bTB would fire pizza and grill. So I go to our text line and
you can Texas show anytime at five to five two or six eighty eight sixty
six, and I get hey. Bill went to Btb's tonight for the ten
dollars pizzas again just because I heard it on your pod. Matt wasn't there.
I so wanted to pick of us together. Now I know Matt went
to the Matt Rife or every friendayed going er to get my pizza. Matt's
never there. Guy's got the greatest schedule of all time. Anyhow, pizza
absolutely delicious. We girlfriends get together every other week for dinner. This is
going to be our new spot. Chicken French again. Love the pod Cougar
corner. I guess zero. Oh. By the way, it was me
and my boyfriend tonight, just ordered to take out pizzas while we had dirty
Martini's. So surprised we could order a white garlic pizza for ten bucks to
What a deal? Thanks again, So bTB, where do you find him?
You find him in the mall at Grease Ridge. bTB would fired pizza.
Your old career gives you lemons throwing some ice mix in some vodka.
We call it a podcast from the Mac of All Trade Studio in Fairport and
driven by Victor Chrysler Dots Jeep Ram. It's Billified but Bill Moran Podcast.
Well, hello and welcome. Thanks for getting your pod on, Thanks for
telling a friend. That's how we spread the word. And for fourth or
July and eating. When we get a guy today that will motivate you.
For forty seven straight days, Sergeant Brett Sobarovski started each morning with a twenty
six point two mile run. Man. That sounds insane to me. Yeah,
I think all crazy a lot. Yeah, never as much as when
I did this, I would think, yeah, they're crazy, the crazy
running bank. Because so you're a former sergeant that led the RPD swat team.
Yeah, I was a team leader on that swat team for the last
fifteen years of my career. Okay, and you did this in honor of
Tony massurka Witz. Yes, I did, and Tony who Now I think
it came out that it was a gang that was involved in basically the assassination.
It was basically they brought a hit man in from from Boston to you
know, to take care of a rival gang and then Tony got caught in
in the middle of that, right, got caught in the middle of that.
Now, so you did this to raise money for his family, But
I would think that someone had to say to you, there are other ways,
since they lost somebody, there's other ways they did because you know,
I had to buy a motor home for this. So I literally had to
buy a motor home for X amount of dollars. Like why why didn't you
just give him the money for that? And I was like, because it
would have got the word out like it did here, Like I spread the
word of you know, of his sacrifice, Yes, through eight states from
Florida all the way up to New York. And you know, I talked
to thousands of people who became aware of tony sacrifice. And the major reason
I did it was I felt like his death died like in a news cycle
or two and Roger So unfortunately, I mean, you're absolutely right. I
mean this is where miss yeah, and this is where we live. These
are the times we live in because you're right. I mean used to be
sometimes stories did have a longer time, Right, you would be on the
front page a little bit more, or I would pick up a newspaper that
came out yesterday and the story continues. Now everything is so quick, and
we had a yardstick to measure it by, unfortunately, which was Darryl Pearson
was murdered in the line of duty two thousand and eight. Yeah, that
was in a news cycle for months and months, and it was so I
was like, this didn't happen. There wasn't the amount of fundraising for Tony
like there was for Daryl. And you know it's because of the certain times,
because of the last three years basically where you know, law enforcement has
been you know, demonized and vilified because of a few like horrible cops,
criminal cops. It's funny because you're right. I always think that the fringe
gets the most attention these days of anything, Right, So if we get
a few bad apples, they get the most attention if you're the loudest on
either side, and most of what I'm referring to would be the political spectrum,
even they're the ones that seem to get the most. But that's not
where most people are. No, that's not where most people are. That's
not how most police officers are. No, squeaky wheel gets degreased, right
like you'll say, yeah, when you when you think about you know,
ninety nine point seven percent of cops go out there do that job great every
single day, helping people, making a difference, and you know, for
this to happen, I was like, I couldn't stand by and let that
happen. And I thought maybe I could help make a difference at least,
well you can. My question is where does the idea to then go,
Oh, I know what I'll do. I'll go to Florida and I'll run
a marathon every every day all the way back to Rochester. Yeah. So
I didn't know how I was going to honor him. And at first I
thought, well, maybe I can like go to a local track and run
around a track for like two days straight and people can joining. And I
was like, yeah, exactly. I'm like, you know, that's little
mind numbing. So then I thought, well, maybe, you know,
maybe I can run through a marathon in each state, do eight marathons.
And I was like, it didn't match Tony's sacrifice, it didn't match his
persona. I mean, he was larger than life, just as icon within
the police department. So I said, I'm gonna I'm gonna run through eight
states. And the reason I picked eight was he worked in the Tactical Unit
in the Rochester Police Department, very elite unit. Their number designator is eight.
Okay, So like Clinton Section is seven, Lake Section is one.
So I said, I'm gonna use that eight number and I'm gonna run through
eight states in his honor. So before you do something like this, you
said he had to buy the motor home, which was a place for you
then to sleep and and for someone to So you have to get somebody to
come with you. Yes, okay, many people huh yeah, many people
like they come down for five days at a time. Yeah, you know,
transferring it. But somebody has to be able to drive that thing.
Yes, right, you need somebody with a little bit of skill, you
know what I mean. Yeah, it's got some dents and dings in it.
About for sale anyone listening slightly use motor home smells like a YMC a
locker way to sell it. Yes, did you consult with a doctor before
doing this? No? Like I doctors don't understand me, and I've had
bad like um, not bad experiences, but they just don't understand like what
makes me tick? I actually, so I wrote a book, and I
actually gave the book to my doctor. Yeah. The book is called gray
Man, An Average Man's Journey to Personal Greatness. Yeah, it just talks
about how like me, it's my memoir, which is saying that is weird,
Like I feel like I you know that I wrote a memoir, but
about how average of a person I am athletically like subpower, don't have very
athletic genes at all. So but then you talked to doctors, like,
you know, doctor would tell me not to do what I just did,
so I yeah, they would. Yeah, so I don't go to see
doctors for that. You don't know, do you see a doctor on a
regular BAT would assume just for like a blood shut. Yeah, so I
get my blood work done. Make sure you know that the cholesterols where it's
got to be in the blood pressure is. But short of that, no,
I don't really, I'm not a big I'm not a big fan of
doctors. Okay, what did you learn about the human body? You probably
could tell us more having done this experience where you ran for forty seven days
straight every day a marathon actually was fifty Oh okay, so I was supposed
to do forty eight, okay, but I had built in two buffer days
in case the motor home broke down or you know, I broke down.
So none of that happened. So I got back here on Thursday, that
which was forty seven marathons on Thursday. So in theory, I would have
Friday and Saturday off and then Sunday was the big finish. Yeah, but
I'm like, if I take two days off, my body's gonna start to
heal and it's gonna be really ugly. So I just did two additional marathons
on those rest days to keep my body going the way it had been.
Okay, But I learned. What I learned is and I read. I
read a lot of research on doing this, because there's other people that have
crossed, you know, the United States, you know, whether west to
east or north to south, I have done this, that have done this,
and what they say is you have to get past the first week.
The first week is the toughest. Your body is acclimating, you're sore,
you're tired. So I had that in the back of my mind, but
it took me two weeks. The first two weeks I was struggling, Like
I look at it as being the deep end of a pool and I was
barely tread and water. Well, you started out. You couldn't start in
a hotter fucking place unless you went to the desert. Man. I mean
you were in Florida. I love the heat, but man, that's intense.
That's not heat, that's like humidity, all of it. It was.
Man. I was running down these and I just picked it off.
I did a route. I laid in bed one night and I said,
Okay, I'm gonna start in Plock of Florida. I have good friends there.
What's the next, like north the thing I can run to. I'm
like, well, folks in Georgia without and I'm like, let's do a
route where I can't take the highways, where there's no tolls, so I
can run on these roads. I'm not knowing, like the thirteen or fourteen
miles a day. We're on these sandy roads in the middle of nowhere in
Florida without any kind of cover, like just getting baked to death. Yeah,
and it was, Yeah, it was interesting. So that I mean
that's where you started. Yes, Yeah, So that right there. I
think you kind of put yourself behind the eight ball a little bit. But
you're right. So my younger brother quit a job in New York City many
years ago, bought a bicycle, flew out to Seattle, hung out with
a buddy, and then rode the bike. Having never done this, being
never really trained for this, never did anything, and wrote it from Seattle
to Virginia. Oh my gosh. That's ambitious. And I think it's one
of these things. And there are, like you said, you know,
people who have done the marathon thing. There are books, and there are
hostels that you can stay at, and people who welcome in the guys who
were doing this trip, and you know, and so there were books and
things that my dad bought them, and he went and did it, you
know, setting up camp and everything. And I to this day he'll tell
you it's the best thing he ever did. And I think there were some
really introspective days. I would think even for you, there had to be
some days where it was very it's just you and your thoughts as you're running
twenty six point two miles. I know there were people that joined you along
the way, but not every mile. No, I ran. I will
bet you I ran ninety percent of those marathons by myself. Yeah, like
completely by myself. So you're running for four or four and a half hours.
Yeah, there is a lot to think of, yeah, other than
running. And I did learn it was it was a I call it an
odyssey or an adventure. It was incredible. It was truly incredibly changed my
life for many, many different reasons. Okay, before I want to find
out about that. But as you're talking, and I'm thinking back to the
doctor thing, there's a big thing now called biohacking, where people are trying
to hack the human body and live longer. And there are some people who
say statistically where the human body can probably go healthy one hundred and ten,
maybe one hundred and twenty years. The oldest person to ever live was one
hundred and twenty in France. And I think that was back I don't.
I think it was at the beginning of the ninth of the twentieth century.
But then there are guys now that are doing all kinds of things, taking
the plasma of a seventeen year old, putting it into their body at forty
five and trying to live and all that. Are you curious as to your
chronological not your chronological ages, but your biological age verse your chronological age after
doing this, I'm looking at you. You couldn't be more fit, and
you're fifty six years old and he just ran fifty fucking days to day.
It's it's so the oddity is, and I talk about it a little bit
in my book, is the more I do this, the better I recover.
So when I first started, you know, I think it was I
think it was May Maybes, eighteen years ago. I did my first half
marathon I did I ran thirteen point one miles. I couldn't run for two
months after, Okay, like my body hurt for two months. And I
did my first iron Man a triathlon. It was like three months. I
was hemmed up, just aches and pains and everything hurt. And then the
more I did this, the quicker in my recovery comes. It's like it's
almost like reverse aging. As far as the healing process. Did you learn
recovery tips as well? Do you do things that you didn't do maybe in
the beginning, I don't know if it's stretching or sometimes those roller bars or
pads or whatever they are, the people rolling muscles off. Yeah, that's
exactly it. So I would during these eight States for mass I would work
three to four hours a day on prehab and rehab a day, you know,
in short segments ice right after, you know, rolling massages, the
massage gun, essential oils, which I never believed that my girlfriend's a big
essential oil person. And I would use this panaway which is like the nature's
thing of gay or bio freeze, and that would help a lot of stretching.
H these compression things I put on my legs at blow up Air.
Yeah, yeah, so I really If I didn't do that, I would
have broke. Do you lay ever with your feet up like on a wall
or above your heart? You know? I read I'm a big fan of
TikTok, but I always joke that I have old man TikTok right, because
it's all it's all how to stretch before bad, It's all this shit.
But I saw something that says the Navy seal, a Navy seal nap where
you lay down for fifteen minutes with your feet up above you, like on
a couch or something or an ottoman and you're laying on the on the floor
and it just keeps the I don't know, I do that every once in
a while. I feel great. That's hilarious because there's a policeman who was
a great hockey player, Dave Simpson. He goes, what do you think
we do between periods playing hockey? He goes, All the hockey players are
on their butt with their legs against the lockers, letting the lactic acid rain
out. So I would put those sleeves on. They would pump full of
air. And I think what that would do is I'm in the back of
the motor home feet elevated. It pumps that squeezes the lactic acid out of
my muscles back into my heart, all that bad blood. And then I
would drink a ton of water and I would pee, and the whole toilet
bowl would be full of foam, and that foam is lactic acid. Wow,
like it was. So I have this little joke with Todd Baxter because
the Shared Good Sheriff wrote the forward to my book, And in my book
I talk about how you know I pee you a toilet bowl and it's just
full of foam, And he batches something like, Hey, if you think
a toilet full of foam is a bad thing, you better read this book.
So I'm sending pictures of it all the time. I take a picture
of my peace. I send it to Baxter. He's like, oh gosh,
he goes, I see you're stretching again. Huh. So you said
this changed your life, how oh many different ways? I So the biggest
unknown was day two. So I run the first marathon, and I didn't
run a marathon in training because you just can't go that fire. I would
probably break in training. So I went to bed that night thinking like,
what's going to happen on day two? And I told myself, I'm like,
we know what's gonna happen is you're gonna get up and run, because
that's what you said you were gonna do. And every day that happened,
and I found out that, you know, it was more it was more
mental than physical, Like the mental toughness about convincing yourself that this aching pain
I had behind my knees not gonna stop me tomorrow. We're gonna figure it
out. We're gonna work through it. And then when the right leg goes
bad, we're gonna figure that out. But what I really learned the most
was about humanity was the just the wonderful, decent, hard working, gracious,
kind people I met along the way, like I'm talking hundreds that gave
me their last dollar out of their pocket to give to the Missurka, which
family was incredible, like incredible. You can't you know, we watched the
news and we think of how divided we are. But the fringes are divided,
right, the fire fire left, fire fire, right, But there's
all of us in the middle that kind of still get along and still kind
of get what America's about. And I saw that at the ground floor.
Yeah, that's amazing at the ground floor. It has to feel incredible to
see that and make you feel good about this country. It's beautiful. I
saw the fabric of America. I saying it is beautiful. And the people
that came down I could I could go on Instagram and Facebook and tell of
these stories. But the people that came down and helped me and witness it
said it changed their life. Like they're like reading about it and then seeing
it firsthand is incredible, just incredible. Yeah, I'm still smiling about it.
Like I said, all these people that strangers that would I would tell
the story because there's only there's two missions of eight states from mass to honor
his sacrifice and let other people know how Tony lived and how he died,
and then to comfort the family financially and emotionally, and to see these people
from eight states away who never know Tony Mazurkowitz and come out and hug me,
to tell me, to hug the family and to honor his sacrifice without
ever meeting him. It was mission accomplished. Yeah, I get a little
em Yeah, it was incredible. Well, I think it's incredible. Do
you mind saying how much you raised doing this? So the goal was one
hundred thousand, and everyone told me you better back that off by about fifty
percent. It's just unrealistic. And I'm like, well, people say it's
unrealistic to run from Florida to New York. So I'm not backing it off.
And we're over one hundred grand now I think we're pretty close to one
hundred and ten thousand for the family. It's amazing, It's totally amazing.
Let's just pause here for a moment. But when we come back, I
want to talk about belief. Right, believe all this is the thought that
we think over and over and over again. But I want to know kind
of your perspective unbelief and also a little bit of spirituality in that as you
go forward or do that in just a moment. Who's gonna be crown the
funniest person in Rochester twenty twenty three. Great talent, people who have been
wanting to do this forever, getting up there and putting it all on the
line. I love this contest comedy that the Carlston does it better than anybody.
They make it the most fair and democratic way you could possibly do this
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That's the fun thing about it. I host this contest. I don't love
it because I host it. I actually love it and asked if I could
host it after seeing it. Who does that me? Because I thought it
was really, really well done. Vinnie Paulino, Mark Eppolito Comedy at the
Carlson. Find up more information at Carlson Comedy dot com. The Red Wings
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to what matters most, beauty, who in liberating strife? Who more than
country? Well these words almost I'm thinking to you as I do that all
that that's amazing. Yes, this is not the you know, running fifty
straight days of marathon every day. I'm thinking back to to you know,
the marathon started. It's a way to deliver mail. Yes, you know
what I mean. So I wonder if back did the Greeks know about the
human body more than we do today in terms of being able to push it
and do things. Because I was gonna say this isn't the first insane thing
to do, but I don't like to say it that way because I think
it's the first. Um, I don't know if it's it's not the first
that man, excuse me, insame thing you've done. But I would say
the most. Uh, I don't even know. Self sacrificing, noble,
pushing yourself, it's everything. It's the way we should be and we're not,
or most people should be and we're not. Yeah, And I think
this was what made us you know interesting, I guess was the duration of
it, you know, for fifty days? Uh to you know, to
run that? So most things I've done before. You're over in a well
a day or two and you're done. But no, the last thing I
remember you doing was running the canal from Buffalo to Albany. Yeah, fifty
hours for two days. Fifty hours. Yeah, so I ran in like
one hundred and seventy six miles straights. So yeah, I was like after
two days, you know, I could lay down for it, you know,
and recover. So these fifty days it was a Yeah, I'm not
sure if it's the hardest thing I did, but it was certainly the longest,
like grind day in and day out, and you know, there's nights
I went to bed wondering if I was going to run the next day because
I had these elements that stopped me in my tracks. And um, but
I was so happy to do it, like I was proud to do it.
I was. I felt like it was my my duty to do it.
I guess. Yeah, well, that's where I was going to say
to you. You know, I'm I'm a big believer and have said on
the pod a lot that if you have an idea to do something and you
really believe in it, don't say anything to anybody because they're gonna say things
to you, and not to be mean, They're not. They're gonna just
put but from their perspective, they're going to give you their advice, and
their advice is going to be set your goal fifty percent less for raising money
for the missourko Wits family. Correct. And yet here you believed, you
believed you would, and you did you know, and that that that's the
thing that I think, like most of us, don't, you know,
we look at people like yourself, or we think of sports heroes or guys
who have done incredible things and we go, wow, it's just amazing.
But anybody can if you just you have to believe, like really believe,
and there can be no negative thought in there. You can't have any doubt,
you know. I always like to use the story from the Bible when
Jesus would heal somebody and then say go forth and tell no one, And
the reason he said that was because they're gonna go. Yeah, he did
give it a week, man, it'll be back here. I mean,
you know, I mean that that kind of thing. And once you get
that doubt, it has to be almost this pure positive belief. And I
gotta tell you, when you invest in a motor home. You there was
no doubt in your mind. No, And I this story three different people
told me before I left, asked me I should say, and I appreciate
their candor that's the only thing I appreciate about it is what are you gonna
do when you don't finish? That was the questions posted me. God,
well what do you do when you don't finish? Like what's the plan?
Be? Like? How are you going to work that out? Because June
eleventh was always the end date with having these people run the last three miles
with me in front of the family. So I said, I look at
him and said, I don't have a plan for that, Like, well,
what you should start thinking about that? And I always said, you
know, if you started making these contingency plans for something like this, you
plant seed, it's gonna grow if you If you say, well, the
contingency is I'll skip a state and I'll start up five days later, that's
that seed is in the back of your mind. You plant that seeds is
probably gonna grow. So I'm like, there's no contingency. You do it
or you don't like and I'm not gonna don't. So but what was great
about those three people was when I was suffering the most, either these mountains
in West Virginia or the heat in Florida, I would think of that.
Would those are like, oh yeah, like I have this huge inferno inside
of me, and there's times when it starts to smolder. So that's a
giant log. People doubting me, where does that come from? Um?
I think you know it's over years. Man. Like I said, I
was this kid who couldn't even earn a varsity letter jacket in high school.
You're kidding. I tried. I tried. I tried. You go to
high school, Lockport High School, which is like didn't have the greatest athletes
there, like four hundred kids like graduating class. But so I couldn't make
any The only team I can make is a track team because they didn't cut
anyone. And I you had to earn, like you had to race varsity
and coming first, second or third and gather enough points. I couldn't earn
a letter jacket. So I come, you know, and you know,
I smoke for sixteen years, two packs a day. You know, was
unhealthy, A bad a very bad role model for my sons. And I
turned this around. But I didn't turn this around in a year or two.
This is like, from where I'm at now is eighteen year odyssey of
little baby steps. So eventually I learned about this giant flame. And that's
how I see it, like when I'm suffering, when I'm truly like inside
out, and you can't hide behind like false bravado or my cheese mole or
anything, and it's I tell people, it's like a botomfire. We've all
been to a bonfire. When you first walk up to a boonofire, you
get as close as you can, and then it starts to burn a little
bit. We stop, but if you stand there long enough, it gets
it. You get acclimated to it, and you're like, I'm not hot
anymore. You take a few more steps towards it. That's what I did
over the last eighteen years until I was able to get in the center of
it. So talk to me about growing up. What did your parents do.
My dad was a police officer in Lockport for twenty eight years. I
was forced enough to work with him for a few months when I got hired
by Lockport at the very unripe age of twenty one. My mom was a
stay at home mom. Then as we got older, myself and my two
sisters, she took a job at the hospital. Is like medical records.
In Lockport was the greatest place to grow up when the lights came is truly
when the lights came out and you went home at night. Yeah, parks
were like a quarter mile on either direction, so you could walk to the
parks, spent all summer there. Just a great, great little city.
Yeah. But I mean in terms of like this, right, this this,
push yourself, strive to be more. I'm not gonna say be the
best, but but more, push yourself, do it for you. I
mean that's the thing like in life. I don't think we think of it
enough. It's only really about you and the satisfaction you get. And if
you are no, no, but but yeah. But also but on top
of that, if you aren't feeling your best, like you come in here.
You got a big smile on your face, you got a lot of
energy. I saw you before you did this over at Iron Smoke when we
were right. I saw you before you again, same energy, same positivity.
I would have never said to you, do you have a contingency plan?
I just either, But I'm just saying like so, but all of
that, right, this this push yourself. But if you're not feeling that
way, you're no good to anybody else. And I think a lot of
people see some things as maybe self care or working out or taking time for
yourself is selfish. But I've started to believe as I've gotten older, that
it's not it's it's it's what makes you good for your sons, for your
girlfriend, for the mass the Mazerkowitz family absolutely, and I you know,
I don't think you know, and chasing your dreams, like I get,
you have to balance that with family life, and family always comes first.
But I think part of the part of the problem is instead of chasing our
own dreams, we chase the Joneses and the Smiths. So you want to
have what they have or what they do, and we're compare ourselves. And
that's where I first experienced personal greatness because what happened was I was played a
cruel joke. When I was born. I was They said to me,
whoever made me? You know, people will say God, other people call
it different things. They said, let's give this kid zero athletic ability.
Let's make them uniquely averages averages could be average height, average weight, average
intelligence, but let's have them always want to be great, like on a
global level. How do you ever become great when you don't have the makeup
to become that? Well, I'll tell you how. And I think there's
part of it is consistency, right, showing up yes every day, and
then I would say setting goals, but I don't even know if they're necessarily
goals, but just I'm gonna do this, right, I'm gonna do this.
And I think the way you were saying it is, I think anything
in life, like you know, people go, I want like you're saying,
I want all this stuff. If you got everything that's coming to you
in life all at once, wouldn't want it. If you got all the
food you were ever gonna eat in your life today, you wouldn't want it.
You couldn't do it. But you know the unfolding, right, and
the journey of that. And look at how much you seem to be happier
about the last eighteen years than the two pack a day sixteen years prior.
Because I started trying not to be great globally because it could never happen,
but to be great in my own skin. Yeah. Like, so my
greatness is I ran fifty marathons. Someone else's greatness maybe to get off the
couch and run a five k. Mine isn't any greater than theirs. Their
feeling of greatness will probably match my feeling of greatness. So it's when I
stopped comparing myself, when I started setting my own unique goals and how I
judge myself as how far I can turn myself inside up. Well, are
your parents still alive? No, they're both passed. They're both passed.
Your sons are around. Yeah, So I had My oldest son's a police
officer. He's third generation RPD with he's got eight and a half years on.
And my youngest son works at a plug power the hydrogen plan out in
Henrietta. So I've two great boys man plus so and so and they have
to be just blown away by all this. Yeah, and they've always supported
me. None of them have gotten into athletics like I had, but let's
face it, I didn't get into it till I was in my you know,
mid to late thirty so, um, but they both do their own
like unique things, Like my oldest son loves riding is Harley So he's gonna
ride the end of this month, he's gonna ride from Florida, I'm sorry,
from New York to key West NonStop. And then he's going from Key
West to Alaska by himself on his motorcycle, then back to New York.
So he's got a little bit of the crazy gene and yeah, but just
just a different way of showing Yeah, okay, Yeah, what do you
hope people kind of learn from from this, from this journey that you did?
Um, I think it's and I hate to it sounds almost self centered,
but you a person can help make a difference. Yeah, and it
wasn't you know, I had this we talked about. I had a huge
support staff. I had people come down, burn vacation time, catch air
air planes. You know, they had to pay for their tickets, had
to rent cars. A lot of people sacrifice so that I could I could
succeed. But it was a huge team effort. You know, there's probably
twenty thirty people that helped me day in and day out and sacrifice. I
would say, no, you know, having started this right, nobody does
it alone. You don't do it alone. You just don't. Now,
can you be the one to spearheaded. Is your vision? Is it all
that? Sure? But you need people that are supportive and that says a
lot about you. Realize what that says about you? Though, no,
I'm too close to it. Tell you. What I'm saying is how people
would be willing to burn vacations, the money to be part of something that
you're doing. That that that's quite a testament to you. And I don't
I don't let anyone just come down. And that's probably like the selfish part
of it. It's all people who I truly truly love and trust and respect
because you know, they have to. They have to be that type of
people because they're going to sacrifice so much for me while I'm while I'm trying
to succeed. And these are the people that have been with me, like
they've been out to California with me for races, They've been when I went
across the lake all this, like the what do you mean I swam the
lake? I swam across. I swam across Lake Ontario from Fort Niagara to
a Toronto a couple of years back. Okay, NonStop, non stop?
Yeah, thirty two miles. How long did it take? Twenty one hours?
And fifteen minutes of straight in the water that whole time I did.
It almost killed me. Yeah, I felt I felt like the lake was
gonna try to kill me. It. Uh. We started off. It
was easy, I mean so lake. We started off at the mouth of
the lake or the Niagara River, so that water coming out of there.
I swimming like Michael Phelps for like the first three miles. I'm like,
this is gonna be easy. I got halfway through and my shoulders burned so
bad. My eyes were water and every time, you know, doing freestyle,
then the lake kicked up, got rough, and then I got hypothermia,
and then the lake kicked up again, and then I got hypothermia a
second time. My skin was completely see through purple. And then I got
a virus where I couldn't stop, had NonStop diarrhea, had a swim with
like with my trunks around my knees because I could just couldn't stop pooping in
the lake. In the lake, because I drank so much of that nasty
lake water by accident on a few times, I thought I was gonna drown.
And this is a for like twenty one and a half hours, like
you could, I felt that you did that and then decided, Hey,
I'll run fifty states or fifty marathons. Excuse me, Yeah, I mean
they're so they're all like um, like you can't never rest on your laurels,
but they're all like things I can draw from when things get tough,
like oh man, like this is tough, but remember how tough that was?
Yeah? What was the lake? One for? Um? I swam
for All In, All the Time. So Tommy Valentine was Navy seal.
I met him and another guy I called Weimo, and they were training in
Rochester when I was very young in my SWAT career. They befriended us.
They let us go down to like you know, they're from Seal Team what
they would call Seal Team six, they're now called dev Grew Developmental Group,
and they let us use their facility and damn At his top secret navy facility
for us to train. So we became good friends. And about three years
after I met Tommy Valentine, he died in training in a parachute accident and
his wife started All In, All the Time foundation. So I swam for
that. So you know, I've done, you know, And we talked
about it before like quitting or stopping or not finishing it. So I've done
it for Tommy Valentine. I've raised money for Billy Mahoney, who was a
Rochester police sergeant who died suddenly. For Tony Mazurkowitz, I did. I
went down and honored Darryl Pearson. So people are like, well, what
happens like if you don't finish. I'm like, well, like forty fifty
years from now, we talk about you know, I expect to live to
be a hundred. I guess after one hundred, I give up, Like
I'll go to sleep and not wake up. But it's sometime in the future.
I gotta go meet these people, like I gotta sit across the table
like we're doing. Now what do I do? And I fail? Say,
hey man, did I honor your sacrifice? Did I honor your good
name? Then you got to live with that fraternity. So like, failure
is not an option. Yeah, quitting's never not now when you're doing it
for something for me at least, yes, And but these ideas, I
mean, stuff isn't. I mean it really is. It's pushing the human
body to the limit. I mean, boy to get sick and be purple
and swimming. I mean, you should have just taken the shorts off.
Well I would I actually thought about that. I'm like, you know,
no, my luck, like something would happen and I'd die. Never never
I am. There's a picture of me dead, floating in the water,
like naked as hell. My. You know my parents, actually both of
my parents, they were alive at that point. I'm like, what do
they say to that? What do you what do your parents say? They
never really I don't know if they truly understood well my mom. So this
is I have many fears in life. The biggest fear is my mom was
in a nursing home at my age, nonverbal, with early onset dementia and
probably some mini strokes real so she and then she was healthy at Hacks.
So I got my healthiness from her. You know, back when people didn't
work out, she would do like a robic and she'd swim, she'd walk
everywhere. So she lived in this nursing home for like the better part of
twenty years because her body was so healthy, but her mind was not okay,
So you know that that often worries me. So she never really understood.
She never really understood I didn't get into this until she was, you
know, fully into dementia Alzheimer's. My dad was just like he was just
looking at me, kind of shake his head like, you know, I
didn't understand it, and I understand he comes from a generation that doesn't.
He was supremely proud. Yes, I'm sure I couldn't understand what I'm doing?
What was So then I guess what, you know, why don't we
pause for just a moment and then I'll ask you and you can think about
this what inspires you, you know, as you've done more and more of
these, and that Lake one sounds like that grueling isn't even a word.
It was you know, I was a fifty fifth person to do it,
or fifty fourth person. It's a thing. So who knows who realizes that
this is a thing that started with some sixteen year old girl? Did her
fourteen year old girl did it forever ago? Yeah, and there's like an
established route. I just said I'm going to do it, and then I
did the research. I'm like, oh gosh, this is some silly some
silly ass people that have done his du Yes, yes, but kind of
And then who taught you the most we'll get to that all next. If
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I work for all my life and I had to start again with just my
churlren and my wife. I thank my lucky stars to be living here Aday
because the flag still stands for freedom and they can't take that away. I
don't know why I find these like songs, and I know you know where
this is coming a little after the fourth July, but still you are like,
you're like the all American, You're you know what. There's somebody I
forget who. It was an actor and he kept saying I'm a human doing,
not a human being. I know what I mean. I mean right
that that's you, because you know, there's a lot of people that talk,
but the act of doing, the act of acting is so important,
and just for the little things, and just for the little things is those
turn into big things? And all the things you've done, what would be
the most satisfying. I mean, having swam across the lake, you ran
down the canal, You've now run fifty marathons in eight states, so you're
looking for athletic stuff. But I'm gonna say the most satisfying thing I ever
did was I had this not so bright idea I built my own house.
Okay, I'm talking about I built in my own hands. Yeah, like
I did the entire thing myself, except for the foundation, the drywall,
and the heating. Yea wait, Dad did that way over my head.
And I say myself. Great friends helped me. My dad was alive at
the time. But this was and I remember I wasn't tough at that time.
I wasn't mentally tough. I didn't have grit stick to witness. And
I got three months into this project, probably closer to four, and I
went out there one day and I was, so, I'm working on this.
I'm working forty hours a week at work. I'm working an additional fifty
hours a week building this house, four hours every night after work, fourteen
hours on Saturday, fourteen hours on Sunday. And I go out to the
work one day and I look at the back of it. I'm like,
there's no way I'm finishing this, Like I want this to burn down.
I hope it gets hit by lightning. I can't finish this. And I'm
like, but I have this money tied up into it. I have this
building loan, and so I don't even put my tool belt out that day.
I walk away from it and I don't touch it for like a week,
and my dad takes notice and he calls me up. He's like,
what are you doing? And he's I'm like, I don't think I can
do this. Dad. He goes, you can definitely do it. I
know you can. And I wanted to be like, no, you're full
of crap. But he built his own house by himself when he retired,
did the same thing. So he gave me some tough love and we got
back to it. And it took me nine months because that's all I had
on the building loan. I kept extending it and it was the hardest thing
I ever did in my life. But now I live in that I'll die
in that house. I call it my coffin home. Every time I walk
in the house, I smile. I sit there to this day, sixteen
years seventeen years old, I sit in the living room and I just stare
at it in awe. I stare at the floor, at the ceiling,
at the walls, like my heart and soul was in that house. Yeah,
and it was. It was That's when I learned that like dedication,
sacrifice, uh, perseverance, like what the end result. That was the
first time I experienced greatness in my entire life. And that was I don't
know, I was thirty, I was forty years old. Yeah, and
that's the first time I experienced that that something great comes out of a great
amount of effort. And that's what started all of this. Yeah. See,
I always think like there there's a couple of things. As I've gotten
older, I'm not um. I think words like discipline U scare people and
I and so what I'll try to say is whatever matters most put it first,
that's discipline, right, whatever matters more? Do you want to lose
weight? You know, sitting on your ass, sit in your hands and
shut your mount Now, I I'm just saying, but like whatever you're putting
first, that that's what it is. And I think there are words like
discipline or or the grind there. To me, those are ugly words.
So what would be a better way is I get to I get to build
my house, I get to work out today. There's somebody who can you
know, there's somebody who wishes they could, right Tony Mazurka, which probably
wishes he could still, you know, be here to see his kids and
stuff. You get to and I think that that's a different way of thinking
about it and sometimes can help you not have that moment where I got to
help this burns down because I think everybody's been there. It's a very human
feeling, yes, but the idea to push that and I will say that,
you know, doing this and having done radio for a long time,
at the end of the day, I don't have anything tangible. I can
hand somebody a little more now with a podcast, because you can go back
and listen right to all everything's archived but I don't have anything tangible. And
that's why I liked working with my hands. I like doing things around my
house and I like saying I hung that door. You know, I did
this, I did that. There is some unbelievable satisfaction in that. There
is because you can look at it and say, this is you know,
It's like so for eight states for Mas, this thing what I'm doing is
and I enjoy looking at something that I did. Yes, So through all
these eight states, these policemen came out and asked corded me so I didn't
hit by car, and people gave me trinkets and I found like pennies on
the ground. I'd run by lucky pennies. So I'm making this like shadow
box of all these patches and challenge coins and people gave me so much stuff.
This special Olympian um Emily, she sent me one of her gold medals
in the mail after with a note saying, like you inspired me so much
and like you know I've earned these so hard, but I want you to
have one out. Oh my god, yeah, think about that. I
mean, oh my god, think about that's it broke out. I put
that on Facebook. It broke the internet, Yeah truly did. What a
great person she is. And I'm like, no, like you inspired me,
Like it's the opposite, Like okay, so let's ask you that what
does inspire you? Um? I think so nowadays I don't know like what
like what does nowadays? But I can tell you how I started on this
is it age thirty seven. I joined the SWAT team. Yeah, it
aged like old, so like that's an old man in the in the world
of swat. And at that time I was I was not tough, feeling
forty sevens old in the world thirty sevens and old in the world of sports
we talk and all that stuff. I mean, yeah, there's not too
many Tom bradies right there. For I had a buddy who was on a
swat team, Jimmy Carroll. Oh yeah, on the Sheriff's department. I
love Jimmy Carroll. Yeah, great guy. So I get on the SWAT
team and I started looking around. I'm like, these guys are tough,
and these guys are not just physically tough, they're mentally tough. They're guys
that when they get it wrong, they do it until they get it right,
and they never give up. And I was like I want to be
like and there's too many a name, but like Todd Baxter, Aaron Springer,
Fabian Rivera, and it goes on and on, and I started understanding
that term iron sharpens irony. But I was like, yes, yes,
I was like like soft lead at the time, Like I wasn't even close
to being iron, but I wanted to be like these guys. And I
think that says a lot like you are what your inner circle is. You
hang around with a bunch of naysayers and negative people, and that's the guess
what you're gonna be. You're gonna be a naysayer and a negative person.
And so I started the One example was Todd Baxter, who ran that swat
team like a drill sergeant, and he made the training days so tough.
We got done one night and he's like, hurry up, clean the guns.
You gotta get out of here. Hurry up, clean the guns.
You gotta get out of here. And I'm like, my buttch dragon,
I want to go home, eat dinner, play with the kids for five
minutes, and go to bed. And finally someone's like, hey, Todd,
why are you in such a hurry to leave? And he whispers I
gotta run eighteen miles tonight. I'm training for a marathon, and he did
everything I did that day in training, so I thought that was super human.
I said, that's how does someone go home after this and run eighteen
miles? I want to be like that guy, like Todd Baxter, And
that's that's who I initially drew my inspiration from. For those squat guys,
I got a round tough guys that made me tougher. So you gotta.
So you really gotta watch out who you who are you hang out with,
especially your closest circle man, because you're gonna become them or you're not gonna
You're not gonna be the shiny star amongst you know, a bunch of duds,
right, a bunch of negative people, or a bunch of whatever.
I always think too, because we can all say, well, circumstances in
life gave me this. And my thinking is life's never gonna stop coming at
you, but how you react to it, it's completely your control. What
you can control is how you handle things. And it's a simple sometimes mind
switch, a mind switch from I have to do this too, I get
to do this. And there aren't times where yeah, hearing about a guy
who just did what you did, let everybody through it, and then it's
going to go run eighteen miles. As you're thinking I want to just go
home and have dinner, there is something that almost in yourself you go,
what am I? Why am I like this? And I think the human
body is capable. I think we do things, you know. I don't
think we need to eat as much as we're eating. I mean, I
don't know how you saw this on running the marathons, because you would need
a lot of fuel for twenty six miles a day, right, But I
mean you had to lose weight. I lost from the day. So I
spend January snowbird. Everyone's like a too young in a snowbird. I'm like,
no, screw, I'm too old to be cold. So I was
like, I spent January and February and Florida. Well, I'm not a
surfer, but I surf and train, starting to train for this run.
Then I left their March first, I weighed one hundred and eighty one pounds
and on March firsts when I started putting it in serious training miles. I
came home from eight states from as at one sixty four, So seventeen pounds
and I don't have seventeen pounds to lose, ye, honestly, like my
clothes don't fit. I'm hungry all the time now. But yeah, seventeen
pounds. What did you eat right after? So it all wraps up,
it's all done, and maybe I don't know if your appetite doesn't really come
back for a day or two. But what what was the biggest? So
we had the ceremony on June eleventh at the Halls of Justice, the courtyard
and Salvator is the great people there. They call up Ellen from Fleet Feet.
They're like, we want to donate the Pizzas he goes, I don't
think you understand there's gonna be a thousand people. They're like, well,
I guess we just have to make a lot more pizza. I ate a
whole large pizza before I left that courtyard. Everyone cleared out. I told
my girlfriends all this pizza left over. Actually, I'm like, go grab
me a cheese and pepperoni pizza. So everyone's left. There's like six of
us there. I didn't want to leave, Like I had this emotional attachment
to the ceremony. At the end, and I'm like, I'm not ready
to leave. Everyone like go your own way. And I sat there eight
a whole large pizza, like the whole thing, the whole thing, and
I'm still hungry. I still who made the pizza again? Oh salvatory?
Yeah, like how how incredible? Man? And uh yeah, so I
and I'm I go to bed hungry. Now I wake up hungry. I'm
I'm constantly hungry trying to get this weight back on. Yeah, are you
do you want to get the weight back on? Or do you like the
way? You know? I like being like one eighty is like a really
good weight, and I wanted to go into this at one eighty knowing I'm
going to give a bunch back, but I went in like at one seventy
two. Wish yeah yeah, wow Yeah. I like having like some semblance
of muscles, you know, like I hear who taught you the most along
the way? Um, do you think of like anybody who taught yours or
any anything. I mean, it just sounds like a lot of this isself.
It is. But there was like so one of my sponsors, which
was like everyone's like, I don't understand the sponsor. His name is Greg
Walsh. He's the owner of it is called woof Brigade jim Um. It's
in the city here, And this guy's the best, one of the best
strength and condition he coaches in the entire world. And I don't say that
like like you know, haphazardly. He's just a great, great strength and
condition he coach. And what they do with that Jim is they build superhumans.
They build people, the strongest people you've ever seen, and not people
that are talented from the start. They take people like average people like us
and turn them into superhumans. It's it's the weirdest thing I've ever seen.
And that guy has had like a lot of knocks in his life, Like
you know, we're associated with some people then they cut strings and he should
be a bazillionaire, but he's not because he has he's he stands by his
conviction. So like if one of his sponsors or people gets squirrely, then
he just cuts him and he refuses to bend a nia anyone. He's very
But he was a guy who like sees like he would I would put something
on Instagram, then he would he would comment on it, and uh,
like that was a guy Drew a lot of strength from because of his insight
into life itself and how he's how he's very not just disciplined, but um,
like I said, he refuses, he refuses to bend his principles.
You know, He's like, I don't care about money. I'll go I'll
go live in a shoe box or in a in a refrigerator box. But
I'm not gonna I'm not gonna bend for like this this culture that we live
in now, not going to And so that was a guy really took a
lot of like strength from. And when you have the superhumans, they're like
the Avengers right this, Jim, and they're in your corner. Like,
how do you fail when you have all these super humans behind you? Yeah?
I find the whole thing. And I'm sure you've heard of this a
lot. Pretty incredible. But I love the humbleness of it of you.
I'm not a great athlete, but you know it's inspiring that you teach.
I think you're teaching people. You're retired, yes, from RPD. What
do you do during the day, because I know you're not sitting around.
I mean, yeah, so I've only worked like five days since I retired,
and I helped a buddy. He owns up a scoreboard company and he
puts up scoreboards. Okay, so he's putting a scoreboard up at Brockport and
because COVID, like you know, always people quit and uh so he's like,
wht to help me put a scoreboard up. I'm like yeah, So,
next thing I know, I'm hanging off these sky lifts and I'm I'm
afraid of heights man, that's one of my fears. And I'm like thirty
feet on this little cage like leaning over and I'm like, oh gosh,
and he's like, I need you for a couple of days. Well ended
up being like fourteen hour days for like six days in a row. But
again we got done. I'm like, I helped do this. I put
this giant, yes, cool assome scoreboard up that's got like color picture on
it. Yeah. So but I stay busy, like I'm always kind of
planning the next thing. You know. Everyone's like Watson act and sometimes I
have an answer. But so I have fifty seven acres that I live on.
I love to hunt, like bow hunting is my passion in life.
It beats everything else. So m September October November, I spent about eight
hours a day in a tree stand, like four hours in the morning,
four hours at night. In the summertime, I'm always planting food for the
deer and cutting trails and mowing stuff. My girlfriend lives in So I live
in Orleans County in the middle of nowhere's zero neighbors. I love it the
piece and quiet. My girlfriend lives in Webster, So I'm her pool boy,
lawn boy, fixed the stuff around the houseboy, and so, like
it's funny they say, like when you're when you retire, like you say,
like how to ever make time for any of this? When I was
working? And then there's always something to do. You know. I have
Harley, I ride, I have muscle cars. Um, so I'm always
busy, like definitely always always, always stay busy. And I never wanted
I never wanted to work again, and I don't think I have to.
Did you uh do you teach it all? I mean you could do this
stuff. Do you speak publicly? Dude? Get hired to do? Yeah?
So I do. I have had some page speaking gigs that came out
of my book. And uh, it's just that you know the problem is,
I guess getting like the the word out there because you know, maybe
in Rochester people know what I've done, but like getting out globally, so
you know, unless you get on like a Joe Rogan podcast Hester, you
know, like like you look at David Goggins, Yeah, like you know,
he just that guy just blew up and you know, to get at
that level, And I don't know if I want to get I don't know
if I'm that person like the like, I can't be that person that gets
on Instagram and starts yelling, oh you motherfucker got every day you got a
turn, you know like that that Like I almost feel like that's not even
an effective thing anymore. I think people are they don't want to hear that.
But I think that somebody who just quietly does what they do is more
inspiring than the person that doesn't. I love when you meet somebody and they've
done something like this and I don't know it, and it's like peeling backing
onion and you go, wow, that is so cool because it's not the
first thing that you know, I may be introduced is or some stranger to
you, Hey, this guy just ran fifty marathons, but then find out
he swam across Lake Ontario and he ran from and all these things, and
that to me, I think I find that kind of a cooler thing.
It's like, you know, people who donate big money but keep their write
their name out of it, right, they do great things for humanity,
but we don't know. I like that a little bit better than the other.
The book Gray Man. Where does the title come from? So I've
always so I look at it like this, and I think most people would
agree when I get done. So, if you took a bell curve of
people in general, say about where you work, or say a sports team,
that if there was a bell curve, it's a top ten percent would
be the people that are really good at what they do. Yeah, like
wherever you work, they're the hustlers. They get the job done and they
stand out. And then at the bottom of the bell curve, on the
left side of it are the ten percent of the people that are horrible at
what they do, and they stand out too, right because they're like,
oh gosh, they don't do anything all day. They're horrible. So the
top ten in the bottom ten are the shiny objects. For exactly different reasons.
The eighty percent in the middle. Those are the guys that the boss
doesn't even know their names because they all blend together. They're shades of gray.
Yeah. So I'm like, I was that guy. My entire life
was the gray man. And so it was always like no stimulus. And
where I first learned that, where I got the term was I taught at
the Police Academy Physical Fitness that ran the program for five years. And what
I learned was when I first started teaching, if there was forty I call
them kids recruits in the police Academy, I could tell you the top four
and within a week I'd be like, that's Joe Smith, Bill Smith,
you know, Tina whatever. I could tell you the top four fastest and
most fit people. I tell you the bottom four worst unfit people by name.
But those thirty two in the middle, I didn't even know their names
until halfway through. And I'm like, I'm not giving them any attention.
I'm praising the really good people, I'm correcting the really bad people, but
I'm showing no mind to those thirty two in the middle. And that's how
that's how us great people go through life man like. But we're the bulk
of the workforce. Right, like there's only so many Michael Jordan's on a
team. Yes, Michael Jordan doesn't win NBA championships. It's the supporting cast
were good people. So that's where the gray Man came from. That my
whole life, I was the gray Man. Yeah. So I mean another
thing. It had to be so satisfying to write the book. It was
because I would teach classes. I would teach this the physical training to be
a trainer, like training a trainer, and I would tell about my journey
through life about you know how I they say you play the hand you're dealt.
I folded my hand right because I smoked two packs a day. And
I was like, I'm never gonna be that guy. And people were like,
oh my gosh, Like what a great story. You should should write
a book. Or I journal some of my races on Facebook or Instagram.
I'm like, oh my god, you should write a book. And then
I started a seven years ago when I was still working there, eight years
ago, and I was home to two winters ago, and I'm going through
my thumb drives and I see it and I'm like, oh my gosh,
this is horrible. Like I had a couple of paragraphs, a couple of
chapters. I'm like, this really sucks, but I'm like, let's let's
go back at it again. Now you have the time I wrote that book,
like in two months, sitting in my lazy boy recliner, recalling like
my life history. And it was very cathartic. Sure, it was so
catharitic to go back and think about where I started and where I'm at now,
and where my faults were and where my faults are now. It was
incredible. What have you learned about living through all this? I think that
you know, well, Tomorrow's promised to no One. And Tony Mazurka,
which is an example of that. Darryl Pearson is an example of that.
Tommy Valentine like, so we keep putting things off, man, We procrastinator
is the killer of hopes and dreams and goals and your personal greatness. So
I try never to put anything off. And at times I do procrastinate about
certain things, certain things that make you uncomfortable. Right, And we talk
about discipline, which you know, discipline is doing the things you don't want
to do when you don't feel like doing. The man, well, that's
true too, yes, And I try to I really try to stop procrastinating,
like because I think it's it's just it's a killer of everything. And
I the thing with eight States for MAZ is when Daryl Pearson died, I
wanted to do something for Darryl. Yeah, and I waited too long.
In the family at that time, there is there is a million fundraisers,
and the family went to every single one. So you think about it for
years they went and you got to peel that scab off every time and relive
it every time. And I when I got around to doing it, They're
like, thanks, but no thanks. So I'm like, I'm not procrastinating
for Tony. Yeah, what advice would you give? Like, I mean,
I'm even thinking of like your sons and stuff, But to anybody who
is living there, you're you're listening to this. You know, you talk
about the gym that makes superhumans, and that guy's inspiring to you, and
you certainly have done superhuman feats. I would put you in that superhuman category.
But what would your advice to somebody making? I think it is whatever
you're gonna do, whatever you're whatever you're trying to seek out. And again,
for me, it's not just athletics. Maybe you want to get a
promotion at work, maybe you want to start your own business, maybe you
have this giant project at home. You got to first figure out your why,
like truly, what is your why? If the why is not for
you, it's probably not a good why. If you're like, well,
I want to I want to get in shape so my wife thinks I'm more
sexy, that's probably not a good why. You're not doing it for yourself,
man, You're doing it for her. And you can't live for other
people. No, your why has to be uniquely you. And then when
you figure that out, if you write that down, like then you got
like of it done, man, because if why is strong enough, you're
gonna you're gonna figure out how to get to there, like your goal.
It's a very interesting thing because I think again, and it comes you know,
with life comes wisdom. Right. The longer you live right, the
wiser you can become. H But I always think you can't live for somebody
when you are satisfaction, When your personal satisfaction comes from somebody else there and
this is gonna sound horrible, but they let you down every time, and
the only reason and only because they can't. That's not their job. You
have to find that internal happiness. And if it's running eight states, that
makes you happy and you've got the people around to support it and you do.
It's great if it's swimming across like, but that all comes from you,
and then then nobody can take that away at all. And and it's
always something that you have and have done. I think it's an incredible way
to live and you know, really inspiring. That's like, that's a hundred
percent like my house. No one can ever take that away from it.
Man, I've built that thing, You've built that Sweat and Tears book,
You've swam across the lake. You I mean, do you realize all the
things you like? Like because I know how Like I know that because I
could do this, that the other eighty percent of the people out there they
can do it, and they and they because they don't believe they can.
And well, we're we're a society of instant gratification. Like so now you
can look at something online and like I want that right now, and you
don't have to even go get it. You could put it in your cart
and instant car come to deliver that shit to your house. Or Amazon will
come the next day. You got it. But when it comes to like
really meanful goals, you it requires sacrifice and determination and grit and stick to
it and failure, like failure is a part of it. And if your
goals are lofty enough, you're gonna fail somewhere along the way. And how
you respond to that. Fails are great teachers. They suck when it happens.
It's a great teacher, though, Yeah, who loves to fail?
Nobody because it's getting kicked in the balls and failing you're like, gosh,
but how you regroup there? And we just have to get away from this
this instance instant gratification that we're in now where people there's people, there's these
services. They're like, well, you don't have to work out. We're
gonna hook you up to some pros and we're gonna stimulate your muscles and it's
just like lifting. Come on, Pete, come on, or you can
go to some medical center and we're just gonna suck all the fat out of
your gut and we're gonna put us somewhere else in your butt. So you
got Kim Kardashian button, it's like, you know, so we're asking all
this hard work and all and it's just at each day if you're just a
little bit better and a little you stick to it and it becomes this habit
after four weeks, six weeks, right, And I do think that there's
a lot to be said for that. But then it comes back to like
the personal satisfaction of and then you're better for everybody else. You know,
when you stop trying to figure out that I have to live. This person
makes me happy, Well, I'm happy. I like when they're around,
but they don't make you understand what I'm saying. And it's not an easy
thing to do, but that to me, the job of living is to
line up with whatever is happening. Life has lived in your head. And
my great example of that is if you and I went to the same party,
I may walk out and go, God, that sucked, and you
could come out of there going, man, what a party. Man,
it was great. I saw everybody I love and I got the hound I'm
going. You know, you know what I'm saying. It's life is lived
in our head and everything's happening all at once all around the world. But
you get to slow it down and use your head and it's all there.
You can start each day. There are times while I will wake up and
I start to think in my head, but I got this, uh,
And I'll go hang on a second, and I'll think, God, this
bed is so soft, it feels so good. Oh God, it's nice.
Man. I get to get up, and my whole mind changes.
My whole mind changes, and then I do a bunch of weird shits,
cold shower, I do this weird breathing thing, I do a little you
know, but that that's me and that makes me feel right, that that
gets me right and gets me back where I should be. It's you hit
it on the head. And I say this all the time. Your perception
is your reality. Perception may be totally different, yes, but it doesn't
matter, right, It doesn't even matter if you're wrong or you're right.
Your perception is your reality. Yes, And I agree with that one hundred
and ten percent. Yeah, And I think is. And if you can't
be happy with yourself, in your own skin and by yourself, then I
think you'd probably never be happy with anyone else. So people are like I
went and hunted in Colorado by myself. I lived in the mountains for like
twelve days in a little tent by myself. Wow, I never saw it
in Colorado Steamboat Springs. Yeah, and so no elk were harmed during this,
of course, but you know, I climb these giant mountains, didn't
hardly see anyone, And I was like, how can you go, like,
you know, twelve days without talking to anyone. I'm like, it's
I love being by myself. I also love being around my sons and my
girlfriends and my friends, but very comfortable with the silence. Like I'm very
comfortable in my own brain. Or you know, when I go out and
run X amount of miles or do a marathon a day, like I think
you have to be comfortable with yourself before you probably can be comfortable with other
people. Well, every time you keep talking, I got I get one
more question, and I'll will kind of end it here. I always found
with running, some of my best ideas would come to me. Did you
find that best ideas or best ways to like resolve things? So you're sure
like yeah, yeah, So you're like you have a just like dilemma should
I do this or should I do that? And then you get done running
You're like, man, this is what I'm gonna do because you can really
do a deep dive into it by yourself. There's some real clarity that comes
out of that super clarity. Yeah, there, yes, one hundred percent
right. And I think that, you know, I always think, you
know. The big thing that you'll hear it seems very popular today is I
got add I got a d D. If you have a d D,
exercise you know, out of running is maybe one of the best things you
can possibly do. For that. They would have medicated me if I what
happens now as me as a kid they would have met have ADHD, they
would they would have medicated the hell out of me. I would have been
a riddling kid or whatever else they're giving. And um, yeah, And
like I said, I think doing is you know, doing something helps helps
your mind and also helps you grow. Like who's ever said, who's ever
sat on a couch? Been watched? And I binge watched, but like,
how much how much satisfactions are just laying around in the couch for four
hours? I watched when Sons of Anarchy came out, I watched for like
almost an entire day once and I went I was so depressed, exactly so
depressed. You didn't. I felt like I didn't do anything. I was
like, oh my god, you know, you got one life and this
is what you did. So somebody didn't come after you. You're like,
what did you do the other day? You're like, uh, sat out
of college watching Nestlik for four hours? Yeah, but you sure said,
man, I went out. I ran an hour. Man. It was
so awesome, man, and I had a better time than the time than
you know. I beat my other time and I'm training for this race.
Like that's where the satisfactions from. We said it right at the beginning.
Doing us, at doing yeah, doing us. It just makes you feel
better actually do that kind of stuff. It has been a pleasure to man,
really really, I can't wait to read the book Gray Man, An
Average Man's Journey to Personal Greatness. Where can we get it online? Amazon?
Amazon? Go to Amazon and get that book. I think everybody will
enjoy that. For Brent, I should say, Sergeant Brett sober Oscar,
who has done superhuman things. I'm Bill Moran. We'll see you tomorrow.
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