I'm not the best at anything. I'm not.. I'm not gifted. I'm just driven.
I'm a guy that came from nothing anybody's capable of doing shit like this... anybody... and I sat in that tub
She put the water on me
She called my mom up
And my mom was dating a doctor at the time the doctor said "you need to get him to a hospital now"
She came back in All I wanted to do is call Chris Koster on the phone and race instructor from badwater and see if
I can get in. So she said "take him to the doctor" and I said no, let me sit here. Enjoy this pain
She said what are you talking about? I said "you don't.." I go "I need to go the doctor. I realize that.."
But I never thought that it
was humanly possible to do what I did
I went 70 miles.. and at 70 miles. I was dead.
I was at a hundred percent... what I thought when I thought was 100 percent I went thirty
Thirty-one more miles after being in the worst physical shape I've ever been in in my life
And I sat in that tub and the water's hitting me.. it was the most amazing feeling of accomplishment
I
I did this
However as crazy as it sounds it was the most amazing moment of my entire life
To overcome such... to come from this kid
Who is mr "tortured soul"
was tortured isn't tough, this kid.. to this guy, now...
who was able to overcome such amazing odds and obstacles
And I called Chris Kostman the race director at bad water and he said "the idea of a 24-hour race is to run 24 hours"
"You only ran 19" and he put doubt in my mind that he would let me into bad water
Two weeks later roughly December 5th was this marathon that we all signed up for.. I couldn't walk
I could not walk
I ran a hundred miles before I ran a marathon
It's ten days or two weeks after this hundred mile in one race I did
This marathon December 5, Las Vegas
That gun went off
2005
14 days after I broke myself off and I qualify for the Boston Marathon and ran 3:08
Like, the gun went off.. and that thing came back like "Alright, man.. what if.."
And then I went to the hurt 100 race in Hawaii
26,000 feet of climbing over 100 miles
probably one of the top five hardest hundred mile races in the world out there and
got through the race did in 33 hours with a ninth place finisher and
I qualified for bad water and got in
I went on to lose weight and train hard and I got fifth my first year and went back my second year and got third
I'm not the best at anything. I'm not I'm not gifted. I'm just driven.
Out of a hundred men that go into war: 10 shouldn't be there 80 of them are just targets
9 do most of fighting
What is a warrior?
Saw it going through training. I saw it everywhere I went.
There's so many people who just show up to life
There's something about talking to a guy like you, a lot of people hope that you're gonna say some magic thing
that's gonna click in their brain what you're saying is that you have to do those things..
you have to suffer.. You have to live in it.. You have to be comfortable in it. And then... Maybe..
Some of that shit will help you a little bit along the way
Me now, is the guy that with this shirt off who can do 4030 pull-ups in 17 hours
Who can run 205 miles in 39 hours.. who can do all this crazy shit
but what they don't understand is.. they don't understand the journey that it took me to get to this point..
and what got me to this point was, I was just the opposite of what I am today..
I was that guy who ran away from everything.. absolutely everything that got in front of me
I wanted to quit so badly, but I quit everything in my life. I copied through school. I wanted to prove people wrong
and so here I am in this Air Force program starting to get a little more confidence, but this water was kicking my ass and
You may get some results from it. They're not permanent
The permanent result comes from you. I say it all time you have to suffer
You have to make that a tattoo on your brain. So when that hard time comes again, you don't forget it
I'm trying to find more of myself
And only way I can find more is to silence the world out as much as I can because it's getting busier every day
It's getting faster. I
I put my phone away up and I go dark. I
Go dark a lot and it's because I have to find out I'm on a journey of life and we all have a different journey
I like to take this four-lane highway
The easy highway we all love that four-lane highway. We always step over the shovel s shovel. I made my own path
But going through this path of life this journey over here that you make yourself that's incredibly difficult and we're afraid
It's easier to accept the fact that I'm just not good enough
You have to go into the dark chambers that we often shut off you got to open them up
It's not some easy, lit up, streeetlights... with nice smooth roads, right?
Fail and you're gonna be in your head. You could be saying "I'm not good enough." it's how you get through THAT.
That is how you get through that on a daily basis when that thing is saying "Man, I'm 43.."
"'ve done so much..." you start to become civilized...
The refrigerator gets full you start getting making money and you start I'm not getting cold anymore
I'm retired at 40, people shouldn't be playing basketball or football or
at 43 I'm still putting hundred-mile weeks
Still doing thousands of pull-ups... thousands of push-ups because I'm not allowing myself
to become civilized. the worst thing that can happen to a man is to become civilized
You want to be uncommon amongst uncommon people. period
You start putting yourself in situations that suck. You'll find yourself.
I'm big on being.. with yourself..
I want to be forever proud of who I was as a man.
and change who I used to be.. the liar.
The insecure guy the guy who can, Whatever.. I want to be proud..
But if I died now, if I die at 90 100.. look at myself and say "I'm proud of myself."
I believe in patience. I'm a patient dude. I can watch the piece of grass grow for 20 years because I know that..
This is how you get somewhere in life by being that look like mentality
Being able to watch something grow, very calmy, patiently
Okay, body faster.. Well, I can't go any faster.. We do that to our brain. Put a governor on our brain
Pain. Suffering. All words that we hate to say could be on this happy peaceful world we live in now...
We stop
We slow down
If you can get through these different barriers and gain 5 percent 2% 3%
That 40% becomes 60s 60 per kid you just 70 80 and 90 and then you're hopefully one day near a hundred
That that dreamer mentality just would always fuel me. It was just fuel for me.
What if I can be but if I can be a SEAL man... now I run 205 miles
What if I can go but just what if I can go in and what if how would that feel?
You have to go into the dark chambers that we often shut off and you gotta open them up.
I was, like I said, I was about 32 percent body fat and
I went my idea was to run four miles for my first run. I ran a quarter mile and walked home
I walked home and sat on my couch and cry I sat down I gave up
You start out on the first day. And then do you start running again the second day? Yeah second day
We're right back after the ginn, but I start realizing I can't run that far, right?
So what I did was I became damn near a professional cyclist with the miles. I put it on the bike. I
Go to the gym and I developed this crazy workout where I was doing volume like 2-300 reps
And I spent hours in the pool hours in the pool I had to live in the water
The bike got easier I was able to run more I went from like one mile when I was a great accomplishment
2 miles and then from 2 to 3 was a big one then I went from 3 to 6
I failed I go back to scratch
But I started realizing this a part of the process. That's a part of the journey. I'm just not good enough
I'm gonna make myself good enough
When we have bad times in life, even the hardest person where we forget how badass we are during that hard time
I
Have a thing where I take a couple seconds to reflect on I hang on man
you meant to been through this you've been through that you overcame this overcame that I
Don't ever close my mind to the fact that this can't be done
I've quit several things. I know what's on the back end of quitting..
Wanted to be a man that detests mediocrity
Started callousing my mind at this point in my life. I lost the weight and I went back to recruiter
I got into that class
I went through three Navy selects in 1 year
Only guy ever be in 3 hell weeks in one year, to my knowledge the first one I didn't make it through the next two
I did
And I started opening different doors that I didn't think we're even there
They didn't think even existed and the more doors opened up the more I start realizing that my potential is damn near endless. I
Wanted to feel something besides defeat. I wanted to just go to distance and
That going the distance pushed me to a point of where now I'll go way past...
I didn't have a motherfucker come wake me up at 3 in the fucking morning, saying "yo! get your shit in!"
I didn't have a trainer. Didnt have a nutritionist. I did what I had to do to survive.
I was too weak to thrive.
No one say hey, man, you're 297 pounds, man. I want to help you out.
I had to overcome and..
It self discipline is everything if you don't have it. I don't look at you right... I know you're capable of more.
It's not discipline so much for me. It's all on you. It's all on you the self part. It was big
We count on people too much to get us through shit and
We look to our right we look to our left we're looking for help
And if you can build that self you can build a total accountability in oneself
We live in a society where mediocrities often rewarded
We often forget how hard we are but you got to reflect back take a couple sides reflect
I've been through this. I've been through that if you don't believe it, you have an indoor chit
You're just blowing smoke man
I'm not the best at anything. I'm not I'm not gifted. I'm just driven
It's all about trying to share that message with people