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E82: Two Years Later · The Junto Podcast

0:07
Hello, America. Welcome to the Junto podcast, where we promote the practical
0:10
applications of critical thinking and bold creativity.
0:15
I'm your host, Edgar Mills. Thanks for joining us.
0:24
Back. I think this is episode 82, and I appreciate you guys for being with me.
0:29
What am I talking about today? Well, I'm highlighting the fact that this is
0:32
our two-year roll-up, our two-year anniversary of launching the podcast.
0:39
So somewhere about two and a half months ago, my friend Justin,
0:44
my friend Corey, and myself were sitting,
0:48
you know, we might have been sitting at a bar or something in,
0:53
I want to say U Harley, somewhere near Cartersville.
0:57
And we were talking about doing a Juneto podcast.
1:03
And those guys kind of had the idea. And I think their initial intent for those
1:07
dudes is they wanted to sit around and talk about hiking and biking and all the things,
1:14
the hobbies that they love to do because those dudes will go out together and
1:18
go camp. They've been buddies for a long time.
1:21
And, but the idea kind of grew from there.
1:25
And then of course, the, the time and energy to do a podcast became an issue.
1:32
And so I, I was the remainder, the remaining guy who was still,
1:39
I had enough time on my hands to do it.
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So I said, Hey guys, I'm thinking about launching. They said,
1:46
yeah, launch. So that's what, that's what happened.
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And the podcast, I didn't launch it to be a brand or to be a content creator or whatever that is.
2:03
I launched it and my view of it was it was to be a digital space that.
2:12
Could be similar to what they were talking about, talking about the things we
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want to talk about, but giving people an opportunity to give input as well.
2:22
And why do we call it the Junto Club?
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Well, in the fall of 1727 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Benjamin Franklin launched
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a, well, a similar space.
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His was in a tavern.
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Much like the idea originated with us, was in a tavern.
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And they called it the Junto Club, a.k.a. the Leather Apron Club.
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Some of you may know it as.
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You might learn a little bit about it in history. It's brief anyway.
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But it was for men of the community who did any number of things for a living, for a profession.
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Just any number of things. artists, philosophers, tradesmen,
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musicians, printers, et cetera, et cetera.
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So it wasn't launched by elite CEO types.
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And those men existed back then, by the way. And I'm sure the majority of these
3:31
dudes were successful in their time and in their space.
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But it was for men who earned a living already to get together and sharpen their
3:43
minds together to try to be even better, because that's the American way.
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It's not a matter is, is this good enough? It's how can it be better?
3:56
Yeah. And there ain't nothing wrong with it.
4:00
And yeah, and those guys had the fortunate opportunity to do it over a couple of pints.
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Now I'm not a heavy drinker these days and I'm not going to sit and drink a
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pint by myself while I do a podcast.
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Moreover, I normally do it in the morning. I normally record in the morning.
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Anyway, yeah. Sitting with friends though, that's a very social thing to do. Have a couple of pints.
4:25
These days, one of the differences and one of the reasons you can call it whatever
4:32
you want, generational technology, you can call it whatever you want.
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Men back in those days who sat around the pub having a couple of pints talked
4:44
about important things,
4:48
talked about freedom, and talked about how can they be better, how can they produce.
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And there was a lot to talk about back then.
5:01
And we'll get to it, but a lot of things came out of that Junto club that exists
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today that didn't exist back then.
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But my point is this today, when your average dude goes and sits around the
5:13
pub, having a couple of beers,
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is he talking about how to improve the community and how to improve himself, his self or his friends.
5:28
As just a normal social activity?
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I don't, I don't think so. Now, look, business guys, that's the way, it's done that way.
5:40
But we've been divided up so much into this class warfare and all this and that,
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and the haves and have-nots and everything.
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So, and it's different now. And I, and I don't, I wish it could be the,
5:58
like it was. It can't be a hundred percent, but I wish it could.
6:02
And I'll tell you another thing. I'm going to, I'm a side road here one more time before I carry on.
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Back in the eighties and well, from the sixties on up until the mid early tooth, I can't remember.
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The Stein club, it was on Peachtree street, maybe the 800 block of Peachtree street.
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And I was a bike messenger during my time there where for the the four years
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or so that I frequented the Stein Club and this was the early early into the mid-90s.
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Different people were at the Stein Club because it was in Midtown Atlanta,
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different people were there there were lawyers or bike messengers sitting there,
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drinking $2 pitchers of old Milwaukee's beast.
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There were lawyers sharing those pitchers.
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There were medical professionals and,
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union carpenters and electricians and musicians galore and service industry
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workers coming and going.
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Just any number of types of people or people that did different things for a living.
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And the Stein Club was set up. I mean,
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there was books. There was a space to read. There was board games.
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This was pre-cell phone, by the way. It was such a good place,
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and it puts me in the mind of the Junto Club.
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And, yeah, you can long for the days gone by. I'm an old guy,
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right? You can call me a boomer if you want. I'm Generation X, but whatever.
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Man, that's the place when I think of the Junto Club, I think of that place.
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Yep. Anyway, detour complete. So anyway, Ben Franklin and those men.
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He later wrote that he formed most of his ingenious acquaintances into the Junto Club.
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So it was a purposeful, deliberate thing to gather all his clever homies to
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sit around and solve the world's problems.
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And they met every Friday. It was definitely a social event.
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They met every Friday. Every Friday evening, they got together.
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And here's one of the good things about it, though. Like I was saying,
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the difference between then and now.
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Then, every member, in turn, not all in one night, every Friday,
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a different member would get up.
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And it was his task to bring forth a question or a query on morals, politics, philosophy,
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whatever his thought was that he wanted the group to ponder.
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And once every three months a member would get up and he was tasked his task
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was to write an essay on a topic of his own choosing and then to get up and
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to deliver that essay to the group.
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No one's doing that these days and you could say that that that sparks creativity
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that's It sparks independent thought. It sparks a lot of things.
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That club, the Junto Club, that stood, that ran for nearly 40 years.
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These dudes did this. Nearly 40 years.
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There's very few people in my life I've known for 40 years. There's a few.
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And I love them. And I'm still friends with some of them.
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But yeah, imagine that. If the
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Stein Club was still there, I'd still be going to it 20, 30 years later.
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That club didn't, they weren't worried about status. That's not why they were there.
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There was no status in hanging around the pub with your homies.
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It ran on practical application of the ideas that came forth. That's what it was.
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And it was magical. I love the whole idea of it.
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I love it. So that's how I've attempted to model the podcast.
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To emulate the, at least intent, of the original Junto Club.
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And I came out straight away with the introduction and episode zero,
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that's what the intent was.
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And for those of you who don't know me I'm going to go ahead and give you a
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little brief rundown Excuse me, I'm an Atlanta native Born and raised I was
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born in Decatur For some reason,
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I'm not going to go into it I was born in East Point Is where we lived And I
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was born in a hospital in Decatur,
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So yeah, Atlanta native I was a bicycle messenger for about four years in Atlanta,
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and that's a short time, right?
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But man, that was a formative time in my life.
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It was one of my favorite jobs, my second favorite job ever,
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next to being a Green Beret.
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I am a retired Green Beret. I'm a husband of 30 years.
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I'm a father of three grown children, one being 31 years old. Did math on that.
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I have four grandkids and I'm a small business owner. There you go. That's it.
12:02
My business is Osprey Shooting Solutions, and through that I do some different things.
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Yeah, we train people and organizations on firearms,
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use, being proficient in firearms training, and depending on the organization,
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some offensive and defensive tactics and stuff like that,
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judgment and decision-making, for sure.
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We do leadership and team building and leadership development through scenario-based courses.
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And there's good stuff there. It's all good stuff. Anywhere from land navigation
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to search and rescue mountaineer to situational awareness. We do a lot of stuff. And it's all great.
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Well, the scenarios are the experience, but the goodness that you get from those
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scenarios is immeasurable.
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And I do security consulting obviously and that's that's more formal formalized
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stuff helping organizations just,
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professionalize their security apparatus their their SOPs and then where can
13:12
they harden their structures and that kind of thing so that's what I do that's what I do for a living,
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and then I do this and this is not for a living again I'm still trying to figure
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out how do people make money on, on podcasts, but,
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as the host of this podcast,
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that doesn't meet, that doesn't put me above anyone at the table.
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In fact, my table is, is huge and you're all welcome to it.
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That's what I'm trying to do here is I'm trying to open my table up to whoever's
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willing to come sit at it.
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That's it. And we're all sitting at the same table.
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And who am I targeting here? Well, I mean, everybody. Well, you can't do a successful
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podcast if you don't have a niche market.
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My niche market is people who work for a living, who want to become better.
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Artists who want to become better. Creatives. Professionals who are already,
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whatever version of successful they are, who want to be better.
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Anybody who just wants to grow a little bit and to learn to think from different perspectives.
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I ain't trying to win anybody over politically or any of that.
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I'm going to present. Now, I always lean. I always share my sort of libertarian
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perspective on things, and I will share my Christian perspective on things,
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but that's on you to take or leave it for sure.
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So anybody who just wants to be better or who wants to better their community,
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yeah, that's it. That's who I'm targeting. So that's a broad audience.
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And my audience is slowly growing, and I'm thankful for that.
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I appreciate you all who do listen because I can tell just by the metrics,
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there's probably, there might be about 70 or 80 of you out there who listen.
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As soon as the episode drops. I don't know who you are, but I know that you're
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out there. So thank you so much. I appreciate it.
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Share, you know, not only listen to it, but hit a little like on it and share it with whoever else.
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Yeah, target audience, people who want to be better, all fields, any field, you name it.
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And what subjects do we talk about often? Well, there's few that have a recurring,
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spot on the show here, but it's one, it's from the old Junto charter.
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They had a charter. Yeah.
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And so that's one. That's where we get topics from.
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And two you know I've written a series I said I started out doing this as a blog.
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And that's one of the things my friend Justin said well you write these why
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don't you do a podcast and I thought now I write better than I speak and I do
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and that's that's a fact you can spend more time crafting up your your writing when you speak,
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it's a little less scripted and polished and whatnot yeah I'm reading notes here but,
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so it's not quite as polished so I wanted to be eloquent in the way I was delivering
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my thoughts and opinions.
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And I would occasionally get feedback on those via comments or via a text or whatever.
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Yeah. But who's taking the time to read an essay?
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That's one of the problems in modern society. Attention span.
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If it's going to be more than a 30 second read, everybody reads the first paragraph and moves on.
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And you kind of require the same attention span to listen to a one or two hour
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podcast, but at least there in your car, when you're driving to work on your
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hour and a half commute, you can get an episode, right?
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It's, so it's, it, what it does is just makes it easier for you to consume same, same information.
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So that's, that's what, but we take, anyway, we take topics from the old charter
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and of essays that I used to write,
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and I still do sometimes for myself and then I'll use it as a podcast.
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And I've done episodes on for other people's writings.
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I originally, and I still do, encourage people to send me in via the website
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an essay on whatever you think is important.
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Now, there's obviously parameters, and I'm not going to relay a bunch of hateful,
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nonsense, a bunch of garbage.
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But look, that's not censorship.
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You understand. Rational people know that there's a line for things.
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I didn't start a podcast to be an open platform for any kind of bizarre madness.
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It is to improve people, to help a club of mutual improvement.
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So if what you're saying has a bunch of negativity attached to it and doesn't
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offer any practical applications to improve, you're not within the scope of the show.
18:38
We talk about history now and again, ethics in various terms.
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We've talked about entrepreneurship quite a bit, politics. Yeah,
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of course, talk about politics, talk about spiritualism.
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I'll do a lot of comparisons of Christianity to libertarianism or objectivism
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or comparing philosophy, like ancient philosophy, to religion—well,
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Christianity, not religion, necessarily—,
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Talk about the arts occasionally because I do love the various arts, the arts. I love them.
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And whatever else, like I said, whatever else listeners throw up there.
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And I've had guests on. I've had plenty of guests on. Not as many as I'd like maybe.
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But I'm going to try to open that up more this year to look for more compelling guests.
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The guests I've had on have been awesome,
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So I think we parallel the Junto, the original Junto charter.
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We parallel the original Junto club pretty well for being two different formats,
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sitting at the pub versus being on a podcast. I think we do.
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But that parallel, yes, hold that. But also the ethos, that's the juice.
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That's what's important.
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And the ethos lives in the structure of the way I do business here.
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It does not live in the facade of the social media.
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Yes, I'm going to try to do better video. Well, I'm going to try to do where
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the whole episodes are on video in the future.
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And then I got to make it pretty here to do that. Right now,
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it's not pretty enough behind me to do that.
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So I'm not going to do it until these are just clips and stuff that I'll put
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out. But yeah, it needs to be professional to a degree, not hyper-professional,
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not hyper-polished, but it's not a facade.
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With the Ginto podcast, with OSS and with Edgar Mills, what you see is what you get.
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That's it. I stand on it.
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I always have stood on that and I always will stand on that as advertised.
21:06
All right, so Ben Franklin and the boys, they didn't gather around every Friday
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and have beers and stroke each other off and pat each other on the back of how awesome they were.
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That was not it. They didn't sit around admiring their own superiority over the masses.
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I think they were probably very humble men, probably.
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In a time like that, humility was probably infinitely more common than it is today.
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That was still somewhat hard living back then, folks, even for the wealthy.
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I think the wealthy in 1727 was living very similarly to the impoverished of 2026, probably.
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The conveniences of life, the modern conveniences. Hell, water,
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what? Where to take a poop?
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Can't remember when toilet paper came to me, but I mean, things like that.
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Think about that stuff. Think about the little daily life. Yeah,
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think about a little daily life.
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Yeah, living back then was different than living now. I think humility was the standard. I think.
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They didn't stand around there patting each other on the back, right?
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They gathered around to become more useful, to be assets and not liabilities.
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You've heard it 8 million times, be an asset, not a liability.
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On a team, that's critical. In a community, it's critical.
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In your family, It's critical to be an asset.
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They had fellows there who were, well, doctors, mathematicians,
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geographers, carpenters,
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botanists, chemists, and a word that were like mechanicians.
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They didn't have mechanics back then. They had mechanicians.
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They were the guys who predated what we think of as a mechanic,
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working on a complex machine.
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They were the guys who helped create the framework for these complex machines.
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And Ben Franklin purposely wanted dudes from all these different fields in this
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club to get these different perspectives.
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So one single tray, so you ain't just got a room full of doctors literally stroking each other's ego.
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Because a room full of doctors will do that. There's a funny joke,
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not about doctors, about pilots.
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How do you know when a pilot walks in a room? Because he'll tell you.
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He goes run high in some fields. Yeah. Is it deserved? Maybe.
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But that's not what this is, right?
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I'm sure if a doctor back in the pub started getting a little too lippy,
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I'm sure a carpenter probably delivered a decent ball busting of the time.
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And that's a prominent feature here at the Junto Club and the OSS,
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is there's a little ball busting. We hold each other accountable.
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That's what the ball busting's for.
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And that's just a technique, right?
24:39
Some guys respond to that better.
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Some guys respond to a little bit of challenge better than just a kindly word.
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Oh, you should consider this.
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Hey, why are you so jacked up? It's an attention getter, maybe.
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Think about that. It's an attention getter.
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And if your poopy feelings get hurt because of it, you're in the wrong club, maybe.
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Maybe. Yeah, so that's it, man.
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So we try to do the same. I try to do the same. I've had people on from...
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Now, most of the people I've had on are from my own personal sphere that I know personally.
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So I haven't ever cold called a person that I don't know and I've never trained
25:29
with or worked with and said, hey, would you like to be a guest on my show?
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Here's my show. Would you like to do it?
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I've never done that. I've never reached out to any semi-celebrities or anything like that.
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But, well, we've had competitive shooters on. We've had...
25:50
Fire chief, firefighting fire chief. We've had, speaking of fire, a bona fide fire eater.
25:59
I like the performance art, you know, and then spit fire out. Yeah.
26:07
And the interesting bit of that is that not only was he a bona fide fire eater,
26:13
he was a goddamn Black Hawk pilot before that.
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And he happens to now be a wellness coach.
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With contracts with major universities helping these fraternities,
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you know, not rape people and things like that.
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Anyway, these are guys I know, guys from the range, guys in my daily life. Yeah.
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So we talk about a lot of different stuff. and yeah man psychology is a big
26:44
one because psychology is threaded through almost everything we do so I've talked
26:48
about things like alcoholism and and just,
26:54
young families how to develop at what you're already a family you got kids and
26:59
you're a hot hot mess things you can do and the psychology of all that,
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I talk about that stuff and and folks I do research it I'm not an educated guy,
27:09
and I've said that time and again.
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I do the research, though, and I bat the research off credible sources.
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So, yeah, take that for what it's worth. It's just an opinion.
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I'm delivering an analysis when I do these solo episodes.
27:25
Talked about things like, well, I'm a fan of Ayn Rand, but deeper than that, Frederick Bastiat.
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He wrote a little, no, not a book, I guess you would call it,
27:37
but it's called The Law by Frederick Bastiat.
27:40
And that's a foundational document, folks. I think that's one of the most important,
27:45
writings out there today.
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So foundational for government. I mean, for government. That's implied by the name, the law.
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So there's a mixture of things we talk about, and that is the point.
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That's why it's so important that it's the Junto Club and not Osprey Shooting Solutions podcast.
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I could talk about shooting for a little while. I'm going to max my expertise out at some point.
28:14
And there's only so many philosophies to discuss when it comes to shooting.
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Kind of limited, I think. So I just made it a point to say, hey,
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we're talking about everything. Bring it.
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And I also make it a point that people don't, that I'm not delivering,
28:38
I'm not having people on or I'm
28:40
not posing a question that I think people automatically agree with me on.
28:45
This show isn't about pushing a specific dogma or doctrine Well, it's,
28:52
Christianity Y'all need Jesus, but I'm not preaching,
28:57
But I expect to get pushback on things A respectful pushback But I expect to
29:03
get pushback on certain things I probably hold some beliefs that are somewhat unpopular,
29:09
One of my more recent episodes was on abortion That's always a hot-button, divisive topic.
29:17
Yeah, I delivered my thoughts on it.
29:19
So it's not here just to be agreeable. And it's not here to stir the pot either.
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It's here to get you to think.
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There's a difference in stirring the pot and sparking creative thinking, critical thinking.
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And that's what I'm hoping to do.
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And furthermore, I'm hoping that my lack of education, my stereotypical Southern,
29:44
ignorance that some of you attach to that, being Southern or poor white trash.
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Hope that that will stir you not to just discount what I say,
29:58
but take what I say and think on it and go, oh man, does this,
30:02
does this ignorant dude actually make sense?
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Let me go. Let me go do some research to, right?
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I'm trying to spark you to think, not trying to tell you what to think,
30:16
trying to help you learn how to.
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That's the name of the game. That's what you should do with your children,
30:21
but you should also do that with your colleagues and your family and your friends
30:27
and everybody, helping each other learn how to think independently,
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creatively, and how to solve problems, the problems.
30:37
Life is a problem. It's a series of problems.
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And you know what? I used to always hate on rich people. It's just different problems.
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I wish my problem was, oh man, the taxes on my 40 foot yacht are getting a little
30:53
expensive, a little expensive.
30:55
I want my Land Rover's down. I'll put that in a shop and drive my Jaguar.
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It's different problems, way deeper than that kind of shit.
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For us poor people, problems are, oh man, my car's broke. I don't have no money to fix it.
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I'm still solving those problems.
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But the problem-solving process transcends money, socioeconomics, transcends race.
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It transcends religion.
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Problem-solving skills transcends religion. It transcends everything.
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If you've got a good process for decision-making, life is easy.
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No matter how big the problem is, because you know you can solve it.
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That's where we're at. That's where I want to be.
31:46
Yeah. So in 1727, every member, they brought a query, a question to ponder.
31:52
Here we explore questions and points of view to ponder. I put them out there to ponder.
31:58
We've talked about paltering. That was in episode one, paltering,
32:01
lies, half-truths, and we've recently revisited lies.
32:08
That's an important one. There's an integrity thing there that we're,
32:11
yes, we're trying to push good integrity too. Yes, that's right.
32:16
We talked about making the best out of constraints, using constraints as fuel
32:23
versus constraining you.
32:27
Take the limited resources and the limited options and they can actually fuel
32:32
creativity or clever problem solving.
32:37
We talked about hate. We've talked about building good habits, atomic habits.
32:43
We've talked about the law. We talk about law periodically because I am kind
32:47
of a, I poop on government, like big government a lot.
32:50
I think the more laws there are, the worse off we are.
32:55
We've discussed the search and rescue, right? One, we do the course.
32:58
Me and my friend, Nathan Hicks, do the search and rescue mountaineer course.
33:02
And two, recently there was a mountaineer search and rescue on Mount Yonah,
33:09
where we happened to do our course.
33:12
We talked about cancel culture. That was recent. I think that might have been the last one even.
33:17
I don't do these episodes to meander aimlessly through random topics and headlines.
33:24
In fact, we're not really on to the headlines. Those come and go,
33:29
and if it's compelling, then we'll expand on it. But I don't just hit the headlines.
33:34
I don't care what Leonardo DiCaprio's got going on. It's irrelevant. it.
33:39
We talk about a topic or topics,
33:47
that we can pull out some practical use from.
33:51
And that's almost anything. We can pull some practical use out of it. And that's what the.
34:02
And yeah, and then they required once a quarter, one of their members would
34:08
get up and read an essay that he's written.
34:10
That's pretty cool. I ask my listeners to write an essay and send it in.
34:16
You know, give me some thoughts on a topic. And I've had a few do that.
34:19
And I love it and I'm grateful for it.
34:22
And better yet, instead of writing an essay or the quarterly,
34:26
you know, once a quarter, a guy gets a read, come on the show.
34:31
You know, bring your heat.
34:33
Bring your stuff, bring your A game, come on the show, talk about what you think is important to you.
34:38
If I disagree with your whatever, that don't mean I'm not going to invite you
34:42
on the show. That means I'm going to impose an argument.
34:45
So if you come in with some bullshit, don't think that it's not going to be
34:48
challenged on the show. It will, but in a respectful way.
34:53
You're free to do and think however you choose. And I'm free to disagree with you or not.
35:01
Yeah, we just bring the genuine stuff, whatever that is. Yeah.
35:07
So that replaces the essays. That replaces the essays.
35:12
But do an essay. Do send it in. I'll still look at it.
35:17
And I like the feedback, but the feedback isn't just a courtesy from you to me.
35:22
The feedback is, it's training, it's education.
35:27
You guys giving thoughtful feedback helps me, helps me develop where I can then
35:33
in turn help you develop.
35:36
Everybody learns from good feedback, thoughtful feedback.
35:41
And the reason Ben Franklin wanted the essays once a quarter,
35:47
and he said, and I paraphrase, A man who cannot put a thought on paper does
35:52
not yet own that thought.
35:58
If you can't articulate that thought via paper or words, is it even your thought?
36:05
Are you just regurgitating what someone else said? There's so much brilliance in that.
36:10
I want you guys to think, I'm going to say it again.
36:13
A man who cannot put a thought on paper does not yet own that thought.
36:19
So much brilliance there.
36:23
Want to push that same critical thinking and ownership of the process,
36:29
not the idea itself, whatever idea, the process, yeah, that's where it's at.
36:36
Because if your process is strong, you can have an idea and be wholeheartedly all in on it.
36:45
And then if your process is strong and new information discredits that idea,
36:52
you have the capacity and the ability to change your thoughts on that idea.
36:59
Yeah, or not, but still, that's what the process does.
37:04
The process allows you not to be willy-nilly jumping around from one side to
37:11
the other. That's not what it is at all.
37:13
What it is is the ability to take in new facts and reevaluate your stance.
37:20
Yeah. Take in new facts, reevaluate your stance.
37:25
So some of the standing queries that the original Juneteau podcast had,
37:30
I'm going to read a few of them.
37:33
And here's one of them. Have you met with Is anything in the author you last
37:39
read remarkable or suitable to be communicated to the Junto,
37:46
particularly in history, morality, poetry, physics, travels, or mechanic arts?
37:54
That one question alone is so enormous. Have you read anything good lately and
38:01
what was good about it that relates to us?
38:04
What was good enough to share with the group, particularly in these topics, but whatever.
38:11
So that implies that everybody reads or listens to audiobooks.
38:18
Modern day. It's modern day.
38:22
One was, what new story have you lately heard agreeable for telling in conversation?
38:31
So that seems simplistic and it almost seems like gossip.
38:36
But what makes it not gossip is what new story lately heard for sure agreeable
38:42
for telling in conversation.
38:45
That's the qualifier, agreeable. Don't spread any gossip. Don't spread rumor.
38:52
Have you heard a good story lately that's positive.
38:58
That's suitable for the group? Has any citizen in your knowledge failed in his business lately?
39:06
And what have you heard of the cause?
39:09
Think on that. Think on that. Has anybody you know failed and why?
39:16
So that what? So that we can avoid that, so that we can fix that,
39:21
so that we can look out for that problem, whatever the why was. Yeah.
39:27
And then, have you heard lately, or sorry, have you lately heard of any citizen
39:33
thriving well and by what means?
39:38
Is there anybody killing it and
39:40
how are they killing it? Because I want to kill it like that too. Right?
39:45
We got books these days, folks. We got all these things out here telling us how to do things.
39:49
I'm delivering these days. I'm delivering you at the end of episodes practical
39:54
application, like here's five things or whatever.
39:57
There's all kind of stuff. There's all kind of input these days.
40:00
Back then, it was them dudes sitting around.
40:04
That was the input. That was the social media. It was the pub.
40:09
Newspapers. Yes, Ben Franklin printed. He was a newspaper printer also. There's that too.
40:15
But yeah, man, some stuff don't make the news.
40:21
But it makes the pub. Yeah. Have you heard of anybody thriving well and by what
40:25
means? That's a good one.
40:29
Do you know of a fellow citizen who has done a worthy action,
40:34
deserving of praise and imitation, or who has committed an error proper for
40:41
us to be warned against and to avoid?
40:44
Yeah, and we're always seeing this stuff. Now, usually it's from self-promotion,
40:49
but you're seeing stuff posted all over social media when somebody does a charitable thing or whatever.
40:55
We do charitable stuff.
40:58
That it's good to do charitable stuff. And this isn't just charitable,
41:01
but when I think of deserving of praise, that's, well, that's one of them,
41:05
something that I charity.
41:07
Worthy of praise and imitation. Yeah, that's good. This is good stuff.
41:12
Do you see anything amiss in the present customs of the Junto,
41:17
which might be amended? And what is that?
41:21
I'll tell you, I'll get to it.
41:23
Think on those things. Think on all those things I just said.
41:27
They're the foundations of what we do now, and they're all brilliant in their own little way.
41:32
Instead of bringing the topics to the pub, though, we bring it to the digital waves.
41:36
We share, I share the analysis that I think carries a lesson with it.
41:43
I try to avoid rants. Sometimes I get a little I try not to highlight or dwell on any grudge.
41:53
I try to offer some practical way to overcome that grudge.
41:57
I even talked about resentment before and how it kind of hurts us more than
42:03
it does the other people.
42:06
We look at failures and successes in business, failures and successes in character,
42:14
an outward display of character.
42:16
Not with gossip. That's not what I'm here to do at all.
42:21
But objective analysis, that's it. We look at, well, particular dudes or techniques
42:27
or mentalities that thrive, that successful people have built upon,
42:35
and then try to figure out, well, how does this practically apply to my everyday life?
42:40
Because a regular guy can read a big grand sentence in a book and be like,
42:44
nah, that doesn't apply to me.
42:47
They don't understand. I'm at the low level.
42:50
I don't. It all applies. It can apply. Yep.
42:56
But that last query from the Junto, do you see anything amiss in the present
43:00
customs of the Junto, which may be amended? What does that mean?
43:06
Well, we do it here.
43:08
It means we hold ourselves accountable and are open to fix a problem or change SOP or a habit,
43:22
If it's wrong, yeah.
43:26
Do you see anything amiss in the present Juneto that might be amended?
43:32
Accountability, folks. It's all about accountability.
43:38
Start to drift off into some clickbait, hyperbole, hot topic of the day,
43:44
or some freaking self-aggrandizing fluff.
43:51
Hold me accountable. I'll hold myself accountable. We will amend that.
43:56
I don't think I've done that. I hope I have it. And if I have, call it out.
44:01
But yeah, that is not what we're trying to do, right? We don't want to drift
44:05
off into those those things that need amending. Let's try to just avoid the amendments.
44:10
But if it's that, it's got to change. Can't stand.
44:18
And then in the old Junto Club, the original, they asked every member if they
44:24
held any particular disrespect for a present member.
44:29
That wasn't, you know, that wasn't like Fight Club. You know,
44:32
that was just saying, Hey, do you got any grief you want to,
44:34
you want to, they aired them. They aired the grievances, man.
44:39
Hey, you said this. I think it's all effed up. What, what defend yourself.
44:46
And if you go, well, I don't have to move myself against you.
44:48
Then you're not, you're not club worthy.
44:51
Defend your, defend your, your statement, defend your belief.
44:56
You're going to have to defend it some, someday to someone. Yep. Defend it.
45:01
I like that. I liked that they had that back then. Is there any,
45:06
any member right now that you have a particular disrespect for?
45:13
I can tell you this in a special forces company hallway, six teams and a B team.
45:20
There's plenty of dudes with plenty of beef against other dudes for whatever reason.
45:26
It needs to get out there. It needs to be said.
45:31
It's welcome let's disagree it adds flavor but,
45:36
yeah contempt don't hold you can't you can't hold the grudge you can't hold
45:42
the contempt either get it out in the open or get rid of it because it'll eat
45:48
away at you it'll erode the team,
45:52
that rule stands folks that stands here as well so yeah the Junto club in its
45:57
original form, it was a, you know, they hung out Friday nights,
46:01
drink beer, discussed all the goodness,
46:05
but, but that's not what it stayed.
46:07
It was that for 40 years, among other things. It wasn't just that it didn't
46:11
remain that one of, because they were all dedicated to self-improvement and
46:18
community improvement, mutual improvement.
46:22
And, and they They were all, well, they weren't civil servants by trade,
46:28
like by job, but they were civil servants by, they felt that responsibility.
46:35
And what came of the Junto or from the Junto? A lot of things.
46:42
And I'll throw some simple ones. I've said these before. They had a,
46:45
they created a library company that is now the public library as you know it.
46:52
They created a volunteer fire company that is the fire department now, as you know it.
46:58
And eventually it evolved into, they had their own little philosophical society,
47:04
that grew into the current American philosophical society, as you know it.
47:09
One of America's longest running.
47:16
Time. Sorry, folks. All right. One of America's longest running institutions.
47:22
And what I'm saying from that, the lesson here is not that the podcast has to
47:26
launch all these epic institutions.
47:29
That's not going to happen, I'm sure.
47:33
But the lesson is that all of this that I'm doing here,
47:38
has failed if we don't pull out the practical applications and spread those
47:46
practical applications out to the community,
47:50
to the home, to the individual.
47:54
We have to make these practical applications that sound that sounds like something I can do.
48:01
And we have to make that accessible to whoever needs it. That's what the goal here is.
48:08
That's the institution I'm trying to build now, to the individual,
48:12
the individual institution.
48:15
Because if you are a strong individual, you will be a strong community member
48:21
and a strong family member.
48:23
If that's not what it is, then what is it? Then it's just entertainment.
48:27
And entertainment's cheap.
48:30
Entertainment's not the mission. It's not what's here. I'm not very entertaining.
48:36
I'm not very charismatic. I'm not a lot of things.
48:40
But I'm delivering some good news here. So that's the ethos.
48:45
And it fits all into one tight package, right? We promote the practical application
48:50
of critical thinking and bold creativity.
48:53
So that private life, that business life, and community can all rise up together.
49:01
You can, folks, without practical application, it's just faux intellectualism.
49:09
It's academic. It's not, it's theory.
49:14
Bold creativity without a strong will and a strong constitution individually. It's just a mask.
49:22
But you put them together, folks. You put these two together and you can run
49:26
a business. You can run a shop. You can run a family.
49:30
You can raise a child. You can train a team.
49:33
You can build things that endure, that last, quality products.
49:39
You can paint a painting that will endure for centuries.
49:45
And also, you can lift the people around you. You can lift the people around you.
49:52
You don't have to step on anyone around you to move on up.
49:57
I was going to talk about a lot of the different episodes. I don't want to go
50:01
into this too much time. I'm not trying to take up all your time.
50:07
Years is a start. I think we've held strong to the ethos and to the mission.
50:13
But the original 1727 Gentiles, I don't think they had a two-year anniversary party or anything.
50:19
They just kept going Friday after Friday.
50:23
They kept the questions coming, and they kept coming up with solutions.
50:27
They kept the essay, and that kept the men thinking.
50:33
They changed their customs as they grew slack or outdated or no longer served a purpose.
50:40
Yeah, that's what I'll do.
50:43
The table's open, folks. My table at the pub is open. I have an extra microphone
50:49
here. It's open for you. Yep.
50:53
And to anybody, entrepreneurs, artists, professionals, gunfighters,
50:58
law enforcement, you name it.
51:01
And we'll sit and do the work together. It may be pleasant. It may be unpleasant.
51:07
I'll keep inviting guests on to bring a trade of information,
51:15
not a performance, not just to promote a book or a product.
51:20
Yeah. And I've had some good guests.
51:22
And most of these are friends. Yes, for sure. I had Kurt Fennell on.
51:26
He's a pro shooter. That's what he does nowadays, He's a pro shooter and a Green Beret.
51:31
Buddy Ricky Robinson, decades of law enforcement. We talked about training and law enforcement stuff.
51:38
My good friend Nathan Hicks came on, talked about going all in,
51:42
talked about commitment. We did a joint podcast together.
51:47
Johnson, who, yeah, he's a fire chief, battalion fire chief,
51:51
but he's also a leadership coach.
51:53
He and his wife do command, command the room podcast and then coaching.
52:00
So they're out there. They're doing successful things. Pat Towery,
52:03
the fire eater, the Black Hawk pilot and wellness coach.
52:09
He's a thoughtful dude. He's a, he's a smart, intelligent guy and he's a creative
52:15
man. He gets out there and he does ring announcing for like boxing and stuff.
52:20
He's all over the place. It's brilliant. It's brilliant.
52:24
A friend Will Stevens come on. We talked about brotherhood and faith.
52:28
He wants to come on again. We're going to do some other topics here pretty soon with Will. Yeah.
52:35
And so the seat's open, folks. The seat's open. Had my buddy from Australia,
52:40
Charlie Hart, who's a – And Charlie Hart randomly pulled up in my driveway when we were doing a match.
52:46
And I says, hey, can I help you? And he says, yeah, I'm Charlie from Australia.
52:49
I'm like, okay, what you got? Yeah, I just want to come check it out. Okay, right on.
52:54
Charlie is in a NXS cover band in Australia. And he's a musician, does original music.
53:01
But how crazy is that? It's awesome.
53:05
And he came on. We talked about traveling and stuff like that.
53:09
Yeah, man. had some interesting people on that interest me anyway i hope you
53:15
get something out of it yeah so the seats open man come on come the table's open.
53:27
So, Franklin and the boys of the original Juto,
53:32
you know, they left the tavern every Friday night, better equipped to live their lives, to do their jobs,
53:42
to support their families, better equipped to argue their position,
53:49
better equipped to defend their position in a time where it needed defending.
53:56
And, yeah, maybe they were a little tipsy.
53:59
They were probably back then, man. Hey, you guys think now drinking is bad.
54:05
Those dudes were knocking out five, six, seven pints at a shot.
54:10
Hard drinking.
54:13
Take it for what it's worth, good, bad, or otherwise. They did brilliant things.
54:18
So bring a topic. Bring a disagreement without the disrespect.
54:25
Send your essay because i plan on carrying on with this podcast and definitely
54:30
and until until complete,
54:35
yeah one episode at a time we're gonna do it just like one friday at a time just like they did it,
54:42
uh because i want to leave like they left people with something i want to leave you with something,
54:50
with something that outlives the podcast, something that outlives us,
54:57
something that will stand through generations.
55:04
Folks. I appreciate you guys for listening to this. This is just a wrap-up episode.
55:07
This is two years of the Junto podcast.
55:12
Please follow, share, like, share with your friends. Talk about these things with your friends.
55:18
Send in an essay. Edgar Mills at OspreyShootingSolutions.com is my email. Send it.
55:25
You can do it from the website, thejuntopodcast.com. There's a place there.
55:29
You can upload a document, send an essay, comment on the stuff.
55:34
We got a YouTube channel. We got, we got all the social medias do,
55:37
you know, go in there and hit me up, hit me up.
55:41
We got plenty of training. We got plenty of matches and training in October and November.
55:46
And in November folks, uh, we have a women's only pistol course,
55:50
which I rarely do, but I'm doing in November.
55:53
So it's a perfect time for the wife or if you're a female listener,
55:59
perfect time to come out and be with a bunch of ladies.
56:04
So you got some dude breathing down your neck, condescending or whatnot.
56:10
The environment is conducive to learning. It's low stress. It's easy breezy.
56:15
Try not to intimidate. I bring some humor.
56:19
It's a good time for if you're, especially if you're a nervous shooter.
56:23
I'm not saying that's my specialty, but we'll get you where you need to be.
56:28
All right. So that's in November. Think about that.
56:31
All right, good people. I appreciate all of you. I really do.
56:35
I really do appreciate all of you. Thanks so much. I love you guys. Take care.