Transcription
I have a question about the warrior mentality. I recently was dumped on a deployment, and it's difficult now that I am home stateside. How does a warrior handle this? Is it like any other emotional loss? I'm trying to use this loss and get after it and improve myself mentally and physically. I'm not sure how to properly submit questions to the podcast.
All right, so the Dear John letter, the old classic Dear John letter. You know, sometimes you can keep it at bay when you're deployed, but then when you get home and you get back to the familiar places where you have specific memories, that's where the pain starts to come in. And that's fine, you know, that hurts. We get that.
But in my opinion, I've said this before: the person that you built in your mind, the person that you had a relationship with that you built in your mind, that person doesn't actually exist. They're not real. They're not real. She wasn't who she appeared to be, and she isn't who she appeared to be. She isn't the sweet, understanding, fun person that you cared so much about. That's not her. That's your memory. That's what you built in your head.
She is actually the selfish, self-centered person that cares about herself first and doesn't care about you. That's the reality, and that's fine. But a lot of times, the pain that we feel isn't based on the reality; it's based on the fantasy. So you're feeling pain of losing something that wasn't real.
So let the fantasy go. Remember that she is not the perfect person that you built in your mind, period. She's not. Otherwise, we wouldn't be in this situation right now.
Then move on, brother. Get after it. Work out, train hard, go to jujitsu, hike, run, or play guitar. Just get after it. Those things are not only going to distract from the pain, which is good, they're going to improve you as a human being, which is good. They're going to rebuild your confidence, which is good. They're going to make you feel good. They're going to make you stronger, smarter, and better, and put you into a place where you don't need that little made-up fantasy anymore.
They're going to put you in a place where you're going to find something better than the fantasy. Now, I'm going to tell you right now, the fantasies don't exist. The perfect girl or guy for you doesn't exist. They don't exist. So you're going to be out looking for someone that's good, but you're not going to find perfect. Don't get obsessed with finding perfect. If you find someone that's perfect, it's not true. Everyone's got their flaws.
So that's what you have to do, and you will end up finding someone that's real. I get it, man. I know you're going to have some moments down in the hole, as Alice in Chains put it, or trapped in the heart-shaped box, as Nirvana put it, or so lonesome you could cry, as Hank Williams Sr. put it.
You notice a theme here? This is what people go through. But those feelings, they're temporary. So let them say hi, let them hang around for a minute, or for half an hour, or an hour, or whatever, and then kick them out. Kick those feelings out. Get them out of there and go do something else.
Take your mind away from those memories of fantasies and build some good memories that are real. Then, yeah, you know what? You can use your anger and your frustration to fuel positivity, for sure. I spent much of my youth doing that very thing, for sure. All those breakups? Yeah, I turned those things into fuel.
And the other thing I'm going to use is if you take action with your body, your mind's going to follow. And pretty soon, you'll be on to the next chapter, and you can move beyond this bad fantasy chapter that you kind of got roped into.
Girls, man, I can teach you every time if you let them. It's so hard to. I'm with you. There are so many times, you know, because when I was an assistant platoon commander, platoon commander at asking the commander what I was doing right, but more in the earlier phases, right? Because once I was, you know, what to ask you to commander, I was dealing with a lot less.
Those problems that would come to me on a relationship level would be something big, you know, divorce, custody of children, some kind of domestic violence scenario—like real things. But when I was younger and I was in a SEAL platoon, that's when you're dealing with guys going through the breakup with the girl.
And that, you know, the method messing with my head. Yeah, it's messing with my head, man. Yeah, of course, every guy goes through that. Me? You ever? That's the way it is. You get that weird thing kicking around in there, and you start getting crazy.
And what's so funny is when you're on the outside of it, it's so—like when you're in the heart-shaped box yourself, and you just can't see anything else, it's just devastating. And everyone that's looking at you is like, "Bro, let's just go to the bar tonight. You meet 17 new girls tonight."
Yeah, but I fight back. No, it's not. I remember I kind of had a—this is kind of evil—but I had a kind of a standard response to guys when they'd say, "You know, hey, I broke up with Jennifer last night." I'd say, "Sweet, man! Let's roll!"
I would always—and I even carried that, honestly. This is like not something I don't think I do anymore, but even when guys would be like, "Came in, me and Jennifer getting divorced," I'd back, "Oh, right on, bro! Let's rock and roll!"
You know, I kind of—and part of it was just to kind of spin it like, "Guys, man, it's not that you need to, you know, you don't just wallow in it, right? You're getting divorced? Okay, here's what you need to do. Here's how you maneuver."
But you know, what are you going to do? You're going to get dragged down by that into that mire, or you're going to, you know, salvage what you can of your life and let's move on. Let's rock and roll.
Yeah, so that's again, it might be a little harsh. I don't know that I would still have that react. Maybe with—maybe fall still in the Jews, you know? And most—and 99, I had one guy that in—I probably said that too. We have a high divorce rate in the SEAL Teams, so yeah, 85, 90 percent divorce rate.
So I've said this to quite a few individuals over there. I only had one that ever kind of, you know, was like, "No, man, you don't get it." And then I said, "No, I said you get it. Mmm, you don't get it."
Yeah, and it always is a little rougher when there's kids involved and all that, so that would put another little horrible spin on it. But the bottom line is that is a good attitude to have. "Hey, broke up with my girl? Right on! I'm glad I got out of this relationship before it developed into something where I did have hooks in me—financial hooks, children, yeah, all those things. I made it out scot-free."
You know, I'm getting divorced. "Oh, you have any kids?" "No?" "Okay, rock and roll!" "Yeah, you got kids? Okay, well, how's it going to go? You know, what are you putting in line?"
Yeah, you know, so yeah, definitely hard. Here's the question: have you ever gotten your heart broken?
Negative? You haven't? Straight-up? Even? Of course I have. I was—I was a boy. Boys get their heart broken. Win-win. Tell me, you know, 10, 11, I'm 21-ish time.
'Cause, you know, when you're 10, it's like, okay, 15, 14, 17, 13. I mean, I think once I was obscene. Once I was in the SEAL Teams, I kind of had that coping mechanism.
Yeah, yeah, gotta be hard. Yeah, and the girls are like, "Mmm." Yeah, you know, you gotta just kind of—but the other young—that's, you know, the younger days for sure. Every guy goes through that, and that's what's hard.
And you know what I'm saying, guys specifically, but the girls are the same way. Both guys and girls go through these two horrible breakups.
And this is the other thing that we got to realize as parents: when you're 16 years old, we—you know, I look at my 15, 16, 17-year-old daughters, right, as they were growing up, and I think, "Oh, they got a boyfriend, whatever."
This guy is meaningless in their lives. I factually know that these guys are meaningless in terms of the broad spectrum of their life.
Yeah, but guess what? When you're 15 years old and you got a boyfriend, that is your whole life. Yeah, and so when something goes sideways, I had to say, "Oh, I had to remember that myself when I saw my daughters distraught over something."
I'd say, "Okay, here's what's going on. This is her whole life." And I tried to explain to them, "This guy, I understand that you like him and that he was good and blah, blah, blah, but you know, let's remember you're only 15, and there are going to be other nice guys, and there will be other opportunities, and blah, blah, blah."
But of course, it barely, barely gets through to their head. Yeah, believe me, they can't even imagine. "No, certain is different. I know because he's the best."
No, and so, yeah, yeah, you're on that question restriction from now on. No bail. I wanted her to know. I think we all wanted to know.