 There's people in the Marines that are artists, that are ex sports people that have done all weird and wonderful things and go on to do all weird and wonderful things after. Because I think if they find this, they're 100% going to rip it up. The stereotype is that everybody thinks that you're just this mindless killer. Mainly the Americans would leave and all we did for that year was reassuring that it wouldn't happen. Gareth, how are you brother? I'm very well, thanks Chris. How are you doing? Yes, good mate. Always good to chat to fellow Royal Marines Commando. And I'm saying that especially because apparently YouTube recognises the first words in a video and that's what it goes on to promote it. Yeah, if some of my videos I think don't get many views because I normally just start by saying, all right, mate, yeah, and then we chat about the weather and then we chat about whatever nonsense is going on and then we get on to the subject. But Gareth, absolutely massive congratulations on your book. Becoming the 0.1%. Here we go, folks. There'll be a link below. I suggest everyone reads it, military, non-military, whatever, because it's just a cracking book. It covers a time that many of us boys had at a place called Limestone Commando, the Commando Training Centre Royal Marines, and it's a great read for anyone, but for those of us that went through it will certainly bring back a few memories. 34 lessons from the diary of a Royal Marines Commando Recruit. They said Royal Marines again there, so this video is going to hit, mate. We're having it. How to Build an Elite Mindset by Gareth Timmins, RM, which stands for Royal Marines, by the way, I didn't mention it. Mate, what I loved, the first thing that I hadn't really thought of before, people often say, you know, how tough is it to get a green berry or whatever, and I always try to give an approximation of how many people go in the recruiting office and try and some people will fail there and then. The recruiting sergeant will look at them and go, we're not having this one. Not in a nasty way, but it's not for everybody. We're to recruit Hanson in our troop, Gareth. I shouldn't probably have said his name. I hope he doesn't mind, but we're all fell in on the parade square about week three, I think. The drill sergeant called us up to attention. Hanson prove, right, double away to the training team's office, and off he went, and the drill corp will just turn to us and went, take one last look at Hanson men. Hanson is a teddy bear, and there's no room in the Royal Marines for teddy bears. By teddy bear, folks, I don't mean gay. I mean, he was just a very soft and gentle lad. He was absolutely lovely. Everyone thought the world of him. He used to sing us off to sleep at night when he was doing his ironing, but as they say, it's not for everyone. So I've always tried to give an approximation of how many people go to recruiting office and how many actually get their green lid, but you've captured it up very well with one in a thousand. So not just the 1% that the recruiting adverts say, but 0.1% of which you are one. And yourself? Yes. How's the book been received? Really well, mate. It's just blown me away. It's been absolutely incredible. There was a lot of energy prior to publication, and it's taken quite a while. It took months to go through the MOD, which we were all quite kind of nervous about. But I mean, how it's been received, mate. It's just been unbelievable. The feedback, the energy. It's been best seller on Amazon. It's just been fantastic, mate. Really, really, really just delighted. Yeah. What is it about the Marines that produces so many best-selling authors? It's just, I think, the way that they've created its brand, isn't it? I think the way they've created the Royal Marines brand and just the amazing adverts that they've had over the years, and obviously the length and how difficult it is once people become aware of it. It just creates so much mystery and intrigue and people just want to know, don't they? Whether you're interested or not in the military, people just are fascinated by it. To the other side of the coin, though, writing a book is no mean feat. It's utter dedication, talking anything up to 18-hour days for anything up to two years. And also, you've got to have kind of the, not academic, but the literary stuff to make it happen. And I think that says a lot about the quality of the men that find themselves in the Marines. Absolutely. I mean, the diversity in the Marines and what you get is quite unbelievable, isn't it? You can have, like, there's people in the Marines that are artists, that are ex-sports people that have done all weird and wonderful things and go on to do all weird and wonderful things after. And you just end up with a network of people that are often quite exceptional in all different kind of fields of whatever they go into, but it definitely attracts a special type of person. I think entrepreneurial would be a great kind of summarisation of the people that make it to the end and some that obviously drop out as well, but it definitely attracts people that accept risk and that are willing to take risk on, and then that transfers into all kinds of successes when they leave. It's a funny thing in the publishing industry as well, because I don't think they caught up, really, with modern methods. I think they're still living in the past a lot. This thing about bringing a book out in hardback that they still stick to to this day, it used to be a thing that it used to work because there weren't so many authors out there. There weren't so many authors that could just self-publish on Amazon or whatever it is. They had a very select view. They kind of, you know, these publishers ruled the rules so they could afford to say, hey, the special paperback is out now, and if it was a Wilbur Smith or whatever, there's a million people immediately just will buy it. But this day and age was so much competition when you want your book to smack into the market and make an effect and get people talking. Five people talking to five people saying, read this book. That's the kind of marketing wave that you want to create. But they still stick with this thing, because I bet you've had people already go, I'll wait for the paperback. Yeah, there has been a few people that quite remarkable that do prefer the paperback. I think just in recent times with technology, people are more wanting to download books and also listen to the audio. There's so many people that say to me, look, I don't enjoy reading, but I'll get it on audio. So times are changing with it. There really are. And it's quite interesting that touching on your approach as well in terms of marketing, word of mouth is just so powerful. And that's what I found over this last free of form maybe five weeks is just that just somebody as simple as putting it on Facebook and saying, great book. You see the comments underneath and people like, just ordered, just ordered. Really, is it a great book? And it's just so powerful, that kind of personal validation or that personal relationship that somebody else has got with somebody else, that like trust that they've got between themselves. As soon as that goes up, you get quite some, you get some good success from that. I'm guessing also that probably quite a few disillusioned young men out there. By that, I mean, you know, an office job, it's just not, we don't have a lot of industry anymore. We don't sort of build ships and melt iron and dig coal. So it's kind of funneled everyone into office jobs, isn't it? Sat beyond a computer for eight hours a day, possibly for a boss that you don't really like. And I think a lot of people like to live vicariously now through the armed forces. If I can't join, I want to read about it all, or maybe they're reading about it because they're thinking, maybe I need to change your career. Yeah, absolutely. I think everybody, no matter who you are, you always want to be better. You always want to learn how to get better mentally and physically. And I think books like this and other books that are in its kind of field, definitely kind of fit that void. I think COVID as well, COVID played a massive factor in, I think the probably desirability of this book as well in terms of helping people get back on track, get back into a good mind-setting. I think the lessons that I've kind of put in it are just it's psychology that hopefully everybody can understand. It's like the kind of layperson's understanding of psychology. It's understandings about ourselves that we all know about our own minds, but we don't. It's not reinforced academically. And that's kind of what I kind of wanted to achieve. But yeah, it's just, I think everybody wants a tool or everybody's always looking for a drink or something to make them feel better, something to make them perform better. Everybody's, we all want it no matter who we are. Yes. And so you're getting on the train to go off to Limbson and your mum rushes in a bookshop, comes out with a diary and goes, there you go son, write it all down. This is not an approach I've heard of before. No, absolutely not. It was the most bizarre gift that anybody could have given me. I'm sure I like yourself, Chris, when we were younger, we all kind of split the same mold to was young bootnecks, but I wasn't academic as a young lad. I didn't read. I didn't want to read. I wasn't very good at reading. And when I left of all things on the train, just as the train doors were shutting at Wakefield Westgate, my mum give me literally put this diary in me and as the door shut and through the window, she's just saying just write it down. It'll help just write things down. I want to see what's going on and train to a coffin. I would just walk on earth like crazy mindset. And as I'm kind of going down on the train to Limbson, you know where it's like, mate, you're nervous. You don't know what you're doing. You're in a sense of disbelief. And I thought, I'm just going to open it and just write how I'm feeling and see if it settles me, see if I feel better. And I did. And I just kind of documented that I felt nervous, but excited and that I felt like we're on a roller coaster. And I was strapped in on my way, but all of a sudden you want to get off and you want to stop it, but you can't. And I wrote it in and kind of from that moment on, I just felt completely compelled to keep it. And that's what I did. It's interesting, mate, reading it as well, because whereas, for instance, pretty much the same for everybody, isn't it? It's like a blueprint or maybe there's more appropriate analogy. But this is obviously getting into your mindset of how you felt as you went through. So immediately I see when you're in the, it's called foundation when you went through, it's called induction when I went through. They have to change that because induction just sounds like brainwashing. Which it was. Brainwashing, brainwashing into how to iron properly. Yeah, and shower. Yes, polish lots of stuff. But I noticed as you said you were down, you felt quite down quite a lot. Whereas my experience was I, I didn't even have, I don't think I had time to, I wouldn't have known how to feel down at 18 years old. To me, every day was like, certainly in training, every day we just get on and just get through it. And you do allude to that. I noticed as you go through, but I was kind of just bright eyed, you know, wide eyed really, right? I was very naive as well. But I had, I had the fortunate, the fortunate thing in my corner was I was a bit, have you ever seen Officer and a Gentleman with Richard Deere? Yeah. And where he's beasting him and he's trying to get into, was it DOR, drop on request, I think they call it? Yeah. And he said, I want you out of here, male nays. And he's like, but I got nowhere else to go. That was me because I was living in my car. I was basically homeless and living in a Renault 12 when I joined up. So I did, I had nothing outside. I didn't have that psychological, oh, I could go on to a nice family. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think that might be more of a modern thing though? Because people, young men now seem to be more sensitive. Yeah. It's a great point, Chris. I think that when we went through in 2005, mobile phones had not long been out. And you certainly couldn't get onto the internet like you could now. Google was, and certainly getting onto the internet with efficiency and access was, so if not impossible, there were still black and white phones with Snake. So, but you were still more connected than what you would have been. And I think that being connected to society in your support system potentially makes you a bit of a weaker asset. And I think more so now with our good connectivity is, I mean, you're always connected, aren't you? And I think alluding back to your point, I think living in your car, I think that's such a strong place to be mentally when you've got nothing in a sense to lose. You've got no pulls. I just found that when I was in training, I had no girlfriend. And that was, for me, the best place to be. There were so many good lads that you would have tipped at the start to get to the end that left for girls or left for other kind of family issues, whether genuine or not. But yeah, I think it's a great point. I think the reason why they brought the ROP in was because there were so many young lads getting stress fractures. And that's because the skeletal composition is just not tough enough in the lower legs now to withstand the impact from training, they're getting stress fractures. So they brought the ROP into kind of build, build them up to stop the the immense dropout rate. And that's all because kids are no longer jumping out of trees. Young lads, they're not playing tigs in the street and hide and seek and stuff. It's more a sedentary lifestyle. And that's, I think that's quite profound really. Yeah, they're not nicking enough stuff. Yeah, I do some proper shoplifting like the good old days. Yeah, they're not pinching bottles of milk off people's doorsteps and stuff. Yes. Yeah, so ROP, is this pre-month now that we hear about? Yeah, it is. I think it's, from what I've heard, it's still tough. I don't think they're ever going to change the fabric of training, or I hope they wouldn't, but it's tough. And there's a hell of a lot of people that drop out in ROP as well. It essentially makes training 36 weeks. But I have heard literally in a number of days that they're going to grow back to the PRMC. I think the cost of it, I heard that the cost of the PRMC wasn't cost effective. But I just think it's a fantastic part of the process, me, is the PRMC. Yes, that was called the PRC back in my day. So for friends at home, the ROP is, what does that acronym stand for? Recruit orientation phase. Yeah. So this is the bit where apparently lads rocking up at Limson just don't know what's hit them. I guess you say don't really have the minerals for entering what is essentially the toughest military basic training, infantry training in the world, not to have special forces if I'm talking about like basic infantry level. And then the PRC was potential recruits course, now called PRMC, potential Royal Marines course. My God, that was tough enough in itself and to think that during this recent stuff that's been going on that that's been done online. I mean, you can't swap. Bloody hell, first moment there on our three day PRC was throwing ourselves backwards off the high diving board. Like what you see at Middleton getting the candidates to do an essay. We had to do that and just stand there, pull backwards. And if you hesitated, that was it. They'd say, right, go and get the train. Yeah. Then that's followed by an hour swim, just swimming, endless swimming, swimming around the pool, swimming across the pool, then hit the gymnasium. I was watching a Dirty Sanchez video the other day when the boys rocks up at Limson and they got beasted and they're all throwing up. That's superb that in it. So funny. But would you agree when you're in training, you don't throw up. You grow with the program. It's the PRMC that is such a shock to the system that lads were spewing out and just going on. We had lads falling off the ropes on their head and they were getting sent home. There's lads as well. There's lads that pass the PRMC that never go back. There's lads also that pass the PRMC that go down on the train and then when they stop outside a camp to start training, they stay on it and go home. That's how intimidating that place is. When we got in the induction block, there was three empty beds. Three lads hadn't got off. They stayed on the train. I wonder what they're doing now. Yeah. It's just an unbelievable place. Just touching on PRMC again, it's like on our first day, the first night, although felt quite hostile. The next day is when your gym test start and we started with a three mile run and the PTI came in. Just kicked the door open at five o'clock morning followed by another load of PTIs and one of them kicked a locker and a load of boots fell out and we're frantically racing to put these boots on and I had a size eight and one foot and a ten on the other and it was just absolute carnage and then you get beast. It was just an unbelievable experience. Yes and how did you make time for the diary? I say this with interest because I was this is going to sound really stupid but I missed somewhere in the program. I missed a crucial bit of information and that is that you only wash your shirt like every day in your smalls. You don't have to wash your denims and this so there were lads maybe they'd wear their stone shirt on parade for what two hours or something and they were just hanging it back up and there's me blimming, you know, Mr. Fucking Stupid washing literally everything I wore every single time I wore it and I did that all the way through training. I didn't I missed the memo that said you haven't got to do that, right? So I was up till 12, one o'clock every single night even up until Kingscott. I couldn't work out why they were lads on their bed reading a book or going ashore. I certainly didn't have time for the diary but you clearly made time for it. Yeah I've always had really bad OCD and I've had it from birth and I think this is probably something to do with it. I played rugby before I went in and I always kind of played I wanted to master the game with the perfection and also the perfection side of OCD and once I'd started that kind of process on the train it was almost like I had to continue and it was almost like an anchor of stability and an extrinsic motivational factor for me to stay in and complete it because you imagine coming out of training after four or six weeks or midway through with half a diary. That is a it's an awful reminder of failure is that so it almost it kept me in and it was really tough sometimes we'd have been to sleep for days and right and it was horrific especially when lads were getting in bed and you know sometimes when you've got an hour and a half two hours before you're up again anyway but it were tough at times it were really tough I mean when I went in the field sometimes I had to write on my arms and on my arms and just little buzzwords that I could then remember that for when I got out and then just kind of document it again but yeah well it were a tough one. Yeah Gareth were you worried at all that the training team did they know you were writing it? You know on my 21st birthday which came shortly after me uh me joining about week eight or something like that uh I put my cards around my bed and the training team came up and they were like no I think I had around D and ripped them all up and uh literally just ripped them all up and just dropped them in front of me by my feet and I'm like oh bloody hell that made me really really anxious then about them finding the diary because I think if I thought if they find this they're 100% going to rip it up and at that point I've captured some really really rich unbelievable stuff in there and then all of a sudden one of the days they just walked around unannounced and I was sat on the bed we won that while we were writing it and they were like what's that and I reluctantly told him and he looked through it and as he's looking through I think he's going to wreck pages out any minute and he would just like his hoofing and they absolutely supported me and continuing it on and from that moment on I were able to kind of waterproof it and take it in the field don't get me wrong they never give me the opportunity to write in it that were that were up to me to to kind of find the time but uh yeah they kind of got behind it and that really helped with we were completing it did you write like our section court book is incredibly handsome he's like the big brother I never had I absolutely did yeah for next time we came around yes um let's talk about my old nemesis we touched on it but before before we recorded the endurance course because that for me I don't know I think that epitomised my experience of of command it was it was the moment when I understood the difference you know what separates the men from the boys and I guess it's because it's the first time in training pretty much that you have to do something on your own certainly something that's so epic and by that I mean it's only you and your thoughts that are going to get you through that course and everyone's pretty I wouldn't say physically on a par because we had some like we had Welsh rugby players and they were just freaking hoofing at the fizz you know yeah but you've all you all know you can pass it it's just whether you can turn that switch in your head and that the I only passed it on the day so I think I've failed to run throughs and on that day I remember thinking right do I want this bad enough yes fucking start running then yeah and I started and I didn't didn't stop yeah it's I call it in the book like the day training is like the daily burden of failure it's like a massive coat that you wear every day and it's oppressive and it weighs you down and absolutely make the endurance for me was my nemesis and I've put the word nemesis in there as well which is quite unbelievable but yeah I mean I failed every run through partly because my conduct on leave was just atrocious but I failed every run through and when it got to the day there's so many things that can go wrong that the worst thing about it mate is is that you're under time isn't it as soon as you start the time the time's on and you have in a sense you you haven't got a lot of it and any at any point that you misjudge something you could say more so on the tires and the slope course but on the endurance as well you could wrong foot in you could get caught on the on the sheep depot whatever and you're really up against it and you could fail and then you've got to get back and you're flapping about the shoot whether your weapon's going to work and it's just your anxiety is through the roof isn't it it's just and you just no matter how mentally tough that you get and you do get mentally tough throughout training you never know that you're going to do it until you've literally crossed the bridge on the 30 mile idea it's just it's one of them however they've engineered it or whoever's done it it's just incredible because nobody can profess at any stage that they think that they've got it until you've literally got that green lid on your head at the end yeah I can't remember if I did the battle swimming test before or after the 30 mileer I was one of the last people to pass it it's and they generally do that rerun in the king squad fortnight week can't remember what we had but yeah I can't remember that being it I can't remember getting like my commando flashes and going I do remember feeling yes result we've done it so I guess I must have done the swim by then but sometimes they keep it to the and that I mean that if you're skinny chat that's that's the hardest test not not not I mean you're not blowing out your but if you're drowning you yeah that's kind of quite a bad result isn't it yeah it really is I do know that the often chopped and changed it I think at one point you did field firing after your commando tests and that rounded off the end of training but certainly when I went through and I think it had only just changed you were the end of training was crossing the bridge and getting your green lid in your your flashes and all I can remember thinking that is I'm just glad it's over I'm just glad it's over it wasn't the presentation of the green lid as such but I would just I was just so thankful that the nightmare was over and it were a nightmare you know just an absolute just a brutal vivid an enduring nightmare that felt like it had gone on all your life never mind 10 months yeah yeah what an experience when I was sat on the fortana coming back from the 30 mileer I still had a a snickers bar in my webbing pouch they called it they called them marathons back then and it was because I just had no appetite to eat you know we were just pushing it pushing it pushing it so much I just couldn't face eating a bloody bar of chocolate I do remember getting on the phone grand I've done it dad you went oh yeah all right some what yeah yeah you know that there were a point on it where we'd gone up the up the up the hill from old campton barracks and it was like a real fast speed match pace up this mile or one and a half mile gradient and my legs were just like lead and I just felt like we're not even a mile in and I'm absolutely hanging out here and then we got to 12 mile checkpoint and not even halfway and I was absolutely busted up and broken and like you said you get into all these checkpoints then every six mile checkpoint and you're you're not feeling great and you can't eat can you mate it's it's it's weird you're like you're literally you're so dry mouthed and you're like adrenaline's just you're eating but you're like you're like having to swill it down with water it's oh it's just a just an unbelievable test is that I underestimated it I thought I had it in the bag the 30 mile once I'd got there I thought easy just head down and just plod on but oh no it caught me out yes and what do you what do you now think Gareth because um well we chatted earlier and I'm proud to say you're you're a spiritual guy which is I think is one thing demonstrating you've got an elite mindset which we've we've all done but then it's taking it to the next level in life isn't that you know you can go through life resting on your laurels because you've got a green lid when you're 18 or 19 or 19 in your case 21 um but there's a lot more to life isn't there there really is mate you know I started studying psychology when I was 20 28 before that I'd always been really intrigued by it uh I've always been like a really really deep thinker and I always wanted to kind of work things out especially myself and that's this is kind of where it all started so when I was a young lad I was uh just like a burning fire a ferocious burning fire I had in a sense disregard for for many really in only regard for few and I wanted to work out who that boy was and also why I had such a propensity to to want to go and experience war and in a sense had such a lack of empathy at that age and I thought oh look I'm going to go down a line of inquiry of forensic psychologists just to see what it's all about why are we so uh in a sense predisposed to want to inflict harm on each other and destroy everything that we've got around us uh in general in a more general kind of sense and it just absolutely I mean I started it uh I didn't think at all I could do it but I just applied the same kind of mindset that I had done in the Marines uh of just getting there I'd down take a few weeks off and let's see how far we can get and throughout it I just became absolutely fascinated into I suppose in a sense our existence and what's the meaning of it and what we're doing and uh just really trying to work it out and I'm still trying I think I'll always be I'll always be trying to work it out I'll never be kind of satisfied of my understanding of things the meaning the meaning of things uh so yeah I mean my my kind of uh I suppose fascination with with with your manager really just came from uh a wanting to understand this help better and why I was a particular person yeah I guess well I would say young people but probably a lot of people if not most that they'd be surprised wouldn't they to learn that limson commander doesn't make a warrior it it it it makes people that can go go to war but what makes a warrior is reading books I think that would you agree that would probably surprise most people absolutely I think there's so much of life that you don't know uh and you can quite easily be I think in a sense fall into the illusion of of what what's it what society has as socially created and it's only like when you start reading books I think powerful books that resonate with you especially the stuff that I that I read about in psychology on stuff like bystander effect and on class structure and where it all comes from and just everything really uh it just expands your mind and you start being critical with what what you're seeing around you uh and your evaluation is I think of of those in those that informations in depth and it just broadens just broadens your horizons and I can just even now like when I put the lessons to the book the lessons kind have emerged from the weeks the construct the construct of masculinity lesson two looking at recruiting aro and and stuff like that and savannah type environments looking at uh I was sensors are not evolved to live in urban environments yet even even after all the after all these years it's all stuff that we all should know yeah but yet we don't we don't get taught in school and I'm just I just can't believe it it's almost like I want to get these six or eight books that I've got from my time at uni and just sit people down and make and make them ingest it because it would make the world and society such a better place it'd help us with our climate response uh and and just everything else like that like we touched on before mate in terms of uh eating habits what we're supposed to be putting into his bodies just everything it'd make us such better people if we just add just a tiny bit of academic material insiders yes unfortunately the um the matrix is controlled isn't it by Pete I my kind of thinking there is sociopath psychopaths mix of the two but like if you can't know love you can't pick up a baby and feel that oh you know that there's you should be protecting this and if you're a psychopath or sociopath you you can't have that you just by definition you so you're like so you're going through the motions going uh uh hello hello yeah it's pretty true and if you can never know love of your fellow human beings then all you've got in your life is control you know yeah you're never going to get the satisfaction of being an enlightened individual that can just love all people and and and your maybe not your every action but but you try to make your action about about being the best you can be for others but if you don't possess that emotion because you're not born with it or your you were psychologized as an infant into not you know by a by a bullying corporate trillionaire father that this is the way and you see you see this in people like the bush family and and and so on and so forth very very robotic ah this utter disregard and and in compassion utter disregard for human life well then the only way you can get your kicks in life is through control so it's the complete opposite end of the scale and it's these controllers that that that um they control everything like you say they control the the education system they control what we understand about diet i mean you take psychology so you've got um famous you know the famous psychologists there talk about was a id ego super ego they never talk about being caught a set of carbon molecules flying through the atmosphere do they you know they want to keep you in that that birth certificate identity trying to make sense of the world is this individual that's so bloody self and but not understanding is such a bigger thing going on here and then till you can detach from being you know chris or garif you you you you you're never going to um uh self actualize as in reach that the pyramid of your of what what you were put on the planet to be or what you were putting in the universe to be um and i think it's brilliant to the two bootnecks can have this conversation absolutely mate i think again like we spoke before we came on i mean if you if you look at if you look at the scientific basis of existence we we just manage the stations of the universe that embody the intelligence and uh and awareness to reflect back upon ourselves and try and understand the universe trying to understand itself it's quite unbelievable and you're you and i'm me no you're me and i'm you it's why i wish you all the success because we're both we're both the universe just trying to understand each other isn't it just just trying to work it out mate yeah just trying to work it out and the the thing is and this is this comes down to empathy as well and it touches on your last point it's there's the people like if you want to use bush and his family as an example yeah is a you could say he's a successful guy is reached the top and uh many would say that he's well traveled but he's not really he's lived in a bubble uh and a lot of people live in bubbles uh whether it's a village bubble or or whatever it's not until you get out there and you expose yourself to different things and different cultures and different ways of living and thinking that you you kind of develop this awareness uh and in developing that awareness and you people are often baffled by the fact that royal marines or servicemen have got empathy because the stereotype is that everybody thinks that you're just this mindless killer that's got no kind of intelligence whatsoever that he's completely inaccurate and i think the education that's the re f regiment but it's uh it's uh education is education is don't they say you've got to witness some extreme poverty in your life to understand yourself and on that subject can we talk about afghanistan sure mate how how was your experience over there yeah so i mean unbelievably mate i never went with a car and and and i did want to go uh i kind of beg to go but at the very start of it when i left training but the drafts just didn't work out so what i did was uh i applied to get into wall style uh close protection for a for about two or three years and all of a sudden i got uh iraq with olive group and afghanistan we a company called tor that added a dod contract department defense contract and i went out there in 2013 for a year uh working in Kabul and it's i've been i've operated like around Somalia Egypt and iraq and stuff but afghanistan is the cherry on the cake in terms of hostility and a place that justice it's like a nightmare is the only way to describe it everybody huge feel that wants to kill you and you know what we're saying that though which is quite contradictory that one of the key things that when we were working with the interpreters and people like that because we what we were doing were we were training the afghan national army how to use radios we were protecting the engineers training them how to use radios in classrooms which was vastly unsuccessful because they were all asleep but uh they all wanted a better life that's one thing that they all fundamentally want a better life they didn't want the Taliban at all they were all scared to death of them uh and they were scared to death that the the west mainly the americans would would leave and all we did for that year was reassuring that it wouldn't happen and it's happened in in the worst kind of way ever uh and it's just absolute it's just absolutely tragic i mean three of my mates from training there were 11 of us that passed out at the end and three got killed we're in the first i think 24 months of training and i was speaking to ben reddy's mum just when i was going to send a copy of the book and she would just lost her words couldn't believe clutching at straws as to the meaning of it what why it happened but i don't know mate i just i just for me look being optimistic about it there's been 20 years of of un Taliban in a sense occupation in terms of power and i'm just hoping that that them two generations that have never experienced the Taliban will one day grow up and elicit positive change in the country long shot but it's the only up that i think they've got yeah you might want to look into the belt and road initiative um and how americans no sounds really wrong saying i don't mean the servicemen i mean that country was was used to go in there and smash the place up make a bad name for themselves to then allow the chart chinese to walk in and go hi guys right you want to do business with us and the Taliban are going to go oh yeah you know fine we'll do that and it's essentially the belt and road is a super highway between europe and china for goods and goods and services and it's all part of what all well would have called the super states creating super states that are going to constantly be played off against against one another i'm only saying it's not not out of any disrespect for anyone that gave their all all all all got injured but you know the the the kids that are next generation they need to know what war is really all about yeah yeah and this is what i say warriors read books yeah you know what mate it's it's i in a sense become disillusioned with the whole thing from being in the military to being in in in cp as well private security hostile private security it's just not worth it no it's just not none of it's worth it and look again another misconception is is that you go out and i get so many negative messages on my posts of people saying oh you're a governmental hit man you'd you went to work for the queen and she don't care about you i went i went for me i wanted to go to war for me nobody else i wasn't fighting for the queen i was just fighting for me and the lads around me that's that's it wasn't it was kind of for nobody else but once i became disillusioned with it i just i just think that now the older me life's so precious uh just get in here and having having that self-awareness that you're alive and to try that to be ripped from you i mean he's just i just don't see where the where the worth is now remember what i said some people are born they can't experience love kindness and then that's not an option for them the only option is control and that's what we're seeing in the world isn't it on a on a global scale control through fear creating all these false falsities and because they also control the education system so they're very good at keeping people in their ego mind or you know psychology when you're when you when you live out your ego you're full of bitterness anger hate fear jealousy is subject to your your animal desires or all what um ancient eastern scriptures would call your lower self all the stuff that's not good that keeps you with the beasts and all the love the kindness the empathy the the healthy eating the well they can't have that they can't have people that live in their upper self because they'd have no one to go and fight these these wars so this answers your question about why in education are we not teaching you know we teach kids that six apples plus four apples minus ten oranges is that stuff they're never going to use in their life they don't teach them that from birth you're you're a sovereign human being under the universe you you know you're perfect as you are um you just need to go go out in the world and and self actualising and be all that you deserve to be um but we don't see that do we we just see angry road rage people trying to get ahead in their company if someone else gets the position go buddy it's just this constant um constant state of fear and order out of order out of chaos yeah it's a difficult one isn't it i mean it's not one between you before you're knocking on the door of of retirement in a lot of respects it happens it just like my life just seems to be speeding towards that now and uh you get to a point where you you you just want to find happiness uh and and contentment uh i look at my parents and uh my own man retired now but my my mom's still working and she's six to sixty odd and she's saying i'd love to retire it's just you kind of just think well what's well what's the point in it all it's it's just a real point of i suppose reflection for me at the minute i just really want me to just just just kind of find some meaningful for for where i am and where i want to be i just want to kind of carve my own path out really yeah well hopefully we can work together on that because that's you know i think we can support each other in this in this direction i've actually um i've actually coached i think four lads now through limestone i think all four of them were in hunter troops so the remedial injury troop or um or people that are struggling with staff and uh yeah have a chat with your uncle chris i'll tweak a couple of things mate mate they've all got their green nids now so and and they all were going to leave really yeah wow that's incredible mate so we uh i've got like a a pre-military performance kind of training program thing that that men and women come onto young young young lads and women come onto and yours is what you've done there is is quite remarkable mate and you need props for that because uh for us and i do all the psychology on it trying to get people into training through training it's tough but it's tough people uh have their own thoughts and their own rationale for why they ever want to continue or or drop out so getting four people through mate is is a fantastic achievement yeah and also you know i'm not might sound a bit hypocritical because i think people know my thoughts on the military industrial complex um but it's not really because they're you know my support rubs off on them in other ways if you know what i mean i'm getting them to think a bit like that actually um so when you're there you're in your military role you can be going hmm what's actually really going on in this situation and did you um did you know Brad's been a chance Andy Brad so he worked for olive he he got killed in mozo no i didn't make i didn't i didn't actually do any work for olive i went down for the interview i got off of the job but i i chose the role in afghan instead yeah i got you yeah and that is something to live through for you alone let alone everyone else involve three people out of 11 i've put it in the diary mate uh after final x the lined up the originals of which at that point they were 11 uh and just had said statistically uh two or three of you will get killed in your first 12 months of being out of training and unbelievably mate it came true it absolutely came true and i mean tom who are kind of a busy oppo in in training they were the commando medallist uh and what's funny about it is at the start of training i gave him they said they gave us all a kfs a knife phone and sport fork and said give this to a lad that visually looks like he's going to fail uh and i give mine to tom uh as did a lot of other people because he would just like a big fat teddy bear really uh fast forward 32 weeks and he got the commando medal and i voted for him so it was just remarkable such a strong oh sorry mate okay we are such such a strong individual uh and yeah it was just it's tough and you know i think although we only spent 10 months together uh and that's where our friendship were forged is off i think about him more or less every day or often it's it's unbelievable yeah and his mum and dad have never got over it his mum especially is just still to this day just in a bad place yeah it's beyond belief isn't it yeah you know what what can you say well what i'll say is it you know is it is it worth it to make george bush tony brayer and all the rest of the war criminals even more rich and powerful than they already are i think that's a no-brainer isn't it mate based on what we've seen over this last four weeks uh it was categorically not worth it wow it yeah but a psychopaths it is believe me their plan is well well underway you know they they they meet the high closed doors to plan all this shit yeah you know and it's it's one factor in a whole complex web of deceit but people are waking up to it and veterans are waking up to it now which is the the best thing yeah yeah i think i think recent events have done a big job of that yes oh definitely definitely you know we essentially all signed up for freedom didn't we that was that that wasn't really for the queen it was obviously it's for for an experience but we i when i was in um conflict yeah not i'm not being political now but i i did like to think that we were the good guys and we were on you know we were doing the right thing for future generations and to see how those freedoms that they've all just been they've been stomped on that and a frightening rate um we've just we've we've let the afghan people down uh and i'm not just saying it because that's what everybody that's the right thing to say on on camera i actually believe it the afghan people that i met would really really super people that don't fit the stereotype of whatever kind of refugee you want to say or whatever or the process of othering somebody else there were fantastic people and we've just massively let them down uh and i think had we've taken care of them it kind of makes a sacrifice worthwhile then let's finish on a more positive note shall we what's um what what what's the future for you for you mate well i'm just seeing how this goes chris to be honest mate i've been quite like i said just blown away by how it's been received uh men and women and also women that are just coming forward and saying there we go that are saying that look this resonates with me when i had a uh a bad first couple years of motherhood when me when me son just all messages like that so it's really kind of touched a nerve across like the the entire section of what what you what you could say is society so i'm just i'm just really delighted mate uh i will write again uh i i under reflection i started writing when i was 20 with the diary so uh it's kind of not my first time although it's my first time published so i do want to write again uh what about i don't know but it's i've certainly it's been a difficult but i've enjoyed the enjoyed the journey got a clothing range at 0.1 projects that uh we look at extreme kind of crossfit and outdoor adventure and stuff like that still in development still growing nicely but we're going to kind of pull the trigger on that more so towards backing that year so just writing just being creative and thinking uh and study i'll definitely do some more study at some point as well so just trying to live a good life mate and just be happy and find contentment so we'll put a link for your merchandise below the video as well yeah i certainly will make certainly will it be a pleasure good yeah i should have asked you to send me a t-shirt when you sent me this wonderful book mate i'll get one out to you i'll get one out to you you legend legend yeah gareth what can i say really well done on the book um but equally you know well done on getting yourself to a good and positive place and and um yes i would i wish you all the best and feel free to come back on the podcast and let us know how it's all going i certainly will make thank mate it's been a great pleasure and i've been i've been waiting to to kind of jump on this and have a have a tune for for quite some time so thanks for the invite mate it's a great appreciate it i'm going to ask you what everyone asked me who's going to play you in hollywood well if it were if it were the voice it'd be morgan freeman and for the uh for the act it's going to be tom addy right he loves he loves the uh he loves the marines as well i uh so yeah mate remember it's order out of chaos so they they'd get someone like angelina joley playing you on yeah yeah and to all our friends at home massive love to you all thank you so much um for watching another episode of the bought the t-shirt podcast if you could please like and subscribe and share this video that'd be wonderful thank you