Jason Redman Life as a Navy SEAL, Leadership Lessons, and Embracing Resilience 01:08:13

80% of the class will quit during Hell Week. He's an individual. He's out doing his own thing. You can't depend on a guy like that. But nothing simulates being shot multiple times. How are you trying to cope with that? Well, boys, try that at Small Town Podcast. Tonight has an American hero.

Retired Navy SEAL Jason Redman is with us. Thank you so much. Jason, thank you. And I was telling the guys... What's up, everybody? I was telling the guys, this book, The Trident, I read it when it first came out over 10 years ago, which that's crazy at this point, but what an amazing book. The story, I was immediately hooked on the whole book, but your story...

When this came out, what was the reaction that you were getting from everybody? Because it is an incredible story and you lived it. So, you know, it's obviously an amazing journey that you've been on. What was the reaction like from people when this came out that you were finding that hit them the hardest?

Yeah, I loved it. I think the number one thing I hear after people read the book is, wow, that was not what I expected. And it makes sense. I mean, there's a, you know, it's kind of funny. There's this idea that there's this formula for sealed books. As a matter of fact, even teammates of mine gave me shit.

as we do, and said, oh, did you follow the CO format? You basically wrote a book about buds, and then you talked about how awesome you were in combat, and that was your book. And I said, it's not quite the approach I took. And it was kind of interesting. I'll be honest, my agent, Jim Hornfisher, who passed away, he was also Marcus Luttrell's agent, and Jim was not the biggest fan

of my story the way I told it in the beginning. He was like, hey, man, you don't need to talk about the mistakes you made. Nobody really cares about that. He's like, just, you know, there's a lot of great combat stories. I want you to expand on that. And I was like, Jim, here's the deal, man.

I messed up. I screwed up as a young SEAL. And I think that's a big part of my story. And I don't want to cover that up. I want people to know that. I think there are people out there that can benefit from that story. I think there's a lot of people in life that stumble and fall and fail. And there's a lot of us, myself included, at that time who kind of thought that this was it. It was the end. I'll never recover from this. And...

Yeah. So I stuck to my guns against Jim's wishes. We really butted heads on this. So it's definitely invigorating when even today, you know, it's still a lot of people still buy it and read it that people write me and say, wow, that was not what I expected. It was so much better. And the other thing I hear is once they start reading, they're like, I couldn't put it down. Yeah. That's, that's for sure. How I felt like I got into it and it just kept

Pulling me in because it was so transparent. You know, the story was so it didn't feel contrived. It didn't feel like the obvious read, you know, and truly amazing, you know, and you come from a long line of family in military as well, which that was also interesting.

Interesting to know. Grandfather was a pilot, correct? And it was amazing. I mean, the lineage of service, you know? Yeah, it's all I ever wanted to do. I mean, all of us in my family, you know, we're kind of committed to service. My dad

Was in the Army. I mean, that's when I first learned about jumping out of airplanes, which I thought, wait, there are people, I'll get paid to jump out of an airplane? Like, how cool is that? And so learning about that, my dad was actually who first told me about the SEAL teams because up until...

Really about 2001, SEALs went through Army Airborne School. I did too in 1995. As a young, brand new, just finished SEAL training, I went through Army Airborne School. It wasn't until after 9-11 that the SEALs basically took over and ran their own

Airborne basically jump schooled and now all SEALs we go through our own jump school. But that's, my dad was the one way back in the 60s there were SEALs that went through jump school with him. He was a rigger and instructor.

And that's who told me about the SEAL teams. He said, Hey, there's a group of guys during the Navy maritime special operations. They call them SEALs, some of the hardest training in the military. He said, you know, you you're exploring this. He said, you're a good swimmer. You should check this out. You know, Jason, I've always had this really, it's such a fascinating thing. I think about the SEALs and we've, we've got some friends who are SEALs and come to shows often and hang out and,

You know, I've always been enamored with how hard it is to become a SEAL and to all the training you guys do. Like, I don't think people realize that you don't stop training, right? You train constantly. And can you tell us a little bit, because I'm so interested really, about the BUDS process and Hell Week and all that. Can you talk about that at all? Like, how difficult and how mentally strong?

it takes to make it through that. What was that like for you? Yeah, it's, so a lot of people when they, you know, their Discovery Channel followed a class through training, I'm pretty sure it was class 234 years ago. And you can go online and find it. And it definitely looks very hard. What's interesting is I would say it's probably a watered down version of what training is really like.

You know, the instructors are a little easier, they're a little softer, they're not quite as coarse on national TV as it is in real life. But it is designed to be very difficult.

Training has an 80% attrition rate. I would probably, if you back that up to a young man like me, 14 years old, who says, hey, I want to be a SEAL, I would say the attrition rate's probably closer to 99%. You know, by the time you train up from a civilian to go and qualify, to go test, you know, one of the things that a lot of people don't realize is

is you have to be pretty smart to be a Navy SEAL, enlisted or officer. As a matter of fact, in the military test system, the Armed Service Vocational Aptitude Battery, I think it's called ASVAB, SEAL is the second highest score that the Navy Enlisted Corps has. Only higher than SEAL is our nuclear ratings.

So you actually have to be pretty smart. I try and explain this to young high school kids who want to be SEALs. And I'm like, how are your grades? And they're like, you know, I'm like a D student, but I'm really training hard. And I'm like, dude, you need to hit the books, bro. Like, you don't realize.

The interesting, how weak's the number one thing that gets guys out of training? Number two in SEAL training is during dive phase, something called pool competency, where you're basically getting your ass kicked under the water while you're in your dive gear. It's very difficult. But number three is academic. We lose guys to dive physics and dive medicine every class. Probably 10% of the class will fail out because of the academic portion. So

All very mental, though, at the end of the day. Very physical to train and get there. But once you get there, the reality is if you pass all the initial physical requirements, there's no reason why you should not make it through training. On day one, you're physically able to make it through training.

it from that point forward, it becomes mental. And don't get me wrong, the evolutions get a little harder, the runtimes get a little faster, obstacle course time, swim times. But it is the big mental game that, you know, you're constantly wet, cold, coated in sand,

You're constantly told, hey, this is the time or how you need to do this evolution. You need to do it like A, B, C, D, and E, and you'll do it A, B, C, D, and E, and then the instructors will fail you and say, well, you forgot about, you know, step P. Yeah.

And you're like, you said nothing about Step P. You said A, B, C, D, and E. And then you'll get hammered like you'll get your ass kicked for missing Step P. And the guys who cannot handle that, who can't handle the fact that it is designed to be ruthlessly unfair, unpredictable, just unnumbingly brutal, are the guys that end up quitting. And the reason they do that is because that's how combat is.

Is Hell Week at the beginning of SEAL training? And is that to kind of just weed those people out? Yes. Yeah, it is at the beginning and it is the big culling process. You lose...

80% of the class will quit during Hell Week. And then once that occurs, you still, over the next four or five weeks, you may lose some people to quitting. But actually, once you get through that, it's pretty rare that guys quit after that. You know, training is six to seven months long. At that point, then it becomes...

It becomes, you know, like I said, pool competency is a very hard evolution that just takes guys out. Once you make it through that, then you have a pretty high chance. You've already made it through the academic portion. Pool competency is the last evolution before you start moving into some of the other higher level dive training that you're going to receive in SEAL training. And then you'll move to the third phase where you're learning basic weapons, tactics,

And usually what will happen there is you'll lose guys due to safety. If they're unsafe with a weapon, if they're unsafe with explosives, there's a lot of attention to detail. If you cannot grasp those concepts quickly and if you cannot be safe with a gun, that's usually where you may lose some guys at the end of training. I know a lot of guys from Alabama like that. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And seal training here. Hold my beer. Watch. Yeah. So if you're one of the guys that goes to the beach and you complain in the evening that you've, you've got to get chafed, uh, thighs, you know, from the sand and the, and the way you probably shouldn't go to seal training. I wouldn't think that basically is seal training. Is there any way, is there any way to prepare for what happens that week? I mean,

Mentally, I'm sure not. Physically, is there...

I would say that the better shape you're in going into SEAL training, everybody gets pushed over the edge. I don't care who you are. So believe it or not, there have been guys that have shown up to SEAL training that are not in the best shape. They might have just barely passed the qualification test and they show up to SEAL training. They're not in the best shape, but I tell you what, they're mentally hard as woodpecker lips and they make it through training, man. And the whole time you're doing it with almost no sleep, right?

during hell week like you don't how much sleep do you get is it during that that yeah like the average student will get two to two to three hours yeah yeah so from from uh sunday midday until friday midday is pretty much the average so you make it through you graduate and and then what's your next step like for you personally like so you you graduate and

I went to Disney World. No, you didn't. That's amazing. What the hell? We're going to Disney World? That's amazing. No, actually, I went to Airborne School. Right. Yeah, I graduated Bonds in December of 1995. I went home. I had some leave.

Did you say weed or leave? Yeah, a lot of weed. No. Yeah, they test for that. That shit will get you kicked out.

No, I took leave. That's military speak for vacation. I took vacation with my family and then I checked into airborne school in January and learned a very harsh lesson that Fort Benning in the winter

Like, it's ridiculously cold, man. Holy smokes. So, learned that lesson, went through jump school, graduated, I think, the end of January, and then reported to my first SEAL team, SEAL Team 4, maybe February 95, I believe. Or, I'm sorry, February 96.

Hey, sorry, I just want to ask this one question on the jump school. I did not go to jump school. I tried at the end. Then they said you can go, but you got to reenlist for this many years. I was like, okay, I wasn't ready to do that. But isn't it true that you don't pack your own chute, that somebody else packs your chute, and you have to trust whoever that is, you know, that might quit jump school. You know, maybe they're not even into it, you know, but somebody else is packing your chute. Is that correct? And is that a little nerve wracking?

Yes, it's correct. No, it's not like...

It's not like you're relying on some quitter who happened. Hey man, you quit jump school. So now you're going to pass. No, I don't mean, I don't mean after they quit. I mean, like if you had a guy that was not really into it and he's thinking, man, I'm going to be bailing tomorrow and I don't, I don't care. And he's just going through the motions. That's all I was thinking. Cause I would be a worrier. Yeah. You know, well, they're rigors. Yeah. So they have rigors who that's what my dad was. My dad was a rigger. He packed parachutes and he was a, he was an instructor. So, I mean, those guys are trained to pack parachutes.

But you're 100% right. There's a great speech out there by a Vietnam POW who talks about who packed your chute. If you got anybody watching this, his name is Colonel Plum. Amazing story about, you know, seven years in the Hanoi Hilton. But he talked about all the people we cross in life. And one of those key things was when he ejected out of that plane,

He wondered when he was in the Hanoi Hilton, like who packed my chute? Like I had a successful parachute opening and he's like, I had no clue who this person was. So I never thought about that. You know, I don't know, man. I trusted one of the great things about the military and I wish the military is a little off course right now.

It is more focused on individualism than it is about the team effort and combat nor the enemy gives a shit about you as an individual. Uh,

what makes SEAL teams effective, SOF effective, military units effective, is our ability to operate as a very well-oiled team honed in on that focus. So I trusted that the riggers who were packing my parachute, I never even thought about it as a young man, I'll be honest. I mean, as I got older, you know, I guess I was young and naive. I mean, I was 18 when I went through airborne school, so I never even thought about it. I just jumped out of the plane and

was like, this is awesome. This is not going to make a good recruitment video. No, I think that would. I will. Hey man, we can get deeper into that because it's a real problem. If you're,

If you want to be part of an effective team, that's what the military should be, right? Nobody cares. Nobody cares about your race, creed, gender, gender, persuasion, religion. Nobody cares about that. If you have that, great. Man, I don't care. I don't care about any of those things. All I care about is you're an effective member of that unit. If you want to do that in your free time, that's your free time. Go do it then. When you're in the unit,

Don't even bring it up. It should be about the unit. It should be about the mission, and that's it. And right now, the military is off course because we have military leadership who's saying the opposite. Oh, we want to hear about you as an individual. No, we don't. Because let me tell you what, it's going to get guys killed on the battlefield. 100%. And nobody knows that better than you, you know, as far as what you went through, which I'm just going to segue right to it, you know, that September 13th, 07th.

you know, you got, I'm gonna let you take it from here and explain this, this night and what that means to you. Cause you, you just touched on it. Like it is about the unit. So can you. But, but I mean, here's an important point. We should go back just a little further because I, I,

to become an individual for a period of time. That really is the heart and soul of that book. You know, I, as a young leader, I lost my way and it was more about me than the unit or the guy. I was more focused on me moving up and me being able to do things. It was me, me, me. When I made that bad call on the mission in Afghanistan, it was about me. I was like, I want to get in the fight. I want to look like the hero. I want, you know, look,

Look at me, I'm patent reincarnated, going down the mountain to save the guys. And I want, you know, ticker tape parades and unicorns. And it destroyed my reputation and credibility. And the guys were like, we don't want to work with that guy. So there's a perfect example of individualism that how much damage it can do because guys around question,

My nickname became Rambo Red. That was not a compliment. Rambo's cool in a movie. In a unit, that means he's an individual. He's out doing his own thing. You can't depend on a guy like that to make the right decisions if he's more focused on himself and he's not looking at the overlapping fields of fire and the mission and the guys and things like that. It took me years to undo that.

and rebuild myself and thank and that's the heart and soul of that book as you well know so fast forward to september 13th that was that that was the culmination of that journey i mean really i think the culmination had happened a couple of months prior on june 22nd we got in a huge gunfight it's huge the biggest firefight i'd ever been in my life we we had uh

Enemy barricaded on the roof, machine gun barricaded on the roof, dropping grenades down on us. We had women and children running all over the place. We were being shot at from multiple buildings behind us. I had several of our guys got wounded. Our interpreter was severely wounded by a grenade and was bleeding out, took a big piece of frag in the neck and the shoulder and the body, bleeding out on the front porch, screaming.

And that was an incredibly chaotic. My point man took a round in the chest as he made entry on the rooftop. Thankfully, his body armor, he's out there now on a lot of podcasts, DJ Shipley. But DJ took that round right in the chest on that target. And we fell back down, kind of reconsolidated. But that was probably the...

the full circle moment for me as a leader to come back and make good decisions on the battlefield and to get our guys out of there, call in an airstrike, you know, do everything that we need to do and do it right. And I think finally, you know, for the guys to say, hey, man, you know, Red did okay, man. He's

All right. We'll, we'll, we'll stand behind that guy. So now fast forward to only a couple months later, September 13th, which interestingly enough was only about a couple hundred yards away from that night on June 22nd, same bad location. Every time we went into that place, we would get a shot at. And, uh, and on that night we were going after one of the top leaders for Al Qaeda in the Western province of Iraq. And we walked into a very well executed ambush. They, they,

planned on us coming. They had watched military tactics and saw what we had to do. They created an ambush line and we walked right into their ambush. And we're very fortunate. I'm super thankful that none of us were killed that night. I mean, it would have been kind of a miracle, in my opinion, that none of us were killed. I mean, we walked right into a two machine gun and probably 15 man AK-47 ambush.

And, you know, there were six of us that walked into this, six SEALs. Well, I'm sorry, five SEALs and our interpreter. And three of us were shot up, but amazingly, we made it out. And we couldn't have done that if it wasn't for A,

The guys doing such a good job coming together and fighting back. I mean, it was almost a 35, we estimated 35 to 40 minute gunfight at literally, you know, 25 yards. We were shooting back at each other. I was pinned down. I was shot in the first five minutes of the gunfight. I was,

I took two rounds in the left elbow right off the bat. I thought they shot my arm off, and then I was caught across the body armor. I took rounds off my right side plate, helmet, left night vision tube shot off. I took rounds off my weapon. Think of this as a really bad place to be. I turned to try and move back to where the other guys were, and that's when I caught a round in the face. It hit me right in front of the ear, traveled through my face, took off my nose, blew out my right cheekbone.

What was left of the cheekbone broke and kicked out to the right. It vaporized my orbital floor, broke all the bones above my eye, broke the head of my jaw, shattered my jaw. And the guy saw me fall in front of them. I went down probably 10 yards in front of them. And then this firefight raged directly over me for a good, you know, five, 10 minutes before I came to. I was unconscious and came to.

And in a lull in fire, I called out to my team leader. He realized I was still alive and I owe my life to this guy. He, in a lull in fire, ran forward and got me and pulled me back and got a tourniquet on my arm. Firefight continued for another, I don't know, 10, 15 minutes till finally he died.

He called the AC-130 gunship that was up overhead and said, hey, we're running out of ammo. Guys are bleeding out. If we don't get a fire mission,

And they said no. They denied it the first couple of times because we were so close. We were literally only 45 feet from the machine gun that had us pinned down, which is, in military terms, extreme danger close. Meaning, hey, if we bring it around, the chances of the rounds from the aircraft killing you is extremely high.

And, um, and my team leader said, Hey, it doesn't matter. He's like, if you don't bring these rounds in, nobody's going to be left. Anyways, we're going to run, guys are going to bleed out or we're going to run out of ammo, one or the other. Uh, so on the third request, he, uh, they brought in that fire mission and I'll never forget it, man. You can,

he you know he called out incoming and you can hear the gun go on you can't see the the aircraft flies a pretty high altitude i mean at this point it's probably 4 a.m in the morning you know it's dark you can't see the aircraft but you can hear it and when the gun goes off you can hear it they sent off 40 millimeter uh explosive rounds and i remember there was probably a i don't know five

eight second delay, whatever it was, just laying there thinking to myself, as you heard that machine gun shirred it away, you know, one 1,000, two 1,000, three 1,000, then all of a sudden, everything blew up over us and that machine gun went cold. And I heard the enemy crying out. He was in pain. And we called in another fire mission, called in several fire missions.

neutralize the enemy they pulled us back called in a medevac at that point and then they uh they crushed that field with uh the big gun on the ac-130s is is 105 millimeter howitzer so it's got a 200 yard explosive fragmentation radius and it uh it took out anybody that was left

Jason, I can't even imagine. It's unfathomable to think what you might have been thinking at that point. You know, you were kind of talking about Hell Week putting you through mental and physical strains, but nothing simulates being shot multiple times. And how are you trying to cope at that moment? Just like, hold on, just hang on, hang on. My teammates got my back? Yeah. Yeah.

No, that's exactly what I was thinking. I mean, in the beginning, I'll be honest, I went through several series of thoughts. When I was first shot, I was kind of pissed off, to be perfectly honest. I mean, I was angry that we had gotten ourselves into this situation. I was angry that I'd led my team into this situation. I was angry I'd been shot. But as I started losing more and more blood...

I think I was starting to realize, well, before that, then I started thinking about, okay, we're in a bad situation. I don't have the ability to fight right now because I'm too messed up. But I was thinking about all the training that I'd learned, you know, okay, what do we need to do? I knew that we had...

a quick reaction force. I knew that we had another guy. I knew that we had some helicopters that were on standby. I knew that there was a special operations medevac helicopter that I really needed. I knew that we had the gunship. So all these things I was thinking about. And then as I lost more blood and started to

laid out i mean i was you know i mean we go through pretty extensive medical training i knew that hey you're uh hey man your life force is leaking out of you and you're starting to show the signs of hypopalamic shock and all these things at that point my thoughts started to turn towards like hey man you you may die here in this field and uh and that was a hard thought um so then

That's where I think training comes back. You talk about your ability to fight through pain and discomfort. And I told myself, it is your job to survive this. And I was telling myself, stay awake to stay alive. I mean, everything in me wanted to, it's probably the greatest fatigue I've ever felt in my life. I just wanted to shut my eyes.

yeah, just let me shut my eyes and go to sleep for a couple minutes, you know. But I knew that if I did that, I would never wake up again. So I fought it, and I just said, stay awake, stay alive. I thought about my family. I thought about my kids. I thought, you know, I called out to God. I said, hey, I need your strength to go home. And I got it. I got this amazing strength. And in that moment, after I prayed that prayer,

And I don't know what the timeline was between that moment and when finally the airstrikes came in and we brought in the medevac, but that's what I focused on.

um and uh yeah when the medevac came in you know my team leader tried to drag me which was really painful and i told him stop um and and helped me to my feet and i got to my feet and i i walked to the to the helicopter which is i don't know 50 75 yards away and got under it on my own power but uh

But after that, I was done. Apparently, I was drifting in and out of consciousness the entire helicopter flight to Baghdad. How much longer was it until you met the Night Stalker guys, the Army Night Stalker guys that rescued you? Like five years. I met them Veterans Day 2011, which was pretty amazing. So I talked to you about the—so Gary Linfoot, War Officer Gary Linfoot, lives outside Nashville.

And Gary became a friend. I didn't know him when we were in the military, but Gary was involved in a

Gary was a little bird pilot, which the little birds are amazing with the TF-160 at Night Stalkers. Some of the best pilots in the entire world are the guys that fly us and the helicopter pilots. So Gary was a 160 pilot. One night they were on a mission and his little bird crashed and it broke his back and he was paralyzed from the waist down now. But I got to know Gary. We hung out. So one night we were hanging out, talking after an event, a non-profit military event we went through. And I told Gary,

I said, hey, man, I really wanted to reconnect with whoever was on the helicopter crew that night. I just want to thank them, man. I owe my life to those guys. And he said, well, let me see what I can do. So I guess it was about a year that he started researching and then I got invited to go to this Veterans Day event with Oakley, a motorcycle ride out of California at Oakley headquarters.

And they brought me in to be the speaker. And I'm literally giving the Veterans Day speech. I'm like two minutes into my speech and somebody comes up and she's like trying to stop me. And I'm like, what are you doing? I'm like in the middle of a speech here, man.

And, uh, and she like points and this helicopter is coming in and it lands. And it was, uh, yeah, it was the flight crew. It, uh, it wasn't the pilots. I did end up talking to one of the pilots later, but it was the two crew chiefs and the flight medic or our bird that night. And, uh,

Pretty amazing to get to hug them and thank them in person, to get to hang out with them. They also filled in holes in the story that I did not know. I did not realize it. I was in and out of consciousness the whole flight.

Things that I didn't know, there were three of us wounded and that medevac helicopter was rigged only for two people. So they couldn't shut the door because you had three of us wounded, plus at least one of our other guys who flew with us to the hospital. So the helicopter was packed. Well, and they flew the rotors off because we're all, you know, myself, my medic, Luke and Maddie.

We're all shot up. And they said that there was blood everywhere. By the time they got to Baghdad and offloaded us and they went back, they didn't know if we survived. They had no clue. They didn't think I survived. So the first time they found out that I survived was when Gary Winfoot reached out to him and said, hey, man, I don't know if you remember this night, but on September 13th, these SEALs got all shot up.

and you know the guy that got shot in the face wants to connect with you they were like holy that guy survived so um so yeah pretty pretty amazing but they told me that when they went back to their base the whole inside of the helicopter was coated in blood like it took months with q-tips to try and get all the blood out from all the buttons and controls because it

Because it just, they said it just created this, we were all bleeding so badly all over the inside of the helicopter. It just created this mist of blood with the door open flying at, you know, max speed for that helicopter to get us to, to get us to the hospital. It's an amazing story. It's an amazing story. It's, and I, what I love, I see behind you, that's the letter you hung outside your door, the hospital, am I right?

A replica of it. The actual letter hangs at Walter Reed now. You know, it's basically saying, you know, would you mind reciting some of that letter for us? Because I think one of the more inspirational things, and it's an amazing story, means so much you're on here, but this letter...

If you wouldn't mind reciting some of that because it is pure inspiration. Hey, thank you everybody for listening. And we are so thankful for our sponsor. Original Brands is starting a new era in American domestic premium beer. American made, American owned. Original Glory. Original Glory not only tastes great, but it's under 90 calories and only two carbs. Easy drinker and perfect for the active lifestyle. Bring it.

Original Glory. It's a veteran-founded company with a deep love of country. Original Glory. Freedom is worth drinking to. For, I think, a lot of people, you know? No, I'd be glad to. So from the time I got to Baghdad, probably 96 hours later, I got to Bethesda Naval Hospital and was really...

confronted with a lot of bad news. My left arm, I had taken two rounds. The doctors told me I was totally destroyed. I had no use of my left hand, massive nerve function. I was wired shut. I only had tubes left of what was my nose. My face was totally messed up. I was wired shut. I was trached. They were feeding me through a stomach tube. I'd lost so much blood. I

I couldn't even get out of bed to go to the bathroom. Nurses had to help me use the bathroom. So there was just kind of inundating me with bad news at the hospital. I'm in ICU. And I won't lie, I was really kind of struggling with all of it. Because, I mean, I told you the part of the story where I failed as a leader.

And that's the longest, hardest road I've ever come back from. A lot of people say, oh, man, your battlefield injuries must be the worst thing you ever went through. No. Failing as a leader and being told by your teammates, you don't measure up and we want to kick you out. It's the worst thing I've ever been through. I mean, I was suicidal when I went through that phase.

So the good news about that is it set me up for success for the battlefield injuries, you know, and I try and tell people that like an overcome mindset is never forged in easy times. Like you have to do hard things and be thankful for the hard times you go through because it actually builds you up to endure more hard things later in life. If you're willing to, to grind through and dive, drive through. So when I got to the hospital, I was kind of struggling and,

But I also was looking back on the things that I've been through. And I was like, look, man, like, you know, the formula, like you walk the formula from your leadership failure. This is no different. I remember one time I told myself, I was like, this is like medical buds. So it's no different from SEAL training. You take it one evolution at a time, you know, and you just keep grinding forward. And I'd probably been in the hospital maybe a week. And I had some people that came into the room and they were really, you

filled with pity. And oftentimes when people hear this story, they're like, what a bunch of jerks. But a military hospital in a time of war is a really hard place to be. Battlefield injuries are horrific, man. Machine guns and explosions do

massive damage to bottoms. You know, people are burned, they're amputated, they're obliterated, traumatic brain injuries. And it's a very hard place to be. It is overwhelming for people who have never seen injuries like this. So these people were there.

And they came into my room. They talked to me for a minute. Then the nurse came in. And then they were talking next to the bed. And I could hear them. And they were talking about what a shame, what a pity. These young men and women go to war. And they're never going to be the same. They're never going to be able to get to normal. You know, they're just, you know, what a waste. And then they left. And my wife had left the room. And I was just kind of laying in the bed by myself. And I'm thinking like, man, is this me?

Like, is that my future? And when she came back, I just, I told her, I said, hey, give me my pen because I couldn't write. I'm wired, shot, I'm trached. All I could do is write. And I wrote to her and I said, you know what? That's never going to happen again.

From this point forward, no one's allowed to come into my room and feel sorry for me. And from this point forward, I refuse to feel sorry for myself. And then I wrote out that sign and it said, attention to all who enter here. If you're coming in this room with sadness or sorrow, don't bother.

The wounds I received, I got the job that I love, doing it for people that I love, defending the freedom of a country that I deeply love. I will make a full recovery. What is full? That's the absolute utmost physically. I have the ability to recover. And then I'm going to push that about 20% further through sheer mental tenacity. This room you're about to enter is a room of optimism and intense rapid regrowth. If you're not prepared for that, go elsewhere. And we signed it to management. And it took on a life of its own. Yeah.

Lieutenant. Amen. Thank you, sir. And I thought it was interesting that you enlisted on 9-11-92. Yeah. Isn't that crazy? It's amazing. You know, this comes up a lot on a lot of these podcasts we do. 9-11 comes up a lot, and you actually just touched on it, how there's a divide, an obvious divide. And 9-11, for those of us that remember it and were living it,

there was a sense of unity through a tragedy. And we always talk about how we got so far apart now where this divide exists. And it's, it's truly sad. How do we, it's just a question like, how do we fix this? You know, cause it, it seems to be getting wider and wider and wider. And like you said, instead of someone bringing it together, you know, it's, it's concerning, you know? Well, we, we keep, we keep,

putting people into, we keep pushing to the far extremes of the right and left. So the left goes super extreme. So then the right goes super extreme. How we run back into a position where the same two guys are running again in 2024 is mind boggling to me. Like you're telling me out of the entire 330 million amazing Americans, there's not somebody who's

maybe better representative of the people and can bring us back together in the middle. Like everywhere I go, I speak all across the country, you know, about a hundred events last year. And the majority of people I meet are in the middle. They want to actually everywhere in the world I've been, most people are in the middle. Even, even if they're Muslim, they want to raise a good family. You know,

There's an extremism in Muslim no different than sometimes we have extreme Christians. I mean, I think extremism is dangerous anywhere. But what I've come to find is most people are in the middle. They want to live a good life. They want to have purpose. They want to have a job. They want to have peace. They want to raise their kids. They want to get out. And I think that's what America was about back in the day. And we also were a little bit bigger where we were willing to fight for those who were, you know,

who were beat up on, who were in jail. It was one of the reasons why I was so proud to go fight overseas against Muslim extremism that did such horrible things to different people. I mean, you look at what the Taliban's doing. It's amazing to me that after 20 years of war, we gave that place right back to the same assholes who were fighting in the beginning. And we made all this progress in Afghanistan. Man, women were in leadership positions, all these different things.

And it's amazing to me all that overnight went away. All the people who supported us, who believed there would be a better Afghanistan, were killed. They have been there in hiding. If they haven't been killed, they have fled to other places just to give it back to the same idiots who are doing the same thing they did before we ever even got there. This Sharia law, this massive, ridiculous interpretation of it, of extreme Islamic ideology.

Anyways, sorry. Well, no, and then now, and we talk about it because it drives you crazy, you know, like being in America and all the freedoms that we have and all the people that fight and get injured and life-altering injuries and they die for our country so that we can, like you say, go home and love our families and raise our kids and stuff like that. And then you have people who've never done anything for the country, you know, complaining and protesting all these colleges and all these cities, you know, around the United States, you know, for other countries who hate us.

and that have actually killed innocent people. And they're fighting for them. You know, it's just so crazy to me. It's off the rails, man. I mean, it's just weird. It's just weird. And yeah, we're fighting for things like... I'm much more... I'm somewhere...

Much more of an independent, I think. And sometimes I understand the ideas behind libertarianism. I mean, I just, I'm about freedom at the end of the day. I think you should have the freedom to make. That's what made this country great. I believe in freedom. I believe in liberty. I believe that as long as you're not doing things that negatively impact other people around you, that you're not making choices, like I could care less if you're gay.

The LGBT community has become a cult. They are as extreme as it gets right now. It's like they're trying to beat people over the head with the LGBT dogma, if you will. Like, hey, if you're a little kid, guess what? You're gay. We want to make you gay. You should be gay. Do you have any thoughts of being gay? You're gay. And I'm like, that's not true. And it shouldn't be that way. Because if you want to live your life that way, you should have the freedom to do it.

It shouldn't be at the negative impact of other people around you. That's how, in my opinion, America was built and that's how it should be. But it's this weird reverse thing where whether it's LGBT or whether it's, I don't know, some other DEI or whether it's, you know, Hamas. And we're like, oh, we need to fight for Hamas and we're going to beat you over the head because they're

subjugated over there by israel well no they're not man yes they're fighting for a piece of the terrain that they're on but the way they have chosen to fight is about as insidious and wrong because i watched it in urban warfare overseas in iraq and afghanistan

And my hat's off to Israel for being diligent and deliberate in how they're trying to root them out in the worst warfare you ever have to conduct. And that is urban warfare where the enemy is totally embedded with the population. Yeah. And I was going to ask one thing about that. This is a touch-off topic, but when you're on mission, on patrol, Afghanistan, Iraq, and stuff like that, and you're going through a town or a city,

I think about you guys that are over there. Like I would be paranoid at every turn because if a kid came up to me, you know, smiling and wanting to hand me something or whatever, I would be like, he may have a bomb, you know, or if it's a girl or something like that, it seems like your stress level would, would just almost just be around the clock. Terrifying. Is that, is that the case? Or do you kind of get,

Do you have your guys and you feel pretty protected? What do you, I mean, what are your thoughts there? You learn a lot. You learn to read body language. You learn to see things. I mean, if you base, if you enter a house in the middle of the night,

It would be very unusual, not impossible. I mean, it's definitely happened that there would be a kid with explosives that suddenly came in and they're all happy and glad to be with you. I mean, typically you're going to see signs and symptoms that something is not right in situations like that. Um, unless they just, I don't know, did something to rig them. There's a scene in the movie. Uh, you know, what's funny in the movie, American sniper, um, uh,

The scene that stood out the most in my mind is a scene where they're making entry in some of the houses there in Iraq. And they did a good job of duplicating a lot of the architecture. But I remember there's a scene where they flow into a room and there are two little girls, I believe, or two little kids in the room. And that happened a lot. I mean, a lot of people don't realize that the enemy...

You know, it's not like the enemy is sitting around in a dark room plotting nefarious things with, you know, just bombs sitting around them with nobody else around. It's like a bad guy convention. Like they're with their families, man. They're kids. They're, you know, everyday life. And.

When you make entry on that, you're making entry into someone's home and they're, you're terrifying kids and women and these other people. And, you know, whether they buy into the ideology that their dad or husband or, you know, whoever has, um,

You know, frequently I thought about that a lot. I thought about, you know, God dang, man, what if someone was kicking in the door to my house and this is what my kids were exposed to? And, you know, it's just, war is a terrible thing. I know, and we're thankful for your time. I do want to ask you real quick if it's okay, just because you've seen, you know, um,

real war and scenarios many times. Do you have a favorite movie? Because I know you are a part-time actor. You had a film and you had an appearance on Hawaii Five-0, right? But I was watching a little bit, Full Metal Jackets, one of those, this is my rifle, this is my gun, this is for fighting, this is for fun. I want to know, do you have a movie or a couple movies that

just as a SEAL that you think represents them well, people you serve with, or the Marines or any branch of service, a couple of your favorite military movies. Do you have those on tap? Oh, yeah, 100%. Black Hawk Down is probably my favorite military movie. I just think even today when I watch it, it's an amazing story. I'm friends with –

Matt Eversman, who's the key character. Matt's out there, amazing guy. And the movie is just incredible. I've talked to Matt. He said, yeah, you know, they Hollywood some stuff off, but they did a pretty good job. That's a great one. I think I've watched that 20 times. Yeah. And the book's fantastic. And then Hacksaw Ridge is another one that I think is an amazing representation. Yeah.

I like talking about movies. I love movies. I'll be a movie critic when I retire. I wish I could act more. If there's anybody out there that wants to bring me in for something, because I had so much fun, man. That was amazing. And then COVID came along, and I got nothing after that. The person that was representing me left, so I don't have an agent. I don't have anything. But I am a card carrier member of the Screen Actors Guild. We'll spread the word. We'll spread the word.

Well, this may be a good time. We could put your name in the hat for the Try That in a Small Town movie. We may have a movie pitch that we're kind of working on. So we'll definitely keep you in mind. You've done great tonight. You've done nothing but help yourself tonight. Put me in, Coach. Put me in. So what do you do when you're not – you do a lot of speaking. I do. It seems like you're pretty busy. You're out there –

spreading that message and you know doing podcasts like so when you're

free time and your enjoyment and you work out, you do stuff, but is it golf? What do you, what do you do when it's, when it's, you know, when you're not on the road speaking or talking to losers like us, you know, I love my family. I love being with my family. I mean, my kids are getting older. Uh, I'm an entrepreneur, so I'm trying to take, I I've done very well. I'm very blessed with speaking and I'm very fortunate and thankful that,

I've done over 600 speaking engagements. It has been financially rewarding. So we've tried to take all that and pay it forward. We have bought some rental properties. We just bought our first commercial building and we're launching a new co-working office event, podcasting studio space to try and help others like build their businesses.

So that takes up a lot of time. And then in between, family, I would tell you I like to golf, although I golf about four times a year. I like to ride motorcycles, although I sold my motorcycle. I did a charity ride back in April, and I got the bug again. I told my wife, I'm like, I got to buy another bike.

So, and then skiing's our big thing. Our rental properties are up in Snowshoe, West Virginia. So we love to ski. That's our favorite family thing. We typically do a couple of ski trips

trips a year and, you know, we'll, we'll go for like a week, two weeks, a whole family and, uh, just hang out, ski all day and hang out with each other. We have theme nights. My wife comes up crazy theme nights, you know, like it's nineties night or now it's Miami vice night or whatever it is, you know? So we have a lot of fun. We should ski sometimes skiing is it's

My family is the same way. That's what we do. That's our activity. And it really is. Like I tell these guys, like the only time I really feel like I unplug from everything is when we're in the mountains skiing. And it's, it's a great family, you know, it's not cheap, but it's an amazing, it's an amazing, uh, you know, these guys are like summer guys. They're not like really big on the cold and snow, but, uh, I can ski my ass off. Yeah.

Beg your pardon. We'll swap the golf for skiing lesson. Absolutely. Hey, Jason, we're very thankful for your time. We're very thankful for your service, what you've done, what you're still doing now. It's such an inspiration. It's been an honor. Thank you for taking this time. It's such an honor. Thank you so much. Thank you for your service. Thank you.

Well, thank you guys. I appreciate you guys having me on. Can I shamelessly plug myself? Absolutely. All you want. Yeah. If any of you guys are looking for a speaker out there, I mean, I've done over 600 speaking events.

Almost every single event I've had individuals that have said, wow, I've been coming to conferences for years and you are one of the best speakers I've ever heard. As a military speaker, frequently people will say, I didn't know what to expect with a military speaker. But people at the end are like, I can't believe how relatable you were to me. So if your company is looking for an amazing speaker that can deliver a powerful message that will motivate your people, that will give them great leadership tips, tangible, relatable tips,

please reach out to me, jasonredman.com. I love speaking and this commercial building may sink me, so I need you to hire me. Hey, well, me and my wife, Rachel, had already been talking about it because her and her dad, they own a company. Oh, here we go.

called KEG, which is Curt Entertainment Group, and they book corporate events for music, speakers, and things like that. And so you're already in the fold there. In the short list. So we'll be reaching out to you, hopefully, because I said, hey, you've got to get this guy. I've been watching all this stuff and listening, and he's great. So anyway, we were already thinking that as well, so I'm glad you mentioned that. I appreciate you guys. That would be amazing. I also have one last plug. I forgot. Huge.

I have invested, I'm a part-time owner in a new whiskey seltzer company called Patriot Seltzer. Ooh. All right. We are all about- It is America's seltzer. We tell people that it's not about the right, it's not about the left. It is about a seltzer that represents the greatness of America. It is about the average everyday American getting out and just enjoying life, willing to work hard, but still willing to play hard.

And we call it the taste of freedom, man. So we will be launching in New Jersey later this summer, and then we're hoping to get out across the country. But you can check us out at PatriotSeltzer.com. Every can will have...

The four flavors we have have a proud patriot. We want to highlight and represent the military, law enforcement, fire, and first responder community. I'm the first proud patriot. But after we get launched, we will be picking a fire, law enforcement, and first responder, medical. And 5% of our proceeds will go back to nonprofits that support those genres. It sounds like we can do something together in the future. Yeah. Incorporating that and the music side of things.

I love this plant. I'm proud to be a part of it. For sure. I have a nephew that just got home. He's a Marine, Marsauk guy. Nice. And I can't wait for him to see this. Okay. This is an honor. This has been an absolute honor tonight. Absolutely. I loved your book, and I think you're right. It transcends a lot of things, like just people in general, what they're going through, you know, that you can get through. I love it, the forging and reforging.

which I think is a great way to put it. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you, Jason. Yeah, thank you guys. Book number four comes out in February. Come on. All right. Love to have you back on.

All right. It'll be me and my wife. It's a relationship book. It's all about how- My wife's going to want to read that one too. Yeah, we're going to need that one. I need to read that. I need to read it. Yeah. Thank you, sir. Thanks, brother. Bye, guys. Thank you. Cheers, brother. Thank you. Well, how amazing was that? That was incredible. It was actually pretty mind-blowing, right? Guys, defending our freedom gets shot in the face, barely survives, and-

People walking around hating this country. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, uh, that's what gets me going. It's like, that's, that's a true hatred, true American. I didn't even know the story until you had brought it up. You're talking about this book. And then of course, you know, you reached out to him and got him on the podcast, which is amazing. So, you know, we start doing our research and I'm like, Oh my God, what this guy has been through. It's like, you know, we kind of said it, it's, we can't relate at all.

to what he's been through. Attacks, shootings, and somehow he's found a way to kind of bring that back to everybody through his speaking. I think what he said is true. I think when he said he could hook up heart monitors, mental brain... That's an interesting point. Yeah. To everybody who's been through something, I'll be damned. Listen, let me tell you something right now, guys. Go back to start your point. No, it's just like when he was talking about hooking up

different people to the same brain scans, the heart monitors or whatever, whatever they go through dramatically.

They're going to read the same on paper as what he went through. And I'm like, how is that even possible? Yeah, right. It didn't seem possible, but it's an interesting point. Yeah, and what I loved about him because his humility and actually going through what he went through with all that. I mean, we get the training, then the tours in Afghanistan and Iraq and how stressful that would be.

And for him to admit, because most of those guys, because he's talking about people in, in leadership, you know, they're trained, you know, in politicians, like we talked about never say, you know, I missed, I missed that one. I wish they would. I wish they'd say, you know, I really messed up on the border thing. You know, we, we shouldn't, we shouldn't let millions of people come in without checking them. My bad. That's on me. At least that's on me. So at least somebody say that, but the fact that, that, that he is humble enough, you know, in everything that he knows and does, and he's an absolute bad-ass and,

And that, that he made a bad call and he wasn't, he, he wasn't for the team at the time. And, and he spent years and, you know, building that back and everything. And I just thought that was cool because that's the human experience. So you can take, you know, from all his motivational speaking and the book, you know, books that he's written. Um, I thought that was just cool.

seeing the humility of such a tough dude like that and just makes you feel good as an American. It takes a big man to admit all that stuff, too. Exactly. It really does. I like that a bunch. For him to go against his agent is that they wanted to play it safe. Oh, I forgot about that. Yeah, and we know how people want to play it safe, and especially in the music business, we can relate to that with our song. But he said, nope.

i'm gonna i'm gonna tell the truth and i'm gonna tell every bit of the truth and it took a big man to do that absolutely certain power and admitting when you weren't at your best you know to for that to get you to your best you know and i think i don't think you can grow until you accept that maybe you did make a mistake i mean yeah it's a great life lesson that whole episode was full of great lessons

Hell week. Okay. How long till you guys tap out? I mean, an hour, not even an hour. I've seen that discovery program that he's talking about. And, and they, they use a lot of that footage on the beginning of the lone survivor. And it's intense. And for, and for Jason to say that that was watered down a little, right. Oh my God. And that, and that's what always has intrigued me about the seals is the ones that make it through. It is a amazing, amazing,

I think they have to go through. Yeah, I mean, he said it was like an 80%. So, I mean, those guys are dropping out quick. And these are the top of the top already. It's the norm. And I also thought it was interesting because on a lesser scale,

experience it like the people that you think are the badasses that are going to sail through everything and like you're smaller maybe you're not as good a shape and everything and you think oh man dude's going to kill me you know and all the physical stuff and all the stuff and it is kind of interesting because even in my just regular standard issue foot soldier in our basic training nothing like you know

SEALs training, but you saw people dropping out and I saw people that I looked at on the first day and how they were built and they had veins popping out all over the place and they just had these chiseled jaws and things.

130 pounds soaking wet. I'm out. I'm so out of here. But those guys, not all of them, obviously, but, but a couple of those guys, they drop out after day two and three. They're just weak. They're weak mentally. I wouldn't, I would, I would, I would breeze right through. Let me tell you something. Let me tell you something. Okay. I have a little bit of a gut. No, no problem.

The muscles on the outside. It shows. The six-packs, it's there. It's there. We all have a six-pack under there. It's mentally. Mentally. Yeah. I've got it right here, guys. You're convincing me you do. Well, Hell Week to us is having to write with new artists. I mean, Hell Week to Jason Redman is way...

Way different. It's a little different. He hasn't done anything to leisure in with the new artist. No, no. I'd rather freeze in the ice cold water, I think. We can't sit in a plunge pool for 20 seconds, you know, much less go out in the ocean, you know, in the wintertime. Well, you know what's really cool, Kayla, I was talking to you, like in the SEAL community, you know, they don't talk a lot after they get out. Right, yep. But it's a very tight community.

I think it's important that Jason does because it's a story that helps everybody overcome things. I think that's on him. It's not easy to do, I don't think. I wanted to ask him about it, but I know that they're really private about what they can say about their time in the SEALs. But I'm glad that he made the choice to realize his message was important enough to stand his ground on that. Because I think it helps people that are going through

numerous things yeah you know if he can if he can get through that survive that the more people that hear that guy speak the more of them that the young kids especially the young kids the next generation get to hear that guy talk it's they're going to be so inspired whether it be military or whatever they had to do with their lives he is so good inspiring

Yeah. And just thank God for, you know, for, for Jason and, and, and people like him, you know, the freedoms that we have, you know, to, to do our jobs, to love our families and raise kids and, and enjoy the freedom of, of America. And I just wish that, and hopefully we can, you know, get back to a place where more people are,

I wrote today in East Nashville, in Madison. Ironically, I drove past a military cemetery. I was already thinking about we had Jason on tonight. With each guest, respectfully, we're researching and looking at him a couple weeks in advance. I was already thinking about that. I drove past and saw thousands of those white headsets.

Just two miles from where I was riding, I just thought it was ironic. I hadn't been over there in a year and a half, and then we're talking to Jason tonight because he could have lost his life easily on that field. Anyway, you just have such a huge appreciation. When I was driving by all those tombstones, I'm like, how do you not have just appreciation? You just drive by and say, thank you.

But I'm driving in my car with a tank of gas going home to see my wife. Well, we need to get back to that because that's what I think is important to have Jason on is I think people need to wake up and realize why we have these freedoms and the sacrifices that guys like Jason give to us. And we've definitely lost that. And that pisses me off, you know. And it should piss everybody off.

Sadly, it doesn't. It's odd. You're right. It doesn't. I could care less. It's really odd. Now, tell me this. Were you writing with a new artist? That's a double whammy. New-ish. Really? You know, East Nashville is why they invented Zoom. Well...

That's amazing, Neil. It's true. It's true. That's amazing. Well, now, the last time that I was supposed to be with these two gifted writers was I did cancel, and I opted to Zoom, and they didn't want it. So I thought, all right, I've already canceled once. Who's the veteran here? You are the veteran.

You tell them we're Zooming or it's no. Yeah, I told him I was the veteran in the Army. Did you just send him a picture of your room? Who's the veteran writer in that situation? No, I know, but, you know. I would rather than drive to East Nashville.

What would you rather do? This is a good game. How about anything? I will put my eyelash over that candle flame right there.

Before I drive to East Nashville to write. If they don't want to Zoom, then screw them. I'm not writing with them. It's not that it's a terrible place. It just takes a minute to get there. I have nothing against East Nashville. It's just too freaking far. It's a lot of traffic. And I will say, there's a lot more horns honking over there. I got cut off twice. I ran off the road at least three times. It was just a whole different thing. I don't like it. I got no reason to go out there.

I will say, and I didn't bring it tonight, Neil, and I apologize. Uh,

We have a friend and a lady, her name is Jana Orr, and she has helped us with baby Lucy, getting through. She's 20 weeks old now, little baby girl, and she's helped us and night set, sometimes everything, but she loves the podcast. And she's telling all her friends about it and everything. She goes, oh, I really love it. And anyway, she brought us a very nice bottle of whiskey, which I can't currently find.

But I'm going to bring it next time. I think Rachel hit it. But anyway. Smart woman. But anyway, Jana brought us a really cool bottle of whiskey and thanked us and said, hey, really love y'all's podcast. That's awesome. And she's just kind of just a friend or a fan of the show. They want to make sure that people...

You're watching on YouTube, right? Like and subscribe. The best thing is, like you were talking about with the people, leave us some comments. Leave us some reviews. Questions. That's going to be the fun part. Please ask some questions that I can answer.

well yeah yeah because kurt uh kurt and telly brought up a cool very cool thing we're gonna try like like this time at the at the end you know of each especially the guest time we have a guest just kind of do a recap and then maybe read a question or two you know that'd be the perfect that'd be fantastic if if you guys would reach out and just ask something be fun and those of you out there um to close like if you haven't read the trident by jason redmond i think it's a

It's an important book to read for anybody going through challenges or think that they, that they can't make it through something. 100%. I'm about to do it. So it's a great. Thanks guys. Good. All right. Yeah. Thanks to all you out there. Appreciate it. And, uh,

Like, subscribe, download. Love you guys and see you next week. Taste of freedom. Cheers. Try that in a small town. That's a taste of freedom right there. Cheers, boys. Cheers. Hey, guys. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to follow us on all the social platforms at Try That Podcast. And, of course, if you're watching on YouTube, make sure you like and subscribe and leave a comment. We love interacting with you. Thanks.