Ep 11: Brian "Tosh" Chontosh on Pushing Limits

Welcome to the Rewild Gear Podcast. Modern life, society, and responsibilities have domesticated us, but now it's time to rediscover your adventurous side. Whether that's camping, hiking, hunting, fishing, or just spending time in the great outdoors, this is the podcast for you. Join us as we get back to the wilderness and rewild. Welcome to the Welcome to the Rewild Gear Podcast. I'm your host, Seth Spears, and I'm here today with Brian Tosh Chantosh. He's a retired major in the United States Marine Corps. During his 20-year military career, he was awarded the Navy Cross for extraordinary heroism, 2 Bronze Stars, the Meritorious Service Medal, multiple combat action ribbons, and he is a US Congressional Medal of Honor nominee. Upon retirement, Tosh founded the Crooked Butterfly Ranch, where he designs custom experiential learning opportunities for clients looking to test their minds, bodies, and spirits. He also designs leadership workshops that challenge everyday paradigms that can limit potential. Tosh is an endurance athlete competing in some of the world's most challenging ultra-endurance events, including mountain biking the Continental Divide from Canada to Mexico in 27 days. Tosh, welcome to the podcast. Happy you're here today.

Yeah, right on, Seth. I appreciate you reaching out and saying hello. We've got a handful of mutual friends and I'm excited to talk, man.

Yeah, me too. So, you've got quite the background story. I'd love to dig into that a little bit and just kind of find out In your words, how you got started and got to where you are today because you've done a lot of things, a lot of really cool and interesting things, and I think our audience would love to hear that.

Oh, man, that's a big wide-open can of worms, right? I enlisted in the Marine Corps back in '93. I was probably a disorganized, unchallenged young adult. I grew up a wonderful family, household opportunities, blessed with being Moderately intelligent, some you know some physical physical capacity I suppose, but was just largely misguided. Maybe didn't know what I was doing, where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do. Marine Corps said, "Hey, let's go Paris Island." So I went to Paris Islands and just that was really that's really the beginning of who I am, I think, because they they just break you down and build you back up and give you some some ideals and values to to aim for and aspire towards and. Just took it one duty station at a time. If you would ask me I was going to spend 20 years or I was a career guy, I would be like, no, I'm just doing 4 years to find some adventure and figure out what comes next. And that's really how I took my career, just one duty station at a time. Next thing you know, you find yourself 21 years later getting out of the, getting out of the military and trying to figure out what now, you know, who am I, you know, not given, um, Organizational demands and, you know, all these beliefs and ideas. And then you're starting to just analyze, what do I really believe in? Who really am I now that I'm absent from that structure? And fortunate for me, my experiences in the Marine Corps, I really found out over 4 or 5 years of transition that I really was all of that. I had onboarded it and spent the time just developing and annealing those values into who I am. And that's who I am now. And I'm happy with that. Started a leadership program, Crooked Butterfly Ranch. Recently started a nonprofit, uh, to, to serve veterans in, in a, in a prehab role to fight against suicide and, you know, um, catastrophic events, right? And here we are today, man. I enjoy, I enjoy the outdoors, hunting, challenging myself, ultra endurance events, always looking for the next thing, you know. to expose a weakness or a fissure in what I believe in or what my capacity is or capabilities are. And just constantly just challenging with, with an ambition to just get harder, to get better, to get more educated, greater perspective, etc., etc.

Got it. Yeah. Well, there's a lot there that I'd love to dig into a little more and kind of unpack. So tell me a little bit more about Parris Island and how that really broke you down. And I think there's a lot of people who can go through an experience, whether that's base camp or some type of traumatic experience or something like that. And some people come out better on the other side and others it does break them down and they come out worse. And I'm always curious as to how it affects people, if how it pushes them one way or the other. And I'd love to hear your thoughts on whether you think that is something that was built into you already, whether that's genetic, whether that's mindset, whether that's how you were raised as a child into young adulthood, or if it's something that you had to learn by going through that experience. So I'd just like to hear your thoughts on that.

Yeah, that's interesting because my thoughts on that, I actually was pegged with a very, very similar question recently with Dave Durandi and Chad. And It's, man, how I answered it, you know, let me, let me start here. Boot camp is, it's designed to be a traumatic experience, right? It's, it's designed to take young men and women, break them apart because people from all over the country come together with various different backgrounds, right? At boot camp, the platoon, the diversity in the platoon is huge. And then you're all compressed into small confines and then you're task organized to to really work together and rise and believe in a set of common values. So it's designed to be a traumatic experience to stress individuals, break them down, to build them back up again with that common set of values, right? And mission, purpose, whatever. And it can be, you know, and I do some work with this gentleman, Richard Goerling, and he rephrases post-traumatic growth instead of like a post— a trauma being a catastrophic event that is negative. And we can all move through trauma and see it as opportunity and growth. And really, I believe when I started working with him, I recognized that that's exactly what boot camp is. It was a controlled and appropriate scenario of introducing trauma and stress to individuals in order to help them grow. Right. And so that was interesting. And, and it was wonderful, man. They, they broke me down largely. I didn't have any direction that I was going in anyways. So it was, it was very easy for me to adapt. I think a lot of my personality, my capabilities supported me having, having faculty to, to grow through it. Right. Other, other individuals struggled a lot more than maybe I did. I certainly struggled, but I adapted and evolved. at a quick, quick pace through boot camp. So I think that's a product of maybe my upbringing in the positive sense, but also my lack of direction and mischievous mindset back in a negative aspect. Right. And you say, hey, is it something in my genes that allowed me to move through? And, you know, when I was posed this question with Power Monkey, I was like, wow, that's a really cool question. I thought about it for a few minutes and I stumbled. And for the last four or five weeks, I've been really wrestling with that. And I think, I think really, you know, I I grew up with a attitude or a personality or behavior or whatever, all three maybe. Challenging authority. I really constantly challenged authority all the time. And when I got to boot camp, you you can't challenge that authority. Really, you know, you're not going to win that. And so it kind of taught me that that challenging authority needs to be tempered. And, and I did. I grew up a lot. And then the successes achieved is a, is a, is a very, very— the successes I achieved post-boot camp, through boot camp, in boot camp, I was largely successful. And then after boot camp was because of a tempered That challenging authority all the time was tempered and twisted and molded into being something positive and constructive. And, what I mean by that is maybe that's why I continue to do these increasingly more challenging adventure races, ultra-endurance events because you look at that as a form of authority, right? Like, oh, I can't do that. It's an obstacle. It's a challenge. And so, you challenge that like, oh, you can't do that. I doubt that I could do that. And so, you— my mannerisms or my behavior or my attitude kind of invites me to like, oh yeah, really? I'll show you. I'll show you that I can do it. And I think that's something that is— I'm working on right now to figure out how to articulate in a cleaner sense. But I look at it as a character strength now where it was a character weakness when I was growing up, adolescent, you know, young adult. entering adulthood, who knows, whatever I was. And it was definitely a weakness, but it was fixed, corrected, or something. And now it's an absolute character strength because it's tempered and it's appropriate, right? So that's what drives me is to constantly challenge, constantly challenge, challenge myself. And in this leadership space, challenge others. Challenge others not in a confrontational sense, although I'm very confronting with them, But challenge them against what they believe or they think they believe and try to mirror like, hey, this is what you say. These are your actions. This is your performance. You can see the disconnect or the incongruity in between those. Let me challenge this stuff so that we can bring a greater consistency between, you know, those things, what you say, what you do, and what you believe.

Yeah, that makes sense. As far as that belief system of challenging authority, and, you know, because that can be both good and bad. I think a lot of our leaders and entrepreneurs and people that kind of push the envelope, they have that mentality of questioning authority, of questioning commonly held beliefs or systems to try to push past the status quo. But it seems like there can be a balance in there. And so I'd like to hear more as far as how you find that balance in your own life and whether that was in the military or now in business and everything that you're doing. Both, or you said it's been tempered quite a bit. So do you think that was the self-discipline that you learned in the military and that would not have happened if you would not have gone through that experience? Or that's just a process of getting older and learning and just going through life?

Yeah, that's wonderful. It, you know, right, like the paths can diverge. You can go left, you can go right. And if this challenging of authority or this questioning goes unchecked or unbalanced, you take this left path and you can become very disruptive, right? Like challenging and questioning can be exceptionally disruptive unless you learn and evolve some other things. So then the question is, is what are those other things? It is absolutely discipline, respect, common courtesy, decency, You know, developing a strong value set, you know, developing these, these character traits inside of you that are ambition towards good and, and productivity and collaboration, cooperation. And so those are some things that balance somebody's natural, inquisitive, questioning, challenging behavior. If it goes unbalanced, it can, it goes down that path of disruption. And then you're just largely a A dickhead, right? Like we don't want that. We all know people that are challenging and questioning, and they're they're confrontational in a in an ugly sense. And we we we tend to not like those individuals, and they could be brilliant, and they could be right. But there's something with this relationship that just doesn't go wrong, and then you just like hey, you just you distance. But those individuals that are like that that also balance themselves with with with self-discipline, levels of maturity, emotional and social intelligence, common courtesy, decency, and respect towards others, and things like that. We, we tend to gravitate, or I do, or I don't know, certain types of people gravitate towards those folks. And they become mutually beneficial for each other. And you, you grow stronger. And so— I think those are a few good, real quick off the top of my head things that, that we talk about what What are the ingredients to tempering that attitude, right?

Yeah. Do you see any correlation between those that are always questioning authority or pushing back on rules and regulations and success? Because that's something that I've noticed kind of anecdotally over the years as far as those people who seem to be the most successful. They're the ones that they're just not following the standard rule set. They're always questioning those things. So Curious your opinion there.

Yeah, I would, I would say like, you know, again, like you say anecdotally, absolutely right. Otherwise you fall into status quo. Otherwise you fall into, you know, fixed mindset and you group, groupthink and you just end up doing the hoes and the humps and then you don't recognize that there's opportunity or better ways to do things or you lack the fundamental ability to innovate, right? If you if you don't have a mind for curiosity or question or challenge. And so you become stagnant. And stagnant can be good, or it could be less than good. It just depends on the scenario. But, you know, people that challenge or question status quo or what is, maybe they don't have a, they have a mind for innovation, an inclination for innovation that They also like the really, really successful good ones. It's like, yeah, hey, they're still balanced, right? They have that and it's aimed towards something good, not towards some chest-beating self-identity. You know, there's usually something else going on there.

Yeah, for sure. And I think finding that balance in life, no matter what we're doing, can be one of the most challenging things that we do because it's so easy to go from one extreme to the other. And so trying to temper that and balance it out can always be a challenge.

For sure, for sure.

Tosh, let's talk a little bit about hunting. I know you said you, you're a hunter and enjoy that. And so I'd like to hear some of your experience and how you got into that and what you enjoy hunting today.

Yeah, great. And, you know, I'll probably end up hijacking that question here in a minute because there's a personal peeve that I probably have going on in the hunting world, you know, and I think there's parallels across all things in life. But You know, I hunted a little bit with my father.

I'd love to hear that too.

Yeah, sure. I hunted a little bit with my father growing up. Wasn't really super into it. I was distracted by, you know, baseball, a little bit of adventure, a little bit of mischievous curiosity, right? Like girls. And so, you know, I didn't really do the hunting and the fishing that my father grew up and loved so much. Got in the Marine Corps, Didn't do much hunting in the Marine Corps and then kind of got out. And I have this, this opening in my life, right? I had a lot less competition for my time or demands for my time and attention on stuff, and I needed to figure out what I enjoyed. And, you know, reconnecting with my father was really, really cool. Getting out into nature, I grew to really appreciate nature. in the outdoors while I was in the service, right? A lot of time in the woods and desert and the mountains, you know, and you just start to understand and appreciate the different climes and places. And, you know, it was always whitetail deer back in upstate New York. And then I find myself now arriving in Colorado and it's, wow, you know, the— to be able to hunt elk and bears and mountain goats or whatever it is like, it's, it's not a fantasy as much as it's a possibility now. You know, growing up, it was like, I'm never going to be able to afford to go on an elk hunt, or I don't live in Colorado, it's going to take 25 years for me to get permit, or whatever it is. And, you know, I started getting educated and started getting out there. And there's just something about being in the woods and having opportunity, possibility. You know, I could spend 12 days in the woods hunting and never shoot an animal, and it's still Exciting because any, any magical, just one tiny magical moment, something could happen. It could be big, right? The possibility, and I, that excites me. And then I got into bow hunting, and that's where really I started to get excited because it was this skill. And you know, working with John Dudley, Knock On TV, the Knock On Nation, I stumbled into him through a mutual friend, Andy Stumpf, and He was on to something, you know. John really on to something with veterans and through archery. And there's something about, you know, you leave the military service and, and now you're presented with a new skill that you try to master. And the, the more effort you try to master it, the less effective you are. You got to kind of accept, and it's a process and it requires concentration and all these things that remind you of some of the cool stuff. From at least my military experience as an infantry guy. And it was soothing. It was like, hey, if I get— if I pick up the bow and I start to, you know, shoot arrows and I'm thinking or I'm distracted by whatever else, I shoot terrible. But when I can master my own mind and I can control that and stay focused and get checklist-type oriented and stay stuck in the process, your skill goes up and your accuracy goes up, and it's, it's just exciting, right? Like, you just never— I'm never really going to arrive at a level like, like Duds is, is at, but the, the adventure and the challenge to try to get there is exciting. And, um, it's funny because I'll be, I'll be out and I'll be doing the drills that, that John has, and, uh, I'll, I'll hit like 3 Bullseyes, half-inch group, you know, it's like, oh man, this is awesome. Like, I can't wait, I'm gonna shoot this next one. I'm gonna have my 4th arrow, they're all 4 gonna be in there. I'm gonna video John. I'm set up and I'm drawn, I'm ready to go, and my head is like, I can't wait to make this shot because I'm gonna video John. And I shoot it and it's like 3 inches off. I'm like, damn it. And then I'll send him the video and I'm like, dude, I started thinking of you on the 4th, 4th shot. And he's like, yeah, you know. But, um, It's interesting because that's something that I struggle with, uh, for whatever handful of reasons, but just staying focused and enjoying the process and staying in tune, staying present. And I think a lot of that in the archery community, um, is definitely relatable for veterans as they're looking for something, right? Like, they had a very dynamic career and there's like all that adventure and high energy, and now they're out in, you know, this everyday civilian life and something's missing. But archery for me and for many, many veterans, it provides that something soothing, something to look forward to. You know, I'll be sitting at my desk working, working, working, and I'll have trouble concentrating or thinking after a couple hours or a couple minutes even sometimes. And I'll just get up, go out to the garage, sling 10 arrows. Get control, and all of a sudden my focus is back. I get back up in the office, I start working and very productive. So that's been really cool, and I'm so appreciative to have made that connection with John. And then you put it into the hunting piece, and now it just adds every— a whole other set of skills that you have to try to work and get better at. And it's the combination of those 2 things with possibility and excitement. You're outdoors. You know, reading the wind, strategizing against the animal. The odds are stacked against you, you know, that, you know, 10 to 1 against you to try to get up on, on something, especially when you're spot and stalking, or, and then you have to get really, really close and intimate with the animal. And so I like that. And I'm not, I don't hunt just to kill, kill stuff, right? Like, I don't, I don't, if I can't eat it, I don't shoot it. Just a general rule of thumb for me. It's where my value set is. I'm not just a trophy hunter. I don't just kill stuff because I'm walking in the backyard and I want to whack things. We got a rule at the house. I don't— if I can't eat it, I don't shoot it unless it's a chipmunk. And even then, I only shoot the chipmunk if I can hit it from the front porch or the back porch. I don't go walking through the woods trying to whack chipmunks, you know? And I— it's just because like, hey, they need to respect my space. And I'll respect their space thing because when they start invading your home, they ruin everything, right? Damn chipmunks. But if I can't eat it, I'm not going to shoot it. And after, after I do make a harvest and I'm successful, I get this flood of, flood of emotions, right? Like even leading up to the shot and you're getting ready to make the shot, all of a sudden I start getting that little shake and the nervousness and the excitement and And then afterwards, there's excitement that's also inclusive of like a sadness and a respect and like an appreciation for what just happened. And I think the continuation of that appreciation is making sure that I harvest the animal responsibly with the ultimate amount of respect for that creature giving its life. And we bring it in the home and we eat it, you know, and it provides You know, sustenance for for me and my family, and I think it's that excitement that I receive that I have before the shot, after the shot, and and all of that. I don't want to call it sadness, but it's it's a it's a it's it's a good sadness, right? Reminds me that I'm a good person, and I think I'm attracted to that because if I didn't feel those things, I'd start to question like what's wrong with me, you know? Oh, just killing for the sake of killing, or if I'm not excited about what I'm doing, and it's. And maybe I've lost something and I'm missing something. Or— and so it's a good, healthy reinforcement for me because I've done some horrific things to human beings and absolutely didn't care about the people we were killing. And I don't feel that that's right, even though we can rationalize it and people can say, oh, Tosh, it's okay, you were just doing whatever, whatever. And it's like, okay, cool, I got it. I intellectually understand that, but psychologically it's still hard.

Right?

When you're when you're doing what you're doing in combat, and you don't you don't have no feeling of remorse or sadness. And I struggled for a few years with with things, you know, whether it was guilt or whatnot. And not that I did anything bad or criminal, just just a very hard environment to deal with some of the things that you did, you know. And hunting helps remind me that I'm a good person, and I can stick these values and. I like the challenge. And, and so that's why I really enjoy it. You know, get outdoors, get spiritual, be happy. A day alone in the woods not seeing one animal is 1,000 times better inside the walls of your house, like trying to get your brain organized and fight back memories and all this other stuff, right? So, but yeah, I think that's why it's really, it's really a short version, I guess, of the conversation that goes on in my head about why I enjoy hunting.

Yeah, I agree with all of that. Yeah, to me, anytime you're out in nature and, and I've been a hunter for a long time and like I've told my wife, it's not even about harvesting a deer or whatever animal you're going after, a turkey or whatnot. It's about just being in that stand or hiking through the ravines and seeing nature wake up and just realizing how small we are and how much bigger everything else is out there and just seeing the natural world, those things we don't normally see in our day-to-day life in the urbanized environment that most of us live in. And I think that's, that's profound. And you really learn a lot about the entire natural world and about yourself too.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely for sure. Like we're, we have a tendency to think we're so big, but then when you get out there in nature and you're dwarfed, it puts you in your place in a good way. And there's so much if you just sit still, You know, for 2 minutes you don't really notice anything, and then 5 minutes you start to see some things. But if you sit still and just really breathe and just get in tune with your environment, it's— I don't care if you're in the desert, you're at the North Pole, you're at the top of a mountain, you're in the middle of the woods, you're on an ocean. Like, there's so much life, there's so much going on, and we don't ever recognize it until we slow ourselves down and actually pay attention. And then I get at times, you know, you just get overwhelmed with this sense of beauty and this sense of magnificence. And it's really, it's comforting, you know.

Yeah, for sure. I think that a lot of high achievers and people that are very much very driven Type A personalities, it can be hard to really settle down and enjoy those quiet moments, whether that's in nature or just talking to a friend or anything like that. Have you experienced that at all? And do you Do you see either hunting or archery as kind of a meditative practice for you? And the reason I ask that is so my friend Ben Greenfield, who he's an endurance athlete and a biohacker, and he's gotten really big into hunting, bow hunting specifically. And he told me once that that's his daily meditation where he goes outside with his bow and just, you know, lets some arrows fly. And he sees that very much as a meditative practice for himself. And everyone kind of has a different thing that works for them. So curious your thoughts there as far as any type of meditative practice that you see or how that affects your life?

Yeah, 100%. It's absolutely meditative. And, what is meditation? We all have that stereotype or that imagery like, oh, meditation, I'm going to sit cross-legged and I'm going to um and I'm going to ah and my eyes are closed and there's bells and stuff. And, it's like, okay, hey, that's a method of meditating, I suppose. And maybe, I don't know, but Meditating is really just controlling the mind and then letting it run free and then having an awareness of when it's running free and the ability to bring it back to what you want to focus on, whatever that is for anybody. And, you know, and it's exactly what I talked about when I'm shooting arrows in practice. It's as soon as my head runs free and I lose, you know, control and focus, arrows start to go a different direction. And that's okay. You just then you recognize that, then you bring it all back in. And it allows you to, to be able to ebb and flow in and out, right, of focus and awareness, and then just kind of, you know, being, being free and open and being and having that ability to bring yourself back in. And having that ability to bring yourself back in is exceptionally important when, when your mind is running free, your emotions start to take over, and you're going in these negative spirals. And it's like, oh, wow, like, hey, cool, like my mind just drifted back to this point in time or to this or to whatever. Recognizing that and then just pulling it back in and getting back centered to something that you're supposed to be focused on. Otherwise, if you let those things go unchecked, that's when we start to see, you know, negative patterns of behavior and whatnot. And a lot of people will use, you know, drugs and alcohol to numb or to distract, and that's just not it. It's shooting arrows is my drug, right? Like getting out in the woods and hunting is my drug. fitness, you know, the barbell is my drug, or, you know, these ultra-endurance races, right? And a lot of it is I want to, you know, when I'm sitting out there in nature, I'm out there running trails or riding mountain bikes, your mind drifts. Where it's drifting to, there's a checking in with where your mind's drifting to. Is that a good place for it to drift to or not? It is a good place, let it continue. It's not a good place, well, let's put it back in check. And then you start to learn and habituate how to perceive beauty and goodness and, or productivity or whatever the case is on a good spectrum, if that's where you're inclined. And I do that. It is totally meditative. You get out. I want to be in tune. I want to be in presence. I want to know what my body's feeling, why I'm feeling it. I want to be able to receive the world and beautiful things. Hey, even in my interactions with clients or friends, We get so caught up with our own bullshit that I'm not really present in listening or receiving that other person. And so then when I respond, I'm responding from a place that's potentially off, you know, that's self-interested or self-absorbed or whatever it is. And so this practice also allows me to connect with people better because I can learn to put away my stuff and then just focus on them and hear them, you know. Listen first to understand, not to respond, right? Like that whole, that whole saying. And it allows me to have much healthier relationships with people, be more effective when I'm talking to them because I'm listening and I'm there for them and understanding and receiving them well.

Yeah, exactly. That's great. I want to dig into your endurance events and some of that in just a second, but I want to backtrack just for a second and hear about your pet peeve when it comes to the hunting industry.

Yeah, and and we'll use the we'll use this hunting industry just as an example because it exists everywhere else, right? And I believe that it exists, and it it comes from a place of just being confrontational or antagonistic. And and it being confrontational antagonist doesn't have to be like a gross, ugly, negative thing, right? But in the hunting community, you'll see how they're like, "Oh, Tom, well, you shot that on a high fence ranch in in Texas. Like that's not hunting." Blah blah blah blah blah. And it's like. Oh, well, you use a rifle. I use a bow. I'm better than you. Or, oh, well, you know, you're doing this and you're doing that, whatever the case may be. Oh, you're shooting this. I shoot that. I enjoy this. I like to go backcountry. You sit in a tree stand. Like, it's like, hey, why are we focusing on all of that and trying to poke holes? Is it to make ourselves feel better? You know? And it's like, hey, I enjoy hunting. You enjoy hunting. The means that you hunt, you hunt with a longbow. I hunt with a crossbow. You hunt with a rifle. Like, who cares? Like, well, and when you, when you put aside all the, Trying to categorize our differences to make one feel better or worse, or to make you more righteous. You know, we we start to not recognize what we have in common. What do we have in common? Conservation, love for for for the sport. You know, being outdoors, the challenge, all this other good stuff. And I get really really grumpy when people just they just rip on others because they do something different. Oh well, you CrossFit. You're you know blah blah blah. Why Orange Theory?

And you did it.

And oh well, I'm a power builder. Oh that's just. Hey, we all love fitness. We all have a shared common interest in respecting our bodies and wanting to, to be better and healthy. Like, why can't we focus on that instead of being all competitive or rivals? And I've been able to— I use this a lot, especially with transitioning veterans. I struggle to fit in, you know, the civilian world. They just don't understand me, like this and that. I miss this. I miss that. They're all focused on the differences. Always focused on differences, and that's all you're going to see. And you're always going to then have these these voids or these fissures in in what you're looking for, and you're going to struggle. You're going to struggle in the in your new endeavor at life. Like, why don't you look for commonality? Oh well, you know, my community they just don't understand me. They didn't serve. They didn't do this. They don't know what it's like to be in combat. I'm like, okay, cool. Like, what are you missing? I miss the brotherhood. I miss the camaraderie. I miss the this. I miss the that. I miss the respect. It's like, okay, cool. Like Got it. You have it around you, just taking different form, different shape. Why don't you look for what you have in common with the people that you keep poking your finger at? Focus there. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh wow, it is the same thing. It's just manifested differently. And if I set my receiver to the right channel to receive those signals, I can start hearing the music and then it'll make me move forward. But when I don't have my receiver set on the right frequency that my environment is communicating to me with, there's going to be fuzz. There's going to be noise or static, and that's not healthy, you know. So it's interesting because I've noticed it in the fitness community, ultra-endurance community, you know, hunting community, veterans versus civilians, and feeling like they can't fit in, the world doesn't understand them. And then In those communities that I'm around in, you can see who's doing things well and who's not. And then you start to see these common trends, and it's focused so much focused on differences instead of— it's my beef with the government today in America. I don't care if you're left-wing, right-wing, center, half right, half— it doesn't matter. Everybody's focused on how they stand in opposition with each other to give themselves greater identity. And it's like, hey, That's fine. We need that in order to have checks and balances and to come to best organization for decisions and whatnot for governance. But I don't feel like that's in place right now. Like, we need to focus on first our shared common ground. What do we believe in? What do we really believe in as a country? I don't care if you're on the far left or the far right. Like, there's some common ground that we must agree upon. First. And let's make sure then all of our ambitions for whatever, whatever we believe in and disagreement— you could believe A, I could believe B, but it's because I want to use method A or method B to get to that shared common ground of what we all believe in. And so we've, we've just, I just, I just look at the example and the precedent we're setting for the next generation, you know, my children and my children's children. And it's like, hey, they're so focused on disagreement and antagonism. behaviors and I believe this and you believe that, so you must be wrong. Like, can't we both be right? Can't we both be right in what we believe in and understand why you believe in what you're right and why I believe in why I'm right and then work together to figure out how to get to that shared common ground? And what is that shared common ground? Do we even have shared common ground now as a country? Do we even have a shared identity? All Americans, all 350 million or however many million there are. I don't even know. I just picked a number. But can't we all just come to the table and agree on like 2 things? Can we just start there? You know, and, and we're missing that. And it's just opened up my eyes. I see it in the hunting community. I see it in the fitness community. I see it in the endurance community. I see it. You just see it everywhere, you know, competition, competition, competition.

I want to dig into that just a little bit more here because You're talking about competition and some of these activities, they're inherently competitive. So do you think that this is something that we're born with? That's human nature where we want to compete, we want to be right, we want to prove our point to someone else and to differentiate ourselves, or is this something that's learned over time?

I think competition's natural. You look at Mother Nature, Mother Nature can like That's where we're from, right? It's just the fact that we have like an elevated sense of consciousness and whatever, whatever as human beings, right? That we start to organize differently than Mother Nature. There's competition in Mother Nature everywhere, right? You know, the whole Darwin survival of the fittest, there's truth in that, but it's not the only truth. There's tremendous amount more collaboration in Mother Nature than there is competition. We are just receiving competition and we're seeing the competition because that's what we're looking for. That's how we're starting to get wired. And in Mother Nature, it's at a perfect balance. And when it's not at a perfect balance, a species dies off, right? Goes extinct or something happens, right? The imbalance, like, and you look at the ecosystems where there is a perfect balance between competition and collaboration and they thrive. And so I think humans have an ego. And that starts to— and a superego, right? We start talking about Freud. And that's what gets in the way of, of, of being able to take a deep breath and make sure we're aware of the balance that is required. Competition's great. It drives us to be better. It drives us to innovate. It drives us to achieve higher and higher standards. It allows us to set great expectations. Competition is wonderful, wonderful. It does, it weeds out the weak. But then when you start saying, hey, it weeds out the weak, well, who's defining what's strong and what's weak? And then we start to bring in ideas and philosophies and beliefs, which is all subject to good and bad and ego. And we don't put this, we don't put competition in check. And then now we're weighted on this competitive side for whatever device or whatever purpose. And ever since I started bringing back collaboration, cooperation into my life, into the forefront of my thinking instead of defaulting towards compete, compete, compete, you know, because I do compete quite a bit, but I also compete not only against others but against myself, against my beliefs and ideas. Against possibility, against my artificial limitations that I self-impose. And so competition is wonderful. But man, collaborating, collaborating with your environment, collaborating with others, collaborating with your beliefs is just as equal, as powerful as the competition piece. Yet we tend not to go on that, in that direction as a default. For the most part.

Yeah, that's well said. Thank you for that. Tosh, tell me a little bit about the endurance events you enjoy competing in. How'd you get into that? What drew you to it? Tell me some of those experiences.

Yeah, it's funny to try to go back and draw the line all the way back. And I think, you know, the Marine Corps, you know, when you start to get increased responsibilities through, you know, promotions or whatever and you find yourself in a leadership capacity, part of that is like, being better, right? Having credibility and being better. And it's like, hey, I need to be able to run faster. I need to be able to run harder. I need to be able to do more pull-ups. I need to be able to be hard in the field. I can't show weakness. And that leads you to keep seeking to get stronger and stronger and stronger. And, you know, that wasn't until I was commissioned. And now you got a platoon and that starts to get developed. And it's like, well, you do a 3-mile run. I want to do 5-mile runs. And we're going to hike with 50 pounds. Well, I want to hike with 80 pounds or whatever it is. And That the desire to be stronger, fitter, faster, better, harder, tougher was good. And it was, and it was for well, well purposes too, because we didn't know, you know, when I joined, it was peacetime, but you're supposed to be preparing for conflict and you don't ever know what an enemy is going to bring to the table for conflict. So one of the things that you do have control over is making yourself as best as you possibly can. And that's by constantly pushing the margins of your capabilities. and your potential further and further out, higher and higher. And so it just turned into that, you know, long hikes, longer hikes, you know, 5 days in the field, 7 days in the field, things like that. It just kind of grew. And then as that's growing, I remember my workout buddies, you know, Brendan Sullivan and Lance Day. We'd go to the gym and Lance Day's 6'9, 290 and just jacked. And Brendan's like 5' 8 and jacked, and I'm right in the middle. And we were all good at different things, but we all wanted to be better than each other. You know, like Lance was great at bench press and Brendan was great at arm curls. Like, I want to get better at curls. And so that was kind of neat too, where you push yourselves. I think about that. I just— that was a side note maybe, but it put a smile on my face. And then I went to be a guest speaker at an event at the University of Rochester where I had graduated with the NROTC program in leadership and naval sciences. And I met this guy, Kevin Saunders, for the very first time. He was the Marine officer instructor for the NROTC unit at U of R. He asked me to come and be a guest speaker for their graduation, and we we knew each other for about two hours. And part of me coming to be a guest speaker is, hey, I don't want to just fly in and walk in front of people and then talk and then leave. Like I want to I want to get to know everybody and enjoy them. So I'm going to fly in a day early, and maybe we do a a dinner or a drink or something. Then I want to come to the unit early in the morning and I want to PT with everybody and I want to sit in on a class and I want to just kind of be— because then when I do give a speech or something, I can have a connection with the people that I'm talking to, right? And it has greater value and meaning because I can connect better. Anyways, I had met Kevin for about 2 hours and we're PTing. We got the unit and we're on some run or whatever. And we start— we're just talking and he's like, oh man, we need a teammate for this adventure race. Do you adventure race? I'm like, what's that? Well, you've seen the Eco Challenge, right? I'm like, yeah, I've seen the Eco Challenge, ESPN, you know, back in the days, Mark Burnett. He's like, well, well, they sold and they got a company called Primal Quest and it is the biggest expedition-length adventure race in the entire world. It's gnarly, man. And I was like, oh wow, cool. You want to be on the team? I'm like, yeah, sure. What do we got to do? And he's like, oh, you do everything. You mountain bike, you climb, you rappel, you swim, you kayak, you hike, you got to orient, navigate, and other stuff right up your alley, dude. And I'm like, man, we've known each other for, for 2 hours, 3 hours, and now you're inviting me onto this team. And so that was my first, my first introduction into the, the premium event in the entire world, like Primal Quest Utah. And it was awesome. It challenged me in ways. It exposed weaknesses in, you know, things. It made me really think. And I had such a great time, a wonderful teammate, the Fullwoods and Kevin and myself, all the other teams, and to watch and to be part of that. And so then I just started getting into a little bit more adventure racing. And then it started to like unfold, like, oh, I need to run better and started getting into some marathons and started getting some mountain bike races and started to get into other things. It just grows. You know, this is back. I think this was 2006, maybe. And it just grew from there, and it kept feeding me, and I was excited by it. It kept challenging me. It was something new, different, challenging, different directions, different ways. And just started putting together other events and going to different events. And never—I'm not wired to like, hey, I just want to be the best person at Ironman or triathlon. Like, I don't want to do that same race thousands of times, whether it's the same exact race or the same format in different locations. I want to be exposed to different things, that adventure. And so, I would do an event and find out where I was strong or weak and what I enjoyed. And it's like, hey, what other things are out there that do all of that? And that opened the door to something else. You know, next thing you know, you're doing You know, Candace Burt's 200-mile races in Moab, 240 miles in Moab, mountain biking the Continental Divide, doing adventure races in New Zealand, you know, just you name it, just making up my own events and inviting a couple friends to see how we can tackle those. And it's just, it's neat because I enjoy it. I like pushing myself. I think my capacity is going down, actually. But as I get older, but I'm meeting great people that we have shared common interests in. I'm learning so much. I'm learning a lot about myself and different perspectives on different things, and it's just been fun. So that's kind of how I got into it. Where am I at today? I'm getting ready to do— so I'm branching out a little bit again. I'm going to do a couple on the— they're like adventure races but with shooting. I'd never been— I was— I'm a decent shot. Most of my shooting is hunting scenarios and things like that, but I've never really done competitive marksmanship. But I'm a decent shot, and Dave Castro is an incredibly good shot. I've got a lot of adventure racing background, so I— hey, why don't we partner up and do some of these team events? And so there, we've got a couple team event 24 and 36-hour adventure race shooting competitions. So getting ready to do those this year. Got a couple personal challenges that I want to, want to try and tackle as I keep pushing out my margins in ways that I, I want to, I want to explore that I haven't found an event to attend. And, um, the big one right now is we're going to row across the Atlantic Ocean as part of the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge in 2022. So—

Wow.

That's where, that's where I'm going now with a, with a team. That's the big That's the big like motivator to keep, to train harder and stuff, you know, ocean rowing in a 27-foot rowboat with 3 other dudes for 30 days, try to break a world record. So.

Oh my gosh. Yeah. Wow. That'll, that'll be pretty gnarly.

Yeah. It'd be exciting.

What happens if like a storm comes up and, you know, you're in a 27-foot rowboat? I mean, that's a decent-sized rowboat. But that's not big, especially if a storm comes up and, you know, you're getting pounded with waves and wind and all of that.

Yeah, you either overcome it or you don't really. I mean, when you still it all down, you keep rowing or you quit. And so I don't think quitting's in our cards.

I'm assuming there's going to be like a support boat that comes along with you as far as for food and water and things like that in case you know, a big storm comes in and you're not going to survive it.

No, no, it's unsupported. Everything you take on the boat, you keep on the boat. You don't get anything else. You know, we have our emergency beacons and our EPIRBs. There's some shore-based emergency response stuff, and then they use merchant vessel shipping to be able to get to respond if you're out there too far. That's why there's a lot of training and some qualifications we've got to do. they have 2 boats that kind of are on the racecourse. But if you got 40 teams that are spread across 2,000 miles, you know, 1,500 miles, it's kind of hard to do that. But it's a— it's an unsupported race, um, from La Gomorra, Spain to, uh, Antigua. So I'm excited for it. You know, I— the only reason I said this is because it got me a little bit apprehensive. I'm a little bit—

Wow.

Same question you're saying. You start to get into 10, 12-meter seas. That's— I've been on big water before, but in big boats, and I still had that, those butterflies, you know, those nerves get you, and that's exciting to me. So we'll see what that's about.

The thrill of adrenaline. I feel that.

Yeah, right?

Tosh, tell me about Crooked Butterfly Ranch, the work you're doing, how that came about, and the mission and goal there?

Yeah. You know, after, as I'm trying to transition and figure out what I'm going to do with my life post-Marine Corps, I had the luxury to take my time. I wasn't, I wasn't forced into having to get a job right away and do anything. You know, I just afforded a good position in life, largely due to a lot of the hard work that I put in beforehand, right? Like, it's not just a total lottery ticket, but I found myself being invited to direct, be the event director for the Triumph Games, and had made some connections while I was doing that, put on an event here in Vail from one of the sponsors of the Triumph Games, wanted me to just do a leadership workshop for their company. And I found that I liked it. And so it opened up a door for, hey, you want to do this? You want to do that? And I said, okay, cool. Well, I should probably start a business entity. do this. There's, there's a possibility here. I never thought of myself as an entrepreneur or gonna own a business or anything like that. And so we started Crooked Butterfly Ranch and we invite groups, individuals, teams, whatever it is to, to events. We create custom events unique for each client to fill what they're looking for, right? We have a, we have a conversation. Hey, what are you looking to do? And they usually communicate what they want to do in terms of need statements, and I navigate language and vocabulary with them to figure out, like, is it a want or a need? Where are you at for your goals, whether it's as an organization or a team or an individual? And I just say, yeah, hey, I think I have something for you. I think I'm the right man for the job. I'm interested. Or a lot of times I say, hey, I don't think I'm what you— I don't think I'm the best thing that you need. Maybe talk to this person or that person. But We create these experiential learning opportunities because if you're going to try to teach and mentor people and you want to give them skills and habituate behaviors, you got to have an experience together. So we create a shared common experience that everybody can leverage and draw to help use that as the opportunity to teach and mentor and help people grow. And so a lot of it is leadership and whether that's leadership in a sense of leading others Or leading yourself or leading your family. That's kind of what we do at Crooked Butterfly Ranch. And we recently started some specifically challenging physical endeavors and promoting and advertising those that you can kind of register for. But it— let me pause there. Why we do custom events is because I'm not interested in standing on a platform and delivering my bullshit for myself. Right? You bring a person in to talk to your company and then they deliver you their stuff, but it's their stuff. And then is it really beneficial to you as your organization? And so I just, I'm not wired that way. I don't want to sell you my stuff for the sake of me selling my stuff. I want to get a relationship with you. I want to connect and I want to figure out what you need. And then I want to try to leverage my experiences in my domains that I think are beneficial to feeding what you need. And so then we have a much more intimate relationship through that experience. And now I deliver what I think will best serve you, not myself. And so that's why we create these unique events. Every client comes in, we do something different, but it's specific to that client. And then we do satisfy wants too, right? Like needs and wants, but we got to navigate whether— what one we're feeding. And recently, I've put together something I think is just valuable for anybody that's interested in that domain, right? And so, we started creating these Diesel Day events, which uses a physical experience as a vehicle to deliver some leadership and some life management tools to help individuals challenge paradigms that they've set for themselves that limit their own potential without even realizing it. And having a lot of fun with that. We just got off of an event this weekend for some folks and just exceptionally powerful for them. And I like waiting to hear back from them in 3 weeks or 3 months saying, oh my God, Tosh, like I knew that that experience was awesome afterwards, but I found over the last 3 days, 4 days that I'm coming back to it and using everything for these things. And it That's what fills me up, knowing that you provided value to somebody else in their walk of life, whatever that walk of life is, you know, that I can't really script. It's just helpful for them, making them better persons. So that's what we do up here at Crooked Butterfly Ranch.

That's fantastic. Sounds like a very memorable experience for everyone that's going through. Tush, love to dig into your most memorable outdoor experience. And/or what outdoor experience would you never want to repeat and why? So, it could be either one of those.

Let's say that I have one that comes to my head immediately that fills both of those. And, it was in the middle of nowhere in an adventure race in Sweden, Norway to Sweden. And, we're on a team of 4. And I'm at the peak of what I would say, like, I was at physically, mentally, emotionally. Like, I was just the total— I was like, wow. And well, anyways, we find ourselves in the middle of a lake trying to cross a lake in northern Sweden. You know, it's glacial lake, freezing cold. And I started going hypothermic. And you think that you can outwork Will anything I did at the time, and well, I just really couldn't outwill that. That was, and that was the first time I had ever reached this catastrophic failure physically, mentally, emotionally. I you just couldn't control it. I was drowning, and long story short, you know, am I? They saved my life, but reflecting afterwards. I absolutely jeopardized my life, but even more so than that, I jeopardized the lives of my 3 teammates. And that bothered me. I was like, what the heck happened? And as I started to analyze that and dissect what was going on, you know, I was cavalier. I was arrogant. How did I get cavalier and arrogant? You know, based off of all the successes you've had, you kind of fall into this trap, right? Your successes lead you to be more confident and it continues to allow you to have more success and be more daring and more dashing and At a certain point, it tips the scales to be less than positive and starts to broach into the negative space. And I was cavalier about the thickness of my wetsuit wasn't appropriate because I thought I was so tough. Cold doesn't bother me. I didn't train for it. All other things that I did and I went into the race and while I wasn't, I've never been the weakest link and wasn't the weakest link until all of a sudden I was. And, it happened to be in this situation where we're half a mile to a mile from shore in either direction, big building waves, wind, glacial lake. And, I didn't buy the right packraft that we were supposed to use for a little bit of a flotation device. The thickness of my wetsuit wasn't appropriate and I just started crashing, almost drowned. So that experience right there, and I was embarrassed, I was bothered, I was hurt, like I was apologetic. I just, all of it, like, like what the heck, man? And it taught me a lot. I think that was, that put me on a path to really like put myself in check. And I'm fortunate to have had that experience and then outcomes to be where they were, that nobody died. And it, I just swore that I was gonna grow from it. And so, I had that experience with favorable outcomes that set conditions to reset me, to bring me back in from getting worse and worse and worse. Because it's funny because I talk about Napoleon on the Eastern Front fighting Russia and that's where the whole Napoleon complex came from, right? The dude's ridiculously successful despite all odds and all indicators that You shouldn't be doing this. And he's successful time after time after time after battle after battle. And it just starts to feed this Napoleon complex. And I'm not talking about like short man disease. I'm talking about just this winning, this victory. It's actually, I think it's called victor disease. It's not Napoleon complex. It's the victor's disease. And it was named after Napoleon. You can Google it. It's out there. And eventually, yeah, he wasn't, he shouldn't have tried to attack Russia. You know, or the Prussians or whatever it was in the middle of winter, and they got destroyed. And so they— I fortunately didn't get to that point where I put myself in a situation where hundreds of thousands of people, you know, lost their lives. I was blessed to have an opportunity to get out of this one largely unscathed. And I swore that I was going to use it as a learning point and never find myself in that position again. I needed to Rebalance, get back down to earth. So it's a very, very defining moment for me. Oh, that would have been like 2011, and gone unchecked. Who knows? Who knows what would have happened in the in the years after that if that wasn't the case, and I didn't onboard it too. Right? Like I'll accept some responsibility for having a wherewithal and a in a in some sort of psychological intelligence or something that. allowed me to say, hey, I need to make a change. I need to really do some self-assessment and fix some things before people get hurt.

That's a great story. And so what was the biggest lesson that you learned there from that that you applied to your everyday life?

Humble the fuck up, right? I mean, if we really want to boil it down, like, you need to get a large dose of humility really frickin quick. And so, yeah, I probably would if I were to just pick one, bring it all the way back down. And that's what, that's what that was. You need to humble up.

It's great advice for sure. Josh, we're about to run out of time here, but just a few other quick questions. Since we are the Rewild Gear Podcast, we love talking about gear. And since you do spend so much time in nature, in the outdoors, and in your military career as well, what gear do you consider essential that you always take with you no matter what you're doing?

Yeah, that's interesting. Different situations, different gear requirements. And I don't want to get cute, but the number one thing, the number one piece of gear I take out with me everywhere I go is my capabilities and an understanding of what I'm capable of and what I'm not capable of. And also an appreciation that you could have the greatest gear in the world, But if you don't know how to use it appropriately and it's not the right gear for the scenario or the situation or the environment, does nothing. And that can put you in a position to be successful or not successful, right? You know, that said, I'm a big like, you always carry a whistle with you when you're in the backcountry. And maybe, you know, it's not for you, but it's if somebody else is doing a distress call, it's for them. Right? Your whistle is to respond to them. And so, a whistle is a number one, number one piece of gear that I, that I, it's just like, hey, always, always take. Never been a knife guy, but a good knife is, is pretty powerful anytime you're going out there. Another piece of gear is, is your, your plan of action, letting somebody know where you're going, what you're doing, when you expect to be back. Right? Like that's something that I always, always do. You know, I just tell Nicole, hey, this is where I'm going. Da da da da. Like that's that's kind of essential. And a lot of a lot of stories about people that have gone off someplace, but they never told anybody, and then they're never found. Right? Or they they end up getting found in the belly of some bear or something. But um, you know, uh, good map recon. You know, knowing where you're going and understanding it. Taking your map with you. Going where I think you want me to go. I'm a sucker for like a good shell. You know, I want a good outer shell. Yeah, I might be in a desert environment, but I want to take a rain shell. And maybe it's not a rain shell, but it's a rain— I just call it a rain shell, right? Like, because you can do so much with that. There's so many things you can do with that piece of gear. Other than that, man, I'm not really a gear guy, so to speak, but I appreciate— and you know what's funny is I'm not a gear guy, but I've got You know, Action Packers and Action Packers all over the place full of gear, you know, because you're always buying something that you need for the, for the task. And it's funny is I have— how many, how many shells do I have, or whatever it is of an item? When it comes time to go, I always take my favorite one, which I've had for like 12 years. You know, it's funny how that works. It's like, Tasha, you need to throw that old one away in order to give an opportunity for the new one that you got. a chance to, you know, earn your favor. But I'm trying to think what other gear, but just depends on the scenario. You know, I'm a Carhartt pants kind of guy.

It's a good list. Are there any brands, outdoor companies that you feel like are doing just a great job when it comes to either the quality of the gear they're putting out or maybe their conservation efforts or just the mission, what they stand for?

Yeah, I'm a big Arc'teryx guy. I really love that. I really love them. Marmot. I really enjoy Marmot. Let's see. Sitka in the hunting world. I like Sitka. I'm getting ready to— because I was a Woolrich and Carhartt. That's all I wore, you know? And then when I met Dudley, then I get the opportunity to be introduced to John Barlow and get some sick gear and be able to use that. And this stuff's phenomenal too. Getting ready to work with Kuiu. Here coming up on this next vet hunt that we're working on. So I like those. Salomons on my feet. I'm a big Salomon fan, you know. I haven't bought a pair of Salomons in a handful of years, but because Reebok always sent shoes, so it doesn't matter what I'm doing. I'm always just wearing free stuff, right? They send you free shoes, I wear them. But a pair of good Salomons, Danners. I like those brands. I'm a Carhartt guy. You know, I wear Carhartts almost exclusively. Garmin, big Garmin fan. I really, really like Garmin as well. So those are, those are the big brands that I'm usually sticking with.

Super. Thanks. Tosh, what do you see as the biggest need in the outdoor industry today?

Hmm. Biggest need in the outdoor industry.

Wow.

Probably, I don't know, it's weird. You probably have to package this up, but let me identify a few things. Probably like access, trust between private landowners and people that are using it so that we can get more access to places. And how do you get that trust, increased respect from users from outdoor enthusiasts. You know, you look at the guy— I'm the kind of guy that, you know, you're on the trail and you see a piece of trash and it's like, oh man, I don't want to pick up this trash and take it with me for the next 3 days. That's gross or whatever. But you pick it up because it doesn't belong there, you know? And it's a Marine Corps learning. If it doesn't grow, it goes, right? When you're doing police call and people that think a little bit more along those lines, you know, about respecting and taking care of it. Because if we keep abusing it the way we're abusing it, it's gonna going to deny us more access. We're going to lose trust and eventually we're going to ruin our environment. So, having that healthy respect with a mindset of sustainability, and that can go— and now then that goes into single-use plastics and recycling efforts and all these other things, right? So, it can go in different directions. But, the greatest thing that we need in the outdoor community Yeah, that's the big thing, just access that's built on trust and stewardship and healthy mindset for conservation sustainability. If I was looking into items, I think the Garmins and the inReaches and the sat trackers have come a long way and they're wonderful. I've been in a lot of places though that our sat trackers don't work because not a lot of satellites in the sky that they're reading or whatever. So, down in the middle of Patagonia and we get sat phone and a sat tracker, but neither of them are working because there's not a satellite that it's talking to in the sky. So the emergency plan didn't serve us at all, and we actually ended up needing it during that adventure. But, you know, I know that it's come a long way since then. So, but yeah.

That's all great advice. Tasha, is there a book or books that have had the biggest impact on your life? And if so, what would that be?

Man, books, the book question. I got stacks. I've got probably like 50 books stacked up over there on the table like I got to get to and get reading. Biggest impact in my life. One book that I recommend to people a lot, yeah, right, is Children Learn What They Live, Dr. Nolte. I offer that book up immediately every time I'm asked. I just think it's a wonderful book. Simple. People think, oh, it's about parenting. And it's like, yeah, hey, it is. But it's really just good advice for relationships, you know, in life and endeavor. There's lessons in there that you take. They just use parenting and children as the topic to deliver something really powerful. Getting ready. I know I've been digging into, trying to dig in a little more to Jordan Peterson and what he's talking about, his 2 books. Uh, impact— biggest impact in my life. Biggest impact in my life. Uh, The Book of Virtues, The Moral Compass. Those are 2 great books. Um, I think it's William Bennett. Big thick things. They read like short stories. Um, I really enjoyed those 2 books. Um, it's all about character and value making. Uh, any book, any book that helps you gain an appreciation for maybe a different perspective than you're naturally inclined to have, I think is exceptionally valuable. We tend to gravitate towards books that reinforce our belief structure and we sort of create this reverberation, right? An echo chamber to use what everybody's using. But the greatest books that I found is stuff that introduces you to different ways of thinking. And so I'm trying to do that, right? Like, yeah, you read Jordan Peterson, and I listen to some of his podcasts, and of course I'm attracted to it because I'm— I believe in that stuff, and I like where it's going, and it's reinforcing, and it's helping me make sense of my meaning and what I think and believe. But I'd like to hear some— I'd like to read some other things. So I'm trying to find a good book on postmodernism so I can better understand that. And just things like that. Anything that presents a different perspective on something that you you think or believe. I think those are the books that are most valuable. So then we can get out of specific recommendations and get into a genre or something like that, right?

Sure. Has there been a book that really challenged your beliefs that you have found exceptionally powerful to you?

Oh, you know, C.S. Lewis's book, I'm trying to remember the name now, right? Like, so it must have been that valuable that I can't remember the name. Um, geez, what is it? Oh, hey, I'm gonna do this while I'm talking because it's important to get it to you. It's a CS, uh, the Christianity book that he wrote. What, you, you familiar with it?

Oh, Mere Christianity.

C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, right? Um, I'm not a religious guy, but he makes his— that book was really, really great in opening up my mind as he— because he's, he's atheist But he wrote that book, Mere Christianity, and he digs into like, wow, it's possible. And then The Screwtape Letters that I read immediately after reading Mere Christianity. And it's just like, wow, that was really, really cool for me. And then that led me to reading The Atheist's Book of Spirituality. And I realized that, well, maybe my beliefs on God or religion, but maybe, and I started digging into that. book a little bit, and that was a little while ago. But those were some great— 2 great— a great author and a couple good books that I found was like, wow, cool. It really set me on a path to start reading less military history and whatever I was reading at the time and start digging into some other soft topics and learning how to deal with people. And, you know, I went to University of Maryland as part of a master's degree in in leadership, in education, and reading a lot of books on, on, in the sociology world that, you know, educated me a lot, like got me thinking about different ways of thinking. So those were, those were really, really cool. That was a great period of my life where it made a lot of meaning for me and my experiences because I was introduced to different ways of thinking.

That's all great examples. Thank you. Do you have a favorite podcast you listen to regularly?

I don't, I don't listen to podcasts very often. I find myself on podcasts all the time, and I have my own podcast that I do every week. And every now and then somebody will throw a podcast at me and I'll check it out because it's, oh, it's interesting. So I kind of like pick and choose. I don't just listen to a podcast, you know, as a routine, but every now and then I'll, oh, check that one out. Oh, I'll check this one out. And I dabble in there and it excites me to think a little different. So, but I'm not a big, I'm not a big consumer of audiobooks or podcasts, but every now and then when one pops up, I'll jam in on it.

Sure. Well, let's give a plug for your podcast. Tell us a little bit more about it.

Oh man, I don't know what's going on there. It's Crooked Butterfly Podcast. I really just get on and I ramble for 20 to 40 minutes about something. That's going on for me currently. Once a week, you know, something will be bothering me or I'll experience something and I want to process it and it'll be inside of my head. I kind of internal process a lot. And knowing that I'm an internal processor, I'm not particularly fond of my ability to be clear and concise and articulate. So I tend towards internal processing because I feel like I babble and I ramble and I don't make sense and I sound like an idiot. But I'll wrestle with something for a while and I'll toss it around and I'll ruminate on it a little bit and then I'll record a podcast. And it's really largely me processing out loud for other people to eavesdrop on my thoughts. And so it's a way me getting it out what's in my head and then hearing what I'm saying and calling my own bullshit on things and trying to wrestle with different perspectives and invite people into understanding my thought processes. To be, to just better arm them to think differently or invite them to challenge what they think and how they think and learn those skills. So I do that every week. Every now and then I miss a week, but, you know, there's been some great ones and there's been some poor ones. You never know what you're going to get, but I try to keep them, you know, 15 to 40 minutes, 20 to 40 minutes long so that they're not a, you know, you don't have to digest them for 2 and a half hours and dedicate the time or have to Super.

Tosh, what's one final piece of advice you'd like to leave our audience?

Final piece of advice. Who am I to give advice, right? Like, I'm not— like, who am I to give anybody advice? What do I want to leave people with? Just challenge. Just continue challenging what you believe in. Why not? Why not keep asking yourselves? You know, nobody's got the right answers. People have People have good answers and bad answers and better answers and whatever. But who's really right? You know, and just keep questioning. The worst, worst thing that happens when you question is that you reinforce what you believe in. The best possible thing is, is that you're armed with a different way of thinking and maybe you get to correct what you believe in because you find that something else makes more sense or is more accurate or, you know, better. So, yeah. You know, maybe that's derived from humble up, right? Like, just invite that humility in to ask yourself, right? Like, I'm mildly interested in somebody's answer to anything more than I am, like, how they arrived at that answer. That's what excites me. And I think good listeners don't have answers. They have the right questions. You know, any good counselor, any good friend, any good partner or anything Whatever it is, they're not good because they have the right answers. They're good because they ask the right questions. And so if you can't do that with yourself, why are you doing it for others? So that's kind of where I'm at in life today. It's great advice.

You sound a lot like my wife in that too. Great minds think alike, I guess.

I appreciate that. She must be a wonderful lady.

Yeah. Yeah, she's a she's fantastic. Tosh, thanks so much for your time. Really appreciate that. This has been a lot of fun.

And where can people find you online? Oh man, appreciate it. I appreciate being here. You know, many thanks to Andrea, mutual friend who met you at a mastermind group and put us in touch with each other. And I can see why, man. And so just thanks to Andrea for connecting us. I'm online. Crooked butterfly dot. is our website. BigFishFoundation.org is our nonprofit. I'm on Instagram, Tosh.CrookedButterfly. We've got Crooked Butterfly Ranch at Instagram, BigFish_Foundation at Instagram, and or just Google Tosh or Sean Tosh and you'll probably be able to figure out where I'm at.

Super. Thanks so much, man. Really appreciate it. It's been a lot of fun and we'll have to do a round 2 one of these days after you do that excursion across the Atlantic.

Yeah, wonderful, man. And hey, stay in touch, you know, text me and send me some hunting pictures and where you're off and the adventures you're doing in the hunting world. Because I get super happy when other people find success. And success isn't always measured by what you end up harvesting. It's the experience that you had and where you were and who you were with. So please You know, stay in touch.

For sure. Will do. Thanks, Tosh.

All right, man. Out of here. Thanks for listening to the Rewild Gear Podcast. You can check out the show notes for today's episode at rewildgearpodcast.com. If you're ready to spend more time in the wild, our line of high-quality minimalistic outdoor gear can help We'll help you do just that. Check us out at rewildgear.com.