Ep 34: Derek Wilson on Liberation, Lifestyle, and Legacy

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 Adventure Made Podcast.

I'm your host, Seth Spears, and I'm here today with Derek Wilson. Derek is a 5th generation rancher living in Idaho. He's a former software executive who left everything to rescue his family farm, which radically changed his life for the better. He's also the host of the Primal King Podcast and a business coach who teaches that anything is possible through the 3 pillars of liberation, lifestyle, and legacy. Derek, welcome to the show.

Thanks. Glad to be on.

Super. I'd love to kind of just get started and hear your background story about how you got to where you are today and how you— because it sounds like from the little bit that I've heard about you, that you didn't plan to go into ranching at all. And that kind of was a radical life transformation into having a more agrarian and outdoor-focused lifestyle. So, I'd love to dig into that story a little bit.

Oh, boy. How much time you got, Seth? It's kind of a crazy one.

All the time you need.

Awesome, awesome. So, yeah. So, about 5 years ago, actually 5 years ago in December, I was working for a software company called ClickFunnels. It was a A company that kind of skyrocketed, went up, went from like $0 to $100 million in like 3 years and kind of right place.

Very familiar.

Yeah. Okay, perfect. And so I actually had worked with the owner of that, a guy by the name of Russell Brunson for close to 10 years, even pre-ClickFunnels and everything else. And so, yeah, it was kind of living the dream, right? Like I'm a small town boy, like grew up in a town of 400 people. And I think a lot of times when you grow up that way, You just want to get out. You want to go make all the money because you grow up poor a lot of times in small rural towns, right? And so, you know, finally was doing that, was making the great money, doing all of that. And then I got a call December 15th. I was sitting in the office, actually on a phone call, and it was my stepmom. And she said that my dad had been in a wreck. I was like, oh, okay, well, how is he? And my dad was like old school cowboy, right? Like, He's out on the side of the mountains here in Idaho, which are very steep, riding his horse every day, doing like old school stuff that most people just don't do anymore. And I figured he's probably hurt again. He's always breaking ribs, getting kicked by horses and cows and all that type of stuff. And I was like, I'm sure he'll be all right. But then I get a call a little while later being like, yeah, I'm with your dad and he didn't make it. And I was just like, what?

Oh my gosh.

There's no way. No way my dad didn't make it. And so, What happened from there was, was pretty wild. Um, so he had been with, it was my stepmom at the time, with her for probably about 10 years. They just got remarried about 6 months before that, or got married 6 months before that. And my dad didn't have a will. And so enter in ranch land, all of that type of stuff.

Oh boy.

Now, my dad was not by any means a wealthy man. Um, I mean, making $20,000 a year when you're a rancher is like a good year, right? Like, I don't think most people realize that, but ranching is not lucrative for most people.

Really?

Yeah. And so really, it was more about the land. And so my stepmom wanted to sell it because she knew that we weren't living here. And she was like, I don't want to take care of it. I just want to sell it. You can take your money. And for a minute, it was like, okay, maybe that's the best choice. You know, we had just literally a year and a half before that, me and my wife had bought our dream home and we were just kind of content, right? Making good money, had the vehicles and the house and the life, blah, blah, blah. But then once like I was kind of faced with like losing the ranch, it was like something deep inside of me was like, I can't let that happen. And so we ended up kind of going through a lot of struggles with my stepmom. Ultimately had to go way in debt to basically buy out our family ranch from her. And then we're like, you know what? Let's go back. Let's move back to the ranch. Right? And so I ended up walking away from a job that was well into the 6 figures. Moved back to a house that's literally like 120 years old, pretty much falling down, and just starting the adventure. We were just like, you know what? Like, life is good, but we weren't fulfilled. So yeah, we moved back to the ranch, started working on this old house. I don't know if you guys are super interested, you could go on social media and see some of the construction that we did was unbelievable. It should have just bulldozed it. But yeah, we were like, you know, this house has been here, this ranch has been here. We're going to restore the house. We're going to do everything that we can. We sold our dream home, moved up here, packed up our 4 kids. The house wasn't ready when we moved here, um, so we lived in like 600 square foot of rubble. We had 2 sawhorses and a piece of plywood for our kitchen table. Like, it was insane. And so, yeah, but it— I mean, that's kind of like what, what brought us back to the ranch. Like I said, I know it's kind of a long story, but tried to condense it down a little.

Yeah, no, that's amazing. So I'm sure there were a whole lot of challenges there, and it caused a lot of potential issues either within your relationship with kids. And even if you're quitting your job to do that, I'd love to hear a little bit more about that, what that experience was like and how that affected things.

Yeah. So it got to the point and I like, I don't, I don't know if, if this is something that most people would do. And I don't say that, I hope that doesn't come off in like any type of an arrogant way, but I remember getting to the point with my job to where it had kind of changed and I wasn't really doing what I wanted to. I was still making great money. But I remember thinking like, I would almost rather be broke than do something I don't want to do. And that meant walking away from a 6-figure salary, meant walking away from benefits. You know, I have 4 kids, so like stuff like that isn't like super simple to walk away from, right?

Yeah.

But I kind of like, I felt like I had this pull to walk away from that and create my own path. And I was just like, okay, like again, my wife is an absolute rockstar. Most people's spouses probably would be like, you're crazy for walking away from your job. You're crazy for wanting us to move back to a town of 400 people. Like the school literally has like, my daughter's class has like 7 kids in it.

Wow.

So I mean, we're talking like very small and, but she was right along there with me and I just told her like, we'll figure it out. And she was like, okay, if you think we'll figure it out, then we'll do it. And so that was kind of like my theme though, is it's like, you know, I'm willing to be broke for a while while While we kind of pursue what we wanted to. And, you know, like the lifestyle of living in a town like this, like you can't explain it really to people who maybe have never lived like rural, but like being able to go out and go into the mountains and be by yourself and not have to deal with traffic and all of that type of crap. Like it's just a whole different lifestyle and it's one that I grew up loving. And then when you move away, you kind of get used to the hustle bustle of the city.

Sure.

You get used to the keeping up with the Joneses mentality. And it was like, once we got back, I remember, Seth, one time, so I was up deer hunting and I sit on this little ridge and it just like the most calm, beautiful day ever. And it just starts kind of like lightly snowing. And I remember like, and in this point in our life, you have to understand, we had our house completely tore apart. We had twin girls that were a year old, our youngest 2, and they're literally like, we're telling them not to go to the bathroom unless we pack them because there's nails sticking out of the floor.

Oh.

Right? Like, it was nuts. And like, I remember going to replace a window in, in their room, in the twins' room, and the whole wall came down because literally the only thing holding together this old wall was this old metal frame window.

Oh, wow.

And so I thought it was gonna be like a 40-minute, like, window out, put a new vinyl one in, and then the whole wall comes down and I'm out there until like midnight with— or 10 o'clock at night with my, my truck pointing the headlights over there so I can put it back together so we don't freeze that night, right? So we're going through all of this craziness. And I remember this morning, I'm up there deer hunting, and I'm sitting on this ridge and the snow's falling. And I'm like, you know what, it's all worth it. Like, it's everything that we've been going through. Like a moment like this, sitting here complete, just like quiet, complete, just like solidarity, complete, just peace, right? Like most people, I feel like in this day and age, like you don't ever have a moment of just like peace. Because you're worried about bills, you're worried about your job, you're worried about your business, you're worried about your marriage, like all these different things, right?

Yeah.

And so it's like, I was just sitting there and it's like, it does not get any better than this. Sitting here hunting with a little bit of snow falling on me doesn't get any better. It's worth all that other stuff. It's worth— like, I know when I get done hunting, I'm gonna go down there and I'm gonna be like trying to be construction builder Bob, right? Like doing all this stuff, trying to keep my kids from getting slivers in their feet because our floor isn't done because contractors aren't showing up and you can't get anything done. But I was like, it's all worth it. Like, and it was so crazy, like, because this is like 4 years ago now, like looking back 3 and a half years ago and looking back and being like, like that one moment, it just made everything like justified what we had done. And so I feel like when you ask like, you know, kind of how, how that process went, it was awful. There were so many times where I was like, what are we doing? Like, I went from freaking granite showers to like, we don't even have a kitchen. Like, we went from, You know, all of this awesome stuff to like, we can't even, we can't even walk to the bathroom without putting our shoes on because we're gonna get a nail. And, and then it was just like that one moment. And I guess what, what I'm getting at is that there was just these moments every so often that just like, you know what, somebody, something, you know, I call it God, maybe somebody else calls it the universe, whatever, would put you in to be like, you're on the right path, like you're on it. Mm-hmm. And I felt like making all those hard decisions It was kind of nice to get a little bit of validation, but that, that day, like, was seriously something that helped kind of push through the next part. Got it.

So when you were considering making this decision to move back to the ranch and take it over and renovate the, the home and everything, what was that decision process like? Was that just a gut feeling that you had? Was it you just wanted— just completely wanted to change? Did you have a plan in place? Tell me more about that.

Kind of. So yeah, when we, when we made the decision, it wasn't real popular with some family members and stuff like that, because we actually lived down next to my wife's parents. My mom lived pretty close to there as well. So it was something to where it wasn't really like the most popular decision ever to do that. So it was a lot of just like, what do, what do we want our life to look like? That was kind of like what we kept coming back to. And, you know, we had at that time, like I said, a nice house. We had 7 acres out kind of in the country away from Boise, which is like obviously in Idaho is like the big city here, right? So, we had that, but it was like, what, like if we could choose any way to raise our kids, how would it be? And it's like, you know, I'd like my kids to grow up in the mountains. Like I want them to know how to hunt, how to fish, and how to sustain themselves. Like especially as crazy as the world seems to be getting, It's like, you know, what type of life do we want?

Sure.

And it's like, okay, well, if, if we want that kind of simple, like more primal life, right? Like that was obviously how I started the podcast and everything else was like, we have the opportunity to do that. We just have to have the balls, lack of a better term, to make the decision to go and do it.

Yeah.

And that was really, I guess, kind of what, what, what led us back was just what type of life do we want? And what are we willing to do in order to create that lifestyle? And it's like, well, all we have to do is just get through the fear and make it happen.

Yeah, that's amazing. And I think there's a lot of people that kind of crave that simpler lifestyle now. But one of the things that I've noticed is that when it, when it comes to making those decisions, oftentimes the spouses will not be on the same page. You know, one will want to live a more rural, simpler lifestyle, and the other likes the conveniences of the city and an airport that's close by or all the conveniences that a more urban lifestyle brings. Were you guys both on the same page there?

Kind of. So my wife grew up in Alaska, and I know a lot of people think like Alaska, like, you know, very, very rural, right? But she didn't. She lived in a, in a, what most people would consider a small town. But, you know, there was Walmart, there was, you know, that type of stuff. Like where we live now, the nearest Walmart is 2-hour drive away.

Oh wow.

Like the nearest fast food place. Yeah. Nearest fast food place is like 45 minutes to an hour away driving. And so again, it's like, not only is it small, but it's like remote. And so that was the thing I, 'cause I honestly felt guilty, Seth, trying to talk my wife into doing it in all reality.

Sure.

Right. Because I was like, I feel like this is something I want to do, but like, I don't want to, I don't want to do this if I'm kind of dragging you kicking and screaming. And she's like, you know, She's like, anytime we're out like driving around and I see that old farmhouse, she's like, I've always wanted to like fix up a farmhouse and I've always wanted to live rural. Right. And she grew up like riding horses and stuff. And it's like, you know what? Like we can do that any day. Like we can ride our horses every day if we want to, we can, we can do all of that stuff. And so she was like, all right, yeah, let's do it. And it's so funny because so many people that I've talked to, it was like, my wife would never let me do that. My husband, whatever, would never. have allowed us to do that. And so, that's where, like, obviously, I have an awesome wife, first off.

Yeah.

But then, we just took time because I think so often, I worry sometimes, I should say, that we live a life kind of by default. What I mean by that is something happens in our lives and we're like, oh, because of that happening, now I have to go do this, right? Because I had an injury, I had You know, whatever happened, I got ripped off by somebody. Now I just have to go and, and do this, right? And I'm big on like trying to design the lifestyle that you want to have.

Sure.

And I know there's so many people, it's like, oh, it's easy for you to say, right? It's easy for so-and-so to say. And it's like, well, no, it's, it hasn't been easy, but we're finally at the point now after a few years of struggle to where it's like, we've literally designed the life that we wanted to. Like, we pretty much do what we want when we want, right? And so that I think has been such a big lesson for, for us just to be like, okay, like what do we want to do? How do we almost reverse engineer it and then go make it happen instead of just being like, oh, something happened. We're just going to be on defense now and just try to get by. It's like, screw that, man. Like, I don't want to just get by. Right. Like I want to live our life by design, how we want to, and then we'll figure out how to do it from there.

Sure. That's, um, that's amazing. One of the things over the past year, year and a half or so with COVID and lockdowns and everything, it has isolated a lot of people. And so they've been forced to be separate from family, from friends, and there's just been a serious lack of community. And I think one of the major things that we're seeing, as far as like mental health issues and depression and anxiety and all this infighting and polarization amongst the classes and across the country, is because people don't feel seen, accepted, or like they're part of something, that whole communal aspect. And so when you're living in such a rural environment like that, you're separated from people intentionally. So how has that been as far as establishing community and a sense of belonging when it comes to just outside of the family unit for you guys?

So what's, what's wild is that where we live, if you wouldn't have said that, like, if you had never watched social media, the news, like, you wouldn't even know that COVID was a thing. And I know that's weird, right? Because like so many people have been impacted so greatly by it. But that was like one of the things when we decided to move back. Yeah, we were, we were like, you know, things just seem to get crazier and crazier. And, you know, God forbid things get like super wild. Where else would you want to live? Like, we literally, like, our water comes from a spring, right? Like, it comes from a spring behind your house.

Wow.

You know, we have a wood stove for heating, like, We have obviously all the beef that we could ever eat. So what's been wild is that we made that decision, not obviously not knowing anything about COVID or any of the stuff that was going to happen.

Sure.

But when COVID hit, like other than our kids being home from school, like it didn't change anything. It didn't change how we lived one bit. You know, like maybe if we'd go to neighboring towns or something like that, it would change. So, but then the beauty of that as well is that when you live in a small town, you know everyone, right? It's kind of the cursing and the blessing, right? Is that Like literally, you know everybody. Yeah.

Good and bad.

Yeah. And so, you know, if something bad happens, like everyone knows about it, something great happens, everyone knows about it. But just in terms of like building community, like everyone around here, and it was so funny, like going back to our house construction, I'll never forget this too, like talking about community and how people live here. So one of the guys that was working on our house, uh, so we had hired a contractor and then I ended up basically kind of having to finish everything. But it was hilarious because I come from like software and I come from business and I come from entrepreneurship, right? Like, Like push, push, push, like work, work, you know, make all this money, blah, blah, blah. And this dude shows up to our house like at like 10 o'clock in the morning. He's got his fishing pole in the back and he leaves at like 3. And like, he's, he's like, yep, outta here. Like heading to go fishing. It's like, okay, cool. And, and I remember being so frustrated by it being like, dude, like me and my kids are living in squalor and you're working, like you're showing up at like 10. You're leaving at like 3 and it's, it's so you can fish more. But then I was like, how awesome is that? Yeah. In, in the same sense, like how awesome is it that this guy isn't working to live? You know what I mean? Like, like he's, he's, he's just working so he can make enough money that he can go and fish and do the stuff that he wants to do. And so you get a lot of that here and, and I, I sometimes struggle with it, right? Because I'm, I'm a pretty high ambitious person and I want to build stuff and like, You know, try to work hard. But then there's also the other side to where like, I see the guys along the road fishing and I'm like, that's pretty cool too. Right. And so, so like with the community here, it's, it's very good. Like you have, you have a little bit of everything, right? Like you have, you know, very kind of, I don't know if you'd say like kind of very just rural people and then you also have very aspirational people. And so it makes for a good mix. Like I think our kids get a really good mix of that at school, just kind of seeing a lot of different perspectives and everything else. And so. Like, the community honestly has been, has been awesome.

Wow, that's amazing. You know, that kind of lifestyle that you're talking about, um, I think Tim Ferriss calls it lifestyle design, where you're intentionally trying to build out that type of lifestyle so you can live and work and do and play and all the things that you want, and you're very intentional about it. Um, is that something that you really were focused on when you decided to make that decision?

It really was. It really was. Like, And not to say my lifestyle was bad even before, but kind of like I said, like I, I'd always envisioned growing up rural and kind of living a different life, which is so weird, right? Because the way that I grew up now is so weird and so foreign to so many people. And, you know, but, but I loved growing up just running in the mountains and looking for antlers and, you know what I mean? Like just all that type of stuff. And when we started talking about it, it's like, you know, do we want our kids Do we want our kids like going, you know, every single day, all day, you know, at ballet class and gymnastics and blah, blah, blah, right? Or do we want our kids like to be able to climb mountains and use their imagination and, you know, stuff like that? And so just in terms of like the lifestyle and designing it, it was like, this is what I want. And I tell my kids all the time because, you know, we let 'em play electronics and stuff like that, but We try to keep it real minimal. And I'm always like, you know what, someday you'll thank me. I believe that like someday because you're not completely immersed in social media at a young age and all this stuff that I feel is pretty toxic, like there'll come a point where you thank us. And so like I'm trying to teach our kids like, yes, you're growing up a little bit differently, but hopefully at some point down the road, like having learned work ethic, like my daughter, she's 12 years old. Every day she's out feeding her horse. Like some nights we get home, it's dark, it's cold, it's nasty. I mean, right now it's snowing. She'll get home from school tonight and she'll be out there feeding her horse, like teaching them responsibility and work ethic, like that type of stuff. Like, I feel like those are the things that hopefully someday, like, their lifestyle will be better because of what they're learning right now.

Yeah, no, I agree. That's, that's amazing. And it seems like there can be this balance of teaching that discipline, that responsibility, but then also trying to give opportunities where they're around multiple different ideas, business examples, other people and things like that. So just a diversity of opinion and thought processes. And so that's something that I've tried to— I've thought, gone down this rabbit hole of thinking, okay, what is the best option for my own kids? And how should they be in cities? Should they be in a rural area? And trying to balance all that out because, you know, if you just have one, it can be they're not seeing the whole, the whole experience of life. And so trying to give them a fuller experience there. Have you you guys done anything as far as like travel or getting them outside of just like the ranch so that they can see kind of that diversity of lifestyles?

Yeah. So like my mom still lives like down in a bigger area. And so like, you know, we do stuff like mall trips and, you know, there's every summer we go up to a big amusement park, like just to get out of Riggins, you know, the little town where we live. So there's absolutely things like that that we do. And that's the thing, right? Is that I always try to raise our kids to be very open-minded about things, just in terms of being open-minded about how, you know, because, and you probably know this, but your kids would come home and be like, so-and-so's doing this, so-and-so's doing that. And it's like, you know, you may not understand what so-and-so's going through at home, right? Like you may not understand different things, you know? Kids pick up on political stuff, right? They come home and they're like saying this or that about politics. I'm like, how do you— like, you don't even know about poli— you don't— you have no idea if this president is good or bad. Like, why are you even talking about this stuff? And it's like, well, so-and-so said it. And it's like, like, don't, don't judge your opinion on what someone else is telling you, right? Like, if you really think that this president sucks or this president's great or whatever, that's fine. But like, tell me why. And so that's the big thing. Like, I'm always trying to push our kids to—

Critical thinking.

Yeah, exactly. Like, critical thinking. Just because somebody says that You know, a politician is good or bad, like, hopefully you're willing to look into it enough. And I mean, maybe this goes for all of us, right? Not just kids. But yeah, again, like actual critical thinking and thinking about issues and stuff like that. Like, if you want to be political, great. But at least like, do a little research and maybe have some backing to what your beliefs are.

Yeah, agreed. So coming from a business background and working in the tech space, and then going into kind of an agrarian existence now. What skills have you brought over into that aspect of life?

So work ethic is always to me, number one. I don't think that there's ever a way to, I mean, we all want to work smarter, not harder, right? But the problem is, is that I believe that until you can work smarter, you have to work harder. And that's really been one of the things. So when we started like our direct-to-consumer meat business, Like this ranch has been what they call a traditional cow-calf operation. So that means that basically in the fall, all the calves get shipped out to these big commercial feedlots. So when we decided to do our own direct-to-consumer meat business, we were like, okay, how are we going to get through this? And it's like, well, we don't know enough about it initially to work smart. So what we're going to do is we're just going to commit to working really hard and figuring it out and working really hard and figuring it out. And then hopefully over time, we'll work hard enough to where we learn enough to where now all of a sudden we can start working smart. But I think so often what we do is we want to start at the work smart, right? We want to be like, okay, yeah, I want to build a house and I want this to be as efficient as I can. And, you know, I don't, I don't want to work too hard when I'm doing construction or whatever it may be. And it's like, well, the only way that you can work smart, in my opinion, is first you have to like work hard. You have to figure it out. And then you're like, oh yeah, I don't want to do it that way because that way takes like 5 times longer and it's actually easier to do it this way that I figured because I've been working hard at it. And so like, that's one of the biggest things that I feel like kind of going from any, I mean, it's the one skillset in my opinion, or the one thing that is absolutely transferable, whether it's working software, whether you're in sales, whether you're in construction, whether you're in farming, ranching, whatever. Like typically the people who work really hard and then they use that hard work to get smarter and better, those are the people who usually are successful in just about anything.

Sure.

And the people who just commit to working really hard forever and never try to get smarter, right? Like, then you're probably just working really hard for a low wage, and that's not great either. Or if you go to the other end of that and you just try to work smart and you're lazy, you're probably not going to be successful. And so that's really been one of the big things that we've always tried to be is like, let's work really hard, never let our work ethic be the reason why we fail, right? Like, that just can't be. We can't let our work ethic be the reason why we fail at this. And if we work hard enough for long enough, you know, because anything you start, like you suck at, right? Like anything, you know, podcasting, it doesn't matter. Like my first few episodes are probably just awful, but it's like most people, I feel like, and this is again kind of coming back to kids, I feel like most people aren't willing to suck at something long enough to get good at it.

Yeah.

Right? Like, like that's something that I firmly believe. Like so many times, like even my kids, like my daughter, when she first started playing basketball, she's like, I suck at it. I'm not good at it. Well, are you willing to suck at it long enough to where you can actually like suck a little bit less? And then maybe if you keep playing, you'll suck a little bit less. And then you might get to the point to where you suck so little, you're actually good at something.

Mm-hmm.

Right. And, and like that perseverance and that work ethic to where that's kind of how, like with our business, when we made the transition to starting this business, it's like, we know we're gonna suck at it. We're not gonna be great at probably on the social media side. We're not gonna do any of this stuff great, man. If, if we just suck a little bit less every day, Maybe at some point this will be a really, really awesome business. And that's kind of, I think, what sustained us through the last couple years.

Yeah, that's a great lesson because there's so many people, and especially the way we tend to coddle children these days, is, you know, they're given the participation trophies and, oh, you're great just as you are, you don't have to do anything, and just, you know, just go and do the activity but don't actually work that hard. So I think that's a great point, that you got to be willing to suck and realize you're not going to be great at it at first, but you got to put in the work and effort. Until you actually build up that skillset and those muscles so that you're actually decent at it and get better from there.

Well, it's not fun to suck at something, right? Like, it's not fun if you do something, you're like, I am absolutely terrible at this. But I feel like, again, like to your point with kind of the participation trophy, like generation and everything else, is that like, it's okay to struggle. Like, I think that that's something that we've built into like this highlight reel called social media. Is that we only see the great spots, right?

Yes.

And I think most people don't understand that it's okay to fail and it's okay to struggle and it's okay to go through that stuff. Now, yeah, you don't want to struggle your whole life. I get it. But I mean, without struggle, there's no growth. There's no character. There's, there's no lessons. And like, I worry that as we get kind of further along and more technology and things become kind of easier, that we're losing that. We're losing the, like, character to go and suck at something and to fail at it, but then to kind of pick yourself back up and go again. You know, like, I worry about— like, do you worry about that?

Yeah, for sure. One of the big realizations that I've had over the past couple of weeks is that suffering is actually part of the human condition in that it is probably the very nature of us because everyone is hurting in some capacity. Everyone is suffering in some way, and it's just part of who we are as a species. And we're all trying to elevate and rise above that, but I don't think we ever fully can. And so maybe that's just part of the journey that we're on in life is that that's where we learn and grow and we just have to accept and embrace it and not just think that, oh, we have to get past it right away and get to the elevated state or to where we're perfectly happy or just the goal that we're trying to reach, but just enjoy the journey. And that's a really hard concept to grasp. Um, and I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.

Yeah. Well, and that's, that's been one of the things. So for me, if, if, if, if we hop in a, in a car, in our, in our car and we're going on a road trip, my wife's grandparents live in Seattle, like an 8-hour drive. I'm the guy, Seth, that when we get in the car, I'm like, everybody go to the bathroom, grab whatever you want to eat or drink. Like, we ain't stopping, right? We're, we're, we're getting to the destination, right? My wife—

100%.

Yeah. My wife, She's like, let's stop here and go and sightsee. Let's, you know, what's that sign say? Let's, let's go there. Let's let the kids out and run around in the McDonald's playpen, whatever. And I'm like, no, like we're getting there. And, and I started thinking about it and I'm like, it's, it's so funny. Cause sometimes in life, like I find myself being the exact same way. Right. It's like you get so destination focused that you don't ever actually like have fun in the journey. And that's been something that I've tried to step back at as we've kind of gone through this process. It's like, man, just enjoy the ride. Your kids are young because there is part of it. It's like, man, our 4-year-old's just finally started going to preschool. Thank God. I've been waiting for that. And then it's like, man, that's kind of sad. Our last kids are now in preschool.

Yeah.

And so, I think as you get older, maybe you get a little more perspective, but I'm just like, I'm ready for it to slow down. I've been like, let's get the kids in school and let's get them out of the house and then let's golf and blah, blah. So much stuff that us guys, I think, really like to do. Like, once my kids are a little older and they're out of the house, they can leave me alone and I can finally golf or I can go hunt more or whatever it is.

Yeah.

And now I'm kind of getting to the age to where, like, I don't know, man. Like, I'm not really wanting it to go that fast anymore. I want to enjoy the journey more.

Yeah, totally. I've heard it said that expectation is the greatest cause of unhappiness. And I think there's a lot of truth in that because, like you said, when you're on a road trip or something, you just want to get there as opposed to just enjoying that journey to see where it leads. And the example, I guess, that I would use— so when I was in college, um, I was in a fraternity and, you know, there was a party coming up this weekend and we're setting all these expectations and this anticipation about it. Oh, it's going to be a crazy rager. It's going to be so much fun. And then it's like you're let down because it can't meet the expectations that you set up in your head, the buildup. And then there would be like a random night where me and my friends would go out on a Thursday night. Oh, let's just have a beer, you know? And it would turn into something crazy and we just had so much fun, like, Where did that come from? Like no expectations at all. And it just turned into something so fun and amazing. We still tell stories about it years later. And so I think that's how a lot of life is, you know?

Yeah. Well, and it's, it's, I don't know, because you'll, you'll hear people that will talk about the end goals. You got to have the end goals. You got to have, you got to have all that stuff way down the road laid out. And I understand that. I, and I agree with that. But sometimes, like, I worry that we get so focused on what we want our life to be like in 5 years that we have no life now.

Right.

And you start putting that out there and I don't know, like trying to balance all of that is something that I feel like I'm still not very good at, in all honesty. Like trying to balance, like, where do we want our business to be in 5 years? Yet, like, what type of stuff do we want to do right now while our kids are young? You know, and just trying to weigh all of that. Like, I think to me, that is honestly a challenge. I think You know, people talk about balance and it's, you know, I don't know how much I agree with balance because I think at certain points in your life, the scales are going to be tipped one way or the other, depending on what you're doing, right? Like maybe when your kids are young, like you've got to be mom, you've got to be dad, you've got to be more geared toward that. As they get older, maybe you can be more business. You can be a little bit more, you know, kind of what you want to do. And I think that, that so many people are like, oh, my life has no balance. It's like, well, maybe it's not supposed to. Like you said, um, I read, I read a book at one point. We all want balance. We all want happiness. We all want fulfillment, right? Like all the stuff we all want. But like, I don't think that that is part of our experience. Like, I don't think we were put here to just have a smooth sail. I think a big part of it is maybe upgrading our problems, right? Like I read in a book, The Subtle Art of Not Giving an F. I don't know what your policy is on cursing, but—

Oh, you can swear.

Yeah.

Mark Hansen. Great book.

Yeah. Yeah. But he talks about it, right? He's like, the guy who has no money and literally can't pay for food, he's got money problems. Warren Buffett, who has all the money you could ever want, like he has money problems, but they're not equal problems, right? Like the point of this may be to have better problems. And I've thought about that. Maybe as your business gets bigger, you have, you have, you still have problems, but hopefully they're better problems, right?

Yeah.

Like in life, you know, maybe your marriage is always going to have problems, but hopefully like your marriage at 20 years aren't the same problems that you had when you were dating and wondering if you should get married, right? Like hopefully they're better problems. And so I think that like for me, I've tried to keep that in perspective too. Like as you go through this, like I don't want to have a life with no problems because I know that's not real, right? Like I know I'm going to struggle. I know there's always going to be things, but like maybe they'll be a little bit better. Maybe the problems will be just a little bit better every, every year as I get a little better at this thing, right? Like maybe, maybe the problems will just be a little better.

Yeah, exactly. When I look back over the years in my own life and when I was an early entrepreneur and starting a business, You know, you're so set on these goals or trying to make this much money or get these clients or have these many, this many sales. And it's this goal and objective. But then when you step back and you look at it over the course of a decade or more and you're like, oh, the time when I actually enjoyed it the most was having the most fun. It was early on during the struggle. And when all of a sudden you made a little bit of money and in hindsight it was not a lot at all, but it, it set like an example for yourself of, oh, I can do this. And it was like a, like a mountain that you're getting over, or not even a mountain, just like a small hill. But it set this, this example of, oh, that's huge, and we can do this. And so it, it changes everything. And so when I look back, those are the times when I learned the most. And I look back the most fondly on them too.

Yeah. Well, and I think that Like as, as humans, everything becomes normal, right? Like after a certain period of time, like I remember when I started my podcast and it, it was, it was crazy cuz you, and, and I know, you know how this is, right? When you have a podcast and it's a pretty intimate thing, right? People get to know you probably way better than what they should, right? And yeah. Going through that. And when I hit 10,000 downloads, I, I remember just being like, I cannot believe that like this has been downloaded 10,000 times. I'm a guy who lives in the middle of nowhere and probably like, I don't know, maybe there's good stuff, maybe there's not, but there's really no reason for anybody to maybe listen to me, right? Like you have those thoughts and then you hit that number and you're like, okay, that's awesome. And now I look back at like that first milestone being like, that was so cool. You know, in business, you make your first sale and it's like that, that, oh my gosh, I can't believe that somebody actually bought something that I did, that I created, you know?

Sure.

And then as you get further along the line, obviously the goals change. But I'm with you, like, and, and we're still somewhat in that, like, with our direct-to-consumer meat business, right? Like, we're still a couple years in now. Like, there's still some of the stuff where it's like, yeah, we'll look back in a few years and laugh about having to do things this way or going through that. So we're still in that phase a little bit with there. But even, even, yeah, like the first time we sold out and it was like, oh my gosh, like we actually, like more people want this than what we have. That is amazing. You know, how cool is this process? You know? Good problem to have. Yeah. Yep, it is. And now, like, we sell out every month. Like almost like every single month we sell out of at least something. And, and like, you look back when you're sitting there being like, okay, we're going to put this out. And I like, please, dear God, let somebody buy it. Like, please. Like we, we just dumped our kids' college fund into starting this business. Like, please let us get it back. And yeah, it's, it's just been awesome.

Yeah. That brings a great point, brings up a great point as far as the, the animal side and living in nature, um, and your direct-to-consumer meat business. So being a rancher, having I'm assuming you have cattle and other animals. And a lot of people are so disconnected both from our food supply, both from nature itself, living in a much more urban environment. How would you recommend that someone tries to reconnect and get back to nature, to the wilderness, to kind of a more natural state of being if they don't have access to that like you do?

So one of the things that we've tried to do, like on our, on our social media page for our direct-to-consumer business is Like, try to show it because I get it. Like most people who live in an urban area, you can't like, and as much as I'm, I'm all about like, be self-sufficient and have, you know, raise your own food and know where your food comes from. And I'm, I'm a huge proponent of that, but I'm also a realist. And I know that like, look, if you're living in an apartment in LA, you're not gonna be able to raise your own beef.

Yeah.

Right? Like, I get it. You're probably not gonna be able to have your own garden. And so what we've really tried to focus on is like letting people who follow us kind of take the journey with us. So it's like, you may not be raising your own beef, you may not be, you know, raising your own pork or whatever, but at least maybe vicariously through our social media, you can kind of feel like you're part of the process.

Sure.

And so that's what we've really tried to do is, is to just kind of show it all. And sometimes it's annoying. Like my wife is the one who pretty much runs it. I'm like, Jess, like, why are we showing this or that? And she's like, because people like, They love it. They want to see like what goes on here on a daily basis. And I'm like, it's so stupid though. Like looking at pigs and doing an Instagram story seems so dumb to me because it's so normal to me. You know what I mean? And other people are like, we absolutely love like seeing the pigs and we love seeing the steers and we love seeing all this stuff. And I'm like, but it's so just like mundane to me. So that's like one of the things that I was like, okay, it's not like, this is completely different for so many people and it gives them a connection to their food.

Sure.

And, that's what we want. And so, honestly, that's been one big thing for us is just trying to keep people connected to their food, knowing exactly where it came from, how it's raised. And, I know it's not possible for everybody to do that on their own, but maybe somehow vicariously through what we post on social media, it at least allows that connection.

Yeah.

Because I worry as we lose the connection to our food, it's not good, right? I think we want to know where our food came from. We want to know how it's raised. We want to know that we're not going to be poisoned. We're not going to get some crazy illness or whatever from tainted stuff. You know what I mean? Like, there's just so much weird stuff that happens.

Yeah.

To where it's like, just take the journey with us, guys. See what it is. If you love our meat, you want to buy from us, great. If not, that's fine too. But follow along on the journey. Maybe you can put your cowboy hat on every once in a while when we do a cattle drive and feel like you're right there with us.

Yeah. No, that's a great point. And I think so many people, they want to live harmoniously. They want to live vicariously through what they see someone else do. And while they're interested in it and maybe fascinated by that different type of lifestyle, they don't necessarily want to make those changes or sacrifices so that they can do the same thing, especially if you're making a lot of money or just you like where you're at, but there's a fascination and an interest, but it's too big of a change for them to make. I've certainly seen that in my own life, um, in different things that I've been interested in over the years. So I think that that's a great point.

Well, and I would love everybody to have an opportunity to kind of live the way that we live and experience it. But I'm, again, like, I'm also a realist and I know that like a lot of people would not like our lifestyle. They would not like knowing that Walmart is 2 hours away. They would not like, you know, it's snowing here right now and I'm gonna have to go feed here pretty soon and it's not going to be fun or enjoyable or any of that. And so like, I, I look at stuff like that and I'm like, you know, it's not for everybody, but you know, it's, it's for us. And if we can kind of take people along on the journey with us, then hopefully it'll connect them to the outdoors more. Maybe it'll inspire somebody to go go for a hike that they wouldn't have normally gone on, right? Just to get out in nature. Maybe it'll inspire somebody to spend more time at a park and around trees and around, you know, maybe they'll visit Riggins, Idaho. I don't know. You know what I mean? Like, there's hopefully some way or another it'll inspire people to get outside more often, breathe fresh air, get out of their house, put the electronics down, and like actually go and be outside.

Yeah, exactly. One of the things that I've been trying to wrap my head around over the past year or so is when it comes to conservation and protecting the environment more and our wild areas. and just for animal species and plants and things like that. And COVID has brought up a lot of issues where people are trying to live a more rural lifestyle, where they want to get away and be more independent and self-sufficient. But that also has caused a lot of challenges where we are— this expansion where we're losing a lot of those wild spaces and places. And I'm not sure what the solution is there because as we continue to push outward from the cities. That's going to have negative consequences for a lot of different species as well as positive consequences for people being more in touch with the land. Do you have any suggestions there on how we balance that just as a society?

Man, that's a tough question because you see that with hunting, right? So it's kind of like the double-edged sword of hunting, which is You know, people like Joe Rogan have made archery elk hunting pretty, pretty normal, pretty mainstream. 5 years ago, like, I didn't hardly know anybody who did archery elk hunting. And now literally every person, it seems like, that listens to the Joe Rogan podcast is, is an archery elk hunter now. And so part of it is like, that's great.

Get—

getting outside, getting your own meat, hopefully. Uh, that part of it is awesome. The other side of it though, is that then it, you know, you get overhunting, you get stuff like that. And, and trying to balance that all, like, I'm, I'm glad I'm not important enough to make those types of decisions because I don't know how you do it. I really don't. You know, as, as we move out and we, and we've, we've witnessed this here big time, Seth, which is, so our tiny little town is not quite the well-kept secret that it once used to be. You know, as, as more and more people like, like they've had crazy lockdowns in I mean, we don't even have to get into that, but like Washington and Oregon who border us have had insane lockdowns for, for so long. And those people are just fleeing. They, they're just fleeing left and right to come to Idaho.

Yeah.

Which is again, awesome. They want to come here. They want to be a part of Idaho and, and all its beauty and everything else. That's great. But what happens is they, they leave those places and they come to a small town like this and they want the nature and they want everything that goes along with it, but yet There's also downsides, right? Like it might mean that some of our cows come through your yard, right? Because you're building where our cows have been coming for literally like 100 years. And so that is, that's creating some problems, right? Like as people expand and it's like, I don't want to live in Portland, but yet when I come to Riggins, Idaho, or, you know, wherever it may be, I still want that same type of life. And it's like, no, this is completely different. And so as you expand out and you start understanding like everything that comes along with that life, I'm all about people expanding and coming here. Like I would love to see my, my daughter's class have more kids in it, right? I'd love to see our town grow, but I worry about the growth at the expense of kind of what makes some of these places awesome.

Sure.

And so again, balancing that, like I'm not the damn Californians moving into Idaho. Like I'm, I'm not that person, right? Like I, I think Idaho's plenty big and, and there's lots of people who would say that. But I'm more along the lines of, you know, if you, if you come here, it's kind of like I would expect, like if I go to a different country, like I don't want to go to your country and be like, you need to be more American, right? Or go to California and be like, you need to be more Idaho. And so it's like, I hope that we can kind of keep the balance of like people that are coming in, shared values, things like that to kind of keep this thing rolling.

Yeah. What's interesting about that is the what made a place special, like a city, a town, a location, the draw there when so many people come, the size, the quaintness, the uniqueness of it. When it gets that much bigger, it ruins what made it so special and unique. And it's kind of like the bumper sticker I saw all over the summer, don't California my Texas. And I think that kind of just, just explained it, you know, because it's like everybody, they want out of a certain location because of either the rules, the tax laws, the regulations, whatever. And then they want to go to this place that doesn't have that, but then they're trying to bring all these other things with them to make it like where they came from. And it's like, wait a second, if you're going somewhere, accept where you are. And because that's why you're moving there and don't try to bring what you left with you because you're trying to get away from that.

Well, to me, it's insanity, right? Like it almost— okay, so I don't want to offend anybody.

That's okay.

But it's almost like a cancer, right? It's like this cancer takes over a state and absolutely ruins it. And then what does it do once that state is no longer like a host? It has to go find other places to take over. And that's the way I look at this sometimes is it's like, you know, don't come to Idaho.

Parasitic.

Yeah. And say that we need to increase tax rates on the rich people. Like the state's working just fine how it is, right? Like we're doing okay. You moved here because you can't afford to live there anymore. But yet you wanna move to a different place, implement the same policies that made it impossible for you to live there. Like, it just seems like it's insanity to me. I, I don't understand it. Like, like I said, like people wanna move to Idaho, they wanna take advantage of the low tax rates, you know, the rural living, you know, Texas, whatever. That's great. But like, don't go there and then like try to make it like the place you just fled from because the place you fled from is so terrible that literally you cannot survive there on $150,000 a year income or something like that. You know, and so that is the thing sometimes, like where you talk about expanding out and the balance of it is it's like, no, expand out, but like, like integrate yourself, go hang out in nature, like live more of a traditional lifestyle if you want to live in more of a traditional community, right? Like, don't, don't try to get like these crazy policies and everything else implemented that drove you away from where you were. Like, to me, it's just, it's just insanity. Like, I have a hard time comprehending it. Sure.

Yeah, no, I agree for sure. And that's One of the things, while I've always been an entrepreneur and a business owner, and I don't know that I would label myself a capitalist, but very much in that vein of free market and being able to grow and create and having the freedom to do that. However, this mindset of growth at all costs comes with a lot of downsides where it's just growth, growth, growth. That's not necessarily a good thing, like we were talking about earlier. That's one of the things I really like about Europe is when you go there is it's not this short-term mentality of we just have to build, build, build right now and grow. It's thinking so much long-term, like all the buildings. An old building is 500 years old or older. In the US, if a building is 100 years old, that's considered old. So it's just a very different mentality and there's pros and cons to both, obviously. But trying to balance that out, I think, is a challenge and I don't know what the solution is there.

Yeah, I don't either because it is, right? Like, I feel like What's weird, like politically, what I've noticed is like there used to be like one side was like pro-big business and pro-capitalism at all costs. And the other part was kind of like, you know, like anti-capitalist or anti-big business. And it almost seems like it's switching. Have you noticed that?

Yeah.

Like it's almost like I've noticed like some of these major tech companies now are supported by one party that used to kind of be anti-big conglomerate monopolized type businesses. And the other side is like, you need to stop like being so big.

I don't know.

It's weird. Like, I can't keep track of like all politics and like sides and everything else.

Sure.

I'm kind of with you though. Like the growth at all costs. I don't know that that's great. And even in your own life, right? Like, I don't know if you're just going to be like, I'm just going to grow at all costs. Like I'm going to leave my wife because she's in this backwards mindset. It's like, maybe like try to take her along with you or something. You know what I mean? Like, Like growth at all costs, I'm not sure is ever a great idea because you have to make such huge sacrifices and other things. It could be, you know, it could be pollution, right? It could be all kinds of different things if growth is the only thing. And that's what worries me about like kind of where we're headed because I'm like you, like I'm 100% a capitalist, but I also believe that there has to be restrictions on that. Like I'm 100%, I should say, in favor of like Going and doing and creating and building and making as much money as you can doing that. I'm all for that, but it also can't be at the expense of someone else or something else being hurt, you know, like pollution, that type of stuff. I don't know. That's a, it's another tough one, right? Like where do you fall on that? Like how do you feel like you could balance that?

For me, I guess the way I look at it is the regulations and things like that coming from the government or political entities or whatever, that's not the best way to handle it because they're always going to look out for their own self-interest. I think We just, as individuals, we have to think long-term and not just be so selfish or think about ourselves, where we're maximizing our own income or our own business, but look at, you know, our family, our community, and, and think much longer-term about it. So what, what is the outcome from this, not just for myself, but for everyone else? So we're thinking just more locally, I guess, and locally and bigger picture too, and not just being so, so one-dimensional about it. But again, I don't know where that balance is.

Well, no. And I even think that like our previous talk about like, as people expand and everything else, because there are a lot of people like in our little town that are like, don't let anybody else move in here. This is, you know, it's already too crowded. And it's like that way of thinking is not thinking long-term because people are going to move here. So then it becomes a question of, okay, we know this is going to happen. Like, how do we facilitate good growth then? And I think that that's where sometimes, like, rather than just resisting the inevitable, like, how do we understand, like, maybe how to point this in the right direction? That's the way I look at, you know, like with your business, like hopefully your business is always gonna grow, but at the same time, is there something to where, you know, you can do it in a way that's smart, responsible, all of those things? I don't know, because there's always probably gonna be somebody there that's like, I don't care about any of this stuff. I just, I just want to make more money, right? Like, I don't care what it takes, what it costs. I don't care about the rivers. I'll be dead by the time, but until between now and then, I'm going to have a bunch of, you know, hookers and blowers, whatever. Like, I don't, you know what I mean? Like, there's going to be people that do that and there probably has to be some oversight, right?

Exactly. Yeah, for sure. Derek, living, living in a rural area and on a farm, on a ranch, what's the biggest lesson that you've learned through that experience?

I think one of the biggest lessons that I've learned living this way is I kind of feel like it's like no one's going to come save you when you live like this. And it doesn't mean that you don't have community neighbors that are unwilling to help you. But so often, I think when you live very rural, you find yourself in situations To where no one's gonna come save you. Like, I remember I was out, we call it horn hunting. Some people call it shed hunting, whatever. And I was in my Can-Am.

What's that? Shed hunting. Yeah, totally.

Yep. So I was in my Can-Am and I see this, this big drift and I'm like a long ways from our house up in the mountains. See this big drift and it's, I can make it through that. And if I can't, like my winch should be able to reach to that tree. So I'll pull myself out. So I Hit it, get buried. Absolutely buried. Now I'm real smart and didn't bring a shovel with me. And so I was like, no big deal. I'll winch to this tree. I pull my winch out. I kid you not. I was like a foot short of being able to get to the tree.

Oh, no.

So then I'm like, okay, I have no shovel. My winch won't reach. I am like an hour's walk away from my house. And it was one of those moments of like, no one's coming to save you. You don't have cell phone coverage. There's nobody with you. You're like, basically you have 2 options. Number one is figure it out, or number 2, you sit here and die, right? Like, that's pretty much your 2 options. And like, there's beauty in that though, right? There's beauty in not having a cell phone and being like, I have to sit down and I have to figure this out. I actually, there's no one I can call. I can't call a cop. I can't call ambulance. I can't call a friend, a family member. Any of that. The only thing that I can do is I can sit here and I can figure this out. And so what do you do in that situation, right? When no one really is going to come and save you, you tend to figure it out. And so that again is exactly what I did. What figuring it out meant is that I didn't have the ability to winch to the tree. I didn't have the ability to do any of that. And then I ended up having to walk all the way off of there, come down, get a shovel, drive back up to where, as far as I could drive, like a pickup truck, and then walk the rest of the way up, dig myself out. And it was a whole day deal. But again, it was kind of one of those things where nothing was— I knew no one was coming to save me. I knew that there was no way that I could get around it. So you just have to figure it out. So, and that's like a daily occurrence, not maybe that extreme, but like when you live rural, when you live kind of a ranching farming type lifestyle, It's very common that every day, like, you have to figure stuff out because you don't have a lumber store 5 minutes away. You don't have stuff like, you got to figure it out. No one's coming to save you. So that's been a huge lesson, I think, since moving back.

So basically self-sufficiency.

Absolutely.

Got it. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I think that is a lesson that everyone, no matter where they are in life, could stand to learn from, just because with this expectation of somebody's going to take care of us, that's not a good thing necessarily, in my opinion. So I like that a lot.

Oh, I totally agree.

Yeah. Derek, uh, let's get into your podcast a little bit. Love to hear a little bit more about Primal King and, you know, your mission there and also the business coaching that you're doing because I know those kind of go hand in hand together.

Yeah. So with the, like, the podcast and kind of the, the movement that I've tried to build around that is knowing that, like, having kind of like a, uh, maybe more of a primal sense of living, but also still striving for success. Like those things don't have to be mutually exclusive. And I think that that's something that a lot of us think is like, oh, if you want to live more of a traditional lifestyle, and what I mean by that is things like being self-sufficient, you know, things like thinking that it's cool to like be married to the same person and raise kids and have a family and buy land and try to be, you know, again, self-sufficient. Like a lot of those things seem to not be that valuable anymore. And so often the times that you find people who do feel that way, they're kind of like the very rural people who don't also maybe want to build businesses or they don't want to maybe create social impact or things like that. They just kind of want to be left alone and live their little traditional lifestyle. And so what I've kind of sought to do is to be able to bring those people together, people that maybe have more traditional sense of what a family looks like and how kids should be raised and how you want to live. And so that's really been kind of the premise of starting the podcast was like liberation. First thing is mindset. So that's the liberation side. I grew up very rural, right? Very small town. A lot of people thought that the only way that you could ever have money is if you screw people over and you must be an evil person if you have money. Well, then I get into the software world and work with a lot of entrepreneurs and it's like, you know what? There's a lot of amazing people that have a ton of money. They're great people. And it kind of like, boom, like mindset shift. And so that was like one of the big first things of like the aha of like, okay, not everyone who has money is evil. It's okay to have money and you can actually use money for a lot of good. Then I get into the lifestyle. I realized the lifestyle I was living, it wasn't the lifestyle that I knew I wanted for myself or for my kids. And so I really try to encourage people like through the podcast, through The people I have on is like, take a look at your lifestyle. Is, are you living how you want to live? And unfortunately, I think a lot of people would answer that question no. And if you're not, then why aren't you? Why aren't you living the lifestyle? Do you understand that you have a limited amount of time in this world? You have a limited amount of time that you literally can be here. Why would you spend it living a lifestyle that you don't want to live? And so really just kind of questioning that and getting people to stop and think about that. And then lastly is legacy. Doing things that are bigger than us. Coming back to a ranch that's 5th generation, this ranch is so much bigger than me, Seth. I technically own the ranch right now, but this is something that hopefully will go on to my kids and their kids and everything else. And so, how often do we get so stuck in the day-to-day grind that we don't ever think about anything bigger than us? We don't ever actually think about, is what I'm doing now going to leave an impact? Is it going to help people? Is it going to create any type of a legacy? Or am I in such a scarcity mindset that the only thing I'm worried about right now Is making enough money to pay a rent and to pay my bills. And most of us live that way. I know I have a lot of my life, like, like we're not worried about anybody but ourselves. And it's, it's literally like, what can I do to get by until the next paycheck? And then after that, what can I do to get by, by until maybe I get a bonus? And like, there's no legacy. There's nothing bigger than ourselves. It's literally us just worrying about what we can do to just simply get by. And I, I, I hope that by people listening to the podcast, They'll get out of the line of thinking of like so small to where they'll be like, you know what? I can do anything. Like literally. And I know it sounds stupid. I know it sounds cliché, but like if I could walk away from a job, move back, be remote, do all of this stuff that we've wanted to do, there's nothing special about me. Like anybody can do it. It just, it takes a little courage. It takes like liberating your mindset, possibly getting outta scarcity, moving more toward abundance and just doing it at that point. Like, I don't know. I just hope that through the podcast, there's enough inspiration, maybe enough stories, enough perspective to kind of help people shift the way that they think a little bit.

Yeah, that's great. And then tell me a little bit more about your ranching operation as far as the direct-to-consumer meat.

So one of the things that I talked about earlier was my dad, um, when he died 5 years ago, and it will have been 5 years in December, so the last year that he was alive, 2016. So we ship all of our calves out in November every year in the fall. And that's when you get like your one big paycheck for the year. When you're a rancher, you sell all your calves, they give you what hopefully is a pretty big check, and then they take all the calves away. And the very last year, my dad had a rough year. You know, calves weren't as high, blah, blah, blah. So I'll never forget Seth sitting there, and it was me and my stepmom and him. And my stepmom, you know, had just gotten the check or whatever, and she was just like, Dave, what are we going to do? That was my dad's name. Dave, what are we going to do? And I remember the look on my dad's face and he was just like, I don't know. I don't know what we're going to do. Because again, like you or I may be in a business, we could maybe run a promotion or we could, you know, do something to maybe sell some more, whatever, hit our email list or whatever. Right. Well, you can't do that when you're a rancher.

Have a lunch. Yep.

Yeah, exactly. But when you're a rancher, like you can have the best calves and our calves here are historically some of the best calves, you know, cows, calves that there are around because of the water and the way they're raised and the feed and everything else.

Right.

But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how great your calves are because they're still a market. It's a commodity, right? Like it's $1.50 a pound. It's $1.20 a pound. It doesn't matter how great they are. It just matters what the market is at. And so I remember sitting there feeling Just freaking horrible. My, like, again, my dad is, well, he was an old cowboy. He, he didn't talk about a lot of that stuff, but I could just see like the dejection in his eyes, like the, the whole, oh shit, like, what are we going to do? And then turns out a few weeks later, he has a massive heart attack and he died.

Hmm.

And so I remember sitting there being like, I don't want to, I don't want to go through that. In fact, it pisses me off. Honestly, like we started this business because it was personal. It pisses me off that someone like my dad can work his whole life, raise the best calves possible, and still not make any money in that business. I mean, like work his ass off every day.

Yeah.

You know, he's 64 years old when he passed away and never hardly had 2 nickels to rub together because of the business that he was in. Now, yes, some people would probably say, He chose that business and that's fine. I get that. But at the same time, there's not a whole lot of businesses that you could be literally raising the best product and still get absolutely screwed for it outside of the ranching industry. And so we were like, you know what? This is personal. We're not gonna be able to take down the big 4 companies, the corporate beef monopolies. You know, there's basically 4 of them that control about 90% of the market share, 85 to 90%. So that means if you go to a store and you buy beef, it probably went from one of those 4 companies.

Yep.

So it's like, we're not going to be able to take them down, but we can kind of take a war to them because I believe that it's the price fixing, it's the monopolization of the beef industry that, I don't know, it led to a lot of problems like with my family growing up. And so it's like, you know what we're going to do? We're going to, we're not going to sit here and bitch about it. We're not going to sit here and complain about how unfair it is that these big companies are taking advantage of people like my dad. And a lot of family friends that we have, we're gonna start just going direct to the consumer.

Mm-hmm.

And we're gonna try to do our best to take it right at these people. And again, like it, we would have to 1,000 over our business, right? To ever even impact them. But what we can do is we can educate people. Hopefully we can make people understand that, that there is a different way that you can get your beef a much better way, a much safer way, a much cleaner way. than what you're doing. And all the while, like, if we can gain ground on these people, Seth, like, if, if we can, if we can build a coalition of people who are interested in buying meat that's made in America, and, and we can take a small percentage out of those people who are screwing over farmers and ranchers, we'll consider this business a massive success.

Got it.

You know, if we can buy calves from other ranchers around here at a decent price and help them, this will be a massive success. Outside of that, if we end up making money on it, then great. That'll be awesome. But it's so much more like personal for us starting the business. And I think that that honestly is why we've had success is because this hasn't just been a money grab, right? It's been something that's been personal to us and it's, it's been so mission-focused that it helps you get through some of the crap that you go through when you're starting any type of new business. Yeah, exactly.

And I think anytime you can take on the big boys and be the underdog, there's something that's very appealing, at least just from the American ethic of being the underdog, being the smaller player, and trying to, trying to win against all odds. And other, other than going direct to consumer, are there any other differentiating factors that is separating you apart from the bigger players? I know, you know, there's a lot of, there's getting to be a lot more direct-to-consumer companies, especially in the food industry and meat especially, that are really differentiating based on the quality or, you know, they're grass-fed, grass-finished, like ButcherBox, US Wellness Meats, Wild Pastures, and, you know, there's others as well. But what other differentiating factors do you guys have?

Yeah. So, one of the things that we decided to do was to try to thread this very small needle. So, if you talk to most people, they want extremely healthy beef, right? But then, if you have ever eaten grass-fed beef, it typically has texture like boot leather and kind of tastes like it also. In my opinion, it's just not very good. Like, like straight grass-fed beef is not very good. Now, what a lot of companies do is they'll tell you it's grass-fed, but it won't be grass-finished. It'll be grain-finished. So a lot of these companies are like, oh, we're grass-fed. But they actually finish with grain because straight grass-fed, grass-finished is typically not very good meat. It just doesn't taste good. And so what we decided to do is it was like, okay, how do we make it be extremely natural, healthy, all of that stuff? But yet also make it taste awesome. So, the way that we decided to do it was with non-GMO barley. So, rather than using corn, GMO corn, people use oats and fillers and all this type of stuff. I mean, it's crazy actually what people inject into their steers and into the cows to get them to grow really fast. So, by doing barley, it takes much longer of a process for us to do it. But what it does is it gives you the most amazing marbling and fat. The taste of the fat, like maybe it'll gross people out, but I love like the outside of a ribeye, a little fat in there, right? But it gives it like the most amazing texture and taste, but yet we didn't pump it full of steroids or all this other junk that happens, the oats, the fillers, the corn, all of that type of stuff. So, I think that most people don't understand, and this is maybe something that we've had to try to do to help educate people, is that not all grain-finished beef is the same. Right? Like, if you're pumping things full of corn and all this garbage, you know, whatever else, that's way different than if you're using like a super clean barley.

Yeah.

And so, like I said, trying to thread that needle is I think what has really been able to separate us from so many other companies because we raise our— like our calves and everything are raised at like 8,000 feet elevation all through the summer. They're up there with mountain springs, belly-high grass. Like, it's the most amazing landscape that a cow could ever live in. But then, once we come Bring them down and they're about a year old, we start them on the finish program. They, they, you know, natural grass hay obviously, and then some barley to finish it out and give them that marbling. And so, like I said, we really try to kind of thread that needle to make it taste amazing, but yet still be like super, super healthy.

Got it. And are you doing anything as far as regenerative agriculture goes in order to kind of help conserve the landscape and just the, um, the pastures and, uh, composting and all of that sort of thing?

Yeah. So what's, what's wild is we've been doing this regenerative farming for like 100 years, but it just never had like a cool name, right? Like, like a lot of ranchers and a lot of ranchers do do that, but it's, you know, you get like, what's Joel Salatin, I believe is his name, who's made that a pretty big thing.

Yep.

But I mean, you almost have to like, yeah, the carnivore guy. Yeah. So you almost like have to do regenerative farming and ranching with cows or else they won't have anything to eat and then they all die and then you go outta business, right? So you kind of have to do that.

Yeah.

But yeah, so like what we do is they start at about 1,200 feet in the spring. We, we take them up, they kind of work their way up to about 2,500 to 3,000-foot elevation. And then we do this, it's, it's, it's a famous, Seth, I'm telling you, this is like famous cattle drive. We call it Over the Top.

Okay.

And we take 'em from there all the way up over about 8,000 feet and drop 'em back down into about 6,000 feet. And so this is where we're all on horses. Just, just one of the coolest trips you could ever do. Moving like 350, 400 head of cows up over the Rocky Mountains and blah, blah, blah. You know, it's super cool. Like, you guys can check it out on social media if you want to.

Yeah.

Um, but we bring them all up and then they, they spend the whole summer up there. And then in the fall, they come back down kind of behind where our house is. We have fields and stuff up in the mountains there. So they make basically this big huge circle every year. And so it gives everything time to regenerate, grow back, you know, um, the manure and everything else obviously helps with fertilization. So yeah, it's, it's kind of like a big circle that they go in.

Wow. That's amazing. That would be a lot of fun and a great experience to kind of go on a drive like that.

I've had people reach out and be like, I'll pay you to come on that trip. And we're always kind of like, ah, it's kind of, I mean, it's kind of dangerous. Like if you don't know how to ride horses pretty well. Sure. I mean, you're on like side of steep mountains and stuff a lot. So we've always been a little hesitant, but we're always like, man, if we ever wanted to just do a cash grab, we could probably throw it out and be like, all right, it's $5,000. You get to go do some old Wild West shit or something like that. You know what I mean? Like it'd probably be a fun time.

Especially with the popularity of shows like Yellowstone, where that really has brought it to the forefront and people are so much more interested in it. I mean, that's, you know, one of my very favorite shows right now. Um, so there's, I think there's definitely a lot of interest there from a lot of people that wouldn't necessarily have even thought about it before.

Yeah. Well, the, the funny thing is, so Yellowstone started getting popular, right? And I, I have to tell the story. My wife hates it cuz it embarrasses her a little bit, but so that, that show started. And my father-in-law started watching it. And at one point he's, he's like, you know, I remember telling Jess when she went from Alaska down to Idaho to go to college, that's where we met. We met in college. She said, I remember, you know, joking with her being like, yeah, go down to Idaho and meet some, some, you know, some, some boy that has a big ranch in Idaho or something like that. And she's like, and he's like, but when I told her that, I thought it would be more like Yellowstone and not like what you guys have going on. I was like, really, man? Like, are you serious?

Thanks.

Yeah, exactly. Uh, but no, like Yellowstone's made it even more popular, like the, the Wild West stuff and cowboy stuff, which is cool, right? Because I mean, like, well, like, so 2 weeks ago we took our cows down the highway back to where they go in the winter where they have their babies. And we took 'em down, like the only major highway that runs north and south through Idaho is Highway 95. And so the road was shut down. And then once they kind of let traffic go, everyone's like going by, like taking pictures and like videoing it. And it's so weird because people are just so fascinated by something that is so everyday life for us. Sure. And, but it is kind of cool because you're like, you know, we get to do something that so many people find so cool. But, you know, I don't know. It is. And Yellowstone come out and it's like, you know, that's, that's kind of what we do except for like all the murdering and stuff like that. We don't really, you know, we don't really do that. But, but I mean, outside of that, it's pretty much the same, right?

Got it.

Yeah.

So it wouldn't be, that different as someone is growing up on a farm or a very rural environment and they're going to New York City for the first time and taking pictures of the Empire State Building and the Brooklyn Bridge and, you know, all of that. So yeah, totally get it. Makes sense. Derek, is there a book or books that have had a major impact on your life over the years?

Oh man. Um, so honestly, the, the Mark Manson one, um, The Subtle Art of Not Giving an F, that, that to me was just so refreshing because it wasn't your same old, same old self-development stuff, you know? And it just had a couple of things in there about beliefs and things like that that was like, wow, that's really insightful. And just put in such a different way that I felt like I connected with it. So that was one of the books for sure. I mean, outside of that, like there's some really, really good business books. Think Bigger, I think, is a really good business book that I've read. Yeah. Gosh, I love to read, so there's probably too many to go through, honestly.

Yeah, no, that's great. We'll definitely add those into the show notes. Other than your own, do you have a favorite podcast?

Oh man, I'm a podcast junkie, so I love all kinds of podcasts. I mean, I like Joe Rogan. Honestly, a lot of times they're too long for me, but Some of the stuff that he talks about's just probably off the wall enough that I find it interesting. Tom Bilyeu, Impact Theory, huge fan of that one. School of Greatness with Lewis Howes. I like that one. Just trying to name a couple here. Yeah.

No, those are great. Yeah.

Basically, I love podcasts that make me think. Yep. And like challenge my beliefs. So like sometimes it's political podcasts, sometimes it's self-help podcasts. Just, I love like getting done with a podcast and being like, you know what, there's one or two things there that actually challenge what I believe or what I think. And so really, like any podcasts that do that, I know a lot of people like novels or thrillers, crime stuff. I'm not huge into like kind of the entertainment type podcasts. I'm more, I really like ideas and business strategies and self-help type stuff, I guess.

Yeah, no, I'm the same there for sure.

And sports. I love the Colin Cowherd podcast. I listen to that all the time.

Oh, great. Derek, some of the things that we've talked about as far as, you know, kind of getting back to the land and living a simpler lifestyle and just lifestyle design, um, do you have any advice for listeners if this is something that they're interested in and want to do, but their spouse isn't on board?

So I feel like number one is understand that trust is earned and not given. And I feel like one of the reasons why my wife was on board with this is because I had built up enough trust capital to where she believed me when I said that we would be okay. And again, like, I hope that doesn't come off as arrogant, but I try to, I try the best that I can, Seth, to be somebody that if I say something like it means something. Maybe that comes back to the old school stuff. Yep. To where like, if I tell you, Jess, like—

Stick to your word.

Yeah. Jess, we're going to do this and we're going to be okay. She's like, okay, I believe you. And like, we've— so I bring her on to my podcast a fair amount. And like, we talk about that type of stuff because I feel like if, if you're a guy right now, let's say, let's just take men. If you're a guy who repeatedly tells your wife something, I'm gonna lose weight, and then you never do. You tell your wife, I'm gonna— I'm going to get a better job, and you never do. You know, honey, I'm going to— I'm going to provide for our family, and you never do. Then when you come to her and say, hey, I have this big, huge, holy cow, life-changing decision that I want us to do, she's going to be like, man, you've never done anything you've told me you were going to do. Why should I be on board with this? And so I'm a big proponent, like within marriage, of if you want to be able to do these crazy holy cow types of things, you better have some trust capital built up. You better be a person who is trustworthy when you say, babe, it's going to be okay. She says, yeah, I believe you. I don't know what you got going on. I don't know how you think it's going to be okay, but I believe you. To me, that is powerful. And I think that years of us, I mean, we've been married now, we've been married for almost 15 years, been together for like 20. Like I said, since our first year in college. And over that time, I've done a lot of stupid stuff. But the one thing I feel like I can, I can, I can, I can say with my wife is that if I tell her something, like, I mean it and she believes me. And so we have that trust to where this stuff comes up. She's like, no, I believe you. I'll go along with it if you think that that's what's best for our family. And I know not everybody's spouse is going to be that way, but also a lot of people, a lot of people's spouse won't be that way because you haven't built up that trust capital to a way to where you should be believed when you say that.

That's great advice. Thanks. What is one piece of advice, final piece of advice you would give to our audience?

Do it. Just do it.

That's it.

I mean, there's been so many times in my life to where I've been terrified to take a chance. When I went back to working with Russell, so the first time I worked for Russell, the first few years, it ended terribly, absolutely terribly. Like merchant accounts got shut down, people couldn't get paid. And so when I wanted to go back to working with him, like prior to ClickFunnels launching, again, my wife was like, it didn't end very well the last time you went back. And it was like, I think it'll be different this time though. So I'm just going to do it. And so I did it. And like when we went to move, like we thought about it and it was like, should we do it? Should we just do it? Because I feel like so much more is lost in being scared than taking courageous action, right? Like, I really believe that, and I don't think anybody could ever convince me otherwise. Starting a business is scary. Do it. You know what I mean? Like lifting weights for the first time after getting fat and out of shape for 10 years after school or whatever. It's scary, right? It's going to hurt, but do it anyways. Like, there's so many things to me to where I look back and it's like, if I could If I could challenge or encourage people to do one thing, it would be like that thing that you keep thinking you should do, but you keep not doing, like, do it. And everything else will fall together after that. There's a reason why you feel called to do something. If it's starting a business, if it's getting healthier, if it's getting married when you're not sure, like, I believe that, like, if you feel called to do something, you absolutely must do it. Because the one thing that I know for me I never want to get to the end of my life and to be laying on my deathbed wondering what would've happened if I would've just done it. And that was one of the reasons that made us move back to the ranch. I remember having this, this conversation with my wife, like, if, if we don't do this, there will come a day to where I look back right now and I'll be pissed at myself for letting fear hold us back from doing this. If we go up there and we fail and we have to sell the ranch and we go bankrupt or whatever, I can live with that. I can live with failure. But what I can't live with is regret. And so again, like when it comes to those types of things, just do it. And at least you won't have regrets. You may have failures, you may have bankruptcies, you may have whatever else. I mean, God forbid, think I haven't had any bankruptcies, but I mean, who knows the way I go? You never know. I don't know. But no, the reality is, is that like, I know what I won't have, Seth, is I, at least I hope every day and I pray every day that like I won't have regrets when I get to the end and I'm laying there, hopefully in a bed surrounded by my family. I can, I can be like, you know what? I did this thing called life full out. I didn't not do something because I was scared. I did not do something because someone was gonna say some stupid shit on social media about me. Like, hopefully I can, I can with a clear conscience be like, I did it. I did everything I could. And if, if that's the advice that I could pass on, like, just do it. Like, don't worry about what people say. Just freaking do it. And then don't worry about regrets.

That's great advice. And I think that growth only happens on the edge of your comfort zone. And so pushing past that and just living a life without regrets and listening to your own intuition in your heart. That's fantastic advice. So thank you for sharing that, Derek. This has been so much fun. I really appreciate your time. Where can our audience go to learn more about you online?

Yeah, so I'm pretty active on, on the gram, on Instagram, um, @primal.king. Um, so on Instagram, it's just @primal.king. Um, websites, uh, PrimalKing.com. Podcast pretty much anywhere people can find podcasts, you know, iTunes, Spotify, blah blah blah, all of those. Just search for the Primal King Podcast. So yeah, I mean, probably the most active spot though is Instagram.

Great, Derek. Thanks so much. Really appreciate your time today. It's been a lot of fun. And for all you out there, until next time, stay wild.

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 you do just that. Check us out at rewildgear.com.