Latest / Your Thoughts Your Reality / Strength Asks for Help | Omar Ritter on Emotional Armor, PTSD & The Seventh Silent War

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Strength Asks for Help | Omar Ritter on Emotional Armor, PTSD & The Seventh Silent War · Your Thoughts Your Reality

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: How do you stay resilient when life changes you on the battlefield and beyond?
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: Preventing veterans, leaders, and high performers, strength can become the armor we wear.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_02: We keep moving, we keep leading, we keep performing.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_02: And sometimes we keep suffering in silence.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: But real resilience is not about carrying everything alone.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_02: Today's conversation is about emotional armor, the seventh silent war.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: Mental health, gratitude, and leadership we're going to discuss as well, and the courage it takes to ask for help.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Your Thoughts, Your Reality with Michael Cole, the podcast that shines a compassionate light on the journey of veterans battling through life's challenges.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Michael is a dual elite certified neuroencoding specialist in coaching and keynote training presentations, dedicated to guiding military veterans and to navigate the intricate pathways of post-disciplined life.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Join him as we delve into the profound realm of neuroencoding science, empowering these brave individuals to conquer universal battles, procrastination, self-doubt, fear, and more.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Together, let's uncover the strength within you to re-engage with families and society, forging a new path forward.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to say it out loud.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: Omar Ritter is a West Point graduate, combat veteran, entrepreneur, and CFO.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: He served as a scout troop officer in Iraq, earning a bronze star, valor device, and combat action badge.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: After the military, Omar transitioned into finance and rose into a billion-dollar level CFO role.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: His journey includes personal battles with PTSD, and we're going to dive into that today, and major health challenges that reshape how he sees leadership, resilience, and mental health.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_02: His message reminds us that strength is not just about enduring hardship, it's also about knowing when to ask for help.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, Mike, thank you for having me on the show, first and foremost.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: So extremely happy to be here.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you covered a lot about me in terms of what I've done professionally.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: But, you know, from an individual standpoint, really, Mike, what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to advance the conversation on mental health, specifically, you know, for folks that have served in the military, for folks that work hard every day in corporate America, and for those folks also that are leaders of their families, and every day they go out and try to make life better for the people that are waiting on their support, and they ignore the stressors of themselves, right?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: So it's really for leaders of all type, military, corporate, family, just really trying to advance that conversation.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely love it, man.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think it's important, right?
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: Especially, you know, that's why I focused on exactly that the transition period.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: So again, you're the perfect guest for the show.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_02: So I appreciate it.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that's one of the most important things, whether it's you're getting out of the military.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_02: I can't tell you how many people that I've worked with, veterans that I've worked with, that have said, man, if I would have known these things back then, you know, I think it's so important that we we really get this mission out there.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: And so I again I'm honored that you're on here to play with us today.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_02: So let me ask you this.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_02: You know, when you hear emotional armor, which is again the seventh silent war, what does that mean to you personally?
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: Emotional armor, it's just a tough exterior, it's putting on that that tough exterior.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I I just redid the the cover of my book, but my original cover was a golden bull and with the with the West Point cap on it.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: The reason why I made that my original cover is because I felt like I was always hiding behind being this tough bull, you know, bear in a in a china shop type of fella, talking about you know what I did at West Point, what I did in the military, etc.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: But on the inside, you know, some days waking up, I was just getting crushed, you know, due to due to the pressure, due to the things that I was trying to achieve personally, always comparing myself to two other folks.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so at some point, you know, you hope you get to a point where you say, okay, enough is enough, right?
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm enough.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'm happy with where I am right now.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And you try to move the ball forward in that way, right?
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: So that emotional armor is really just acting like everything's all good when it's not.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, what's funny is you know, we we we really wear a lot of masks in life until we don't.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_02: And just we're just you know full of integrity and just ourselves, and people are gonna love us or hate us or whatever the case may be, but but we're uh we're living fully in integrity.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's kind of the game changer, right?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: Because again, we wear so many damn masks in life, depending on who we're playing with, dealing with, all the different stuff.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_02: So let me ask you this, and and you know, I think it's really important because uh for the podcast, we always try to go, you know, hey, what did I struggle with?
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: Crack the light open to it, and then how did I get past it, right?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: And how did I move forward?
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: So let's talk about your story a little bit.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, when did you notice that you know you were you were wearing that emotional armor?
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: Great question.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: So for for me, I noticed that I was wearing this emotional armor all the way back in 2004 when I came back from uh from Iraq.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so the way that I sort of covered myself was being the life of the party guy, you know, showing up to different events, always bringing the fun with me, right?
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I talk about it in my book, you know, I would I would stay out till 2 a.m., 3 a.m.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: at night on a Tuesday.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like that was nothing to me while I was in the in the military, go to work at 6 a.m.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: the next day, you know, do do physical training.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, at the time I was running, you know, two miles in 11 minutes, 30 seconds, or going off a three hour sleep, all to do it again just the next day, right?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so I knew that I had an issue.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: Now, did I want to address my issue?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: Not really.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so what happened to me is I just got this new group of friends and we'd hang out all the time, and and I'd do everything except be left to my own thoughts.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: So that's really how I hid not only from you know people on the outside, but from myself as well.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: So I you know, I I just want to bring some some some thoughts to that when when for the audience specifically, is how many of you see yourself in what Armor is talking about right now?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_02: How many of you are you know doing exactly what he did?
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_02: I did it.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I I did it, I'll admit it.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's I think it's super important.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for you know being vulnerable and obviously sharing that because I think it's super important.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: So when we move you know from that, and when you're like, hey, something's not cool here, and I need to make a change.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: What what was it?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_02: Because usually we make change with the plain uh pain, uh pleasure principle, right?
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_02: How much pain do I have to go through to get to pleasure?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so something obviously hit.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_02: So can I ask you to be a little vulnerable on this one too?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_02: And tell me what was it that said shit, something's gotta change now?
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's when real change happens.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: So before I can actually answer that question, I gotta tell you, I knew something was wrong in 2004, and I actually didn't get any treatment until 2024.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so we're talking about you know, a 20-year time span.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: So a lot of things changed.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: One is it that the the the black hair turned turned gray, and now you see a lot of it's white, right?
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: So that was a big change.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: I got you, but I got you.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: I was I was very successful in in corporate America at my jobs.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: I was the guy that could stay up all night, crank out a financial model, look at your company, tell you how to do M ⁇ A deals, etc.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was all going very well for me.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Picked up my CPA, went to Columbia, got my MBA, started working on my doctorate, you know, had several promotions along the way, had the opportunity to be a CFO of a multinational division of a billion dollar revenue generating shop.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: And look, these are these are all highlights, and I was doing quite well.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: But it took me over time to hit rock bottom because the issue that that that I was having, and I and I say that this is a I call this a first world issue, is that I could almost out party and outpay and out and outpay my negative feelings.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: So if I'm feeling bad, let me just hop on a plane, go somewhere, have some fun, and then I'll I'll come back and deal with reality for three or four months, and then I'll go someplace else, have a great time, and come back and deal with reality, right?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so for me, just to be very specific to answer that question, time stopped when I had my child, right?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: So so I had a daughter in in in 2022, right?
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: So that daughter's now three, going on four.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when I realized, you know what, I can't, I can't keep doing this.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: One, I'm getting a bit older, so I can't be the fun guy anymore.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: Like you can't be fun guy looking like this, right?
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: You just you know, it would be hard.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: You'd be the old man wherever you are.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: You see that you see that no more, you just can't just in a different way.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: You you can in a different way, right?
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: But then you could end up falling out, you know, etc.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, I was spending so much time with my kid, like taking a dance class, swimming, etc.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so at the same time, I was trying to get right, you know, to so I could be around for her because I'm an old dad, I want to be around as long as possible.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: But at the same time, I had you know, several friends within a one-year time span.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: I had four friends commit suicide.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, for me, it was an extremely crushing blow when a buddy that I worked with in Iraq ended up not only committing suicide, but but but murder suicide, right?
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that that really that really made me hit rock bottom from a from a mental perspective.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: And it was at that point that I actually went to the VA, because I've been going to the VA for years for my my brain tumor you know treatment, but I had never talked about mental health.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so it made me go in, talk to a psychiatrist, get some help, start weekly therapy sessions, because again, like I wanted to be here for that little girl.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it got to a point where I just couldn't outrun it because now you know I got a three-year-old man, I can't just take off and go somewhere and party and come back fresh.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: I got a wife at home now, so that's not gonna work.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: I don't really want to be divorced.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so reality, reality hit me, and I had a choice deal with this reality, get healthy, or continue down the same path, and who knows where you're gonna end up, right?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_02: I love you know, first of all, sorry about your your your friend, obviously.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_02: That that's always tragic, and unfortunately, I've heard it too many times with what I do, and as I'm sure as you have, you know.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: So what I want to bring out, and hopefully you're okay with this.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_02: What was his name, if you don't mind?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: Or is that okay?
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: His name was Sergeant Slacks, and so like my my my guys listen, and they they know they know Sergeant Slacks.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: He's I I like to honor people, yeah.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he was my he was my mechanic, you know, when I was an executive officer, and if you know anything about the military, the executive officer and the mechanic, they're they're like this.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I I remember we were we had a chemical threat in in Iraq.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: And so me, Sergeant Slax, and Sergeant Balieu, we actually had to go back from Iraq, drive 50 miles back to Kuwait, Kuwait.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: We went to the vehicle junkyard.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: The three of us lifted an engine out of a hump out of one Humvee, put it on the roof of my Humvee, and drove this thing back to the front lines in Iraq and installed this engine into the Humvee that the engine was out on, right?
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and we did this all under Mop 4 and like 110 degree heat.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: So if you can imagine like the dedication to get that done, and so that's just where we were at that point in time.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so you can imagine how many hours I spent with this individual.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, absolutely get that.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: And and obviously made an impact, right?
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: Because you guys were close enough.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, not only there, but but I'm sure after.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_02: So the thing I want to point out again, sometimes this doesn't this isn't something people love to hear.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_02: But if that if he didn't do what he did, would that would you have not, you know, did that not catapult you to change your life and to where you are now?
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: That that was my ultimate uh catapult.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so that was yeah, it's crazy that when we think about some of the bad things that happened and really think about it, it's really was a gift in a sense.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: Not not what happened specifically, but what because of what happened for you.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, it was definitely a gift for my child, a curse for his children.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and and for for me, it was reality smacking me in in the face, right?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: Because like this was my guy.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like, we like we were close, like we were up until you know the incident happened, we were on the phone talking.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: We were we were messaging on Facebook.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he was talking about he was on a weight loss journey to to lose weight because he told me he was going through a divorce, and so he needed to get get fit so he could get back out there on on the dating scene, you know, etc.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I try to tell people it was one of those instances where I say, man, I didn't see it coming.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: And see, that's that's the issue.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: I I I didn't see it coming, but now knowing what I know now, I would probably dig deeper with him on that divorce situation and how that was impacting him, right?
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: I I I didn't I didn't see the the trees through the fog on that one.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: And here's the thing is And then I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: That that's the problem, right?
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: Is when they when people are suffering in silence.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_02: You know, if he would have said something, it would have been different, right?
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: But that's right.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: It's a thoughts and and when when the world slows down or stops that you know, in our own heads.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_02: So so thank you for sharing that truly, you know, and I think it kind of leads us right into kind of what we really wanted to talk about, or at least start talking about, is you know, for a lot of veterans and high performers, asking for help can feel like weakness.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think it ties in very well to this question.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, what changed your perspective on that?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: So, what changed my perspective again?
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: I I'll go back to to my kid, and like it opened up a different corridor in my in my heart, if you if you will.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it made me more of an I'm a girl dad, so it made me more of a tender type of dude than than I have originally been, right?
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: So, so first and foremost.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so as I thought about what my what my options were, it became very evident to me that I at least needed to go and try to have a conversation with a with the therapist, right?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: So I started with a therapist and ended up with a psychiatrist since I'm being open here.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and the psychiatrist was like, man, you've been like suppressing a lot of stuff.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, let's let's talk some more about it, and let's talk about some of the different types of treatment that that you could go through.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so once I got in there and they told me that fact, and they they told me that I was suffering from PTSD.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I didn't go to them and say, hey, I got PTSD.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: They were like, dude, you got you got PTSD, and we need to talk about some of the things that happened in Iraq, some of the things you did, some of the things that that you saw while you were there.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I and I will tell you, with with all my guys from my cavalry unit, we were brigade asset.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so we used to get sent on some pretty hairy missions, and it'd be like, hey man, like this mission sucks.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm glad you're going on it and not me.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like, good luck.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I mean, that's how we would, we would, we would talk to each other.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: I got, you know, if Sergeant Davis, he's one of my Facebook friends, he would tell you, I mean, he went on some crazy mission to go guard a bridge from the Republican Guard, and they sent him out there with no up armor, with the with an umvey with no up armor to go guard this bridge, and he was up all night fighting, right?
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, these are the kinds of things that you do at the time.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: You don't think about how it impacts you, but then, you know, a year later, 10 years later, 15 years later, you're waking up in cold sweatsin, and then what the what the hell, you know?
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's it's and that's that's part of the problem, I think.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: When we when we when we say, you know, PTSD, or you know, we create this this uh stigma around it, right?
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_02: And so half the people don't know they have it until they until they do, and half the people don't want to say they have it because it becomes real.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so I I love that you know you brought that up.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, you know, with your experience, how did PTSD really shape the way you think about strength, leadership, and mental health now with your experience with it?
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I I will tell you that my PS PTSD, it really helped me in my in my corporate career somewhat, right?
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm very obsessive compulsive.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so when you're when you're a finance person and you're obsessive compulsive, every number, you know, checks the block.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: You want to make sure everything adds up, all the words are correct, etc.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: So it made me very good at at what I was doing, and it made me go pursue like my my CPA, my CPA, all these other things, because I just want to prove that that I'm knowledgeable.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: So from that, from that perspective, it helped me a bit.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't all all hurt.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: But from the from the other perspective, you know, it was just a lot of a lot of pain that I don't think that I needed to to put myself through.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, from both a a work and a family perspective, and I'm not talking about wife kid, I'm talking about, you know, general, general family perspective, you know, you're you're trying to to hold it down for everybody.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: You got these stressful work environments, you're suffering from PTSD, and it's just pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: And you think that you're supposed to have this pressure in order to carry, you know, your employees, your family, everything forward.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: And once you go seek that treatment, you figure out, wait a minute, I don't need all this pressure.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: I can actually divide this, parse this out, and have conversations with people about what I'm willing to do and what I'm not willing to do.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so I will tell you, when I when I think about the different segments of my life, it feels good to be at a point, you know, with the treatment, with being able to talk to to my therapist, etc., to be at a point where I could say, this, these are the things I'm gonna focus on.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: Anything outside of this, I'll get to that later on.
• 20:18
  unknown: Yeah.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_02: I I I really appreciate you saying that.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_02: The the learning from it, right, and growing from it is is a beautiful thing.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: And that's where a lot of people get stuck, right?
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_02: Is they don't move over.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: So I appreciate you saying that.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_02: With your journey, you know, we're gonna no, you know what, I'm gonna go back a few steps.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_02: I have so many questions for you, my friend.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: So, so you you you went through, you know, your life's journey, right?
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, and forgive me, 2024 is when you got to go.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: 2024, yeah.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_02: Perfect, thank you.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_02: So once you did that, let's again, we're gonna we went through the darkness now, let's crack open the light, right?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_02: So I what did you start noticing when you started getting help?
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_02: Because again, let's just call it real.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's not a man thing, it's not a military thing, but it's stronger in those in those, you know, demographics, if you will.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: Asking for help is weakness, right?
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: And we still know, I know you know, and I know I know that asking for help is the strongest thing you can do.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: For for you, your family, generationally, your family, and everybody else that's around.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: So tell me about that.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_02: Is when when you uh were were strong and said, Hey, I got a problem and I want to make a change, and you reached out and made let's say that first call up for a year, what where do you see your life changing by making that decision, that true decision to ask for help?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: It made me prioritize in terms of what's important to me.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: So so so prior to getting help, sitting down, talking to a therapist, starting on that journey, especially.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Especially that first year was rough, man.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: What it made me realize is that when I when I leave this planet, nobody's gonna say, man, that guy Omar Ritter, he was a great banker.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: Man, he really did a one hell of a job at Wells Fargo, right?
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like, like he was a man at JP Morgan Chase.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like, nobody cares about that.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: Man, he got me a debit card.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like, who who the hell cares about that, right?
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: Like, for me, you know, I'm I'm fortunate to where you know I I invested wisely ever since I I left West Point and all the way through my my corporate career.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there there were times when I was a second lieutenant, you know, when they had that dollar menu at Burger King and McDonald's, I would buy like five burgers, man, and eat a burger every day, right?
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Just to save money and like do my IRA stuff, right?
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: So it gets to a point where you say, man, enough is enough.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: Like I could I could keep staying this in this in this rat race and and and make myself tired and dizzy, uh you know, out of shape, heart condition all high, and then just die off at like 65 the day after I retire, right?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so getting that treatment made me prioritize like what what is important to to Omar, right?
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: Number one priority for me, raising that kid, right?
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm unfortunate to have another kid raising that kid, right?
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's number one priority.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: Number number two priority is family, like spouse, kid, like all that stuff's encompassing for for me.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_01: Number three is my health, and then four, quickly following is like my my friends and making sure I have those relationships and I'm able to support them.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: Whether I'm talking about friends in my circle or friends from that I've made during my life, especially those at West Point and those folks that I serve with, you know, and in the scout troop, right?
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: So being there to support those people, right?
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: That that's what's important to me.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: At the end of the day, for me, because I went to Columbia, because I'm gonna be a doctor of finance soon, because I'm a CPA, because I'm a CPA, I'm gonna make the money, right?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: The the money is chasing me.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't need to, I don't even think about the money piece anymore, right?
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: That'll come for come for me whether I I want to make more or less or whatever.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even think about that anymore.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: I need to think about my health, prioritize my family, and create a legacy that people are actually gonna talk about, you know, in terms of you know, my life, like what did I contribute?
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a major reason why I wrote the book, West Point to Wall Street, My Journey to Mental Wellness, is because I want to leave something behind that somebody can pick up early on in their career or 20 years into their career, yeah, and really think to themselves, Am I looking after my mental health, my mental wellness?
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: And if this guy was able to do that, write this book, come on these podcasts and talk about the issues that he had, surely I can address my own personal issues, even if I just want to keep that to myself.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's that's the legacy that I'm looking for.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_02: Love it, man.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely love it.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's it's uh just hearing you talk about it, and and you literally could see your energy changing from what we were talking about before to the excitement now, right?
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_02: So you have to open the light, you're you're you're in the light, you're you're moving forward with the life that you want because of, and I'm gonna say it, the hard ass things you went through, not just the military, but I'm gonna say that year of hard that you went through might have been even harder because you're really battling with your own thoughts and emotions.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm applauding you, my friend, because so many people don't have that courage to just take that first step.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_02: And what a payoff is it when you do.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: You have to get uncomfortable and comfortable in anything you want.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the first day I did a podcast, I I almost had anal leakage.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I just said that.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_02: About 150 episodes later, I'm just having fun.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_02: So you have to get uncomfortable and comfortable.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_02: So I really love what you just said there, Manty.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's super important.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: The the journey from West Point to Wall Street, because you brought up the book and so on.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: So let's let's talk about that for a second.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_02: And first I want to talk about the book even more.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_02: What parts of the military discipline?
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_02: Because I want I want veterans to really go back one step.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of times the patterns, and again, the the stories are different, the patterns are the same, right?
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_02: So I see a lot of veterans that that come out of the military don't realize all the skill sets they actually have, especially discipline, leadership, all of the amazing things that you do learn because when you're in there, it's usually you're just doing a job.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: So what parts of military discipline or military skill sets helped you?
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_02: And what parts did you have to kind of rethink as a civilian?
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: The biggest help for me, Mike, is that I can work around anybody on anything.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: I don't care what your background is, what race you are, where you're from.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: I don't care about any of that.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: First and foremost, I want to know can we work together?
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: And if we can't work together, initially, I try to figure out how we can how we can partner, right?
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so the biggest thing I took from the military and and really from West Point was understanding what the commander's intent was, whether that's a military commander or your boss in corporate America, et cetera.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what do they want us to achieve?
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: Being able to really know what that is myself.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: And then if I'm in charge of teams, being able to explain that to my team because hey, if I'm don't come to work one day or I get fired, or if I get hit by by a bus, you know, the team keeps marching forward, right?
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: So that's something I took from from the military.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: And another huge thing that I took from the military is servant leadership.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of people are managers.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of managers out there, you know, they get it, they get something from their boss and they say, hey, go do this, because my boss told me to do this, you know, and if you do it, I might give you a big bonus or or or or whatever, right?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: So they don't really care about you.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: But for me, I've always cared about my people, whether it's been in the military or it's been in corporate America, and I'm a straight shooter.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so when folks have issues, you know, first and foremost, I want to understand what those issues are, but I also want to understand them as a person and what motivates them.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to figure out how I can help them get to the goals that they want to achieve.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: Because if I can help them achieve the goals that they want, that gets them excited about coming to work specifically for me.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: And it's gonna help me move to move to the next level or help me get to where I want to go.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: And even if that doesn't happen, at least I get to look back, you know, on LinkedIn, Facebook, wherever I'm looking, and see people that I worked with previously that may have worked for me be successful, right?
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like that that fills my my my cup.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely love that, absolutely love that.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_02: And that's the difference between management and leadership.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: Totally night and day difference.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_02: So, Omar, let's talk about the book.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_02: We're about out of time.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: So let's talk about the book a little bit.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_02: You know, what's what's in the book?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_02: Why should people be excited about reading your book?
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they should be excited about reading my book because I I take you through different steps of of my life, right?
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, there are times I lived in a trailer park, you know, there there were times that I was in the the the heat of combat and in Iraq.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: There were there was a time where I had 18 hours of emergency brain surgery, what my recovery was from that.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, see, brain surgery, having 18 hours of brain surgery alone at the age of 26, that by itself will give you PTSD.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: So I have to call myself like a double PTSD because at 26 years old, I was actually thinking about death, you know, already.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've had life insurance for a very long time at this point.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm always thinking about being more morbidly so, like, about what's gonna happen when deceased, right?
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I gotta put, I've already got plans in place for you know my kid, you know, etc.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: So you're gonna you're gonna hear about about that.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna hear about my my journey through through through Wall Street.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I showed up to Columbia two months after having brain surgery to go to an Ivy League business school.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: What was that pressure like going through that?
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then landing a job as an investment banking banker working 80 to 100 hours a week.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: What was that stress and pressure like?
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's a I have a funny story in the book about I had a girlfriend that moved in with me, you know, when I was a young investment banker, and and lo and behold, man, like she had her she had another boyfriend move in with her.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't even know.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_01: I was at work 80 hours a week, you know.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: And neighbor, my neighbor actually had to tell me, hey man, you know, your girlfriend, she has a boyfriend, and it's not you, right?
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, just just things like that that that that happened, now that didn't really affect me too mentally, like that was okay.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: But through all these different steps of life, each chapter, I reflect on how it impacted my mental health, and how all these things took me to that critical moment where I said, I gotta do something, you know, uh about this, right?
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: Because I'm making life miserable for the people that are closest to me, pushing them away.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: And and they don't they don't deserve that.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, you know, I had a I had a best friend, best friend with this with this guy since 1995.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, peas in a pot, and and we fell out five, six years ago because of me.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so we just recently, you know, over the last year reconnected, and it's like we never disconnected because I've been getting this.