135： Jocko Willink ｜ Discipline Equals Freedom
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Summary
Jocko Willink is a former Navy SEAL and commander of Task Unit Bruiser, the elite elite special operations forces unit of the elite United States Air Force Special Operations Forces. He is also the author of Discipline Equals Freedom: The Field Manual, a New York Times Bestseller, and one of the most disciplined men on the planet. In this episode, Jocko talks about why every man must find his mission, how to overcome fear, and procrastination, and why discipline equals freedom.
Transcript
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There is no shortage of motivational events and courses, seminars, quotes, memes, you name it.
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Don't get me wrong, motivation has its purpose, but discipline is a far greater asset on your
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path to accomplishing big things in your life. Where motivation falls short, discipline picks
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up the slack. Today, I am joined by a man that needs no introduction, Jocko Willink,
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to talk about connecting future ambitions with present actions, why every man must find his
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mission, how to overcome fear and procrastination, and his mantra, discipline equals freedom.
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You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart
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your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time. You are not
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easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who you are.
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This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,
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Man, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Mickler, and I am the host and the founder of this
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podcast, The Order of Man. I can't tell you guys how excited I am to finally, finally be releasing
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this podcast. I've been talking about it for about a month now and telling you to subscribe
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because we've got some amazing guests coming on. We always do, but my lineup this month is killer.
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Last week, we had Gary John Bishop, the author of Un-F Yourself, and I told you to fill in the blank.
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You can do it again. Today, we have Jocko Willink, the author of Discipline Equals Freedom,
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The Field Manual. And next week, we have Lewis Howes, the author of The Mask of Masculinity.
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So, powerhouse lineup. I want to let you know that I appreciate you for tuning in and for listening
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as long as you have to The Order of Man podcast. Without you, we would not be able to interview
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guys of this caliber. So, I want to thank you. Now, a couple of things before I get into the
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interview for today. First, would you mind sharing this? I don't ask for you to share this
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a lot, but this one really is going to resonate with you and the other men in your life, whether
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that's your father or your brothers, friends, colleagues, coworkers. It could even be random
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strangers on Facebook, but either way, share it and make sure to tag me and Jocko when you do.
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Second, I want to give a quick shout out to our show sponsor, NetSuite by Oracle. I'm a business
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need. Again, it's netsuite.com slash man. That's netsuite.com slash man. Gentlemen, as
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I said before, I have been looking forward to releasing this conversation, this podcast with
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you with my return guest, Jocko Willink. I'm sure that most of you know who Jocko is, but
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just in case that you've been living under a rock for the past four or five years, let
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me introduce you to him real briefly. He is a former Navy SEAL and commander of Task Unit
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Bruiser, which is the most decorated special forces unit of the Iraqi war. We actually had
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some overlap time when I was in Ramadi. We talk about that towards the end of the show.
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He is a recipient of the Bronze and Silver Star. He's a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt. He's
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a New York Times bestselling author of three books and arguably one of the most disciplined
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men on this planet. I, like you, have been following him ever since I ran across his book,
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Extreme Ownership in Barnes and Noble, and have been fortunate enough to develop a close
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enough relationship with him and his team that when I heard he was coming out with a
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new book, Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual, I was able to get a message to him and
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get him back on the show. Gentlemen, strap in, get your notepads out, and get ready to tune
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into one of the most qualified men I know to talk about how discipline will give you the freedom
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that you are after. Jocko, what's going on, man? Thanks for joining me on the show today.
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It's going good. Yeah, it's been a while. It's been about, you know, I didn't look. I should
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have looked, but it seems like we are about a year, maybe a little over a year ago since
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we last talked on the podcast, and I know the guys really enjoyed that conversation.
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Yeah, so we've got a new book coming out, Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual.
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When did this whole notion of Discipline Equals Freedom become your mantra, if you will?
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I would say it's hard for me to actually pinpoint a date and time when I began to actually say
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those words. I was still in the SEAL teams. I think it was when I was starting to have to
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explain to the young junior officers how to do better. And as I was doing it, as I was trying
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to explain that to them and try and verbalize to them in a simple way, sort of the code that I tried
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to live by, you know, along with the military tactics of cover, move and keeping things simple
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and decentralized command and prioritize and execute and taking ownership of things. Along with those,
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I would talk somewhat about my personal mode and operating system. And when I tried to explain
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that to them, I at some point said, if you want freedom, then you need to have discipline and
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discipline equals freedom. And that is where it came from.
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You say you want these guys, you wanted these guys to do better, you know, as they started to
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adopt this principles. And I know it's a simple phrase, right? And I know there's a lot more to it,
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and we're going to get into that. But as these guys started to adopt this mantra,
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I mean, did things change quickly? What was the result of implementing more discipline in their
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lives? Well, I mean, it's obvious when anyone starts to implement discipline in their lives,
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that their lives get better. Sure. And you see that on every level from the way they handle their
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finances, to their physical conditioning, to their actual internal health, to the way they do their job,
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to the way they, you know, take care of their family. When you live a disciplined life,
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you do better across the board. And it's really interesting because if you say discipline equals
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freedom, then you almost have to assume that the opposite of that is bondage and slavery. And yet
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we see so many men and women who have anything but discipline and gravitate towards letting life get
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a hold of them versus the other way around. Yeah. Well, one of my classic ways that I explained this
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to my son was when we were walking down the street, you know, we saw some guy that was clearly a bum,
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probably addicted to drugs and alcohol, clearly homeless. And, you know, I mean, I feel bad for
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the guy. But at the same time, I explained to my son that this guy made decisions along the way that
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he thought he was going to free himself. He was just going to, you know, I'm not going to work. I'm
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not going to go to that job. I'm not going to show up on time. I'm going to do whatever I want.
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And I'm going to, I'll do whatever I want. I'll drink this alcohol. I'll do these drugs.
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I'll, I'll, I don't need to pay the rent on time. You know, I'll just do whatever I want. I'll be
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free. And, and now, like you said, he's a slave. He's a slave that has nowhere to live. He's a slave
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to the weather. He's a slave to trying to beg for food and for, for water and for medical attention.
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He's a slave to people that are willing to give him things as opposed to owning things and making
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things happen for himself. So I think that's the, the, the strongest example of where total freedom
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results in, you know, a devastated life is if you look at many, many people that have lost their way
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and lost their path in life and they end up, you know, addicted to drugs and alcohol and living on
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the streets because they have had no discipline. Let's define the, the word freedom. When you,
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when you say freedom, what are you experiencing in your life? And what do you mean that other people
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can experience in their lives when you're talking about freedom?
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Well, freedom is the broad term for me that encompasses being able to do what you want.
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Primarily number one is being able to do what you want. And, and the more discipline you have in your
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life, the more you will be able to do what you want. And that's not true. Initially, initially the
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discipline, it might be things that you don't want to do at the time, but the more you do things that
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you don't want to do, the more you do the right things, the better off you will, the better off
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you will be in the more freedom you will have. So again, the, the, the classic examples that I talk
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about all the time are financial freedom. Number one, because if you want to have financial freedom,
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what you need to have is financial discipline. And the more you, the more attention you pay to how you
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spend your money and the more disciplined you are in, in saving money and not buying things that
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you don't need, the better off. And the more financial freedom you are going to have. The
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other one that I talk about all the time, because everyone understands it is free time. Everyone
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wants to have more free time. And if you want to have more free time, there's only one real way to
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get there. And that's to have more disciplined time management, not only creating a schedule of what
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it is you want to do during a day and then sticking that to that schedule, but also saying no to things
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that don't benefit you in any way, saying no to things that aren't going to help you improve as
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a human being saying no to spending an hour and 47 minutes watching stupid YouTube videos that are
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actually taking you backwards mentally. Yeah. Those are the kinds of things you need to say no to if
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you want to have more free time. And I imagine too, and I know this has been true for me is that
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the more that I exercise discipline in my life, for example, the discipline of getting out of bed
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earlier and going into the gym, the longer that I exercise that discipline, the less discipline that
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is actually required for me to continue doing that thing. Yes, that is true. The more your
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disciplines become just habits, the easier it becomes and the less effort you have to put into it.
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And what that allows you to do is step out and find new things that you might be weak at
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and use your, use your extra discipline to get control of those things.
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When you talk about the things that you're weak at, I think there's two schools of thought and I
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think it's probably somewhere in the middle, but a lot of people will talk about, don't worry about
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what you're not good at. Just double down on what you are. And then other people will say,
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always focus on your weaknesses so you can build those up. Where do you fall? Or is it somewhere in
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the middle? I think you definitely want to capitalize on your strengths for sure. You know,
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if you and I were to get into a fight and I knew that you were a really good boxer
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and I was a really good grappler, well, then I would take you down to the ground and submit you
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there. Now that's what I would do in a fight. Meanwhile, while I'm training, guess what I'll do?
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I'm going to become a better boxer. I'm also going to maintain my grappling skills, but I'm also,
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but I'm going to focus on the areas that I'm weak to make sure that they don't get exposed
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in the event that that situation arises. So I think definitely capitalize on your strengths and
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work on your weaknesses. They're not mutually exclusive. You can do both.
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I will say that one of my goals in life is not to get into a physical altercation with you though.
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Unless we're training, I would take part in that for sure.
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Right on. I'm definitely going to take you up on that. So Jocko, have you always been disciplined?
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I mean, where does this come from? Is this ingrained in you? Were you born disciplined? Were
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there times in your life where you were not disciplined?
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Oh yeah. I was kind of a crazy kid growing up. I actually was pretty rebellious. And for me,
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growing up in a small New England town, probably the most rebellious thing that I could do was join
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the military because most kids either stayed in town and became house painters or landscapers,
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or they went off to college and pursued some kind of a career. Not many people from where I'm from
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joining the military. So that's one of the most rebellious things I could do was join the military.
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And I think what led to that was I always, I was a little bit of a rebel against kind of the
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mainstream kids that I grew up around that were smoking pot and listening to hippie music. And I
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actually went in the other direction and was into kind of hardcore music and metal music. And that
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attitude that I learned from that kind of music sort of directed me in, in this thought process when
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I was young and it just kind of carried through. And I would say that phase of my life, it was pretty
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hardcore for, for when I was a kid, but it's still, you know, I still think about that. I still listen to
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the same music. I still, I still believe in, in trying to do the right thing and try and maintain
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How did your perspective change when you joined the military?
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Joining the military was great for me because it was a blank slate when you're a kid. And well,
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when I was a kid and I think a lot of kids have this problem. And I say kids, I mean,
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people between the ages of seven and 27. I think that it's hard sometimes to connect the present with
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the future. And I know me, I didn't realize that I didn't realize where that, that what I was doing
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at this moment in time as a 14 year old or 15 year old kid absolutely affect what affect where I would
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end up in the future. And what was great was when I joined the military, all of a sudden they paint
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this very clear path for you. And for me, the path that I was trying to get on was trying to be a
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seal. And, and when I got into bootcamp, they said, okay, if you do these things, you will get this,
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you will be on the path to be a seal. If you don't do these things, you will be off the path.
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So it was very simple for me. Okay. I need to do these exercises. I need to run this amount of
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time. I need to swim this amount of time. I need to fold my uniforms that are way, the way they're
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telling me to fold them. I need to study the material that they're telling me to study. If I
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want to stay on the path to becoming a seal. So once, once I found that path, I could focus my
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So then you're suggesting that if somebody were to find a path that's appealing to them or,
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or, or moves them for whatever reason, then that's going to help them be more disciplined
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because they work themselves backwards into the tactics that need to be completed.
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Yeah. And I think that's one of the hard things for younger people is you don't, I had a very
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clearly defined path that I did define it for myself. I wanted to be a seal. And so that's a very
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clearly defined path for me. A lot of people, they don't know what it is that they actually want to do.
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And so when you don't know what you want to do, there's no path to be on. So you can just
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wander wherever you want. And what I would, I would say is even if you don't know where you
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want to go, there are certain fundamental things that are going to help you no matter what path you
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want to be on being physically fit, being mentally strong, being learning as much as you can about as
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much different topics and, and variable things in the world that you can doing all those things
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will make you a better person, make you more prepared for whatever endeavor it is. You're
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going to end up trying to pursue. I want to talk about mental strength, because I think if we take
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the route of physical strength, I don't think that's guesswork. I think everybody knows you go
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into the gym, you move your body, you push around heavy things, you run, you do the thing.
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But I, I get a lot of questions about how to develop mental strength. What are your suggestions?
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Yeah. If you want to be mentally tougher, be tougher. That's it. There's no mystery there.
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You, the things that are hard to do that take mental toughness, do them. You don't feel like
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doing the work that you're supposed to do, do it anyways. You don't feel like getting up in the
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early in the morning, get up early in the morning. You don't feel like spending that
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one and a half hours writing for the book that you're trying to write. You write the freaking book
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that you're supposed to write. That's what you do. There's no, there's no magic pill. There's no
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brain waves that you can hook into a machine. There's no meditation that's going to get you
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there. What you do is the things that you don't feel like doing, do them anyways. Just be tougher.
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I love that. I love that answer because I'm actually dealing with the,
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the example that you just shared, which is writing a book. And I know for me, it's like
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write 1500 to 2000 words per day, man, that's a challenge sometimes, but I know how I feel when I
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get it done in the sense of accomplishment when I just do it. And it literally is just a decision
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that I've made to sit down, get my butt in the chair behind the computer and get the words
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cranked out. Yeah. And when I'm writing, I only write a thousand words a day, which takes me about
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an hour. And after that I get, I don't, I want to go do something else. So 2000 words a day,
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I'm guessing that probably takes you around two hours, unless you're just a really fast writer.
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Well, there you go. So that's how you get it done. And like you said, I think it's important for
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people to remember what it feels like to when you do get done. And that way,
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when you don't feel like doing it, you can fast forward your brain a little bit and say, okay,
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well in two and a half hours, I'm going to feel really good that I got this done.
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And, and you can add that, add to that fact that in 30 days, you're going to have 60,000 words,
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which is almost a whole book. So think about that and sit your ass down and start writing.
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I mean, it isn't, it's amazing that we as human beings have the capability of projecting
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ourselves into the future consciousness, essentially, and deciding what the future
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One of the things that you had mentioned was the discipline that comes with the military.
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I've seen a lot of guys who get out of the military and they continue that discipline
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lifestyle. You're one of them. I'm sure a lot of guys on the teams with you are,
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are among those ranks as well. But then there's other guys who really struggle
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when they get out of the military. It's almost as if they lose either their sense of direction or
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something goes wrong. And I'm curious what the difference is between guys who maintain that
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discipline and guys who potentially fall apart.
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For me, guys that maintain discipline are guys that move on to their next mission. And the guys
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that lose discipline are the guys that can't find or don't find their next mission. So if you're
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getting out of the military, what you need to do is figure out what your next mission is going to be.
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And I don't care what it is, whether you're going to build a house, whether you're going to start a
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nonprofit organization, whether you're going to get a job, whether you're going to make a bunch
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of money doing that job, whether you're going to go and walk around the world with a backpack
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feeding people, whatever it is, your next mission is going to be. That's what you need to do,
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because I think that mission will reveal the path that you need to be on. And military guys can tap
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into the fact that they know what it takes to be disciplined. They can tap back into that to
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accomplish their next mission as long as they figure out what that next mission is going to be.
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What do you consider your life's mission right now?
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Right now, I'm trying to just pass on some of the lessons that I've learned and that I'm
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continuing to learn in my life. I've been really fortunate to have had some great experiences and
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to have the opportunity to pass those experiences on to other people and then explore new experiences,
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always reading and trying to educate myself and learn more about the world so I can pass that on.
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I know that just by watching you, obviously, in the morning, you're up by 4.30. Is that every
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morning, by the way, seven days a week, 4.30? Yes. What does the rest of your schedule for the
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morning look like? How do you get ramped up for the day and develop a system for discipline?
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Wake up, brush your teeth, work out. That's where it starts. Wake up, brush your teeth, work out.
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So those things are what you have to do. And for me, like you said, you talked earlier about
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having habits. Those are my habits. So that's what I do. Now, once I'm done with that, I've got a lot
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of different businesses going on and a lot of different things happening. Obviously, I've got
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a consulting company called Echelon Front where we go around and work with companies actually all over
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the world now, which is awesome. So I have to talk to clients, return calls to clients, email clients,
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look through information that they've sent me. So I have to do that. I have to write each day. I have
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to prepare for the podcast that I do, which takes a lot of time to prepare for. And of course, I have
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to do jujitsu and surf, which are very important things. And then I got a family, so I spend time with
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them. That's what my day is. My day is just get up and go and get the things done that I know I need
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to get done. You talk about surfing and I've seen some pictures. I imagine that's a sense of
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release and relaxing, if you will. I don't know if you can relax. I don't know. Based on what I've
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seen, it's like, man, does the guy ever slow down? And I'm really curious about downtime, free time,
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scheduling, time to recharge in your life. What does that look like for you?
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Usually jujitsu and when the waves are good surfing, that's what. But the thing that's good
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about jujitsu is you can do it every day. You don't need good waves. You just need people to train
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with, which I have a lot of because I have a gym in San Diego. And so we have a thousand people to
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train with every day, which is awesome. So that's a great form of relaxation. And if the waves are
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good, you can relax surfing. And so you actually build that into your day. It sounds like every
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day, essentially. Well, jujitsu is, yes. Surfing, again, depends on what the ocean wants to do.
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As we talk about discipline today, I want to very quickly make a mention of our exclusive
00:21:30.020
brotherhood, the Iron Council. We talk a lot about accountability in the group and how powerful
00:21:34.620
it can be, but more powerful than that are the tools and resources that you're going to be tapping
00:21:39.640
into to develop more discipline in your life. As much as I would like you to be a lifelong member
00:21:45.920
of the Iron Council, I'd rather you pick up the tools and the skills to go out into the world,
00:21:50.620
out on your own, lead your family, lead your business, your community, and your life. We've
00:21:55.680
developed a quick start guide to get you up and running quickly and have built a program that
00:22:00.120
will walk you through everything that you need to do to create your own 90 day battle plan.
00:22:04.340
This plan is going to help you identify some objectives and then narrow down to the tactics
00:22:09.180
to ensure that you complete these objectives. And then of course, giving you everything that
00:22:13.500
you need to develop more discipline in your life. So if you want to learn more and you want to claim
00:22:17.920
your seat in the Iron Council, you can do so at orderofman.com slash Iron Council. Again,
00:22:23.200
that's orderofman.com slash Iron Council. Now let's get back to the conversation with Jocko.
00:22:30.660
What role does accountability play? Because I look at accountability sometimes and it's kind of a weird
00:22:36.680
thing for me because essentially if you're looking for accountability from others, you're relying upon
00:22:41.280
what others are going to do and if they're going to show up. I think there's a deeper level of
00:22:45.280
accountability, which is to yourself, but I'm really curious how you use or if you use accountability
00:22:50.420
to keep yourself disciplined when you don't want to be. You know, from a leadership perspective,
00:22:54.620
I always say that accountability is a tool, but it should not be your leading tool. And I work with
00:23:00.400
companies, I've worked with a lot of companies along the way that their answer to every problem
00:23:04.020
that they're having is that they just need to have more accountability. Right. And that sounds great
00:23:07.880
because let's face it, if you're my employee and I need you to do X, Y, and Z every day,
00:23:14.220
and every day I sit there and watch you do X, Y, and Z, and I check the box that you've done X and
00:23:19.020
I check the box that you've done Y and I check the box that you've done Z, I've held you accountable
00:23:23.100
to doing them and they get done a hundred percent because I watched you. Well, the problem comes in
00:23:27.900
that I don't just have you as my employee. I've got a team of 15 people and I've got other things that
00:23:33.400
are happening. So I can't watch 15 people do ABC, DEF, LMNOP, QRZ, and I can't hold everyone
00:23:42.420
accountable. So accountability in a leadership, from a leadership perspective, it doesn't really
00:23:47.680
work because no leader has the time to hold everyone accountable for every single task that
00:23:52.900
they're doing. So what we actually want to do is we want to lead people. That's what our goal is,
00:23:57.260
is as a leader, I want Ryan to know that, Hey, here's my task for the day. This is what I'm doing.
00:24:03.400
And this is why it's important that it's, that I need to get them done. This is how it falls into,
00:24:07.800
into helping the rest of the team. This is why the rest of the team is counting on me to do these
00:24:11.920
things. And this is why strategically, if I don't do these things, the whole team is going to be let
00:24:16.500
down. And therefore you are intrinsically motivated to get the things done. Not because I'm, I'm
00:24:22.460
imposing discipline or accountability on you, but, but, but because you understand the mission and you
00:24:27.160
want to accomplish it. And when I have a 15 people that are, have that attitude, we got a team that is
00:24:31.980
rocking and rolling and doing outstanding. Now, of course that doesn't mean that I never check on you
00:24:36.720
and maybe, you know, when I, when we first start working together, maybe I'm checking you every
00:24:41.000
two or three days to make sure you did X, Y, and Z. But then after, you know, a month of working with
00:24:46.520
you, and I know that you understand why you're doing what you're doing. And I know you're, you're
00:24:49.620
a solid worker and you're getting after it. And I know that if you have a problem, you'll raise your
00:24:54.140
hand and say something to me. Well, then I don't have to check on you and I have to hold you
00:24:57.000
accountable every day because you've, you've been led and, and now you're taking leadership yourself
00:25:01.440
and making things happen. So from a leadership perspective, accountability, it's a tool
00:25:06.100
that you have to use sometimes, but it's also kind of a crutch. It certainly shouldn't be the
00:25:10.960
main tool of leadership. Now, from an individual perspective, well, for me, it's just about
00:25:17.580
discipline. And, and people say, how do you get discipline that you get discipline just by,
00:25:22.040
by executing discipline. You don't allow, you don't rationalize with yourself. You don't have
00:25:26.660
any conversations with yourself about, well, I'm tired today or, well, it was a late night last night
00:25:31.860
or, well, it won't matter if I just miss one workout or, well, I can put off writing this
00:25:36.700
stuff tomorrow, or I can put off this job until next week. All those little rationalizations that
00:25:42.200
you do with yourself are just lies. And what you do is you tell them to be quiet and then you obey
00:25:47.860
the discipline, which is going to make you a better person. Powerful. And I know coming back to what you
00:25:52.580
said from a leadership perspective, it sounds very in line with what you talked about in extreme
00:25:57.560
ownership of that idea, notion of decentralized command, meaning that you don't have to hover
00:26:01.880
over people. You don't have to micromanage people. You lead them effectively and allow them to do their
00:26:05.980
work. That is affirmative. Makes sense. You also talk a lot about some of the weaknesses. And I think
00:26:11.160
you, you cover this in the book as well. You talk about the hurdles as being a weakness and
00:26:18.320
procrastination. Let's talk about procrastination for just a minute, because this is something I know a
00:26:22.440
lot of guys deal with. And I think I know your answer to this, but I'm really curious how a man can
00:26:27.060
better overcome his procrastination. Yeah, I'm pretty sure you know what my answer is too.
00:26:31.580
I'm not really hard to figure out. If you, if you're supposed to do something, you do it.
00:26:36.440
That's it. And, and, and one thing that is good, and if you need to do this, it's, it's a good tool
00:26:42.840
that'll help you out. Write the stuff down that you know you're supposed to do tomorrow. And then when
00:26:47.600
you wake up, you do the stuff that you're supposed to do. That, that, that's, that's, that's what you do.
00:26:52.520
I, you know, I used to make checklists after checklist, after checklist of things that
00:26:57.000
I needed to do. And when I was in the military, I did that. The, I don't have as many things to do
00:27:03.520
now because they're all just bigger chunks of things, but, but yeah, it's a great, it's a great
00:27:10.300
way. And then what you do is you wake up in the morning, you look at the list of the things that
00:27:13.840
you're supposed to do and you do them. So if I'm hearing you correctly, basically when you're
00:27:17.880
talking about writing these things out the day before or whatever it may be, you're basically
00:27:22.000
eliminating barriers to you actually getting that thing done. Yes. I know for me when, when,
00:27:27.320
when working out, wasn't a priority as big of a priority as it is now for me, it was simply a
00:27:32.780
matter of knowing what I was going to work out to the next morning. It was having my gym close out,
00:27:36.800
having my drink out, having everything ready to go prior to me waking up and actually going into the
00:27:41.560
gym. Yeah. And that sounds great. And that sounds cool. And a lot of people talk about that and you
00:27:46.360
should definitely do that. And if you, whatever, blah, blah, blah, blah, get up, get up out of bed and do
00:27:50.940
what you're supposed to do, work out. That's it. And also make sure if you need to download
00:27:54.640
psychological warfare. Yeah. Psychological warfare will get you out of bed from, from most,
00:28:00.520
for just about anybody. I know for me, I wake every once in a while, I'll wake up and I'm like,
00:28:04.680
I don't want to get up. And I just hear these words like, what would Jocko do? And then I just
00:28:08.580
get up and I go do the work. Check. What about fear? I know a lot of guys are afraid. You know,
00:28:14.420
I started this business, for example, two and a half years ago, you you've written three books now,
00:28:19.080
by the way, my son, I told my son, I was going to be talking with you today. And he said,
00:28:22.620
tell him that the way of the warrior kid is awesome. He loved that book. So I just wanted
00:28:26.120
to pass that message along. Well, thank you. Appreciate it. That I actually, I actually really
00:28:31.600
enjoy that book and it's kind of cool to read because I wrote it from the perspective of a
00:28:35.620
10 year old kid. So it's almost like I didn't write it. And when I read it, I think, wow, this kid's
00:28:40.480
cool and he's having a cool experience. But then I think, oh yeah, I actually wrote that, wrote that. So
00:28:45.180
yeah, it's a great book. And the feedback I've gotten from that book has been, been just very
00:28:50.180
fulfilling to see kids that are starting to train jujitsu, starting to eat better food, starting to
00:28:56.500
study harder in school, starting to ask their parents for a pull-up bar so they can get stronger.
00:29:01.660
It's, it's been great. That's been very rewarding.
00:29:04.040
I know for me, it's been, it's been valuable in my family's life because I look around at society and I
00:29:09.780
look around at school and I look around at the things that our kids have to deal with. And
00:29:13.820
man, it's tough. And I just want to equip and empower them with all the tools they need to be
00:29:17.920
able to stand on their own two feet. And it's becoming more and more difficult. It seems like.
00:29:22.100
Yeah. Well, that's one of the reasons why I wrote the book. You know, one of the reasons why I wrote
00:29:25.360
Way of the Warrior Kid was because when I was raising, I got four kids and as I was raising my
00:29:29.800
kids and I would be out shopping for books for them, it was like every book was encouraging the kids
00:29:37.160
to be weak. And the one that pushed me over the edge was a book about pirates. And I grabbed it
00:29:43.760
from my son and I got, you know, I picked it up and I'm looking through it and I think, you know,
00:29:48.940
it's a pirate book. I mean, pirates, how pirates are pirates, right?
00:29:55.060
Right. They're attacking people and they're, they're, they're pirates. And I get this pirate book
00:30:00.420
and these pirates were anything but pirates. They were, they were just really pathetic human
00:30:05.260
beings. And so I said to myself, this is ridiculous. And that's one of the things that
00:30:09.860
pushed me to, to write Way of the Warrior Kid so that that kids could say, you know what? It's okay
00:30:14.080
to, to want to be strong. It's okay to want to be smart. It's okay to want to do better in school.
00:30:19.840
It's okay to want to stand up to your, to other people if they're trying to pick on you. Yeah,
00:30:25.500
that's okay. And, and the outcomes in the book are, I think prove that that's, that actually is a,
00:30:31.480
is a very good way to live. So I want to come back then to what I was going to mention. And I
00:30:36.080
went off on a, on a tangent there and that is the notion of fear. Was there any doubt in your mind,
00:30:43.040
uncertainty, voices that said you have no business writing a kid's book? I mean, what did that actually
00:30:47.360
feel like for you as you were considering writing this book or, or any of either of your other books as
00:30:51.780
well? Not really. I mean, the, the old, I guess the closest you would say was writing the first
00:30:57.580
book, Extreme Ownership. And the only thing is, you know, I was raised in a culture of the quiet
00:31:02.380
professional and we don't talk about what we do. And so that book, I mean, obviously I was writing a
00:31:08.560
book with my, with my brother, Leif Babin. And we talked about that for a long time before we actually
00:31:13.580
said, okay, let's do it. And, and what we knew that we needed to do was number one, represent the,
00:31:19.460
the, the, the, the seal teams, the way that we thought they, and knew they should be represented
00:31:24.060
and also make sure that we point out that the seal teams are just one military organization
00:31:31.720
of all the military who are out there risking their lives and making incredible sacrifices
00:31:38.000
for this nation and for our freedom. And so we wrote heavily about the forces and the soldiers and
00:31:45.620
Marines that we worked alongside of in the battle of Ramadi. And, and I think the other piece is,
00:31:50.960
you know, from my, from my brothers that are still in the seal teams, you know, when they started reading
00:31:56.260
the book and the reason that I think it's been, that it's accepted by within the seal community
00:32:01.160
is because we didn't, we didn't try and make ourselves out to be something that we weren't.
00:32:08.980
You know, the guy that's in that book that I, me, that's me. That's what I was like when I was in the
00:32:14.040
seal team. That's what I was like now. I didn't embellish anything or, or, and, and, you know,
00:32:18.500
you've read the book. The book is not about how, how great I was. The book is actually,
00:32:22.500
a lot of it is actually about mistakes that I made and what I learned from it and what mistakes
00:32:27.180
Leif made and what he learned from them. And so that's why I think there was a little fear with
00:32:32.320
that book and, and how my brothers in the seal teams would react to it. But once guys started
00:32:38.360
reading it, the feedback was awesome. And so for the kid's book, I had didn't, did no fear at all.
00:32:44.080
None. I I'm writing what I want and I know that kids out there need it and discipline equals freedom.
00:32:50.100
Same thing. You know, I'm doing, I'm doing what I want and, and I'm putting word out there for people
00:32:56.320
to the best of my ability to, to try and help them sort themselves out and move further along in
00:33:01.620
their lives. And, and it's through lessons that I've learned because I've been, you know, far from,
00:33:06.300
I'm far from perfect. And it's the same thing with my podcast. You know, my podcast is what I want to
00:33:11.140
talk about. And people have told, given me all kinds of advice since the beginning on what I
00:33:16.120
should do and shouldn't do. And, uh, I, I always listened to people's advice, but I, I go with my
00:33:21.800
gut of what I want to talk about, what people I want to talk to, what events in history I want to
00:33:26.680
cover. There's been people told me, don't make it too long, bring on guests. So you're not,
00:33:31.900
you're not the only voice and don't talk about all this violence and horrible things. And if you
00:33:37.680
listen to my podcast, it's, it's very long. There's not many guests. And I talk about some
00:33:42.420
pretty awful and horrendous things that have happened in the world. So I'm, I'm not afraid
00:33:47.980
of, of doing what I'm doing. Cause I think I'm doing it for the right reasons.
00:33:52.060
Well, and if I don't want to put words in your mouth, but based on what I'm hearing you say,
00:33:55.140
it sounds like your goal and your mission. And of course, what I've seen of you drives you to do
00:34:00.500
these things in the face of maybe getting some pushback from the seal and special operations
00:34:04.600
community, or the average listener to your podcast, it's the mission that drives you past
00:34:09.760
the fear. Is that accurate? Yeah. And like I said, with the seal teams,
00:34:13.940
of course, in the beginning, I didn't know what people's reactions was going to be because they
00:34:18.420
didn't know what I was going to be doing. But once, once people saw what I was doing and there's,
00:34:22.960
you know, I hear from seals, every podcast that comes out, my brothers, they send me a text and say,
00:34:28.180
yeah, it was great, man. And, and so it's awesome. It's, it's, it's great stuff. And
00:34:32.880
yeah, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not really afraid of what's going to happen. If someone doesn't like
00:34:36.760
what I'm doing, I'm okay with it. What do you suggest to somebody who might be,
00:34:40.400
because I think there is a lot of people out there who have grand visions and ideas for what
00:34:44.420
they want to do in the future. And for whatever reason, they're scared about failure or scared about
00:34:50.560
the, the, the feedback or the ridicule from others. What do you say to somebody like that?
00:34:55.200
Well, you know, if you're that scared of something, maybe you should just not do it and go away and
00:35:01.060
hide somewhere else where, where no one will bother you in a nice comfort, comfortable place,
00:35:05.420
maybe with some nice pillows and a down blanket.
00:35:12.980
Yeah. I mean, if you believe in what you're doing and you're doing it for the right reasons,
00:35:15.840
there's nothing to be afraid of. What's the worst case scenario? So someone doesn't like what
00:35:19.940
you're doing. Okay, cool. They can, I mean, especially if it's something, it's anything,
00:35:24.940
what are you going to do? You're not forcing something down someone's throat. If you don't
00:35:28.280
want to listen to this podcast, just turn it off. You don't want to look at the, what I built. Don't
00:35:32.180
look at it. You don't want to buy what I made. Don't buy it. You know, that's the way it is.
00:35:36.280
That's the last thing you should be worried about is like what other people are going to think of what
00:35:40.180
you're doing, which actually there's a dichotomy of that because, you know, as you could hear in my,
00:35:45.120
when I just said about the SEAL teams, even though I don't really care what people are
00:35:48.360
thinking, the people that you do care about, you want to do something that is going to make them
00:35:52.380
proud. And so if you're thinking that what you're going to do is going to be viewed poorly by people
00:35:58.280
that you respect, well, then maybe you should rethink what you're trying to do. But if you
00:36:02.060
think people that you respect are going to like it, then you're on the right path. And if it's people
00:36:05.960
that you don't care about or people that you don't respect and they don't like you, good. That's a
00:36:09.180
badge of honor. Bring it. You bring up a really good distinction because I think there is this notion that
00:36:14.720
we shouldn't care what anybody thinks and F everybody else and I'm going to do my own thing.
00:36:19.540
And yet here you are talking about taking into consideration what the people you care about think
00:36:27.100
Well, yeah, if I respect someone, then I respect their opinion. And if somebody tells me, hey,
00:36:32.940
you did this, that wasn't cool. And here's why. And there is someone I respect and I respect their
00:36:38.300
opinion. And perhaps I need to make some adjustments because their perspective being detached from what I'm
00:36:43.200
actually doing might be better than mine. So I have no problem listening to people that I respect.
00:36:49.020
And I think, you know, it's just part of being a humble human being. If you just say, hey, screw everyone
00:36:52.900
else. I'm the man. I'm going to do whatever I want. And your opinion doesn't matter. Well, I guess you can
00:36:58.620
just do whatever you want and we'll see how that works out for you.
00:37:01.640
Right. So what coming back to discipline, what do you feel like comes first? Because I think there's this
00:37:07.180
idea that you just have to get your mind right first. And then there's the idea that says, no, you just go
00:37:12.160
take action and then the mindset will follow. Is it one or the other? Is it both? How does this work?
00:37:17.700
Well, it's pretty simple. Those two things actually support each other. And I talk about this
00:37:23.780
with in a bunch of different ways. There's dichotomies, right? So if there's a day where
00:37:29.380
you're mentally not feeling like doing something, guess what you do? You physically just go do the
00:37:33.220
work. You just go do what you're supposed to do. And there's times where you physically don't feel
00:37:38.100
like something and you just mentally have to go and make it happen. So those two things support
00:37:42.800
each other. And if one of them is, is a little weak one day, well, you just, you know, I talk
00:37:46.780
about going through the motions, you know, for, for instance, for a workout and you can do this with
00:37:50.780
anything. You can go, you can go write a thousand words that you didn't feel like writing. And maybe
00:37:55.220
you can only salvage 280 of those words, but guess what? You got 280 words that you didn't have before.
00:38:00.860
If you, if you feel all tired and weak and you don't feel like working out,
00:38:04.260
just go to the gym and go through the motions. And people say, go through the motions with a
00:38:08.960
negative connotation. But for me, going through the motions means you still did it. So go in there,
00:38:13.960
go through the motions. I'd rather do that than stay in bed and sleep and be warm and cozy when I
00:38:22.580
could be getting stronger mentally and physically. It sounds like it's more of an emphasis on the
00:38:27.780
effort and the actual process of doing rather than what that actually is going to produce.
00:38:32.880
Actually, what you are going to produce is something as opposed to nothing. So if you,
00:38:38.720
like I said, if you write a thousand words and you can only keep 250 of them, well,
00:38:43.600
that's better than zero. And if you go to the gym and you break a sweat and you gain a little,
00:38:48.320
maybe if you didn't even lift any weight, you just gained some flexibility, just went in there
00:38:51.200
and stretched. You did produce something which is better than nothing. And you also, importantly,
00:38:57.220
you overcame that mental weakness. You maintain the discipline and those things build up over time.
00:39:03.120
You talk about discipline your body and you free your mind. Is this the place that you feel like
00:39:09.520
a lot of people should start? Start with the body, start training, start exercising,
00:39:13.720
start feeding your body the right fuel. Is this a great place to start when you want to develop more
00:39:17.560
discipline? It's a great place to start. It doesn't take it. You know, that's another thing I say is
00:39:22.120
people say, what do you, how do I get up in the morning? Get up. Don't think about it. Don't
00:39:25.980
rationalize it. Physical is a great place to start. And it's clearly the body and mind are
00:39:32.180
connected because the body is, the mind is inside your body and there's no doubt that they're
00:39:39.000
connected. And so if you don't know where to start, yeah, get up and start moving your body
00:39:42.680
and then start figuring out what you're going to do with your mind and find a path for that as well.
00:39:47.500
Right on. Well, Jocko, we're bumping up against time. I know we've talked about a lot. Obviously,
00:39:51.920
guys, you want to just pick up a copy of the book, The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. You will
00:39:55.880
not be disappointed. Jocko, I want to ask you a couple of questions as we wind down. The first one,
00:40:00.360
and I've heard you answer this before. I'm curious about your answer this time. And that question is,
00:40:03.940
what does it mean to be a man? You know, to me, being a man is doing what it is you're supposed
00:40:12.660
to do. And I think people get wrapped around all these different things, but you as a person,
00:40:19.720
you know what it is you're supposed to do in your life. You know what's going to make your
00:40:23.440
life better. You know what's going to move you in the right direction. You know what's going to help
00:40:27.840
not only you, but also your family, your community, society, and the world. You know
00:40:33.540
what the right things to do are. And in my mind, a man is the person who does those things on every
00:40:40.180
level, from the individual level to his family level, to taking care of his community and his
00:40:45.800
nation. Powerful, powerful. How do we connect with you? How do we pick up a copy of the book? And
00:40:51.300
where do we find out more? You can get the book anywhere that they sell books. So anywhere that
00:40:56.580
they sell books, you can get the book Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. It's a different
00:41:00.860
kind of book. There's no book has been like this before. It's different. As far as finding me,
00:41:06.200
my podcast is called Jocko Podcast. You can find it on jockopodcast.com or you can search iTunes or
00:41:13.580
Google Play or any of the other podcast platforms. I'm on social media. I'm on Twitter at Jocko Willink.
00:41:24.060
I'm on Instagram at Jocko Willink. I'm on Facebook as Jocko Willink. And I'm on the interwebs a lot.
00:41:32.820
So if you reach out, I'll reach back. Right on. So what you're saying is we can find
00:41:36.920
you wherever, wherever we are, we can find you. Yeah. I'm not hard to find after a lifetime in
00:41:42.240
the shadows. I am no longer very difficult to find. What's that transition actually been like
00:41:47.840
for you transitioning from, like you said, the shadows to now this public figure in this public
00:41:52.020
life? It's been, it's been interesting and it literally happened. It would happen very,
00:41:57.320
very quickly. I was on Tim Ferriss's podcast and you know, his podcast gets millions and millions
00:42:03.980
of downloads. And so that was incredibly fast. And then two months later, I was on Joe Rogan's podcast,
00:42:13.220
which he gets millions and millions. And so those, those two things really kind of brought me out in
00:42:18.880
the public, uh, light along with my book, which, you know, what I wrote with life extreme ownership
00:42:23.220
that that happened. And then with my podcast now it's, it's, it's been, it's crazy. It's what's
00:42:30.020
cool about it though, is the people that I talk to and communicate with are, are great people. And I
00:42:34.580
learn a lot from everybody that communicates with me and talks to me and reaches out to me and tweets me
00:42:38.900
or sends me a book. I got so many books now for, to review on my podcast. They're just piled up.
00:42:45.120
It's, it's awesome. And I'm always learning from all these different people and it's great to
00:42:48.760
interact with people. Right on. Well, Jaco, I want to tell you, I appreciate you. Of course,
00:42:52.760
I appreciate your service and sacrifice to, to our country and in your service there. I appreciate how
00:42:58.380
you show up, uh, your level of discipline and the way that you're doing things has been inspirational
00:43:04.900
for me, starting this podcast, launching this business, writing my own book now.
00:43:08.860
And, uh, I just want to take a minute and thank you for the way that you show up.
00:43:13.120
Well, thanks man. And, uh, thanks for your service. I know you were in Ramadi, uh, maybe a year or two
00:43:19.060
before me. I think I left, well, I think I actually left thinking about this. Um, it was June of 06 that
00:43:27.060
I left. Okay. So we, we actually overlapped. There was, there was a little bit of an overlap.
00:43:31.620
Yeah. Cause I got there in, so, Oh yeah. Cause you were, you, you were under the one,
00:43:35.880
one AD then. Oh, sorry. Not the one, one AD. You were under the two, two, eight,
00:43:39.020
the two, two, eight under, uh, the triple deuce out of Utah, but then we attached to the unit out
00:43:43.420
of Pennsylvania. Yep. That's, that's the two, two, eight out of Pennsylvania under Colonel
00:43:47.000
Gronsky at the time. Who's now a general. Yeah. What a great group of guys. I always talk about
00:43:51.200
the national guard unit that was on the ground when we showed up, the two, two, eight and folks like
00:43:55.140
yourself and how awesome it was to see just good Americans out there who had, you know, day jobs back in
00:44:01.460
America who were out there at the time in the, in the toughest part of the world, uh, taking a fight
00:44:05.900
to the enemy. So thanks for, thanks for getting out there and getting after it, brother. Right on,
00:44:09.440
man. And I'm going to take you up on the, uh, on the jujitsu training and schooling, if you will,
00:44:14.320
uh, sometime in the future, in the near future as well. Coming in. All right, brother. Talk soon.
00:44:18.540
All right, man. There it is, guys. What did I tell you? Powerful interview and conversation
00:44:24.160
with a powerful man who is probably one of the most qualified men to talk about discipline
00:44:28.540
and how you and I can develop more of it. Uh, we talked about a lot today. We covered his
00:44:33.940
newest book, which if you're listening to this today, the day it's being released, his
00:44:38.120
book just came out. So you want to make sure you get a copy of that. You can get the link
00:44:41.800
for that book. Discipline equals freedom field manual and the way of the warrior kid and extreme
00:44:47.460
ownership and his alarm clock track, which we talked about psychological warfare on our website
00:44:53.420
at order of man.com slash one three five as an episode 135. Again, guys, if you would,
00:45:01.140
please be sure to share this one. As I know more men need to hear the message of discipline.
00:45:05.680
And if you pick up a copy of the book or just enjoyed the interview, make sure you let Jocko
00:45:10.000
and I know we're both active on Twitter. So make sure you tag us there. And then last thing,
00:45:15.280
the iron council, if you want to develop more discipline in your life, sometimes having the
00:45:19.580
tools and the framework and maybe even a gentle nudge will help get that kickstarted for you.
00:45:25.660
So head to order of man.com slash iron council to learn more. I will look forward to talking with
00:45:31.160
you on Friday for a Friday field notes, but until then take action and become the man you are meant
00:45:36.140
to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life
00:45:41.400
and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.