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Security Halt!
#212 Bryan Ray: Mental Health, Military Transition, and the importance of asking for help.
This episode explores the importance of mental health and seeking help, particularly within the military community. Green Beret Bryan Ray returns to discuss his personal struggles and the challenges they faced in seeking support. Bryan emphasize the need to normalize mental health and break down the stigma surrounding it. The conversation also touches on the impact of trauma and the difficulty of comparing one's experiences to others. Overall, the Bryan and Deny highlight the importance of addressing mental health and seeking help to lead a healthier and more fulfilling life. The conversation explores the importance of addressing mental health and finding alternative treatments for veterans and individuals dealing with trauma. It emphasizes the negative impact of relying solely on pharmaceuticals and the need for natural medicines like cannabis and psilocybin. The conversation also highlights the importance of finding purpose and passion in life after military service, and not settling for a mundane existence. It encourages veterans to embrace discomfort and use their unique skills and mindset to excel in the civilian world. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the need for better transition support and representation of veterans in various fields.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Personal Struggles
05:12 The Importance of Mental Health and Seeking Help
10:53 Challenges in Seeking Help within the Military Community
15:47 The Process of Seeking Help and Addressing Mental Health
19:27 The Impact of Trauma and Breaking Down the Stigma
27:22 Exploring Alternative Treatments for Mental Health
31:56 Finding Purpose and Passion After Military Service
35:03 Embracing Discomfort and Using Unique Skills
38:12 The Need for Better Transition Support
45:12 Representation of Veterans in Various Fields
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Produced by Security Halt Media
security hot podcast. Let's go, you're dealing with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best with guns, with knives, with his bare hands, a man who's been trained to ignore ignore weather to live off the land job was disposed of enemy personnel to kill period eight got up at midnight and I was like fuck, I'm not gonna be able to go back to sleep, so it's like get out of bed, go do something.
Speaker 2:So geez turning and burning, running, running, reverse cycle and not reverse cycle at the same time it's the absolute fucking worse, but I, I stick, I stick to my routine.
Speaker 1:I know that this will last for a couple days. I gotta look at what's what's causing me to like, have stress or anxiety when I'm gonna. Honestly, what's come down to it is it's the final week for my math class and I just got to prepare for the final test.
Speaker 2:That's all it is.
Speaker 1:It's just the oh fuck, I have to get an A Because a 4.0,.
Speaker 2:I mean that's a big deal. Jeez, you're a better man than me, man. I'm like I got to make sure I can keep the BAH coming in, so keep her above a C. I mean not really. I mean I do try to do well in school, but I'm not brokenhearted if I get a B on something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's one of those things where it's like it's the first time in my adult life that I've been able to devote myself to my passion, which I'm studying things that I'm passionate about. I am not passionate about math, and I've worked really hard and it's just, it's like just getting kicked in the dick every day for an entire summer, but it's finally here, it's finally over with, I'll be done with this class.
Speaker 2:but it's like man, like I'm just uh, that's exciting, that's the, that's the bummer. Um, like when I started going to school, I front loaded all the technical classes because I didn't care about all the core classes, I just wanted the technical knowledge. Um, but I had one business class I had to take last semester and it was like me and maybe one other vet and like a ton of people right out of high school, so our worldview and experience was so wildly different in this class that I was like golly, I felt like I was in the wrong place the whole time um I feel,
Speaker 2:that, yeah, and you're supposed to keep your major. You know, the whole point of the gi bill is supposed to help you get a degree, but I consistently changing my degree every time I want to take different classes because I don't, I don't need all these things, I just want, I just want the knowledge. That's it, you know. Um, so, yeah, I'll be switching majors again this semester. Nice, where are you switching it to? Uh, radio television? Oh, no shit. Yeah, so it started. I started off, uh, under professional photography. Um, I did probably like 75 of that degree, minus a couple electives and things. And then, um, yeah, so I switched over to rtv this semester. So it's all like live broadcast, podcast, audio design, everything like that. So, nice, yeah, just putting more tools in the toolkit, I guess, and collecting some bah yeah, yeah, I did the.
Speaker 1:Uh. I went through berkeley for an audio design and storytelling through sound course and I was so excited, I was thinking that I was gonna learn so much. And I'm just like, I'm just gonna you know it might be liberal, whatever. This is like really good school and they're putting this I'm gonna pay out of pocket to do this thing. I remember being done with it and like realizing like I did learn some cool things. So I was like, yeah, because I never played around with storytelling through sound and pacing and learned all these little things about, like, audio effects. But at the very end, the guy's like, you know, when it comes to doing this stuff, when it comes to podcasting, you just have to go out there and do it. And I was like, motherfucker, you're like thanks.
Speaker 2:You could have told me that at the beginning and I would have asked for a refund. Man, I'd say I definitely. That's definitely something that I've learned through school is, having grown up, having not gone to college, going straight into the military, I always thought there was so much more to college. Like man, the people who went there, they just must be like so good at what they do, especially people who are doing technical roles. And what I found out, you know, even through my first semester, I was like you don't really leave with enough knowledge to be an expert in any sense of the word.
Speaker 2:Uh, in fact, especially in the days and age right now of like all the instructable options online through like youtube or private courses and things, dude, you could be so far ahead of what you'd learn in a semester of school in a fraction of the time just by self-study, and a big part of it.
Speaker 2:It's like, okay, I do like being around people who have been in the profession, I can ask, I can work with a professor directly. So it's good to give me a left and right limit on the skill set, but like, if you really want to get good, just doing a couple of classes in school is not going to prepare you for the workplace, which is the same as you know, even our environment too. It's not like you graduate the Q course and you're like a seasoned special operator but you've gotten yourself into the door. But but I think that's something you have to understand is like, don't expect to like go to school for a technical skill and immediately go out and be one of the best out there. Um, you know, you have to find mentors. You have to find somebody who's doing the work that you like to do and study under them, you know, and get better. So that was definitely an eye opener for me. But you know you don't get BAH for YouTube classes. So I'm going to continue going to school until that well runs dry.
Speaker 1:So Brian Ray, welcome back to your part two of Secure that Podcast. Yeah, brian Ray, welcome back to your part two of Secure that Podcast. Man, it is again. It's fascinating to have another Green Beret brother, that's you know, along the same mission sets, along the same passions.
Speaker 1:And our first sit down we tapped into a lot of things, a lot of common things that we experience as Green Berets or soft professionals in general. It spans a military experience, but one thing we didn't get a chance to talk about was the importance of mental health. And one thing that I realized through this experience, through this journey and this podcast, is when we share our struggles, when we are willing to be vulnerable with our story, we give others the strength to realize that they are not alone, they can get help, and that this is not a matter of if it's a matter of when we are all going to go through this. It'll be different for everybody, but at some point we all need to take a knee. And, brian, today I'd like to focus on your journey and specifically your struggles towards the end of your career.
Speaker 2:Yeah, awesome man. And you know, coming on and talking about these things openly, it's definitely not something that I enjoy doing. It's not at all, in fact. But what I do enjoy is possibly doing for somebody else what was done for me, which was normalizing, seeking help. Else, what was done for me, which was normalizing, seeking help, identifying symptoms and just making it okay to go get checked out.
Speaker 2:Um, because we're we're so good at we're so good at putting things away and focusing on the task at hand, just like deployment, you you kind of make yourself emotionally numb, um, just with all the dirty, nasty things that you see, because you don't have time to allow emotions to dictate your decisions. You have to move on with the reality that you're in right now. You know, move that body, do this thing. You know it's like it has to be robotic, it has to be rote and it has to be muscle memory, because you can't let your emotions, you know, dictate what you're doing on the ground when it's actions on. But the problem is, what we do is we take all that shit that we like put in a dump pouch emotionally, we just keep it there and eventually it gets too full and and then you know you start finding unhealthy ways to to process that, and that's where that's where I was, um, you know, I had specifically one situation in Afghanistan that really messed me up and it really drove in a lot of guilt, a lot of not even wanting to be on this planet anymore, to where, like in a karma sense, I felt like I deserved to get killed. I didn't want to do it myself, but I felt like if something happened to me then then it's cause I earned it. And I was like sometimes kind of disappointed when it didn't happen and, um, you know, I lived with that for years before before I did anything about it, because I was like, well, this is just part of the job. You know, this is what we all do and you know, I kind of it got to a point where I, when I was telling somebody the symptoms and things that I was going through, that they're like that's not normal, like that's not something you should have to do, that's not a burden you should have to carry the rest of your life, um, and that's that's where kind of my journey to seeking help started, um, and it was through a friend, it was through one of my NCOs on the team who, you know, I've just, I've always trusted.
Speaker 2:He was always kind of a confidant to to check, like, hey, what do you think here? Is this, does this make sense? Just really smart guy, um, and when I found out that he was getting help and he told me his problems, that he was having, um, I was like, dude, that's the same shit I'm going through. And he's like, yeah, he's like so, um, it's like once I found somebody that I trusted and I knew that they were getting help, I was like, oh, shoot, man, I thought that I had no idea you were going through this. Yeah, like, yeah, man, so that's what it took for me.
Speaker 2:And like, as much as we say that we care about mental health, um, I got shut down several times trying to seek help, even within our own community, before I finally found somebody that worked for and just kind of break down that process. You know, when you get done with the deployment, you have a post-deployment health assessment and there's always questions and you do it like you know, a couple days after you get back and then 90 days again, and when you that it's like you're always like, just, I'm just gonna rush through this, dude, I just want to go on leave, I just want to be done. Uh. And of course they ask all the mental health questions have you considered hurting yourself? Do you want to hurt other people? Did you experience anything terrible? All that stuff. And usually you just kind of like blast your way through, you're like, nope, typical deployment is what it is.
Speaker 2:And on one of those, um, because it was my first deployment to afghanistan, I had a subsequent one after that, even dealing with all this stuff, um. So for the second one, I was honest about it. I was like, yeah, I do have dark thoughts, I do have problems and because of how much we talk about, how much we care about mental health, I was sure that that would pop up something to where the help would come to me. I was like, all right, I'm going to do it, I'm going to tell the truth on this one. And it was like nothing came back, you know, and I was like, okay, well, I guess, and that that automatically already told me that my problems weren't serious enough. Because I was like, well, I was honest, I told I wrote exactly what I was feeling and all this stuff. And nobody saw this and reached out and said, hey, do you want to talk to somebody, or hey, we're going to make you talk to somebody. So it already kind of invalidated my trauma because I was like, okay, well, obviously I didn't pass the threshold for whether to have somebody help me nothing wrong okay, all right, so I guess I'm normal good, good to know um
Speaker 2:and then before my second deployment, um, you know you sit down with, uh, you sit down with a counselor. You know I have my wife there and we were like, hey, we know this is gonna suck it always does. It's tough for my wife when I'm gone. We have a ton of kids and a lot of responsibilities. So we did like a pre-deployment couples counseling, um, and I kind of like started letting things out, things that I hadn't even told my wife about, um, um, like fairly nonchalantly, just kind of, I guess, again throwing that line out and hoping that maybe it catches something to help. Um, you know, and I'll kind of go into it. I was like, yeah, I've got a problem. I've I've, you know, killed a couple of young, uh, young soldiers and it really, really bothers me, uh, and sometimes I cry at night and you know that stuff. And like the response I got from the counselor was like, yeah, that can be really hard. I'm like, okay, you're right, yeah it is.
Speaker 2:so I was like all right, well, here we are. So again, like I had two things from my own community support network that basically kind of invalidated my need to get help, because I tried reaching out, which is already hard enough to do and when it didn't happen, when nothing really came from it or I didn't feel like I was taken seriously on it, then I just assumed that this is something everybody has problems with and my problems aren't bad enough to need professional help. And that lasted like it lasted a couple of years. That basically built like whatever wall I moved out of the way to be able to have the confidence to talk to somebody about it. I just built it up five times stronger, because now I was vulnerable and it got kind of like thrown in my face Like, oh well, geez, I'm just being a wimp. Just you know, that is what it is.
Speaker 1:That's why it's so important to have trauma-informed care from our providers within the soft community, individuals that understand and that response man. Like I know this happened years ago, but I'm sorry you went through that man. I'm sorry you went through that because that in that moment that could have been the catalyst for help. That could have been the moment where it's like wait a second. I could have started healing years before I did.
Speaker 2:The effects on my family, the effects on my job. Basically, what I had done to myself was I had applied so much guilt to my own actions that I didn't feel like I really deserve to be successful anymore. Um, and every time I would get like, every time I would get on a roll. You know you're in the roll, you're, you're hitting the gym, you're feeling good, you're knocking out all of your requirements at work and just things feel good. I could only handle that for so long before I felt like I needed to crash and burn because I didn't feel like I was allowed to be successful, because I owed it I owed it to the universe to not be successful anymore, um, just because of the things that I'd done, and that's, that's the feeling that I kept again for years. So I was like I was 75% of my capacity pretty much the whole rest of my career, and I'll always regret not having been better when I could have been, because I just didn't. I didn't feel like I was allowed to, and it sucks for the guys that worked underneath me. It sucks for the ambitions I had and the things that I could have done, and you know, in the end it is an excuse, but you know that's how it affected me and I wish I would have figured this whole thing out sooner. But here we are with with platforms available where it's okay to be outspoken about these sorts of things, to let guys know like, hey, you, you don't have to live this way and you know you can get help, and all those things. And if you try the first time or try the second time, don't just stop. You know, not every person you talk to is going to resonate with you.
Speaker 2:And you know, now I have the one person that I've worked with and you know she was the one that was able to crack the code. She was the one who was able to really dive deep and I mean, it was so hard, man, the first geez. I was there a couple of times a week for months when I first started and I hated those days so much, like the emotional pain of telling the story over and over again in detail and just closing my eyes and putting myself back in that spot. It would just crush me for the whole rest of the day. I was just emotionally completely wiped out.
Speaker 2:And then then it got a little bit easier. Then then it got a little bit easier, and then it got a little bit easier and once I was finally able to go through it without completely breaking down, we were able to diagnose why am I applying this to myself? Why am I punishing myself for this? You know, um, and that's that's what that journey looked like. And it was, yeah, man, it sucked, but, um, on the other side of it and I don't think I'll ever be fully on the other side of it, I still get help, but, um, it's, it's way better than it was, um, infinitely better yeah, it's a lot of people when they're they're still haven't taken those brave steps to getting help.
Speaker 1:We often think that man like I really need a silver bullet or magic wand to fix this. Once we like actually admit that there's something wrong. We are looking for a magic wand, but the reality is there isn't.
Speaker 1:Yeah it takes a lot of fucking work it takes a lot of freaking work and you said it, sometimes it's like triage. You get through working on the patient. What do you do? You reassess yeah, go through. We look at it. There's the people that I look up to, that have dealt with so much, that have gone the distance. They'll tell you the same thing every single time. It's a process, it's a journey. I have good days, I have bad days. That's the reality.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you just need to get to a point, to where there's more good days than bad days and you need to understand how to manage the bad days. And where my tipping point was is again going back to the analogy of shoving that stuff in the dump pouch is that it just got too full. And I would have these situations where I knew I had to do something about it and because I was just so guilty about it, my time to process was usually at night, you know, when the kids were all in bed and my wife was down for the night, I would put on. I had like my list of songs. They were like my depression songs and I would sit in the kitchen and I would just do dishes or whatever and I would put these songs on. They were all like war songs or things. And because I wanted to be in pain um, I wanted, I wanted to feel harder and I would just break down and I would cry to myself like just listening to these, because I knew I knew that they would trigger me. So I purposefully did it, because I would be like, okay, I can do this when no one's looking, I could get this out and this might last a while. This might last me a couple of weeks before I have another breakdown. This might last another couple of days maybe.
Speaker 2:And it got to the point to where my method of controlling this at night was spreading beyond my boundaries, which were at night, away from anybody, so nobody knew to where I would start having situations while I'm driving, like I would completely zone out and I would put myself back in the situation and then you know when you kind of like you don't wake up, but you wake up and you realize you've been driving for 15 miles and you're like, oh my gosh, I don't remember a single thing that I did for the last, however many miles I've just been on autopilot and one of the most alarming ones was I was driving my kids to school and it was a situation like that where I kind of snapped back into the reality. I was like holy cow, like this is so dangerous because I'm driving with my kids. There's other people on the road that I could affect. If anything was different about my road that day, if there was a detour, if there's somebody slammed on their brakes, if anything was different than being able to basically autopilot your way up the road, um, I wouldn't have even been aware to react to something like that, because mechanically I was there, but mentally I was not even in that car.
Speaker 2:And that's when I knew, like I was like I'm going to hurt somebody who doesn't deserve this because I'm not dealing with this, and that was, that was the biggest part where I realized this, this has to, this has to end somehow. Yeah, Um, and it did, um, you know, I, I was able to finally let everything out. I was able to finally process all this trauma and get to a point to where I could, in a healthy way, manage this stuff and move forward. But, yeah, it wasn't until I thought I was affecting other people that I really knew this can't go on.
Speaker 1:It's exactly what so many of us finally have that revelation, if we realize that it's affecting our wives, it's affecting our work and everybody else in that team. Look, when they don't work within the community, when they don't know Rangers, green Berets, navy SEALs we wear a mask and it's really fucking good we hide so much. I have met in pain is one thing. We all know that one EA or E7 that's struggling with a hip that needs to be replaced uh, two shoulders are gone. Guys hide pain so well, but they hide emotional distress and they hide mental health issues even better. They're the ones with that can make you laugh. They're saying the jokes.
Speaker 1:And I, looking back on my own journey, right before I had my own mental break, I was going to a um freaking peer-to-peer support class and talking about the importance of going in and getting help. Yeah, and, and that's the reality, that's why it's so difficult with our community. When you look back at yourself, were there any moments where anybody within that team room, any one of your close friends, was like, hey, chief, there's something going on, or were you able to maintain that mask?
Speaker 2:No, I was able to maintain it. The bar, like the guys in this community, are so freaking good that even at you know, a lower capacity than we can achieve, they're still excellent. You know what I mean. Like you, can be broken and still be highly effective. And that's why in this community it's so hard to spot things like that, because we're so driven and there's such a high op tempo that we're so it's so easy for us to be distracted.
Speaker 2:And it's when the downtime comes is when it gets way more dangerous. And that's why it doesn't happen all the way, that's why it didn't happen right after a deployment. That's why you get those random calls that hey, our former teammate that retired two years ago, he just smoked himself, you know. Or hey, this dude just freaking, went to jail for meth and domestic violence three years after he got out. And you're like dude, what in the fuck? This guy was good to go, he was a good dude, he wasn't a problem.
Speaker 2:And again, it's because we're able, like when you have an op tempo, when you have a passion, you have a drive and you have people around you that you're afraid to disappoint, you're so capable of still putting in the work, and it's when that downtime comes, it is when you know if you didn't catch those indicators. You know guys end up taking their own lives and it sucks that we're so good at it, but it's also necessary sometimes because in the end there's a job to do. Yeah, but we have to figure out how to do both. Um and normalizing mental maintenance, just like our spiritual and our physical and our marriage, like normalizing all those things we have to maintain in our life. But adding in mental health, uh, has to be the answer we talked about in the last, you know, first time.
Speaker 1:We talked how sorry I have a short-term memory TBI moment here Welcome to Secure Podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and here we are. But yeah, so where I'm headed without my segue, which I forgot where I was headed, there we have to be able to. Oh yeah, yeah, that's right, it was results may vary. That's where we kind of talked into. Like your, your soft experience may vary. You might be a perpetual jay set guy. You might be a guy who's got freaking, two silver stars and eight purple hearts. It just is what it is.
Speaker 2:But because, because we have that environment, we immediately discredit our own trauma, because we always compare ourselves to somebody else. You're like man, I've only gotten in five firefights. This guy's gotten in 10 firefights. Hey, this guy lost two teammates on this deployment. Or, oh my gosh, this guy went on this op and, freaking, it went completely south.
Speaker 2:And so, like you're constantly thinking of people who have done more what you think to be more traumatic experiences, or you're constantly thinking of people who have done more what you think to be more traumatic experiences, or you're constantly comparing yourself to other guys in the community and you're like man, those guys did this and I only did this. So who am I to have trauma If this guy's doing okay? Well, you don't know. That guy's doing okay and you can't compare your stuff to other people's stuff. You have to manage your own shit.
Speaker 2:Um, and a lot of times you do find out that, oh, this dude that I thought it was doing great, she said he's actually wasn't.
Speaker 2:He was actually getting help too, but we just keep it so private that, um, you know, we, we, again, we, we disqualify ourselves because we're always comparing ourselves to everybody else in our own community. So reach out to those guys it's okay to talk to, to talk to guys that have been through horrible situations like, hey, man, like I know it's been tough, but how did did this bother you afterwards? Did you go seek help after this? And I don't, I mean, I don't know anybody that would just be like, shut up, I didn't need help. Or, like I think most people in the community you know, as a brother, would be willing to be like, yeah, man, uh, I'm still getting help for this. Or yeah, man, like I managed this inappropriately with a bottle for years. Or yeah, I've tasted what a nine millimeter barrel tastes, like you know. And you find more and more guys that are in that situation. So, again, you have to normalize processing your trauma without comparing it to somebody else like your shit is your shit yeah, it's so true.
Speaker 1:Trauma is trauma and what you've gone through and it's. We have to understand too that before you came in the military, you were also just another human being that could have experienced a whole different form of traumatic events. You have to take the entire life into perspective. If you grew up in a violent, chaotic background, if you had a childhood that was just absolute, the worst manageable things ever, that plays a huge factor. You have to understand that it's not just your experience in the military. You have to look at your entire life and be willing to do the work, because you can't just put that behind a wall and say I don't need to look at this trauma. It didn't happen in the military, it wasn't combat related. All of it matters. Everything you experience in life, it's all connected.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it doesn't go away. You have to live with it. That has to be a part of your life Because again, it just it piles up and piles up and piles up and eventually it's got to come out somewhere. So you know, hopefully you've got a good way of dealing with that when it comes out. Most of us think we do until we don't.
Speaker 2:You know, um, and alcohol is a huge problem with that, and there's so many guys have ruined their, their lives and their relationships because they just want to numb that pain, they just want to get rid of it. And you know we're so reliant on I'm super anti-pharmaceutical for a lot of things. I've seen guys with PTSD get extremely over-medicated and the problem is they don't just give them two pills, they give them a couple pills to help with their depression, but those pills have side effects. So they give them five more to deal with those side effects, and then they give them a couple more to deal with those side effects and all of a sudden you've got a guy who's got this cocktail of bullshit that he has to be on to just be a former, just to just become a shell of himself, living through life as a fucking pharmaceutical assisted zombie, and that's what we have done to so many people, and it doesn't need to just have to be mental health. We do it to guys with, like, chronic back pain. We do things like, you know again, put people on painkillers hey, these painkillers make me suicidal. Here's some antidepressants hey, these antidepressants do this. Well, let's throw some more in the mix and dude, it's so, so bad.
Speaker 2:And I know there's a lot of um, there's a lot of uh lobbyists right now that are really trying to push for natural medicines, really try to push for, like, um, you know, microdosing and psilocybin and things like that. Um, and you know, especially, cannabis. I've seen guys lives turned around by getting off all of their meds and going towards cannabis. Um, you know, and it was like it was eyeopening, like, like a guy that I thought was just done for it, just a zombie all of a sudden has a normal life and he can grow his own plants, he can make his own medicine and it's free. And I think that's where we run into, you know, and not to get super conspiratorial here, but look, man, there's good medicine that doesn't cost a lot at all. And then there's things made in a lab that will fuck you up for a long time and the taxpayers are going to pay for it and it's very expensive. Yeah, so you know, take what you want for with that, but uh, I can tell you that I'm in the same boat.
Speaker 1:These compounds were not meant to exist within your body for your entire life. They arguably cause a lot more damage than they do good, and at the very beginning I needed medication. I needed it and then I realized that, hey, do I want to live the rest of my life just taking medication, or do I want to learn about the things that I'm dealing with and figure out how I can adapt my behavior, figure out how I can be better suited for my, my long-term health by just understanding the things that I have to change in my life, rather than just going the easy route?
Speaker 2:you're you're masking it. You know all you're doing is you're you're putting something over the pain and you're making it numb and you're moving through life. You know all you're doing is you're putting something over the pain and you're making it numb, and you're moving through life and you're not forced to process it correctly. And even whether it's a physical injury, like, yeah, like a knee thing, like if you can take a couple pills a day and not have knee pain at all, where's your drive to seek physical therapy? Where's your drive to do something that's going to improve your joint health, when you can take something and not feel it and forget about it?
Speaker 1:um, it's that comfort over pain, and I think more, more of us need to understand that there is an importance in being in discomfort. There is a benefit to it. There is a benefit to choosing discomfort over comfort.
Speaker 1:Whether it's just looking at the data for your longevity of your organs, or looking at the things where you can adapt, like, okay, maybe I can't do this because, hey, there's no cartilage in that knee. Well, there's a different exercise I can do. I don't need to take all this medication, just so I don't feel the pain. And understanding the language too. Language is powerful. If I'm telling myself that I'm always in pain which is the number one thing I hear from a lot of veterans it's I'm always in pain. My back's messed up, I'm always in pain. Okay, change the script. Are you always in pain or are you in pain when you do X, y and Z? What can you do to improve that area? There's tons of efficacy that have shown. Mindfulness, yoga, Tai Chi have helped with pain, but we don't talk about it as much.
Speaker 2:No, I think until you get to the other side it's really hard to realize how young most of us are when we get out, comparatively, and how much more life we have to live because this is such a cool job and it's such a high point and such an accomplishment that you get out and like, for me, I retired at 37. And once I got out I was like is that is this? It Is this the coolest thing I'm ever going to do in my life? And now I'm just going to sit and be in pain for the rest of my life. And I and I asked that for guys that are physically broken as well Like, are you guys cool with just taking pills and just like living in pain the rest of your life? Like 37, 38, 39, 50, like those are all pretty young ages if you can maintain your health. So like, don't do that to yourself, don't think that you're going to get out, and then then that's it. You're.
Speaker 2:The first chapter of your life was the final chapter. It's like no man like you have so much more time to to conquer the world and chase your pursuits and do things that keep yourself healthy and don't turn yourself into a zombie. Like there's so much more on the other side, so much more opportunity, that what you did before can just be that it's what you did before, yeah, but yeah, there's so much more life to live to decide to to just like close the door on ambition when you get out. You know, being an SF guy doesn't have to be the best thing you've ever done. It can just be something that developed you into who you are so you can continue to achieve great things.
Speaker 1:Exactly, and that goes right in hand with mental health. If you just get out and tell yourself, hey, I did the greatest thing ever, that's going to really quickly deteriorate your well-being If you don't constantly try to achieve something new or try to Look. You're a goal-oriented person. You are, if Don't constantly try to achieve something new or try to look you're a goal oriented person you were.
Speaker 1:If you were Green Beret, if you're a Ranger, seal, air Force, special Operations, you're a part of the soft professions. You were goal oriented, you were chasing something. If you don't go into this next chapter doing the same thing, actively, engage, creatively, passionately, looking for that next thing you're going to, you're not going to blossom, You're going to turn inward, you're going to get, you're going to lose color, you're going to lose that, that powerful person you were. And then you're going to look like this, really like bleak individual that's just doing a nine to five. And we've seen it. I know, I've seen, I've seen some of the guys I looked up to that got out, older star majors that went on to do nothing and they don't look like they were. They don't look like the vibrant individual that you looked up to. They look sad, they look defeated because they just accepted that they did the greatest thing ever. It's like no, that was a stepping stone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, stepping stone, yeah, and and it's it's so common it's almost a trope now that, yeah, you know, you think of the guy walking around the px or the commissary with his I served hat, just like looking for joe, you know, either to correct or to tell them how much better it was when you were in, or to tell, you know, corner these poor guys and like, tell them stories and stuff, and like, because you're just constantly trying to relive what you were and who you were, um, and I go on post occasionally. You know I'll go to the commissary, uh, and I I try so hard to to, not, I just want to be a gray man even there. Um, you know, I I don't want to be associated with it. I don't want to like corner people like that's their career, that's their thing. I did my thing. But yeah, like I don't want to rest on those laurels. Yeah, what I did was pretty cool, but I can do more. You know there's more to life, there's more to my story. And yeah, guys, I think guys need to understand that when you get out world, like your critical thinking, like your ability to problem solve, your ability to like take a step back, look at the environment, assess how to approach. It is so valuable in this world right now.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, and just our pragmatic approach to things, like you know, when people ask like what, what a mission looks like for sf, or why they're considered, like what makes them different, you say, hey, x team, we're going to put you in this country and we need you to do this incredibly tall order. Okay, great, I'm going to need, um, I'm going to need ISR assets, I'm going to be these types of vehicles, I'm going to need $2 million, I'm going to be I'm going to need all these things to be successful. And then hire says we're going to give you a pallet of MREs, a couple of guns and a broken ATV. And you're like, okay, all right, we'll figure it out.
Speaker 2:And that mindset of we'll take what we have and we're going to figure out and we're going to accomplish that mission, that's something that's so ingrained in these guys that is such an incredibly powerful tool on the outside, because a lot of people don't possess that or never had to possess that mentality that, like gosh, they're so like. I get fired up about it because, like our guy, our guys could be so good, you know, but we put ourselves in a hole and say that we don't need to be good anymore like guys. Stop, just use this as a launch point you know, chase your passions, chase your dreams and do something incredible.
Speaker 2:You know you have the mindset to do it before and just because nobody's forcing you to do it doesn't mean you have to let it go. And I promise, because I go through bouts of depression, I go through bouts of like am I doing the right thing? Why am I putting myself in a position where I can set myself up for failure? But when I'm on a roll and things are working and when I'm like, it's the pursuit of passion and and that fires me up, that makes me want to wake up early, that makes me want to work out, that makes me want to be a better father, husband, person. Um, so yeah, like that's such a huge part of mental health. Getting out too is find a drive and chase something you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah it's every person I talk to that's coming into that transition period in their life. They want to immediately kill that fear. They want reassurance. And I tell them the same thing Like, look, you don't want the easy route, you don't want it the easy way out. It's not going to be the thing that keeps you happy. I'm telling you fear is good, you're not going to fail. That's one thing I want you to know. You're not going to be the thing that keeps you happy. I'm telling you fear is good, you're not going to fail. That's one thing I want you to know. You're not going to fail in this transition. You're too good.
Speaker 1:But the fear that fire in your belly is needed, let that be the thing that pushes you to learn about the industries that you're interested in. Looking at the different courses of action, that fear is important. But know that you're going to succeed, because there's so many different individuals and so many transition specialists and different groups and organizations out there that want to make it seem like it can be an easy thing and it's incredibly challenging for everybody. Everybody will have their own test and challenge going through it, but it's okay to understand that you've been through this before. You've been in the unknown. Your entire career, you've been trained to go into the unknown. This is no different, and when you embrace that and when you go into that transition period excited, even though it's scary, you're going to be way more successful than the individuals that get paralyzed by it or just look for the easy way out. Don't go for the easy way.
Speaker 2:We put civilians who have just been living a normal civilian life, at whatever industry they're in, on such a high pedestal because we think that we just don't have anything that they have.
Speaker 2:Because, well, I was just an army guy, I just know army stuff. But your mentality and your soft skills that you have are such a force multiplier to any employer out there that I would hire a completely unskilled for my own company, green Beret, who has a passion and a drive, long before I would hire somebody who's been running a camera for 10 years, if they don't have the same mentality. Because I can teach a team guy, I can teach a special operator to run equipment we do it all the time but I can't teach and mold a technician how to have the mindset and how to have the drive and how to have the problem solving skills to where I can completely trust them in a short amount of time. Like and that's the thing like you have to realize that you are coming into it, you're coming into the serving to the civilian world as a freaking weapon. Like you are so powerful in whatever you do.
Speaker 2:You just have to learn how to sell that and say, hey, hey, man, like I can work with this company, I can do this, I'm a natural leader, I can problem solve. I will be honest with you because I'm okay being honest and saying this isn't going to work. We have to do something different. Um, so yeah, like guys we're, we are so much more capable than we think we are when we enter the workforce on the other side of things. But you have to process your own shit, you have to be willing to put yourself out there. But, man, it's not over when you get out. That's just the beginning. That's just the next chapter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, one of the biggest things that I realized that guys need help with is just understanding that, how unique they are, coming from our community. That's why it's so important to share stories such as yours, like the ability to show an alternate path to finding what success looks like. Everybody thinks that they have to have the same path, get out contract, and that works for a lot of people, but it also doesn't serve a lot of people. I think everybody needs to understand that you can be successful in the most unconventional ways. When you get out, you just have to be willing to listen to yourself and it's sounds cheesy, but, man, follow your heart. Dig deep into, like, who you are, and that's why identity is such a hard piece for all of us. It's like you're more than the beret and the long tab. Start digging into who you are, figure out what's important to you, and I want to ask, like, when you started doing that work, what did you identify? Were like the top, like most important things for your next chapter.
Speaker 2:I would say figuring out what, like balancing happiness and talk all but you can't yeah.
Speaker 2:That I never dad's going to make it home. I never want my wife to wonder are we going to make this house payment, you know? So that's the biggest struggle is do I chase easy stability, which, with the resume of most guys getting out, you can find a good job. You can find a good high paying job. You can find a good remote. You can find a good high-paying job. You can find a good, remote, moderate-paying job. Really quickly. It's not hard to find a job to make money on the outside. It's really not.
Speaker 2:And again, going back to the asset, you're mixing and if that's what makes you happy and if that provides a stable platform for your kids and family to do the experiences you want, then by all means go for it. But if it doesn't, if you're not happy, maybe there's something else that you can choose. Maybe there's something else you can chase, something you can do. It's okay to start over. We're still young. You can go to trade school. You want to be a welder. You want to be a fabricator, you want to do HVAC, you want to do something where you work with your hands. It's okay to do that.
Speaker 2:But the biggest challenge is am I going to leave my family struggling by chasing my dreams, because I've already chased one dream, so is it fair for me to chase a second dream and put my family in another unstable situation in the meantime?
Speaker 2:And that's where you really have to balance. How do I do this? So for me, that was the biggest challenge and the biggest hurdle on starting my own business, and it's still the same thing that comes every now and then when things aren't working out or I'm like, hey, client flow is slow. I'm like, dude, what am I doing? Should I just hang this up? Why should my family ever have to worry about money when I could just go get an easy nine to five job and just be a robot? You know and that was probably the hardest thing for me is being willing to take that leap and invest and believe in myself to create something that I'm passionate about but also provides enough stability for my family. That's a hard hurdle that everyone's going to have to look at differently, with their own financial situations and their own passions. You know how profitable your own passions can be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's something that everybody needs to be able to reflect on for a little bit. I mean, it's like look, you come out and go straight into the entrepreneurial route. Like you have to be able to look at the the all the factors, not just stay married to one course of action, but once you figure out like you'll find your footing, you'll find your ability to like equalize, going through it. But just understand that, hey, it takes a lot of work and there's resources too. Like there's so many things you can do, like being able to go back to school to offset some of that cashflow. Like being able to go back to school to offset some of that cash flow. Like being able to get paid to go back to school. Man, that's something that nobody talked about.
Speaker 2:No, everybody's gone. You have to go through the TAP process and even for at least at Carson, they've got two tiers of TAP. They have the regular. Everybody goes through it, like from guys retiring to guys ETSing, to guys getting chaptered, and then there's the executive course, which is supposed to be all guys who are retiring, or like upper echelon guys who are getting out. But you know, on day one when they're like okay, guys, you're gonna get out of the army, so remember, civilians don't know all these acronyms. You have to speak like a normal person. I'm like all right, great man. It's just like a week of like.
Speaker 2:It's extreme fire hose to where the things that are important just get lost over and they create a situation to where all you want to do is just leave because you've got clearing to do. You just want to get home. You've got other shit to work on that you like so much of the tap program that you get is either irrelevant or so much common sense that you're like you blow off the rest of it. And I found out about veterans programs that I didn't even hear about in tap that are so powerful like just the other day I found out that there's a there's grants for first-time veteran farmers because the Department of Agriculture, they want more veteran farmers. So even for my own ranch here I'm like well shoot, that's another business opportunity that I didn't even know about. There's voc rehab you want to get your pilot's license, you want to freaking like you know, you want someone to pay for your equipment, to start a carpet cleaning company, whatever it is. There's so many things out there that we don't even know about because we're inundated with all this. I don't want to call it useless, because I'm sure it's helpless for somebody, but tap, I did not come out of tap feeling like I knew all the things that were out there for me. Um, I'm learning about them from guys that got out. I'm learning out them.
Speaker 2:After somebody else figured it out, it's like hey, did you know that? I just heard about this Dude. There's, there's a lot of opportunity out there that we don't even know about, um, that that I hope they can revamp and maybe even they need like a soft tap where it's like hey, this is in-house, we take care of our own, we now provide companies, come in that can help you network or whatever. Like I really do think we need something that's a little bit more bespoke than hey, go down and hang out with all the guys in fourth id that are getting out. Um, you know, and let I don't know, just kind of figured out. So, um, yeah, there's a lot more opportunities than you think.
Speaker 2:Um, so, like, use that year. I mean hell, I think guys are getting like almost two years to get ready to get out. Now, like, yeah, when I was, when I was in the process of getting out, they just passed that thing for ncos, which is like, hey, guys, if you put in, if you sign this statement, that's saying hey, at this time I'm putting my packet in. Dude, these guys are almost and it hasn't worked for everybody, but a lot of guys untouchable 24 months, go take care of your shit, which is the right answer to be able to help guys prepare for things. But, like, let's maximize that time, you know. Let's actually like help these dudes figure out what they can do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they just got rid of it at seventh group. It was Red Empire time, which is horrible. They need to bring it back. They don't do enough for guys. Look, the failure was on the command, not the individual. So build up a proper transition. We have to get out of this mindset that we're going to let nonprofits and benevolent organizations and individuals solve the problems for us. There's one man right now Huge shout out to Dan Rayburn, no-transcript professionals and I can't thank him enough and he's I mean anybody that's been through any of his transition classes will tell you worth its weight in gold. I mean, the thing, the things he's doing for individuals, is fucking amazing.
Speaker 2:But, yeah, our own command he, he came out to our group as well. Yeah, and it was the same thing. He, he will change your mindset as far as letting you know just how valuable you are. And that was a huge W Because, again, it was like holy cow.
Speaker 2:You've now taken away this big fear that I'm just going to be a has-been and you'd let me know that I do have power, that I do carry a lot of weight on the outside world, and it's 100%, 100, true, but he has the corporate experience to back it up. So and say, hey, here's all these guys that were successful, that were all former team guys, and then they hired more team guys and it just, yeah, it's just this big network of stuff. Yeah, huge asset. So yeah, if if this guy's coming to your group, um, and you're doing whatever we call it summit week or whatever, I think the summit at 10th group, basically, where you come in and guys were transitioning, they have these classes. But yeah, if, if Dan is going to your groups, listen to the guy because he he does kind of help put into perspective what you're bringing to the table as a, as a former team guy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he does some amazing work. I mean he'll he'll fly you out and take you into the NAB streaming show and get you in front of people that are hiring, and that's how amazing this dude is. But don't just and I'm speaking to individuals that probably won't listen to this if you're within the command suite, you need to do better. If you're in seventh group, bring back Red Empire time and give them real transition support. Not just put them off into a corner and say we're done with you Because guess what they?
Speaker 2:have to look at the. It's a long game Like there was this push and I don't know how active it still is or who's still involved in it. But when they were looking at the invasion of Afghanistan, how to get in, like, do you know how many people were in the Situation room figuring out how to do that? There were actual special operators. Or how many people in Congress at that time had experience in special operations? It was like one guy. There wasn't enough. So if you're not preparing your guys to be successful and giving them all the tools that they can, we need to get more of us into those situations that dictate where our boys go. We need special operators in Congress. We need special operators who run large businesses. We need people to continue to do that so they can advocate for us, so they can lobby for the community.
Speaker 2:So when they say, hey, what do you guys think about Afghanistan 2.0? You know, should we go there and build another couple of Burger Kings, make another perpetual war? Let's go for 40 years this time. Raytheon is doing pretty good right now. Maybe we can have some be like, hey, no, that's not how we use special operations, that's not how we win wars, we don't need to go there and create mega cities to put ourselves into, you know, perpetuity.
Speaker 2:We need to go in with a mission set, we need to go, get it done. We need to be strong, we need to be out of it and then we need to get the fuck out because we're using our guys inappropriately, we're burning them out. Who's going to advocate for these guys if we all just get out and just do meaningful meeting? You know, just jobs that aren't contributing to that. So, yeah, we do need guys with ambition to grow and be a huge part of the community. So, um, yeah, like even if you're thinking, uh, my, my special operations time is done. You know well, maybe there is more things you can do, maybe you can become a voice, and there are guys that are doing it. We're starting to get more guys, more SEALs and more, you know, tab guys that are moving into politics, that are moving into local government, and that is going to be huge.
Speaker 1:It is. We need more representation. I always say that the best and brightest of our men and women were sent to war for 20 years and there's no wonder why our country is the way it is. We can start changing that if our soft professionals and like-minded veterans from all across the service start leading within their community, start changing things in the community, start being of service again, start running for office. Look, we spent an entirety of our adult lives trying to solve complex problems in really bad places, so now it's our turn to try to solve you know complex problems here at home. We have the knowledge, we have the tools. We just have to be willing to do the work. And, Brian, before I let you go, I want you to share some of the tools that you lean on. Now that you've been through the worst of it, what are some things that you still do to this day to help you stay on your mental health journey?
Speaker 2:Yep, um, so one is I fairly actively revisit my trauma, um, you know I kind of talked before about I had these songs I would listen to. You know my my depression playlist, um, and I still put those on, uh, and I still, but I treat them very differently. I treat them as a, as a song of strength. I can now sing the lyrics without breaking down Um, and I allow myself to go into that place and to be triumphant in my processing. So I know that it's not keeping me down anymore. So I do revisit my trauma. I don't forget about the things that I've done, um, but I I access it in a more healthy manner. I let it out and and, yeah, it still breaks me down a little bit, it still makes me sad, it still makes me, you know, regret certain things. But what it doesn't do is it doesn't tear me apart anymore and it doesn't hold me back from my aspirations. So I constantly revisit that um. I also still do occasional counseling and I went about a year and a half without it because when I um, when I retired, I I wasn't clear on on how to continue that process. You know it was easy when you're in, because I can go to my pcm. They get me appointments with you know, they have the intrepid spirit I I think they have it a couple of groups now and that's where I went for my TBI and for my PTSD stuff, um.
Speaker 2:But then when I got out I was like, oh, what do I do? How do I do this? How does TRICARE work? Wait, healthcare is not free. I actually have to pay for it still. You know how long I didn't know that. My entire career I thought you retire and you get free healthcare. Dude, that's not true. You just get access to TRICARE still and you pay for it. Like I mean, it is great, but it's not what I believed my entire career. Um, but I did, uh, I did start recently and this is only because my my therapist got out and started a private practice that's in network, so there's no copay, I can do as many as appointments as I want and it's super easy.
Speaker 2:So, um, so I still do that. I do that as just a checkup, a life check, to see how I'm doing and just to keep myself in check. But yeah, I, I don't memory hole my trauma anymore and that's been one of the most helpful things because I don't have big breakdowns. I don't have those because I'm constantly living with it and I I just kind of do it that way. What works for me might not work for everybody else. You know, everybody's going to have their own way to manage things like that, but that has been, um. That has probably been one of the biggest players on me being able to move forward without going deep down into depression again.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, man. Well, brian, I can't thank you enough for coming back on and sharing this with us. Brother, it's going to be impactful, not just for our soft professionals but to any veteran, because, like we said before, trauma is trauma and if we can show people how we've overcome ours and what helped us might not, you know, not every tool may help them, but some of it might, and it'll help somebody start on their journey. Thank you for being here again, brother, and I can't wait to have you back on to talk about your next endeavor. Man, before you go, how can people get a hold of you if they'd like to talk to you some more about your journey?
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, I mean I'm on Instagram. I'm not super active there, but you can kind of see what I'm doing on that side, both on the business side and on the just my life part. But I can drop my contact info in your show notes. Perfect, and at any time. Any vet is able to reach out. If you want to talk about my paths on the business world, if you want to talk about you know, maybe you're scared to talk to about somebody your own trauma or whatever you'd reach out, I'm happy to help anybody at any time.
Speaker 2:Move forward, it's all you know. Rising tides lift all ships. Let's collect the best ships we can and do our best, you know, in a positive way. Um, and to leave just on um, I guess kind of one note avoiding your problems is not strength, you know. Put yourself into perspective on that Strength is facing your problems and moving past them. So if you've kind of manipulated your way into thinking a strong man doesn't have to process his trauma because he can move through it, no, avoiding your problems is not strength, facing your problems and moving through them is strength. So just use that mindset and make yourself better. Don't become a statistic.
Speaker 1:Hell yeah, brother, I can't say anything better, so we'll end it on that note. Thank you all for tuning in Again. Brian Ryan Ray, thank you for being here. We'll catch you all next time. Till then, take care, if you like what we're doing and you enjoying the show, don't forget to share us, like us, subscribe and remember we get through this together. Take care, thank you.
