filters. You take their filter, a bucket,
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  and you have clean water for 10 years.
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  So yeah, it's amazing. So.
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  We took is is Sawyer spelled like Tom Sawyer?
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  Sawyer, Yeah. OK, cool, cool.
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  Yep. So we we took these Sawyer
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  filters over to Uganda and here's the really cool piece.
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  So we don't want to be an organization that pops in for a
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  week and then disappears. So the way that you're going to
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  make an impact in another country is to build resilience
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  and capacity. It's like teaching people to
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  fish right, so they don't go hungry.
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  Exactly. So we, we learn, we've learned a
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  few things over the years. First of all, if you give these
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  filters to men, they're going to go sell them because they can
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  make money right away, OK. If you give them to women, they
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  realize this is going to last us for 10 years.
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  That's going to keep my family safe.
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  My kids survive, right? Yes, so.
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  Women there's there's the focus, right?
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  Men want to make the money for the house.
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  Women like, screw that. Let's figure out how to make
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  this established water for a decade.
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  Yes. Then we can worry about making
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  monies on another way because we're taking care from what you
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  need to survive. Exactly, exactly.
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  So, so we, we only train women and girls on how to use these
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  and how to keep them safe. So, and then we took it one step
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  further. We partnered with a school in in
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  Uganda called Levites Academy and their high school.
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  We have a group of high school girls that have become wash
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  ambassadors. So washes, water, sanitation,
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  hygiene and we have taught them everything they need to know
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  about these filters. So if if anyone in the community
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  is having problems with their filters, they can just take them
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  to these wash ambassadors and say help and they they're able
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  to troubleshoot. So we ask you this.
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  Yeah, go ahead, Mike. How do they keep the men from
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  learning their what their knowledge is right?
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  I mean, they can, they can learn it.
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  But if we were to just hand them out to men and the women weren't
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  involved, that would be it. Yeah.
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  So because we're engaging the women they have, they have more
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  ownership over the product and they're not, I mean, they're
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  they're not letting the guys just take.
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  Them this just becomes. Their thing, right?
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  This is our thing. I was going to, I was going to
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  say, you know, have a dude come into the house and try to take
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  that filter away from from the wife.
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  Yeah, that's not going to happen because what kind of wife do?
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  Yeah, yeah. OK, you take my filter.
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  Guess what you're not getting, buddy.
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  Yeah, that and no more clean water.
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  Right. So I'm on, I'm on Sawyer's
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  website. So, so everything is like around
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  50 bucks or less. So there's just one that I
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  pulled up. It's a Sawyer water filter.
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  It's called Squeeze water filtration system.
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  Is that a good example of what you're using?
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  Let me, I can, let me look at their and I can tell you exactly
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  which one. But yeah, they're about 5030 to
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  $50.00. I mean, we we get a bit of a
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  discount. Because of the.
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  What we're doing obviously, but but yeah, we take, OK, so the
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  squeeze water filtration that is it's the same principle.
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  But if you look at there's, there's the filter in the bottom
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  of the squeeze filtration system.
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  We basically take a filter that very much looks like that and we
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  buy buckets wherever we're at and you take the bucket and we
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  we put a hole in the bucket and we put the filter in it.
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  So then they they get 2 buckets. So they take their dirty water,
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  pour it into the bucket, let it filter out, and then they have a
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  bucket to catch the clean water. OK, so on the basically on the
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  bottom of of one bucket, you cut a hole and you, you, you drop
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  the filter into it, right. So like, like for, for people
• 18:16
  that aren't grasping, like it's like a garden hose, like a
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  little piece of garden hose. The water's going to travel
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  through it. The kicker is you have the
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  filter that the water filters through.
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  So we have two Home Depot buckets. 1 is full of water.
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  You're going to pour it into the other one that has the filter.
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  And then where's that water going underneath it?
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  So they have a clean bucket. OK, gotcha.
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  Yeah. So essentially.
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  So essentially we have 3 buckets.
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  Yeah, or they can. They don't even have to use a
• 18:39
  bucket because it has a little nozzle thing on it.
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  So they can just once they have that water in there, they can go
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  ahead. And okay, so you could set the
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  bucket on the counter and have the nozzle coming out the side
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  instead of the bottom? Yep.
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  And then like on off like a faucet.
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  Yeah, kind of like one that Yeah.
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  And it's it's wild. I actually scooped some water.
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  So we also have a bag system. I saw that on the site.
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  Yeah, the gravity, the one gallon gravity.
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  Yes. And we we use those when we're
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  in the field. I mean, we're not going to go
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  and tell someone you should use this if we're not going to use
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  it. Thank you.
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  Right. So we we were out in the field
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  and we scooped up some water and it was disgusting looking.
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  It was brown, it had stuff in it.
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  Put it through the filter and I drank it and it was the
• 19:34
  refreshing water. So let me ask you, that's crazy.
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  So does this work with all kinds of water?
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  Does it work with sea water? So it doesn't desalinate.
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  Okay, so that's why I asked, because some people think I can
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  go, you know, so it's more like ponds and streams and stuff.
• 19:52
  Yes, yes. Or, you know, if you catch.
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  Water. It has to be a fresh water
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  source. Right, right, right, right.
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  OK. Yeah, you don't.
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  It's it's not a desalinator. It's those are much more
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  expensive. That's.
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  Why? Yeah, that's.
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  Do you follow Justin Wren at all, Alicia?
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  No. The MMA fighter.
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  Uh huh. He spends time with the pygmies
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  and what he does is he drills wells because they don't have
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  any. They don't have a source of
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  water. So he goes over there and they
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  actually drill the wells so they can have water.
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  Yeah, that's cool. Because they were losing like 50
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  to 100 people a day from dehydration at one point.
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  Yeah, that's terrible. And one of the things we've
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  noticed. So we set these up with families
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  and then the the way it's supposed to work is like a
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  community system. Several families can use one
• 20:43
  filter. But we also made sure the school
• 20:46
  is set up. So all of the kids at this, at
• 20:50
  this particular school, Levites Academy, not only do they have
• 20:53
  fresh water at school, we made sure all of them have a filter
• 20:58
  at home. So they're getting fresh water
• 21:00
  at home and at school. And we have seen the results of
• 21:03
  that and absenteeism has decreased.
• 21:06
  That's cool. That is really cool.
• 21:08
  So when I hear when I hear that is just people worry about such
• 21:13
  stupid shit that live here, right?
• 21:15
  And when you listen to this message, it's like all these
• 21:19
  people want is a clean glass of water that makes their entire
• 21:22
  day, right? Yep, absolutely.
• 21:25
  Just a difference in the way that they live their day and the
• 21:28
  things that we find disturbing in our day, right?
• 21:32
  Absolutely. And then on top of on top of the
• 21:36
  water project, we also typically do a clinic everywhere we go.
• 21:40
  So we take a couple nurses, doctors and then set up.
• 21:43
  Set up a clinic. How many times have you done
• 21:46
  this? Oh, I've done it a lot.
• 21:49
  I mean, I've been all over the world.
• 21:50
  I was previously with another organization and I was in
• 21:53
  Ukraine during the war, Guatemala.
• 21:56
  I mean, I've been all over the place.
• 21:58
  We are, we are planning Malawi as well as Niger this year and
• 22:05
  then we have someone in Zimbabwe right now.
• 22:08
  Wow, so so this program again is what out of that say it?
• 22:13
  Veterans without orders. OK, Veterans orders.
• 22:15
  That's a lot of things. Yeah, the out-of-the-box 1 was
• 22:18
  the local stuff. Yes, yes.
• 22:20
  The box out project. Yep.
• 22:22
  So Veterans Without Orders was started about a decade ago.
• 22:28
  A really good friend of mine, John Nanomaker, he was a
• 22:31
  Lieutenant Colonel, Colonel in the army.
• 22:34
  And he started it a long time ago and did things here and
• 22:38
  there. And it wasn't until he retired
• 22:41
  that he was like, OK, I can put more energy into this.
• 22:44
  At that point, we had both been working together at another NGO.
• 22:49
  And when I left there, he was like, all right, let's, let's
• 22:52
  blow this thing up. And I was like, yes, let's do
• 22:54
  it. So he's, his background is in
• 22:57
  civil affairs, which is the humanitarian branch of the army.
• 23:01
  So he's got a lot of those of that background and connection.
• 23:05
  And then with my background and planning and security.
• 23:09
  And we just, we put kind of a, a rock star team together.
• 23:13
  He did, he put this team together.
• 23:15
  We have a board that's amazing and all we want to do.
• 23:19
  We're we're an all volunteer staff.
• 23:22
  So we don't get paid. Every penny that we get goes to
• 23:26
  these operations and we just want to get out there and make
• 23:30
  an impact. When you guys go over there, do
• 23:34
  you have to, do they ask you to come over or do you have to work
• 23:37
  that out with the government before you go there?
• 23:39
  Because I know a lot of those places are controlled by
• 23:41
  warlords, right? There really is no government.
• 23:44
  Right, the answer is yes. So sometimes we do get a
• 23:49
  request, like most recently we got a request from Nazier to go
• 23:53
  do some training. So we can use that request to
• 23:59
  then submit everything we need to to the different government
• 24:02
  entities. But if there's a place that we
• 24:06
  want to go and we have a contact, we can ask them to
• 24:10
  request us, but we're always going at the request of
• 24:13
  somebody. OK, nice.
• 24:15
  So does that provide, what level of safety does that provide
• 24:21
  while you're there? Because I don't think people
• 24:23
  understand how dangerous these places are, right?
• 24:25
  It's not like you're going to a place that's got a 711 on every
• 24:28
  corner and right, you know, they're run by some pretty nasty
• 24:31
  people, most of them. Yeah, I mean, it really depends,
• 24:35
  right. Like we, one of the things I do
• 24:37
  from the security side of it as we're planning is character map.
• 24:42
  So we look at who are the good characters and bad actors,
• 24:47
  right? And then what are our chances of
• 24:50
  encountering them and our chances of having a problem with
• 24:53
  them. And then once we get all of that
• 24:56
  together, we also do a risk analysis and everything's green,
• 25:01
  yellow or red, right? You're either risk is in the
• 25:04
  middle or if you, I'll be honest, I mean with my previous
• 25:09
  organization when we did Ukraine and when we were looking at Gaza
• 25:13
  even you're looking at a whole lot of red.
• 25:16
  And then the organization and the board needs to decide are we
• 25:20
  willing to take this risk? And then the individual
• 25:22
  deployers have to decide, am I willing to take this risk?
• 25:26
  So how many take the risk? I think that there's a group of
• 25:34
  US that are like, I'll go wherever, and then I think
• 25:37
  there's a group that's like I'll go to Guatemala.
• 25:41
  Right. But I'm not going somewhere
• 25:44
  where there's missiles flying overhead.
• 25:46
  Where do you fall in that group? She just goes.
• 25:48
  I was going to say she just goes.
• 25:51
  Yeah, I and actually, yeah. I mean, in Ukraine, I mean, I
• 25:55
  didn't tell my kids, but we had missiles and drones flying
• 25:58
  overhead. I didn't tell them that because
• 26:01
  I didn't want them freaking out. Sure, of course.
• 26:03
  We our whole. Our whole hotel would shake
• 26:05
  because missiles would hit. Oh my God.
• 26:08
  OK, so let. So that's the.
• 26:10
  Hotel. It didn't hit the hotel.
• 26:11
  Well, yeah, but this is one of those things why I wanted you to
• 26:13
  come on the show, because you have.
• 26:14
  You have real world experience inside the chaos umbrella.
• 26:19
  So. So talk about what?
• 26:22
  Yeah. And I'm sure you can figure
• 26:23
  this. I'm sure you can pull this out
• 26:24
  of your brain. Talk about one of the most
• 26:26
  chaotic environments you've been in and how you felt as just a
• 26:29
  civilian watching all that unfold.
• 26:34
  Good one. Good one, huh, That?
• 26:36
  Is a great question so. I would say there were a couple
• 26:40
  of times when I was in Ukraine that missiles hit very close and
• 26:46
  one in particular was earlier in the war.
• 26:49
  So it was still kind of a newer thing and it hit way EI mean it
• 26:55
  hit in La Vie, which were now on the Polish border basically
• 27:00
  right. We're very close to Poland and
• 27:02
  just seeing the chaos surrounding that.
• 27:05
  And there were a lot of humanitarians around and
• 27:08
  everybody was just wanting to help and do something.
• 27:11
  And, and it was, it was very interesting to see that
• 27:16
  environment. And then months later, watch a
• 27:20
  missile hit very close and you could see women walk faster, but
• 27:26
  it didn't really change their trajectory at all, really.
• 27:29
  Like, well, because that became a way of life.
• 27:31
  Right, it's just normal. Right.
• 27:33
  It became normal. And I was, I was staying in a in
• 27:37
  a town where, you know, at least 12 hours a day we didn't have
• 27:41
  power because they had power outages in different parts of
• 27:45
  the country during different parts of the day because the
• 27:48
  Russia had impacted the, the energy system, right, right,
• 27:53
  right. So we would go, we would go eat
• 27:57
  dinner at a restaurant and have candlelight and they just kept
• 28:02
  going. They kept going.
• 28:04
  We would walk by luxury stores and they would still be selling
• 28:09
  their products and using generators, so seeing the
• 28:13
  resilience was unbelievable. That's crazy.
• 28:17
  So when let's go back to when the first, the first missile
• 28:19
  that hit when you were there and what was the distance between
• 28:23
  where you where it hit and where you were at?
• 28:25
  Do you know? I mean, we actually went to the
• 28:28
  site later. It wasn't, it wasn't too too
• 28:31
  far. I mean it was probably 5 miles
• 28:35
  or something. It wasn't too.
• 28:37
  It wasn't too far. But it wasn't too too close
• 28:40
  either. But So what did you when it hit,
• 28:42
  when it struck, whatever it struck, what did you feel?
• 28:45
  I mean, was it loud? Did you just like tremble was
• 28:48
  there, you know, rumbling earth, you know, give because like,
• 28:51
  I've never experienced that. Mike's not experienced that.
• 28:53
  And people that are listening and watching to us, you know,
• 28:56
  most people have not experienced that in their lifetime.
• 28:58
  Yeah. So.
• 28:59
  So kind of give us an idea from a, from your five senses.
• 29:03
  You OK this thing boom blows up and then and you're feeling
• 29:07
  what? So let me let me tell you about
• 29:10
  a a different strike that was much, much closer.
• 29:12
  OK, sitting in in our hotel room, you, you know, you hear
• 29:18
  the air raid sirens go off, you hear commotion outside.
• 29:24
  And then you don't always hear the impact.
• 29:28
  Sometimes you do. I mean, I've heard impact.
• 29:31
  And I've thought, oh, that was an outgoing missile.
• 29:33
  And it's like, oh, wait, no, it wasn't.
• 29:34
  That was incoming. So sometimes you hear it,
• 29:37
  sometimes you don't. But then when you're in a hotel
• 29:41
  and the whole hotel starts shaking, you're like, Oh yeah,
• 29:45
  that, that was close. OK, so wow.
• 29:48
  OK, so literally the building shakes but it doesn't crumble.
• 29:52
  Right, right, right. It like like you can feel I it
• 29:54
  would. I guess it would be sort of like
• 29:57
  when when you feel an earthquake.
• 29:59
  Yeah, feel like an earthquake for.
• 30:00
  Sure. OK, so so you said sometimes you
• 30:03
  hear, sometimes you don't. So has there ever been one that
• 30:07
  that has that has struck something that was so loud that
• 30:10
  it made your ears ring? No, not.
• 30:12
  I've never been that. Close that my ears were ringing.
• 30:15
  Yeah, yeah, OK, cool. That's what I wanted to get a
• 30:16
  dynamic to understand. And then so you went back to the
• 30:19
  impact that you that you mentioned earlier there was
• 30:22
  about 5 miles away. What was the?
• 30:23
  What was the? The?
• 30:25
  I don't, I don't want to say crash site, but what was that
• 30:27
  like? So we actually were, it was near
• 30:30
  the train station, and this was a period of time when trains
• 30:34
  were also being targeted. So we weren't allowed to travel
• 30:37
  via train at that point as like that was an organizational
• 30:42
  decision and everything was sort of blocked off.
• 30:46
  Like the police were like, why are you here?
• 30:48
  What do you want? So they were, yeah, Yeah, it was
• 30:51
  very, very, very secured. Gotcha, gotcha.
• 30:56
  And now, so people understand trains over there, they like the
• 30:58
  Amtrak or they like the old school cartoon trains.
• 31:03
  I mean, they're kind of old school, but they're really cool.
• 31:07
  They're like, OK, OK, you know, you get in and you, you have a
• 31:12
  little sleeping area. So we did.
• 31:15
  Later on, when the trains weren't being being attacked
• 31:19
  anymore, we were able to travel via train.
• 31:22
  And we found that was actually the easiest way to go from one
• 31:24
  part of the country to the other, especially in the winter
• 31:28
  when the roads were bad. Oh.
• 31:29
  I can see that. So we would, we would take the
• 31:32
  train. It was, I think it was like an
• 31:33
  18 hour train ride to where we were going.
• 31:37
  It was awesome. Like we loved it.
• 31:38
  We would have our MRE's, we would cook our MRE's in the
• 31:40
  train and eat our MRE in the train.
• 31:44
  The wildest thing happened though, like, you know, you, you
• 31:48
  Sir, you know, you see all this stuff and you do all this stuff
• 31:51
  and you're about to leave the country to come back home.
• 31:54
  And I'm, I'm laying there and all of the sudden I felt like
• 31:59
  this impact and smelled diesel or train hit a truck that was
• 32:05
  crossing the tracks. I was like, what?
• 32:08
  What are the odds, right? You're not going to hit by a
• 32:11
  missile, but you can run into a truck, the railroad.
• 32:14
  Tracks and they just kept going right.
• 32:16
  So we actually, we came to a stop and we're like, man, we're
• 32:20
  going to be here all day because we're thinking from the US,
• 32:23
  right? They're going to rope this off.
• 32:26
  They're going to do this. NTSB shows up.
• 32:28
  Exactly. Well, they basically.
• 32:31
  I I was looking out the the window and one of the conductors
• 32:36
  or whoever came and grabbed a piece of the train that fell off
• 32:40
  during the threw it right by where I was standing and then we
• 32:44
  were on our way again. I was like, OK, that wasn't the
• 32:48
  delay I expected. That's amazing.
• 32:51
  Hey, if you're just joining, this is Alicia Shields.
• 32:53
  She's an amazing human. That's all kinds of things,
• 32:55
  giving back. She works with veterans.
• 32:57
  She works with different nonprofit organizations.
• 33:00
  She's gone all around the world to help people.
• 33:03
  You can find us in this story on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.
• 33:07
  Chris and Mike Show is the easiest way to find us on all
• 33:09
  those platforms. So veterans without orders,
• 33:12
  we're kind of talking about that, which is basically a bunch
• 33:15
  of volunteers. You don't make a dime.
• 33:17
  Are you all? And you're obviously all tied
• 33:19
  somehow to military, correct? Because it's veterans without
• 33:21
  orders. For the most part, or first
• 33:23
  responders. OK, OK, so you have you all have
• 33:26
  some type of medical military background.
• 33:28
  So when you're going to these obscure places, you're not
• 33:31
  you're not going in like a total city slicker that doesn't know
• 33:34
  what the Hell's going to happen. And you got to have some type of
• 33:37
  skill set in order to be prepared because obviously, I
• 33:41
  mean, have you ever been, have you ever been like, like
• 33:46
  detained, questioned, like approached, attacked from, from
• 33:49
  some of these places you've gone to as a group, not individually,
• 33:52
  but just as a group, Like, hey, why are you here with guns
• 33:54
  drawn? Like, you know we're going to
• 33:56
  blow you up if you don't back up.
• 33:58
  No, we've actually been pretty fortunate.
• 34:01
  We we try to definitely go about things the right way.
• 34:05
  We don't just show up uninvited like we talked.
• 34:07
  About earlier, I asked that question.
• 34:09
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I've listened to a ton
• 34:11
  of these stories with people that do exactly what you do, and
• 34:14
  that seems to be the right way to do it.
• 34:17
  You mentioned a couple other things that people would find
• 34:19
  interesting. You usually have contacts there,
• 34:22
  right, that have you have a liaison between yourselves and
• 34:26
  the government. That or the warlords, or whoever
• 34:29
  the evil doers are, there's a contact between you and them.
• 34:34
  Yeah. And we also don't like to just
• 34:36
  send people in blind. So we will, we try to send at
• 34:41
  least a couple people ahead of time to do a little bit of
• 34:43
  reconnaissance to find out like where, where are all of our
• 34:48
  resources, what hotel do we want to stay at, where are the
• 34:51
  safest, safest areas to stay. So that way we're not going in
• 34:55
  blind. The guy that I mentioned that's
• 34:58
  in Zimbabwe right now, he is, even though he's distributing
• 35:01
  water filters, he is also doing a little bit of a Recon for a
• 35:05
  bigger operation in the future, OK.
• 35:07
  That's awesome. I think another thing that
• 35:10
  people would find interesting is how do you handle the logistics?
• 35:13
  Like, you have to get all this equipment there, right?
• 35:15
  You're doing medical procedures and administering medicine, and
• 35:20
  that's a huge logistical nightmare to get stuff from here
• 35:23
  to there, right? So we like to say that we can
• 35:28
  like hike into places and, and do what we need to do.
• 35:32
  So and and we don't travel with a huge group.
• 35:37
  Like when we went to Uganda, I think there were like six or six
• 35:40
  or seven of us. So.
• 35:42
  Yeah, Yeah. So we can just put put a
• 35:45
  backpack on the front and the back and go into wherever we
• 35:48
  need to go. Now, are there logistical
• 35:51
  nightmares? Absolutely.
• 35:53
  We always find a pharmacy wherever we go so that we can
• 35:57
  get whatever meds that we need sourced locally.
• 36:01
  A lot of times that's easier to. Aren't you actually asked about
• 36:04
  being being detained? Yeah, I forgot about this.
• 36:08
  OK, right. Now dies into that.
• 36:10
  Cool. So I got to, I got to Uganda and
• 36:15
  I had a ton of medication with me that had been like donated
• 36:18
  and stuff. And they're like, well, you
• 36:20
  didn't apply for this, blah, blah, blah, whatever it was.
• 36:24
  And I was like, well, we didn't have to do that last time.
• 36:26
  And they're like, well, our rules changed so we need to hold
• 36:29
  on to all your stuff. And I was like, I was like,
• 36:31
  listen, I'm not leaving here without this suitcase.
• 36:37
  So I was like, if I, if you have to lock me in that room with the
• 36:41
  suitcase, you can, but you're not touching this bag.
• 36:44
  So we kind of went back and forth and I, I called one of our
• 36:48
  contacts there and I was like, can you do anything?
• 36:51
  He's like, just let them have it.
• 36:52
  And I was like, absolutely not. So I was like, I can, I, I am
• 36:56
  patient. I can outfit them so.
• 36:59
  Right on. I waited for the next shift and
• 37:02
  the next. Why you're the right person for
• 37:04
  the job. Wow.
• 37:05
  The next shift I was like, look, what, what can I do?
• 37:09
  Because we don't, we don't do, we don't do bribes, right?
• 37:12
  But I'm like, what can I do to get this out of this airport?
• 37:16
  So, so we sat down and had a great conversation and she's
• 37:21
  like, well, do you have any glasses?
• 37:23
  I was like, I don't have any glasses, but I have Tylenol.
• 37:26
  I have this, I have that. And I kind of went through
• 37:28
  everything I had and what it was for.
• 37:31
  And I'm like, look, here's the bottom line.
• 37:34
  If you don't let me through with this, I'm sending this back and
• 37:38
  everyone will know that you're the reason your people didn't
• 37:41
  get help. That's awesome.
• 37:42
  And they finally let me go with all of our stuff.
• 37:47
  So right on. That was smart.
• 37:49
  Thing how? How many, how many hours was
• 37:51
  that detainment do you remember? No, it wasn't.
• 37:53
  It wasn't super like I think it was like 2-3 hours.
• 37:56
  So it wasn't super, super long. I got there at the right time
• 37:59
  where I didn't have to wait like 8 hours for the next shift to
• 38:02
  come on. Yeah, Can I, can I just drop
• 38:06
  this? I think you're just like, I know
• 38:08
  you, but I don't know you. I'm learning more about you and
• 38:10
  and and you're quite the badass like.
• 38:14
  Fascinating. And not to be and not like, I
• 38:16
  mean, number one, I mean, it's and I don't, I don't want to
• 38:18
  come across here, but you're a woman, you're in a foreign
• 38:21
  country with a suitcase full of medicine that's going to help
• 38:23
  complete strangers that are in dire need of it.
• 38:26
  And you're just like, no, I'm not moving.
• 38:29
  You're not taking this bag. I'll just sit here for three
• 38:31
  hours if I have to. So like I think if I was in that
• 38:35
  situation, I don't I don't think I would be as calm as I mean, I
• 38:37
  could be wrong, but like that's impressive that you just.
• 38:41
  That's why I said she's the right person for the job because
• 38:43
  most people would have just given that fucking suitcase up
• 38:46
  and said I'm out of here because I want to protect myself, right?
• 38:49
  I have a family at home and. Yeah, but she does.
• 38:52
  She's married and has three kids and she's going.
• 38:54
  That's what I'm saying. Giving of herself a very
• 38:57
  selfless human who's helping other countries get but.
• 39:00
  You know, I appreciate that on a level most people can't
• 39:03
  understand because I'm on 10 people, right?
• 39:05
  I think that countries are stupid.
• 39:07
  I think that allegiances to flags are stupid.
• 39:11
  And I'm like, we're all on this. We only have this one planet,
• 39:14
  right? We all have to live on it
• 39:15
  together. So the fact that there's people
• 39:17
  out there doing what you do, I can't appreciate that enough
• 39:21
  because like Chris said, I don't know if I have not only the
• 39:25
  mental fortitude to do it, but you know, just you're proving
• 39:31
  that you are willing to go that extra mile for people that you
• 39:34
  don't even know. That's amazing.
• 39:37
  I, I think that our experiences in life, like my experiences
• 39:42
  when I was younger, definitely led me to become the this person
• 39:47
  that I have. It shaped me for sure.
• 39:50
  I mean, when I I've traveled a lot since I was young and I
• 39:55
  often travel alone. I I was kidnapped in Paris.
• 39:59
  I was mugged in Venezuela. So like I've had these
• 40:03
  situations happen. IA story that Chris, I don't
• 40:08
  even know if if you know, I had lost a son years ago.
• 40:13
  We were. Actually kind of kind of you
• 40:15
  kind of alluded to that in our time, but there was you never
• 40:17
  shared the story. And that's not somebody like
• 40:19
  tell me the story, Alicia. Yeah, but I know that, but I
• 40:23
  don't know the details around it.
• 40:25
  So we actually got trapped in the desert of all places for six
• 40:30
  days. And I almost didn't make it out
• 40:32
  either. It was Death Valley.
• 40:36
  OK, OK. But all of these things like
• 40:38
  that's the worst thing that can happen to someone losing your
• 40:41
  child. And I don't, there's there's
• 40:45
  nothing that anybody in any of these countries can say or do to
• 40:49
  me that is going to be worse than that.
• 40:52
  So it's like, what do you, what do you got for me?
• 40:55
  Because I've been through health.
• 40:58
  So. Yeah.
• 40:58
  No, I, yeah. And I I get that for sure, but
• 41:01
  that puts. It into perspective for.
• 41:03
  Sure, but you are, I mean, legitimate what you do and you
• 41:06
  voluntarily do it. It's not like you're getting
• 41:08
  paid. It's not like, I mean, I, I like
• 41:10
  to call things life resume. Like what's your life resume?
• 41:12
  Like all the things I've done in my life that Mike's done and
• 41:14
  you've done, It's you, you're building your life resume.
• 41:17
  So when, when you're at the end of your life, because we're all
• 41:19
  terminally ill and you're sitting there reflecting back on
• 41:22
  your life, you're going to have just this epic, this epic
• 41:25
  journey that you can sit back and reflect on, which I think is
• 41:28
  fantastic. So which is leading me to this
• 41:30
  question, are you, are you taking notes?
• 41:32
  Are you journaling? Are you going to put this pen to
• 41:35
  paper and release a book at some point in time that just for all
• 41:39
  the things you do? Because again, you should.
• 41:41
  I, I knew about some of this stuff, but I didn't realize how,
• 41:45
  how in depth you are as a human with all of this volunteering
• 41:48
  and giving back and providing help and, and you know, building
• 41:52
  countries so they can survive. I mean, that's fantastic.
• 41:58
  I mean, I do write write some stuff I journal here and there.
• 42:02
  It's probably not as organized as it should be.
• 42:06
  I should probably start putting it in in one spot instead of 10
• 42:10
  different spots. Or get somebody to help you do
• 42:14
  that, because I'll tell you what I see in you is you're a doer.
• 42:18
  You're not a sit down and reflect on what I've done,
• 42:21
  right? You're thinking about what am I
• 42:22
  going to do next? You're you probably have a five
• 42:24
  year plan, a 10 year plan and a tomorrow plan, right?
• 42:28
  So you're always doing it. If you get a ghost writer or
• 42:31
  somebody that can help you organize those thoughts, I love
• 42:35
  stories like yours. I've listened to literally
• 42:37
  thousands of hours of podcasts with people just like you, which
• 42:41
  is what inspired me to want to do this with Chris is just what
• 42:44
  he said. him and I have done things that most people haven't,
• 42:48
  and you've taken that to a whole nother level in that you spread
• 42:52
  it out to the world, right? You've been to places that most
• 42:55
  people, some of them they haven't even heard of, right?
• 42:59
  Let alone know where they're at. If we just, if we tell.
• 43:03
  Us. That's fine.
• 43:05
  That's true though. That's amazing.
• 43:07
  So, OK, so we've talked about veterans without orders.
• 43:11
  What's what's, how do you guys raise the money?
• 43:14
  Because obviously you must be nonprofit, right?
• 43:17
  It is. We are a nonprofit and we are
• 43:19
  completely donor funded. Veterans Without orders.org if
• 43:24
  anyone feels so compelled. We'll include a link when we
• 43:28
  reduce the show for sure. And, and one of the things that
• 43:32
  I've I've brought to the organization because of my
• 43:35
  mental health. Sure, passion.
• 43:38
  We really wanna start make. Okay, first of all, let me back
• 43:42
  up. Every or every operation that we
• 43:45
  do is named after a fallen service member.
• 43:49
  That's. Cool, that's really cool.
• 43:52
  And the coolest thing we do before the operation, we
• 43:56
  actually do an honor call with that fallen service members
• 44:00
  family. Fantastic.
• 44:02
  And we learn about them what what made them tick, what drove
• 44:07
  them crazy, what was their personality like.
• 44:10
  In their That's really cool. And it's so cool because when
• 44:13
  we're on the operation, like little things will happen and
• 44:16
  we'll be like, that was that was so and so, so, and then
• 44:21
  afterwards we'll, you know, we'll follow up with the family
• 44:25
  and say, Hey, these, these things happen.
• 44:27
  We think it was your loved one, but we also affix stickers with
• 44:32
  their name on it. So like in Uganda, it was the
• 44:36
  Staff Sergeant Kendall Ivy project.
• 44:39
  So all of the buckets that we gave out have his sticker on
• 44:42
  him. Nice.
• 44:44
  So it's really cool. That's beautiful.
• 44:47
  So with all that said, we want to really integrate mental
• 44:51
  health into these operations, so it's not just taking random
• 44:56
  people to go give clean water. That's important, but let's take
• 45:01
  some veterans that lost their sense of service and purpose
• 45:06
  when they left the military and work through a PTSD program.
• 45:11
  And at the end of that program, the final thing they do is go do
• 45:15
  humanitarian work and serve again and give back again.
• 45:19
  That was actually going to be my first question about this side
• 45:22
  of it. What is that the top problem
• 45:26
  that you see when people come to you on this side of it for help
• 45:29
  is that they just no longer have a sense of being and I don't
• 45:33
  know what to do with my life and or is it the PTSD side or both?
• 45:37
  Or what's the top problem that these people come to you with
• 45:40
  that are no longer in the military?
• 45:42
  It just can't seem to function. Yeah.
• 45:44
  So having worked with, and this is I'm, I'm not Speaking of the
• 45:48
  VWO volunteers in at all. I'm Speaking of all the
• 45:53
  volunteers that I've worked or if they're all the veterans I've
• 45:55
  worked with. So you got a couple things.
• 45:57
  You got one that sense of loss of purpose, right They were
• 46:01
  doing. Amazing.
• 46:03
  Yeah. I was gonna ask.
• 46:04
  So when? OK, so go.
• 46:05
  I would sort of. I just wanted to make sure you
• 46:06
  explain that because not everybody's gonna understand
• 46:08
  what you're saying. So continue, please.
• 46:09
  Sorry for. Yeah, so they were doing, doing
• 46:12
  amazing things, protecting their country, protecting other people
• 46:16
  in other countries, serving people in other countries.
• 46:19
  And then you get back and all the sudden it's like, boom,
• 46:22
  figure out your life, you're on your own.
• 46:24
  And it's like, what do I do from here?
• 46:27
  So that sense of, of loss, PTSD, like you mentioned, that's
• 46:32
  that's huge. I mean, people, people that
• 46:35
  served with my dad, and this was in the 80s, they're still waking
• 46:40
  up with nightmares. Oh.
• 46:41
  Yeah. So it it's like it just, it
• 46:44
  doesn't go away. And how do you cope with that
• 46:46
  and how do you deal with that? And then there's also another
• 46:49
  group and I've encountered patients like this.
• 46:53
  As a matter of fact, you went from carrying a gun and killing
• 46:59
  people with no repercussions to now you can't even yell at
• 47:04
  someone that makes you mad, right?
• 47:06
  So, so it's a huge like that power you.
• 47:11
  That really puts it into a visual, right?
• 47:14
  Yeah, I mean, they had the power to take someone's life, right?
• 47:18
  And now they have they have no power.
• 47:20
  Or just like you said, like an officer that was used to
• 47:24
  screaming at an entire platoon all the time is now in an office
• 47:28
  setting or something and he's trying to do the same thing, or
• 47:30
  even a factory or whatever. Yeah, I never thought of.
• 47:34
  I never thought of that. That's a that's.
• 47:35
  A Well, I've heard those stories inside a job that I've had.
• 47:41
  We'll just leave that open. But yeah, you know, that guy
• 47:44
  used to be in the military, so you better watch him because,
• 47:47
  you know, he's carried that side of it into civilian life.
• 47:50
  And people who were never in the military don't know how to react
• 47:53
  to that. And all of a sudden he's in HR
• 47:55
  and he doesn't understand what happened.
• 47:57
  And that's a very great point to put it into perspective for
• 48:01
  people who are listening, these people trying to reintegrate
• 48:04
  back into civilian life for 10 years, 15 years even, you know,
• 48:09
  a four year stint or whatever. That's a long time to do the
• 48:12
  same thing over and over again. And and that's go ahead, Chris.
• 48:18
  One of the one of the things I love about VWO is we're not
• 48:23
  suiting time. I mean, I'm wearing our shirt
• 48:25
  right now. This is.
• 48:26
  This is what we go out in. I mean, we're not, we're not all
• 48:29
  dressed up. We don't get fancy.
• 48:31
  We go out there to get dirty and.
• 48:34
  I love that. And we, we are, we are
• 48:37
  professional when we're in front of of people, right?
• 48:40
  But it's, it's not always, sometimes the language that when
• 48:48
  our group gets together may offend people that haven't been
• 48:51
  first responders or in the military, or sometimes the
• 48:53
  conversation may people might not like it.
• 48:56
  It's not, it's not, you know, so that's why we, we, we recruit a
• 49:01
  very specific group of people and they need to know like
• 49:05
  we're, we're not what you may expect and we may not be your
• 49:10
  cup of tea. And that's OK.
• 49:11
  Yeah, yeah, because you're there to do one thing, and that is to
• 49:14
  provide aid and whatever however that looks like, because it's
• 49:17
  different everywhere you go. But your sole purpose is to give
• 49:20
  back and establish something. So then you can move on to the
• 49:22
  next. The next, I don't want to say
• 49:25
  adventure, but the next you. Know yeah, the next operation
• 49:30
  so. What I what I was going to jump
• 49:31
  in a minute ago. You're talking about veterans
• 49:34
  and how when they come out, so Jake is Jake's a Marine.
• 49:36
  You knew that, right? So he's gone back and forth a
• 49:42
  lot about re enlisting or getting out, releasing, getting
• 49:44
  out type of things. So, so as of late, he's, he's
• 49:47
  back on the thing while I'm going to re enlist for, for
• 49:50
  another four years, which gets him the 12.
• 49:52
  And then he's like, you know, might as well just stay for the
• 49:54
  other 8 and hit the 20. So from a father's standpoint,
• 50:00
  right? And because my son's a marine,
• 50:01
  because I could never get the military because the asthma, I
• 50:03
  tried 3 branches. They all said no.
• 50:05
  So once, you know, when Jake realized he right.
• 50:07
  So I, you know, the, the, the pride is just leaks out when I,
• 50:12
  you know what I mean. And when I introduce Jake, you
• 50:14
  know, I'll drop, you know, this is Sergeant Dunham and he's like
• 50:16
  stop dad, because he doesn't like that, right?
• 50:18
  He's he's a very humble Marine, like you wouldn't you know, he
• 50:22
  doesn't, he doesn't like to tell Lowe's, Hey, I'm a Marine.
• 50:24
  I wanted my discount. You know, he just doesn't do any
• 50:26
  of that. So I didn't realize it, but in
• 50:30
  in talking with Nikki the other day after Jake and I had this
• 50:32
  long conversation at night, like 10:00, he starts texting me like
• 50:35
  he does. And then so we're talking about
• 50:36
  all this and he wants to go back and to, to the depot and, and,
• 50:40
  you know, go through drill instructor school again and all
• 50:44
  that kind of jazz. And Nikki being the mom, she's,
• 50:48
  she has the vantage point that I don't have because I'm the dad,
• 50:51
  right? And we know mothers are
• 50:52
  different than fathers, right? Because of the I would hope so.
• 50:56
  Right. Well, because Jake's Jake's kind
• 50:57
  of a mama's boy, right? So her so, so when I was right,
• 51:03
  so when I was sharing this with Nikki, she, she just, she got
• 51:06
  like irritated. She was like, well, that's, you
• 51:08
  know, how, you know, that's right for him.
• 51:09
  I was like, I don't know what's right for him, but I, he needs
• 51:10
  to make his own choice. And her fear is kind of what
• 51:13
  you're talking about, which I didn't get until you just
• 51:16
  started describing it. The fact that he's going to go
• 51:20
  from being this this dude that had when he's 18 years old, he
• 51:23
  had $1,000,000 credit card at his disposal because he's
• 51:25
  accounting supply and logistics, right And then when he hit.
• 51:29
  Podcast it's great too. If people want to go listen.
• 51:32
  It was. Episode 9.
• 51:33
  I think he talked about that. Right.
• 51:35
  And he actually talked about in our text exchange about how
• 51:38
  going from a completely structured, secured lifestyle,
• 51:42
  he doesn't know what the real world's going to be like to him
• 51:45
  now because he has had that structure.
• 51:47
  Now see, he's been in long enough.
• 51:49
  He sees that fear, right? Right.
• 51:51
  So, but that's what I got to do exactly.
• 51:54
  And I wasn't, I wasn't thinking of that in my conversation with
• 51:58
  him because why would I? And then when Nikki spun it and
• 52:01
  like, legit, she was, I thought she was mad.
• 52:03
  And I'm like, it's not my fault. I'm not.
• 52:04
  She's like, no, no, no. I'm just, you know.
• 52:07
  But you know what I think is important for your not to
• 52:10
  interrupt you, but you know, what I think is important for
• 52:12
  people to hear in your message is it's that's where the father
• 52:16
  and mother, the true dynamic of that is important.
• 52:20
  Because when I was going to move to Arizona, my mom was doing the
• 52:23
  same thing. She was freaking out being a
• 52:25
  mother. No, you're not going, you're
• 52:26
  going to stay right here where I can keep.
• 52:28
  And my dad was like, he's an adult.
• 52:30
  You got to, you know, somebody needs to be that voice of reason
• 52:34
  of we've done the best we can and it's time for him to make
• 52:37
  his own decision, right? Right.
• 52:39
  I think Nikki's fear is. That's important.
• 52:42
  Yeah, Nikki's fears he if he if he stays 20 years, then where is
• 52:47
  he when it comes out? He'll be 38 years old.
• 52:49
  So she's fearful of, of occupation, things like that.
• 52:52
  And I'm like, well, he's going to why he's still in there.
• 52:54
  He's planning on finishing school and stuff like that.
• 52:57
  Jake doesn't like school, so he'll take a class and then his
• 52:59
  mindset changes because he just doesn't like school.
• 53:02
  I appreciate that, right? I like to learn when I want to
• 53:06
  learn when I want to learn it. Right.
• 53:08
  But I can see the dynamic that Alicia shared is like, OK, so
• 53:11
  here's here's let's say Jake stays for 12 years.
• 53:13
  He gets out when he's at the end of his 12 years, it's like what
• 53:16
  kind of what kind of benefits does the military give him as
• 53:19
  far as pension and medical, right?
• 53:21
  I mean, he's going to have access to the VA for the rest of
• 53:23
  his life. But we all know what a fiasco
• 53:26
  the VA can be, right? I'm sure you see that with
• 53:29
  Patrick on a personal level, Alicia, as well as what you do.
• 53:32
  But I wasn't look at it from this, from that standpoint,
• 53:34
  because I'm like, I'm like, well, if, if he goes for 20
• 53:38
  years, that's a career. So you, you, you finish your
• 53:40
  career, you get your pension, you get your military and your
• 53:42
  medical benefits. And then you haven't, you're
• 53:44
  only 30 years old. So guarantee income, right?
• 53:48
  And I have a client that that actually his father did the
• 53:53
  exact same thing Jake's doing. He got in the military in, in
• 53:55
  the 60s. He was accounting, supply and
• 53:57
  logistics, spent 20 years doing that, got out, got a job at the
• 53:59
  city of Phoenix doing the exact same thing within the last three
• 54:03
  years, retired from the city of Phoenix.
• 54:04
  So he had double pensions, double mail, you know, blah,
• 54:07
  blah, blah, blah. But Nikki's concern is just
• 54:10
  that, like, where's is there pensions still available in the
• 54:13
  military for 20 years? What's the medical like?
• 54:16
  And when he gets out at 38, is he going to have that concert,
• 54:19
  that issue that you just described, Alicia, which is
• 54:21
  like, oh, here I am. I'm in control of this entire,
• 54:25
  you know, what is it right now he's doing reservist.
• 54:28
  So when the reservist comes come into Pendleton, he handles all
• 54:32
  of it like he handles all the supplies and stuff.
• 54:34
  So it's, you know, it's a big, it's a big job and he's
• 54:37
  structured and he doesn't have to pay for room and board and
• 54:41
  he's got his own place to live. He's, you know, it's all those
• 54:44
  things that are tied into being a service member.
• 54:46
  And then when you get out now what?
• 54:48
  Which I never thought of because again, I couldn't, I couldn't
• 54:51
  get in. But that just that struck me,
• 54:54
  which is why I wanted to kind of back up and talk about that
• 54:56
  because it's it's, it's a real thing, obviously, because you
• 54:59
  brought it up and, and Nikki's concerns are validated now, so
• 55:02
  I'll let her know that. But he just, I didn't think
• 55:06
  about it because you always think PTSD when you get out of
• 55:08
  the military. OK, they did some, they did
• 55:09
  some. And everybody ties PTSD to
• 55:11
  active service in, in, in a, in a, in a chaotic environment.
• 55:15
  But that's not always necessarily true, right?
• 55:18
  You can get PSD because a drill Sergeant lights you up and
• 55:21
  scares the bejesus out of you. You don't have to react.
• 55:23
  And all of a sudden you're having nightmares for the rest
• 55:25
  of your life because this dude was this close to you, you know,
• 55:27
  just shredding you. So there's all forms of PTSD,
• 55:31
  not just that's just combat zones.
• 55:34
  I think that no matter when somebody gets out of the
• 55:38
  military and it doesn't matter if they served for four years or
• 55:41
  or 20 years, there's, there's grief.
• 55:45
  You, you go through the stages of grief when you get out and
• 55:49
  part of it. I have known people that hated
• 55:52
  their time in the military but miss aspects of it because the
• 55:57
  the camaraderie. I mean, there is relationships
• 56:02
  are formed in the military that people don't understand.
• 56:06
  And, and the, the closest I can, I can liken this to when you've
• 56:11
  done CPR on a patient, you have a different relationship, I
• 56:17
  guess, as a group then, like those of us that work together
• 56:21
  during COVID and we were intubating patients left and
• 56:24
  right and we're, we're working, you know, 70 hours a week or
• 56:29
  ridiculous hours. We have an understanding that
• 56:33
  when we try to talk to people outside of our that did that,
• 56:37
  they don't get it. No.
• 56:40
  Well, that's kind of what him and I describe of being in a
• 56:42
  band together. You know, it's nobody's ever
• 56:44
  going to know what it's like to go up and stand in front of
• 56:47
  hundreds or thousands of people with three other guys and think
• 56:51
  that, you know, you're all that. And it the only reason it works
• 56:55
  is because the four of us have a hive mindset, right?
• 56:58
  It's the same concept, just in a different environment.
• 57:01
  There's certain things that you're going to do in your life
• 57:04
  that the only other people that understand it are those that
• 57:08
  experienced it with you, right? Can't explain that to anyone.
• 57:13
  For sure. And and that's the same, I think
• 57:15
  it's the same with sports too, that you're alluding to, because
• 57:17
  when you absolutely like Jake played high school football and
• 57:20
  you have that bond with those, with those kids that he played
• 57:22
  football with for the rest of his life.
• 57:23
  It's the same hive mindset of a team.
• 57:26
  Right, when you win championships, when you do
• 57:28
  whatever you have that you, you, there's that bond.
• 57:30
  It's same like with the Marines. Once a Marine, always a Marine,
• 57:32
  right? And you're the Marines, you
• 57:34
  know, the Marines are the ones that kind of you look down on
• 57:38
  all the other branches because they're Marines like they're,
• 57:41
  you know, they're going in before anybody.
• 57:43
  It's, it's, it's one of the things that that Jake shared
• 57:46
  with us when he got out of boot camp when he graduated, it was
• 57:49
  is you're a Marine first period. Your job is to go out and kill.
• 57:53
  That's it. That's there's no other way to
• 57:55
  sugarcoat it. So even though he wasn't, he's
• 57:58
  not infantry. That's not his MOS.
• 58:00
  He still had to go to the infantry school because you're a
• 58:03
  killer 1st. And that's what you talked about
• 58:05
  earlier. Alicia, you, you, you in the
• 58:07
  military like Chris Kyle, the American Sniper, right?
• 58:11
  I mean, the dude legit one of the greatest, you know, military
• 58:15
  snipers ever to walk this face to earth.
• 58:18
  And you made a really, really valid point that's stuck with
• 58:21
  me. Like you get a pat on the back
• 58:23
  for taking somebody's life, and then you're going in in in QT
• 58:27
  and your car doesn't work because the machine's broken and
• 58:29
  you start yelling at the clerk behind the counter.
• 58:31
  You're in trouble. Like, but wait a minute.
• 58:33
  Or smashing a gas pump. Or Yeah.
• 58:36
  Right. But wait a minute.
• 58:37
  Look what I did for this world. Look what I I protected you.
• 58:40
  Now I'm up. They.
• 58:41
  Told me to actually blow the button.
• 58:43
  They actually told me to blow another human being's head off.
• 58:45
  And that's what I did, right? I mean, that became happenstance
• 58:49
  for him. To her point earlier, that
• 58:51
  became normal life for that. You know, snipers, their job is
• 58:55
  to shoot people that could never see them, right?
• 58:58
  And they take pride in that. Yeah, but that.
• 59:01
  How do you reintegrate back into civilian life when that was your
• 59:05
  job for the last four years, eight years, 10 years, 12 years?
• 59:09
  Come on. Well, and I think that's where
• 59:13
  it's so important if you're thinking about getting out and,
• 59:16
  and like for Jake especially, have a plan.
• 59:19
  Who are you going to volunteer with?
• 59:20
  Where, where are you going to get that camaraderie that you,
• 59:23
  you got when you were in? And that's, you know, when we,
• 59:27
  when we go out onto these humanitarian operations, it's
• 59:32
  that same kind of camaraderie and the, the, the guys and women
• 59:38
  that go are like, Oh my gosh, it's just like I was back in the
• 59:41
  military. Like they get that sense of that
• 59:44
  feeling again. So it's really good for them.
• 59:47
  And that's where if we can incorporate the mental health
• 59:51
  into it, then they can come out of the operation an even better
• 59:56
  person than when they started the the process.
• 1:00:00
  So along those lines, that's a great segue into a thought I
• 1:00:04
  just had because you're in the medical field as well.
• 1:00:07
  What are your thoughts on? Because I've listened to a lot
• 1:00:10
  of shows on this too, like psychedelics, MDMA, therapy.
• 1:00:17
  Thumbs. Up for the people who are just
• 1:00:18
  listening, I got 2 thumbs up on that one.
• 1:00:21
  OK. So kind of kind of talk to me
• 1:00:23
  about that because I know it from a recreational user for,
• 1:00:28
  you know, a couple times allegedly.
• 1:00:31
  Yeah, so. How did they do do that and what
• 1:00:35
  are your thoughts on it? Yeah, I think there's a lot of
• 1:00:37
  benefits. So ketamine therapy is really
• 1:00:39
  big right now. I fully plan on doing ketamine
• 1:00:41
  therapy when I am done with school.
• 1:00:43
  OK, so so explain, explain to people what ketamine?
• 1:00:45
  Thesa because kind of not everybody's going to as you go
• 1:00:47
  through this explaining things because yeah, I'm not even
• 1:00:51
  familiar with that. Yeah, you're.
• 1:00:52
  Good Ketamine is a a medication. People say it's the horse
• 1:00:57
  tranquilizer. It can be used during certain,
• 1:01:01
  certain procedures. It can be used to kind of make
• 1:01:04
  you forget things or or not so much forget things, but be
• 1:01:08
  really calm and relaxed during certain procedures.
• 1:01:11
  If somebody is very, very anxious, we could give them give
• 1:01:17
  them some ketamine. If they're in a lot of pain, we
• 1:01:19
  can give them ketamine. There's a lot of reasons you can
• 1:01:21
  use it, but it also there's ketamine therapy where you take
• 1:01:28
  ketamine and it kind of gets you into this spot mentally and then
• 1:01:33
  you can access parts of your memory that that maybe you've
• 1:01:37
  you've blocked off. So if you're doing therapy and
• 1:01:40
  the other the other all the other drugs work like this as
• 1:01:43
  well. And if you're, if you're doing
• 1:01:48
  it under control, a controlled situation and have somebody
• 1:01:51
  trained who's walking you through it, you can really
• 1:01:54
  unlock some things that you experienced and haven't
• 1:01:57
  processed and be able to process those things.
• 1:02:00
  OK. With Academy and therapy, what
• 1:02:02
  kind of time frame that's that road you're going down there?
• 1:02:07
  What kind of time frame are you talking?
• 1:02:08
  Because I know they like to use the term micro dosing, right.
• 1:02:11
  So for the people that are listening, they're they're not
• 1:02:15
  taking people in and just like shooting them up with a bunch of
• 1:02:18
  drugs and getting them super high.
• 1:02:19
  And you're talking, is that what you're talking about is like the
• 1:02:24
  micro dosing part of it where they're doing it a little bit at
• 1:02:27
  a time for an extended period of time?
• 1:02:29
  Yes, yeah, OK. Yeah.
• 1:02:31
  And then you would, you know, you come at it.
• 1:02:32
  It's just it's another form of therapy.
• 1:02:34
  So just think about therapy. You don't just go once and then
• 1:02:38
  you're done. You keep, you keep coming back
• 1:02:40
  and you keep working, working through those issues.
• 1:02:44
  There's I actually have a, a friend he serves with veterans
• 1:02:49
  without orders. Also, he was a Marine, OK, He he
• 1:02:53
  did one of the ayahuasca retreats.
• 1:02:56
  Awesome. OK, I'm familiar.
• 1:02:57
  With those as well, he said. I mean, life changing, yeah.
• 1:03:00
  So. I used mushrooms for the same
• 1:03:02
  thing twice in my life. So I reset my brain 2 times
• 1:03:06
  about 7 years apart. OK, And I went into it with an
• 1:03:12
  intention. You know I'm going to fix these
• 1:03:14
  problems, right? OK, so for those, those of us,
• 1:03:19
  those of us that don't know what is an IO, why'd you say iOS?
• 1:03:24
  Ayahuasca. Ayahuasca.
• 1:03:27
  No idea what that is. It's another psychedelic.
• 1:03:33
  OK, so are you familiar with it? I'm not.
• 1:03:37
  OK, so ayahuasca is an actual drink that the shaman make.
• 1:03:45
  It was invented in South America, Brazil if I remember
• 1:03:50
  right, but definitely in South America.
• 1:03:53
  They figured out a way to extract DMT, which is
• 1:03:57
  dimethyltryptamine. Your brain produces that.
• 1:04:00
  They think that's a lot of what happens when you dream, right?
• 1:04:03
  Your brain dumps all these chemicals into your body.
• 1:04:06
  Some of them keep you still, but some of them they're pretty sure
• 1:04:10
  enter you into the dream state and DMT would be one of them.
• 1:04:14
  The shaman figured out how to make a drink out of this and
• 1:04:18
  make that DMT experience, which is very short when taken by
• 1:04:21
  itself. I've done that too.
• 1:04:23
  It lasts like somewhere around 20 minutes, 10 minutes, 20
• 1:04:27
  minutes, but it's super intense. Like you leave reality.
• 1:04:30
  I'm staring at you guys right now.
• 1:04:32
  And if I had done some DMT in a couple minutes, all the sudden
• 1:04:36
  all this would fade away and I would be in a different
• 1:04:38
  universe, right? That also resets your brain.
• 1:04:42
  It's super cool if done right and under the right
• 1:04:46
  circumstances. And all these things Chris likes
• 1:04:48
  to say, and I like to pair it, we're not advocating drug use.
• 1:04:52
  We're advocating positive drugs under controlled environments,
• 1:04:58
  right? But ayahuasca will change your
• 1:05:01
  life. So if you're a smoker, if you're
• 1:05:05
  a horrible drug user, like addicted to opiates, these are
• 1:05:10
  things that this is a drug that will actually reset your brain,
• 1:05:13
  just like any psychedelic will if done in the right
• 1:05:16
  circumstances. You can come out the other side
• 1:05:19
  a different person. That's crazy.
• 1:05:21
  The nice mellow human being that you know me to be today doesn't
• 1:05:25
  want to do mean by people when I used to be closer to the person
• 1:05:29
  she described, where it would be more like barking orders at
• 1:05:31
  people. That changed after those two
• 1:05:34
  experiences. That's how interesting reset the
• 1:05:37
  way I thought about the world. Yeah.
• 1:05:39
  So with your mental health that you're that you're pursuing now
• 1:05:41
  that that degree in that when you go to places like Uganda,
• 1:05:45
  OK, and you're, you're establishing, you know, water,
• 1:05:49
  whatever, are you going to instill that as part of what
• 1:05:52
  you're doing? Yes.
• 1:05:54
  So I've actually had had two countries so far.
• 1:05:59
  People from two countries. I know many have asked me to
• 1:06:05
  help them in implement a mental health program.
• 1:06:08
  So as you can imagine, medical in a lot of places is difficult.
• 1:06:13
  Now think about mental health here, it's hard to get access.
• 1:06:16
  So now go to a third world country.
• 1:06:18
  How hard is it there? So kind of what our plan is and
• 1:06:22
  we are, I'm, I'm working on building this program and I'm
• 1:06:25
  hoping to start it in Uganda and then like Lake Guatemala next.
• 1:06:29
  So see how you said Uganda out of nowhere?
• 1:06:33
  We're going to build a well, I already have like a shell
• 1:06:39
  program where we can teach anybody some basic mental health
• 1:06:46
  skills, almost like mental health first aid.
• 1:06:49
  OK. And then we're going to take
• 1:06:52
  community members and teach them to become peer counselors.
• 1:06:57
  All right on. So that way they have somebody,
• 1:07:00
  granted it's not a therapist, they're not going to get
• 1:07:02
  medication, but they have a peer counselor that has basic skills
• 1:07:06
  that can walk them through certain situations, right?
• 1:07:09
  And we know with lots of people, they just need to talk through
• 1:07:12
  the problem. They need to talk through the
• 1:07:13
  trauma, talk through the chaos, purge and get out of their
• 1:07:15
  system, work through it from a verbal standpoint with somebody
• 1:07:18
  that you can trust that's not going to go down the street.
• 1:07:20
  Oh, Chris is a whack A mole because you have that trust and
• 1:07:24
  you're helping them get through that, that trauma that they hold
• 1:07:27
  and carry. That's brilliant, Alicia.
• 1:07:30
  So the we've kind of, we've made like a shell program because you
• 1:07:34
  can't do A1 size fits all because the cultures are so
• 1:07:37
  different. So we have like a shell program
• 1:07:40
  that we will change and tweak based on the culture we're going
• 1:07:44
  to. OK.
• 1:07:46
  So obviously, so that's the importance of understanding the
• 1:07:48
  culture walking into which goes back to how you do all the
• 1:07:51
  planning of actually getting into the the country that you're
• 1:07:55
  going to. So that's part of your research
• 1:07:57
  obviously now. Yeah.
• 1:07:58
  Do you speak? Do you speak multiple languages?
• 1:08:00
  You just pulled that right out of my head.
• 1:08:04
  Like do you have AI? Was going to say, do you have a
• 1:08:06
  translator? Do you speak multiple languages?
• 1:08:08
  We actually we do. We do have translators when we
• 1:08:11
  go places, interpreters, But I do, I mean, I speak Spanish.
• 1:08:15
  I've, I've spoken Spanish since I was young and then when I was
• 1:08:20
  over in Ukraine and Poland, I spent so much time over there.
• 1:08:23
  I actually got a Polish tutor and so I do speak some Polish
• 1:08:27
  now and then. I love languages so everywhere I
• 1:08:30
  go I at least pick up the basics and learn how to introduce
• 1:08:33
  myself and ask people how they're doing.
• 1:08:36
  I love them too, but I'm horrible at all of them.
• 1:08:39
  Yeah, I'm, I'm on, I'm on day 670 on Duolingo learning
• 1:08:42
  Spanish. He's.
• 1:08:43
  Doing good with Spanish. Manamo crystal ball, don't be a
• 1:08:46
  star, don't be a * El Bano. I mean, I did a whole better
• 1:08:50
  than that, but you. Did a whole paragraph on one of
• 1:08:52
  the. Podcasts.
• 1:08:53
  Yeah, I did. It was great.
• 1:08:55
  Yeah, that's. The I said Ola and he rattled
• 1:08:57
  off a whole paragraph and I'm like, that's the best I can do.
• 1:09:00
  So, Miguel. Miguel.
• 1:09:04
  Hey, if you're just joining us, this is the Chris and Mike.
• 1:09:06
  Sure, you can find us on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.
• 1:09:09
  Give us a follow up, give us a like and drop a review on all
• 1:09:11
  those platforms because that's how we grow.
• 1:09:13
  We're talking with Alicia Shields.
• 1:09:14
  She's an amazing human. Veterans without orders is
• 1:09:17
  something she does the box out. What is the box out?
• 1:09:20
  Box out project. Box out project and that that
• 1:09:23
  helps veterans as well. And now the box out project does
• 1:09:27
  it. Is it just veterans as as open
• 1:09:29
  to to kids, families, women's fathers, everything?
• 1:09:31
  Are the three. Three areas that are our main
• 1:09:34
  focus are at risk youth, women's empowerment and veterans.
• 1:09:39
  OK, cool. And So what and box out is a
• 1:09:41
  gym. And as she talked about earlier,
• 1:09:43
  in case you just join us, you're actually you're actually trained
• 1:09:46
  by either active or retired fight pugilist, right?
• 1:09:50
  I mean, they're they're somehow they were in the lifestyle as a.
• 1:09:52
  Boxer in the circuit. Right.
• 1:09:54
  So you're actually getting real world training, not just some
• 1:09:57
  guy who's like, I want to teach boxing today because I played
• 1:10:00
  knockout when I was a kid. Yeah.
• 1:10:02
  Been working out at the Y since 50.
• 1:10:04
  Yeah, right, right. So her life resume also includes
• 1:10:08
  the fact that she's she's been a nurse for God knows how long.
• 1:10:11
  She's working on getting another level of that, which is mental
• 1:10:13
  health, to help with mental health aspect and all the things
• 1:10:16
  she does. Anything else you want to talk
• 1:10:18
  about? She's misses Arizona, USA.
• 1:10:20
  Oh, she is misses Arizona. She's forcing out of.
• 1:10:23
  I just forget that because, you know, there's all these other
• 1:10:26
  things. So yeah.
• 1:10:27
  I know she's an amazing human being, but she's also misses
• 1:10:30
  Arizona, USA. She's a woman.
• 1:10:31
  They like that stuff. Right.
• 1:10:33
  And she's and she's, she's an avid runner now because we've
• 1:10:35
  been talking a little bit. She's doing the Marine Corps
• 1:10:37
  Marathon in October. Yeah, right.
• 1:10:40
  Which is funny. Because I hate running.
• 1:10:42
  Where do you have time I. Like.
• 1:10:45
  You make me feel like a lazy, horribly lazy human being.
• 1:10:50
  Well, I I wish I. Could have seen my.
• 1:10:54
  So I have a competition coach for for the bodybuilding show,
• 1:10:58
  right? I wish I could have seen his
• 1:11:00
  face when I messaged him and was like, hey, by the way, I'm
• 1:11:03
  running the Marine Corps Marathon because those are such
• 1:11:06
  polar opposites. You're not supposed to do that.
• 1:11:09
  Well, and yeah, and see, that's because I've ran Nikki and I've
• 1:11:13
  done probably 60 half marathon since 15.
• 1:11:16
  There is a fine line between, I mean, bulking up muscle wise and
• 1:11:20
  running because it contradicts itself.
• 1:11:22
  Absolutely. Because, you know, it's just
• 1:11:24
  it's like like she doesn't Nikki likes when I have more bulk like
• 1:11:28
  I have now as opposed to when before I broke my my head, my
• 1:11:31
  stress fracture that I was, you know, I could get up tomorrow
• 1:11:34
  and go run 10 miles without even thinking about it, right.
• 1:11:38
  But I was more lean and fit. But she likes, she likes where,
• 1:11:41
  you know, what I'm standing for. Although I can see your chest,
• 1:11:44
  but you, but when you run you, you lean it away.
• 1:11:47
  And if people don't understand the whole concept of running,
• 1:11:50
  you're basically putting your body in shock when you're
• 1:11:51
  running a half marathon or a marathon because your body
• 1:11:54
  doesn't know what to do. So it starts retaining all the
• 1:11:57
  all the food inside you because they know that you're going
• 1:12:00
  because of your training. Do you know you're going to
• 1:12:02
  starve your body for an X amount of time?
• 1:12:05
  And while doing so, you're punishing your body for X amount
• 1:12:08
  of time, which is why it's so important to hydrate and diet is
• 1:12:12
  so important. So I can see where your
• 1:12:14
  competition coach was like what you're going to do that?
• 1:12:18
  But are you? Is it going to help you find a
• 1:12:20
  balance though? Yeah, for sure.
• 1:12:22
  And, and kind of what I've been doing because I have to do a lot
• 1:12:24
  of cardio every day anyway for the competition, but it's
• 1:12:28
  usually usually elliptical or bike or, you know, something
• 1:12:31
  like that. But I've just turned all my
• 1:12:34
  cardio into running. So I try to run about four times
• 1:12:38
  a week. I'll do four or five miles most
• 1:12:41
  days and then I'll do a long run.
• 1:12:44
  So I'm I'm not like killing myself with the running where
• 1:12:48
  like people that are running 1015 miles every day.
• 1:12:51
  I'm not doing that and. We were never like that either.
• 1:12:54
  When Nikki and I were training for all our rushes that we did,
• 1:12:57
  it would be basically at least at least a 5K every day.
• 1:13:00
  We'd have a day off and then we'd have a long run on Saturday
• 1:13:03
  or Sunday. So if Monday through Thursday,
• 1:13:04
  we're at least, you know, 3 to 5 miles, I would end up doing more
• 1:13:07
  because that's just, you know, overachiever.
• 1:13:09
  And then the Saturday, whatever it was, you know, the first, the
• 1:13:12
  first day would be, you know, 3 miles and you just build it and
• 1:13:16
  you build it and build it, build it until all of a sudden you're,
• 1:13:18
  you know, your training runs, you know, 14 miles that day.
• 1:13:22
  But your body's accustomed to it now.
• 1:13:24
  And, and it's as much as it can be, right.
• 1:13:27
  But with the bodybuilding, I asked, but that's why I asked.
• 1:13:29
  So is he going to help you find a happy meeting?
• 1:13:31
  Because the bodybuilding's in July, August.
• 1:13:34
  August 2nd. August.
• 1:13:36
  OK. And the and the and the My
• 1:13:37
  birthday, October. Yeah, so I'm, I'm like measuring
• 1:13:42
  my obviously I do my weight all the time and then body fat
• 1:13:46
  percentage, but I also measure my, my measure my thighs,
• 1:13:50
  measure my arms. And we, we make sure I'm not
• 1:13:55
  like losing too much anywhere, making sure I'm staying
• 1:13:59
  hydrated, upping my car, my carbs as needed.
• 1:14:04
  So yeah, he's definitely, we're, we're making changes as needed.
• 1:14:09
  Cool, do you do any supplements? Oh yes.
• 1:14:12
  You know, not everybody does. That's why I.
• 1:14:14
  Asked. Yeah.
• 1:14:14
  No, I mean, I'm all natural. I'm a natural bodybuilder.
• 1:14:17
  Oh, no, I wasn't thinking. Yeah, yeah, I just, I was just
• 1:14:21
  meaning like from a healthy standpoint, like I just, I
• 1:14:23
  start, right. Like I just, I just started
• 1:14:26
  doing a hemp works supplement, my mushrooms in it for energy
• 1:14:30
  and vitality. And then I take these little
• 1:14:33
  healthy gut gummies, sea Moss gummies once a day because it
• 1:14:36
  helps with the gut health and things like that.
• 1:14:38
  So I'm not super into everything either, but for what you're
• 1:14:41
  doing, that's why I asked that because you obviously there's
• 1:14:43
  got to be, you know. Yeah, so I believe everybody
• 1:14:47
  should be on creatine whether they lift or not because of the
• 1:14:50
  brain benefits. So creatine is so good for
• 1:14:54
  people. So I definitely take creatine,
• 1:14:56
  amino acids, magnesium, zinc at night.
• 1:15:03
  I started taking ashwagandha root at night.
• 1:15:05
  I feel like I sleep better. Magnesium I might have already
• 1:15:09
  mentioned. So I I do I take AI take a quite
• 1:15:12
  AI take quite a few. I do collagen drinks in the
• 1:15:15
  morning. Yeah, OK, yeah.
• 1:15:19
  But yeah, now now with with the kids and and the hubby now is
• 1:15:23
  does Patrick just sitting on the sidelines watching you do all
• 1:15:25
  this stuff and just be like, what the hell, When do you
• 1:15:27
  sleep, woman? Yeah, sometimes, but.
• 1:15:30
  We. Actually, we, we worked out.
• 1:15:33
  We worked out together the other day and he's like, now listen,
• 1:15:37
  don't think that this means I want to start bodybuilding.
• 1:15:42
  So he, Giovanni, I wish he would start running with me.
• 1:15:49
  He's like, I don't. So the trick, the way we got
• 1:15:53
  Jake to run with us is is he got in trouble one day.
• 1:15:56
  So his punishments we had, he had to go do the race with us
• 1:15:58
  the next day. OK, nice.
• 1:16:00
  OK. And he was so pissed off.
• 1:16:02
  He beat everybody. Wow.
• 1:16:04
  He was like. Sticking that one in your back
• 1:16:06
  pocket. Right.
• 1:16:06
  He was like 10 years old at the time, but legit he beat every
• 1:16:10
  single person in that race. It was like 21 minutes for his
• 1:16:12
  very first 5K. And I'm, I mean everyone.
• 1:16:15
  I'm not. Just out of share everyone.
• 1:16:17
  Like we were, we were, we, we, we weren't in front, but we
• 1:16:21
  were, you know, where we started.
• 1:16:22
  And legit he won first place overall.
• 1:16:25
  And I'm like, dude, you need to run.
• 1:16:27
  You need to run now. Like, come on.
• 1:16:29
  And then, you know, he would do a little bit now and then he
• 1:16:31
  probably did, I want to say 1520 races, 5K's with us and placed
• 1:16:35
  in every single one of them. And then he's like, he's just
• 1:16:36
  done running. I'm like, seriously.
• 1:16:39
  Because as you know, as a kid, I couldn't run.
• 1:16:42
  I had asthma so bad that I was on the way to the hospital every
• 1:16:45
  single week. It was that I had a breathing
• 1:16:47
  machine at home. I had, you know, Quibrin and and
• 1:16:51
  all these other weird asthma medications that they just, you
• 1:16:53
  know, and Arizona's on the worst state for that.
• 1:16:55
  So as a child being able to run, I couldn't experience that
• 1:16:59
  right. I didn't hit that till high
• 1:17:00
  school and I grew out of it. So for him to be 10 years old
• 1:17:02
  and run for the first time ever run a 21 minute 5 Cam like holy
• 1:17:06
  shit son that's. Crazy.
• 1:17:08
  Right. And he can still do it.
• 1:17:09
  Like a couple years ago he texted me and says I just did a
• 1:17:12
  6 minute mile Dad, I'm like, OK, I'm coming for you.
• 1:17:14
  And at the time I was, I was at 7:40.
• 1:17:17
  So it took me two years to get there.
• 1:17:19
  But I ended up doing back-to-back at Orangetheory
• 1:17:21
  Fitness, two classes back at that at 555, each class for a
• 1:17:25
  mile. And then I ran, went outside in
• 1:17:27
  557. So I'm like, OK, I got you son.
• 1:17:30
  So here's my thing with that. Because.
• 1:17:33
  I, when I did my first 10K runners are a strange breed,
• 1:17:37
  right? I don't consider myself a
• 1:17:38
  runner, but whatever. I first 10K, I've run plenty of
• 1:17:44
  5K's and everyone's at the starting line and this guy's
• 1:17:47
  like, what's everybody's pace? And I'm like, look, I just want
• 1:17:51
  to finish like I don't care if I finish last.
• 1:17:55
  So my thing now is my race, my pace.
• 1:17:59
  I the Marine Corps Marathon, you have to hit a 14 minute at
• 1:18:03
  least. I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I can do that.
• 1:18:08
  And what's crazy is it doesn't matter if I'm running 2 miles or
• 1:18:12
  9 miles, my mile time is the same.
• 1:18:15
  No, but that's good though. But I love.
• 1:18:17
  Your attitude though, that's awesome.
• 1:18:19
  See my my see now my mindset for running changed after I broke my
• 1:18:23
  foot because before that I was trying to get to 145 half.
• 1:18:26
  Which was that guy? Which but to, but to me that,
• 1:18:29
  that for being over 50, to run a half marathon in an hour and 45
• 1:18:34
  minutes, to me was like, that's and I got to 1:48 and then, and
• 1:18:37
  then when the foot really got bad and that was it.
• 1:18:39
  Because then I ran the, the Vegas half and then it's just
• 1:18:42
  from there on, I was in the boot and, and, and for bills.
• 1:18:45
  You don't know people that are in fantastic cardio shape. 8
• 1:18:49
  months takes all of that away. I don't care what you cause
• 1:18:52
  cardio's different things. Cardio's not just running, it's,
• 1:18:54
  it's biking, it's, it's the, the rowing machine, it's elliptical,
• 1:18:59
  it's the Stairmaster. You can do cardio with different
• 1:19:03
  kinds of weights. You can do cardio can be doing
• 1:19:05
  leg day and, and doing goblet squats and sumo squats and leg
• 1:19:08
  press and leg growth. I mean, because as long as your,
• 1:19:10
  your heart rate's elevated and you're sucking for air, that's
• 1:19:14
  cardio. So it doesn't have to just be
• 1:19:16
  running, which I didn't know until I got in the boot.
• 1:19:20
  Then I'm like, wow, what the hell am I going to do with this?
• 1:19:22
  Right? Because I'm not allowed to run
• 1:19:24
  and I can't put the boot on the row or I can't put the boot on
• 1:19:26
  the bike. So then it was all upper body
• 1:19:28
  cardio when I was using TI Rex straps and stuff, and you know
• 1:19:31
  what I mean? So I still was able to maintain
• 1:19:33
  a certain level of cardio. But even before that, when we
• 1:19:38
  just thought it was a neuroma and I was having problems with
• 1:19:40
  then all I was doing was biking and I was afraid biking on a
• 1:19:44
  stationary bicycle wasn't going to have the same impact at
• 1:19:47
  running. Oh my God, when I was able to
• 1:19:50
  run again, I was faster and was in better cardio shape per SE,
• 1:19:57
  because it's it was so much harder to maintain the the the
• 1:20:02
  same kind of level on a bike doing, you know, 1516 gear on a
• 1:20:05
  bike. And because it was orange
• 1:20:07
  theory, it's up and down, you know, push paste all out me.
• 1:20:11
  That blew my mind. It just totally blew my mind
• 1:20:13
  that cardio is everything. It's not just running down the
• 1:20:16
  street for for people that understand that it is anything
• 1:20:18
  that you get your heart pump and get you sucking for air, that's
• 1:20:21
  cardio. Whether?
• 1:20:22
  Anything that gets your heart rate elevated for sure, yeah.
• 1:20:25
  Right, right. So that's like what you alluded
• 1:20:27
  to Alicia, like you, you, you know, the different things
• 1:20:29
  you're doing cardio wise, it still helps the end game.
• 1:20:33
  And when you when when you train for marathons and half
• 1:20:36
  marathons, you can do all kinds of workouts that do that, which
• 1:20:40
  I mean, because you do CrossFit, you can do regular just
• 1:20:42
  weightlifting, you can do regular core stuff, you can do
• 1:20:45
  regular running, you can walk, you can jog.
• 1:20:47
  I mean, there's so many different things that benefit
• 1:20:48
  you and it and it works out the other muscles that you don't
• 1:20:51
  realize will be a benefit when you're running, which is when
• 1:20:55
  the whole bike thing for that. And really I was like, holy
• 1:20:57
  shit, this is amazing. I didn't lose a step running on
• 1:20:59
  the bike. I lost, I lost all kinds of
• 1:21:01
  steps being in the boot because, you know, there was absolutely
• 1:21:04
  no traditional cardio, but the bike totally did not, did not
• 1:21:09
  derail my my fitness level. From a running standpoint, it
• 1:21:11
  actually made it that much better, which was surprising.
• 1:21:14
  Nice. Yeah.
• 1:21:15
  It's it's so funny when I run the first mile, I want to like,
• 1:21:20
  die. It's so does Nikki.
• 1:21:22
  So does Nikki. She talks to herself the whole
• 1:21:23
  time. This is stupid.
• 1:21:24
  I don't want to do this. Yes.
• 1:21:26
  Why am I doing? Like what the hell is wrong with
• 1:21:28
  me? I have to stop.
• 1:21:29
  I can't breathe. And I'm like, you are breathing,
• 1:21:32
  your lungs are moving air and it's like I have to stop.
• 1:21:35
  My legs hurt. No, your legs don't hurt.
• 1:21:37
  So I actually got the pep talk app and I'll listen to like like
• 1:21:43
  David Goggins and. He's great.
• 1:21:46
  Yes. I love that dude.
• 1:21:48
  I've followed him on Instagram for years.
• 1:21:50
  I heard him on Rogan the first time and I'm like, he's just one
• 1:21:54
  of those people that is infectious now.
• 1:21:56
  He really makes me feel like a piece of shit.
• 1:21:58
  He may be every day because this guy takes a picture and she'll
• 1:22:03
  tell you he takes a picture of his watch at like 4:30 in the
• 1:22:07
  morning and he's like, I'm up doing whatever.
• 1:22:09
  What are you doing? You know he's.
• 1:22:12
  That guy, he's that guy. And literally he has gotten me
• 1:22:15
  out of bed several mornings when I've had to go run because I
• 1:22:19
  just hear him playing in my head.
• 1:22:22
  But but yeah, that's a great app at like 40 minutes on the stair
• 1:22:27
  stepper. I'm listening to those.
• 1:22:29
  I'm listening to people the whole time, giving me
• 1:22:32
  motivation. That's awesome.
• 1:22:34
  Yeah, Nick is the same with running.
• 1:22:35
  I I have the mindset with running that finished stronger
• 1:22:38
  than you started. So if if my like our first smile
• 1:22:42
  forever and ever and ever was always in the 10 minute range
• 1:22:44
  because again, Nick is like you, I don't want to run.
• 1:22:46
  Yeah. You know, and I get behind her
• 1:22:48
  and I'm like, you got to run because I'm behind you, you
• 1:22:51
  know? But I think it's important for
• 1:22:52
  people to understand that that's what you replaced your addiction
• 1:22:55
  with. So your mindset about running,
• 1:22:58
  you know, I, I'm going to tease him about it, but he knows that
• 1:23:01
  I know you know, it's like when I say he's one of those guys,
• 1:23:05
  it's like I think like you do Alicia.
• 1:23:07
  I see these people on Facebook and even David Goggins.
• 1:23:10
  I'm like, I could never keep up with that anyway because I don't
• 1:23:13
  understand that mentality, right?
• 1:23:15
  I understand Chris's mentality towards running because that's
• 1:23:19
  what he does to keep himself on the straight and narrow as far
• 1:23:23
  as my mind, my body, my spirit is healthy, right?
• 1:23:26
  I can appreciate that like there's no tomorrow.
• 1:23:29
  So I get it. The other people that do it, I'm
• 1:23:33
  I guess I can appreciate where Nikki's coming from.
• 1:23:36
  I would be doing the same thing. What?
• 1:23:38
  This is so stupid. But the difference and one of
• 1:23:42
  the main things which is cool about you doing the Marine Corps
• 1:23:43
  Marathon that's in it's in Washington, DC for those that
• 1:23:46
  don't know you actually, you Arlington Cemetery, all the, all
• 1:23:50
  the really cool, cool. But you know, all the sites that
• 1:23:53
  you want to see in Washington, you're running through and, and
• 1:23:56
  you're part of that. You run with with with veterans,
• 1:23:58
  You run with active duty members, you run.
• 1:24:01
  I don't know if they're they did it before the you run through
• 1:24:04
  the 1st responders fallen, you know a.
• 1:24:07
  Memory Mile. Yeah, memory mile.
• 1:24:09
  Yeah, I'm hoping my dad's picture is going to be on that.
• 1:24:11
  That would be cool. So, so it's, it's a really, it's
• 1:24:14
  a really humbling race because number one, it's it's massive,
• 1:24:18
  but #2 you, you look to your left at one point in time, you
• 1:24:22
  have, you have a Marine running full gear with a rock on.
• 1:24:25
  And it's like, yeah, be kidding me, this guy's passing me, you
• 1:24:29
  know what I'm doing? 9 minute mile.
• 1:24:30
  And he's like, OK, it's just, it's very humbling.
• 1:24:33
  It's, it's, it's, it's an amazing race And they have
• 1:24:35
  everything. They have 510K, half marathon
• 1:24:37
  and full marathon. So if you've never done 1 and
• 1:24:40
  you want to do want to be a part of that environment, I highly
• 1:24:42
  suggest that we would have, if we went this year, it would have
• 1:24:44
  been our fifth time. But we just, we just because the
• 1:24:46
  next thing we just got to bow out.
• 1:24:48
  But it's and it's an amazing event.
• 1:24:51
  We the whole weekend you stay and have, I mean, it's just
• 1:24:54
  really cool. So if you've never done it, boys
• 1:24:55
  and girls are listening and you're a runner.
• 1:24:56
  Marine Corps Marathon, it's mcm.com, I think is the thing.
• 1:25:00
  Go check it out. It's it's definitely something
• 1:25:02
  to do bucket list wise for a runner.
• 1:25:04
  Yep, and this year they're doing it a little bit different this
• 1:25:06
  year because it's the Marine Corps 250th.
• 1:25:09
  Birthday. Marine Corps Marathon 50th Every
• 1:25:12
  entry is a marathon entry this year.
• 1:25:14
  Right, which is why it's a drag that we're not that we have to
• 1:25:17
  bow out because that thing, it's like.
• 1:25:19
  Yeah. So I think next year it'll go
• 1:25:21
  back to the five. Oh, OK. 510K half, yeah.
• 1:25:24
  Yeah. So yeah, I'm excited.
• 1:25:27
  I've been, I've been training. I've I'm starting to not hate
• 1:25:32
  running quite as much. Yeah.
• 1:25:34
  Well, see, The thing is once you once you train for it and then
• 1:25:37
  you do the the full, you're gonna you're gonna find yourself
• 1:25:40
  in the couple weeks I need to go for a run.
• 1:25:42
  Yeah, yeah, that's, I hope so. I've I'm doing 1/2 in June to
• 1:25:47
  see where I'm at. Where's the half at?
• 1:25:49
  Long Beach, OK. Good.
• 1:25:51
  I was going to say, hopefully not in Arizona.
• 1:25:53
  No, it's in Long Beach, but I and I keep I keep learning
• 1:25:56
  valuable lessons. I posted about this.
• 1:25:58
  I don't know if you saw it. It was my seven mile run a few
• 1:26:01
  weeks back and I started out and I got to a mile and my hair tie
• 1:26:06
  broke. So then you know, it's it's in
• 1:26:09
  the morning. It was still kind of warm and I
• 1:26:12
  don't have a hair tie for my hair for the next 6 miles.
• 1:26:15
  So like, all right, I got a carious fair with me from now
• 1:26:18
  on. Nikki has all kinds of things in
• 1:26:20
  her camel pack. She has Chapstick, she has
• 1:26:22
  Kleenex, she has about $20 in cash.
• 1:26:24
  She has several, her ties, band aids, little Advil, Tylenol, you
• 1:26:29
  know, because you, you don't know.
• 1:26:30
  And when you're off, when you're off running, like you have your
• 1:26:33
  phone because it fits in our camel packs, but that's it.
• 1:26:37
  Like you, you have nothing else. And you know, it's kind of
• 1:26:41
  you're, you're purposely isolating yourself regardless of
• 1:26:44
  where you're running, because if you're on a trail, well, you're
• 1:26:47
  still on a trail. It's not like you could turn
• 1:26:48
  around. Oh, there's a Circle K you may
• 1:26:50
  have passed through OK two hours ago.
• 1:26:52
  So, you know, that's the thing. So when you train, be mindful of
• 1:26:56
  that, those trails where you have the areas where you can hit
• 1:26:59
  a QT because you know. Yeah.
• 1:27:02
  It sucks having to pee when you're running and there's
• 1:27:04
  nowhere inside to pee for a woman.
• 1:27:06
  See men like Oh Tree. You know, yeah.
• 1:27:09
  I'm good, but women? Yeah, that happened last week
• 1:27:13
  and I was like, OK, I can get to repairing.
• 1:27:18
  Is it called Reserve I? I was.
• 1:27:20
  Like I know there's a bathroom. There, I think I'm close enough
• 1:27:23
  I can get there or I can turn around and go back home, but I
• 1:27:26
  made it to the reserve and use the.
• 1:27:28
  Bathroom there, yeah, there's that, There's you running on
• 1:27:30
  that, that that canal system, Yes, the one that starts like we
• 1:27:34
  used to start it from Arizona Ave. and Riggs and take it all
• 1:27:36
  the way to Freestone Park. Yeah, it goes far.
• 1:27:39
  Yeah, it's awesome. I learned.
• 1:27:40
  I learned that it actually goes farther than that.
• 1:27:42
  But we've just when we were running for our races, we would
• 1:27:45
  take from the rigs in in Arizona and we go to my office at at
• 1:27:48
  Bourke St. and baseline. How far is that for people who
• 1:27:52
  are listening? I want to say that's that's
• 1:27:56
  pretty. I want to say 10 miles at least.
• 1:27:58
  There you go. At least.
• 1:28:00
  If not, yeah, because because I would stock the fridge, we would
• 1:28:03
  put, we would put little goo in the fridge because my office was
• 1:28:06
  there and I had a code. So Gatorade little goo min a
• 1:28:09
  point and then run back the other direction.
• 1:28:12
  Yeah, I've discovered if I start at my house, I can run to the
• 1:28:15
  reserve and then hit the canal and I can do as many miles as I.
• 1:28:19
  Want. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:28:20
  It's like I just have to be mindful that it is like 2 1/2
• 1:28:23
  three miles back to my house, so.
• 1:28:25
  Right, right. See.
• 1:28:26
  And that's where, that's where Nikki helps me with the math
• 1:28:28
  because we'll be like going to go run 6 miles.
• 1:28:30
  I'm like, OK, we're going to run out to, you know?
• 1:28:32
  Yeah, he's going to run 6 miles in One Direction.
• 1:28:35
  Right. Yeah, exactly.
• 1:28:35
  She's. Like, no, we got to turn around.
• 1:28:37
  Well, because I like to do a half mile cooldown.
• 1:28:39
  So then I'll say something and should be like, yeah, no, we
• 1:28:41
  went go this far. In turn I'm like, oh, OK,
• 1:28:45
  Because if it was up to me, we'd have like a mile and a half cool
• 1:28:47
  down and you know, that's just not her.
• 1:28:50
  So and we haven't, we really haven't run in about a month
• 1:28:52
  which sucks but I replace it with just pushing weights and
• 1:28:55
  stuff. I do like that Strava app.
• 1:28:59
  Yeah, Strava's cool. We were Strava forever now.
• 1:29:02
  And then we went. Then I went to Garmin.
• 1:29:04
  I had a Nike, Nike watch when we first started running.
• 1:29:06
  And then I finally got a Garmin, OK.
• 1:29:08
  And then so I kind of bounced out of the Strava because I
• 1:29:11
  mean, how many running apps do I need, you know?
• 1:29:13
  Right, right, right. What does that do for you?
• 1:29:15
  For somebody that doesn't run. What was that Strava app?
• 1:29:20
  Yeah. What does the Strava app do for
• 1:29:21
  you? Well for me, I make my routes so
• 1:29:25
  I I'm like OK, I need to know 10 miles from my house what what is
• 1:29:29
  the route? And it'll either show you routes
• 1:29:32
  that have already been made, or you can make your own.
• 1:29:34
  Yeah, like I've, I had, I had routes I saved in Strava as we
• 1:29:37
  were training for things. I would say I don't know if they
• 1:29:40
  come, if they go public or not, but I would, I would save
• 1:29:43
  different little things we did to just, you know, then I could
• 1:29:45
  go, let's go run this today. And then what about?
• 1:29:48
  Yep. And then what I do before I go
• 1:29:50
  run, I send the route to Patrick just in case.
• 1:29:53
  Oh, because you run by yourself. Yeah.
• 1:29:56
  OK, that's good thinking. Good thinking.
• 1:29:58
  But of course, you're you're a badass, so I dare anybody to try
• 1:30:00
  to stop her on the trail. You're going to get your ass
• 1:30:03
  kicked. She.
• 1:30:04
  Did not give up an entire suitcase of no pharmaceuticals
• 1:30:08
  to the Ugandan government people, right, you're in.
• 1:30:11
  Trouble. What I didn't tell you guys is I
• 1:30:14
  actually trained Krav Maga in Israel.
• 1:30:16
  So. Oh.
• 1:30:17
  Right on. We really are a badass, yeah.
• 1:30:21
  Yeah, so I was actually supposed to be there last week and had to
• 1:30:24
  delay my training. So I'll be going probably in the
• 1:30:28
  fall, to do another training. There you go.
• 1:30:31
  All right. Well.
• 1:30:31
  That's one thing. That's one thing that I always
• 1:30:33
  like that Rogan talks about on his podcast is nowadays you got
• 1:30:37
  to be careful. You don't know what woman you're
• 1:30:38
  running into. That's true.
• 1:30:40
  You might, you might run into a Ronda Rousey that nobody knows
• 1:30:43
  about just because she didn't pursue it, right?
• 1:30:46
  But she might be a Brazilian black belt.
• 1:30:48
  Yep, Yep Chris, can I make 2 quick plugs?
• 1:30:53
  Absolutely. All right, this is the empowered
• 1:30:56
  nurse. This is my first ever book that
• 1:31:00
  congratulations. On.
• 1:31:01
  Amazon. Nice.
• 1:31:03
  And then it's really just about, you know, burnout is so bad in
• 1:31:06
  nursing. So it's just about getting back
• 1:31:08
  into why you got into nursing. And then a plug for Patrick.
• 1:31:11
  This is his book. Right on, Where'd it go?
• 1:31:14
  That's awesome. It's part of a series, so this
• 1:31:17
  is the first one. Right on.
• 1:31:18
  What's this about? What's the synopsis of it?
• 1:31:21
  Oh, I haven't read. I'm.
• 1:31:30
  Going to but I've just got too much going on right now.
• 1:31:34
  You don't say. Since we're since we're dropping
• 1:31:36
  books, this is my book that I wrote a couple years ago.
• 1:31:39
  It's called the Legend of Charles Lee Lang OK, cool.
• 1:31:42
  It's based on a true story because I used to go up every
• 1:31:44
  January work with his name is Chuck.
• 1:31:45
  I used to work on his cattle ranch.
• 1:31:48
  And then finally at one point in time he had asked we had a
• 1:31:51
  conversation when when we were going riding out, it went to a
• 1:31:56
  dark side. He's like, hey, when I die, man,
• 1:31:57
  I don't want to be buried in the cemetery.
• 1:31:59
  I want to be buried in the open fields and mountains so I can
• 1:32:01
  sew. That's that's it's, it's based
• 1:32:04
  on a true concept, but the whole thing's made-up.
• 1:32:08
  But so what's on his Amazon as well?
• 1:32:10
  That was my. That was my third my. 3rd I
• 1:32:11
  don't have a book this. This is my book right here.
• 1:32:15
  This is book. This is as much writing as I'm
• 1:32:17
  going to do. I just, I just figure we're
• 1:32:19
  busting out books. I'd you know, I'd share.
• 1:32:21
  Of course. So again, boys and girls, this
• 1:32:24
  is Alicia Shields. She's an amazing human.
• 1:32:26
  We'll have all her information on the Instagram, Facebook, and
• 1:32:29
  YouTube. Mike puts these all together
• 1:32:31
  once we're done. So there's gonna probably be
• 1:32:32
  about 1520 shorts that we can share with you.
• 1:32:35
  So then you can put those everywhere on your stuff that
• 1:32:38
  will talk about all of the nuances of what you do.
• 1:32:40
  She's misses Arizona, she's trying to be Misses USA.
• 1:32:44
  She works with Veterans Without Orders, which is a fantastic
• 1:32:47
  nonprofit organization that goes around the world to empower
• 1:32:53
  other countries on so many different levels, and she has
• 1:32:56
  Box Out. Box out and box out project.
• 1:32:59
  Box out is a is a boxing gym she's a a part owner of and
• 1:33:03
  Chandler and Box out project helps empower veterans, women
• 1:33:07
  and at youth at youth kids that risk kids.
• 1:33:10
  Is that OK? So yeah, anything you want to
• 1:33:13
  learn about Alicia Shields, that's going to be on the show.
• 1:33:15
  Mike and I always wrap this stuff up with, you know, if
• 1:33:18
  you're hit, don't let the bad days win.
• 1:33:20
  Somebody Loves You. Reach out, talk to someone if
• 1:33:23
  you're if you're depressed, if you're sad, if you're just
• 1:33:26
  confused, whatever the case may be, tomorrow is always going to
• 1:33:28
  be a better day. So to be don't be that person.
• 1:33:30
  That leaves avoiding somebody's heart because you just didn't
• 1:33:33
  have a conversation with them, right?
• 1:33:37
  Any anything you want to wrap up with Alicia?
• 1:33:40
  I I appreciate you having me on here.
• 1:33:42
  It was awesome. It was a lot of fun.
• 1:33:46
  Thanks for letting me get all that information out.
• 1:33:48
  And if anyone's interested in volunteering or finding out more
• 1:33:52
  about any of the awesome organizations we talked about,
• 1:33:55
  please reach out to me because we would loved.
• 1:33:58
  I'd love to talk more about the organizations so.
• 1:34:01
  Well, we can have you back on. We can have that as much as you
• 1:34:03
  want. And we just, we can just focus
• 1:34:05
  one day on on veterans without orders and talk about all the
• 1:34:07
  stuff you do there. So that's the thing about us.
• 1:34:10
  We don't have an agenda. We don't.
• 1:34:12
  We don't. Have you want to do a whole show
• 1:34:13
  on that? Just get with Chris and we'll do
• 1:34:16
  a whole show on just that. Yeah.
• 1:34:17
  Cool. Yeah, I'll have the.
• 1:34:18
  I'm all about the veterans, too. Yeah, Yeah, that would be, that
• 1:34:22
  would be fantastic because again, we're all about helping
• 1:34:26
  everybody else's stuff grow and be and be brought to the
• 1:34:29
  forefront because you know, it's networking.
• 1:34:31
  It's it's a different brand of networking, but I didn't know
• 1:34:35
  about better than other orders until you just told me.
• 1:34:37
  I knew you the other stuff you did right, But then you're like,
• 1:34:39
  Oh, I don't do that anymore. I didn't I knew you were I
• 1:34:41
  didn't know you were a real part over a box out, but I knew you
• 1:34:43
  were a boxing right, So I knew you were legit.
• 1:34:47
  I didn't know you're a bad ass. So you are I'm like legit.
• 1:34:51
  You're a truly human, amazing human.
• 1:34:52
  I mean, I liked you and your family before, but you just you
• 1:34:55
  went up a notch with this stuff because it's it's selflessness
• 1:34:58
  and there's so many people don't do enough to help others.
• 1:35:04
  And I think that's sad because you get so much of you get so
• 1:35:07
  much for food for your soul when you're helping other people and
• 1:35:11
  and you know, you're teaching people how to fish
• 1:35:14
  theoretically, so they know how to take care of themselves for
• 1:35:18
  decades at a time with the water.
• 1:35:19
  That's amazing. And the water thing is
• 1:35:21
  sawyer.com. So if you guys didn't catch that
• 1:35:22
  part of show Sawyer, like thomassawyer.com really cool
• 1:35:26
  products about how to filter water that doesn't work for the
• 1:35:29
  ocean. But all the other you know, you
• 1:35:31
  I I I pulled it up while we were talking about it too.
• 1:35:34
  There's a picture, I don't know if it's from one of your
• 1:35:37
  adventures, but a bunch of buckets lined up in a row and it
• 1:35:40
  looked like 1/3 a third world country, right?
• 1:35:42
  I don't want to say this, but and they all had their little
• 1:35:45
  things going out and and kids. I mean, it's so it's it's
• 1:35:48
  amazing, amazing stuff that you do Alicia, amazing.
• 1:35:51
  You should you should go take go take a nap.
• 1:35:53
  OK. I think I might.
• 1:35:56
  You deserve it. Eat my rice cakes and take a nap
• 1:35:58
  there. You go and tell Patrick and the
• 1:36:01
  kids I said hello and then we'll definitely have you back on
• 1:36:03
  again. Love to have you have more of
• 1:36:05
  your story, especially with the other stuff that you do with.
• 1:36:07
  From a volunteering standpoint, it's fantastic.
• 1:36:08
  It was awesome to meet you for sure.
• 1:36:10
  Thank you for coming on and doing this and getting your
• 1:36:12
  message out there and whatever message, whatever links you want
• 1:36:15
  as far as those messages for this one, just drop them in the
• 1:36:20
  link that we have. To e-mail me e-mail, shoot me an
• 1:36:22
  e-mail today when we're done, e-mail me everything that you
• 1:36:24
  that you talked about. So then when Mike puts it all
• 1:36:26
  together. I'll drop those links on Spotify
• 1:36:30
  and he can drop them on YouTube. And actually yours will when I
• 1:36:34
  drop it, it'll go to anywhere an RSS feed goes to.
• 1:36:37
  So Apple, Amazon, Spotify. So whichever ones you want in
• 1:36:41
  there, just send them to Chris and I'll include him in the
• 1:36:44
  final post. So thank you again.
• 1:36:46
  I really appreciate it was amazing to meet you.
• 1:36:48
  Nice to nice to meet you Mike. Nice to see you again, Chris.
• 1:36:51
  You as well have a great day. You too.
• 1:36:54
  Love you guys. Love you too.
• 1:37:10
  The place where you will go behind your eyes.
• 1:37:14
  Take a moment, look until you see it.
• 1:37:25
  Fight your bail and see your boss weird.
• 1:37:39
  Fight your battle. Now you're coming.
• 1:39:05
  Come down here. Yeah, we found out he didn't see
• 1:39:09
  his sand. You can fuck and fight him.
• 1:39:13
  Wait for the dead. Or when he's.
• 1:39:16
  Closer out here. But in the wind he went.
• 1:39:20
  No quizzes, we'll play, inspire and make sure you press on the
• 1:39:26
  almighty day. You got a dream.
• 1:39:30
  Who in your life to keep our soul in every day?
• 1:39:37
  Take the trail behind your eyes. Feel the soul revolution.
• 1:39:51
  Yeah, take a moment. Look where you see it.
• 1:39:58
  Fight your family to you. More clear.
• 1:40:26
  You gotta, You gotta. You gotta, you gotta, you gotta.