Latest / The Vincere Project / Episode 14. Bad Volunteers Aren't Helpful
Transcript
- Vince: All right. We're back at it, the Vincier project, staying consistent and true, doing our best. Doing the best we can, pushing through June. Man, this this time of June is always like a little bit sad or heavy for me. I feel like I feel like 'cause of the way my deployments fell, there was always the spring. It was like heavy fighting season, and by the time we would get to June, things would kinda get calmed down a little bit. But June twenty fourth and two thousand and eight Dwayne Kelly was assassinated in in Sadr City, Iraq and miss him a lot, man. It's a mountain of man and you know, he he he stepped up to cover down for a colonel that couldn't make a meeting and he attended on that morning You know, just just a weird w weird way it unfolded and he was going to a meeting, he doesn't typically go. He's kinda like the C mock chief, so he stays all in the compound, so he doesn't really go out, but the colonel can't get there and he's gotta go and he goes and my myself I'm standing by the gate. where they went to is like maybe like a half mile out the gate to the left to the there's like a district compound on the corner of Route Delta. The other route, but doesn't matter. And so he goes down there and he's with the State Department folks. I think the one lady was OGA, but it doesn't particularly matter. And they detonated a fire safe. They had a safe inside the office, and whenever he got in the settled, they detonated it and he took a pellet or two above the the sap. He played such a drown. I remember hearing the detonation when I was staring by the gate 'cause we were getting ready to go out with Staff Sergeant Condre. And you heard the boom and then You there's the the radio opens up and and the chaos ensues and it was a terrible day, man, and and America lost an incredible son at that point. And he's not the first one. I mean we'll be the last one and but that that hurt. That hurt a lot, I think. And that that's what happens at war, right? Like, young men and women and many times the best kinds of young men and women are are are exposed to you know ins incredible amounts of violence. Also inflict incredible amounts of violence on both sides of that. So but every year I I think about the guy a lot. pretty remarkable person and you know that's not an easy position for the person to replace him who was could never be the the person that Duane was or is and but it makes it even more difficult when the next one end doesn't just you know there's nearly as good or as competent, right? That's that's the stuff we're learning war in combat, man. Everything is everything is subject to change. So man, just doing a lot. I know some other people do too. Great weekend though, honoring some veterans, helping raise some money at the Big Fish Foundation, watching Brock participate for thirty hours with some veterans and some pro athletes. I use that term loosely. I mean they're athletic, they're fit, but pro athletes I don't think that's subjective at all, right? Maybe there's some junior varsity athletes, maybe there's some NARPs. and then at one point they were throwing things and chucking them in a few of them through like Europeans, which always makes me laugh. So I don't know if that's an athlete or not, but I'm being nippicky, that's my stuff. But great event. Raised a bunch of money, got to see a bunch of friends, old friends, make some new friends, see some of the goofies in there too. There's some real goofballs in there. Good. It's good. Everybody looks good. Tosh keeps building that thing out and developing and over-delivering and it helps so many people, man. It's so wide-reaching, and you know, he gets all these high, high-quality people on board to help and support, serve the foundation. it's just impressive what they do, and the branch looks great. And you know, Mary and I got to do that event once, got the privilege, and it's just a great event, it's hard, challenging. Brings a lot of people together, expresses camaraderie in different ways, whether it's a volunteer or somebody participating as an athlete. yeah, Brock was great, man. And so you know it's good to get out there and settle and see everybody. And before I left, Mary gave me the briefing. She's Hey, I know you, you're not a good volunteer, like at all. I'm like, Well, I I think I can I can help. I won't even she's like, You're a homer. And so crazy. I get out there and I'm like serve and Brock and giving Brock all the attention. I'm not like attending to anybody else or doing anything else. and D T's like, Vince is such a homer, it's pretty unbelievable. I'm like, Yeah, D D absolutely figured me out, man. I pick a side, I'm an US then guy. but it was funny that he said that. But anyway, so I go, I don't I'm sleep good the first night or two and And cranky movement. Matt's coming up. I invited Matt. He'd been perfectly fine without me. I just needed to make the handoff. Like, hey, these are the big fish people. Matt's gonna be up there now, man. He's out there, dude. He's an incredible athlete, dude. An endurance athlete, you know, like those folks. Probably throws like a European, but he loves soccer, so it makes sense. And that's my son of here him crying in the background. He just he just finds the podcast just never a good time for him. But Yeah, so so we're out there and I sleep like crap the first night and I hear my wife in my head, she's like, Hey, just take the credit card in case you don't sleep well. Go get a hotel or rental car. Like, nah, I'll be all right, I wanna support Brock. I think it's the right thing to do. He asked about this, volunteered and brought him out here and stuff. So she's like, all right, well if you're gonna stay out there, you know, she gives me this basically firey guard schedule to go check on him every two hours the whole time. if anything happens, she's gonna hold me accoun accountable. But yeah, it's a great event, man. And it really good to connect, see Matt and Brock again, see the other big fish people, see Tasha's element, keep expanding the Big Fish Foundation. any veterans in it that have been through some stuff and that are in not quite in a clinical sense, but maybe. But they're in the transition of life, then they need a little bit of a stimulus to to explore and grow. It's it's a good place. much like any other foundation or group that's doing things. but I do like the the thirty hour bit of it. It's pretty it bring it brings to the surface an expression of endurance that's good for good for the soul. So it's really good. But man, thinking about that hotel and how Vince isn't a good volunteer and I that's kind of what I reflected on after the event is when everything was all said and done, like I I in my mind I was like, Hey, like I'm not a good volunteer, but is it I'm not a good volunteer 'cause I don't want to be a good volunteer. Is it I'm not a good volunteer 'cause it like doesn't click in my mind, like how I see the world. I don't have an answer for that. But that's what just came up at one point because I I don't I don't even count things at my own events. Like I've never once counted anything at I as a kid playing sports I never counted with the scoreboard or any like I didn't open the door, you know, do equipment. Like I I I played started all the time. Forever. You know, in army, same same thing. PT test is about where it stops 'cause you're N CO and you're obligated to do that, right? And you know you do your your evals and counselings, but after that it it yeah, that's not it. Like I I'm better at like planning and execution. And so anyway, my wife points out to me. She's you're you sure you want to volunteer and be there or whatever? And I'm like, Yeah, I c I could do it, I could do it, I could do it. And I get there and I'm like, Yeah, I I can't do this. That's the that's not what I'm good at. I have zero I have zero wiring that way in any way, shape, or form. And and then I see Brock doing his thing, and I'm like, all right, he's okay, he doesn't need Vince. So then I'm like in my head, like playing it out, like why didn't I just book book the hotel and and and take the rental car and go go to sleep? 'Cause my mind is thinking about and sorting through all these other things when working on some projects with Brooke at the office and thinking about the team at the counseling office. I'm looking at that schedule 'cause they're juggling and balance stuff. I'm not there and I feel some kind of way I'm not available. you know, it's my stuff and part of growing my business as well, right? You gotta be able to trust that the people are doing great stuff in your absence. But yeah, I'm not a good volunteer. What did come up though is interesting is I'm excited to share this on the podcast. Is I think I think Mary and I want to have some veterans. I think we gotta figure out how to have some veterans. I think we're going to have some veterans. I think we're gonna do a little bit of programming, we're gonna partner with some other people. I don't know how we're gonna do that, but again, it goes back to what I talk about in all the other podcasts. If if this idiot can figure out how to get people to space and start raising money to do that, I'm like 99.9% sure I can align with some good friends and family and create a really safe place for for homeless veterans that are transitioning or need to do the next part of their life. I don't know how we're gonna do that. I don't know what not for profit we're gonna partner with to help execute that. But I have some really, really, really strong convictions about what would need to be done to make it successful. It's not a systemic like scalable thing. So hopefully because it's not scalable and it doesn't bring out all of the greedy tendencies of human beings, it could be something that's effective and efficient for a few brothers and sisters that are going through that season. Really powerful. Really, really powerful. Man. So yeah, a little bit of a sad week, time period, but exciting at the same time. you know, Mary and I had our anniversary yesterday, which is amazing. She finally gave me permission to start training my son for ice hockey. And yeah, that's that's gonna be good, man. We start we're gonna start every year for the next seventeen years, sixteen years, seventeen years. We'll start on draft night. Yeah, until draft night 'cause it's June. We'll take a break after the season until June. I don't care what they're doing, their club is team, whatever. Those are always somebody deal. Let you play and pay the tuition. We're taking a break in the spring. Got some traveling, dude. Some play some lacrosse, I think. If you like it or baseball. I definitely played baseball through high school. Competitive, you know, like the Jersey Shore is pretty competitive in baseball. Back then it was. I think it I think it's very competitive now too. Jersey's hoping sports in general. But but all good, yeah. And then we'll surf in the summer, do a little skiing in the winter, take some breaks from the seasons. But but train camp starts, man. We we're starting on a draft night forever. We'll it'll just be a fun thing we'll do. And the first workout is always gonna be the Chelios. You know, it's a two and a half mile beach run and then you go surf and hang out, have lunch with mom and You know, and then you come back to the house and then you do Fran, Max Effort. And then you go to the fourth period and the fourth period we ride the air bike and the sauna, some intervals and some sprints. that's what Chalios used to do, man. He was the greatest American defenseman ever played the game. So yeah, that's the first work I will break open with every every summer and then yeah, it's all there for us, man. It's gonna be fun. Can't wait to put him through that. Fun thing about it though is because he's too is that I'm gonna be running with the stroller. I don't know if we're gonna make it on the beach with that because we don't have the big wheels, but I have to do the two and half mile run. And then I'm going to be in the ocean right next to him, and then I'm going to do Fran while he walks around his little stroller and then I'm gonna ride the bike in the sauna. If I can fit it. I gotta try that. I know it fits yet. We might need a bigger sauna. But either way at some point that's gonna be part of the workout, it's gonna be good. HR training events, we're gonna have Mary America, Mary Ruiz aka La Tigrari Rubia on next week. She's doing some really cool women's initiatives and events and it'll it lines up with what we're doing as a brand in a business with HR on both sides and it makes sense. You know, Mary wants to put for push forward the the women's fitness stuff like many other groups and nothing unique or something, but she wants to tailor it to serve our population, our neighborhood, our community and the folks we work with. And then she's gonna, you know, we're flipping it over and Brooke is starting to explore an exam and hey, we're gonna take a look at and do some some CEUs for women's stuff that comes up along the way. And I think it makes sense because I would say about half of my clients are women, and I would say probably about twenty five, thirty percent of them, meah, one in four ish, plus or minus. I don't know. Maybe twenty five percent of my total clients somewhere I think about it actually have women's related issues and things that come up at certain phases of life that is consistent with human development that you have to talk about and work through in therapy, whether you're a male or female clinician, it is relevant to the topics and issues you face when it comes to trauma, anxiety, depression, mental health as a whole, phases of life, career changes, any of the other stuff that comes with that, grief, infidelity. Psychiatric illness, disease, existential crisis, right? Like men and women deal with those things. And I think we'll I'll do an offshoot. We'll do the male one in the next year or two. But I think that's those are things coming up. But yeah, we're gonna have the CEO of HR training events on next week. little fourth of July celebration kind of thing, released it next on the second or whatever. She doesn't want to talk zombie apocalypse. I thought it would be a safer and fun way. She wants to get right to it and talk all things war and conflict and how her and I decide, make decisions, some of the new initiatives. Things we had to learn from our early career into our adult life at this point in terms of professional sense and ways to accelerate those particular things. Her and I are not unique. There are hyper successful veterans across the country in many every corner. but I but I think sometimes people struggle to understand conceptually how and why the military service accelerates those particular things. You know, you look at the enlisted side of the military and there's an assumption that that was the only thing that people could do or it was the only option people had. And that's not quite the storyliner case. It's quite the opposite actually. most people couldn't serve or can't serve at this point. we don't have conscription enacted at this moment in time as a as a nation. and so as such it's all volunteers. And because of that, you know, w in our storyline, and Marion I'll carve this out is you know, we're not really nationalistic at all, right? Like we're we're actually jingos in the hardest truest sense, man. Like, yeah, I think it favors America to let le loose the dogs of war with no rules to go secure the the resources of other nation states to secure them for American interest. It's not popular, but I don't see a better way because the reality is most of the world doesn't have railroads. So what do I care what they think? Right? But they have things that the United States could benefit from. And we're gonna need a lot of copper going forward. There are a lot of natural resources we are going to need as a nation, but copper specifically with space travel and the the data centers and the energy consumption, production, production and consumption. that's gonna be our responsibility as a nation. So there's your mental health note of the day is peace of mind can be created when you are on the offensive securing resources and things like that. But Mary's gonna be the first guest. There's gonna be many guests after that, and I'm excited to get her on here. yeah, it's gonna be really good because she's smart. She's really, really f she knows her people, she's situational aware, and she said to me before I left, she was like, Hey, are you sure you don't want to get a rental car? Brand loyal and I was like, I'd like to be there to support Brock, which she didn't need any of it 'cause they the big fish team just does it better than Vince could ever do it. Again, I'm not a good volunteer like that. Good teammate. I'm a good teammate. I'm a great teammate, but I'm not a good volunteer. It's just the reality of it. so next time I'll listen to Mary America, right? Like I'll just I'll let that little voice like when she makes a statement like that, I'll listen to it because she's quick to turn around once you she gets your agreement, then she puts you to work or task and Then she gives you the fire guard schedule and then every two hours you're waking up to take a pee and then go check on Brock to make sure he's hydrated and taking salt tabs, which I don't think he was at any point in time. But yeah, man. It was good. It was good. But yeah, don't throw a hatchet like a like a European. Kind of looks silly sometimes. Well, good. Merry next week. It's a good week. June. Keep doing this thing. Yeah, we have we have blue lights in the back now. I don't know. We had blue, pink. We had none the other week. We're gonna keep doing this thing. It's gonna be great. Got some some good stuff coming up, got some good people. First one with the glasses on. I'm feeling super old, super sophisticated, but that's okay too. Cheers, enjoy.