 The only easy day was yesterday. Get your heads up, get your eyes open. Stop trying to hide from the pain. Head up, eyes open. Welcome to The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday, the official Navy SEAL podcast. On May 24th, 2018, Navy SEAL Senior Chief Britt Slavinsky was invited to the White House and presented with the Medal of Honor. He was awarded the nation's highest military honor for his actions in 2002 when he led his team on a daring rescue to save their teammate who was wounded behind enemy lines. In this episode, Senior Chief Slavinsky talks about the importance of team mentality when facing adversity and what service means to him. Get your heads up, get your eyes open. Stop trying to hide from the pain. Head up, eyes open. Thank you for sharing some of your time with us. For one, that means a lot, I think, to have your perspective voice in on the podcast. So thank you for sharing some of your time with us to start with. Certainly, happy to be here. For people that might not know you, if you could just briefly introduce yourself and tell us your history with the Navy. Certainly. So I am Britt Slavinsky. I am a retired Command Master Chief. Served 26 years, mostly all of that in the SEAL teams, and mostly all East Coast teams. Went through with Bud's Class 164. Graduated with that in January 1990. And then served with SEAL Team 4 for a few years, and then served with the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, and served at Group 2, as a Command Master Chief, and then retired from the Naval Special Warfare Command. In March of 2002, deployed to Afghanistan in January 2002, but in March of that year, conducted an operation called Operation Anaconda, where I led a seven-man reconnaissance team onto a snow-covered 11,000-foot mountain peak to conduct overwatch operations, reconnaissance operations. During that operation, one of my teammates, upon landing or helicopter landing on top of the mountain, we received heavy RPG, rocket-propelled grenade fire, machine gun fire, damaged a helicopter badly, and one of my teammates was ejected from the aircraft. A teammate's name was Neil Roberts. So my helicopter crashed landed in the valley, and I made the decision to launch an immediate rescue mission with my remaining team members back up to the mountain against superior numbers, heavily armed enemy force, and for those actions during that day, I was awarded the Medal of Honor. And I understand that just happened recently as far as receiving the award. Is that correct? It did. It happened May 24th at a ceremony at the White House. Oh, wow. So just not too long ago at all. Not too long ago at all. That must have been pretty amazing experience. It was. It is still very surreal. I don't think surreal is the right word for it, but it is still very, very surreal. Amazing experience, indeed. Yeah. Tough to wrap your mind around, I'm sure. Yeah, it still is. So let's rewind back to joining the Navy. What or who inspired you to do that? So I think like most youth graduating from high school, I'm trying to figure out what do I want to do with my life. And from an early age on, I was involved in Boy Scouts. Boy Scouts was the kind of foundation of my life. And I became an Eagle Scout. And from what I learned in scouting, that really became the foundation of my life. Boy Scout oath, Boy Scout law, those things are what I made decisions from. They were vitally important to me growing up, from being able to take the heart of the heart to this day. My father was also a UDT guy. So he was in naval special warfare, really back in the early days. He went through one of the beginning classes, about class 13 back in the early 1950's. Wow. So when I was around 13, 14 years old, my dad took me to a silver union where I introduced me to some of his teammates. And from that moment on, wow he's introduced me to this other family that he had and I thought this looks like something very interesting that I want to do very difficult job difficult selection process for the job but very crucial important work on behalf of the nation so retiring from high school I made the decision that I wanted to do something that was more important for me to do I wanted to contribute I wanted to serve my nation and for me that was joining the Navy and then applying to go to the SEAL program did you know what you wanted to do with the SEALs whenever you first joined I know at that point there might not have been nearly as much media coverage about what the teams even did but did you have an idea of kind of what you wanted to do in the teams I certainly did because my dad introduced me to it I'm from Northampton Massachusetts to Western Massachusetts so as you can imagine it wasn't a big presence right of military there so I would not have known of the SEALs probably let alone even the Navy other than my father introducing me to it so really happy to have this opportunity to get this message out to yeah other people in the same particularly there are other people there and just to help them focus hey what do you want to do with your life right right right I kind of set off on the right path what did you do in the SEAL teams as your specialty coming through SEAL training you're trained in various different things when you get to your SEAL team everyone's trained up in a lot of the basic things everyone's a combat diver you do land warfare you do parachute jumping it has a name fits the air and land you do all the specialties there all the special warfare tactics that go with that later on in my career I specialized more in being sniper training sniper instructor but overall the main thing that I'd say that I did is I was the leader first first and foremost above all the other specialties I was I was the leader the one making decisions and executing those decisions you mentioned being a sniper trainer is that what you said instruction instructor okay instructor that's a place where the SEALs do get a lot of recognition what separates the best Navy snipers from other precision rifle teams in the world I don't know if there's a real distinction behind them I think they're going to sniper school there are a lot of great shooters a lot of great rifle shooters most if not all SEALs I think are expert shooters everyone has a capability right to go through the sniper training what you get out of that training though is that you're just going to think differently you're going to look at targets differently you get planning on it you get strategic thought processes strategic in the sense that how you were going to go about going against a target so in an operational sense how am I going to go do this and you get leadership skills out of it because mostly the sniper guys you're solo and a lot of things where you got one partner with you and you're going to go out and do certain operations so instead of having a larger team a much much smaller team so that that's really what you learn how to operate across the whole battle space just you and your and your shooting partner to accomplish a mission well you did say that sometimes you're solo I mean I've obviously never been to sniper training or any precision rifle schools but I think that is pretty common that there's a team there but the solo aspect I think is definitely a little bit different you know it certainly and you're never really alone in the team environment you're never really alone and you have support you have your teammates that are going to be close by but it what you also learned at the sniper schools a lot of times it's just you and you have to rely on you and and what you bring internally to that problem set and the sniper school really helped hone that down to you're the one making all those decisions and that was invaluable to me what's something that you might have wish you knew before you entered the Navy I think things have changed considerably since you entered the Navy does anything stick out in your mind you know with 2020 hindsight looking back yesterday there's a many a number of things I wish I would have known at the moment when I where I was I was learning everything I possibly could I was reading all the books looking at everything talked to everybody that I could possibly talk to about what I was getting into so at the moment which you know was 30 something years ago I felt I was the as most prepared as I could of course from what you see on the outside and when you really get to the program it is completely different of course because you know there's be a lot of hype and a lot of publicity to when you get to it just like well this is totally different than what I thought that it was oh in a good way of course certain certainly much harder because then it all becomes all becomes just very real and your commitment really takes more of a tangible form to okay here I am here's a decision you made and you're going forward with it do you think that most seals have a calling for that kind of sense of purpose that you're talking about people coming into whenever they arrive on the teams I believe so because given the nature of the training the training is really intense there's some 75 80% people that come into the training all of them thinking they have what it takes don't get through for one reason or another and the process is going to weed that out of you there are no shortcuts to Bud's training based on the water demolition seal training there are no hacks for it the process is you go there and you perform better than you did the day before and you just don't simply meet the minimum standards you need to excel those standards excel those standards are not only what the program sets for you but what you set for yourself internally about you internally growing and moving forward every day yeah I think yet that does make a lot of sense that your own internal calling or however you phrase that is I think what pulls people to the teams and then to wherever they end up in the teams whether it's they continue on and be it is a calling about it's about service service above above oneself service to complete strangers to your fellow countrymen those people that are gonna walk by you on the street and look at you and not even think twice about you not knowing what you're doing for them on a day-to-day basis and really being okay with it it's okay right right that you don't know it is a much higher calling of service so we spoke with Ed Byers a few weeks ago and I asked him a question I think that is maybe appropriate to talk to you about too I've learned a lot about the camaraderie and the mechanics of being on the SEAL teams in terms of what is required of them and there's also the external impression that you're talking about people have an impression of what these guys do and who they are and what they're about but it contrasts a lot because I think there's a disconnection there people realize or people believe that these are individuals they're super you know super human individuals but really there's so much more focus on the team and that is what really is defining you know the idea of the SEAL teams and all the people that are operating there they put the teams above themselves right are there parts in training or whenever you're on deployment that you rely more on yourself or does that change and is that ability to change back and forth between the two you think allow you to be successful Navy SEAL or special warfare operator so both SEAL and SWIC operators really any special operator the first person you have to lead if you look at what you see from the SEALs in a SWIC is you see this big tactical side you see the guys in the boats the big guns the fancy electronics the state of the art equipment that those guys they're really industry leading equipment that they're using at SWICs and then the same thing that at the SEAL teams and then you see the image the big burly guys doing all this dangerous and crazy stuff that's really a small percentage of the things that we do you also don't see the the human side of what they do their husbands their fathers they are your little league coaches there you're never next door out there cutting their grass there's still that human element there to it as well and then the level of commitment that also takes you know we kind of called it mastering the switch the switch being you're at home you got to throw the switch in one direction I got to be dad I got to deal with everything at home and then you're gonna go through the switch and you're gonna go to work and then you have to take on this immense responsibility that it is to be in these organizations of doing what the nation is asking of them and when you're in that mode that is the priority your priority then isn't your family life it is taking care of that much broader picture and then the families are at home still bearing that immense weight as well at home they're not out doing that job physically but emotionally they're still there doing it and then they have to bear the burdens at home as well too so immense challenging task for those family members as well so we call it you have to be very good at mastering that switch and you have to be very good at it as well when you're out doing your job because there be one moment when you have to have a what we call the very kinetic response and then switch right away into a very human response because maybe the situation or something other than this kinetic side and very often that's the case a person that can switch back and forth to being exactly what the situation requires I think that in a way separates us from what a lot of other organizations do kind of feeling that is a unique challenge that only certain people are really able to do effectively consistently and well because that's obviously required in your job making that switch fast is part of the process that's what I think really separates the seal and sick training so from other training that's out there so it's not necessary the physical physical piece is really that's going to come pretty easy you know it come easy to most it's that internal piece it's going to be much more difficult and when you are stressed when you are in a very difficult situation you are uncomfortable you're exhausted beyond compare and to be able to make those intellectual critical thinking tasks and make them accurately that is what this training is really going to prepare you to do I believe that's what separates us this this training from from other training is it's training that mental acuity in our people I kind of define part of that is the grit I think that's maybe the working side of that switch right talk a little bit about how you've developed that in your life or if that's even possible to develop it's something that you're born with so that that's the the great man question right is a person born into the situation or does the situation make the person and I think it's becomes a little bit of both right there's a there's an art and then there's the science piece of both things or there's an emotion and a logic piece to all of it you need absolute both of those things to move forward it's a logic piece which is cold hard facts then there's the emotion piece which is your life experiences and things that you've been through both of those things you need to move forward to make the right decisions in life not just in our role but in any life right I think that yeah I think that like foundational right like you're foundational for me that foundational piece came from scouting scouting was that Boy Scout oaths that Boy Scout law and the other adult leaders that I was ran so I think those those programs you know Girl Scouts boys and girls clubs those things are very very important to our youth because it just gives you some foundation and challenges you I think too it does challenge you the young age here you're gonna take our youth you're gonna put your sights on a long goal a long task it's gonna take several several years four or five maybe six years to attain the rank of Eagle Scout and you're young and you're making a commitment there so at an early age you're getting used to responsibilities thinking through things making a commitment and following through yeah following through so you're getting that great you're getting that resilience and there's a lot of difficult tasks and a lot of things are placed on those those young kids in order to complete this task and it really it is just a primer the way I looked at it scouting for me it was just a primer for citizenship I wouldn't have traded that for anything that's huge I don't think enough people are involved in those types of organizations not necessarily them specifically but from a young age especially I think in today's climate that challenging your kids with potentially dangerous things you know giving your kid a pocket knife when they're six years old or whatever the ages you know what I mean stuff like that is kind of almost sounds outdated to a lot of people which I think is really kind of naive to think that those things are at the very core of the very fabric of who we are has a nation you know the pocket knife stuff that they're out there let's teach the kid how you're going to use this thing so yes you don't cut yourself right or an axe like basic things I look at Boy Scouts aside from the character that it develops fire starting mm-hmm you know first aid and and tie a knot you're gonna look at a Boy Scout and say here here's someone that hey the kid that's over there standing that Boy Scout uniform ten years old he could save your life he knows how to do CPR he can stop you from bleeding that kid can absolutely save your life because of training that he's been through so yeah and his mind knowing that he just even taking any action is what stops a lot of people I would imagine that you know then becomes he can look at the situation and go I need to intervene there right I see something going on I have the courage in me to do something and I have the skills to go and do something and that's all when you see in a little ten-year-old boy standing there and the same goes for Girl Scouts as well too so you have Girl Scouts do the exact same thing that Boy Scouts are gonna do you know we don't look at our youth as being oh that kid what could that kid do okay can do a whole lot let me tell you yeah I think the responsibility piece is really huge because I think kind of giving people that permission to take responsibility and ownership at a young age that is something people don't realize that maybe they can even do but are allowed to do and then it's kind of getting them off jumpstart almost yes and the accountability right that you're accountable for your action we don't have a lot right right if you never became a seal what kind of could you see yourself doing other than than that in your life maybe as a kid do you have any other ambitions or looking back on it now really I can't see myself have doing anything else right back to that yeah yeah great man theory is for person born or not like any youth yeah I had my dreams a okay you want to be a fireman or you want to go be a fighter pilot or you want to go be architecture doing engineering and you sort through all those things and you have to go through that process to say okay what do I want right kind of the wine is a true of each of these things and then you kind of say okay this one right here looks the most appealing to me I'm feeling this one is is right for me and it's the right thing to do and that's kind of where I was at I made that decision that hey that maybe is the right place for me to go and yeah very difficult life but I have not looked back once yeah I kind of expected that answer by figured I would have to ask anyway sure to see if you might give us a little gem like you know you want to be a race car driver something like that yeah you're hidden hobby no ballet dancer no ballet dancing you never know I mean I've met people across the board with the Navy Seals I'm sure you can do it I'm sure it's like not much you guys can't do no how I look in tights I can't Foxtrot though can we talk a little bit about fear and getting over fear what are your best strategies for getting over fear so fear is very common very common reaction and it's normal everybody's feels fear everyone is is afraid everybody does if there's a seal that's out there's a sweet guy out there that's gonna say look I'm right now I'm fearless and it run away from that person true courage and I think there are several quotes out there one of them I think comes from a fictional John Wayne true courage is being scared to death but sad on up anyway right that's that's like I'm scared right I embrace it like I'm no like I'm not I'm not gonna hide it yeah I'm scared to go do this but what I'm getting ready to do absolutely needs to be done right now true courage comes from being scared and doing the thing you're about ready to do anyway no one you recognize the risk you know there could be a very terrible outcome but you're gonna go do it anyway cuz the outcome if you don't do something would be much worse so recognizing there's a situation there recognizing you can have an impact a positive impact on what's going on there and then making the decision to go and do on it the strategies that you're gonna have are gonna come from the core of who you are as a person the things you believe in the things in your life that you will do things in your life that you know you will not do and then living them so yeah it's identifying I think some of those belief systems I think or but the priorities I think is what gets in the way of now hearing you say that because if there's no sense of urgency then I'm not gonna do it I'm scared no there's no need to do it right or if it's something that's more personal you need to have that definition for yourself what you're willing to do what you're willing not to do what your goals are to be able to say I'm gonna have to push through this you think that's kind of a big part of it for seal training for the strict train it is a big part of it because although you're going through as a group you're gonna have a group of teammates that around you're going through seal training but what the training is going to do is it's gonna break down that team a little bit but it'll it really is going to get down to the core of who you are as a person now all those little things there's only so much that team effort is going to get you through but remember a team is built up of a lot of individual great efforts and you take those individual great efforts and put them all together and those together they go off and they do great things if you have people there just doing mediocre meeting the minimum standards but that's not really a team certainly not high-performing team right which is the ones that we have so those people are just meeting the minimum standards those are ones we simply don't want around the people that are exceeding those standards so you absolutely need to have someone that's gonna dig deep inside them and say okay this is the way that we're gonna go or I'm not giving in I'm not gonna quit today my body's hurt I'm in pain so is the person right next to me and the thing we're doing right now is really where they're doing and we're gonna go do this yeah that I think that's something that people don't realize about the teams is that there's lots of different personality types but what really connects them in the core you know that the other person at that stage when you guys are finally put together like we're on the same page is that you think that's accurate so it is accurate so being like-minded yes we've all been through the same experiences that we've all been through the same trainings we're like-minded is that we're very I don't want to say singularly focused but we're very committed right to this action what we're doing we have a term that hey it's we're all in in this and that terms you use very freely today if no one really understands what this really means is that when I'm all in I'm here with you right now a hundred percent of your life not just yeah I'm here with you in my life my life what equals my life is not just my heartbeat right it's my soul is my heart it's my dreams it's my family's hopes and dreams and and all the things that they could become all the next birthdays all the all the events those are the all the things that we are going to give up willing to give up for you go see my kids you'll get married you know just experience that living and not existing I'm gonna give all that up for you right my fellow citizens and that's that's really that's what's at risk here when we say all in like I am I'm all in on doing this to protect my fellow citizens I understand that you spoke with a Buds class earlier today yeah what was that experience like what did you talk to them about so spoke with Buds class 3 3 2 they are about a week out from hell week so they just finished hell week and I think there was about 90 of them in there an amazing experience I haven't spoken to a Buds class been that close to a Buds class since I myself yeah right so it was really almost know this real moment for me I'm standing there and I can really picture myself in their seat you know seeing like well I've been right there so I talked to them a little bit about my experience is going through hell week and that things that I remembered and you know I told them I said you know this is just a primer you just went through hell week you've not arrived you're not done yet you got a long road ahead of you but just like I was mentioned earlier hell week is just a little primer for you to get tapped into the resources within you that you're going to need to go forward with the rest of your career so yeah you're going to be sleep deprived you're going to be in pain you know discomfort you're going to be hungry you're going to be angry you're going to be sad you're going to have all those things but guess what inside of all of that you still have to function and how best you do it that's what I told them this is really what the purpose of all this is here you're doing a lot of things maybe you don't make any sense of maybe by Thursday you don't remember the things that you're doing but this is the purpose of it to tap into you the internal piece of you of who you are to say yeah I can get through all this stuff and I can get my teammate through all of this stuff and he's going to get me through all of this little bit of a reality check a little bit of a little reality check say it's and I mentioned to them we have that logo that you mentioned in the beginning of this podcast it says the only easy day was yesterday well I believe words have meaning each word has a definition and that they're put together a certain way to get away at certain emotion everyone has different definitions to certain words to me the only easy day was yesterday and this is what I told the class is I don't care what you did yesterday I really told them this is you may have saved the president of the United States life yesterday great good on you get two minutes get over it you did a good job we're gonna do for me today right we're gonna do the top it so that's what I told them I said hey patch yourselves on the back get two minutes to get over it and then focus on what the next task is ahead so those are the things that I told them congratulations on getting through hell wait right also my condolences right because it's gonna get much harder yeah never stops I mean even look at your career now taking a change that unforeseen you know and you still developing you still looking for I think that's important and recognize and still serving that's right for me a career for the seal on the switch it progressively it's going to get harder and harder and harder the jobs and the tasks are gonna put on you they're progressively gonna gonna get harder they're gonna get more intense that's the career path that our people that goes through I'd like to touch a little bit on adversity and I think we kind of defined a part of what enables you and I think most people to be able to push through that and that's having a direct understanding of the purpose for why you're in that position to begin with and having the vision to continue on are there any other aspects that you can add to that in terms of overcoming adversity any personal anecdotes or anything like so the I have several the best one that I can give you so the night in question where I received the the medal of honor the actions for mm-hmm so you know my helicopter was shot down my teammate had fallen out so I have a downed helicopter shit in front of me I made the decision that I'm gonna take care of the problem in front of us a downed helicopter we got all those that air crew got us all to a safe location a secure safe location it was from that spot that I had a decision to make you know weight of command I was a ground force commander and the responsibility on our commanders that are on the ground is incredible it's national strategic level commitments that are on those guys the people going forward is sitting on their shoulders so I had a decision to make it's in that decision it's in those those moments when no matter what teammates are around you right that leader has to bear that responsibility you're gonna feel absolutely alone and in that moment I did feel alone although I had my teammates around me had air crew around me I felt absolutely alone with the critical decision I was going to make and the decision for me to make was do I go now back to the mountaintop against superior enemy numbers they have heavier caliber firepower than I do I am not outfitted I don't have the equipment to do an assault I was outfitted to do a different mission and if I go now there's a chance that I could rescue my teammate or I could wait three four hours for more reinforcements to come and that is the sure thing that I will go to the mountaintop but it probably most likely be a recovery fully known if I go now the chances of me myself perishing I thought we're a hundred percent I thought it was a hundred percent of me losing more of my teammates and at that moment that piece that came back to me is what I learned as a youth and those were the opening lines of the Boy Scout oath the opening lines are on my honor I will do my best to do my duty on my honor do my best to do my duty on my honor I will do my best to do my duty that echoed in my head as I'm sorting through all the tactical scenario of what I'm going to do it's them and I started listening to it about the third time I was like wow okay I've not done my best and I'm gonna go do this so that's when I briefed my team I said hey we're going back and we're gonna go do this so can't stress to the listeners enough how important is the core of who you are whatever it is that you believe in that's finally important for you going forward how do you make decisions what do you believe in and can the problems you experience if you throw them against whatever it is that you believe in whatever ethos whatever creed whatever it is you belong those things that they're very core Boy Scout oath all that stuff they're just a tool for you to use to make decisions when decisions are difficult to come by that's really at the basis of what they are right I got bad problem right here difficult decision to make I'm gonna take that problem I'm gonna throw it against whatever I believe in for me it was a Boy Scout oath for the seal of sweat gets the seal in the sweat creed you take whatever problem you got you throw it up against it and if it sticks to it guess what I'm gonna go do it if it bounces off of it he made me I probably shouldn't go do what I'm getting ready to go do that's what I look at those things at their core their tools for you to make a decision and they're not just for when you're in uniform therefore your personal life as well if you don't know what you believe in if you don't know what your core ethos is if you don't have one personally then here's the seal one here's the SWIC one what that came from it started in around 2000 ish 2002 2003 somewhere around there that came from our entire lineage from the first day down in Fort Pierce when the first frogmen were made till this present day every word in there every phrase is fact it happened in one form or another so it is a bit ideal but it is a factual thing that all stems from something that happened and we put it down in writing to say this is this is who we are this is what we believe in this is how we'll conduct ourselves that is what those ethos is are there for in kind of stepping forward into the future after that event what aspects in your personal life did you kind of rely on to gain that strength again to kind of push through in your personal life so certainly after the event when we came back off the mountain immediately coming off the mountain which was some 20 hours later I walked into our planning control center you know and I was this is the point when I can finally I can like breathe right I can breathe a little bit and I walked into our command space and I just felt like I'm just exhausted and I just felt like wow that that was some pretty intense stuff that we just went through I really didn't feel like I could move and go forward and I'm standing in our command space and I still had all my gear on and this was the teamwork stuff comes in so my teammate was there in the room recognized in me that I was I looked defeated and I was defeated it I felt defeated at this point and a teammate who is a high-ranking member of the community now saw this in me great he didn't say anything to me he just came up to me this is the definition of teammate comes in for me he came up to me and he just embraced me and say anything and he just just simple human gesture coming up to me right and embracing me and just telling me in this very brotherly way to say look it's going to be okay right but get yourself straight right because I need you and that's basically what he was telling me right and then he let me go and I go back to my tent and that's exactly just what I needed so there'll be times there'll be times when oh man I just can't I can't take another step forward that's when those teammates are going to go hey look I'm here for you right we can do this together so that was immediate aftermath of that and then moving forward yet certainly still those core aspects that they're just going to remain there's going to be difficult times you have to always go back on who that is who you were what you believe in and they will carry you through how do you suggest candidates take care of their mental and emotional well-being whenever they're really pushing themselves or even people that are deployed so everyone is different everyone goes through experiences things different what might be stressful to me is not a stressful someone else right so everyone's going to be in a different situation what I'd say in general if you've made the decision that this is the path that you want to go down whether it be seal whether it be swick you think through it all completely to say why am I going to go do this do I just want to I want a little piece of that image or do I do I really want to go out and I want to serve at the highest possible levels with some of the best citizens that our country could produce if the answer is yes to that then go for it all in and the other piece the mental piece once you've made that core decision and your reasons are sound everything else is going to come easier to you you're going to be able to pull from that because my reasons for being here are sound the training process the pipeline all that stuff is just going to pick you apart maybe you came in for one other reason because you bought into the image you hit the training process and you're like oh my god this is really terrible what I'm doing here worst decision of my life and then you just hold on just a little bit longer and then you hold on a little bit longer you go one more day one more day and you're like well this really is what I want to do so the initial thing I would say which make the decision for why are you into this why do you want to do this and if you're in then you're in don't give up on it and if you're in it and you're having those thoughts look just just wait another minute right and go back to your core reasons why are you here what you really want to do this take a look to your left take a look to your right and say okay this is this is the reason why I'm here for me I look at our flag a little differently than a lot of people and I we can use this analogy for many years I'll pass it on to you guys so it can be very difficult at times you know certainly a lot of things that allow stressful environments that that we go through but if you look at our flag a lot of people look at our flag they see the red the white in the blue the red symbolizes you know the blood and sacrifice that generations have given for the country the white you know innocence purity you know many other definition the blue the field is for justice that's kind of how I look at those things are very readily apparent when you look at the flag but the real core of our flag when you look at it is the thread that holds it all together something that no one no one ever pays any attention to right and that thread passes in and out of all of that stuff and you never see it and you see the flag standing out through a hurricane and the ends may be a little frazzled a little torn the flag is still all together all that we are as Americans is all tied up in that flag and that thread is the only thing that's holding it all together that thread is us that's how I look at it it's that thread I'm gonna get battered I'm gonna get bruised I'm gonna get beat up but I know who I am I know the things I will do I know the things I will not do I know my character's intact this is what I'm gonna do and I'm gonna hold strong and that's what I see as our community is we're the thread that's gonna just hold everything together no matter what it is you're gonna throw against me thank you so much for sitting with us and spending some time with us I know you've got your own life and a lot of other things that you got to do in your life so appreciate you taking the time to speak with us yeah very happy to be here thanks for the privilege find out more at sealswik.com and join us again for the next NSW podcast