Order of Man - Front Toward Enemy ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart

00:00:04.980 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.

00:00:10.460 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who

00:00:17.220 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:00:22.780 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is

00:00:27.360 Brian Mickler, and I am the host and the founder of the Order of Man podcast and movement.

00:00:32.020 Thank you for joining us today. I've got a very interesting one based on some things I've been

00:00:37.080 thinking about over the past couple of days. And of course, this is your Friday field notes.

00:00:41.400 If you're new to the podcast, this is me just riffing, just sharing some ideas, some thoughts

00:00:47.880 and things that have been bouncing around in my brain over the past week. We've also got our

00:00:51.360 interview show, which I'm interviewing guys like Jocko Willink and David Goggins and Mark Manson

00:00:56.800 and Brian Rose and Tim Kennedy and Pete Roberts and the lineup of men that we have who join us on the

00:01:04.220 podcast is absolutely phenomenal. We've also got our Wednesday show, which is an ask me anything show

00:01:09.880 where I joined my co-host Kip Sorensen. And we ask questions from our exclusive brotherhood,

00:01:14.940 the iron council, and also from the Facebook group, which you can find at facebook.com slash groups

00:01:21.200 slash order of man. The only other thing I would tell you right now, before I get into the discussion,

00:01:26.260 cause I am anxious to talk with you about this today, uh, is our battle ready program. This is a

00:01:31.860 free 30 day email course where you're going to learn the skills and the strategies and the tactics to

00:01:37.900 be able to plan out, uh, your quarter and then act accordingly and achieve what it is you're after.

00:01:44.040 So you can check that out at order of man.com slash battle ready. All right, guys, without further

00:01:50.760 ado, let's get into the conversation. I want to talk with you about this concept, an idea of front

00:01:55.680 toward enemy. Uh, I was at jujitsu the other night and we were rolling and doing our training and my

00:02:02.260 coach, Pete Roberts, uh, started talking about some technique and some strategy. And one of the core

00:02:07.460 principles was always face the threat, face your opponent. And what's interesting is a lot of the

00:02:15.640 times our natural tendency is to turn our back, right? To turn, to run away, to retreat. Obviously the,

00:02:22.700 the problem with that is that you expose yourself to vulnerabilities. You expose yourself to weakness,

00:02:29.220 uh, and you potentially put yourself in a, in a compromising situation, not just with jujitsu,

00:02:35.280 but with life. Uh, so Pete talked a lot about making sure that you're rolling into your opponent,

00:02:40.580 that you're turning into your opponent, that you're not giving up your back and that you're facing the

00:02:45.300 threat or the potential threat that could arise. Uh, and as I started thinking about this at jujitsu,

00:02:50.660 I started thinking about my time in the military service. I remember when, uh, I went to basic

00:02:55.880 training. Uh, one of the more interesting and fun parts of, of the training itself was when we got

00:03:02.080 the, the claymore mines out. And if you have ever seen a claymore mine, it's this green rectangle and

00:03:08.420 it's, it's bowed a little bit. And on the front of that claymore mine, it says on their front towards

00:03:14.640 enemy. And obviously that, so you wouldn't set it up backwards and then end up blowing yourself up.

00:03:20.060 Uh, but I think it's a very applicable lesson, not just in combat, not just in jujitsu, but in life.

00:03:27.200 And I can't tell you how often I hear from guys who, who haven't adopted this mentality and this

00:03:32.660 mindset into the way they operate their, their everyday lives. Uh, when things get scary or

00:03:38.460 challenging or difficult, uh, they retreat and they don't retreat strategically. Cause I think

00:03:45.340 there is a point in time where maybe we do need to retreat or reset or give ourselves some space

00:03:50.840 and margin. Uh, but they don't do it tactically. They do it with their natural tendency, which is

00:03:56.480 to turn around, expose your back and then run away as quickly as possible. And if you're facing an

00:04:02.060 enemy, whether it's in jujitsu, martial arts, or in, in combat, uh, exposing your back and not

00:04:09.160 covering your retreat is a very dangerous way to go about doing it. But it's the same thing in life.

00:04:13.920 Now, most of us aren't going to be in a life and death struggle, whether it's combat or a civilian

00:04:17.680 life. And that's a good thing. You know, we don't want to be in these situations. We may find

00:04:23.060 ourselves in these situations, but we certainly don't want to be there. Uh, but I want you to be ready.

00:04:27.580 And I want you to be prepared. Should, should that happen? And should you run away and retreat

00:04:32.320 and, and not cover your back as you do, whether that's in your marriage, uh, in your career

00:04:39.360 or any other facet of life, then you're exposing yourself to potential loss and hardship and heartache.

00:04:45.820 And I think about it in the context of, of a relationship. There's so many men right now. And I

00:04:51.660 hear messages every single day from you guys who are going through separations and divorces,

00:04:56.400 and you're not covering your back and you're not taking care of yourself. Uh, so you get blindsided

00:05:01.800 with custody paperwork and custody orders and alimony and child support and visitation rights.

00:05:10.760 Uh, when it comes to a career, for example, you might burn your bridges because you're emotional

00:05:17.680 and you aren't considering how this may impact you, you leaving a job or you getting let go or

00:05:23.760 laid off and how that might impact you in the long run. And so you're so hopped up and hyped up and

00:05:28.840 emotional that you just want to get out of that situation. And I can't blame you. I really can't

00:05:35.660 blame you for being in a scary situation, a threatening situation, and just wanting to get the hell out of

00:05:41.860 there as quickly as you possibly can. But speed isn't always prudent. So what can you do to ensure

00:05:50.920 that you're reacting and maybe not even reacting, but responding in a way that's going to serve you

00:05:58.780 with maximum impact, not necessarily now, but in the long game. And that's what so many men do.

00:06:06.740 They play the short game. What's in my best interest right now, not tomorrow, not in five

00:06:11.640 years, not in 10 years, not for the remainder of my life, but what's in my best interest right now.

00:06:17.360 And while you may save yourself and spare yourself some heartache and financial catastrophe and

00:06:23.580 headache in the short run, you might actually be setting yourself up for failure in the long game.

00:06:29.520 If you turn your back and you aren't facing the enemy, you aren't facing the threat and you

00:06:34.160 aren't aware of what's actually happening. So I wanted to break down some, some benefits of this

00:06:40.120 kind of front towards enemy mindset. And then we can talk about more tactically how you would do this.

00:06:46.580 So let's talk about the benefits. And again, this is going to be in the context of jujitsu and,

00:06:50.920 and combat as well. But if you're facing towards the enemy, again, that enemy in your civilian life

00:06:58.240 might be the loss of a job. It might be relational issues. It might be medical conditions or illnesses

00:07:04.660 that you might be dealing with. There's all sorts of things that could potentially arise as

00:07:09.740 a quote unquote enemy. It might not be a legitimate and literal enemy, but if we look at it that way,

00:07:16.040 I think what I'm going to share with you will make sense. When you turn and run away, you limit your

00:07:21.880 options because you can't see what's going on. And because your options are limited, there's only

00:07:27.820 one path forward. And it's that direct path. It's get out of this combat zone, this combat

00:07:33.240 environment as quickly as possible. Well, you might actually be running into another trap

00:07:37.800 and, and that's the danger. But if you turn around and you think, all right, I'm going to

00:07:44.500 look at what's going on and I'm going to retreat or, or back up or get out of this situation in a very

00:07:50.340 strategic manner. What you do is you give yourself options because you can respond to different

00:07:55.660 threats as they evolve. So if you have an enemy facing directly at you and you're looking at that

00:08:01.360 enemy, all right, you're going to be able to see what's going on. And you're going to be able to

00:08:05.160 make decisions based on what you see in front of you, which, which what will happen is the enemy,

00:08:12.780 whether that's a legitimate and a literal enemy, or just some situation that you're dealing with

00:08:16.920 will evolve as well, right? You evolve, they evolve, you evolve, they evolve. And it's just this

00:08:21.260 chess match that happens. So as that enemy changes strategy and changes tactics, if you're not

00:08:28.560 looking at what's going on, you're going to get flanked, you're going to get blindsided,

00:08:32.880 and you're going to find yourself in a very difficult situation because you were unwilling

00:08:37.000 to look towards the threat, look towards the danger and actually see what's going on.

00:08:42.600 If on the other hand, you turn around and you retreat strategically and systematically all the

00:08:50.280 meantime, you're watching what's going on with the circumstance or with the enemy, then as they

00:08:54.980 adjust or the circumstances change, then you can begin to pivot and change based on what you're

00:09:01.180 observing, what you're seeing. Guys, I, I had one of my stepfathers tell me, and I'm just paraphrasing

00:09:08.260 here, but I will remember this lesson forever. We were talking about knowledge is power, right?

00:09:14.440 That's something we hear a lot of. And he contrasted that and said, you know, knowledge is important.

00:09:19.400 Sure. You got to be knowledgeable, but options is what's truly powerful. Options are what truly

00:09:25.500 are powerful. The more options you have, the more you can make decisions based on your external

00:09:32.720 circumstances. And if your back's against the wall and there's only one way to retreat,

00:09:37.240 or there's only one way you're willing to look at, then you're limiting the other scenarios that

00:09:41.260 could potentially play out to your advantage, but you got to have that front towards enemy and you

00:09:47.180 got to observe and you've got to get that peripheral vision going on. I had a football coach and I'm

00:09:53.660 sure you guys are very much the same way, but my football coach would always say as a middle

00:09:57.120 linebacker would say to me, keep your head on a swivel, keep your head on a swivel. What would that

00:10:03.700 mean? That means look around, use your peripheral vision, see what's going on to your left and what's

00:10:08.380 going on to your right and look at plays and observe, but keep your head on a swivel. So you can

00:10:13.140 constantly see and evaluate what's going on. Why? So you can make the read and then you can make the

00:10:19.220 play. That's what we need to do in our lives, but we blindfold ourselves. And at a minimum,

00:10:24.040 we put blinders on like, Hey, I'm not going to look at what's going on here, here. I'm just going

00:10:27.920 to be so entrenched and so focused on this one thing, or I'm going to turn away completely or bury

00:10:32.580 my head in the sand, like an ostrich and think that somehow things are going to miraculously turn out.

00:10:37.440 We do this when we're unwilling to jump on the scale, for example, and look at how heavy we've

00:10:44.360 actually gotten, or we put off and we delay perpetually and forever difficult conversations

00:10:52.980 with our spouses or with our children. Just in the past couple of days, I had a very sensitive,

00:10:59.580 I'm not going to get into all the details right now anyways, but a very sensitive conversation with

00:11:04.400 my son. And as my wife and I talked about the conversation that needed to be had, it was,

00:11:09.740 it was not something I was looking forward to. It would have been very easy for me to neglect and

00:11:15.980 shirk and put off and turn away and put the blindfolders on and come up with all the reasons

00:11:20.680 and excuses why I didn't need to have this conversation right now. That's, that's the easy path,

00:11:25.560 but that doesn't serve me. It doesn't make me any better by avoiding those confrontations and

00:11:31.460 those conversations that need to be had. And it certainly doesn't serve him, my son, who I have

00:11:36.980 a moral and ethical obligation to, to serve, to lead him. But instead front towards enemy mindset,

00:11:48.200 here's the situation. Here's the, the, the sit rep, if you will, the situation report, if you're not

00:11:55.760 familiar with that term. And, and here's what I need to deal with. And then you address it

00:12:01.400 accordingly. And so my son and I, just a couple of days ago, walked around the field. We had the

00:12:06.540 conversation. I thought a lot about it the night before, about what I wanted to say and the

00:12:10.260 conversation I wanted to have and how I wanted it to go. And we had this conversation in the morning

00:12:14.440 and he was nervous about having the conversation. I was nervous about having the conversation, but

00:12:20.100 I faced myself towards the enemy in this case, towards the difficult and uncomfortable conversation.

00:12:27.920 And it actually played out the way I thought it would because I didn't retreat because I didn't

00:12:32.680 run away because I didn't expose my back because I didn't avoid the conversations that need to be had.

00:12:37.920 This is what boys do. If it came down to it, my son actually would have loved not to have that

00:12:43.300 conversation. And so would I, and the difference between an immature boy and a mature man is that a

00:12:49.800 mature man sees what's happening and sees what's wrong. And he doesn't turn a blind eye to it. 0.99

00:12:54.420 He actually turns towards it. He faces it. He deals with it. Even before that, he comes up with a

00:13:02.080 strategy for dealing with it. And then he engages with the enemy, with the confrontation, with the

00:13:09.100 conversation, with the difficult circuit set of circumstances. And then he finds himself in a

00:13:14.520 better position over the long haul because he was willing to do that. So guys, give yourself some

00:13:19.080 options and give yourself some chance, some chance, a chance to, to make things right,

00:13:23.860 to improve, to thrive and to excel in the, in the wake of difficult, demanding, scary,

00:13:32.560 confrontational circumstances. All right. And the last thing I want to talk with you about,

00:13:36.780 and I realized this one's going to be a little bit shorter than normally is. And that's okay.

00:13:39.820 Cause I can make a point shorter than I need to, um, or, or have the desire to, sometimes I'd like

00:13:45.000 to hear myself talk. So they might go a little longer than needed. We'll try to keep this one

00:13:50.100 short. Uh, what can you do effectively to make sure that you keep your front towards the enemy?

00:13:56.280 Well, I think just having the mindset in place, if that becomes a mantra or part of your code of

00:14:01.240 conduct, that I will always deal with situations head on that I won't, that I won't shirk

00:14:07.320 responsibilities that I won't neglect, that I won't procrastinate, that I won't avoid,

00:14:11.780 right? Some of you guys are avoiding. I want you to think about that for a second.

00:14:16.820 What conversations are you avoiding having?

00:14:22.000 What circumstances have you ignored for far too long? When's the last time you looked at your bank

00:14:28.760 account? When's the last time you jumped on the scale? When's the last time you hung out with

00:14:32.020 somebody who was better at something than you so that you could improve? Well, it's scary to do that.

00:14:37.920 It's threatening, right? At a, at a minimum, it threatens your ego at a maximum. It threatens

00:14:45.860 your, your livelihood and your wellbeing and your sanity and your ability to thrive in this world.

00:14:50.620 So take a personal inventory and ask yourself, what are you avoiding?

00:14:55.180 What have you been turning your back, exposing your back to? Have you turned that clay more around 0.53

00:15:02.140 and faced it not towards the enemy or towards the circumstances, but faced it towards you. A lot of

00:15:06.540 you have. I have in the past as well. The first step is the realization that I need to turn outwards

00:15:13.180 and I need to look at these things. And I can't turn to blind eye to what's going on. And I can't

00:15:17.120 ignore situations or circumstances. And the longer I do, the more difficult they will become. If you

00:15:23.560 have to have a conversation with your wife, the longer you put it off, the harder it will be.

00:15:27.980 If you have to have a conversation with your kids, the longer that you put it off, the more difficult

00:15:32.600 it will need to be. If you need to have a conversation with a client or an employer,

00:15:36.660 do it now. Like a man does it. Here's the issue. I'm scared. I'm uncomfortable. And yet I'm a man. 1.00

00:15:45.360 So I'm going to do it right now, as soon as possible. That's the mindset that you need to

00:15:51.260 adopt. Number two, make a plan. I just told you the circumstance with my son. I didn't go into the

00:15:56.840 conversation blind because if I did, I, I wouldn't have known what to say. I wouldn't have played out

00:16:03.180 the scenarios in my head. I probably wouldn't have said everything that I wanted to say. I wouldn't

00:16:07.300 have given him the, the grace and, and the level of respect that he deserves. Even as a 12 year old

00:16:13.060 boy, I would have probably been over emotional as would he, and it would not have been conducive to

00:16:20.860 the result I was after, which is to discipline, to get him back on track, to have the conversation

00:16:27.260 that needs to be had, to teach him some, some thought processes and some skillsets similar to

00:16:32.080 what I'm doing right now so that he could improve in his life. So instead of rushing into battle,

00:16:38.820 I thought about it for just a second. And in this case, I took some time that evening after I talked

00:16:45.680 with my wife and I ran through scenarios in my head and I planned out what I was going to say.

00:16:50.760 And I thought about the points that I wanted to make. And I thought about how the conversation would

00:16:55.680 flow and roll and what he would potentially say. And then what I would say back in return, but

00:17:00.040 it wasn't something that I just rushed into it. So just because I'm telling you front toward enemy

00:17:06.340 doesn't mean that I'm telling you to be reckless with what you're doing. It's not it at all.

00:17:11.000 I'm saying, turn around, face it, adopt the front toward enemy mindset,

00:17:17.480 and then come up with a strategy and a plan. Now the plan's not always going to work,

00:17:22.560 right? There, there may have been something you overlooked or something shifts or something

00:17:27.300 changes, or you hear from your boss that the reason you don't have the promotion is because of

00:17:31.440 something you didn't fully anticipate or didn't see or observe. Okay. Well, as long as you keep your

00:17:37.720 front forward, then you can pivot and you can adjust and you can make the necessary corrections

00:17:42.740 in order to get what it is you want. In this case, the raise or the promotion.

00:17:48.380 So plan out the strategy. Third component is execute, do it, right? Just get into battle, do it.

00:17:55.840 It's going to be uncomfortable. It's going to be awkward. It's not going to be fun. It's going to

00:17:59.100 be painful in a lot of ways, but you know what? When's the last time you actually had one of these

00:18:02.880 types of conversations or you addressed a difficult circumstance and you thought to yourself, man,

00:18:07.800 I really feel worse for doing that. Like it doesn't, it doesn't happen like that.

00:18:14.100 You always feel better. You know that whenever you address and face something head on as uncomfortable

00:18:20.500 as it is, you feel better because you did. You always feel better. It's like the weight has literally

00:18:26.920 been lifted from your shoulders and you feel lighter and you feel more at ease. And then you

00:18:32.420 clear the, the, the mind space and the head space to be able to focus on different things that are

00:18:37.080 more significant and meaningful. Draw upon that. Know that if you have these conversations and do these

00:18:44.120 things, even if it's working out at the gym, I mean, how many of us talk ourselves out of going to do a

00:18:49.940 workout? I don't feel like it today. I'm not in the mood. I don't feel good. I deserve to take a

00:18:55.300 break. We tell ourselves these things. That's a retreat. That's turning your back towards the

00:18:59.140 enemy. Turn around and say, yeah, you know what? I don't feel like it today, but you know, I'm going

00:19:04.000 to do it anyways. Cause I can, I made a commitment to doing it or because I realized that if I go into

00:19:09.500 the gym, I'm going to be a better, more capable, stronger, more efficient man. I'm going to be a man

00:19:14.060 who's able to step into the protect, provide, preside lifestyle that I want to step into.

00:19:19.520 But that requires you stepping into the fray, not away from it.

00:19:25.300 So we've got the mindset first, the planning second, the action third. And then the fourth

00:19:35.040 component of this is an after action review. How did it go? What did I do? Well, what didn't I do?

00:19:42.980 Well, what's the resolve? What worked? What didn't work? What am I going to do moving forward?

00:19:49.060 This is a very contemplative process. Now think about how it went because something's going to

00:19:55.880 happen again, and you're going to need to address it again. But if you don't think about what went

00:19:59.840 well and what didn't go so well and what you did good and what you did bad, you're not going to get

00:20:04.840 any better at this. And what are you going to do? You're going to neglect it. It's actually very

00:20:10.300 similar to the, the OODA loop. I, the, the, the name of the, I believe it's an air force pilot and

00:20:18.860 it's escaping me right now, but you guys can look into the OODA loop. O O D A observe, orient, decide,

00:20:25.480 act. It's very similar to that. Observe what's going around. Okay. Orient yourself to the battle,

00:20:33.280 whatever that battle is. You can't orient yourself. If you're not looking at the battlefield,

00:20:36.860 if you're turned around running away, you can't orient yourself to the enemy and what's happening.

00:20:42.260 Decide what is my course of action. That's a planning process. And the last component of the

00:20:47.640 OODA loop is to act, to do observe, orient, decide, act. And, and I would say the last component of that,

00:20:56.440 which isn't necessarily in the OODA loop is to review that might be cycling back into observe,

00:21:02.100 but review it. What went well, what didn't go so well? What am I going to do next time when I'm

00:21:07.560 faced with this difficult circumstances? Think about how you feel. Do I feel better? Do I feel

00:21:11.380 worse? You're always going to feel better guys. This really isn't that that's why this is so short

00:21:16.800 is this really isn't a complicated process, but it needs to be set because there's a lot of you who

00:21:21.640 are running away, who are retreating, who are withdrawing from your masculine role, responsibility,

00:21:27.940 and duties because it's scary. It's uncomfortable. Nobody ever taught you how to do these things.

00:21:33.160 It represents and poses a very real and serious threat to your short-term wellbeing. I could have

00:21:39.760 done without that conversation with my son today. I certainly could have done without that, but I feel

00:21:44.000 better because I had it. I'm a better father because I had it. He's a better young man because I was

00:21:50.740 willing to have that conversation with him. It's the same thing in your life, whether you're an employee,

00:21:55.580 an employer, talking with clients, talking with employees, talking with your wife, talking with

00:22:00.260 your kids, uh, just observing what's going on around you. You're going to be a better man because

00:22:05.400 you have embraced the front toward enemy mindset. That's it guys. That's all I've got for you today.

00:22:11.820 So what I want you to do this weekend is go out there and think about where you're falling short,

00:22:15.780 where you've shown your back, where you've exposed yourself, where you're vulnerable and weak

00:22:21.440 because you turn away when you should be turning towards. I hope that serves you guys.

00:22:28.700 Let me know how it does. Let me know if you agree. Let me know if you disagree. We can do that

00:22:33.080 respectfully and have a serious conversation about that. Um, follow me on Instagram, Twitter,

00:22:38.580 Facebook. I'm very active on Instagram at Ryan Mickler, second, most active, probably on Twitter,

00:22:44.320 believe it or not, which is something I don't think I'd ever think I would say at Ryan Mickler.

00:22:49.120 Facebook is at Ryan Mickler or at order of man. And then YouTube, if you want to catch the video

00:22:53.060 of this, I can't imagine why you'd want to look at my face instead of just hearing my voice. But

00:22:56.880 if you do, for whatever reason, you can check it out on YouTube at order of man. All right, guys,

00:23:05.080 that's all I've got for you today. Keep that front toward the enemy, embrace the battle,

00:23:10.620 embrace the confrontation, embrace the hardship and do what you need to do as a man. So you can achieve

00:23:17.400 the results for you, the people you have a responsibility and obligation for. All right, guys,

00:23:22.260 we'll be back on Tuesday for an interview show. Until then, go out there, take action and become

00:23:28.380 the man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take

00:23:33.620 charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order

00:23:38.260 of man.com.

Order of Man - September 11, 2020

Front Toward Enemy ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript