Charlie Mike The Podcast
Charlie Mike The Podcast
Guardians of Growth: Policing, Parenting, and Purpose
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As a Navy veteran and Houston police officer, Matthew's life is a tapestry of service and sacrifice, intertwined with the unwavering love for his daughter and community. Across the table, we have Donald, whose athletic prowess is now channeled into fueling young dreams with his Developmental League. Together, we navigate their stories of triumph and trial, illustrating the profound impact of mentorship, family values, and the quest for balance in a life dedicated to others.
The Birdwell Foundation
https://www.birdwellfoundation.org
Battle Bud Project
http://Battlebudproject.com
Silent Screams: Part Two Poems from The Front Line
https://a.co/d/aYvHyPH
Unmasking The Warrior
https://a.co/d/gROm7ff
Silent Scream: Part One
https://a.co/d/bBKe7eu
Battle Bud Podcast
https://open.spotify.com/show/4wF4xy32OCDsprnurK1LfG?si=lD2g7832QDqg-rXbzu2W7A
Dr. Motivate
https://www.facebook.com/share/ynQCZfaBENnK8bkz/?mibextid=LQQJ4d
DBD Leagues
https://www.DBDLEAGUES.COM
Iowa Colony Junior Pioneers Youth Football
https://www.facebook.com/share/Jgn9jPUNRBHvLHAJ/?mibextid=LQQJ4d
Donald Brown Developmental League
https://www.facebook.com/share/1TFLcpPKR8Fvoohv/?mibextid=LQQJ4d
101 Days Of Inspiration
https://a.co/d/dtLl3Zi
Run To Recovery 5K
https://www.facebook.com/share/iJd51DneHmdxsGiu/?mibextid=LQQJ4d
Email Contact For Donald Brown
DrMotivateLLC@gmail.com
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Website
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Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNyGgJYIgU8b02NypoJgHAg
Charlie Mike Military Apparel
Veteran Owned & Operated
This is Charlie Mike the podcast Veterans helping veterans. Talking about things happening in the veteran community, Things we've experienced and overcome, such as addictions, PTSD, depression, legal trouble, and we also promote veteran-owned businesses. If you're talking about it, we're talking about it. This is Charlie Mike the podcast.
Speaker 2Yo, what's going on everybody? Welcome back to another episode of Charlie Mike the podcast. As always, I'm your host, Raul man man. Today I got two special guests in the house. All of you know my good friend matthew from shit. What does he not do? Yeah, he's a navy veteran, houston police officer author, uh, executive director, and a foundation you're. You have your own non-profit yes, sir and you do a, you do a podcast. Yes, sir man you got a little bit of everything man.
Speaker 3Trying to man, Trying to hit all angles, man. How's everything been what you been doing, man, man it's been great, yeah, yeah, man Spending a lot of time with the princess, my daughter.
Speaker 2I saw you, man. I saw you at the. Where'd I see you? At the rodeo right?
Speaker 3yeah I was like seeing your stuff with your daughters man, oh yeah, man we're crazy I like that father daughter bond. He's my boy, donald. He has the same thing with his.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, man, I brought them in here, like maybe two weeks ago oh yeah because we wanted to do a podcast. Just like, you know, just shoot the shit just to to. You know, my daughters and myself we recorded for two hours, man just talking, just talking, and it came out good, I'm not gonna release the whole thing because, you know, we talked a lot of personal stuff so yeah yeah, I was like I'm just gonna get different reels and just release it that's awesome that you're exposing your baby girls to you.
Speaker 4Know what you do, yeah man, they love it.
Speaker 2Man, any chance they get, they come here, put these headphones on.
Speaker 3Yeah, for sure, yeah yeah, but before we jump into that man, let me introduce my boy, donald brown. We went to school together, kind of pretty much grew up together. He's a beast on the football field back in the day, beast in the weight room, you know he had a hard upbringing, you know, so he knows how it is to to grind it out. You know he had a lot of personal issues, you know, back in the day. And so now he's dedicating his life to helping underprivileged children be able to play sports. He raises funds to get them uniforms and they have their own football tournaments. And I think you're getting into cheerleading and all that stuff too, right? Oh yeah, go ahead, talk about it.
Speaker 4So you know, I've dedicated my life to you know, helping families underprivileged.
Speaker 4You know, I grew up in Alvin, texas, and I was one of those underprivileged kiddos and now I have an opportunity to give back to the community and I have a football program, cheer and dance program. I have singular programs that I'm pushing through, the Donald Brown Developmental League, which is now a nonprofit 501c3. And just excited I haveD in educational leadership and really I'm just excited about uplifting the community. You know, anything we can do to make a difference in the lives of those who matter most, what got you into that man? So what really?
Speaker 4You know, when I go back and I think about my journey into education, I remember going to the University of Arkansas and the counselor asked me what would you like to do? And I said to her I'd like to do what my coach did, coach Bass and at that moment she told me that OK, well, we're going to put you in kinesiology. Okay, well, we're going to put you in kinesiology. And so that started my pursuit into education through kinesiology. But really what brought me to it was the impact that the coaches had in my life.
Speaker 4You know, I grew up single parent home. My father was in prison for a while and it was those coaches you know who were my dad and now I'm really blessed to be able to for lack of better words, father other kids. Yeah, be, a father to those who you know who are fatherless. So you know, in education, yeah, I'm just no, that's amazing man, especially helping the youth.
Speaker 2I hats off to you. I know it's, uh, you know what.
Speaker 4So you're born and raised in alvin yeah, born and raised in alvin, you know what he's.
Speaker 4I moved to alvin during my third grade year oh, that's born, I still pretty much born and raised, you know my mom asked me hey, we're thinking about moving this place called alvin and and I was like, does it have any horses? Next thing, you know I was here in Alvin but you know I have so much to just to thank Alvin for the public education system. I was a kid that was early on in life struggled in education. You know, due to some of the movement and you know, through the struggle came something greater. I was in special education early on and fortunately Alvin ISD had some great programs that helped me to overcome the educational deficits that I was facing.
Speaker 4So I took the ACT 10 times, the SAT 10 times before I was able to gain admittance into college. I was able to gain admittance into college. So for that kid that is struggling, I have a story to connect with them, to help them build confidence and just believe that you can you know, any, anyone can become more, but you just have to believe it.
Speaker 2You know you gotta plant those seeds. Yeah, that's dope, especially being able to relate to the youth saying that I've been there. Yeah, that's dope, especially being able to relate to the youth saying that I've been there, I've done that.
Speaker 4Look at me now. You know what I mean, and that's an amazing thing to accomplish my kid to become a better student. Hey, there's all types of programs out there. There's, you know, lots of resources and hey, you can reach out to me or Matt.
Speaker 3Yeah, you know we can help get it done. Let them know your handle's on social.
Community Leadership Development and Support"
Speaker 4Okay, yeah, you can follow me on social at DrMotivate. I do leadership development in the summer, leadership workshop programs for kids in the summer. You can also follow me by typing in wwwdbdleaguescom, and on that page you'll see all of my youth programs. So I have volleyball, I have basketball, I have football. Track will be opening up in 2025. Nice, I'm getting ready to go all in. I mean, um, I'm literally getting ready to go all in. This will be my last year finishing out an educational contract and now I'm getting ready to go into business for myself full-time how long has the non-profit?
Speaker 4So I've had the nonprofit for 20 years. So no shit. The first nonprofit, believe Incorporated Inc. You know it was started back in December of 2003. And here recently I've started the Donald Brown Developmental League so that people can understand. You know what the nonprofit stands for and you know how everything works. I started Dr Motivate LLC.
Speaker 3As you know, I'm a major sponsor to the programs, to the nonprofits that I'm working with, so yeah, and just to clarify something I know this is, you know you mainly have, you know military and stuff. He's not military. Something I know this is you know you mainly have you know military and stuff. He's not military. But the reason why I felt the need to because there's other people that I grew up with that have their own thing going right the main reason why I felt the need to connect with him and partner with him and I actually he can't, he can't get rid of me, right? So uh, yeah, we have a lot of talks, man, but but yeah, the main reason why man is because, like, I see, like where his heart is. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3So, like this is genuine, yeah you know what I mean so that's rare to find, you know that's amazing because I mean, I'm all about helping, right, yeah, but what it boils down to is he's helping children in the community and there's a lot of veterans out there that have kids, right right, and they have kids low income, you know, living off the VA benefits that can really benefit from this yeah, you know, so for what he's?
Speaker 2doing that can in turn help our veteran community a lot, so I'm all about that no, I definitely been changing it up a little bit, man, and not having so much just focusing on the veteran aspect. I've been bringing in more people that I see that are doing good in the community. Man, and that's dope. You know you can't give them enough praise. You can't give yourself, you know, because, man, it could be, it could be shit. You could be the exact opposite. You know what I mean. I know exactly what you mean. Yeah, or I mean you could be the.
Speaker 3You know those. I mean, you could be those nonprofits that say they're helping out the community and they pocket the money. You don't ever see any difference, you don't see any changes, you don't see any programs, you don't see nothing. But with him, he's open, with it on Facebook, on Instagram, all that stuff, and you can actually log on to his stuff and see everything they're doing. And another good thing that I think that he does is he shines a light on the individual players or athletes when they're young, right.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3And that in turn, will help them get scholarships later in life, because these colleges nowadays they look at their past.
Speaker 2Right, right right.
Speaker 3And from just pulling up their name, you know that video might pop up and that school might be like oh well, he started young. You know so, yeah, yeah, man, that's truly pop up and that school might be like oh well, he started young.
Speaker 2Yeah, you know so, yeah, yeah, man, that's truly true. I don't have words. And it's not often that I'm speechless, bro, yeah, but you know like and the thing is like, I've never I haven't.
Speaker 3I might be wrong, but you know I've never seen that before whenever they shine the line on the athlete individually right and he interviews each athlete as they're coming up.
Speaker 2I see, and you know, that's awesome, that's awesome, you know, because a lot of people are different, man. They're different. By when I say that, I mean like, if it's not about them, they don't want to be involved. So to be able to make it something about somebody else is dope, and that's what you know, a lot of us try to do, especially as veterans and first responders and leaders in the community that are out there doing it.
Speaker 4Man and shit you know kids need that opportunity for exposure and to be able to work on those soft skills.
Speaker 4soft skills and you know what better opportunity than to interview a kid that's showcasing his talent and helping him to build him or her to build that confidence that they need to become the best version of themselves. So I really enjoy putting the spotlight on our student athletes, as well as our families, and we really are doing a great work. Last football season we gave out over $8,000 in scholarships to kiddos that are on free or reduced lunch, families who truly have a need. So you know, I'm vested in the community. They're our future. Those kids are the future. Those are the kids, are the ones who are going to be taking care of us, who are going to be running the programs that we're currently have been charged with. So exposure is a huge piece of what's needed. You think about it. Some underprivileged kids don't travel more than one to two miles outside of where they live, miles outside of where they live. So when I'm able to get a kid who's on free or reduced lunch or who is low socioeconomic and put them in my program, we're traveling.
Speaker 3Oh yeah.
Speaker 4Now they're getting a chance to do something that they may not get to do often and we have a village family mentality. I mean we're helping each other out. It takes a village man.
Speaker 3It takes a village Through a struggle becomes something greater, right?
Speaker 3oh yeah, oh yeah, that's what's up man yeah and so like, with our event this weekend it's on saturday, it's a hometown heroes event. Um, he has a 5k that we've been doing now for this. This will be our third year. This will be our third year. We had to skip last year. I had to take some time off personal time off for family, but we're kicking it back up this year and, yeah, so his 5K, all proceeds that he makes from the 5K will go towards his foundation. We won't take any of that at all. That's his own thing and I definitely want to give him that platform for however many years he wants to stick with me. You know that kind of thing, raffles and stuff like that. Like I want to eventually do it to where, especially at the event, you know, we can split some raffles. That way he can take home some profit for his kids too. So, yeah, man, it's going to be a good day. Man, it's supposed to be clear skies Saturday, hopefully.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's raining right now, man, but you know, yeah, I just noticed that I didn't even.
Speaker 3I see everybody talking about some eclipse. Yeah right, I was like, okay, yeah, so so yeah, the event is a saturday man and it's family friendly. No alcohol will be served there. There will, there might be some alcohol, like involved in the raffles type thing, but no, no consumption at the event what's the event?
Speaker 2tell me what the event is. What's the purpose of it, what's the mission yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3I mean the mission's always, you know, combating the suicide rate, right right so among veterans and first responders and the community all together.
Speaker 3so my the birdwall foundation. I'm the executive director for them. We specialize in specialize in PTSD among veterans and first responders. We have a hotline. If you go to birdwellfoundationorg, we have a hotline, 24-7 crisis line. There will always be somebody on the other end of that phone call to walk you through, calm you down, see what the issues are. If you have an addiction, we'll get you help. If you need a facility, a 30-day facility, 60-day facility we'll find it for you.
Speaker 3You know we've had it to where we've first responders, it's really hard for them to reach out because they have that mentality of the stigma, you know. So we have to be very careful with that and luckily there's some laws that came out to where it protects them now and they're able to take off, work and get the help that they need and not skip a beat when they come back right, so they can get off, they can recover at a facility, come back and jump right back into, you know, serving the community. So we're taking full advantage of that, as you should yeah, man so and then the main thing is is like spoken word, written word.
Speaker 3It's going to eliminate that stigma. The more knowledge is out that's out there about the symptoms, red flags to look at right you know and and um. Awareness saves lives, bro.
Speaker 2Yeah, man 100 because of you, I was able to be involved in a documentary. You introduced me to joe and oh, how'd that go? Man and being able to sit back and listen to to. Well, I had to piece all of it together. So sitting back and listen to like 20, 25 stories, like at one point I had to stop and I I could feel myself heavy. Yeah, it's a lot. I felt it in like depression in my own shit I haven't heard it.
Speaker 2Man, oh man so I had to stop. But we finished it and I've heard stories from police officers, veterans, nurses, doctors and man. It was deep as deep he did.
Speaker 3He's good at that he is really good at interviewing. Yeah, man, he definitely, he definitely is. Yeah, he did awesome. Yeah, I think I have to like redo mine.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3I don't know.
Speaker 2I think he's going to put you on a second season.
Speaker 3Okay yeah, because something happened with the audio or something.
Speaker 2Well, there was a lot of audio issues. Oh man, yeah. That was actually a good one too. Yeah, it took a lot longer than I wanted to, but being able to piece, oh man, it was a pain in the ass.
Speaker 3Nice, it was cool. I bet yeah, yeah, yeah, because I guess the guy that he had before he said he knew what he was doing, but in reality he really didn't. Oh, yeah, yeah he did.
Speaker 4He was like no, we've never met anybody like that before, right no right, he lied on the resume, Bro.
Speaker 3I was like, did he even turn the microphones on? Man?
Speaker 2It got pretty sketchy.
Speaker 3Yeah, man.
Speaker 2Yeah, but I was able to save a lot of it too.
Speaker 3But like stuff like that opens the public's eyes bro. Oh yeah, especially like my podcast, the Battle Bud podcast. When I interview trauma victims, I interview everybody, like military first responders, regular civilians, and the point of the whole thing is anybody can get it right right anybody can get ptsd. Anybody can go through a traumatic event. Anybody can suffer from these symptoms right now. The angle of which you help people are different, but it's all the same traumatic events right.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3Severity differs a little bit, but all in all it's the same thing and the symptoms are either very high, with some, or very low. One may have a high anxiety, the other one may have severe depression.
Speaker 3Some of them might not even know they have it, bro, I didn't know I had PTSD for the first four years and I was drinking myself to sleep man. I didn't know I had PTSD for the first four years. Yeah, and I was drinking myself to sleep man, like I literally would drink myself to pass out and I'd get in fights for no reason, I just my temper was horrible. Yeah, it was weird, man.
Speaker 2I understand.
Speaker 3But and that's another reason why I wrote I started writing my books Because I mean, if I could save one life from my story, you know I'd do my job.
Speaker 2So let's talk a little bit about your books. I know about Silent Screams, the original one, the part one man, so you just dropped two books back to back.
Speaker 3Oh yeah, one's a journal and then the other one is a poem book. So Silent Screams is my first one. That's my first one. That's my first one. It's on Amazon.
Speaker 2This one right here man.
Speaker 3I poured my freaking heart into that. There's a lot of stories that I couldn't put in there because I'm still a police officer, but when I retire I'll make another one with other stories.
Speaker 2So once you retire, that cap is no longer out there, you can share whatever you want.
Speaker 3Yeah, I'll be able to share whatever I want. That's what's up Right now. I just gotta keep my job bro.
Speaker 2You know who cracks me up though man. I'm not gonna lie. I follow the Houston.
Speaker 3Police Officers Union, gamaldi Bro he cracks me up with them.
Speaker 2comments, man, they always got me laughing my ass off.
Speaker 3Yeah, so now the president is Doug Griffith. Yeah, he's awesome too, but yeah, joe's awesome, he's actually the fraternal police order. Oh, yeah, yeah, he's good with it, middleman, he's good with the camera.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, so tell us more what you got there.
Speaker 3Yeah, man. So the one that just came out is Silent Screams, part 2, poems from the Frontline and, believe it or not, I created the freaking images and everything on AI.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3I just learned how to do that. Man and man. They came out so good.
Speaker 2That's what's up.
Raffle and Success Stories
Speaker 3Yeah, so that saves a ton of money. But, yeah, I created some poems in there and some of them are geared towards first responders, Some are military and I have one poem in there directly representing the Birdwell Foundation and people who like poems. You know that's a good deal for them. This one right here is a journal and it's a free writing journal. It's a Unmasking the Warrior, a journal for military and first responders, and all these are on Amazon if you want to get them on Amazon.
Speaker 2And if you're watching this or listening to it, you're going to see the links below.
Speaker 3Yeah, for sure. And, yeah, man, so with that journaling saved my life, bro, and I have another journal that I'm going to release, probably in a few more months, but this one's a free writing journal, so this one will help you keep track of your recovery while you're seeking help through peer support and then through a regular therapist. This will help you determine, like, if your symptoms are getting better or worse, and where you got to adjust, what you got to tell your therapist. Hey, you know, I was doing really good controlling my, my, my, sleep, right, and now, all of a sudden you know it's starting to get out of whack again. Yes, wake up swinging, wake up sweating, wake up crying. Sometimes I don't know what the hell's going on. You know, and I wasn't doing that, you know, last month, or right two weeks ago, right. So that helps your therapist and whoever you're talking to for peer support, your battle bud kind of revamp your, your therapy.
Speaker 2Yeah, in a different path. I like that man. Y'all be sure to check out the books unmask the warrior and silent screams, part two. And if y'all haven't heard his song, silent screams, be sure to check that out too. And oh yeah, yeah, soldier Hard, man, soldier Hard, he's a beast.
Speaker 3You know what? Actually, if you go on my podcast on Spotify, I made its own episode. It's called Silent Screams.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 3I think it's just called Silent Screams, but it's Soldier Hard. He's a well-known artist and he picked it up and ran with a man and he made it over the book and it's it's pretty darn good it is, I like it, I jam it.
Speaker 3Yeah, I jam it man I noticed you've been doing a lot of raffles lately bro, what you got right here said yeah, so we got a raffle. Actually we got two raffles and the winner will be announced at the event on Saturday. So one raffle is the Yeti cooler and it comes with a Battle Bud hat that's my other nonprofit and then it also comes with one of each of my books and then the two cups, the matching cups, and this is a new color that came out from the Yeti, so this is a new thing. It's going to be $10 for one ticket, for three tickets $20, and for 10 tickets, 50.
Speaker 3If y'all want tickets, contact raul or myself and he'll have my contact information on there, yeah and just hit me up and I'll fill out y'all's uh, y'all's tickets and everything for y'all, and I take payment in venmo and you know that kind deal. But our other raffle is I just got this today the shotgun. Hold it up, bro.
Speaker 2I don't know how to handle guns.
Speaker 3I know bro, I'm scared.
Speaker 4It's been a while right.
Speaker 3So this shotgun right here, I'm going to keep the tickets the same as that, so it's the same thing $10 for what I say, three for 20 and then 10 for 50, and that's that shotgun is mr birdwells. He's the founder of the birdwell foundation and he just he gave it to us to do a raffle off of, and all the proceeds from this goes towards. I gotta pay the. There's an exotic zoo that's gonna be at the. I thought you were going somewhere else with it, bro.
Speaker 2You said exotic and I was like oh, it's that army.
Speaker 3Yeah, that's the whole exotic zoo, and then we're going to have a live auction at 3 o'clock at the event, and there's going to be some badass stuff for the auction.
Speaker 3Yeah, oh yeah. I'm picking up everything on Friday and then on top of that, everybody that's there as a vendor is going to donate. They're going to donate one item per vendor and then we're going to make a different baskets and stuff to auction those off too, yeah, and so it's going to pay off the bidder, the guy who's doing the bidding and then also the DJ. So we got to pay those three oh axe throwing. So there's three oh axe throwing, so there's going to be an axe throwing. I didn't even know there was a business.
Speaker 2They're popular now.
Speaker 3Yeah, it's its own company, and I guess they redid a trailer, a big trailer. Oh shit, I didn't know. Yeah, it's a mobile axe throwing.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3And so I got to pay for that too. But yeah, that's where these funds are going to go. And just to you know, wash it yeah.
Speaker 2Man. That's what's up, man, and that's going to be Saturday. We're at yeah what time.
Speaker 3Yeah, so it's going 11 to 7 pm. So the Exotic Zoo will be from 5 to 7. And the axe throwing will be from 3 pm to 7 pm. But we'll have over 60 vendors there for shopping. We'll have different raffles there, we'll have a DJ, we'll have two live singers Shane Barron He'll be out there singing. But yeah, it'll be a good thing. We're going to have bounce houses for the kids. Houston Bounce it's a company out of Houston that 100% free two bounce houses and a dunking booth and we can make money on the dunking booth. So we're going to do $5 for three balls for the dunking booth and on top of that, I believe the Hooters from Galveston, the girls, are going to go out there and be in the Duncan booth.
Speaker 2Yeah, man, how about you, you getting?
Speaker 3in there, no man, I'll be running around.
Speaker 2Because, I'll pay for that.
Speaker 3No, I'd rather the pretty girls get in there. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. But speaking of Hooters, my good friend Anna Rodriguez, she's a GM over there and they had a car wash for us to raise funds and we raised about three almost $400 selling tickets for another raffle that we were doing. It was actually like an orange cooler, it was smaller than that, but yeah, that one like four-hour period. We raised a little under $400 just in ticket sales. So that's awesome man.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3And it was a slow day because we did it Easter weekend.
Speaker 2Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3And I was thinking I was like man, it's going to be a good busy day because everybody's off. Yeah, they're willing to do another one, another weekend for us, so we're going to have to get that up and going, yeah that's what's up, man?
Speaker 2I definitely. I saw it. I wanted to go out, but I was doing the family thing. Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3And then this weekend.
Speaker 2I'm going to miss it, man. I want to be there with you, but I got dad volleyball thing to do bro, family first man. Give me a success story that you've seen, that you've witnessed with your own eyes through your programs. Well, I'll tell you, you don't have to do no names. Okay, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4We've had, you know, single moms that have been in our program, who have had children I won't identify male or female that were struggling in school, not doing well and after about two, three weeks in our program, behaviors improved.
Speaker 4You know you have the coach there, male or female, that are there to support and help guide. And the biggest success story I can think of was I want to think of a nickname for this kid. I can see him right now but he was getting in trouble every week in the principal's office in trouble and we had some coaches that helped him to see the light.
Speaker 4That's good, and so he went from being in trouble to being one of those kids that was called on often to, you know, to do things. I mean, the grandmother was just head over heels excited about the program and all of the progress that her grandson had made.
Speaker 3You know.
Speaker 4So I think about that success story and I mean there are many others. So I think about that success story and I mean there are many others. You know, sports can bring about confidence in a different way when you have the right coaches, when you have the right leaders out there modeling. You know they're seeing our social skills, how we interact with each other. So I really believe that one of the biggest success stories would be that kid and I wish I could say his name.
Speaker 2No.
Speaker 4He's a real cowboy. That's what's up, man. That's amazing.
Speaker 2That's awesome to hear man, because sports can do amazing things and I witnessed it in the little leagues and things like that, but, like you said, with the right leaders because I've seen it go both ways ways and you have to know that fine line you have to know and oh yeah, and some of the things that we do.
Speaker 4You know, we don't believe in cursing the kid out. We believe in talking to them, teaching them and we build them up. You know, and those push-ups, believe it or not, bring about confidence oh yeah, and then when they come and strike you and they do something well, we celebrate in the moment. But we're also real. We give them real feedback about how they're doing and we talk about the training that we do.
Speaker 3We can only be as good as we train, oh yeah, man thank you, I just Not only that, like, it gives them structure if they don't have structure at home. Right right right, you know, if they don't have a father figure at home. It gives them a lot of structure, man, and it forms their path in a way that you know not being in organized sports could do. You know, so, like for me, it helped me like realize, like, how to get along with people.
Speaker 2Yeah, you know Well, you can build friendships and partnerships how to get along with people. You know you can build friendships and partnerships.
Speaker 4Well, I mean you build a bond through competition for sure. You know you're going to war with. You know every game is. You know a war.
Speaker 3You know what I mean. So you're relying on your partner to help you out and to play for the you know the best that he can play, you know. So, like when I went to the military, it was crazy Cause you can tell, like, who was in organized sports and who wasn't, because the people that weren't were kind of like socially awkward, you know, and the people that were were like super open and, like you know, willing to work with you.
Speaker 2Know, let's get it yeah, teamwork, teamwork, yeah, yeah yeah, like what's your strengths?
Speaker 3well, mine's this, this, this, you know. So I mean that's yeah, that's awesome yeah, man, that's, that's that's.
Parenting and Mentorship Impact
Speaker 2It's amazing to hear man Like I say man, my hat's off to you because you know working with children is a difficult task and you know I've seen coaches belittle, degrade and scream and there's a couple of times where I'm like man, if that was my daughter. You know we fight, but you know.
Speaker 4Hey, look, it starts at the top, and you know what I'll say is, as I'm modeling and teaching through my interactions and showing love to others while they're out there with us, others are soaking that up too. You know how I treat Matt as a coach and how he treats others. We have a standard is what I'm trying to get to, and our standard is family first. We're going to love on them. You know, we tell the moms and we tell you, know, our parents, that we're going to be tough, we're going to be physical and we're going to do it the right way, with character, and we will be disciplined, because discipline, we all know it, equals freedom.
Speaker 4You can do so much more when your child is disciplined and, if they need that, send them to us, right, right right and on the motivational aspect, is it a motivational speaker? Yeah, so Dr Motivate, Bro he's been like this since man.
Speaker 3Yeah, so Dr Motivate, bro, he's been like this since man look, oh you done, struck a nerve.
Speaker 2Now Teach me, man, teach me.
Speaker 4Look, what is it that you cannot do? I mean, I want you to look in the mirror right now and tell yourself that, yes, I can, and not only can you will. You see, the other day, when you were walking out, you didn't know that you were going to connect with somebody that was going to uplift you and let you know that there is nothing that you can't do. If you can see it, you can become it. I'm Dr Motivate. You will become the best that you've ever been. Just give it a moment to sink in. Not every question that is asked is meant to have an answer. Sometimes you can just sit back, wait, relax and then you come back with deep ferocity.
Speaker 1No, I'm just joking, Shit bro, hey man.
Speaker 2Look.
Speaker 4I'm all over here, nervous and stuff.
Speaker 3I'm on the pod, I'm like but look, man, imagine a little kid hearing that though we can go. That's what's up, man, he's getting hype.
Speaker 4Hey.
Speaker 3I mean man, this is our world.
Speaker 4And if we're not interjecting us into it. You know people are talking about what are you doing to make a difference? Right, they're saying all these different things, and then you see a lot of people not doing it. They complain about stuff, but then you have Matt out here who is making an incredible impact in our community. Better yet the world, like saving lives. I watch him. He doesn't know. Well, maybe he does know. Man, I love the example that you provide day in, day out. I mean, he is a grinder. I'm talking about a nail grinder.
Speaker 3He gets it done. No, I'm like, when does he sleep?
Speaker 4Because I could text him 1 am in the morning, you know right back. You know, but I just where I was going with that. You know your inner circle, you know you got to be able to lean on it and I'm glad that I have matt in my inner circle because I'm always strong. When I'm weak, I can lean on my brother yeah, he's a good dude man.
Speaker 2I really like him. We we met a few years ago and we've clicked man, so it's been an honor to learn about him and his stories, his struggles, his triumphs, yeah, you know, and and watching him I don't want to say develop, but watching your daughter get older and seeing you be that father is dope. Every time I see pictures, every time I see y'all somewhere, that shit gets me because that that's, that's what we need, man. You know what I mean oh, yeah, yeah, I mean excuse me my bad
Speaker 1I take a lot of pride in that man yeah you should um uh so it's a great example, man.
Speaker 2It's a great example and I, I see it and we only get one chance at it yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3We only get one chance at raising our kids and it's up to us to make that, that bond, strong, you know. So you either make it strong or or you you don't and you're gonna suffer later for that, and I've seen it happen plenty of times. Yeah so, and then the regret comes in. You know shit, I worked too damn much, I didn't spend enough time with her man.
Speaker 1My, my shit revolves around her, bro I know, when I get her I don't work. You know, I don't work at all. I might take when I get her.
Speaker 3I don't work. I don't work at all. I might take phone calls and stuff, but I don't work. I do double shifts. I just did a double shift yesterday and I'm doing a double shift tomorrow, and then I have her for Wednesday, thursday, friday and then I have my event after that. But yeah, I don't work when I have her bro.
Speaker 2I make that a top priority. You know, I saw a little glimpse of her, her boxing skills, man, oh, yeah, I'm slowly throwing her in it, bro, and she's liking it too so yeah, and it's getting her a little workout, a little video had me laughing yesterday, I think it was yesterday, the day before, bro, I was like, oh I, little eye of the tiger, yeah, yeah, that's what it was. I was like, okay, I like that, that's like the.
Speaker 3I think I got it for like 15 bucks on amazon yeah and it's a blow-up one, but it like, whenever you hit it it lights up. Okay, yeah, and she loves it, she'll hit it. She'll sit there and watch tv and just sit there and box it it sounds fun, I might get one for myself.
Speaker 2Bro, put it in the living room.
Speaker 3Yeah, for sure, for sure. But yeah, man, I take a lot of pride, man, and you know what, man? Honestly, you can tell a lot about a person by the way they are with their kids, 100%. You know what I mean. With you, you're super close to your kid. With him, he's super close to all his kids. I try to align myself with people that are like that because I know where their heart is. You know what I mean. Like that, if you don't see your kid, bro, and you have the opportunity to, yeah, like I don't understand it.
Speaker 3I always say that I'll be an acquaintance bro, but like, don't expect you know I don't understand that.
Speaker 2That was one of the questions I always ask man, and it's not. It's just I don't ask, it's just a way. I think is like I don't understand an absentee father. It doesn't make sense in my head. I can't comprehend it Like I want to know why. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3And real quick. Veterans that come back from war, you've seen it. They distance themselves from their family, right, yeah. And whenever I counsel veterans police officers too, sometimes you know that happens to them too. It's all about your perspective, man. You could use that. That. Your kid is the reason why you need to fucking get better, right that you're. That little kid is absorbing everything that you're doing. You're saying all your emotions that are coming out of you, all your little smirks. You know everything, bro. You come home drunk. They see that.
Speaker 4Yeah, they do.
Speaker 3You know, they're sponges, man, and they're learning that learned behavior. So you have to make sure that you show up respectfully. You know what I mean, because you're forming that mind, you know. So, yeah, man, For sure.
Speaker 4And sometimes I believe it's about, you know, breaking a generational cycle. Oh yeah, you know you had his father's father wasn't present, and so you start looking generations down lineage and it's just that they hadn't found that right person to come in and pour into their life to break that cycle. You know, and how do we?
Speaker 3do that, yeah, by being present. Oh yeah, be present in the moment, don't be afraid, and you know what, and see what in my life, my dad was there, he was present. You know, I mean, and I see the difference in myself and my homeboys that it wasn't like that yeah their father wasn't present and they're in jail. They're dead. You know it is what it is, but you have a blueprint, you know.
Speaker 3I mean, don't be dumb, you know straight up and you know, sometimes when I counsel people like sometimes you have to be blunt, bro. Like you, you have to be blunt to open their eyes up and to make them see what they're doing. You know, and you're making it worse on you and the kid as well, but you're making it worse on your recovery as well, like you see what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah yeah, and some people just have to be brought down to earth and get spoken to stern. You know, not disrespectfully, but you know.
Speaker 4Yeah, sometimes you need to kick and kick in the butt, man yeah, and that's another benefit, like when I think about, uh, some of the things that I do in the community having the youth program, you know, for those kids that are fatherless or whose fathers are not, who are absentee fathers, they have a. One of the coolest things that I saw last season was all of the fathers that came out to help. Yeah, that's awesome. I had never seen so many men just black, white, orange, latino, asian. We're the whole airport on the sideline. It just was incredible to see all of those fathers coming together to put their hands around the community.
Speaker 3And iron sharpens. Iron bro, I'm a firm believer in that. That's why I align myself with strong-minded men around me, because I know that I have a lot of faults, and when I see him in the community doing what he needs to do, it just makes me. I wanted to take a week off, but I'm not going to anymore.
Speaker 2You know what.
Speaker 3I mean, like I, when I see you pushing it, I gotta keep going. When I see my you know a couple other guys that I align myself with like they keep me going Right, and you know we're not immune to depression.
Speaker 4We're not immune to all this stuff, right? So so to have those strong minded men in your back pocket to lean on, that's you know. It's everything right there. Charlie, mike, I have a question for you what keeps you going, what keeps you motivated to, you know, keep pushing in and do what you do every day, every day, you know we hit walls as men. I mean, life is real. How do you stay engaged? Recharge I mean how do you recharge? And when you hit a tough wall, something difficult.
Journey Towards Sobriety and Faith
Speaker 2What do you do to help yourself overcome that man? There's a lot, you know, charlie. Mike means to continue the mission regardless. You know I'm in sobriety. You know I'm almost at five years. God willing, I'll hit five years of sobriety.
Speaker 2But before that I was a different person. I wasn't doing the things that I'm doing now, but what I did witness was, after I made that change in my life, I witnessed God doing amazing things for me and bringing the things that I once prayed for and asked for into my life. But if he would have given it to me years ago, I wouldn't have handled it correctly. You know what I mean. Once I started doing the path of Sobriety and working the program and changing my ways is when opportunities and doors started opening and people started coming to me. And I know through my story, through my struggles, through my addiction, I can help other people. And right now, with me being so close to five years, I feel like if I was to relapse, I would let everybody down. Yeah, and that kicks me in the butt all the time. That's what keeps you.
Speaker 2Yeah, that one thing it does Besides my family. It's just I've come too far. No, I have so much to lose. I've gained so much, spiritually money, I'm in a house. You know just things that I never thought could be possible A couple of years ago. If you would have told me, hey, raul, you're going to own a podcast studio, I would have said man, you're stupid.
Speaker 1What the hell is a podcast studio?
Speaker 4You know what I mean, but it's just, it's amazing. So one more, one more follow-up Talk about your faith in this journey. I mean because none of this was here, nobody could see it all. I don't know if you went to a technical program or you had some type of school, some education. So talk about the faith.
Speaker 3You just got behind the mic, bro.
Speaker 4Let me tell you man.
Speaker 3Yeah, that was truly it.
Speaker 2During COVID I was like I want to start a podcast. And then I went to Barnes Noble's and I got a book how to Podcast for Dummies. That's how this all became reality. Real talk For real on everything. I didn't even do that how to Podcast for Dummies and I read it and I used it as a manual. You know, even when I opened this place, I would still refer back to it.
Speaker 3You is a manual. You know, even when I opened this place.
Speaker 2I would still refer back to it that you know it's, it's insane. And as far as my faith man, I'm gonna tell you what at times my faith has been sketchy I'm not, I wouldn't say sketchy, maybe as strong as it should be. Yeah, and you know, I've had some things happen to me that within maybe the last couple of years, you know, I lost my son and it kind of derailed my faith a little bit. It kind of did. But I had to bring it all back together and find, because my biggest question was why. I wanted to know why and how could? You is what I figured. If I blame somebody else, it wouldn't be as difficult on me or my girls or his mother, you know I. But I had to getting my peace again and going back to church and praying. And my little one was the one that kept pushing us into church and was like, come on, dad, we got to go back, we got to go back. So every Sunday she's the ones like dad, we're going to church, we're going to church you know, and man.
Speaker 2so with with God, man, anything is possible. You know, you just got to keep the faith and don't blame God when bad things happen and don't forget to be thankful for the things that you get. When you okay, don't, what is it? Don't forget to be grateful for the things that come to reality, that you were praying for, you know what I mean, don't forget that, those small things man.
Speaker 2You know, I sit back here a lot as I walk out the door in the evenings and I look back and I'm like damn, it's crazy. You know, this is mine, you know, this is what I'm doing for a living. My girls tell people like, hey, what does your dad do for a living? They say, oh, he's a podcaster. They were like what?
Speaker 3What is that yeah?
Speaker 2I don't know man. It's surreal Everything is just surreal.
Speaker 3But faith, man, faith that's my daughter's name, by the way. Faith, nice, and you know what your daughters are seeing. You create your own path in life too. And don't mistaken it, bro, that they're seeing that and they're gonna form their life on that too, so if later on in life they might venture out and start their own business and you know, do their own thing and that's because they saw you do that.
Speaker 2I hope they do, man. My daughters are crazy, and you know it's scary because they remind me so much of myself. I see it in their smiles, their sense of humors, their jokes, their inappropriate laughter moments that we probably shouldn't be laughing, you know.
Speaker 1I see it bro.
Speaker 2It cracks me up.
Speaker 1But I'm blessed bro.
Speaker 2I'm blessed, bro. I'm blessed, I'm really blessed to be in this situation. I'm blessed to be across the table from you guys right here doing amazing things in this community. Man and you know, you and you're damn bro. I don't even know people ask me describe matthew marne. That's shit, I don't know how you're entrepreneur.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know I'll tell you this, man, I wasn't trying to do all that, really, Like I got tired of seeing my friends commit suicide and there's nothing really out there for us.
Speaker 2You know you go to the VA and they load you up with meds and be on your way. You know, yeah, I feel you, brother, I feel you Likewise. I experienced that part, you know, through my addiction. I was on the verge of suicide at one point, like literally on the floor with the gun, drunk as can be, I said, hey, after I finish this bottle, I'm done. I passed out and it started you know, things, reality kicked in. I wouldn't say reality but, my mindset started to change.
Speaker 3Yeah, I write about it in my book, man. I drink until I passed out, man, and one night I woke up with a glass of whiskey in one hand and my gun in the other, and I didn't even know how I got my gun. You know what I mean. So I had to change somehow, bro. Yeah, man, and you know the Birdwell Foundation. We have a camp in Conroe and what we do is it's an in-house facility for veterans and first responders Mainly. We have veterans there, though, but, man, that's where their last hope. They go, over there, and a lot of them coming off of addictions. And we have an awesome director out there, john Bailey, and he's a Vietnam war vet, and his story alone is crazy, man.
Speaker 2I spoke with him Silver Fox. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we call him Silver Fox man because he has long hair and it's all gray. But he thinks he's flying with it. He is man. I wouldn't tell him nothing. He kicked my butt.
Speaker 3Yeah. So he was in a helo crash and everything. Man, he's legit man and the thing is like at the camp. You get these guys in and, man, they're hoping for something you know. So during their time there they learn how to deal with their symptoms. They have AA meetings there, they have prayer groups there and on top of that, man, it's a peaceful environment. It's on nine acres and we've got a big pond. We've got a little prayer section near the pond. They can go fishing. We have a swimming pool there. They do bonfires. They connect with each other.
Speaker 3What a lot of people need is purpose. So, especially military guys like mission. When we're in the military, we have our mission, we have our purpose, we know identity, we know what we're doing every day. We know exactly what we're trying to do. We know how many okay we got to launch all these aircraft in this amount of time. Y'all gotta, you know every. Everybody knows what we have to do.
Speaker 3When we get out, that sense of purpose is gone, right, and a lot of times veterans don't have schooling behind them already when they get out, so they're out in the workforce. People won't hire them because they don't have school. Some will because of the military background. It's just hit or miss, you know, and some take a nosedive, you know, some some it gets to, it gets to them mentally, you know, and they need that pickup purpose, yeah, and they need to get set on a on a good path, you know so. And a lot of our books we are faith-based man, so a lot of our workbooks that we go over and that they learn from at the camp is based on the Bible.
Speaker 2So that's what's up, man. I was able to visit the camp. I'm sure it's grown. It was probably about a year ago. I want to say, and I'm sure it's grown since then, how many?
Speaker 3That's the same, it's the same. Yeah, yeah, many. That's the same, it's the same, yeah, yeah, it's the same as last time. So we were going to move down here but it fell through the building that we were trying to get the next door neighbor, the people that own the whole property next door to us. We're going to turn it into a landfill and we're like man, we can't have a rehab facility?
Speaker 3yeah you know what I mean. We can't have that next door. So we ended up backing out. And that was really the only building man that had everything together for a facility, a live-in facility. It already had all the sprinkler systems, the sewage system, everything for that amount of people, and it's hard to come across those now, man. So I mean we're still looking, but I mean we're actually like good. I mean we're still looking but I mean we're actually like good staying where we're at. But we do need funds and that's why I do events like this and you know stuff. So a lot of these funds go towards helping the camp out so how do they find out more about this camp?
Speaker 2yeah, camp, valor right.
Speaker 3So if you go on the website birdwellwellfoundationorg, you can find all the information on there about the camp. If you have any other questions, you can look under the camp director. John Bailey's phone number is under there. You can call him up. If you ever want to help at the camp, contact him as well, or me. My number is on there as well. Under the executive director, but yeah, I mean, it's all the information is on our website. If under the executive director, but yeah, I mean, it's all the information's on our website. If you ever want to donate to the Railroad Foundation, you can donate directly through the website and in a memo just type in what do you want to use it for. Like you can just put in a memo put Camp Valor, support Camp Valor, or you can put future events or whatever. You want to use it for peer support. So we're in seven states now. We just formed a chapter in indiana, so you got locations in every state. Yeah, so yeah, and they're all listed on the website as well. Yeah, yeah, so we're in.
Speaker 2Yeah so be saturday. What? What's another thing? Y'all got coming up or in the works, or you see happening yeah, so locally, um, I'm trying, I want to do a gala.
Speaker 3I've never done one before, but but I definitely want to spearhead one just knock it out of the way and then make it better. You know.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's what's up? Man, there's a lot of see. There's some organizations out there that you could reach out to that guide you and assist you in that. I know it's a lot of work, but yeah.
Speaker 3Well, this event I mean threw. I just threw it together one year and I was like let's try it out and then we just build it, built from it, you know. So I mean it's easy to get it together. It's just tedious and there's a lot of stuff that you have to make sure.
Speaker 2You're better than me, bro, you're better than me. I ain't got the patience for it?
Speaker 3yeah, I don't either, but I'm making it work, yeah so let's starting my emails to who it concerns.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, and I want to say this because apparently there's a lot of businesses out there that want to help, but they didn't. They don't know how they can help, right. So when you're dealing with nonprofits, of course there's always you know, monetary, you can, you can donate, right, but we also have in-kind donations as well, right? So that's what? Another huge way that people can help, or services. You know providing services for the nonprofit and you know we can create for the business for tax deduction at the end of the year, you know.
Speaker 3So if you charge, I don't know, two thousand dollars for a whole day for bounce houses, right. For instance, for the guy who's helping us out saturday, he's doing it completely for free, yeah, so we'll end up giving him a tax letter and it'll help him out at the end of the year in taxes, and not only that, it'll show his you know the community generosity that he's providing help for veterans and first responders. You know what I mean. So it's, as long as it's a two way street, like, we don't want to just take a lot of times when we partner up with a business or another nonprofit, how can we help? How can we help each other, like, I don't want this to be a one sided thing, right, because that crap don't last.
Speaker 3That gets overwhelming at times, man, it don't last, and when you have a partnership to where okay in your business you have something going on this weekend, all right. Well, I'm going to promote that on my platforms and help you out.
Speaker 3you know, generate some followers and stuff like that for that one event or whatever right, or I'll create a show or a podcast or something out there at the event to draw in a crowd. It's just, you know, you've got to work together because if not, if it's a one-sided thing, it's not going to last.
Speaker 2Yeah, 100%, man. It would definitely mean you've got to do more work together.
Speaker 3I feel like we don't do enough?
Speaker 2Yeah, we don't, and we need to.
Speaker 3Yeah, we don't, and we need to.
Speaker 2Yeah, definitely, I feel like you're itching to say something bro.
Speaker 4Him too, though yeah, yeah, and you got a friend in me.
Speaker 2now, bro, you got a friend in me.
Speaker 1I can't sing, I don't want.
Faith, Purpose, and Technology
Speaker 3Paul to leave the podcast.
Speaker 4But when we were talking earlier, you know, I felt the words keeping God at the center of everything that we do, and this verse fell into my heart Philippians 4 and 13,. I can do all things through Christ. That strengthens me, and when your faith is tested, just believe that you can do all things that he has called you to do. Man, this is just awesome. I don't want to leave.
Speaker 2Faith tested. That's what I wanted. That's how to word it. Hey, you know what?
Speaker 3It's kind of crazy because I've been through a lot of dark stuff right Death you know, seeing death in front of me, seeing kids, you know, decapitated like all kinds of crazy stuff. Right I was in a shipwreck, you know, in the military saw a bunch of people die. There's a lot of stuff that happened right and I'm still here.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3And so there's nothing that frightens me anymore, right? So I've seen it all. Why wouldn't I help out everybody else? Why wouldn't I risk something and create an event? Or why wouldn't I write a book, I mean, if fail? Yes I'm still here, you know what I mean?
Speaker 3I ain't failing, yeah like now, like the way I see life is. We only have one chance at this, man, you know, and our purpose on life is to set up the next generation to be stronger, you know. So that's these things are forever, you know. So that's, these things are forever, you know, and I'm going to keep doing stuff like this. So next generation, my kids, their kids, you know it's going to.
Speaker 2You know, one thing that I've noticed, man, about the people that I surround myself with, is there's always a picture that reminds me of our friendships and what we, we do, and it's a guy on top of a mountain or a hill, and he's at the top, but at the same time he's leaning back to pull the next person up yeah and that's the type of things that I see and I respect, man, I see that in you, and I see that in you and, and that's why I want to be around you guys.
Speaker 2You know what I mean, and you're not just oh I'm up here, let me start dancing and forget about everybody else. I'm up here. How can I get you up here with me? Tell me how I can do that you know, I think about it.
Speaker 4We I don't want the kids that we, that I work with or that we work with, to be in an identity crisis and how do you keep them? Out of being in that identity crisis. You help them to connect with their why.
Speaker 4When they understand the why man, they can overcome any of the hows that they're going to face and just sitting here listening to the two of you, I mean there's been a couple of times where I wanted to jump in, but, man, the information coming out was so good I just didn't want to, you know, stop. But again, that identity crisis is a real thing when you think about the younger generation and social media, instant access to everything, the microwave we used to go outside and play Stick ball, now they're.
Speaker 3TikTok, you know. So, man, I'll tell you this I'm glad we didn't have social media when we were growing up.
Speaker 2I'm glad we didn't have video cameras, bro. If we would have, you wouldn't be a police officer right now.
Speaker 1Yes, I would have. I'm just kidding.
Speaker 2I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding I was only kidding that was a joke, guys, oh my god.
Speaker 3Vhs tapes you had some kid with a VHS tape cassette tape, oh man but you know it's kind of crazy, man, in our lifetime we had to where our, from where our phones were on the wall, to now we have a whole computer on in our palm, yeah, you know, and our all the information we can ever want is right here. It's so crazy to me.
Speaker 2You remember when our teachers used to say you're not going to have a calculator with you every time, everywhere you go. Oh yeah, she lied, yeah, she lied, oh yeah, you need to learn this because and you know what, man, this is a double-edged sword.
Speaker 3Oh yeah, big time this evil lurks. Oh, 100% Evil lurks, and I'll tell you this. I used to be an officer, part-time, I was on a side job for Passmore Elementary and, man, when I tell you, I walked up on a kid watching a video of how to commit suicide.
Speaker 2Oh shit.
Speaker 3By some creep on YouTube. That opened my eyes so much, bro. I mean, you know we pulled him aside and we had to talk with him and stuff like that, but our kids are seeing this stuff, man, a lot of kids are raised by this bro, like hey the parents want a little quiet time.
Speaker 2Go play on your iPad.
Speaker 3Yeah, you know. Yeah, but you know what. And on the other edge of the sword, if you ever need help, that's on YouTube too, You're right.
Speaker 2You're right. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3You can do anything. You can do anything, you can find anything on.
Speaker 2YouTube how to fix anything. That's how I went to college yeah. Youtube University.
Speaker 3That's how I started my podcast. I binge-watched YouTube videos.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 3And I started my podcast, battle Bud and I just anything how to fix your car. Everything is on here. Yeah, you know how to handle depression, like different ways. You know that help other people. Like how to handle anxiety, different techniques, like there's a lot of stuff that you can learn on online, right?
Speaker 2You just got to control what you're doing. Yeah, you got to control, oh yeah, yeah man Fellas, this has been an amazing conversation. I don't want it to end, but let me ask you how can someone reach out to you and do you have any closing?
Speaker 4comments. Well, if you want to reach out to me, you can reach out to me at 832-264-0122. If you're, if you have kids or you have, you know someone that has a child between the age of three through 12 and they're looking for youth sports to become a part of, I definitely can get them connected or find someone within their community that they can connect with. You can also connect with me on social media at Dr Motivate or at Iowa Colony Junior Pioneers or at the Donald Brown Developmental League. Any of those ways you can get in contact with me. I'd be happy to talk to you. You can also visit the website wwwdbdleaguescom, and there are programs there that you can put your kids in, and I'm working on getting a link there. So if you want to donate or you'd like to give of your time, you would be able to submit that through the website.
Speaker 3And until then, until he gets that up, just contact him directly for donations and stuff.
Speaker 2Yeah, amazing, awesome. I'm going to be sure to put all that contact information so everybody can reach out to you. Matthew, what you got, man.
Community Support and Fundraising Event
Speaker 3Yeah, man, you can always reach out to me 832-561-9593, 24-7. If you went through a traumatic event if you're dealing with somebody that's been through a traumatic event.
Speaker 3If you have a family member in your household that's suffering, reach out to me. If I don't know the answer, I'll get it. And if I don't know the answer, I'll get it. You know so. And if I, if I don't have the facility, I can get one. If you don't have the money to go to the facility, you know, sometimes I'm able to get scholarships for people through facilities that will take them on free of charge. It just depends on on how many people are in the in each facility, but usually I'm able to get people in there.
Speaker 3I actually just got an officer in a facility in Florida a few months back. It wasn't a few months back, it was Christmas Eve actually, yeah. So on Christmas Eve his wife reached out to me and I went and got him, shipped him off to Florida within two hours and he was in a facility for three months. Came back a different man, bro, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, and he's doing well and taking care of his family right now and living life good and closer to God at the same time, and he's, he's doing really good.
Speaker 3But yeah, on my website is birdwellfoundationorg. All the numbers are on there. All the information for the Birdwell is on there. If you want to look up Camp Valor, you can also look that up on the website as well. All my books will have a link underneath and the Battle Bud Project Incorporated. That's also a 501c3 and battlebudprojectcom. You can look that up and that's dealing with mental health within the community, and we also raise funds for kids that can't afford, like if they're a tuxedo for a dance or you know stuff like that know, yeah, yeah school supplies you know stuff like that.
Speaker 3Well, that all ties into mental health, right right so so, yeah, so we do fundraisers for them as well and for that non-profit. And I have one of my cousins, eric edwards. He lives in alvin and he's a teacher and coach at alvin junior high, but he's on the non-profit with me and he's awesome and he's helping me raise funds for different things and he's kicking butt doing that too.
Speaker 2So so saturday april 13th 13. Tell the people why they should be there and what are you supporting?
Speaker 3yeah, so, um, april 13th 11 am, uh, there's right after the we're gonna have a prayer and the national anthem and then right after the we're going to have a prayer and the national anthem and then right after that there's going to be a MC ride that's going to leave the park right after that and then the event starts. But we are supporting the rebonding of the community and first responders and veterans here. Over the last 10 years or so, you know that bond has been slowly separating and it'll be a good deal to bring that back together with the community or their people in uniform. So they're here to serve us and we need to be there to help them as well, because they're there helping us overseas.
Speaker 2Can they find the information online?
Speaker 3Yeah, so on Facebook there's an actual event page for it the Hometown Heroes event and you'll see all our sponsors and stuff there. There will be a I think I mentioned the live auction.
Speaker 3Yeah yeah, yeah, so that'll be at 3 o'clock. That's going to be huge. If y'all can make that, make it. Invite your whole family out there. There'll be food out there, different kinds of food, tons of vendors for shopping, bounce houses for the kids, different raffles and a lot of information out there for people that need help. Or if you know anybody that needs help, you can go out there and we can load you up with some info on where to get help.
Speaker 2Dope man, I appreciate you both for being guests on the show today. It means a lot and thank you for dropping knowledge. Man, always giving back to the community, taking care of our youth, our veterans, our first responders. I look forward to working with you guys and learning you know as we grow. You got a friend in me now.
Speaker 4Look, oh my, oh wait, I'm not supposed to talk right, you got it talk. One thing that I left out is I'm doing leadership development for the youth between the ages of 5 through 14 during the summer months, and I'll also be doing some summer programs for kids. So, parents, if you're looking for opportunity for your children to be engaged in leadership development, relationship, skill building, social skills, you know, again connect with me and it's going to be special.
Speaker 2Awesome.
Speaker 4Amazing.
Speaker 3Be sure to buy some tickets for the raffle oh go ahead and be sure to check in for the run to recovery. So the 5k that's going to be at the event. At 10 am we're going to be doing sign-ups, so just show up, and at 10 am we'll have somebody out there taking payment. And what do we want to do? $20 a person.
Speaker 4Yeah, so for kids that are between the age of zero through, you know there could be some crawling out there. Zero to 17 is 15. And then 18 and up is 25. Okay, 25.
Meeting Reminder and Encouragement
Speaker 3Yeah, 15, and then 18 and up it's 25. Okay, 25, yeah so, and then you know, and we'll take venmo and everything else too, or in cash as well, but but yeah, that run will be, we're gonna do what.
Speaker 410 to 11 yeah, it's gonna be 10 to 11. Please show up by 9 15. There you go, 9 15 and then we will. We'll get going and if you beat me or Matt, you might get a donut.
Speaker 2You driving in the car, you driving the car, you running the room. Matt got to work. Excuses.
Speaker 3I heard excuses I might walk.
Speaker 2Yeah, baby, as always, if you're in crisis, be sure to call 988 or text 988. If you're a veteran, press 1. And if you're uncomfortable, be sure to just man reach out to somebody, as always. You know we love you. And Charlie Mike, Yo yo yo. What's going on? Everybody, it is me, Soulja Hard Hardwell, Redcon1 Music Group and thank you for listening to Charlie Mike, the Podcast, Yay.
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