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The Bunkhouse -Challenge Accepted: Rich LaMonica on Service, Transition & Purpose · Military Broadcast Radio | MBR Talk

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  There were times I was looking at myself in the mirror like,
• 0:11
  dude, why are you putting on khakis?
• 0:16
  Where? Gunny Holly, who was blown up
• 0:19
  and killed, who had two children.
• 0:21
  I lived in a reality for about I think 15 years that it should
• 0:26
  have been me. Your source of strength has
• 0:31
  never been you. It has always been from
• 0:33
  somewhere else. It's just my belief that mine is
• 0:35
  from God and I, I choose to rely on God and I'm far from perfect.
• 0:40
  I screw up all the time, but my life is at peace.
• 0:43
  I found it in past the storm where I am at peace.
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  When things got really bad, which they will, we all are
• 0:54
  going to have times in our life where we just can't handle some
• 0:57
  things. To know that reaching out for
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  help is an option. It's the same as going to the
• 1:02
  doctor. When you you can't get over the
• 1:03
  common cold and it's turned into something crazy, sinus
• 1:08
  infection, you got to go to a doctor and get medicine.
• 1:10
  It's the same with your mental health.
• 1:33
  Hey everybody, welcome back to the Bunkhouse live here on
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  military broadcast radio where we give veterans of voice.
• 1:39
  Before we get started, if you could go ahead and follow the
• 1:41
  link to scrolling down below, it goes out to my link tree could
• 1:44
  find the show on all my platforms.
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  Go out there, follow them, like them, share them, get somebody
• 1:49
  else involved, get them listening.
• 1:50
  You might, you might be able to learn some stuff and maybe could
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  be a conversation that somebody out there really needs to hear.
• 1:56
  And also with that, everybody out there listening, please let
• 1:59
  please know that you're not alone.
• 2:01
  If you know anybody that might be struggling, please let them
• 2:03
  know that they're not alone as well.
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  There's help out there. They can call the Crisis Line
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  9888 for all your veterans out there.
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  Go ahead and press one that gets you over to the Veterans Crisis
• 2:11
  Line. Again, you're not alone.
• 2:14
  And the strength is asking for help.
• 2:15
  I promise you that is strength and there's somebody out there
• 2:17
  that's going to listen and want to help you out.
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  But before we bring my guest on, let's go ahead and get a quick
• 2:24
  word from MBR. The station where our veterans
• 2:28
  voices are heard. MBR talk.
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  Hey, thanks for supporting our channel by watching and
• 2:34
  listening. Find us on the web at MB Radio.
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  Dot. Oh, right, and now I'm breaking
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  to the stage. Rich Lamonica, man.
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  Welcome to the show, brother. Thanks, brother.
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  Thanks for having me. Thanks for inviting me on and
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  getting let's get some stick together.
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  I think it only took us a couple weeks to get us on there.
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  So it's outstanding. And from the time we met, it's
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  less than a month I think, so it's awesome.
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  Yeah, no, absolutely, man. And that's one thing I like, I,
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  I always try to showcase because there's so many networks online
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  now for veteran, like, especially for podcasters.
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  Like when I first started my podcast back in 2022, there
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  wasn't hardly any of this type of networking going on.
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  But man, this year, like my relaunch is, has been nothing
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  but like, has been a blessing. And like, I couldn't have, I
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  couldn't have imagined a year ago what this was going to be
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  like and how many great people, including yourself, that I've
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  met along this way, man. Yeah, I started mine in 21 and
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  like you said, it was desolate. There's me against the world.
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  I felt like, and until I ran into people like Willis and
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  things like that. And me and Willis had long talks
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  and I'm he he calls me this mentor.
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  And we kind of helped each other and we built this thing.
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  And then tip of the spear started and all of a sudden
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  these the tentacles were wrenching out.
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  And that network is brewing. It's wow.
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  I don't even sometimes I forget things where I was sometimes.
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  Who was I talking to at this time?
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  Because there's so many of us now.
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  It's it's amazing how much it's grown.
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  It is man. And and like Speaking of Willis,
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  yeah, I mean, like, I think that's how we matter of fact,
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  that's how me and you got kind of linked up was through Willis
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  and through tip of the spear, you know, and and another
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  another great organization, Cav Arts as well.
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  I think we we partnered on some stuff there too.
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  So it's been it's been a great ride so far.
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  And I'm, I'm, I'm super excited with 2020 sevens and it brings
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  us all of us in general, man. I hope the ride keeps going the
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  same way, the same trajectory forward, and everyone just
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  helps, keeps lifting each other up.
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  So right now none of us are. I don't think anyone in our
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  circle puts anyone down. We always lift each other up and
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  promote each other more than we promote ourselves, I think, so
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  it's pretty good. No, you're absolutely right.
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  That's like, that's one thing that early stood out for me,
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  getting involved in all these different networks, man.
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  It's like nobody's competing for anything.
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  Like like we're all just supporting each other.
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  And like you said, I think we probably promote each other more
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  than we promote ourselves. I know like I I am horrible at
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  self promotion for my show but I will like and share and repost
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  everybody else's stuff like without even thinking twice
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  about it. Definitely.
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  I think it's all of us. I think we have that that hard
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  headedness. It's just like when raising the
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  hand to ask for help. We won't do that and we won't do
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  anything for ourselves. But if J.
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  Cole puts a show out, I'm I'm promoting it.
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  I'm I'm sharing it. I'm liking it.
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  And what? What was I supposed to do for
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  me? Oh yeah, I gotta promote my own,
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  Dang it. Yeah.
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  All right. Well, Speaking of sales
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  promotion, if you could go ahead and kind of introduce yourself,
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  give everybody a little bit of information about your
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  background and kind of what you do.
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  All right, my name is Rich Lomonica IJ, Cole said.
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  I'm the host and founder of the Misfit Nation show, but before
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  that I was a soldier for 22 years.
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  I joined the Army out of New Jersey in 1993, did 22 years all
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  over for combat deployments. I met my wife on my first duty
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  station and we're still together now, which is a, you know, it's,
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  it's an anomaly in military circles to have someone that
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  long. We're 32 years now married right
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  now, we're living apart, but it's OK because we're still
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  strong. She can still yell at me on the
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  phone. It still works.
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  And I retired in 2015. I took a complete year off.
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  We'll get into that later about what went on there and a lot of
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  what went on during the 22 years And after the after that year
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  off, I took a job with a nonprofit called The Mission
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  Continues where I was mentoring other veterans on how to get
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  through that transition that I just failed at and to make sure
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  they didn't go through that same problem I did and did that for
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  about 2 1/2 years because only one, because I didn't want to be
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  a statistic of losing a job after one year like many
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  veterans are. And two, because I'm hard head
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  like just referenced earlier. And so I stayed there a couple
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  years until one of my, my first sergeants called is, Hey
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  brother, you want a job as a guest?
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  And he got me in training soldiers and working with
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  soldiers. Since 2018, I've been working
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  with soldiers and training him on emerging threats.
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  And that's what I still do today as my day job.
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  At night, I do the podcast. I'm on hold right now in school
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  because I got really sick so I couldn't focus.
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  So I'm trying to get back to that starting at 27.
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  Like we said earlier, we'll see what 27 is going to bring for
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  us. That's something I'm going to
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  bring forward, is to start my schooling again and then finish
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  that, that doctorate. Got it, man.
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  That's awesome, dude. Yeah, I got it.
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  My podcast is really my side gig too, right?
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  I have a day job I do IT work on, you know.
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  But yeah, I think one thing, and I know you will talk about this
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  probably a bit more too, is just the sense of service that we get
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  being able to do the things that we we are able to do with our
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  shows. You know, I, I think it's what
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  you guys are doing at Misfit Nation, man, amazing.
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  I love, I love listening to your guys's show.
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  Always a different story, you know, what the impact is and
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  stuff. And I think that's amazing.
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  And that's some of the stuff that I try to do.
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  And a lot of us really out there trying to do the same thing, you
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  know, just getting the stories out there, getting, you know,
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  the message across, like letting everybody know they're not
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  alone, you know? Exactly.
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  And I think the more stories we get out there, probably the more
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  people will help. But you never know what story is
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  going to help what person, right?
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  Like something we like to say on the Misfit Nation is reach one
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  teach 1. So even if with tomorrow's our
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  700 show and it's amazing that we got the 700 now, but in the
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  1st 699, if we help 699 people, then we're a success.
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  That's that's what we look at. That's the metric that matters.
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  If 699 people got something from those 699 shows, then that's
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  amazing. I think that's what our whole
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  circle does, yeah. Yeah, that's definitely right
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  man. Like that's one thing I always
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  try. Like I haven't had a many shows
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  since free launching. But my thing is if, if one
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  person can take something from one of my shows, whether it be
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  one of my lives or my pre records, I do monthly, you know,
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  and, and take one thing from her to learn something from it that
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  can help them or maybe a light switch clicks on.
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  But oh, you know what? Yeah, I, I can get some help.
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  I do need to get some help. Or, you know, that they're not
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  alone. Just that one person.
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  Best success for for for all of us, you know, is just that one
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  person. Yes, exactly.
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  And I think I think that's the best goal to go for.
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  Everything else will come. If you're doing a good job, if
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  you're putting on a good program platform, it's going to work out
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  and everything's going to go great.
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  And if you're a genuine person and being real, it's going to
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  where everything will work out for you.
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  And I think that's another thing that we promote amongst our
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  amongst Tots and amongst everything else is just yourself
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  and just do what you want to do and be real about it.
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  Yeah, no, absolutely. So real quick, what was that
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  transitioning like from active duty when you first got out?
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  And that's, you ever hear just the, the phrase running into a
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  wall? I think that that's not, that's
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  a, that's a simple way of putting it.
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  But you go from 22 years of putting the boots on and knowing
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  what you're going to do every day, every day that you have
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  this, this pattern, things going to happen.
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  You do PT, you're going to do XY and Z throughout the day, and
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  then you go home, reboot and do it again the next day.
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  Then all of a sudden on July 1st, 2015, it just stops.
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  What do I do with my hands? I was like, what do I do now?
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  What is this life? I don't have to leave the house,
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  what do I do? I'm trying to find this job that
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  I thought I would fall right in on and it didn't happen.
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  So I was now sitting at home drinking beer, hanging out with
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  my dogs on the couch and looking up jobs and applying to all
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  these jobs and nothing was happening.
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  So drinking more beer, hanging out with my dogs more.
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  The dogs loved it at home. Now, he wasn't deployed all the
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  time. He wasn't gone.
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  And they were getting a bowl of beer every day.
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  So this is outstanding. This is awesome.
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  So but my wife is like, are you OK?
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  I think you're depressed. I think you're depressed.
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  I'm not depressed. There's no way.
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  I'm depressed. There's no way.
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  And I just kept going through things.
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  And I started a fellowship with the mission continues as a
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  fellow. And I started volunteering at
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  the Red Cross and starting to find that purpose to give back
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  to people. So I volunteered almost 600
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  hours there in, in five months or so.
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  And during that time, I, I found my footing.
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  I started finding that purpose and my eyes were open, seeing
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  what I can do to help others within my community help the Red
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  Cross who helped me and so many of my soldiers along the way
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  when whether it was getting flights home for emergencies or
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  getting those emergency messages to you.
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  And when I got wounded, it was one of the little packages they
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  give you in the hospital, like the toiletries and stuff was the
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  Red Cross. So I said, let me give back.
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  That's the place I'll go give back to is the Red Cross.
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  And at that time they were getting a lot of heat because
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  the Haiti stuff and all their bags are not in Haiti.
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  Well, that's the international Red Cross.
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  This is the American Red Cross. It's two different organizations
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  and they still do help people. If your house is burning now has
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  burnt down, they're usually the first people there to get you
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  and put that blanket on you and put you in a hotel and get you
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  in the right frame of mind for to start that next power to move
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  forward. And that's why I gave back to
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  them. And then I went still applying
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  for jobs though, trying to find that real job where you're
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  getting paid money and, you know, finding that next level.
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  So I wound up the interview for a place in Washington, DC at the
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  Homeland Security Emergency Management for Washington, DC
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  itself. I drove from Tennessee up there
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  for 11 hour drive for this interview.
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  I sat with a mentor and me and her went through interview
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  questions and everything was great.
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  Went to the interview the next day and I sat there and I went
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  through the interview and the guy, I can tell they didn't want
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  me right away. I can feel it.
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  You can feel that in them across the room looking at you like
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  you're not the guy they want and or they already, or that they
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  already had someone. And once they said, oh, what
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  college did you go to? And I went to college while I
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  was deployed. So I went to Ashford University.
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  Easiest way to go to school is online when you're deployed.
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  So I went there. Oh, Ashford, That's that's it,
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  huh? Yeah.
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  It's still a degree. It's still Ashford's degree.
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  Homeland Security and I left there knowing that I didn't get
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  the job. I knew it when I walked out the
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  door. I started driving home and my
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  fellowship program specialist, Jeremy Bailey called me.
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  He asked me how I'm doing. It's the greatest left of this
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  interview. He said you don't want that job.
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  So I kind of did. I drove 11 hours for it and he
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  said no, you don't want that job, bro.
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  I do want that job. He said no, I got something for
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  you. I'm going to send you a link.
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  Apply to that. That's the one you want.
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  So OK man, challenge accepted. I pulled out.
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  I went to my in laws house, filled out the application in
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  West Virginia that was in I think end of April.
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  Middle of May me and my wife went on a retreat with Wooden
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  Warrior Project couples retreat. We're in Mississippi doing some
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  crazy stuff like zip lining and hijacking and stuff.
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  And they call me and say you got an interview in Saint Louis.
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  We're flying home on Thursday, the interview's on Friday so I'm
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  man. So I got to drive to Saint Louis
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  on Friday. So I get poems Nashville and
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  late night on Thursday. I don't have a suit ready, so
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  I'm wise getting a suit together.
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  I get in the car and I drive to Saint Louis the next day.
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  It's 3 1/2 hours. I get dressed on the way.
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  I stopped at McDonald's, get the suit on.
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  I walk in there and I say, what are you doing here?
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  So I'm here for the interview. Oh, I forgot to tell you it's
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  remote. So what I said it's a vital
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  piece of information. I said, but lesson learned
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  because we just, they took me to pizza.
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  Me and the whole team went to go have pizza.
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  And that was my interview. Sitting there eating pizza with
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  these guys. And this is a good interview.
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  I can fit in here. And lo and behold, I was offered
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  the job in exactly 365 days. After retiring, I started
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  actually working. But that's awesome, man.
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  And what's crazy about that story is like if you hadn't
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  showed up, you probably wouldn't have had that same dynamic
• 14:04
  during that interview, right? Like it just one little piece of
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  information that theater didn't get passed properly or whatever
• 14:12
  the case may be. It's just like you showed up and
• 14:15
  it's almost like it was supposed to happen that way, right?
• 14:18
  All the stars aligned and that's that's how it was.
• 14:21
  And then it's falling into that team Geo batched out there too
• 14:24
  for the year and hanging out with that team.
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  Jeremy, Jim, Jim Robbins, a Vietnam veteran and they're now
• 14:31
  mentoring lot veterans coming out of service.
• 14:35
  Grandpa Jim had him in there and he's, we always, you know, pick
• 14:38
  on him, but also glean that knowledge from him.
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  He's the institutional knowledge that's in the room and the rest
• 14:44
  of us are all GWAT veterans and we're ribbing each other.
• 14:46
  I was the only Army guy. There's a couple, 1 Marine
• 14:49
  couple, Navy and Air Force and as man, this is a rough 1.
• 14:54
  So I got a big Army flag put on the wall just to, you know, keep
• 14:56
  that rib going. We had a great team and, and it
• 15:01
  they moved away from that program, which is why at that
• 15:03
  year mark, a lot of them lost their jobs because they went
• 15:06
  away from that program. I stayed on for a different
• 15:08
  program just at a hard headedness and I regret staying
• 15:13
  on after they left, but I had to stay on after that point.
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  So I was already too many, too many feet forward.
• 15:17
  And that's yeah, said you're not getting me now.
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  I, I stayed forward and I did my job.
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  I I still gave 100% effort and stayed there until I took this
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  job. No, that's awesome, man.
• 15:29
  So what was? Was there a point in time to
• 15:38
  where you felt like maybe what you were doing wasn't maybe
• 15:47
  enough at it? Did you when you started kind of
• 15:50
  because you, you were saying you started your podcast a little
• 15:54
  bit later after that. So was there like a point in
• 15:55
  time to where you were like, I need to do something more, I
• 15:58
  need to do more? You know, great question.
• 16:00
  Great question. So while I was working at the
• 16:02
  Mission Continues, I started my studies for my masters at
• 16:05
  Georgetown University because I, I still had that eerie feeling
• 16:09
  in my head about that Ashford comment by that interviewer.
• 16:11
  So I said, I want to do 1 better.
• 16:12
  I want to go to Georgetown. You can't, you can't discount
• 16:15
  Georgetown, right? I got accepted, went into their
• 16:18
  disaster Emergency Management program for my master's.
• 16:21
  And so that was taking a lot of my time at night.
• 16:23
  So there's a lot of effort, a lot of studying.
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  I graduated there May of 2020, which when COVID was going on
• 16:29
  and I was like, man, I got 8 hours a week not dedicated to
• 16:32
  anything. I need to find something to do.
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  So I started researching and I said podcasting, this can't be
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  hard. Joe Rogan doesn't, He's a
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  comedian. I can do this.
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  And then I didn't think about what he has behind him, this
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  scheme of humans that he has behind him and money training
• 16:48
  that's behind him. I don't have that.
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  I come up with this plan, you know, I'll interview some of my
• 16:53
  old soldiers. That'll get the monitor and get
• 16:55
  them to share their story and make them breathe a little
• 16:57
  easier and make people tell the story.
• 16:59
  So they do breathe and they stay with us.
• 17:01
  It's easy, easy peasy. January, I launched my first
• 17:04
  episode in the 21. That's why that came about those
• 17:06
  eight hours. And and I learned quick that Joe
• 17:09
  Rogan has a team and it's a lot harder than it looks.
• 17:12
  We look great on here right now, but there's a lot of stuff that
• 17:15
  goes on before us 2 getting here.
• 17:17
  Yeah. Yeah, I know.
• 17:20
  So I, I kind of have a similar story with my podcast.
• 17:23
  So I, I started my podcast in early 2022.
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  I was still active duty when I started mine because I, I knew I
• 17:30
  was getting out, but not on my own accord because of my Med
• 17:32
  board. And I was like, man, I was like,
• 17:35
  I seen other other people that I knew that got out and they
• 17:37
  didn't stay connected with the veteran community and some
• 17:40
  struggles that that just came with not staying connected.
• 17:42
  And so I was like, I, I have to find a way.
• 17:44
  And kind of the same thing. Like you see people like Joe
• 17:47
  Rogan, like these, all these other big names out there doing
• 17:49
  podcasting. Like you said, you really don't
• 17:51
  know what's behind the scenes and what it really takes to do
• 17:53
  it. And so like I initially started
• 17:57
  just talking to the veterans about their career path in IT
• 18:00
  and cybersecurity, but I did in a Marine Corps.
• 18:02
  So it was super easy for me to talk about, you know, and, but
• 18:05
  you're right, they're like after about 6:00 or so months, 6-7
• 18:09
  months after retiring and I was continuing to build some a
• 18:12
  little bit of steam with my show.
• 18:14
  I quickly realized that the back end was very overwhelming.
• 18:22
  And it's it, I, I stressed myself out, I burnt myself out
• 18:26
  trying, trying to figure that out.
• 18:27
  And, and that was about the time I started kind of going through
• 18:31
  my own struggles, you know, and I ended up taking like a
• 18:34
  three-year break and refocusing when I relaunched on what my
• 18:40
  message was going to be with my show.
• 18:42
  You know, like I said, like when I first started, I was talking
• 18:44
  IT and cybersecurity. My focus now is only on mental
• 18:48
  health and life after service because of the struggles that I
• 18:51
  went through, struggles of people I know that they went
• 18:54
  through. And man, just, it's, I know you
• 18:58
  feel this exact same way, but like it's so important to talk
• 19:01
  about those things because when you don't talk about those
• 19:04
  things, they just fester and get get worse.
• 19:06
  And then it just puts even more weight on your shoulders.
• 19:10
  Exactly, And you've seen Jake pop in there.
• 19:12
  He's one of my Tuesday crew hosts.
• 19:13
  He had to give himself a self plug there.
• 19:18
  He's right though, when once I was able to move off a Tuesday
• 19:21
  and let him and my brother take Tuesday.
• 19:22
  And and that's a funny story in itself because those two would
• 19:25
  be in the chat all day long. Just make trying to break me.
• 19:29
  It was kind of like being on a impractical Jokers, but with
• 19:32
  them two in the comments. They were trying to make me
• 19:34
  laugh the whole time and see how that little ticker in their
• 19:36
  little box of how many times they can make me laugh or break
• 19:39
  me interviewing. So, so you know what, you 2 need
• 19:42
  to do this. And I gave them a show and
• 19:44
  they've they've ran full, full throttle into it.
• 19:47
  You can see there, you can see their improvements over the last
• 19:49
  two plus years and how much they're doing great.
• 19:51
  I mean, they, they hosted the 500th episode.
• 19:53
  Now they're hosting the 700th episode.
• 19:54
  So it's amazing. No, that's awesome, man.
• 19:57
  And, and like, I think you bring up a good point there, just the
• 20:01
  the teamwork that it takes to be in continued success, right?
• 20:05
  Like that's really what it boils down to, you know, and we were
• 20:09
  talking about this a little bit ago.
• 20:10
  It's like just the network that you go into and surround
• 20:14
  yourself with makes the world a difference, you know?
• 20:18
  Oh, it definitely. It's like we, we always talk
• 20:20
  about like TOTS or wherever we have a group, even like Cathars,
• 20:24
  The tribes will get you through things.
• 20:25
  And if you don't have that tribe, it's it's not gonna work,
• 20:28
  You know, be just a, a lone, a lone wolf out here.
• 20:30
  It, it doesn't work as a lone wolf.
• 20:32
  I don't care who you are. You need that tribe behind you.
• 20:34
  A. 100% Was there a moment in time where you realized that the
• 20:38
  tribe meant more than trying to figure it out yourself the hard
• 20:42
  way? Oh yeah, I I think about the
• 20:45
  seven episodes in, I reached out to people saying, hey, there's
• 20:48
  there's my brother. So you sound like an adopted son
• 20:51
  of them. I tell you it it never ends with
• 20:53
  them too. Never.
• 20:56
  But he's he's told me I was adopted since I was born.
• 20:59
  I think he's been telling me I was adopted.
• 21:00
  So I was going right after him. You were adopted.
• 21:02
  You're adopted. I don't love you and that's what
• 21:05
  it but but along the way, like 7 or 8 episodes in, I was like,
• 21:09
  man, this is it's going to be hard to keep getting veterans to
• 21:11
  come on and tell that story to make them open up and say this
• 21:14
  is what's wrong. This is what's killing me inside
• 21:17
  and I don't want to share with anybody.
• 21:19
  What else can I do? And then luckily, like we talked
• 21:21
  about, like things happen for a reason.
• 21:24
  It reached back to me the first few episodes, dudes in the save
• 21:27
  and this is great what you're doing, but I think you should
• 21:29
  focus on this, not just that. Focus on this so it bring in
• 21:33
  experts that can help them with all these other things.
• 21:35
  Bring in mental health experts, bring in physical health
• 21:39
  experts, alternate methods to to health instead of doing drug,
• 21:43
  taking drugs from the VA. That's OK.
• 21:45
  How to write a book, how to start business, how to be an
• 21:47
  entrepreneur. All right, challenge accepted.
• 21:50
  And you hear that pattern a lot. Challenge accepted.
• 21:52
  So I just started reaching out to people and ever since I
• 21:55
  started reaching out like the floodgates open.
• 21:58
  And once those floodgates open, it's hard to maintain that as
• 22:00
  well. You just got to take as many as
• 22:02
  you can. At first, you don't want to say
• 22:04
  no to people. Now how I vet people, I'm like,
• 22:08
  I don't know about this one, this one, this one's going to
• 22:10
  hurt if I, if I take this one. Now I'm not doing this one.
• 22:13
  And you can, you can pick and choose, But at first, like I got
• 22:16
  to get them all in here. They want experts.
• 22:18
  Let's see who's who in the zoo and get them in here.
• 22:20
  But that's when I realized that I have to reach out and ask
• 22:22
  things. I guess I'd do hard things, push
• 22:24
  forward, push forward, do hard things.
• 22:27
  I have to ask people for opinions.
• 22:28
  I have to ask people for advice and it was actually one of my
• 22:31
  guests that pushed me to go to video.
• 22:33
  Nate Palmer. He was a personal trainer and I
• 22:36
  was doing things. It was on anchor at the time.
• 22:38
  I'm not sure if you used anchor when you first started the first
• 22:40
  time, but anchor was what I was broadcasting on.
• 22:42
  It was audio only and me and him had horrible connections.
• 22:46
  Three times. He said, bro, why don't you just
• 22:48
  go to Zoom? So I was, I think it was TDY in
• 22:51
  in Utah or what Wisconsin. And I did, I did video with him
• 22:55
  and I never looked back. I never looked back from that.
• 22:58
  And it was because of Nate Palmer.
• 23:01
  No, that's awesome. It's it's funny, the things that
• 23:04
  you pick up from, from people along the way, right?
• 23:07
  Just one look. And The thing is, that was such
• 23:09
  a small nudge at the time, right?
• 23:13
  Like it was such a small thing to say, Hey, you know what, you
• 23:15
  should probably do video instead or try video.
• 23:18
  And it's, and it's pretty just like in random conversation when
• 23:22
  you have those things, but when you but as soon as you do it,
• 23:24
  man, it's like, like you could tell that that was a seed put
• 23:28
  there for a reason, right? And man, it's yeah.
• 23:31
  And that's awesome. So for anybody out there
• 23:38
  listening that may be transitioning or maybe looking
• 23:43
  for that next purpose, what kind of advice would you give them?
• 23:47
  Sit down and ask yourself, what do I want to do?
• 23:50
  What am I good at? What I want to do?
• 23:52
  Don't think that what you did in the service is what you have to
• 23:55
  do when you come out 'cause you may be good at it in the
• 23:58
  service, but you may not like it on the outside.
• 24:02
  Build your roster, build your your network of things that you
• 24:05
  can do. We've been talking about
• 24:07
  building that tribe, but also build your your resume while
• 24:10
  you're going through the service.
• 24:11
  You get free education. You get TA for, for school.
• 24:14
  Use the education. Find those paths.
• 24:17
  Find those career paths that you actually enjoy.
• 24:19
  I think now I think all the services do this.
• 24:21
  It wouldn't last 120 days or so. You can do an internship, still
• 24:25
  get paid by the military, but get your feet wet somewhere else
• 24:29
  and learn if that's the thing you really want to do.
• 24:31
  So if you are an IT guy or or gal in the service, try it on
• 24:35
  that internship. If it's the same thing and you
• 24:38
  like it, you still like it, you want to keep doing it, do it.
• 24:41
  But if you don't like it at that point, now you have a chance to
• 24:43
  pivot before that last day. When you say that's it, now what
• 24:47
  do I do? You can pivot at any time before
• 24:50
  the last day. So now IT you don't want to do
• 24:53
  it in the corporate world or in the outside world, what else is
• 24:56
  there that you can do? You've been a leader.
• 24:59
  You learned how to lead in the military.
• 25:00
  You learned how to be on time. You learned how to work through
• 25:03
  checklist or program management is a good word for this.
• 25:06
  Become a program manager and find find a path that way to do
• 25:10
  it. And then if while you're in
• 25:11
  that, keep going to school, use your GI Bill, keep learning,
• 25:15
  Never stop learning. Read, read, read.
• 25:17
  I read the book. What color is your parachute?
• 25:19
  While I was in that 365 days, at first I was like, I don't know
• 25:23
  what this book's really going to do for me, but a mentor told me
• 25:25
  to read it. I read it and I was like, OK, it
• 25:28
  gave me those paths. I I should have been doing this
• 25:30
  way before and I didn't do it. I 'cause I had to my headset on
• 25:34
  that everyone I knew that got out was going to.
• 25:36
  They fell into the GS jobs. I was going to fall into AGS
• 25:38
  job. The problem was all those GS
• 25:40
  jobs were filled and they weren't hiring.
• 25:43
  It wasn't because I was a lack of skills, a lack of education.
• 25:46
  They just weren't open. And I retired, I guess, at the
• 25:49
  wrong window and I fell into the wrong window and I had to
• 25:53
  regroup and I had to pivot and I started doing things I did not
• 25:56
  do in the military by title, but I did it anyway.
• 25:59
  And just adapting and overcoming and making things happen.
• 26:03
  That's how I I made it through. No, I I think you bring up a
• 26:07
  good point, man. And, and, and what I've noticed
• 26:11
  when it comes to successful stories is not being afraid to
• 26:14
  pivot, right? Not being, not being afraid to
• 26:17
  fail and then pivoting to something else when that first
• 26:21
  thing doesn't work out. Because I know there's a, like
• 26:23
  I, I got stuck in this myself until I decided to, to pivot.
• 26:27
  And everything is, you get into this low and you're like, man, I
• 26:31
  really don't like what I'm doing.
• 26:32
  Or you like you just, you just do it because you're getting a
• 26:35
  paycheck, right? You're not really enjoying what
• 26:37
  you're doing, but you feel like it's like you have to, you know,
• 26:43
  But yeah, don't be afraid to pivot, you know, and don't,
• 26:46
  don't be afraid to try something new.
• 26:48
  And I guarantee you, yeah, it might not have been your MOS in
• 26:51
  the military, but I guarantee you there's things that you
• 26:54
  learned in the military that translate into other roles in
• 26:58
  job fields that you didn't even really officially get trained
• 27:01
  on, but you did them anyways. Right?
• 27:03
  Like especially if you stay in long enough and get put into
• 27:05
  leadership, Bill, it's you're going to know project
• 27:07
  management. You may not know like the PMI
• 27:10
  style and verbiage of project management, but you know how to
• 27:13
  manage a project much better than most do outside the
• 27:16
  military. I can guarantee that you know
• 27:18
  you can. Handle chaos is is 100% chaos.
• 27:23
  If you can handle the military as a leader you can handle
• 27:26
  anything on the outside 'cause you lived in sheer chaos for
• 27:30
  your whole career and you were successful.
• 27:32
  Just keep pushing forward. Tell people I lived through
• 27:35
  sheer chaos for X amount of years.
• 27:38
  I can do anything in your company and be the best.
• 27:41
  Be the best person there. Oh, you're absolutely right.
• 27:44
  And, and I think you're going to go to .2 that like I don't think
• 27:47
  a lot of us talk about, at least it didn't get talked about a lot
• 27:49
  when I was transitioning out in 2022 is like the different
• 27:53
  educational benefit you get as a veteran, right?
• 27:56
  Your, your GI Bill, your post 911 or Montgomery, whichever one
• 27:59
  that you fell into when you were in, right?
• 28:01
  Like use that GI Bill. Oh, and by the way, if you
• 28:05
  signed your GI Bill over to your, your kids before you got
• 28:09
  out, you have chapter 31 with the VA that you can do as well,
• 28:13
  right? That, that pays 100% tuition.
• 28:16
  You also get the, the, the E5 Bah paid to you as well while
• 28:21
  you're active in school. But all that also includes what
• 28:24
  if you go to online school? That's what I did.
• 28:26
  I use chapter 31. I did 100% online school.
• 28:30
  I still got my tuition paid for. I still got those entitlements
• 28:33
  as well as like, even if I was going on campus, it's, it's no
• 28:36
  different. So there's a lot of benefits out
• 28:38
  there. Also, this could be your
• 28:42
  opportunity to try something that you've always wanted to try
• 28:44
  before, right? Like, like, and again, you'll
• 28:48
  see here in at the commercial break coming up soon.
• 28:50
  That's reason I kind of loaded up with this part is let's say
• 28:53
  you want to be creative, you want to be a writer, a song, or
• 28:56
  whether it be poetry, a songwriter, you want to play the
• 28:59
  guitar or you want to get into podcasting.
• 29:02
  You know, there's organizations like Cav Arts out there that
• 29:05
  help you get into that free of charge for veterans, right?
• 29:10
  So there's and that's The thing is like don't be afraid to pivot
• 29:15
  and it's OK to fail. Just keep moving forward like
• 29:17
  you said. Exactly.
• 29:18
  And Ross said it on Friends. Pivot, pivot, pivot.
• 29:22
  Let's do it. Yeah.
• 29:25
  Definitely. All right.
• 29:25
  I think this is going to bring up a good time to go ahead and
• 29:28
  let's take a little quick break. It'll be about two-minute break
• 29:30
  here. And this break, you'll see it's
• 29:33
  actually one of one of my partners for the Bunkhouse
• 29:36
  Cavart's Challenge of America's veteran Creative.
• 29:41
  So here we go. All right, and welcome back
• 31:58
  everybody to the Bunkhouse here on military broadcast radio.
• 32:01
  So before the break, Rich and I, we were talking about kind of
• 32:05
  what got him a little bit to where he is today and, and, and
• 32:08
  about pivoting and how it's OK if you fail and you need to
• 32:11
  change or pivot your direction. Just as long as you keep pushing
• 32:14
  forward and moving forward, that's really all that matters.
• 32:16
  You know, definitely now, now, Rich, let's go ahead and talk a
• 32:22
  little bit more about the Misfit Nation itself and kind of what
• 32:27
  brought that to light. And when did you, was there a
• 32:29
  point in time when you kind of was like, this is what this is
• 32:32
  what I want to do and this is what we're going to call it?
• 32:36
  Like I said earlier, about 2021 when I finished my master's was
• 32:41
  when I came up with this wild idea of becoming a podcaster.
• 32:45
  And then I needed a name. So my platoon in Kandahar in
• 32:48
  2010, eleven was called the Misfits, is based off the island
• 32:52
  of Misfit Toys. Because everyone in my platoon
• 32:55
  was from different companies or different units all blended
• 32:57
  together and into this one group.
• 33:00
  They're all experts in different fields.
• 33:02
  And we were put together as a platoon to be the quick reaction
• 33:05
  force for the base and the FOB security and that group of
• 33:10
  experts and a group of like minded individuals, the Misfits.
• 33:13
  We, we built that FoB and we secured that FoB and we cut down
• 33:16
  any incursions and no one tried to go at the base while we were
• 33:21
  there. Rocket attacks, attacks went
• 33:23
  down and the platoon stayed together during that period.
• 33:27
  We we had the only loss I had in any combat from any soldier I
• 33:31
  lost was during this. During that deployment, December
• 33:34
  31st, 2010, Sergeant Michael Beckerman was killed on the
• 33:37
  mission. He had gone back to the
• 33:40
  engineering company to help them since they had lost some dudes
• 33:42
  and that's where his home was. But he was always a misfit and
• 33:46
  he was killed going through and clearing a building.
• 33:50
  Him and the Lieutenant entered and one or both of them
• 33:52
  triggered the device. The Lieutenant became a triple
• 33:55
  amputee and we lost Sergeant Michael Beckerman, and that is
• 33:59
  what solidified the misfits. A horrible incident solidified
• 34:04
  the misfits and it brought us all closer together and we still
• 34:07
  are pretty close now. The whole platoon still talks to
• 34:10
  each other and we kept saying Misfit this, misfit that.
• 34:13
  I, I made my name Misfit Runner because I was running a lot then
• 34:16
  before my knees stopped working well.
• 34:18
  So I was Misfit runner on things.
• 34:20
  I was misfit this and I started writing Misfit Nation just on
• 34:22
  like on post on Facebook and such.
• 34:25
  And when I came up this wild, crazy idea, I said, hey, guys,
• 34:28
  can I use it as the podcast? Like, yeah, you got it, do it.
• 34:31
  And of course, I made them come on to be the first few guests.
• 34:34
  So they came on, they talked about the Misfit Nation, the
• 34:36
  Misfits and how we came about. And RJ Byrd is the one who does.
• 34:40
  He did my exit video now he's the one who did that.
• 34:43
  He also did my old intro. He did that as well.
• 34:46
  He's a music guy. And he's now leading a
• 34:49
  organization in Charlotte the called The Purpose Driven
• 34:52
  Hikers. So he gets people together.
• 34:55
  The hike can just get out in the outdoors and and be themselves
• 34:58
  and have a good time. R JS doing great things.
• 35:00
  And he's he's on our website as far as part of the Misfit
• 35:03
  nation. But that's how the Misfit Nation
• 35:05
  came about was because of that platoon, that band of brothers
• 35:08
  and sisters in Kandahar, Afghanistan, 2010 eleven with
• 35:12
  the strike brigade of 101st Airborne Division.
• 35:16
  Man, that's awesome. I think every show has like its
• 35:21
  title has a story, you know, in in yours.
• 35:25
  It that's amazing story man, and sorry for the loss during that
• 35:29
  time. We most of us, if we stayed in
• 35:31
  long enough for we're in those situations, we've all lost at
• 35:35
  least one or or few people that we knew.
• 35:39
  But yeah, I mean, when you started, what was what was your
• 35:46
  thoughts and did you think that you would be anywhere that you
• 35:49
  are today? With podcasting, Heck no.
• 35:55
  Man. This.
• 35:57
  The ceiling was very high for me.
• 35:59
  Yeah. I figured I'd just talk to maybe
• 36:01
  12 people. I'd have 12 shows.
• 36:03
  That'd be awesome. That'd be great.
• 36:04
  I didn't think I'd get the itch and stay addicted to it.
• 36:07
  And it was to believe or not in my first days, this was my, this
• 36:11
  was my whole studio. And I was in my Jeep.
• 36:14
  There's a casino across the street from Fort Campbell they
• 36:17
  were building that I think it just opened at the time.
• 36:19
  And I'd sit in that parking lot, interview people.
• 36:20
  I'm in my Jeep. You know what Jeep is loud.
• 36:23
  And I'm sitting in the Jeep interviewing people.
• 36:26
  And that's how, if you listen to our first shows, he said it
• 36:32
  right there. He missed that part when I said
• 36:34
  it earlier, but I would sit there and talk to him.
• 36:37
  Those first few episodes, they're not great.
• 36:39
  I'll tell you right now. And if I go back and say, man, I
• 36:42
  can't believe it, I'm not going to take them down because they
• 36:44
  weren't good, right? It shows where I was.
• 36:46
  That's like battle scars. You keep them.
• 36:48
  It teaches those steps. And see if I didn't improve from
• 36:51
  that, I kept getting up and getting better.
• 36:53
  Get up, get better, get up, get better.
• 36:54
  Buy the more, buy more microphones, buy more equipment,
• 36:57
  buy monitors, buy things I can see with my old eyes and make
• 37:01
  things better. And at that point, like I said
• 37:04
  in the beginning, I did not think it would go this well.
• 37:06
  But then I started getting my, my rhythm, getting good and
• 37:09
  starting to enjoy talking to multiple different types of
• 37:12
  people. I mean, diverse.
• 37:14
  I have a diverse guest list. I don't just do veterans
• 37:17
  anymore. I, I do veterans, first
• 37:19
  responders, and then a whole gambit of others.
• 37:21
  And I enjoy talking to people and learning their journey
• 37:25
  because all of our journeys, they parallel.
• 37:27
  We all have UPS. We all have downs, we all have
• 37:29
  to show resilience at some point.
• 37:31
  We all have to show that deep down grit to get out of stuff.
• 37:34
  And we have to remember to stack victories.
• 37:35
  Like it says under my name there every day.
• 37:37
  You got to stack those victories and make things better.
• 37:39
  So progress and consistency is how you do it.
• 37:41
  Way to go. So I'm teaching him a lot of
• 37:43
  stuff. That's what he's learning things
• 37:45
  along the way. I've taught him to talk to
• 37:47
  people and look them in the eye. It's great to see him grow as
• 37:50
  well and become more comfortable behind the mic and just learning
• 37:53
  these stories. So many people I've had, I think
• 37:55
  my youngest person I had on my show at the time, I think she
• 37:58
  was 11 or 12, Lila Lila, She said CRPS and I had her on to
• 38:05
  just share what she's going through because I had worked
• 38:08
  with her mother, Heather. And it was great to hear her
• 38:11
  young voice share the pain that she was going through and share
• 38:14
  that with my audience and get people to jump in and and say,
• 38:16
  hey, we're going to be behind you and help you and cheer you
• 38:19
  on to get through this. And had a young author too.
• 38:21
  I think she was 14. She published her first book at
• 38:24
  14. And that's, that's amazing.
• 38:26
  Let's get this on here because it needs to get out there that
• 38:28
  anyone can do whatever you put your mind to.
• 38:31
  And just that gambit just gets bigger and bigger.
• 38:34
  And last night I had an amazing soldier on Army veteran who now
• 38:37
  runs a ranch in California, Ocean view, ocean view ranch, I
• 38:42
  think it's called, but amazing, amazing location where it is.
• 38:45
  I'll, I'll send you the link. You can look at it.
• 38:47
  And since you are a a bunkhouse guy, a horse guy, you'll, you'll
• 38:50
  love where his location is. And he was just an amazing, his
• 38:53
  story was amazing how he got there.
• 38:55
  We were, he was in Afghanistan the same exact time I was with
• 38:57
  the Misfits. He was just across the river.
• 39:00
  So it was amazing to have those conversations and just those
• 39:02
  links that somehow we all have together.
• 39:07
  Oh, that's awesome. So, So what was it like?
• 39:11
  Like was there a so was there a point throughout this journey
• 39:16
  from when you first started to now getting to your 7th 100
• 39:19
  episode to where that you felt like this is what I'm supposed
• 39:23
  to be doing or this is where I'm supposed to be?
• 39:25
  Was there a point in time where you where you kind of where that
• 39:28
  kind of click or when that thought kind of came through
• 39:30
  your head? I'd say probably around 2:50
• 39:33
  that's finally said, yeah, maybe this is what I should be doing
• 39:36
  and maybe I should start taking a lot more serious and doing
• 39:38
  some editing or something. But at that point I was already
• 39:41
  doing the live show. I was doing video and some
• 39:43
  video. There's a lot of editing on
• 39:44
  video. And then when I said let me go
• 39:46
  live. So if you go live, you can't
• 39:48
  really take stuff out because it's there forever when you're
• 39:51
  live. And that's why TV shows do it.
• 39:54
  But again, this goes back to that Joe Rogan thing on TV
• 39:57
  shows, they have that delay. So I guess that curses on your
• 40:00
  show, they can beat it out on TV.
• 40:02
  For me, I get, I get a guess that curses and hey, is it all
• 40:05
  right if I curse? You just did that.
• 40:07
  I don't have a button. I don't have a button that stops
• 40:09
  it. But I I knew my passion was
• 40:13
  there. And like I said earlier, reach
• 40:14
  one, teach one. Every episode you do, you feel
• 40:16
  like you're going to get that moment and there's something in
• 40:19
  there that's going to bring someone to light and get them
• 40:21
  out and get them out of their comfort zone and say, I, I can
• 40:24
  do this too, or I've been through this and this dude's
• 40:27
  succeeding or this dude that's succeeding.
• 40:29
  I can also succeed now. And that's the thing.
• 40:31
  That's why I keep going. That's why my brother and Jake
• 40:33
  keep going on their side as well.
• 40:35
  They they're amazing on the Tuesday crew and they keep
• 40:38
  pushing that forward. And all I on that show, all I
• 40:40
  got to do is sit in the background and I can laugh at
• 40:42
  everything that's going on on the show and just make sure I
• 40:44
  can be the button on there. But I'm not that quick to stop a
• 40:47
  curse. There's no way I can do that.
• 40:52
  Sounds like, Sounds like your brother was saying the same
• 40:54
  thing there for a minute. So I, I know you, you do a
• 41:01
  little bit more outside the creative area than just your
• 41:04
  podcast with what made you want to branch out outside the
• 41:07
  podcast and, and get more into the writing space because it's,
• 41:11
  you want to talk about that a little bit too, about what you
• 41:12
  do outside of not just podcasting, but other things
• 41:15
  that you do. So the 13 Step Guides of Success
• 41:18
  is my first book that came out and coincidentally it came out
• 41:21
  about the same time my podcast started probably within weeks of
• 41:26
  each other. So I think the book came out in
• 41:27
  December. The podcast came out in January.
• 41:30
  That was that came out of COVID as well.
• 41:32
  So every month I would write something stupid on Facebook at
• 41:35
  the end of the month. You made it through this level
• 41:37
  of Jumanji because every month they were giving us some new
• 41:39
  fear factor stuff that's going to kill you.
• 41:41
  And if there is level of Jumanji, let's look out for this
• 41:43
  this month and that the last month, I think it was November,
• 41:47
  I think it was the 12th month or whatever.
• 41:49
  I put this whole list of things that you need to do and my
• 41:52
  daughter's like you need to write that in a book.
• 41:53
  Dad, I said, all right, challenge accepted.
• 41:55
  So I wrote it in a book and it can't.
• 41:58
  She was my editor. She grinded me through it and it
• 42:01
  got it out there. And 13 step, God says success
• 42:03
  was born because of that. But I always wrote like when
• 42:06
  we're deployed, I always kept notes and journal things just in
• 42:09
  case something happened to me. There was a note, a list of
• 42:11
  things that I was doing. And so have a history and such.
• 42:14
  And if something happened to one of my people, I had everything
• 42:17
  chronologically what was going on.
• 42:20
  So I was always writing. And then like Added to Darkness,
• 42:22
  my first fiction book that came out, I would, I started that
• 42:25
  book probably 10 times. I'd start writing it and leave
• 42:28
  it somewhere and forget where I wrote it.
• 42:30
  I'd put it on the computer. That computer would die and I'd
• 42:32
  start over. And finally I said, you know, I
• 42:34
  got to finish that damn book. That was supposed to be my first
• 42:36
  book. So I wrote that book and
• 42:38
  finished that. And now I'm making that into a
• 42:41
  three book series. So I'm going to expand upon the
• 42:43
  first book. It's going to be called the
• 42:44
  Valkyrie series and it's going to be team Valkyrie basically,
• 42:47
  and they're going to go through three phases of the books and do
• 42:50
  that. And I came out with a 90 day
• 42:52
  stack and victories journal right here just to help you
• 42:55
  guide yourself to be the best person you can be.
• 42:58
  Best version of you, not to make it like 13 step guides to
• 43:01
  success is nothing about making money, nothing about being a
• 43:04
  business person. It's about being a genuine human
• 43:07
  and being the best version of you.
• 43:09
  And that's why I wrote it. I'm not a businessman.
• 43:11
  I can't tell you how to be a businessman.
• 43:13
  I can tell you how to be a good human because I've seen it done,
• 43:15
  not because I'm a great human. I'm learning that along the way,
• 43:18
  how to be 1. But I can show you, point you in
• 43:21
  the right direction of things you can do to be better at what
• 43:23
  you do. And that's why I wrote that.
• 43:24
  And that's what branching out into writing it really helps
• 43:26
  you. And now I have the magazine as
• 43:28
  well, the Misfit Nation Report, where I write a few pieces, the
• 43:31
  the crew writes a piece as well. And we get as much information
• 43:35
  as possible and share our guests in a different way.
• 43:38
  Guests are like this month we'll have 14 guests in the Misfit
• 43:41
  Nation Report and there's a new story about them in there along
• 43:44
  with our sub stacks that we put out about them because I want
• 43:47
  their stories to be up to as and as many mediums as possible to
• 43:51
  make sure that someone gets it at some point.
• 43:54
  Maybe they don't watch podcasts, maybe don't listen to them, but
• 43:56
  they might read the sub stack, or they might read that the
• 43:59
  Misfit Nation report and learn more about that guest.
• 44:03
  Dude, that's awesome. Yeah, I mean that man, dude,
• 44:09
  like I never thought about other mediums like that to get the
• 44:14
  information out like that's that's an amazing so.
• 44:19
  And again, that was from another guest.
• 44:20
  Another guest showed, yeah, because he was doing a sub
• 44:25
  stack. And I said, man, what is this
• 44:26
  sub stack thing you keep talking about?
• 44:27
  And he told me offline, let me try this thing out.
• 44:31
  There we go. That's awesome.
• 44:34
  So if you could real quick tell us where they can, if anybody
• 44:36
  listening wants to get your book, where can they get a hold
• 44:38
  of it? I think the best place to go for
• 44:41
  the 13 step guide to success and for out of the darkness, go to
• 44:44
  our website, misfitnation.com and under the store section,
• 44:47
  both the links are there. Otherwise the link will be so
• 44:49
  big it's, it's hard to write. And then for the the 90 day
• 44:53
  stack of victories, it's I sent you a TinyURL because that's
• 44:55
  also a huge link. That's all.
• 44:58
  They're all on Amazon. Go on Amazon search.
• 44:59
  You can either search my name, Rich Lamonica or one of those
• 45:02
  three titles and that'll all pop up and just hit my author button
• 45:05
  and all the books will be there. I think there's another guide on
• 45:07
  there as well, a stack, not a stack of pictures, a do better
• 45:11
  book or something I wrote. I just a fun one I wrote on
• 45:13
  there at one point. So there's four books on there.
• 45:16
  You can get on all them on there on Amazon.
• 45:17
  Just search the Rich Lamonica author.
• 45:19
  I think there's two of us. So one's me, a good looking one.
• 45:21
  Then there's another. 10 dude, that's awesome man.
• 45:28
  Are there any other organizations that you're
• 45:30
  partner with or involved with as well?
• 45:34
  Like, you know, Cav Arts is one of them.
• 45:35
  So I'm definitely involved with them.
• 45:37
  I think we next week, I think is our next, next class or and next
• 45:41
  week it's the money class. And Army 10 mile is coming up
• 45:45
  and I'm doing the ruck for whiskey valor organization.
• 45:49
  I was in the Spartan leadership program through Travis Manion
• 45:51
  foundation with their with their founder and he said, hey man,
• 45:55
  you want to do the Army 10 mileers?
• 45:58
  Yeah, why not? Why?
• 45:59
  Why not? Why wouldn't I want to do it?
• 46:00
  And challenge accepted. So I took that out.
• 46:04
  Yes, John's also on TikTok. Yes, he is.
• 46:05
  I am. So me and my wife were both
• 46:10
  doing the Army Time Modeler and then I had Susan Combs on the
• 46:13
  show. She was our 500th episode and
• 46:15
  she was just on again for her second book.
• 46:17
  So her first book was Pancakes for Rodger and her second book
• 46:20
  was A Wonder Woman. The untold stories of female
• 46:23
  veterans. Great guests, great human being,
• 46:27
  both good books and great organization.
• 46:28
  Pancakes for Rodgers were to help veterans get into homes
• 46:31
  when they need it or find the resources they need to get
• 46:35
  stable homes and stable lifestyles.
• 46:37
  And she's doing a ruck on October 10th that's in New
• 46:40
  Jersey. So I'm supporting her wearing
• 46:42
  that patch. And so I'm doing both rucks at
• 46:44
  the same time. That's awesome.
• 46:46
  I'm supporting both of those. And of course, Cavarts.
• 46:49
  And then Molly B's embroidery is probably one of the my biggest
• 46:52
  cheerleaders in Clarksville, TN. Oh, that's awesome, man.
• 47:00
  I think that's another thing too is, is that's part of like our,
• 47:05
  I think the way that we give back a lot of us, we partner
• 47:08
  with different organizations and again, it's selfless promotion
• 47:12
  of those organizations, right? It's and again, like it's reason
• 47:16
  like with Cathars. And if anybody's following me on
• 47:18
  Instagram or TikTok or anything, you might have noticed a post a
• 47:21
  couple weeks ago where I, I have a kind of infographic of all the
• 47:26
  partners that I've kind of started really connecting with
• 47:29
  and really working on and collaborating with.
• 47:31
  And like, I don't do sponsorships.
• 47:33
  Like I call them partners because that's exactly what it
• 47:36
  is. It's, it's a partnership
• 47:37
  partnership. It's we, we promote each other,
• 47:40
  we help each other, you know, we teach each other and we learn
• 47:43
  from each other, you know? I just dropped both links into
• 47:47
  my chat but I don't think your your guys can see it so I put
• 47:49
  them into the private chat as well so you can pop them in
• 47:52
  there. Yep, I can.
• 47:54
  I can put them up here on the screen.
• 47:55
  I'll do that right now. So there's pancakes for Roger,
• 47:58
  for roger.org, and then whiskey valor.org as well.
• 48:04
  Oh yeah, whiskey. Valor is founded by a Marines, a
• 48:06
  Marine as well, just like you. So he, he found it.
• 48:09
  Whiskey, Valerie, you hear Whiskey Valerie?
• 48:10
  You think, oh, it's a drinking thing.
• 48:12
  Yes, they do drink, but they also promote safe drinking.
• 48:16
  Oh. They do things that they'll give
• 48:18
  you a card so you can get an Uber for free.
• 48:20
  That way you're not, you're not driving drunk.
• 48:23
  And so I went to also birthday ball with the Husky Valor
• 48:27
  Foundation last year in Texas and they gave all of us an Uber
• 48:30
  code to get home. Oh, that's awesome.
• 48:33
  Everyone that was at the ball got an Uber code to come go
• 48:35
  home. So it was amazing.
• 48:36
  So they they teach responsible, responsible drinking and taking
• 48:40
  care of veterans, veterans taking care of veterans.
• 48:42
  Amazing foundation. No, that's awesome.
• 48:46
  There's an organization like it's, there's, there's some
• 48:49
  active duty Marines here in the Camp Lejeune area and they
• 48:52
  started up their own business to where they provide rides from
• 48:56
  either home base to the bar or from the bar back to home base,
• 48:59
  stuff like that. So folks don't have to drink and
• 49:01
  drive. They can still go out and have
• 49:02
  fun and then get back on base safely.
• 49:05
  You know, so there's, there's a couple active duty Marines that
• 49:09
  started that up during our next break because we got a break
• 49:12
  coming up. I want to get the information.
• 49:13
  I'll put that up on the screen too for everybody because man,
• 49:15
  it's it's things like that, man, seeing things like that or
• 49:18
  hearing about things like that, just like it, it just puts AI
• 49:24
  wish. So I wish those stories got out
• 49:25
  even more, right, because like those are the stories that
• 49:28
  people don't hear about. They only hear about the bad
• 49:30
  things that veterans or active duty military do.
• 49:33
  Those are the things that are on the news.
• 49:34
  Like those are the things, right, exactly like those, those
• 49:38
  things like you have your brothers and sisters that are
• 49:42
  doing what they can to take care of each other, you know?
• 49:47
  And those are the stories that I think really need to get out
• 49:49
  there too. But yeah, I'll get that because
• 49:53
  they're on definitely on Facebook.
• 49:54
  I know that. So I'll get that information
• 49:55
  too. But we are going to take a quick
• 49:59
  break. And when we come back, we're
• 50:01
  going to talk a little bit more about where your catch phrase
• 50:04
  came from. Now that we know where the
• 50:06
  podcast name come from, we're going to talk a little bit more
• 50:09
  about where your little catch phrase came from.
• 50:12
  All right, So I'll be back in about 3 minutes.
• 53:18
  I, I play this song a lot for my breaks.
• 53:21
  And one of the big reason is because this guy, man, he's down
• 53:23
  in Nashville now, but he's a Canadian veteran.
• 53:26
  He was a, he was a sniper in the Canadian, I believe in the Army,
• 53:29
  but he recorded one of the longest, actually, I think the
• 53:33
  longest kill shot at 2 miles. So that was.
• 53:36
  Like 2018 or 18 I think. Yeah, so I I always try to play
• 53:41
  stuff by him during my breaks. That's good song right there.
• 53:45
  It was, wasn't it? So real quick back to what we
• 53:47
  were talking about before the break.
• 53:49
  The Jayville Brew Loop is what what this what it's called here
• 53:53
  in Jacksonville, NC. Some Marines, active duty
• 53:56
  Marines got together and they decided, you know what, it's
• 53:58
  going to be something we need to do.
• 54:00
  Help help active duty service members get to and from the bar
• 54:04
  and back on the base safely just so they don't have to drink and
• 54:06
  drive. Keeping and keeping, keeping
• 54:08
  them trying to keep the community safe.
• 54:10
  Again, stories like this man, like that's, those are the
• 54:13
  things I love sharing, seeing where people were trying to take
• 54:15
  care of each other. Definitely that those are both
• 54:18
  of them are great organizations. And I mean they're, they're
• 54:20
  trying to eliminate the same thing that Lewis is doing with
• 54:23
  the whiskey barrel or so. And of course they're all
• 54:25
  Marines. Imagine that, right?
• 54:30
  So they know they know what the problem is.
• 54:34
  The thing Marines though, like we may have a drinking problem
• 54:37
  sometimes and we got to keep each other safe, to keep each
• 54:40
  other in check sometimes. Yeah.
• 54:46
  So before the break, you really get into some other stuff like
• 54:49
  your books and everything. Make sure to post that to you on
• 54:53
  my socials after the show. But I've noticed it when I was
• 54:57
  kind of looking into your socials and some of your
• 54:59
  background. You have a explicit catch
• 55:04
  phrase, right? And that's I titled the this
• 55:06
  episode around it as well. And you've said it quite a few
• 55:08
  times so far as we as we talked. So where where did challenge
• 55:12
  accepted? Where did that come from?
• 55:14
  I think when me and Steve were growing up more, our dad would
• 55:18
  always push us to do things better and push us to always do
• 55:21
  great things. We didn't think of it that that
• 55:24
  way at the time. We just thought of it as he's
• 55:25
  just trying to make us go outside, make us do things.
• 55:28
  It was always something in our heads that we had to do
• 55:30
  something better. We if someone gave us a task, we
• 55:33
  had to do it and take that challenge.
• 55:34
  And I didn't really equate it to challenge accepted.
• 55:37
  I would just do the things. If I was given the mission, got
• 55:40
  it. There's no problem.
• 55:41
  I got this. Even if I had no clue what this
• 55:43
  mission was or what anything in in the verbiage was, got it.
• 55:47
  I'll make it happen because that was just in my head, my heart.
• 55:50
  I can make anything happen. And then I was watching How I
• 55:53
  Met Your Mother, Barney Stinson, and challenge accepted.
• 55:57
  I said that's it right there. That's the saying.
• 55:59
  That's what all this means. Everything in my whole life,
• 56:01
  That's what it's meant. If I'm given a task, challenge
• 56:04
  accepted. Write the book, Challenge
• 56:06
  accepted, You'll never make it. You'll never get a master's
• 56:09
  degree. Challenge accepted.
• 56:11
  You'll never get accepted into a doctorate program.
• 56:13
  Challenge accepted. Here we go, boys.
• 56:16
  You know, that was a big jump, though.
• 56:17
  I shouldn't probably thought that one through, but heck, I'm
• 56:20
  fully committed now. I got to finish it.
• 56:22
  Now that I'm healthy, I can do it and I'm going to jump back
• 56:25
  into it. Like I said, 2027, but that's
• 56:27
  where Challenge Accepted came from.
• 56:28
  It's a lifelong of always taking tasks and taking missions and
• 56:31
  just doing it and taking those challenges and making things
• 56:34
  happen and not being afraid like we talked about earlier, the
• 56:37
  being afraid to fail. You're going to fail on things
• 56:39
  in life. It's going to happen.
• 56:41
  I'm here to tell you you're not perfect.
• 56:43
  We're humans. Not everything's going to go
• 56:45
  awesome. Like not every show I've done
• 56:48
  has been awesome. The listened to the 1st 12/14/20
• 56:52
  of them. They were not awesome.
• 56:53
  They were sometimes I even titled them wrong with the wrong
• 56:55
  names because I was trying to do so many things at one time and I
• 56:59
  was man, that's not even the same.
• 57:00
  That's not even the same person that was on the show.
• 57:02
  I wonder how I messed that up. Maybe because I was doing too
• 57:04
  many things. See, no more marathons and I got
• 57:08
  wounded. Exact.
• 57:09
  I got wounded in Afghanistan in 2012 and I was told I shouldn't
• 57:12
  run again. I said OK challenge.
• 57:14
  Except I ran a marathon a year later and that's awesome.
• 57:17
  It's just, it's, it's my mental, my mental makeup is that way.
• 57:22
  Sometimes my mental makeup is hurts me a little more because I
• 57:25
  probably should not have ran that next marathon or the next 6
• 57:28
  after that, because now my body is saying way to go, idiot.
• 57:32
  And I was like, hey, thanks, man, I'll take a new challenge.
• 57:36
  I'll I'm going to walk it now. I'm going to walk a marathon and
• 57:38
  show you because I can do it still.
• 57:40
  And here we go. And that's the challenge is
• 57:42
  always being accepted. And there's nothing I won't take
• 57:44
  the challenge where it's catharts.
• 57:46
  Did I ever teach someone how to make a podcast for?
• 57:48
  No, not at all. I, I, I learned along the way
• 57:51
  taking those lumps and along with Willis and Travis and Ty
• 57:54
  and you, now we're teaching others to get into the field and
• 57:58
  learn from our, our learning curve.
• 58:01
  All of us had a learning curve and now we're trying to make
• 58:03
  theirs a little smoother. And I think that's another way
• 58:06
  of taking the challenge and accepting it to make someone
• 58:08
  else's life a little better. Yeah, no, you're absolutely
• 58:12
  right, man. Like I think and, and almost
• 58:15
  every veteran, at least veterans that I've connected with, you
• 58:18
  could probably say the same thing.
• 58:19
  Like most of us have that mentality already just because
• 58:23
  either how we were raised prior to the military, how we grew up
• 58:27
  in the military, you know, it's just, it's one of those things
• 58:30
  like you get told you have to go do something.
• 58:32
  You're going to have probably most likely very little guidance
• 58:35
  on what actually needs to get done, right.
• 58:38
  But it still has to get done. So you're just going to figure
• 58:40
  it out, you know. So, yeah.
• 58:44
  And, and and like you said, it's I think that is a good challenge
• 58:48
  too, is taking what you've learned and now translating that
• 58:52
  over to somebody else to help them maybe not make the same
• 58:56
  mistakes, right, that that you made along the way to help their
• 59:00
  like kind of growth a little bit easier.
• 59:01
  There's always going to be challenges, there's always going
• 59:03
  to be mistakes, but maybe hopefully make it a little
• 59:06
  little more seamless and a little more, you know, because.
• 59:11
  Yeah, I mean, I like that John's accepted.
• 59:13
  Yeah, I, I noticed that that's all over all of the stuff, like
• 59:16
  online and everything. And it's like.
• 59:17
  Hashtags. Yeah, all your hashtag exactly,
• 59:20
  man. And so like it was it was a no
• 59:22
  brainer for me. Like that's going to be the
• 59:23
  episodes like named like episode title this time.
• 59:26
  So it was super easy. No, that's good, man.
• 59:29
  I like that. And and for our next magazine,
• 59:32
  the Mystification Report, the theme for this month coming out
• 59:35
  and this week will be what we carry forward.
• 59:39
  Yeah, it's the stuff we learned from everyone else and how we're
• 59:41
  passing it on to the next generation.
• 59:44
  And that's what our theme is for this month.
• 59:46
  And that just goes with that challenge accepted to say, hey,
• 59:47
  look, I can't take this knowledge with me to the grave
• 59:50
  because what's that doing for the world?
• 59:52
  Anything I've learned, all the hard lessons I've learned, I can
• 59:56
  help someone else not have to go through the hard part of it and
• 59:58
  just get a lesson. Yeah.
• 1:00:01
  All right. Well.
• 1:00:02
  Man, Rich, thank you for being on the show.
• 1:00:04
  Man, we're, we're getting right here at time.
• 1:00:06
  If there's one thing that you could tell to somebody listening
• 1:00:09
  or watching right now, what would that one thing be?
• 1:00:13
  Believe in yourself. Don't ever let someone tell you
• 1:00:16
  can't do something like like we've been talking about.
• 1:00:19
  Take the challenge, accept it. You're going to have troubles.
• 1:00:22
  Yes, we all do. You think me and John did this
• 1:00:25
  right the first time? The second time, The third time?
• 1:00:28
  Heck no. Sometimes I hit the wrong
• 1:00:29
  buttons now and I'm I'm mute when I'm on here talking Bah Bah
• 1:00:32
  Bah Bah and you don't know what I'm saying because I'm muted.
• 1:00:35
  And that's because we're humans. We make errors.
• 1:00:37
  We're not AI. If I was AI, probably a lot
• 1:00:40
  buffer. I'd look like the rock or
• 1:00:41
  something. I'm not and you're not either.
• 1:00:44
  You're you and you can be the best version of you.
• 1:00:46
  Every day just wake up and start.
• 1:00:48
  Underneath my name it says stacking victories.
• 1:00:50
  Stack victories daily. Count the wins.
• 1:00:53
  You're going to mess up, learn from it and drive forward.
• 1:00:55
  Just keep moving forward. Oh, absolutely, man.
• 1:00:59
  Again, rich man, it's been a pleasure and honor having you on
• 1:01:02
  the show, dude. It's been really great talking
• 1:01:04
  to you. And for everybody out there
• 1:01:06
  listening, thank you again for tuning in tonight.
• 1:01:09
  Hopefully you got something out of this.
• 1:01:11
  If this is a conversation you think somebody needed to hear,
• 1:01:13
  go ahead and go ahead and share. It'll be up for on the man
• 1:01:16
  watching once once the show is over.
• 1:01:18
  So please go ahead and share that out.
• 1:01:20
  But as always, be to lighten someone's dark.
• 1:01:22
  Hi, I'm Beaker with Military Broadcast Radio TV.
• 1:01:26
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• 1:01:31
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• 1:01:35
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• 1:01:39
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