Lost Boy Scouts Podcast

Yeah. It's been a good couple of days of training. Yeah. For sure. Putting

Yeah. It was kids classes today. Kids classes are always wild. Kids

classes are so tough, man. Like, um, You know, I, I go

there, I get up early, go to work all day and I, and I'm

training usually all day training a new air traffic controller,

you know? And, um, then I go to work

or sorry, then I go to the Academy and I have the kids classes. The

first class is like always the hardest because it's the brand new kids.

They're like four to I'd

probably say he's eight, maybe eight, sometimes a little bit older than that.

But for the most part, it's like really young. But the crazy thing is, is

the two youngest kids are four and five. And

they're probably the better of the athletes. Like when

I see them, I'm like, man, these kids are legitimate athletes.

Like they can do a lot of things that even the, some of the uncoordinated

eight year olds can't do. And when you see their parents, you're like, well,

that makes sense. Like their parents are probably pretty athletic. They probably were,

Very high athletic IQ in younger

ages and you never know in Park City You never know if

you're talking to an Olympic athlete or just a random person, right?

Because we have so many walks of life in

Park City, but a lot of times you there are some high-level Athletes

it's always interesting to I mean, I think this this valley does kind of

They're outdoors more, you know, they're hikers, they're bikers. They

tend to be more athletic, right? And they're more physically aware. Well,

I think in like the city, you probably just have more of a melting

pot. Yeah, melting pot. of personalities and

Today I had to get after a kid today. You know, like I try

not to like, you know, Tristan and Nick and

those guys, they, they're, I mean, you have to be pretty strict in the, you

have to be really strict in the classes because like kids can get hurt. We

do throw, we, we do do things that,

um, you know, if they did it, if they're not careful, they'll get hurt. Right.

And I just had this one kid and he just sometimes, um,

He'll, he'll just challenge me. Like everything I say, well, why

are we doing like that? How come you said that? No, I don't want to do it like that today.

I was like, you know what, buddy? I usually put him in a

leadership role because then he kind of takes that leadership role. And I was like, for

a little while, you're not going to be a leader because I don't know if you're giving the right skills

to these kids is if you're teaching that. And man, he got mad

at me. He would, he wouldn't do anything that I told him

to do. He was just his face. He just sat there

like this, kick him off the mat. No. And I was like, Carson, when

you show me your leadership qualities, like you usually do, um, I'm

going to give them back to you. But until then, nobody's going

to give you leadership. And I'm going to call the other coaches and I'm going to remind

them that you are not allowed to leader. And he got so mad. He got more

mad. But then after a while he kind of like mellowed out because

I think he, you know, after a while they just kind of mellow out. They get over it really fast, right?

Like kids don't, kids don't hold on to grudges. They move on

really fast, you know, like they, and he, he moved on. And

at the end of the class we talked a little bit and I explained to him, you know,

where I come from and those kinds of things. And, and it's hard because like,

um, Sometimes with kids you don't

know if you're dealing with a behavioral issue or

if it's just their personality or maybe he's a little immature.

And so they wear me out. And then the next class after

the little tiny kids class is the advanced kids

classes. And those kids have tons of energy.

And they come in and they are jumping all over the place. And I've got

to remember, I've got to amp up my energy, because if not, then I'm kind

of boring. They can feel it. Yeah, they don't want to be there. So

I have to amp my energy up. And then before you

know it, the class is over. And I'm like, I haven't even been home since four o'clock

in the morning. And I get home. you know 6 30 at night and

you're just gassed gas tired man tired so let's uh

i'm gonna do some of these you want to do something a little smell and salt yeah no

i think yeah yeah we'll go ahead take a whiff i think it's the

same The

last time we did still it's like walking in the area the last time

we didn't do it and I was told myself like man You

open the can and it was like it's like off gas out

here and I was thinking it's gonna make me feel better Just doing it,

you know But yeah, and my

Yeah. Yeah, it's traveling. So everybody's traveling action it this weekend. Welcome

Yeah I Gosh, I was like, I told Misty, I

was like, I don't do well in a quiet house, you know, like go home.

And I'm like, man, this is, I feel bad for Tyler. Cause we had, we had a

conversation about that over the week, you know, like struggling with that.

Oh, absolutely. It is interesting after the kids leave, like

how my energy just dumps. And I

honestly think, you know, the changing of the seasons, there's something

to it, right? It gets really gray here in Utah, really

gray. And I don't mind the snow. I don't mind the rain.

I do mind the gray. Like in Colorado where

I grew up, we'd get the snow and we'd get the rain, but we would have,

you know, snow and then we'd have like a bluebird day and the sun would be

out and you would just wouldn't feel kind of like this heaviness, this

gray. Yeah, it does get gray here. And you know, it's the

And we live in the mountains, you know, and if you

go into the valley of Salt Lake because of

the inversion, you may not see the sun or the

sky through the month of, uh, end of

January, all the way through February. You may not see it because

it, and so it's kind of weird for my work because, um, where

the air traffic control tower is like, yo, I'll

be driving to work and it's cloudy, like super cloudy, super

foggy. And all I have to do is go up 26 flights of

stairs and it's blue skies because of the inversion.

And it's like a thick blanket of, um, of,

Yeah. I remember seeing it like too, as you drive down the Canyon, you can kind

of see it just like sitting there like a thick layer of cake frosting

over the city. And you're just like, you're, it's like, you're descending down into it. You're

Yeah. And some days they'll tell you not to go

and exercise and not to do anything outside because the

air is so gross. I've heard it like at times that it's

more the air, and I may be saying this wrong, but it's

more like toxic. to you than like

in the the Asian countries where there actually is

pollution because all it is is um it's

there's air trapped and so like because of where we

sit on the great salt lake right there's air trapped and it is

like this kind of traps all that stuff and it can make you sick yeah yeah i

know a lot of people that have lung and stuff issues yeah And we're up

here and you can, if you don't go down into the valley for like a week, you'll

forget, right? But like you said, it's still kind of gray and

kind of like grumpy up here. And it's probably because

like we see Mount Temp and it's white and like, you know, there's

Yeah. Yeah, it really is just kind of like the overcast

gray skies. It's just the clouds move through. We get

it from Southern California and then it

also blows in from the east as well. So, there's

days where you just – it's not It's just not, it's

just gray and cloudy and overcast, right? And it eats

at you. Yeah, you got to do a little spring cleaning.

And yes, I definitely was hit, you know, still kind

of going through the seasons of grief and, you know, everything

that is gets compounded and you never know when it's going to hit you. I

truly believe our bodies are not meant to, you know, deal with

that all at once. And so, you know, it comes and goes, you know,

you just got to roll with it. you know, call your friends when

you need help. Yeah, right. Have some conversations and

And so the kids are gone now this week and you had them a

lot though, too. Also like, yeah, I had most of February, most of February with

everything that was going on and I'm used to seeing my family. And

so with them being gone for just a day, yeah, I'm like, Whoa, you

know, um, but they're having fun. Misty went to a vintage

show with her friends to St. George and then Tristan

went to the nationals to the wrestling finals. Spoiled brat.

I told Tyler and my wife today, I said, um, I've

failed in life. I've failed in life this time because, you

know, it would have been a plane ticket. We had a place to stay and it

is by far the best

sporting event that I've ever been to. that I've ever

been to. The energy,

the intensity, and granted, I'm

a huge collegiate wrestling fan in itself, but

you're walking around like legends of the sport, and they're literally

walking around, because wrestling is such a small community.

A famous wrestler, you know somebody that knows him, so you'll probably be

able to meet him. you know, here in Heber, we have Kel

Sanderson, you know, he, he, he was, he's my age. We

graduated the same year. We, know

of the same people. Like I'm really good friends with his dad and his mom,

you know, and so you just know, like legends of the sport, like literal legends

Put it in perspective for us because is it, is it collegiate? Is

collegiate level the highest level or is there like Olympics or is

there, I mean, obviously the Olympics, is it, is it kind

It's just on style, right? Style, yeah. So collegiate wrestling is

what you would do in your high school. Same kind of. Same kind. It's called folk

style. But we say collegiate just because it's a college

style. Yeah. And collegiate, that's

the highest. If you were a high school wrestler, you're probably most

likely your highest level would be college wrestling.

And then if you were a really, really, really talented wrestler, you may

make it onto the the Olympic, just

like maybe some of the practice squads. And then, I mean,

one guy, one weight makes it into the Olympic

team. One guy, one weight. That's it. So there's, I

think there's six weight classes there. I may be wrong about that. They

changed a lot, but we have women's wrestling now, which is itself

amazing. And, um, But, but for to

call it for nationals for like division one nationals. Yes.

They're like, they staff a weight for each, each

way. One guy from one guy can make it, but not from

every team. One guy in, you know, the big tens and

then they have like drawings from the big tens. Cause the big

10, the big 10, uh, the big 10 is, is the

premier league or the premier, uh, conference

for wrestling. Um, but, And

you, you know, like I, I know some of the kids, like my kids have wrestled some

of the kids that, that are in there. And so that's kind of fun to watch, but when you go

there, it is just the energy and

the buzz and the, and everything that's going on in there. And, and there's so

many storylines that are happening. You get sucked in and drawn into

it. Right. And then like I tell people all the time, they

all look like me. They're short with crazy ears.

And you know, like just this, everybody's

about the same height, you know, because wrestlers are not very tall in

most instances. I mean, there's some ginormous wrestlers for sure,

because you can go up to 285, but for the most part, everybody just has cauliflower ears

and is a very family oriented sport. So like dads

and grandsons and great grands, great grandfathers and all

of the kids go there as a, it's a, it's a family event. So it's, it's

got that feel, you know, and luckily Tristan was able to go And

he sent me some pictures today of their seats and I was like, man, that's

It was good. It was fun. Yeah. He, uh, he coached wrestling for the, uh,

park city wrestling team and just happens that,

uh, the head coach, his daughter, uh, wrestles for Lehigh and

then he's part of the New York athletic club. And so he's gotten lots of connections, um,

did hear that they, by the time this comes out, we'll have known

if they got floor seats for the finals, which would be. Amazing.

Amazing. It's like Superbowl tickets. Oh my gosh. Yeah. It is Superbowl tickets.

Yeah. For, for, especially for like guys like us, you know, like we're, this

Yeah. I, I think that's, what's interesting, both wrestling. I

always wanted to do wrestling growing up. I had a couple of uncles

that wrestled. One of them wrestled collegially here at BYU. And,

um, I think for just, just briefly before he realized academics is

where I needed to focus. And, um, It's

interesting with both wrestling and jiu-jitsu, what a personal sport it

is. You're on a team, for sure, and team points matters, but you

really have to learn discipline to the

individual sport. I grew up playing lacrosse, which is a team sport. I think I've

mentioned this before, that when you compete, you can kind

of you know, you don't, if you're a

good player, you win and loses a team, right? And if you're a good team, you

win and loses a team. You, you understand what everybody's role is,

but there's a lot of times where you can hide your poor performance behind, behind, you

know, players that are, um

you know better and i'm watching this i'm watching this wasatch lacrosse team

here in town i coached we've got the first kid to

ever go division one and i'm

just seeing that there's like everybody's looking at him for what to do and

he's like i'm trying guys but i need you all to pull your weight yeah i'm

trying really hard and bless his heart he's an amazing player he's an amazing mentor

right um to the rest of his teammates, but

it's just – I struggle to see him and

watch him and know he's put in the work. He's the type

of kid that is put in the work. He's gone to the extra practices. He's gone and

not everybody else is playing up to that level. He's

done so much to develop his talent to get to that division one

level. Growing up, when I was growing up playing lacrosse, it

was such a new sport that college lacrosse was it,

right? And it's grown so much as a sport now that more and more colleges actually

have the sport. It used to be just pretty much your Ivy League schools,

right? Back East, all the Ivy League schools and back

East schools had lacrosse. And then it

started growing and now there's professional and semi-professional indoor leagues

and stuff like that that make it a little bit closer to hockey, but

Again, if you don't put in the work individually, you

can hide your performance. And that's why I think a lot of people, and that's probably true with football

or basketball, those people that really put in the work

With those team sports, each person

has their role, each person has their job to

do. In wrestling, a

lot of stuff happens in the practice room. That's where everything really goes down, the

practice room. You have to do spring stuff,

you have to do fall stuff, you have to do winter stuff, and wrestling

is a winter sport. you literally are

out there on the mat by yourself, right? Wrestling against another

person who's done the same thing, who thinks he's done the same thing, right?

Talent goes a long way. Yeah. It's really interesting to me sometimes with,

um, you know, I didn't wrestle and

my boys were, were very talented. I, you know, I played sports a lot when

I was younger, but nothing like crazy or never really high school sports. But,

you know, I see these, uh, like generations of

wrestlers and I often wonder if it's like, if

it's genetic code that their dads wrestled

and their granddads wrestled and now all of a sudden they wrestle because they have a

different aura about them. They carry themselves a little different on the mat, right?

And sometimes you come across outliers that are just, man, they're gifted.

I've been around some really, really talented kids. But

today when I was watching the wrestling, when I got home from jiu-jitsu, they were

talking about, oh, this kid is,

his dad is this guy, and he wrestled at the Olympics of

this year, and there would be all these things, and I was like, man, that's insane.

And then sometimes there's an outlier where they're like, yeah, that guy's

dad didn't even do anything. No family that

wrestled. And so I always wonder if

when my kids have kids because they, They

both wrestle and they both believe in wrestling and jujitsu. Like if their kids are going to be

like a little bit more talented, you know, like in

that, in that mindset, cause genetically coded, you

know, they might be a little bit better, you know, dude, I'd love to dive a little bit more into

the mental weight of competition like let's just talk

about competition yeah for sure because you've you've competed a lot in

jiu-jitsu i've competed a few times i'd love to do more but

i think competition is interesting it does weird things to

us as men yeah um yeah you have men like

competing because you compete a lot right like you compete in jobs you can

like just little tiny things, right? And competition

So when you step onto the mat, and I'm just putting this like wrestling into

her perspective, like how much of the competition is versus

Before you like before you touch hands and get going so

like whenever so, you know As I've said before I didn't wrestle in

high school. I wrestled later on in life. I wrestled at veterans Nationals

is in Vegas. I did it I did that and I

remember walking out on the mat and thinking What in

the hell am I about to do? Yeah, I had I had already fought

MMA prior to that so I wasn't like nervous for

like getting hands on each other, you know, but, but

I was like, I'm not prepared for this. Um, I remember

the first guy that I fought or that I wrestled, he smelled

like smoke so bad. He, he was like super tattooed like

me. And when we tied up, I was like, Oh man, he smells like,

like he, and he was like breathing really, really

hard, you know? And we, we, um, We

ended up like, um, going the full three,

you go, you go three minutes and then there's a break and then three more minutes. So it's

a six minute match. And the whole time I remember thinking like,

this dude is so strong. He is so strong, but his, like,

The ashtray smell was so, so strong in my

mind and it stuck out. And I remember thinking, why did I

attach myself to that? But I was just like, I can remember that. I

can remember his strength and what he smelled like. And

I ended up losing by a lot. But I thought I was close. I

thought it was really close. I thought we were close. I'm,

I'm, I'm close. I think this is a close match and I

Yeah. Okay. So go into your like second match. Cause I remember my

first match, like I was very nervous for the takedown. Like

we don't do a lot of standup stuff. My first time really competing individually,

like growing up playing lacrosse, I played in some serious games and

again, you can kind of, you're, you can let your ego kind of

hide your performance, your nerves. You can, you

know if you're good and you've got a good mental routine going into it visualization i

think a lot of pro athletes do like that visualization like you

can help build your team but when it's one-on-one

it's really you and the other person yeah for sure right and and you are

kind of your own worst enemy at times.

Cause I remember my very last competition where it

was my second match and I was gassed and I knew

I was mentally beat before I was actually physically beat. Yeah.

And that for me was more heartbreaking than the actual loss itself. You

No. You can't pull yourself out of that. It's, it's tough. It

is tough. Yeah. I remember thinking, um, going

into my second match at national for wrestling, um, that

this is exactly like, cause I had, you know, I had coached my boys for so

long and I had coached Braxton to a high level at that point. And I

remember thinking like, man, this is exactly like the feeling that

they have. Cause I kind of didn't want to go out there the second one. I didn't really want to

go out there because my first match, I thought I

had a really, really, I really had a really good chance against this guy.

My second match, the dude was like a four or

five or six time masters national

champion. And when he

walked out there, my breath

was almost taken away by his confidence. He was so confident.

Oh my gosh. When we shook hands, I was like, this dude's gonna

kill me. I honestly thought that. I was like, damn it, I hope he doesn't hurt

so yeah that that's the that's the worst and like can you imagine

taking that same mindset into like a job application yeah

there's no way you know what i mean like if you go into it defeated defeated

you're you're already like what is it what is this saying um I

think it's Tony Robbins who says like, where your attention goes,

so does your effort. Like where you, yeah, like something to

that effect. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and really it's, it's

A hundred percent. Yeah. The guy, the dude, I mean, I think he, I think it was

20 seconds. Yeah. I think we were on the mat. We shook hands.

He took me down in 20 seconds. 20 seconds was what I lasted, but I

remember getting off the mat and thinking, I was defeated

before. I thought I just wanted to get out

of that match because I was so like, well, I already lost my

first one. And he did, but

I didn't even really like, I don't know if I even had the opportunity to try.

I mean, literally we shook hands and boom, it was over.

And I remember thinking that was really, really fast. And

it was so fast. And I remember thinking the next time

I compete, that's not going to happen to me. I'm not going to go in there like that.

I'm going to be prepared. I'm going to feel prepared. And then when I fought or

when I competed Jiu Jitsu, um, I won four

state Utah state titles. And then I won, um,

a bunch of grappling industries and a bunch of Naga championships in

my white and blue. Um, I didn't compete as much as in my purple belt

as I would have liked to only because like, At this

point, competition, competing like that is not part of

my journey. That white, blue,

I competed every tournament that I could. Every

tournament. And I always told myself, I'm not ever going to feel the

I think it's interesting too being, you know, I practice

jujitsu, right? Like for me, it's a practice. It's, it's about,

um, you know, it initially was about reconnecting

with my own central nervous system, like to really understand what is a threat

to go into a competition, it was like, okay, I rolled a bunch with the

guys in our gym. And I remember professor saying,

do you really have what it takes to break an arm? You know, and I think we've

had this conversation before, but like, I was like, I really wasn't sure,

but I knew that the next level, like, you know, the

only other way to test this is to go get into a street fight. I'm not

about to go get into a street fight. Like, right. So this is like another place where

you amp up the, the intensity a little bit.

You really kind of have to prepare yourself. It's not one

of those things, and I think that's probably some of the mistakes I've made in my jiu-jitsu competition.

My last competition, not so much. I did try to have more of a focused regimen.

I wanted to hit a certain weight. Unfortunately,

I didn't do it, so I ended up fighting up which

I now know that's not something I ever want to do again. I never

want to do that again. It really wasn't

You're already accepting defeat in the weight? Yeah. Because you had tried

Yeah, and I mean it was close. The other problem was there was no one at

my weight class, at that lower weight class. So it was

like, The day before the competition, I'm looking

at the – I'm like, I'm not going to fight anyone. I can't go

down even further. I can either go up or I can just

drop out completely. I'm like, well, I've already signed up. I've already put in

the effort training. Let's

go up." And they mopped the mat with me, right?

They were physically bigger and stronger than

me. And I feel like I did all right, right? I protected myself

and fought one bout to time,

and the other bout I was just so exhausted. I couldn't,

again, mentally beat myself, right? Maybe if

I was in a little bit mentally stronger place, I could have made the

full five minutes. But you

know, once that once those once that doubt creeps in once it

Like, I think as soon as like, there's a little sliver, a

little sliver of like, doubt, it takes it

starts to make your mind wander to a place that you can't

quite get out of. Yeah, which, you know, in my in

my career field, we, we We

have so many things going on at one time. There's so much

going on, right? You

have to like sometimes just pretend like,

you know, what's going on, right? You have to like you, if you have a sliver of

doubt of like what's going on, you probably, your

session is going to be really, really bad and

you're going to walk away from there. Like, man, I just got my ass kicked. Same thing

in Jiu Jitsu. Yeah. Same feeling in Jiu Jitsu. I've not

had another feeling where I like see lineup,

you know, as we do the rotations line up next to somebody that you're like, This

is about to be the longest three minutes of my life. And I can't stop

it. I can't stop what's about to happen to me. And all I'm hoping is

that I make it to the next round. And

not only does that happen, but it's probably worse for me because

I'm like, now I'm pissed off at myself because I'm like, man, I kind of like willed

that in myself. Other times I know Across

from me that person feels the same way like like I'm there.

I'm there like man. I got Danny This is going to be miserable. This

is not gonna be fun for three minutes, you know and that

balance of like the sliver of like How

can you how can you like stop it from happening? How can

you like you how can you be prepared? how can you like prepare

yourself for an interview or for you know to ask a girl

out or to to struggle with some of the things that like that

you yourself have struggled with, struggled, struggled, struggled

with, right? And not throw in the towel and

be like, shit, man, I don't want to be today. Today

I'm going to just wallow. The

five minutes is up and the guy got my back and it

sucks. Tomorrow I'm not going to let him have my back, but today, fuck

Yeah, it's true. You've

got to start recognizing, I think, the patterns of doubt. And

I know the job market is incredibly difficult out there for a lot

of men these days. Tech has been growing into

a new generation of whatever it is. They overhired.

You never can really trust what's being said on the news.

You can kind of only trust what you're hearing other people, your other past

coworkers saying. I remember applying for jobs and

you make 100 applications to get 100 rejections. How

do you keep positive? How do you stay positive? How do you stay positive in that time?

Man, well, yeah,

gosh, and I guess it would be like... um,

see in the long game. Yeah. Right. Not seeing a short game

and like getting caught up in the short wins. Cause you gotta still

have like some sort of win category that's going to

help you like get through the day. But if you start to pilot those,

I think you got to look at where you're successful too and realize that you were like a

multidimensional being right. Like, Hey,

I'm, I'm, you know, a hundred, a hundred rejections. Cool. That's a

hundred people that, that lost, lost out on me. They

lost out on me. They didn't even take the opportunity. That's

their fault. You know what I mean? You've

got to start seeing the positive and just knowing that the universe has got

to have your back at some point. I love the book

The Alchemist. I don't know if you've ever read it. It's an incredible

book, but there's a saying in

the book, in The Alchemist, if you want

something bad enough, the whole universe will conspire to give it to you. Yeah,

and and I and I truly have had to start to believe that and I have to go back

and there's obviously There's moments of weakness sure and it's okay to have

those right give yourself some time. We've talked about this Sometimes it's

a day. Sometimes it's a week, you know, sometimes it's a month right

and and You but you've got to eventually find

Yeah, find your way find your way back your way out of the bottom Yeah, so

you clip you have that clutter there's there's all that clutter of

that you need to get rid of to to get going

in the right direction again, right? Failing

isn't, you know, there's all those things. Failure's not fatal. It's

not. It's not. But failure does help you

grow. Having struggles does

give you the ability to be kind of elastic as

the struggles come. Because we've talked about this. Struggles are

going to come. Bad things are going to happen. if you're, you're,

you're living in a cloud, if you are, you're living in a fairytale land,

if you think that bad things are not going to happen to

you, they are, they're going to happen to you. And there's going to be some rough times and

there's going to be some things that, that just rock you to your core that

shake the shit out of you. And as

a man, we're not always given tools to,

Matter of fact, sometimes I wonder if I'm even, uh, have

the ability to help my own boys deal

with like hard hardships, hard

hardships. Like I can be a listening device,

like I can listen to them, but, um, when I give

them advice, I'm always like, was that really good advice? Shit.

I don't know. You know? Cause I don't know if, I mean, I'm in my own world

sometimes. Right. And my boys are like, yeah, they're, they're men. And

it's like, gosh, man, what if I'm not prepared to, to help them

in their struggles? Like they're, they're like really hard struggles. Yeah.

Oh yeah. Yeah. I think for me, You

cannot let those things, you cannot let the negative compound.

You know, like compounding interest, right? The power of compounding interest, right?

When you compound interest on money, it grows. When you compound

your focus on the

defeat and the poor me, it turns into this victim mentality. And

if I can impart anything to my younger self, to my younger sons,

to my younger brothers that are out there, like ditch

the victim mindset. You're not a victim. You

got tapped, I learned something, right? I'm going

up against, you know, the biggest black

belt in the gym. I hope I'm a fun role for him.

You know, when I roll with Nick and when I roll with Anthony or even

Professor, I'm like, I just hope to provide them some form

of entertainment. I know that it's going to be rough for me. I

know I'm not going to get the position that I want, but hey, maybe

I can help them increase their skills. They

Yeah. Avoiding that victim mentality is a big thing in

any sense or in any chapter of

your life, right? Because as soon as you become a victim of something,

Life is happening to you, not for you, right? Stay in

that for you mindset. There's wisdom out there to be gained from

Sure. For the longest time, that's why

I liked wrestling so much. That's why I liked my boys wrestling was

because it teaches you so much adversity. Yeah.

You have to really, really, really like wrestling.

You have to really like wrestling to put yourself through wrestling.

You have to really, you have to really enjoy it because there is

absolutely nothing fun about it. It's so funny when people are like, um, yeah,

wrestling, they'll, people will be like, oh yeah, wrestling's not fun. And they're like, yeah, yeah,

for sure. It's not fun. But what you gain from it, And

then translate that to as an adult men like it's

not like we have a wrestling clubs available But jiu-jitsu does

that for sure? Oh, it teaches you so much adversity It

teaches you that there is no end. There's no

end to the journey and each little

Each little set, piece, guard, bottom side,

top side, mount, bottom mount, each of those things

have their own little branches that go a million different directions

and you will never find the bottom of it. You'll

never find the bottom because something else will open up, right? And what

that does for you is it always keeps you engaged, right? And

so in life, as as men as we start

to go on and we we see like what did sports do

for us like what did sports do for you yeah it taught you to

to stay engaged to to not only think

about yourself but to think about your team which is your family yeah and to

not give up right to look for the next score to look for the next position

to look for the next ability right And then if

you put your children in sports or in something like that, then

they'll learn adversity. They will learn adversity. They'll learn

how to depend on themselves and to not give

up. They're still gonna have failures. And as long as you

can not just pull the plug and

be like, fuck it, I'm done. I'm moving on from this, then

you're going to learn something from it. And you'll be able to take that with

you in each of those chapters of your life where you start to

struggle, especially as a man, because we don't have outlets. We don't have things that

we can turn to. And if you ask

for help sometimes, it's a sign of weakness. And as

Yeah. Which I think is really unfortunate, right? Because we're human

beings. And while I truly believe, like, you're not your feelings, that

our feelings are really more guides, right?

It's part of our central nervous system. If I'm feeling sad, mad, glad,

happy, it's all just a message telling me, you

know, it's a means to an end, not the end all be all. right?

You don't have to be those feelings, and we need to learn to connect

with that side of ourselves rather than just hide it. I've

spent plenty of years hiding my own feelings, hiding

how I feel about things. I also think, too, that there

is something to be said about stoicism, and

it may be difficult to have For

example, I had my sister-in-law come over today, or my ex-sister-in-law. I

don't know. I mean, we're still friends, but I

don't know where my position in that family is, and I had

to just say, okay, how do I handle this?

She obviously wanted to come over and send

her condolences and share her experience with

me. I could have very

easily ignored it. I did ignore it for a couple weeks, and

then finally I just had to tell myself, like, it's okay.

I need to be part of her healing journey as well as mine,

and I need to allow it to happen. I need to allow things to develop just

naturally. You just can't

hide things forever. This week, if anything, what

Yeah, you especially with like, who

we are, and we've talked about like our childhoods, like we can't deny

who, who we are, we can't, we can, we

can grow, we can get we can become better versions of

ourselves. But at the end of the day, we're still who we are. Yeah. Right. And

like I told you before, like, you're a super kind person. And if

you go against that, like if you go against the grain of being kind, you're

going to feel kind of abrasive. Yeah. And you're going to feel kind of like shitty. Yeah.

You know, you're going to come off shitty. Yeah. You're going to come off like not being

So I start asking myself, like, where is that coming from? What am I protecting?

It's generally something in my ego. Oh man. I'm definitely protecting

some sort of maybe a childhood wound, you know?

And as I was in yoga on Tuesday, um,

you know, kind of suffering through some things, and the heat, and the stretching,

and the breathing, that I just finally fell into child's pose.

And I'm like, what am I fighting against? What

am I fighting against? And I realized that the battle that I was

fighting was in my own head. Wow. Right? That it was my

own, my anger was self-inflicted. Sure.

I was choosing a position where I was protecting something, and

Well, and you feel slighted, right? I mean, like you feel slighted, you feel cheated.

You feel like there's things that you're missing out on. Yeah. There's things

that you're like, man, this is not the life that I chose. Sure. This

is not the person that I want to be right

now. Yeah. But still that person, the person

you are now is a better version of, you know, who you were when

you were really struggling when you were really struggling, when

you were really lost and, a tyler's version

of lost yeah like the like a lost version where you're just living

in your shadow and your pseudo self in your yeah and you're just medicating

however you can right you're still a better version of that And

those feelings don't go away just because we want them to go away. No,

No. And at our age, I definitely think that we

train our brains to, and starting at our nervous system, we,

our nervous system is so well trained for it. You

know, uh, uh, an uncomfortable hell. Like if

that's what we've trained it towards, it will pick that uncomfortable hell

over the peaceful unknown because

Yeah, you're like, I can control this. Control comes into

that too, right? Yeah, absolutely. And like Keith always says, ego

is not your amigo. It is not. It's definitely not

your amigo. But the problem is, for me, myself,

is like, sometimes

I think like, if you see me as a

weak version and I don't correct that,

then I'm like, man, I need to, I'm going to, I'm going

to show you that don't take my kindness for

weakness. And I never feel good about

that. I never walk away going, I showed him, I

showed, I showed them. There's times when I'm, you

know, when I'm like you and I, We, we're not

going to ever get along and I know that like I'm and

I'm cool with that. And so I'm not going to put myself in a position where I

know the next step, the next level that I'll take it to. Um,

so I'm going to protect myself in that instance. That's not

amigo, that's protection. Um, but yeah, you

know, if I, if I was to ever do that with like my wife or with my kids

or something, like I'm definitely not giving them my best version, but

there's times when I'm like, yeah, with them.

And then I walk away from it and I'm like, man, that did not feel good at

all. And I have to go right back and be like, Hey man, I'm really sorry. I

Yeah, no, I would agree. I think that there was definitely, I've

definitely been in times of self protection where I've been acting out of

ego in my previous relationship. And it was ultimately detrimental

to the relationship, right? I didn't know. I

didn't have the tools. I didn't have the guidance to say, hey, take

a step back from your ego. Learn

to recognize it. If you can learn to control your ego, If

you can understand what it's saying, what is it really saying, right?

The basic most primitive level, right? It's just an ape,

right? You know what I mean? It is literally just

self-preservation. And if you can take a step back,

take a deep breath, and realize, am I really in a competition

here? Is there really a competition here? Or am I protecting

Yeah. Like those feelings that are just like made up. Yeah. Like you

made it up in your head and now you're protecting it. Like it's your own little egg. Yes. Like

you're like, man, this thing is so, this thing is so beautiful. I'm going to protect it, but it's

Oh yeah. Sometimes you just need to let the moment unfold and

be what it is, whatever it is instead of like a

personalizing it or whatever you think it should be. Yeah,

and if you wish, if you can step back, man, if I could go back in time and

kick myself in the head a couple of times and, you

know, we all wish we could. For sure. What I

can do now is I can say, okay, yes, I recognize when my ego is

And if we wrap that back around to like with sports and stuff, like ego, like

there's, you got to have a little sense of like a little sense of,

um, um, show off in it. Like you

have to have a little bit of like cockiness, like a little bit of air of arrogance,

right? Like you have to have that to be, to get to a high level, to

Um, it's going to get you back on the mat. It's going to put you back out there after

Like, but at some point if it becomes bullshit, it's going

to like, you're going to see it. People are going to feel it. I'm going to be like, ah, he

kind of turned me off, man. Like I don't want to be around that. But, um, you

have to have a little bit of like that, that ability of like, you know what? I can pull

my, I can pick myself up. I'm good, man. I'm, I'm good.

Have you been around somebody that's been just completely arrogant?

Like you can tell a ton, you know, and you, you, you, that's

when you, that's when I see my ego starting to kick in. Like I

kind of want to test this person. I

realize now I'm acting from ego. He's pulled me into his

Yeah. I don't know how many times that's happened to me where I'm like, damn it. I

got sucked into that situation. But there's other times when

I'm like, I kind of, I'm okay with that. That person's rubbed me the wrong

way. I've got, I mean, there, you know, I don't, I get along with most people,

but if I don't, I probably don't, I probably do

not find, if I don't get along with you, I probably don't find a reason to

get along with you. I don't, I don't look for it. If I find some

like genuineness in yours, in you, I'll probably find

something to like mesh with. But if I don't, I

probably won't. I probably won't even try to, you

know, and I know that about myself. I always tell people like, yeah,

me and that guy would not hang out outside of this environment because I

know what would happen. I would test him. I

would test him to see what would happen. But

I mean, it comes back to that competition, right?

If we distill down all the bullshit of modern society, we

are nothing but a bunch of hunters and gatherers, right? And

that's what I loved, going back to those Indian books that we read, right?

If a tribe wanted something and it was bigger and stronger, We

just go take it. And we have to realize we've learned

a high level of benevolence. Jordan

Peterson always talks about this, knowing the true darkness that

Yeah, know it. Because once you know it, then you can become more

benevolent to To those around

you right and I think that's what that's what's interesting when we're seeing kind

of this clash between the sexes right here We've got this

super Toxic masculine and you know, I think

on the other side of this I'm not gonna gain a lot of friends, but there's a lot of feminism and

That is the polar, like on the other end of the pole. And it's just

as toxic, right? And we have fallen out of harmony

ourselves, just because of this is where society has pushed us, has

pushed us into competition. It's told us that the

way we are valued is based on the way we look, or

how intelligent we are, or the number of zeros in our bank account, right? And

we have to take a step back from all of that external. um

noise and we have to we have to man in yeah we

have to man in and say what's true and and what really matters yeah

end of the day what really matters and we all we each have our roles

right like i mean we have our roles like i cannot take

of my wife. Right. I cannot take on the role of my wife.

I tell her, I mean, like, we both know that. Yeah. And she cannot take

the role. She cannot take on the role of me. Yeah. You know,

and while I grew up in a single

mother household, my mom and I have

this conversation on a regular basis. Like, she

cannot be my father. She cannot. She has,

she does not have that ability. And I've always told her, like, don't ever take

that role. as as a man or like tell me

how i should be as a man because like i'll fight back with

her and we've had some really really we have a really good dialogue

we have really good disagreements a lot of times but it's like i

know my role i know my role i've worked really hard to be

Yeah. You know, I'm not. I mean, I think it's interesting. Like, I think you

start asking yourselves, right? Like, originally marriage

was out of convenience and survival. Sure. Right? Like, we

partner up because we each brought something. The man's ability

to provide, the woman's ability to caretake. What

does that mean now, anymore, when we live in a society where most

everyone is in a dual-income family at some

point? To live in

this valley, you almost have to have two incomes coming in. There's

a lot of places where that's not always the case, but

I'm talking at a median level. At

a median level, I'm willing to bet that 75 to

85 percent of the families in this area. are

dual income households. I would agree with you. So how do you, how

do you find that balance when the woman is having to go out of the home, earn

an income? Is it really her place to be in

the home? I honestly, I don't know. This was a conversation I'd

have all the time. It's like, what are these roles? Yeah. I don't know. Maybe that's

Man, I listened to a podcast today that like,

that i that this is along these lines and i was like man this is

an interesting an interesting dialogue it

was a very interesting dialogue and um yeah i

think i think it is a conversation for another day because if

um egos ego would definitely get involved yeah

ego both sides ego would get involved and i think you need a

good solid understanding of who you are

as a person yeah what your expectations are of the

people around you yeah right and the fact that

like we are and we will if we're

not careful just be apes like you said yeah and and then

in that sense like man, then it could get kind

of really squirrely with situations, right?

Because ego comes, ego can really become an ugly,

I guess this goes back to tie it back to competition before we wrap up for

the evening. And like, who are you really in competition with? You

know, in the marketplace, you're going to be in competition with whoever

else is competing with that job. And that's okay. You have to realize that

you bring a unique talent. And you have to have pride in your unique

talent, whatever it is. And there may be a lot of people that

have that punch on their card, right? There's

probably a lot of developers out there that write a

certain level of code, and they're good at it. And you're just as

good at it, right? There's going to be that. But you also have

to believe that there's an abundance of opportunity. First

and learn how to market yourself accordingly.

Yeah. Right. Sell yourself accordingly, not like pimp yourself

out, but sell yourself accordingly, like sell your skill sets. Yeah. And

that in itself find the right

people around you that don't gas you up, don't gas your

ego, but keep you in check with, um, helping you

and correcting you and checks and balances with, with, with you. Right. And

then with your family, always remember that like

your role, what your role is in that version of

your life, your, your, your family, what, what is your role and

take that role seriously, you know, and, and, Teach.

Teach. That's a huge thing. Teach. Teach skill set. Teach.

Teach skill set. Not force. Not force

feed somebody, but teach them. Teach them how to teach them a skill set. And I

bet you, you will feel so proud of yourself. That's

why I teach. That's why I love teaching classes at the Jiu Jitsu Academy,

because if you take a tiny sliver of what

I teach you and apply it to your game, then

I feel like I'm giving back and it's

You know, I love going to your kids' classes. You do an amazing job. You

do an amazing job. And I think it's true. You've got to, you've

got to teach your children and you've got to teach those

whom are in your sphere of influence and you've got to learn. You've got to be willing to

learn to learn. A super interesting conversation tonight,

Danny. Appreciate it. Competition is good. Competition is getting the right scenario.

Seek it out. Yeah. Seek out competition. Seek out like something that will challenge

you to the level of like pushing you to your best, right?

The best version of yourself. I really am proud of,

um, your eyes, the way that you're like, I can see

that you're kind of colored your colors coming back a little bit. Um, kudos,

man. Like honestly, cause cause I know like this

Yeah. No, Nick made it home this week too. So, um, you

know, in a little bit different form than, uh, we're used to, but,

um, he's home and we're, we're excited to continue to celebrate

his life here in the future. And so, yes, it's all kind of, uh, seasons

are changing. Seasons are changing and it's going to

You got belt test on Saturday belt test Saturday, man Yeah,

we got some man like we've got some really some really

really cool blue belts Testing. Yeah from our Academy. I

know I am excited. We're going to get another female blue

belt, Tashana. Shout out to Tashana. She listens to us. Um,

I know we're going to have her on the podcast soon. Yes. Her story, her,

uh, her, her energy and her vibe, her family's vibe, Matt, Tashana

and Hazel, the family themselves, they, um, amazing family,

but, uh, she's testing and getting another, uh, I'm

We did, we did throws yesterday and I'm like, ah, Yeah. Yes. I'm

sorry. I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to interrupt the fun. I'm like, yeah,

yeah. I'm super disappointed. I'm going to miss her specifically.

She's such a pillar in the Academy. Huge. I love

eat just training with her and like what she brings

That's how I always tell her is like, she, she, she definitely brings a

cool, a coolness to the Academy and she's a big part

of the Academy. So we're really excited for her. Um, and

then, Man, we have the summer camp. The summer

camp is starting to develop. We've got fights coming

out. The fight that was announced yesterday is

Kim, Purple Belt Kim. Stoked for her. She's

competing against, I can't remember her name, but she

comes from back East. She was at

the Big Frog this year. I didn't actually get to train

with her, but I watched her train and she's tough. She's really tough, but Kim's

been putting in a ton of work lately. I've been training

with her a lot on Friday afternoons and

every time we train, she tries to kill me. I love it. And she's

Another one of those, like I see her doing the kids' classes. I sat in

on one of her kids' classes. Oh yeah, she does a good job. She does a great job.

She hands out candy at the end. Yeah. Oh, she had a, she had a mom walk on with

her boots on. And I thought, I thought that mom was going to lose her, her

Yeah. So we have that going on and, um,

summer's around the corner. So, uh, I got the bus out last

I was stoked. Yeah, that was cool. What you got going on? You got

You guys are kind of like in the lacrosse season. Kind of lacrosse season.

I've gotten to a point now where I've got kids at every level. The

first group I've really started coaching as young as

like fourth and fifth grade. They're now freshmen, sophomore in

high school. Wow. So I'm going to a lot more of the games, even though I'm not

coaching as much anymore and I'm just trying to show support for the community. Shout

out to the Wasatch Wasp lacrosse games. If you're in the neighborhood, go

check it out. It's going to be a growth

season for them and, you know, I'm proud of all the hard

work that those young men have put in to get to the level that they're at.

Good for them. Yeah. They're supporting them. Yeah. Just ready for that summer