STAY TUNED * STAY FOCUSED * STAY MOTIVATED
Dec. 3, 2024

Firefighter Jermol Edwards Savings Lives After Service

Firefighter Jermol Edwards Savings Lives After Service
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Season 3

What does it take to balance the demands of a first responder with the entrepreneurial spirit of a media mogul? Join us as Jermol Edwards shares his inspiring journey from New Jersey roots to a multifaceted life as a firefighter, Air Force veteran, and visionary entrepreneur. Listen as Jermol recounts his compelling story of honoring his late grandfather through his military service and how a choice at a recruiting office set him on an unexpected path. Through candid reflections, we explore the transformative power of military discipline and resilience, alongside the intense camaraderie amongst servicemen that shaped Jermol's character and leadership.

Ever wondered about the emotional toll of being a firefighter? Jermol provides an intimate look at the stark realities of firefighting, detailing the adrenaline of battling flames while confronting the emotional weight of emergency response. His stories highlight the impact of trauma on first responders and the necessity for mental health support. From heart-wrenching rescues to the emotional challenges of desensitization, Jermol's experiences underscore the importance of peer connections and resilience, painting a vivid picture of the sacrifices and rewards in this noble profession.

Beyond the firehouse, Jermol’s entrepreneurial ventures with 24 Media showcase his dedication to impactful content creation. As we explore his balancing act between firefighting and fostering a media empire, Jamal offers invaluable insights on structuring productivity without burning out. Tune in to hear his strategic vision for podcasting, from supporting diverse podcasters to aspirations of building a school for budding content creators. This episode promises heartfelt and passionate discussions on authenticity, connection, and the pursuit of meaningful interactions both in personal life and through the creative lens.

Jermol's IG: https://www.instagram.com/spreadjerms?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==


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Website: www.giveusashot.network


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Episode Powered By Act Now Education

Chapters

00:31 - Firefighter and Entrepreneur

10:55 - Transformation and Self-Discovery Through Military Service

21:32 - Impact of Trauma on First Responders

28:30 - First Responder Tolerance and Trauma

38:54 - Impactful Moments in Firefighting Careers

45:32 - Entrepreneurship and Firefighting Balancing Act

54:24 - Building Consistency in Content Creation

01:06:48 - The Future of Podcasting and Authenticity

01:13:54 - Authentic Connection and Appreciation

Transcript
WEBVTT

00:00:01.643 --> 00:00:02.766
Warriors fall in.

00:00:02.766 --> 00:00:04.089
It's time for formation.

00:00:04.089 --> 00:00:10.528
So, folks, today I have a very, very inspirational guest, at least from my opinion, anyways.

00:00:10.528 --> 00:00:12.353
This gentleman is a firefighter.

00:00:12.353 --> 00:00:23.992
He's also a co-founder of 24 Media, which is a branding and marketing agency, and I think, at the end of the day, being a podcaster, military veteran, full-time government worker.

00:00:24.092 --> 00:00:26.458
For myself, it's a juggling act.

00:00:26.458 --> 00:00:29.285
Oh, and I didn't mention also, too, being a father, a family man.

00:00:29.285 --> 00:00:43.432
It can be quite tedious to juggle everything, but the gentleman that I have with me today is going to share his journey and some of his insights, and just everything from firefighting to owning a business and entrepreneurship.

00:00:43.432 --> 00:00:46.061
So I have Jamal Edwards with me today.

00:00:46.061 --> 00:00:49.011
Thank you, sir, for joining me, thank you for having me.

00:00:49.011 --> 00:00:51.784
I'm really interested in learning more about you.

00:00:51.784 --> 00:01:09.768
I mean, I followed you on Instagram, I see your posts and your stories and everything like that, but I really haven't gotten two to three tiers deep into who you are, where your journey started, just found out that you're also an Air Force veteran too, so go Army with that right.

00:01:09.768 --> 00:01:19.762
But anyway, I just want to give you an opportunity to share your journey into what it was like in the Air Force and how you eventually became a firefighter.

00:01:20.944 --> 00:01:30.841
Yeah, so I mean, at the end of the day I'm just a kid from Jersey, Grew up right outside of Philadelphia, bounced back and forth between my dad and my grandfather who lived in upstate New York.

00:01:30.841 --> 00:01:34.575
So most of my elementary years a lot of back and forth.

00:01:34.575 --> 00:01:44.045
And then, once I hit about middle school, I stayed in Jersey permanently, just me and my dad living above a pawn shop in the urban streets of New Jersey just trying to make it happen.

00:01:44.045 --> 00:01:47.072
You know, grits for breakfast, lunch and dinner, that type of deal.

00:01:47.072 --> 00:01:53.591
And as I got older, graduated high school, I tried college, I tried all that.

00:01:53.591 --> 00:01:58.108
I got in a bunch of trouble, you know, and very cliche, nothing special.

00:01:58.108 --> 00:02:02.243
My grandfather had pushed me to join the Air Force.

00:02:02.243 --> 00:02:05.132
I mean, he knew ahead of time I needed a reset button.

00:02:05.132 --> 00:02:12.764
My grandfather was Army but he pushed me to join the Air Force and because I didn't want to listen to nobody, I wanted to join the Marines.

00:02:13.225 --> 00:02:23.197
So in Haddon Heights in New Jersey, old historical town, the recruiting office was in this old multi-use building.

00:02:23.197 --> 00:02:36.512
The Air Force recruiter and the Marine recruiters were in the same building, across the hallway from each other, and I would go in there and I would talk to staff Sergeant Holcomb and he'd rile me up and do all this stuff.

00:02:36.512 --> 00:02:48.757
And, uh, I would see Sergeant Caswell, uh, shout out to Cas he, uh, he also lives in North Carolina, now retired, but, um, I would talk to him in passing and he would always like I come over to the Air Force, I don't want to go over there.

00:02:48.757 --> 00:02:58.364
You know well, I remember the day I was supposed to go sign my name to get ready for the delayed entry program and get ready for MEPs and you know, do the actual sign my life away.

00:02:58.364 --> 00:03:02.225
I showed up and Sergeant Hulk, staff Sergeant Holcomb, was not there.

00:03:02.225 --> 00:03:03.586
Door was locked, lights were off.

00:03:03.586 --> 00:03:06.627
Sergeant Caswell said, hey, you looking for Holcomb.

00:03:06.627 --> 00:03:08.209
I said, yeah, I'm supposed to sign.

00:03:08.209 --> 00:03:09.849
You know, get this thing going now.

00:03:09.849 --> 00:03:14.592
You know I've been talking to him for weeks and I've been on the fence and and he's not here.

00:03:14.592 --> 00:03:16.293
I have the date, I have it written down.

00:03:16.293 --> 00:03:18.054
This is the day, it's the time he's not here.

00:03:18.054 --> 00:03:21.435
Oh, yeah, he hasn't been here since yesterday and today.

00:03:21.435 --> 00:03:25.997
You know, I think he had like a family emergency and he said, ah, what do you want to join the Marines for?

00:03:25.997 --> 00:03:26.677
You know those idiots.

00:03:26.677 --> 00:03:27.937
And I said I don't know.

00:03:27.937 --> 00:03:33.819
Just, marines are bad ass man.

00:03:33.819 --> 00:03:34.401
You know, you see it on TV.

00:03:34.401 --> 00:03:36.542
And uh, I ended up talking to him for about an hour and, right on the spot, just signed it.

00:03:36.542 --> 00:03:39.002
Like you know, I just signed I don't know what nothing.

00:03:39.002 --> 00:03:40.082
It was nothing.

00:03:40.082 --> 00:03:45.045
There was like not rays of shining light, there wasn't like the parting of the sea, nothing spectacular happened.

00:03:45.045 --> 00:03:45.746
I just said you know what?

00:03:45.746 --> 00:03:47.187
Yeah, I'm already drove all the way down here.

00:03:47.187 --> 00:03:48.487
I'm signing something.

00:03:48.788 --> 00:04:04.415
So I signed to the Air Force and go through that whole process and you know my grandfather had passed and things like that, and so I was super motivated to kind of honor him and do this thing the right way.

00:04:04.415 --> 00:04:10.538
And so I was super motivated to kind of honor him and do this thing the right way.

00:04:10.538 --> 00:04:13.582
And so, it's funny, I get to the MEPS program and MEPS so much has changed.

00:04:13.582 --> 00:04:19.206
It's like 12 hours of you in your underwear getting poked and prodded and a bunch of questions asked and it's a terrible process.

00:04:19.206 --> 00:04:21.869
But you know, I take the ASVAB, I score really good.

00:04:21.939 --> 00:04:24.588
And the guy said hey, we need space operation engineers.

00:04:24.588 --> 00:04:25.843
I said what is that?

00:04:25.843 --> 00:04:26.925
He goes.

00:04:26.925 --> 00:04:30.043
You just sit in a warehouse and build missiles and satellites and shout out to this guy.

00:04:30.043 --> 00:04:31.048
I wish I remembered his name.

00:04:31.048 --> 00:04:34.060
He did not want to be at wherever desk.

00:04:34.060 --> 00:04:44.312
They stuck him in flipping binders and telling because when you take your ASVAB test it's just a proficiency test, so based on your score you're only eligible for certain jobs.

00:04:44.312 --> 00:04:49.661
I'm guessing this is the way it works in all branches, but I'm just saying this is how it was in the Air Force.

00:04:49.661 --> 00:04:53.550
So they start with what they need, but they can't make you take a job.

00:04:53.550 --> 00:04:57.367
They let you pick, but you can only pick for what you're qualified for.

00:04:57.367 --> 00:05:01.740
So he said we need space operations engineers.

00:05:01.961 --> 00:05:06.533
And then he asked me he said do you plan on being like a 20 year guy and you know military for life?

00:05:06.533 --> 00:05:07.557
And I was like, no, not really.

00:05:07.557 --> 00:05:08.560
I just kind of need a reset.

00:05:08.560 --> 00:05:10.124
But I really didn't have a plan.

00:05:10.124 --> 00:05:14.781
I just said I didn't think about 20 years, but you know I'm not opposed to it either.

00:05:14.781 --> 00:05:22.048
He said well, you don't want to do that because then you're going to be stuck if you get out with only a government job and then you'll be tied to the government.

00:05:22.048 --> 00:05:26.553
And he kept it so real with me and uh, I said man, I don't really.

00:05:26.553 --> 00:05:28.697
I didn't really think about what I actually wanted to do.

00:05:28.697 --> 00:05:32.107
I went to college for a semester and a half for psychology.

00:05:32.107 --> 00:05:34.980
Uh, I wasn't really interested in that.

00:05:34.980 --> 00:05:40.807
There was just a cute girl in the admissions office that day and so I said I said, man, I don't, I didn't really think about that.

00:05:40.867 --> 00:05:42.369
He said my brother-in-law is a firefighter.

00:05:42.369 --> 00:05:48.255
He said the tech school, the, the um academy, it sucks, it's really hard, but after that you play Xbox.

00:05:48.255 --> 00:05:50.682
And he said, though, he said the magic word for me.

00:05:50.682 --> 00:05:52.687
I said, oh, you get to play Xbox at work.

00:05:52.687 --> 00:05:54.271
Yes, sign me up.

00:05:54.271 --> 00:05:58.886
And uh, so I went Lewis F Garland fire Academy good, fellow air force base.

00:05:58.966 --> 00:06:14.115
After, uh, I did my eight and a half weeks at Laughlin Air Force Base, where all the Air Force does their basic training, and then I got shipped off to San Angelo, texas, to Louis F Garland Fire Academy at God, what's that?

00:06:14.115 --> 00:06:15.223
Goodfellow Air Force Base?

00:06:15.223 --> 00:06:20.899
And in the middle of nowhere somewhere in Texas, like I'm talking red rocks and windmills.

00:06:20.899 --> 00:06:23.968
There was nothing going on out there but that, that fire Academy.

00:06:23.968 --> 00:06:27.024
And uh, yeah, I did a couple of years in the air force.

00:06:27.887 --> 00:06:32.622
Um, I ended up hurting my back, uh, during the Texas wildland fires.

00:06:32.622 --> 00:06:39.322
So that had to be what 2010, 11, ish, you know I go in in 2007, 2008, ish, and uh.

00:06:39.322 --> 00:06:43.632
So when Obama ended the war, iraq war in 2012,.

00:06:43.632 --> 00:06:49.254
Uh, you know, the military has this like weird rule whenever they, you know, they have an influx of people.

00:06:49.254 --> 00:06:50.701
And then they got to get rid of a bunch of people.

00:06:51.404 --> 00:06:53.793
I ended up hurting my back and I was on profile.

00:06:53.793 --> 00:06:58.872
For those who don't know, profiles just basically, um, light duty or something of that nature.

00:06:58.872 --> 00:07:06.021
You know, uh, and I was working in dispatch and my first sergeant called me in the office and said hey, we got to get rid of people.

00:07:06.021 --> 00:07:09.911
You only got a few months left on this enlistment.

00:07:09.911 --> 00:07:11.942
I can let you go now.

00:07:11.942 --> 00:07:14.148
Full benefits, honorable discharge.

00:07:14.148 --> 00:07:21.423
You leave a few months early because they're probably either going to medically discharge you or they're going to reclass you because you've been on profile too long.

00:07:22.004 --> 00:07:25.309
And I said, well, because I was trying to actively get off profile.

00:07:25.309 --> 00:07:33.211
I went through all the tests, but because now they had to get rid of people, he was like you're just an easy person to just discharge just for their numbers.

00:07:33.211 --> 00:07:35.064
I don't want to see you get caught up in that.

00:07:35.064 --> 00:07:37.040
Yes, there's a chance you can kind of make it through.

00:07:37.040 --> 00:07:41.427
But if you don't plan on, if you know, I wouldn't want you to risk it.

00:07:41.427 --> 00:07:50.071
And I talked to my wife about it and I said you know what it's cool If I get everything I'm supposed to get after a full enlistment.

00:07:50.071 --> 00:07:53.807
It's not like I was close to 20-year retirement, so it didn't really matter.

00:07:53.807 --> 00:08:03.430
So I said you know what Fine, I got enough out of the military that I wanted and I left and so I'm out.

00:08:04.271 --> 00:08:06.514
I thought about going to Philadelphia as a firefighter.

00:08:06.514 --> 00:08:19.324
All my certs were good, I had a good amount of certifications, had a good amount of experience at that time and my wife was not feeling me being a firefighter A bunch of dangerous calls and a bunch of bad situations and things like that.

00:08:19.324 --> 00:08:27.202
And my guy got me a job at Rockstar Energy and I said go do sales, drink some energy drinks.

00:08:27.202 --> 00:08:42.956
And I did that for a couple of years in Philly and I ended up moving down to Wilmington, north Carolina, and one of my neighbors ended up as he was a captain here at the fire department and I got to talking to him about my military stuff and he said well, listen, we're looking for volunteers.

00:08:43.496 --> 00:08:46.399
Talking to him about my military stuff and he said well, listen, we're looking for volunteers.

00:08:46.399 --> 00:08:50.245
You want to come volunteer?

00:08:50.245 --> 00:08:53.034
Give me your certs, we'll see if the North Carolina has a reciprocity and we'll let you firefight without going to an academy.

00:08:53.034 --> 00:08:53.817
Sure enough, they did.

00:08:53.817 --> 00:08:55.202
So I volunteered for about a year.

00:08:55.202 --> 00:09:02.364
Rockstar ended up getting bought out by Pepsi and the fire department was looking for a full-timer and I just that's.

00:09:02.364 --> 00:09:04.385
That's how I got into this fire department.

00:09:04.385 --> 00:09:08.852
I've been here now uh, january will be five years.

00:09:08.852 --> 00:09:10.235
So it's been.

00:09:10.235 --> 00:09:11.155
It's been a wild ride.

00:09:11.840 --> 00:09:14.125
That's amazing how that just happened.

00:09:14.125 --> 00:09:14.966
I mean the.

00:09:14.966 --> 00:09:23.190
Is it typical for the that military MOS to have the reciprocity with civilian firefighting?

00:09:23.190 --> 00:09:23.851
Is that, is that normal?

00:09:24.000 --> 00:09:24.942
No, not at all.

00:09:25.143 --> 00:09:25.705
I looked it up.

00:09:25.966 --> 00:09:32.770
North Carolina is one of the very few states that actually accepts it, and so I was extremely blessed.

00:09:32.811 --> 00:09:35.966
I'm not exactly maybe it's my wife rubbing off on me.

00:09:35.966 --> 00:10:04.913
I'm not exactly the most religious my wife and her family is but somebody, something, was looking out for me because I, honestly, I've been blessed and lucky enough to have a bunch of breaks go my way in terms of career path and something like you know, because at that point I had been out of the military for about seven years at that point, so for it to just circle back and just be of use to me, other than just sitting in a box and taking up space in my storage unit, I had no use.

00:10:04.913 --> 00:10:16.140
I have all my military stuff, my whole life is in two boxes in my storage unit and, you know, on a regular, random Tuesday afternoon I dug them up and, uh, I was able to restart my career from it.

00:10:16.140 --> 00:10:24.767
Man it's, you know, it can only be God for me, Like that's, that's, it's insane to think about and uh, I feel, I feel extremely lucky and blessed for sure.

00:10:25.508 --> 00:10:41.243
Yeah, to have that level of gratitude, spirituality, I think, is extremely helpful, because it seems like at a young age you were very aware, very self-aware of where you were, because you talked about reset.

00:10:41.243 --> 00:11:09.250
You talked about knowing that you needed that reset, knowing you needed that discipline, no-transcript, like someone not showing up to work, and then you just sign up for whatever.

00:11:09.250 --> 00:11:13.880
Like I went into the army and the only reason I did was because my dad was in the army.

00:11:13.880 --> 00:11:22.330
I didn't know what I was signing up for, I didn't know what I was going to be doing, I didn't even know what basic training consisted of.

00:11:22.330 --> 00:11:34.505
And that's funny because my dad spent five years down at Fort Knox as a drill instructor, and so when I went to Fort Leonard Wood, I mean it was like a smack in the face to meet a drill sergeant.

00:11:34.505 --> 00:11:36.129
I wasn't expecting that at all.

00:11:36.208 --> 00:11:41.248
But, um, you know, I think it has a lot to do with you and just who you are.

00:11:41.248 --> 00:11:55.009
Man Like you, you understanding that you needed to reset, having the discipline to uh, to the military, um, and then I love the story about meps too, man, like walking in your underwear and all that stuff, yeah, and talking, hey, what about?

00:11:55.009 --> 00:11:56.181
What about the day before you.

00:11:56.181 --> 00:12:00.009
You ship out and they take you to that really shitty uh, motel six.

00:12:00.009 --> 00:12:01.452
So here's the thing.

00:12:01.841 --> 00:12:07.542
Okay, they set this up nice, I don't know if it's just the air force has a better budget than the army.

00:12:07.542 --> 00:12:10.989
They took us to this like four star.

00:12:10.989 --> 00:12:13.173
We had the whole floor locked down.

00:12:13.173 --> 00:12:14.442
They gave us the conference room.

00:12:14.442 --> 00:12:16.788
They had x boxes on these giant projectors.

00:12:16.788 --> 00:12:27.273
We had brisket and the prime rib buffet dinner like they we thought we were going into like club fed, like some just cushy.

00:12:28.173 --> 00:12:31.855
Uh, you know, we knew it was the military, but we thought it was, we thought it was sweet man.

00:12:31.855 --> 00:12:52.011
And you know we fly in and um, you know we're up early and then I mean you ride the bus and everybody, you know everybody's so nice, the military, the military people at the airport that are escorting you, so nice, lining you up, making sure you're good, and then you step off that bus, man, and it's like it's I mean it's.

00:12:52.011 --> 00:12:59.721
They do it on purpose, they, they lulled you into this, you know false sense of security, and then they just start eating you up.

00:12:59.721 --> 00:13:04.370
Man, I mean there was people like from the bus did not want to complete it.

00:13:04.370 --> 00:13:04.890
We had a dude.

00:13:04.890 --> 00:13:17.087
I remember our first night and for some reason, maybe my, maybe my TI picked up on my maturity but he made me the dorm chief, who's in charge of the entire barracks.

00:13:17.087 --> 00:13:21.254
You know, you get your dorm chief and your four element leaders and you know he just picked me up at random.

00:13:21.254 --> 00:13:22.274
Hey, you're going to be in charge.

00:13:22.274 --> 00:13:26.980
Man, we had this kid I couldn't even remember his name and you know we're panicking.

00:13:26.980 --> 00:13:28.563
Hey, be up.

00:13:28.563 --> 00:13:33.961
You know revelry plays, you line up, go to PT and this kid.

00:13:34.020 --> 00:13:39.224
I'm looking down making sure everybody's beds are made, and this had to be like day two or three.

00:13:39.224 --> 00:13:48.950
And I look down and there's this giant hump on the end, very end of the second row of our barracks and I was like, oh, who is this guy?

00:13:48.950 --> 00:13:57.576
And the, the instructors, they wear these little metal clickers on the back of their heels so you can hear them and it's like snapping.

00:13:57.576 --> 00:14:03.505
So, and you know we're upstairs so you can hear them come on up the steps and it's like this, it's it freaks you out.

00:14:03.505 --> 00:14:12.701
Because then it's like and it's like this, they, it's.

00:14:12.701 --> 00:14:13.062
It freaks you out.

00:14:13.062 --> 00:14:14.067
Because then it's like, and it's like, oh my god.

00:14:14.067 --> 00:14:16.294
And like, uh, sergeant riley man, uh, he was a, he was a little pitbull man, he did not want to make him mad.

00:14:16.294 --> 00:14:17.318
And uh, why are you not downstairs in formation?

00:14:17.318 --> 00:14:17.519
No, no, no.

00:14:17.519 --> 00:14:24.990
And you know, uh, whatever the trainee edwards reports his whatever his name is is not getting out of bed.

00:14:24.990 --> 00:14:28.216
Who the hell is that Get out of bed man?

00:14:28.259 --> 00:14:31.490
This kid, visually, was hilarious.

00:14:31.490 --> 00:14:44.609
He flips the blanket over his head and only his head is showing and he just looks at Sergeant Riley and goes no, covers his face back up with the blanket and I mean you couldn't help but laugh, but you're not allowed to laugh in basic.

00:14:44.609 --> 00:14:53.476
So you know, and like it was so off-putting that sergeant rob, he cracked a smile and looked at me and we both caught ourselves smiling because it was funny.

00:14:53.476 --> 00:14:54.640
But it was just like, and I like I snapped it.

00:14:54.640 --> 00:14:56.365
You know, all right, just go to pt.

00:14:56.365 --> 00:14:58.510
And I mean that was the last we seen of this kid.

00:14:58.510 --> 00:15:00.465
I guess he just didn't want to do it and he quit.

00:15:00.465 --> 00:15:05.299
We by the time we got out of pt and, um, his, all his stuff was packed up and he was gone.

00:15:05.299 --> 00:15:07.725
His bed was empty, they took off the blankets and everything.

00:15:07.765 --> 00:15:13.990
So you know as much as much crap as the air force gets for being like chair force and everything else?

00:15:13.990 --> 00:15:24.101
I've heard a lot about basic training being fairly difficult, fairly challenging anyways, and uh, did you think that it was a challenge for you?

00:15:25.125 --> 00:15:35.760
so the thing about basic and again, I don't have anything to compare this to other than stories from people from other branches that I talked to I don't think it's any more physically difficult than any of the other ones.

00:15:35.760 --> 00:15:45.208
Yeah, the PT standards may defer a little bit, but you're still doing pushups and burpees and sit-ups and you're walking and you're running all the time for eight weeks, like that, doesn't that's hard for anybody?

00:15:45.208 --> 00:15:55.085
Uh, the thing about basic training that people don't understand physically I don't think it was all that difficult, but I've always been in pretty good shape, uh, just playing sports as a kid.

00:15:55.085 --> 00:16:01.683
But mentally, man, like that mental, how they break you down affects how you perform physically.

00:16:01.683 --> 00:16:06.751
So things that may not have seemed hard to you, like, yeah man, I could do a hundred pushups, no problem.

00:16:06.751 --> 00:16:12.369
But you know, after about four or five weeks and you know they're just ragging on you every step you get.

00:16:12.369 --> 00:16:18.360
And you know, because no matter how perfect you are in basic, you're not perfect They'll figure out something to pick at you on.

00:16:18.360 --> 00:16:25.566
And and that's the mistake people have when they go into the military they're so afraid of getting yelled at or getting called out on something.

00:16:25.566 --> 00:16:26.966
They're trying to be perfect.

00:16:26.966 --> 00:16:30.490
That makes you more of a target and they don't want that right.

00:16:30.490 --> 00:16:32.052
Their job is to break you down.

00:16:32.052 --> 00:16:38.976
So by breaking you down mentally, it does break you down physically, so it makes these tasks seem harder.

00:16:51.519 --> 00:16:52.403
I loved basic training when I got out of it.

00:16:52.403 --> 00:16:52.945
I would never do it again.

00:16:52.945 --> 00:16:54.028
But coming out of it I've learned so much.

00:16:54.028 --> 00:16:55.072
I've completely transformed my mindset and who I am.

00:16:55.072 --> 00:16:56.596
I didn't go into the military to see what I was made of or to see who I was.

00:16:56.596 --> 00:16:58.019
I went into military to see who I wanted to be.

00:16:58.019 --> 00:17:03.227
It showed me who I wanted to be as a person and I've taken that from.

00:17:03.227 --> 00:17:07.615
Like my life is legit split pre-military, post-military.

00:17:07.615 --> 00:17:15.423
I'm a completely different person in terms of my outlook and how I view things, from basic to the last day I served man.

00:17:15.423 --> 00:17:17.310
I really, you know I wanted to.

00:17:17.310 --> 00:17:17.853
I picked.

00:17:17.853 --> 00:17:19.960
I talked to a lot of people when I wanted to.

00:17:19.960 --> 00:17:23.226
I wanted to be somebody you know coming from where I come from.

00:17:23.626 --> 00:17:24.067
You know it's.

00:17:24.067 --> 00:17:34.269
It's literally that town where, like the guy's 48, 50 years old wearing his Letterman jacket outside the liquor store oh yeah, talking about you know what he used to do driving his Pontiac.

00:17:34.269 --> 00:18:14.820
You know, sunbird, whatever, you know what I mean, like still talking about things he used to do and no-transcript go out and play.

00:18:14.820 --> 00:18:17.785
So I couldn't play sports cause I had to go work so me and my dad could have rent money.

00:18:17.785 --> 00:18:21.690
You know, I used to sweep up like leaves and stuff outside the flower shop.

00:18:21.690 --> 00:18:31.204
I used to take out the trash and I would sweep the barbershop across the street and I would just do odd jobs around the neighborhood.

00:18:31.204 --> 00:18:33.269
I mean, we were collecting cans.

00:18:33.269 --> 00:18:36.425
I was picking cans out of people's garbage so we can take it to the recycle spot.

00:18:36.767 --> 00:18:41.242
Like we had to make it happen to live and you know I moved out of my dad.

00:18:41.242 --> 00:18:42.585
Me and my dad never really got along.

00:18:42.585 --> 00:18:44.488
So I moved out when I was 17.

00:18:44.488 --> 00:18:47.634
That was when my granddad was like go to the military.

00:18:47.634 --> 00:18:48.634
You know you're couch hopping.

00:18:48.634 --> 00:18:50.123
You got these roommates.

00:18:50.123 --> 00:18:51.286
You know I worked.

00:18:51.467 --> 00:18:55.343
I got fortunate enough to get a job at a very upscale diner Like these Greek people owned it.

00:18:55.343 --> 00:18:58.807
They were millionaires and this wasn't like the diner you go and get a tuna sandwich.

00:18:58.807 --> 00:19:01.310
This was like the diner the millionaires went to.

00:19:01.310 --> 00:19:09.781
It was very upscale and I was making $150, $200 a night, working 10, 12 hours.

00:19:09.781 --> 00:19:10.563
I was living with my roommates.

00:19:10.644 --> 00:19:11.906
I was like, what am I going to college for?

00:19:11.906 --> 00:19:13.190
And that goes, oh, I'll make up this class.

00:19:13.190 --> 00:19:14.492
But then your car breaks down.

00:19:14.492 --> 00:19:15.961
So now you got to work extra hours.

00:19:15.961 --> 00:19:20.066
You find out you're working extra hours, you're making more money, now I can fix my car.

00:19:20.247 --> 00:19:25.073
But now I got all this money, know, I'm basically living in a frat house, so we're partying and drinking every day.

00:19:25.073 --> 00:19:32.652
I can make my, I can make my rent in two or three days, and then the rest of my money I'm not saving as I should, I'm blowing it, being an idiot.

00:19:32.652 --> 00:19:34.825
And uh, my grandfather ended up dying.

00:19:34.825 --> 00:19:48.801
And uh, that's when I said you know what, man, I got a, I got, I got a reset.

00:19:48.801 --> 00:19:49.123
I need to.

00:19:49.123 --> 00:19:51.048
This is like I'm, I'm not in a good way, and so that's kind of what spurned that.

00:19:51.048 --> 00:19:54.219
You know, living life, not having a life to begin with, and then living it really fast, basically in my college years, to okay, it's enough.

00:19:54.219 --> 00:20:01.186
Now I want more from this life and and that's where the air force came in I'm very, very appreciative of it.

00:20:01.680 --> 00:20:09.585
You have a lot of gratitude, man, because, at the end of the day, I've always said that when people go to bat for you, when people sacrifice for you, you owe it to them.

00:20:09.988 --> 00:20:14.006
And it sounds like between your father and your grandfather and just your family in general.

00:20:14.006 --> 00:20:18.200
You know, that's what motivated you to make something of yourself.

00:20:18.200 --> 00:20:26.255
And, um, you know, I understand your, your situation, your circumstances, but at the end of the day, you had choices, man.

00:20:26.255 --> 00:20:36.673
You could have went the other way, you could have started doing drugs, you could have kept down that track, but something inside of you told you that you needed that reset.

00:20:36.673 --> 00:20:50.102
And the one thing that I want to highlight, too, is I really think that we need strong fathers, strong men, in this country to help with our, with our upcoming generations.

00:20:50.102 --> 00:21:02.826
Man, um for sure, for you, it was between your sounds like between your father and your grandfather that that really helped instill that mindset, that that, uh, that winning mindset that has allowed you to be where you're at today.

00:21:02.826 --> 00:21:09.567
Overall, yeah, and I just wanted to ask you, so you've been a firefighter for you said about five years now.

00:21:10.250 --> 00:21:10.851
Yeah, I've been here.

00:21:10.851 --> 00:21:19.410
So between the military and then where I'm at now, I know there's a pretty big gap, but I have about nine, 10 years of experience firefighting.

00:21:19.981 --> 00:21:27.313
So what do you think has been some of your most challenging and rewarding experiences that you've encountered as a fire, as a civilian firefighter?

00:21:28.260 --> 00:21:28.923
You know what's funny.

00:21:28.923 --> 00:21:34.759
Dealing the firefighting part is the fun part Seeing seeing that smoke in the flames.

00:21:34.759 --> 00:21:37.786
And again, the thing about being a first responder.

00:21:37.786 --> 00:21:41.433
Whether you're police, fire, ems, law, you know anything.

00:21:41.433 --> 00:21:47.810
People aren't calling you because their days are are are a blast.

00:21:47.810 --> 00:21:48.781
You know what I mean.

00:21:48.781 --> 00:21:49.984
People are calling.

00:21:49.984 --> 00:21:58.147
When I get called it's generally somebody's worst day, so the challenging and rewarding is the same thing.

00:21:58.348 --> 00:22:05.075
When I get to impact somebody's life, you know, um, the tough ones are usually always kids.

00:22:05.075 --> 00:22:06.980
Anything dealing with kids is always tough.

00:22:06.980 --> 00:22:20.449
Um, we've had terrible, terrible accidents Um, parents drunk driving, killing their kids, kids being irresponsible, um hurting each other.

00:22:20.449 --> 00:22:22.695
Um, you know.

00:22:22.695 --> 00:22:24.686
And then and then also dealing with elderly.

00:22:24.686 --> 00:22:27.123
You know people aren't taking care of our elderly.

00:22:27.123 --> 00:22:29.469
You know these people are living by themselves.

00:22:29.469 --> 00:22:30.920
The state can't help them.

00:22:30.920 --> 00:22:32.044
They're not getting the right care.

00:22:32.545 --> 00:22:43.606
You know I show up to some of the most terrible, terrible um living conditions for older people and you know a lot of the times they're falling on the ground and nobody's there to pick them up.

00:22:43.606 --> 00:22:45.803
So we go and pick them up and you know.

00:22:45.803 --> 00:22:51.426
But you can tell like we got a lot of frequent flyers and it'll be two, three weeks and they're still wearing the same clothes.

00:22:51.426 --> 00:22:51.989
I saw them in.

00:22:51.989 --> 00:22:56.560
There's the same dishes in the sink, same, the house just smells and it's just like.

00:22:56.560 --> 00:23:06.101
You know, dealing, you know, as a cause at my fire department, you have to be also a medic, you have to be EMT certified, so we run a lot of EMT calls.

00:23:06.101 --> 00:23:14.364
So dealing with kids and dealing with people who don't have support is very challenging but it's rewarding because they're very grateful.

00:23:14.364 --> 00:23:35.108
The fact that I can help them every day and at least be some sort of positivity for them, at least for a few minutes, um, really, uh, puts things in perspective for me right, makes me more appreciative of my life and makes me, you know the kids, the annoying things that kids do, that they break or they mess up in the house.

00:23:35.108 --> 00:23:45.073
I, you know it's like it's really not that important because you know, mr and Mrs Jones's kid unfortunately fell or did this or have this disease and you know he's no longer with us.

00:23:45.073 --> 00:23:55.391
You know, um, you know, last Christmas, around Christmas time, it was like beginning of December like these parents, these kids have these airsoft rifles, you know, and people are having fun.

00:23:55.391 --> 00:23:57.565
They go on YouTube and watch the airsoft battles.

00:23:57.565 --> 00:24:03.705
This 13 year old shot his 15 year old brother in the chest, pierced his heart with an airsoft rifle by accident.

00:24:03.705 --> 00:24:07.953
They were cleaning up and I guess it just went off and they were standing too close to each other.

00:24:08.720 --> 00:24:13.961
You know it's that's terrible to walk into a house to screaming parents and a brother who's traumatized.

00:24:13.961 --> 00:24:18.112
You know it's that's that's challenging, it's hard to kind of recoup.

00:24:18.112 --> 00:24:21.065
But I leave that call and then I have to go to another call.

00:24:21.065 --> 00:24:31.262
I have to go to an elderly woman who just needs help off the toilet or needs help out of bed to get to her wheelchair, and I can't bring that last call with me, no matter how hard it is, and so doing that.

00:24:31.262 --> 00:24:37.193
Or maybe we have a terrible call like a bad accident, but we have to go to the elementary school to do fire prevention.

00:24:37.193 --> 00:24:41.586
So now I got to be laughing and happy but I just left this terrible call.

00:24:42.367 --> 00:24:45.272
And those and those aren't frequent at all.

00:24:45.272 --> 00:24:52.425
These are not, these are every once in a while type deal Like we're not.

00:24:52.425 --> 00:24:54.413
You know this is a New York city where something bad's happening every five seconds.

00:24:54.413 --> 00:25:05.308
But those days are especially hard and challenging and you have to, you have to kind of compartmentalize, uh, especially when you're a first responder, and that goes for law enforcement or medical and fire department.

00:25:05.308 --> 00:25:25.260
It's just learning how to compartmentalize, trying to separate your emotions and rely on your training, because it's easy to say, hey, we got a car accident, this is what I'm trained to do, I'm going to go do this, this and this, but then you show up and a nine-year-old is hanging out of a tree because she got ejected and things are messed up.

00:25:25.260 --> 00:25:28.367
It's like it's hard to do that when I have a kid who's eight.

00:25:28.367 --> 00:25:30.012
You know my daughter's 13.

00:25:30.012 --> 00:25:31.321
I have a.

00:25:31.442 --> 00:25:32.685
I have a 19 year old stepson.

00:25:32.726 --> 00:25:55.828
I've been married to his mom since he was four, so I've literally watched him grow up and he's out there driving and he's out there doing these things, and then I show up to these wrecks and his girls just her and her friends are driving in the back of a pickup truck like they're not supposed to, but she hits a curb and her leg gets severed because the truck rolled over on her 20 years old 19, 20 years old and she, you know she doesn't have a leg now.

00:25:55.849 --> 00:26:06.003
So it's like I think about that man, I come home and it just it's very hard to, and then you also don't want to be overprotective now, like I see all this bad stuff.

00:26:06.003 --> 00:26:07.269
So it's like you got to make sure.

00:26:07.269 --> 00:26:09.460
You know I can't just not let my kids do anything.

00:26:09.460 --> 00:26:11.066
I have to, especially my 19 year old.

00:26:11.066 --> 00:26:26.584
He has to go live his life, he has to figure out who he is now, you know, and and it's hard to let him venture out and I'm not in a rush for him to get out the house or anything, but you know I also understand like he has to leave at some point and I can't protect him from everything.

00:26:26.845 --> 00:26:28.709
So he's, he's got to do life.

00:26:28.709 --> 00:26:31.042
I mean, whatever that is, he's got to do life.

00:26:31.042 --> 00:26:31.242
That's.

00:26:31.242 --> 00:26:51.309
That's really tough man, and as a father, I feel you on that because even when I deployed to Iraq and some of the things that I've done in my full-time job, it's it's hard not to see the face of your own in the like, in the bodies of other folks that you're working with or working for or supporting, so like I've.

00:26:51.631 --> 00:26:59.585
You know, seeing my own kids in the face of you know, kids that are that are, you know, less fortunate or in those terrible situations and circumstances.

00:26:59.585 --> 00:28:00.586
Would you say that overall I mean this is kind of a personal thing, but would you say that that overall understanding of like taking those calls with you to your, the baseline of someone who's been to war, but then the baseline of someone who's a first responder, who sees what you, what you've seen, is what probably 99% of the public never sees Would you say that that is probably one of the underlining things in today's world is just general folks who aren't first responders or combat military veterans, understanding like 100, because you know you, being iraqi vet first responder, seeing death or seeing wounds or like just trauma, right, right, you get decent.

00:28:00.646 --> 00:28:05.503
Not desensitized is such a it's the word to use, but it's not really the right word, you know what I I mean.

00:28:05.523 --> 00:28:08.269
It's like yeah, like we're, just we grow.

00:28:08.269 --> 00:28:11.502
We have, like a um, a tolerance for it.

00:28:11.502 --> 00:28:16.545
Right, our tolerance for it is just heightened, right, just like anything else, right, first shot of whiskey is terrible.

00:28:16.545 --> 00:28:19.983
A hundred shots of whiskey later not too bad, goes down pretty smooth, it's.

00:28:19.983 --> 00:28:25.701
It's just a tolerance that we have because of the nature of our jobs or the nature of what we're doing.

00:28:25.740 --> 00:28:46.773
So you know, uh, you know, my mother-in-law is telling me about, like this, this thing, and I'm just like yeah, oh, yeah, okay, you know, and she's shocked at you know how, how easily I can digest that and I'm like you have to understand, I see way worse stuff all the time and it's and and so I guess it is desensitized.

00:28:46.773 --> 00:28:54.626
But I don't, I don't want to seem insensitive to people's trauma and stuff and and, yeah, it's, it's hard to, especially, you know, a job like mine.

00:28:54.626 --> 00:28:54.948
I don't.

00:28:54.948 --> 00:28:56.571
You know, especially in my marriage.

00:28:56.571 --> 00:28:59.805
I don't have a job anymore where I can tell her about my day.

00:28:59.805 --> 00:29:01.366
You know what I mean.

00:29:01.366 --> 00:29:10.200
What I do is not exactly great dinner table talk Like how was your day, honey?

00:29:10.200 --> 00:29:18.746
Oh well, you know, this guy got into a really gnarly car accident and I had to grab his arm from behind his body that got severed and by the bone, and then we had to put in a bag of ice and like, that's not something you know, but I can freely talk about that.

00:29:18.746 --> 00:29:22.631
And when I talk about it to my friends in the group chat, I say, yeah, this is what happened.

00:29:22.631 --> 00:29:35.944
And they're just shocked at how nonchalant I can be about it and I just said, yeah, man, it's just experience and time, I'm just used to it and I forget sometimes that that, like you just said, it's not something they deal with or see.

00:29:35.944 --> 00:29:39.141
So to them they're like, oh my God, like that's, that's insane.

00:29:39.141 --> 00:29:40.424
And I'm like, no, not really.

00:29:40.424 --> 00:29:43.661
That's like the fourth most interesting thing that's happened to me this week.

00:29:43.661 --> 00:29:51.596
So, uh, it is hard to deal with, you know, and I think that's why a lot of first responders or military personnel always get involved with each other.

00:29:51.596 --> 00:29:53.420
Um, and I do think it's important.

00:29:53.440 --> 00:30:00.921
Uh, I'm part of the North Carolina peer support team, you know, especially for the newer people, we had a kid just start with us.

00:30:00.921 --> 00:30:13.670
Well, he's been here for about a little over a year, but when he first started, his very first call on his very first day was an eight year old who tried to hang himself because the neighborhood kids were bullying him because he was deaf.

00:30:13.670 --> 00:30:24.272
And this kid is a 19 year old kid, fresh out of the academy, and that was his first call and he freaked out like a normal person would.

00:30:24.272 --> 00:30:27.548
We have to remember, the academy is just teaching you how to be a firefighter.

00:30:27.548 --> 00:30:32.509
This kid has no life experience to begin with because he's 19, but he has no fire experience.

00:30:32.509 --> 00:30:33.394
He's not used to it.

00:30:33.394 --> 00:30:37.436
Yeah, he went to EMT school and it's one thing to deal with the mannequins and deal with the.

00:30:37.436 --> 00:30:41.240
You know, deal with the, the, the, the little electronic devices and training props.

00:30:41.240 --> 00:30:55.169
But to see it in real life, to show up on a call, and this kid is just hanging there, you know, um, the, that's just the thing.

00:30:55.169 --> 00:30:58.230
Now the kid's a pro, he goes all, he goes all types of crazy calls.

00:30:58.230 --> 00:31:00.553
You know he's only been here a year and some change.

00:31:00.553 --> 00:31:05.586
So, um, building that tolerance, you know people, people have the.

00:31:05.586 --> 00:31:10.944
You'll be shocked when you have to do it, how quickly you can acclimate and get used to it.

00:31:11.626 --> 00:31:12.568
Um, but it's still.

00:31:12.568 --> 00:31:18.855
It's still tough, like kids.

00:31:18.855 --> 00:31:19.979
Again, kids are tough, because I have kids.

00:31:19.979 --> 00:31:20.619
It's something I relate to.

00:31:20.619 --> 00:31:21.903
But when I see adults all messed up.

00:31:21.903 --> 00:31:22.584
I don't feel it, it's okay.

00:31:22.604 --> 00:31:23.025
What do I have?

00:31:23.025 --> 00:31:23.666
What are the symptoms?

00:31:23.666 --> 00:31:24.695
What can I do?

00:31:24.695 --> 00:31:27.502
As a first responder, I only operate at a basic level.

00:31:27.502 --> 00:31:32.039
It's very limited in what I can do, but what life-saving measures can I take?

00:31:32.039 --> 00:31:33.782
And it's boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

00:31:33.782 --> 00:31:41.665
Just know, just relying on training and trying to focus on the training, and that'll keep your mind off of what's really happening there.

00:31:41.934 --> 00:31:48.489
And yeah, I think, I think people who don't have that they watch a CPR class for their job.

00:31:48.489 --> 00:31:54.508
You know it's a little different, you know, but when CPR happens at the job, people are scared to do it because it's, it's not the same.

00:31:54.508 --> 00:31:57.461
They don't have it's, it's just not something they have to deal with.

00:31:57.461 --> 00:32:01.358
So, um, I don't, I don't blame people, it's, it's just, it's just a tough thing.

00:32:01.358 --> 00:32:52.982
And I think that's why it's important for um veterans, first responders to to get into these peer support groups, right, because we are the only ones that understand no-transcript, that we can put you in contact with Um and and more times than not, nobody reaches out.

00:32:52.982 --> 00:32:57.288
But there have been, there have been a handful of times where people have reached out and I think that's growth.

00:32:57.288 --> 00:32:58.191
I think that's terrific.

00:32:58.996 --> 00:33:00.561
There's just so many angles to it too.

00:33:00.561 --> 00:33:16.047
I mean, we haven't even talked about personal life, like people going through hardship in relationships, loss of family members, and then you're having to go to work and put on this face and this professional face and be professional in these first responder roles.

00:33:16.047 --> 00:33:28.483
So, again, when I first caught up with you on Instagram and I was reading some of your posts on there, man, it really kind of hit home for me and, like I said, I didn't even know you were an Air Force veteran.

00:33:28.483 --> 00:33:37.096
So, man, that just adds more to everything your character and what you're about Overall.

00:33:37.096 --> 00:33:44.509
I mean, mean, do you have any memorable stories or anything like you'd like to share with folks?

00:33:44.509 --> 00:33:50.903
Uh, like, maybe your worst day, your best day or anything like that since you've been in firefighting in general?

00:33:51.744 --> 00:33:57.244
yeah, so one of my first days I might have been, I might have been on base.

00:33:57.244 --> 00:33:59.792
You know, um, maybe a week it of my first days I might have been on base.

00:33:59.792 --> 00:34:02.923
Maybe a week it was my first real call like fire call.

00:34:02.923 --> 00:34:07.183
Barksdale Air Force Base is in Shreveport, louisiana.

00:34:07.183 --> 00:34:09.322
It's a decommissioned nuclear base.

00:34:09.322 --> 00:34:11.420
We still run a flight line there.

00:34:11.420 --> 00:34:13.380
We had A-10 Warthogs.

00:34:13.380 --> 00:34:14.306
I believe we had a B-52.

00:34:14.306 --> 00:34:14.914
We had A-10 Warthogs.

00:34:14.914 --> 00:34:17.036
I believe we had a B-52.

00:34:17.097 --> 00:34:28.050
But most of the land there once it I think I can't remember what year it might have been somewhere in the late 70s or 80s it was decommissioned and it turned into an airman family readiness base.

00:34:28.050 --> 00:34:35.043
So all the wild land that was out there that they had to use for clearance, they turned into parks and they built base housing and they did all this fun stuff.

00:34:35.043 --> 00:34:48.123
Well, um, all the natural gas lines ran back there and one of our first calls in the middle of the night I'll never forget Uh, one of the old retired, uh, uh, gs guys was out there working.

00:34:48.123 --> 00:34:56.547
Uh, something happened and the gas main exploded and you know we're, we're ripping and running around the flight line.

00:34:56.547 --> 00:34:57.369
I mean, you can see it.

00:34:57.369 --> 00:34:59.643
You can see it's a straight line of fire.

00:34:59.643 --> 00:35:01.802
It's straight in the air, clearing the trees out.

00:35:01.802 --> 00:35:03.681
We get about a quarter of a mile away.

00:35:03.681 --> 00:35:05.922
We had to stop the truck because the heat was so intense.

00:35:05.922 --> 00:35:10.681
Our deputy chief said we can't get closer, we're already feeling the heat.

00:35:10.681 --> 00:35:12.802
We're a quarter of a mile away from the main.

00:35:12.802 --> 00:35:20.199
There's no way, and at that point we knew that whatever guy that was out there working probably didn't make it.

00:35:21.561 --> 00:35:26.795
But again, I'm 20 something young, 20 something year old kid First.

00:35:26.795 --> 00:35:29.403
This is like you know and I'm talking about.

00:35:29.403 --> 00:35:32.059
I grew up in Jersey where I thought I was.

00:35:32.059 --> 00:35:35.487
I had it handled because my friend's brother was killed in front of us.

00:35:35.487 --> 00:35:39.884
I've grown up, I've lost friends to gun violence Like I've oh man, this ain't nothing.

00:35:39.884 --> 00:35:44.278
Fire man Feeling that heat for the first time in a real situation.

00:35:44.278 --> 00:35:46.884
I, I mean, I felt like a baby, I really did.

00:35:47.846 --> 00:35:49.516
And we had to wait for the gas to run out.

00:35:49.516 --> 00:35:52.800
Once they shut the gas off, we had to wait for the gas to run out in the, in the pipes.

00:35:52.800 --> 00:35:54.360
The flame finally went down.

00:35:54.360 --> 00:35:56.603
We get over there and it looked like a movie.

00:35:56.603 --> 00:35:57.846
I'm talking scorched.

00:35:57.846 --> 00:35:58.847
The trees are all gone.

00:35:58.847 --> 00:36:10.416
We see a chassis of a pickup truck and all it was, it was just the chassis and it was still red from the heat.

00:36:10.436 --> 00:36:11.619
And, uh, one of the uh, one of the majors from medical came.

00:36:11.619 --> 00:36:12.239
That was his brother-in-law.

00:36:12.239 --> 00:36:14.164
That was the guy that was responsible for fixing it.

00:36:14.164 --> 00:36:15.065
So he's freaking out.

00:36:15.927 --> 00:36:22.614
Um, and yeah, we had to walk around and I stepped on this dude's skull because they told us to look for bones if we could find him.

00:36:22.614 --> 00:36:36.896
And, uh, I stepped on something and the crunch was loud and I freaked out because, you know, and of course everybody, um, you know, I stopped and I said I think I just stepped on a bone and we looked down and I was, it was a skull.

00:36:36.896 --> 00:36:41.079
And that was the first time for me, something like that.

00:36:41.079 --> 00:36:54.929
You know, it's one thing, I guess, as a kid, you know, you grow up and your friend gets shot in front of you and you're just, it's still a body there, but like seeing a skull for the first time, you know, especially in those circumstances, that was tough for me, like that was a wake up call.

00:36:54.929 --> 00:37:02.280
Going through basic and going through tech school and all the hard physical and mental, um, training that I went through didn't prepare me enough.

00:37:02.280 --> 00:37:26.807
Like nothing can prepare you for that, uh, other than just going through it and living through it and uh, yeah, just having to walk around and collect this guy's bones and we didn't collect much, but, uh, and then having to just hand it to somebody, while a family member is sitting there trying to figure out how he's gonna explain to his wife because that's his wife's brother how he's gonna explain to his wife that her brother died tonight.

00:37:27.329 --> 00:37:30.438
You know, just watching it all unfold, man, it felt like I was in.

00:37:30.438 --> 00:37:33.045
I felt like I was watching a movie of about myself.

00:37:33.045 --> 00:37:33.916
Like it just didn't.

00:37:33.916 --> 00:37:34.918
None of it seemed.

00:37:34.918 --> 00:37:47.001
And, and what really shook me was, coming back, how nonchalant everybody's joking in the truck, laughing, uh, not not at the guy, but like just about anything, just making jokes on each other.

00:37:47.001 --> 00:37:52.798
And I was like y'all did, hey, you know, did y'all see what just happened?

00:37:52.798 --> 00:37:56.083
Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, it sucks, man, like I feel so bad for the guy.

00:37:56.083 --> 00:38:01.655
Like they just I forget that I'm new here, right, like I'm the new guy they they've, they've seen this stuff before.

00:38:01.655 --> 00:38:04.903
So, um, that was like a real wake up call.

00:38:04.903 --> 00:38:06.954
I remember, and that's why I remember it's so vivid.

00:38:06.954 --> 00:38:08.536
It happened so many years ago.

00:38:08.536 --> 00:38:13.541
I remember the like I remember the trip, like I remember how long it took us to get there.

00:38:13.541 --> 00:38:20.750
I can, I can tell you how many road signs were on the way, like it was that vivid of a memory, um, cause I'll never forget something like that.

00:38:20.750 --> 00:38:24.338
Uh, so that was for me like one of the main things.

00:38:24.840 --> 00:38:30.599
Uh, more recently in this side of my career, um, my kid was having an allergic reaction that the?

00:38:30.599 --> 00:38:34.849
Uh grandfather thought was, um, like a chest issue.

00:38:34.849 --> 00:38:41.340
This kid he was like five or six years old stopped breathing and we performed CPR and we saved him.

00:38:41.340 --> 00:38:54.001
Like this kid it was, and again in the moment it's like, oh, no, a kid, but it like it kicks you into overdrive and you do everything you can and you know, we had our young firefighter jump in the back.

00:38:54.001 --> 00:38:58.820
We drive the ambulance to the hospital so the medics can actually work on the kid.

00:38:58.820 --> 00:39:17.585
And they saved him and we thought his heart stopped because his anaphylactic reaction caused oxygen to shut off and so apparently, he was allergic to the new cats and dogs that the parents brought in and, yeah, he had a really bad allergic reaction.

00:39:17.585 --> 00:39:23.427
Uh, that caused his heart to stop and and we saved him and I was so happy I was working.

00:39:23.735 --> 00:39:25.621
It took me days to figure out what happened.

00:39:25.621 --> 00:39:28.257
You know, we reached out to the fire chief hey, we want to update, we want to update.

00:39:28.257 --> 00:39:36.505
And then, maybe like two weeks later, uh, the parents and the kids show up to the firehouse and the dad was crying, thanking us, hugging us.

00:39:36.505 --> 00:39:38.577
The kid was shy, we let him jump in the fire truck.

00:39:38.577 --> 00:39:41.085
I drove him around the fire station with the lights on.

00:39:41.085 --> 00:39:44.041
He was so happy man, it was such a great feeling.

00:39:44.041 --> 00:39:45.505
It was a great like.

00:39:45.505 --> 00:39:49.802
It's things like that, things that I can do to help people, that makes it worth it.

00:39:49.802 --> 00:39:50.865
All the bad stuff.

00:39:50.865 --> 00:39:58.204
I see, you know it comes and goes, like it's just going to happen, but moments like that is exactly why I do what I do and I love it.

00:39:58.664 --> 00:40:01.148
Yeah, wow, that is so damn interesting man.

00:40:01.148 --> 00:40:05.402
You know anyone out there that's thinking about cause.

00:40:05.402 --> 00:40:15.202
I talked to a lot of young young adults and they're always asking me about the military and first responder stuff and you know those types of careers.

00:40:15.202 --> 00:40:16.047
But I don't know a lot about careers.

00:40:16.047 --> 00:40:17.414
But I don't know a lot about firefighters.

00:40:17.414 --> 00:40:22.416
I don't know a lot about firefighting, but would you have any advice for folks that are thinking about getting into that career?

00:40:23.639 --> 00:40:28.186
yeah, the biggest advice is it's, it's.

00:40:28.186 --> 00:40:29.027
It's a job.

00:40:29.027 --> 00:40:29.568
It's tough.

00:40:29.568 --> 00:40:32.019
It's tough on you physically and it's tough on you mentally.

00:40:32.019 --> 00:40:38.478
It's just like anything else, though, um, I didn't think I was going to be a firefighter.

00:40:38.478 --> 00:40:43.625
I had no inkling on being a firefighter until I started doing it and I fell in love with it.

00:40:43.625 --> 00:40:45.246
You have to love the job.

00:40:45.246 --> 00:40:48.630
It's not a job that you can half-ass.

00:40:48.630 --> 00:40:59.043
Then you'll try it and, and you know, maybe go volunteer somewhere, see if it's something that interests you.

00:40:59.043 --> 00:41:00.447
From there, then you can pursue it as a career.

00:41:00.447 --> 00:41:03.599
But if you go volunteer, most places only require you to do what?

00:41:03.599 --> 00:41:05.563
24, 12 to 24 hours a month.

00:41:05.563 --> 00:41:12.327
So you can pick and choose where you go, um, and, and trust me, volunteer firehouses are always looking for volunteers.

00:41:12.327 --> 00:41:21.322
They'll train you, uh, but see if it's something that you really like, because it is a job you have to fully be in, because you're responsible for life.

00:41:21.722 --> 00:41:27.541
Our job is life preservation, right, life and property preservation, you know, um?

00:41:27.541 --> 00:41:29.985
So it's not a job, it's not.

00:41:29.985 --> 00:41:31.289
It's not something you watch on tv.

00:41:31.289 --> 00:41:35.965
This is a chicago fire where you, you know, you run calls and you bang the medics Like.

00:41:35.965 --> 00:41:37.894
That's not what the job is.

00:41:37.894 --> 00:41:41.001
People are relying on you to save to.

00:41:41.001 --> 00:41:42.545
They're calling you on your worst day.

00:41:42.545 --> 00:41:44.615
Uh, the people on your truck.

00:41:44.615 --> 00:41:49.244
Your life and their lives are in your hands and your life is in there.

00:41:49.244 --> 00:41:53.579
So my advice is, if you, if you're generally interested in it, go for it.

00:41:53.579 --> 00:41:54.139
It's great.

00:41:54.139 --> 00:42:03.936
Um, if it's something that you're kind of thinking about, go volunteer and figure out if you love it or not, because if you don't love it, then don't do it, because you're going to get somebody killed, you're going to get somebody hurt.

00:42:04.858 --> 00:42:15.043
Fire, being a firefighter, to me, is the best job in the world, man, for that reason I just told you for the story I just told you that five-year-old kid is going to have a life now because we relied on our training.

00:42:15.043 --> 00:42:17.246
We didn't half-ass, we did what we were trained to do.

00:42:17.246 --> 00:42:21.253
And, yeah, sometimes we do what we're trained to do and people die.

00:42:21.253 --> 00:42:25.322
But at least we know we did everything we possibly could and there was nothing else we could do.

00:42:25.322 --> 00:42:35.664
But in those instances where that kid would have 100% died if we didn't know what we were doing or if we didn't intervene, and that right, there is why we do the job.

00:42:35.664 --> 00:42:38.596
That exact moment we had a fire, a little fire.

00:42:38.596 --> 00:42:49.605
A lady was doing some yard work and I think she was trying to burn some trash and I guess the wind changed direction on her in her burn barrel and it caught her detached shed on fire.

00:42:49.605 --> 00:43:00.108
That thing was burnt up and we put it out and we're spraying water and one of the guys said wait, wait, hold up, and we start digging through stuff, 're spraying water.

00:43:00.108 --> 00:43:01.590
And one of the guys said wait, wait, hold up.

00:43:01.590 --> 00:43:04.393
And we start digging through stuff.

00:43:04.393 --> 00:43:05.394
Everything in this shed was burnt up.

00:43:05.394 --> 00:43:09.746
But he somehow had the wherewithal to stop start picking apart some of the charred stuff to find stuff that wasn't burnt yet.

00:43:09.746 --> 00:43:19.282
And in that pile was a photo book that had her dad's military photos, her wedding photos, all her kids baby pictures, all her her whole family album.

00:43:19.282 --> 00:43:22.188
And she just broke down and started crying.

00:43:22.188 --> 00:43:31.230
I mean this, this shed was done Like it was, but this thing was perfectly uh, it was singed a little bit on the, on the binding, but for the most part it was everything.

00:43:31.230 --> 00:43:34.300
All the pictures were in perfect shape and she was so grateful.

00:43:34.300 --> 00:43:37.369
Everything in that shed was was gone.

00:43:37.369 --> 00:43:53.998
You know, definitely worth money, things, things are, I'm sure, a value to her, but the only thing she cared about was that photo album and, um, you know so it doesn't always have to be as drastic as the five-year-old surviving like those memories that she can't replicate, you know, because you had to take photos back then.

00:43:53.998 --> 00:43:57.442
We don't have the cloud, as this is an older lady.

00:43:57.442 --> 00:44:01.505
Has that now because we are trained.

00:44:01.505 --> 00:44:04.027
Let's just put water on everything.

00:44:04.027 --> 00:44:04.907
No hold on.

00:44:04.907 --> 00:44:07.309
Our job is to preserve property as well.

00:44:07.309 --> 00:44:24.949
If there's something we can save from this shed fire, let's try to save things, and we ended up finding a bunch of stuff that were valuable to her maybe not valuable to other people, but you know, it's just an awesome feeling that we can give people, like I said when they call us on their worst day.

00:44:25.715 --> 00:44:38.608
You know, in the first responder line of work, I'm sure that you have witnessed a lot of miracles and blessings and it's hard not to be spiritual, in a sense, because of the things that you've seen, the lives that have been saved and the things that have happened.

00:44:38.608 --> 00:44:52.025
You know, it's so interesting to hear just your perspective as a firefighter, but there's so many angles to you, and one of the things that I want to talk about, too, is 24 Media.

00:44:52.025 --> 00:44:53.677
And how do you?

00:44:53.677 --> 00:45:02.521
How in the world do you balance Because I know being a podcaster, working full time, a father and and volunteering for nonprofits and things like that For me it's a juggling act.

00:45:02.521 --> 00:45:08.766
But how do you meet the demands of being a firefighter and then also being an entrepreneur as well?

00:45:09.969 --> 00:45:17.028
Yeah, biggest lesson my grand, my grandfather, taught me that I'll always remember is don't count time, make time count, right.

00:45:17.028 --> 00:45:20.360
So literally I just divide my time.

00:45:20.360 --> 00:45:22.525
I said, hey, these are work hours for me.

00:45:22.525 --> 00:45:30.717
If that means I get a little less sleep because I have to be a dad and I got to stay up from 11 to 2 AM working on my business, then that's just what it's going to be.

00:45:30.717 --> 00:45:35.324
Luckily for me, my kids are all of school age, so the days that I'm off I have all day to do my work.

00:45:35.324 --> 00:45:37.126
I know I have these eight or nine hours.

00:45:37.126 --> 00:45:40.731
So, no, I can't sit there and watch sports center all day Like I really want to.

00:45:40.956 --> 00:45:44.347
If I have podcast stuff to do, if I have graphic design stuff to do.

00:45:44.347 --> 00:45:53.367
You know, on top of 24 media, which is me and my cousin's company, what we've run and we've helped dozens and dozens of businesses get up off the ground.

00:45:53.367 --> 00:46:01.043
You know Our podcast network that we run with our buddy Mike, who has a contract with iHeart, with Fox Sports in Philadelphia.

00:46:01.043 --> 00:46:03.090
Everything has stemmed from 24 Media.

00:46:03.090 --> 00:46:08.461
To balance that, I just honestly just budgeting my time.

00:46:08.461 --> 00:46:11.166
I try to treat it like a nine to five.

00:46:11.166 --> 00:46:13.096
When my kids are at school.

00:46:13.096 --> 00:46:14.318
That's my time to work.

00:46:14.318 --> 00:46:15.202
On my days off?

00:46:15.202 --> 00:46:23.597
Uh, I'm lucky enough to be a firefighter where I only work at the firehouse 11 days out of the month, so I have those other 10 or 11 days to do what I got to do.

00:46:23.597 --> 00:46:27.597
Plus, at the firehouse, when we have downtime, I have my computer and I'm working there too.

00:46:27.597 --> 00:46:50.456
But when my kids are home, um, I'm, I'm, I'm dad, and when my wife is home, I'm a husband.

00:46:50.456 --> 00:46:51.297
Things are just going to have to wait.

00:46:51.297 --> 00:46:55.182
And for somebody who's running businesses or trying to get stuff off the ground, I get that you have to work extra, but for me, the podcasting could go away.

00:46:55.182 --> 00:46:56.045
Graphic design stuff can go away.

00:46:56.065 --> 00:47:00.612
My, who want to be entrepreneurs or call themselves entrepreneurs, uh, the mistake they make is they grind 24, seven.

00:47:00.612 --> 00:47:02.554
They watch all these stupid people on Instagram.

00:47:02.554 --> 00:47:04.659
Man, you got to work old, 20.

00:47:04.659 --> 00:47:06.184
You got to work 25, eight.

00:47:06.184 --> 00:47:07.726
Man, this is eat, sleep, breathe.

00:47:07.726 --> 00:47:09.775
This thing, no, no, you don't have to.

00:47:09.775 --> 00:47:10.936
Actually, you don't like.

00:47:11.336 --> 00:47:13.378
I literally set a timer, like I, on my days.

00:47:13.378 --> 00:47:14.639
I get off shift at seven.

00:47:14.639 --> 00:47:19.442
My, uh, my daughter gets on the bus before I get home, but my youngest son gets on the bus at seven.

00:47:19.442 --> 00:47:25.967
45, from eight to eight to three o'clock I work, cause that's when my kid gets off the bus, or no, I'm sorry.

00:47:25.967 --> 00:47:27.887
Uh, about four, four, 30.

00:47:27.887 --> 00:47:31.750
So basically, from eight to four I'm working on whatever I got to.

00:47:31.809 --> 00:47:33.030
I take a lunch break and everything.

00:47:33.030 --> 00:47:34.251
I split my time up.

00:47:34.251 --> 00:47:39.436
I work in blocks and I have to do that because it keeps me honest.

00:47:39.436 --> 00:47:41.722
I know I only have this finite amount of time.

00:47:41.722 --> 00:47:52.719
It makes me more productive because when four o'clock hits, I got to help EJ do his homework and then I got to cook dinner and then I got to clean and make sure the house is clean for my wife, cause I don't want to hear her mouth because I've been sitting at home all day.

00:47:53.239 --> 00:47:57.795
So it's the best thing I can, the best advice I give to entrepreneurs, and the thing that's helped me.

00:47:57.795 --> 00:47:58.317
And it trust me.

00:47:58.317 --> 00:48:01.065
This isn't something I just got out the gate I.

00:48:01.065 --> 00:48:06.286
It took me years of getting yelled at by my wife and arguing and fighting, because I had that mindset.

00:48:06.286 --> 00:48:07.215
I want this to work.

00:48:07.215 --> 00:48:21.682
So I have to work all the time and I learned you really don't know like, hey, four o'clock I'm done.

00:48:21.682 --> 00:48:22.168
Don't hit me up for nothing unless you're going to pay.

00:48:22.168 --> 00:48:24.989
If you're going to pay extra, cool, then yeah, I'll stop doing what I'm doing and I'll do that.

00:48:24.989 --> 00:48:28.626
But if not, it can wait till tomorrow, because my kids need me, they want to watch a movie, or I need to help them with homework, or we want to go get some frozen yogurt.

00:48:28.626 --> 00:48:30.467
Those things are important to me.

00:48:30.467 --> 00:48:36.650
One I don't want to burn myself out, and I think that's why I'm able to continue to do it at the clip.

00:48:36.650 --> 00:48:44.699
I am because people, uh, are so focused on trying to make it work right now, not really trusting the process.

00:48:45.443 --> 00:48:47.612
You know, you get a system just like everything else.

00:48:47.612 --> 00:48:49.378
You gotta, you gotta find a system that works for you.

00:48:49.378 --> 00:48:54.096
Um, for me it just works perfectly that I can kind of do banker's hours.

00:48:54.096 --> 00:49:00.311
But, uh, when I was working at Rockstar, I had to adjust my time because I was working Monday through Friday.

00:49:00.311 --> 00:49:03.217
So the weekends was tough because the kids are out of school.

00:49:03.217 --> 00:49:05.804
So basically I forced myself to just stay.

00:49:05.824 --> 00:49:11.105
Hey, everybody went to bed at 10 or 11 o'clock, dad was up until two, three o'clock and I was working.

00:49:11.105 --> 00:49:12.635
And now I don't have to do that.

00:49:12.635 --> 00:49:19.590
But my wife appreciated it, even though she wanted me to sleep more, but she appreciated that I wasn't doing it while everybody was home.

00:49:19.590 --> 00:49:25.242
You know like I used to do so, just finding that, finding that, those gaps, you have to find the time to do it.

00:49:25.242 --> 00:49:27.739
There's 24 hours in the day, there's plenty.

00:49:27.739 --> 00:49:31.273
There's plenty of time to accomplish what you want to accomplish.

00:49:31.273 --> 00:49:38.184
You don't have to go at it all the time and neglect what's really important, which is you know your family and your own sanity.

00:49:38.184 --> 00:49:40.688
To be honest, yeah, underline that.

00:49:40.947 --> 00:49:43.577
Uh, your own family and your sanity Cause that.

00:49:43.577 --> 00:49:47.784
That is huge, because sometimes you can burn yourself out.

00:49:47.784 --> 00:49:58.478
Uh, when you're doing this sort of thing and I've I've been guilty of that before where I've really burned myself out and I was just like the taste buds in my mouth were like dull and I'm like I don't even know if I want to.

00:49:58.478 --> 00:50:03.601
I want to do this, I gotta stay in this, but I gotta figure out how do I preserve myself to do this.

00:50:03.601 --> 00:50:05.266
But I jumped right over it.

00:50:05.266 --> 00:50:07.574
I didn't even talk about it, but 24 media.

00:50:07.574 --> 00:50:10.322
Can you tell us about what that's about?

00:50:10.322 --> 00:50:11.666
I know you started it with your cousin.

00:50:11.666 --> 00:50:15.782
Uh, taishan, right, yep, taishan so 24 media is a.

00:50:16.123 --> 00:50:17.806
It started off as just a graphic design.

00:50:17.806 --> 00:50:22.365
You know, back in jersey we were making mixtape covers and everybody wanted to be a rapper when we were kids.

00:50:22.365 --> 00:50:26.105
So we're like, yeah, man, we'll make your mixtape cover, you know, we'll do this.

00:50:26.105 --> 00:50:28.398
We'll make, you know, party flyers, you know.

00:50:28.398 --> 00:50:34.476
And um, we got really good at it and we were like, yeah, we can, we can make logos.

00:50:34.476 --> 00:50:38.282
And so we started making logos for people who wanted to start businesses.

00:50:39.384 --> 00:50:41.668
And it stopped there and me and him talked one day.

00:50:41.668 --> 00:50:44.800
I said what you know, people want to start a business.

00:50:44.800 --> 00:50:45.824
So what do they do?

00:50:45.824 --> 00:50:46.505
They get a logo.

00:50:46.505 --> 00:50:48.260
All right, then what's next?

00:50:48.260 --> 00:50:48.842
What do they usually?

00:50:48.842 --> 00:50:52.195
Uh, they need business cards, while they need promotional stuff.

00:50:52.195 --> 00:50:52.978
They need a website.

00:50:52.978 --> 00:50:54.942
Hey, let's learn how to build a website.

00:50:54.942 --> 00:50:56.907
Let's be a one-stop shop.

00:50:56.907 --> 00:50:58.971
They need a website.

00:50:58.971 --> 00:50:59.994
Hey, let's learn how to build a website.

00:50:59.994 --> 00:51:00.474
Let's be a one-stop shop.

00:51:00.474 --> 00:51:04.782
Why give them a logo so they could take it to somebody else who's going to butcher it and misuse it?

00:51:04.782 --> 00:51:06.527
We can build something where you don't have to go nowhere else.

00:51:06.608 --> 00:51:10.175
24 Media can do everything for you.

00:51:10.175 --> 00:51:14.237
And so over the years it kind of morphed into that.

00:51:14.237 --> 00:51:17.719
We've kind of learned different skills.

00:51:17.719 --> 00:51:21.222
So we kind of divided the work to multiply the success type deal.

00:51:21.222 --> 00:51:27.125
So he's really good with the video editing and he's really good with the camera, photography, things of that nature.

00:51:27.125 --> 00:51:31.067
I'm really good at graphic design, I'm really good at brand identity, things like that.

00:51:31.067 --> 00:51:31.807
So we kind of combined our skills.

00:51:31.807 --> 00:51:33.489
I'm good with audio editing, identity things like that.

00:51:33.489 --> 00:51:35.148
So we kind of combined our skills.

00:51:35.148 --> 00:51:41.213
I'm good with audio editing and so you know, we kind of combined our skills and we've helped so many people.

00:51:41.293 --> 00:51:49.385
It's and again, that was like a hobby that we both really enjoyed and that's kind of how we stayed close.

00:51:49.385 --> 00:51:52.697
As you know, I left for the military and he's moved from this place and now I'm in North Carolina, so that's for us.

00:51:52.697 --> 00:51:54.019
That's kind of how we stayed connected.

00:51:54.019 --> 00:52:01.182
Uh, but in that, in that journey, I mean it's we've parlayed that into the podcast network.

00:52:01.182 --> 00:52:04.034
Now to the partnership with I heart, to helping.

00:52:04.034 --> 00:52:16.726
You know, um, like Tyrese Maxey from the Philadelphia 76ers is about to do a podcast with I heart and we are going to help produce that because of 24 media and all the stuff we've done for iHeart.

00:52:16.726 --> 00:52:19.798
And we didn't go to college for that, we are self-taught.

00:52:19.798 --> 00:52:30.117
And to the point where, like the president of iHeart in Philly, is like, why is Mike and his buddies so good at this when I have college people and people who grew up in radio?

00:52:30.117 --> 00:52:35.463
You know, even their podcast sounds better than some of the stuff I have on the radio Like it's and I'm.

00:52:35.463 --> 00:52:40.329
I'm just like hey, you know, when we're invested, you know we're invested.

00:52:40.550 --> 00:52:45.744
If I, if I'm going to be doing the sports podcast, I want to be the best version of that that I can be.

00:52:45.744 --> 00:52:46.907
You know I want to.

00:52:46.907 --> 00:52:47.936
I want to be the best at it.

00:52:47.936 --> 00:52:55.831
You know, if I want to do a graphic design or if I want to help people build their business, I want them to say, hey, this is the guy to help me do it.

00:52:55.831 --> 00:52:57.474
That's always been the motivation.

00:52:57.474 --> 00:52:58.197
It's so funny.

00:52:58.336 --> 00:53:00.643
Uh, uh, we were just talking at the firehouse.

00:53:00.643 --> 00:53:01.766
I don't believe in motivation.

00:53:01.766 --> 00:53:02.358
I don't.

00:53:02.358 --> 00:53:07.121
I believe you either want it or you don't want it, and if you want it, bad enough, you're going to figure out how to get it.

00:53:07.121 --> 00:53:09.534
Uh, you don't need to be motivated by anything.

00:53:09.675 --> 00:53:12.262
People who need motivation, uh, are the people.

00:53:12.282 --> 00:53:13.405
Don't have discipline to me.

00:53:13.646 --> 00:53:16.277
Like, don't have discipline to me.

00:53:16.297 --> 00:53:19.344
Like, what do you need to be motivated, for If you want to start a podcast, go get a microphone, go do the research, make it happen.

00:53:19.344 --> 00:53:22.318
You don't need to feel motivated to do that.

00:53:22.318 --> 00:53:24.382
If you're about it, you know.

00:53:24.382 --> 00:53:31.804
So, uh, and and, and all my cousin, uh, all the people that we work with, we're all like-minded that way.

00:53:31.804 --> 00:53:33.376
Hey, is this something you want to do?

00:53:33.376 --> 00:53:37.460
Just let you know if this is what you want to do, this is what you want to do, this is what it means.

00:53:37.902 --> 00:53:40.003
If you're not about that, then you can't roll with us.

00:53:40.003 --> 00:53:40.505
Period.

00:53:40.505 --> 00:53:50.275
It's not personal, it's just like we're trying to get here and I can't be dragging you along trying to talk you into doing it.

00:53:50.275 --> 00:53:54.242
You either want to do it or you don't want to do it, and so we all decided we want to do it, and so, all right, cool, let's do it.

00:53:54.242 --> 00:53:55.282
Hey, weekly podcast.

00:53:55.282 --> 00:53:57.786
If you can't do it every week, try to make content.

00:53:57.786 --> 00:53:59.088
Just whip out your phone.

00:53:59.088 --> 00:54:01.456
It doesn't have to be professional, nobody cares, you know.

00:54:01.456 --> 00:54:03.681
But you have to be consistent.

00:54:03.681 --> 00:54:17.123
So, whether that's graphic design, whether that's doing a podcast, whether you're selling vacuum cleaners, which is, you know, I'm dating myself, but door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman, you know, you have to be consistent at it and eventually it'll come.

00:54:17.123 --> 00:54:21.451
All the all the all the fruits of that labor will come if you're consistent enough.

00:54:23.436 --> 00:54:24.239
Yeah, that's well said.

00:54:24.239 --> 00:54:33.684
Consistency is extremely important and it's something that I've struggled with over the last I think two years been doing this, three years now.

00:54:33.684 --> 00:54:37.641
I was consistent for a real long time and then work.

00:54:37.641 --> 00:54:38.103
It's just.

00:54:38.103 --> 00:54:48.362
I feel like there's ebb and flows with this, but the one thing that's been important for me is to always keep a pulse and to always keep it going, to never step away.

00:54:48.362 --> 00:54:52.679
Don't take the break in the semester at college, because you'll never go back again.

00:54:52.699 --> 00:55:00.320
Um, you know, and that's been my, that's been my fear is like if I stop recording, I'm going to stop altogether.

00:55:00.320 --> 00:55:32.664
And then all this I mean you know as well as I do, bro there's a lot of time, energy sacrifice, late night just teaching yourself how to do the audio side of this, the video side of this that people don't see, and I was telling a friend of mine today that I said there's a lot of times when you're out drinking, having a good time, going out, doing stuff, and I'm sitting in my little studio, my little shed here, and I'm unhooking things like running wires and it's 11 pm at night, going on 12 and and freaking.

00:55:32.664 --> 00:55:34.228
Nobody sees that stuff, man.

00:55:34.228 --> 00:55:40.032
So, uh, hats off to you for that man and understanding the discipline and consistency, especially having your cousin.

00:55:40.052 --> 00:55:43.445
That's, that's huge man, that's it helps, trust me, it helps me a lot.

00:55:43.445 --> 00:55:50.329
I I'm very grateful, and also my buddy, mike and and burt, who I do stuff about sports with, and then, yeah, everybody who's joined the the network.

00:55:50.329 --> 00:55:54.215
It was hard to run a network when it was just us and we got people to join.

00:55:54.215 --> 00:56:00.487
So now the burden to make content for me is less because I push everything through the network, and that was very important to me.

00:56:00.487 --> 00:56:05.365
Yeah, we all have our own separate entities, but I need everything to go through the network.

00:56:05.365 --> 00:56:08.150
That way I don't have to make content every day.

00:56:08.550 --> 00:56:18.655
Or if I know, like Bert travels a lot for his job, so if I know we're not going to do a show for a week or two, I make sure I take one of the days that I know I'm going to be home and the kids are at school and that's my content day.

00:56:18.655 --> 00:56:24.110
I'll sit there and I'll record five to seven things and then I can just post it.

00:56:24.110 --> 00:56:26.074
Now I'll schedule posts that way.

00:56:26.074 --> 00:56:26.795
I'm not, I don't have to.

00:56:26.795 --> 00:56:29.458
I don't feel that pressure of doing something every day.

00:56:30.059 --> 00:56:57.128
I'll just make sure I take a day to do research and then I'll take a day to record and I'll put out reels or I'll make up stories or I'll, you know, make up posts, and then that that kind of helps me for what you were talking about days that you're kind of burnt out and, um, you may not feel like doing something right then, and there, uh, I kind of preload that stuff for me and then that way, uh, a day that I'm a little busy or I know I can't get in front of the microphone, I at least have something I can post uh for for any particular day.

00:56:57.128 --> 00:56:58.094
So that's learning.

00:56:58.094 --> 00:57:05.231
Things like that is just something you come with experience and time like like, damn, you know, I don't have to make a show every day or I don't have to do it every week.

00:57:05.231 --> 00:57:11.621
I can, I can figure out ways to make content for people to look at and, um and and and do it that way.

00:57:11.621 --> 00:57:15.135
So, yeah, it's just everything's like learning curves, right, like just trying to figure it out.

00:57:16.125 --> 00:57:25.784
So talk to me about some of the big milestones that 24 media has, uh has come across, I guess, since you started it around 2006, right yeah?

00:57:26.065 --> 00:57:30.858
So I mean literally just from building our first computer.

00:57:30.858 --> 00:57:35.871
Uh, uh, ty's dad is a computer engineer and I remember in high school we had asked him for a computer.

00:57:35.871 --> 00:57:40.530
You know, back in 2004, five, you know, in.

00:57:40.530 --> 00:57:45.771
In that time computers weren't, as I mean they were getting accessible, but they were still pretty expensive.

00:57:45.771 --> 00:57:49.936
Um, he came home with and he, I learned a lot from him.

00:57:50.125 --> 00:57:54.887
He was the type you know you learn by doing, not coddling, right, you don't?

00:57:54.887 --> 00:57:56.393
You, nobody's giving you anything.

00:57:56.393 --> 00:58:01.356
He showed up from work one day with a box of computer parts and said put it together.

00:58:01.356 --> 00:58:01.998
Here's your computer.

00:58:01.998 --> 00:58:03.010
It's every part you need.

00:58:03.010 --> 00:58:09.157
Uh, you can use my computer to look up what things are if you don't know, and look up how to put it together.

00:58:09.157 --> 00:58:13.188
And it looked like a piece of crap, like we had the.

00:58:13.188 --> 00:58:15.273
I mean it did like all the parts looked old and.

00:58:15.273 --> 00:58:20.291
But by the time we looked up every single part and figured out what part goes to what.

00:58:20.291 --> 00:58:20.911
I mean.

00:58:20.911 --> 00:58:26.300
It took us about two weeks and, uh, come to find out he's got us the parts you couldn't even get in stores.

00:58:26.300 --> 00:58:28.347
We had the best computer like that.

00:58:28.347 --> 00:58:47.971
You, a computer that we built from the stuff he gave us, you know, would have cost thousands of dollars and but it taught us to work for it and I think a lot of that discipline for me started then and I've always been like that, like no, we'll take it apart, we'll figure out how to put it back together, and that's how you learn as far as milestones.

00:58:47.971 --> 00:58:51.070
You know from that moment.

00:58:51.070 --> 00:58:53.637
That's what helped us with our business.

00:58:54.027 --> 00:58:54.829
We have to work now.

00:58:54.829 --> 00:59:02.469
We have to do a bunch of free stuff and uh and give and give people like a taste and then work from there.

00:59:02.469 --> 00:59:06.896
And then now we have the town that we grew up in.

00:59:06.896 --> 00:59:13.018
We're doing their um, their water and port authority website and all their social media.

00:59:13.018 --> 00:59:24.501
The deal with iHeart, the deal with Fox Sports in Philadelphia working with Todd Frazier, new York legend for baseball, helping the children's centralized hospital.

00:59:24.501 --> 00:59:31.456
It's always something that we're adding to our resume because we're helping these people and it's just getting bigger and bigger.

00:59:31.456 --> 00:59:36.467
Frankie darcelle is a legendary voice in philadelphia radio and we help with them.

00:59:36.467 --> 00:59:46.731
We've helped with the um, the, the national suicide hotline, doing they did a series, a podcast series, and we help them produce that through iheart.

00:59:46.731 --> 01:00:01.976
So like, just bigger, bigger opportunities for us are leading to more opportunities and again, it's just us doing it and being good at it and being confident and just kind of.

01:00:01.976 --> 01:00:10.911
You know, every, every opportunity we get, learning for something so we can take it to the next thing, and I'm excited to see what next year brings.

01:00:10.911 --> 01:00:15.405
Man Like now we're working with, you know, tyrese Maxey, star player for the Philadelphia 76ers.

01:00:15.405 --> 01:00:19.847
Right now he's starting a podcast throughout heart and we're going to help with that and that's going to.

01:00:19.847 --> 01:00:21.210
That opens up another door to us.

01:00:21.271 --> 01:00:25.329
Now you know what I mean Athletes like that's something that we haven't really tapped into.

01:00:25.329 --> 01:00:27.152
A lot of it has just been small business.

01:00:27.152 --> 01:00:34.634
Particularly for me and Ty, it's important that we help small black business, so helping them get off the ground, because a lot of them don't really know.

01:00:34.634 --> 01:00:37.619
They just, oh, I just need a logo and a business card and I'll figure it out.

01:00:37.619 --> 01:00:38.925
No, there's, there's a lot more to it.

01:00:38.925 --> 01:00:41.693
Like you know, there you need creative direction.

01:00:41.693 --> 01:00:49.313
It's not just having a logo and slapping it on some water bottles and now you have a business, you need a, you need a plan, and so helping people develop.

01:00:49.313 --> 01:00:59.637
That has been a very beneficial when we use it in our corporate side, like with iHeart and everything that kind of stems from that.

01:00:59.637 --> 01:01:02.648
So yeah, it's been a crazy journey.

01:01:02.648 --> 01:01:04.452
To be honest with you, it's been crazy for us.

01:01:04.813 --> 01:01:09.068
For anyone out there listening, though, that might be interested and they're looking for some brand identity.

01:01:09.068 --> 01:01:19.501
Can you talk about how you assist the small businesses in developing that brand identity and their digital presence as well?

01:01:20.344 --> 01:01:30.117
Yeah, so typically it starts off with a meeting right, just helping create the brand and figure out what you need from us, right, like some people literally have no idea where to start.

01:01:30.117 --> 01:01:31.309
Right, like they just they don't know where to start.

01:01:31.309 --> 01:01:35.204
So we can honestly help from us, right, like some people literally have no idea where to start, right, like they just they don't, they don't know where to start, so we can honestly help from there.

01:01:35.204 --> 01:01:40.186
Okay Well, tell us about your business, tell us what you want to do, tell us what you want to achieve, what's your goal?

01:01:40.186 --> 01:01:47.628
Right, and um, and, and then from there we kind of come up with, we kind of come up with a plan for you, right?

01:01:47.628 --> 01:01:55.360
So, like some people, they know exactly what they want to do and so we uh, they just don't have the ability to make it look good and we just do that, right.

01:01:55.360 --> 01:02:09.369
Uh, like urban youth right, urban youth is a, is a, is a racing school in Delaware and they wanted to teach, uh, um, kids in the city about NASCAR, about racing, how to build the cars, how to do this.

01:02:09.369 --> 01:02:27.489
Jim Brown from CBS is partnering with them and a bunch of the teachers found my cousin Ty and we helped them create a documentary that Jim Brown's going to narrate, and the whole school's purpose is just to teach kids about NASCAR and building cars.

01:02:27.489 --> 01:02:41.186
So, whether you want to race or you want to be part of the pit crew, they're teaching you how NASCAR and how NASCAR vehicles are made and how they run, and it's it's an awesome thing, and so we're in the process of doing that for them, creating that documentary for them.

01:02:41.186 --> 01:02:43.853
But they, they had, they had an idea.

01:02:43.853 --> 01:02:45.257
They just didn't know how to execute it.

01:02:45.257 --> 01:02:51.014
And we have people coming to us hey, I just want to sell shirts, all right, well, what kind of shirts are motivational?

01:02:51.014 --> 01:02:52.797
Okay, well, kind of motivation Like what do you?

01:02:52.797 --> 01:02:57.945
You know?

01:02:57.945 --> 01:02:59.391
Um, and we, we, we help them come up with stuff like that.

01:02:59.411 --> 01:03:09.717
Uh, in Memphis, we had these two people that wanted to create their own mail carrying service and they would just basically deliver packages like the Uber of delivering packages, and, uh, so we helped them do that.

01:03:09.717 --> 01:03:14.773
Like it's just from the ground up, everything from a website, and some people just want a logo, and that's fine.

01:03:14.773 --> 01:03:17.630
Uh, I try to ask them all right, well, what are you going to do with the logo?

01:03:17.630 --> 01:03:19.346
You know, and that's where the salesman part of it.

01:03:19.346 --> 01:03:20.306
Right, you got to upsell it.

01:03:20.306 --> 01:03:21.208
All, right, you got a logo.

01:03:21.208 --> 01:03:22.009
Now, now, what, like?

01:03:22.009 --> 01:03:22.730
What are you going to them?

01:03:22.730 --> 01:03:35.755
Um, and then, if you can't, if you can't do, if you can't do that, then, uh, we'll, we'll figure something else out.

01:03:35.795 --> 01:03:40.885
But, yeah, I mean everything from graphic design, website development, video production, even social media strategy.

01:03:40.885 --> 01:03:54.224
Um, you know, just consulting anything like we honestly it's uh, I hate to say it, like this, anything we, we literally anything to do with media, we can do it.

01:03:54.224 --> 01:03:58.494
And so, um, again, the podcast production.

01:03:58.494 --> 01:04:00.117
We've done live streams for iheart.

01:04:00.117 --> 01:04:01.746
That's really how we got our foot in the door.

01:04:01.746 --> 01:04:11.148
We, you know, we, we were like doing live streams and then they realized we had a podcast and we were going to like mets games, because a lot of half of us are mets fans and half of us are yankees fans.

01:04:11.148 --> 01:04:22.492
So we would do these events, uh, in Philly, whenever the Mets would play the I mean the Phillies would play the Mets or the Yankees we would just go there, set up a table and go live and, um, people started catching on.

01:04:22.492 --> 01:04:31.034
Man, it's just, it was, it's been, it's been a wild, it's been a wild journey, considering that we just started from making like mixtape covers on a computer we built in high school.

01:04:31.574 --> 01:04:32.257
That's awesome man.

01:04:32.257 --> 01:04:38.231
I laughed when he first started talking about brand identity because I was that person.

01:04:38.231 --> 01:04:40.000
I had an idea, but I didn't.

01:04:40.000 --> 01:04:45.373
When they started asking me questions about you know, why are you doing this, and I felt so dumb.

01:04:45.373 --> 01:04:50.795
I was like I don't know, but you know, and I laughed when you said that just because that was me.

01:04:50.795 --> 01:04:52.842
I was like I don't know, but you know, and I laughed when you said that just because that was me.

01:04:52.842 --> 01:04:53.385
I was like I don't know.

01:04:53.806 --> 01:05:02.860
And people have to understand, like, if you're doing podcasts or anything that's in media, anybody can go to Best Buy and go purchase a camera, purchase a microphone, anybody.

01:05:02.860 --> 01:05:06.467
The challenge is is having a plan for that and having a brand identity and having some direction.

01:05:06.467 --> 01:05:28.326
That and having a brand identity and having some direction, so that's extremely important and that and that's where 24 media would come into play uh, to actually give you that foundation, that structure, because these microphones I can, you can get them anywhere, pay the money, get the microphone, uh.

01:05:28.326 --> 01:05:30.431
But the real challenge is is having a direction, uh, on what you want to do with that.

01:05:30.431 --> 01:05:32.235
So, um, that's that's why I laughed when you said that.

01:05:32.235 --> 01:05:35.208
You're probably like why is he laughing Because that was me and anyone out there listening.

01:05:35.208 --> 01:05:37.132
You should not feel bad, don't feel stupid.

01:05:37.152 --> 01:05:38.195
That was me too.

01:05:38.195 --> 01:05:38.655
Trust me.

01:05:38.775 --> 01:05:46.445
Yeah, yeah, don't feel stupid if you have an idea but you don't have it quite worked all out just yet.

01:05:46.445 --> 01:05:58.311
That's what 24 Media would be great for is to ask those questions, those important questions, because helping folks that are behind you, like on this journey, is probably one of the most fulfilling things that that I enjoy doing.

01:05:58.311 --> 01:06:13.152
You know, and I can tell you know a man like yourself that has worked his entire life in public service um, whether in the military or as a firefighter, whether in the military or as a firefighter, that wholeheartedly is at the soul of your business.

01:06:13.152 --> 01:06:13.914
24.

01:06:13.934 --> 01:06:14.273
Media.

01:06:15.175 --> 01:06:17.076
Now going forward into the future.

01:06:17.076 --> 01:06:22.960
How do you envision the direction of 24 Media and your role with the company?

01:06:22.960 --> 01:06:24.702
You guys mainly talk about sports, right?

01:06:33.025 --> 01:06:36.311
Yeah, so the Give Us a Shot Network is the podcast network, but 24 Media is the branding from that.

01:06:36.311 --> 01:06:41.360
Right now, a majority of the network are sports, but we've had podcasts that don't talk about sports at all.

01:06:41.360 --> 01:06:54.210
We've had two young ladies, one of them that worked at iHeart and one that wrote for the Washington Post, that talked about being single in their 30irties, living in the city, and they had, they had a whole podcast series about that.

01:06:54.210 --> 01:06:59.108
Um, again, we've had um, the suicide awareness podcast series.

01:06:59.108 --> 01:07:18.434
You know, uh, we have um, a professional wrestler, uh, like an independent professional wrestler, who is now kind of moving past professional wrestling but getting into training like physical fitness, and so we're helping him with that, like transitioning to that and starting that podcast.

01:07:18.434 --> 01:07:25.235
And so the podcast network, the Give Us a Shot Network, is literally giving podcasters a shot.

01:07:25.235 --> 01:07:38.251
Hey, if you don't know how to monetize your podcast, or you don't know how to start a podcast, you don't know how to monetize your podcast, or you don't know how to start a podcast, you don't know what microphone to buy, you don't know what, what, what to do other than talk, we can help you, you know.

01:07:38.251 --> 01:07:46.954
And so, luckily for us, a lot of our guys just needed a brand behind them, you know, to help them kind of promote what they're doing.

01:07:46.954 --> 01:07:52.626
So, and if that's all you need from us, sure, like you know and we can help you do that.

01:07:52.626 --> 01:07:58.278
But you know the future of it for 24 media, the future is to build a school.

01:07:58.278 --> 01:08:00.148
I want to teach people how to do this.

01:08:00.148 --> 01:08:03.034
Eventually, I want to teach um.

01:08:03.034 --> 01:08:11.016
I want to teach young people how to start doing graphic design and then also start getting into um like a branding agency.

01:08:11.016 --> 01:08:14.449
All right, this is how you, this is how you help people build a brand.

01:08:14.449 --> 01:08:15.514
This is what a brand is.

01:08:15.514 --> 01:08:18.826
This is why it's not just a logo and a business card.

01:08:18.826 --> 01:08:19.587
There's more to it.

01:08:19.587 --> 01:08:20.850
Know your why?

01:08:20.850 --> 01:08:21.894
Why are you doing it?

01:08:22.694 --> 01:08:28.956
Uh, I used to tell musicians all the time don't make music that you think people want to hear.

01:08:28.956 --> 01:08:31.708
Make music, you want to hear because you're not the only one that wants to hear it.

01:08:31.708 --> 01:08:43.802
So if you make something for you, so like for stuff about sports, you know me and Bert were trying to figure out what, how we wanted to do our show and I said I don't want to hear BS, I just want some dudes talking about sports.

01:08:43.802 --> 01:08:45.466
Man, I don't care if it's politically correct.

01:08:45.466 --> 01:08:50.154
I'm not the only one that feels the way I do about certain things that are happening in the sports world.

01:08:50.154 --> 01:08:52.819
So I'm going to speak the way I would I would.

01:08:52.819 --> 01:08:55.189
I would talk normally and it's worked out for us.

01:08:55.189 --> 01:08:58.552
You know, some people want to be buttoned up and polished and want to be ESPN.

01:08:58.552 --> 01:09:01.332
That's fine too, like if that's how you want to portray yourself.

01:09:01.332 --> 01:09:05.590
But you know why are you doing it?

01:09:05.590 --> 01:09:09.994
Because I just want real, authentic, not scared sports commentary.

01:09:09.994 --> 01:09:12.918
That's what I want out of my podcast.

01:09:13.460 --> 01:09:40.515
So, um, I'm actually going to be starting a podcast called the whole damn truth and each episode is going to be the whole damn truth about being a woman in corporate America, and I'm going to interview some lady who works at like my friend Jenny, who, um, has a high up job at her place and she's had to deal with a lot of crap as a woman in a male dominated workplace, and I want to know about that because she's not the only one going through that and I think it'll help people.

01:09:40.515 --> 01:09:41.769
I want to talk.

01:09:41.769 --> 01:09:52.038
There's an ex-con who had a beer business here in North Carolina and a bunch of people wrote some nasty stuff in a newspaper and it ruined his business.

01:09:52.038 --> 01:09:53.850
I want to talk to him about that.

01:09:53.850 --> 01:09:55.951
I don't think that's fair.

01:09:55.951 --> 01:10:01.818
I want to help him figure out what he can do to fight back.

01:10:01.818 --> 01:10:04.913
So the whole damn truth is something I've been working.

01:10:05.225 --> 01:10:09.996
It's a passion project of mine, because I'm not exactly sure how I want to frame it or how I want to do it.

01:10:09.996 --> 01:10:13.824
Mind, because I don't I'm not exactly sure how I want to frame it or how I want to do it.

01:10:13.824 --> 01:10:20.878
I kind of want a better uh setup for my house that I that I currently have Um, as I've had to move a couple of times in the last couple of years, so I couldn't settle.

01:10:20.878 --> 01:10:22.256
You know, I would love to have a setup like yours.

01:10:22.256 --> 01:10:26.038
Like, like that's the goal for me to have something uh like yours.

01:10:26.038 --> 01:10:28.380
But, uh, I definitely want it.

01:10:28.380 --> 01:10:33.283
I want it to be done right, because I want this to be something that truly touches people.

01:10:33.444 --> 01:10:34.247
Me talking about sports.

01:10:34.247 --> 01:10:35.412
Is me talking about sports right?

01:10:35.412 --> 01:10:36.704
Like it's, we all do it right.

01:10:36.704 --> 01:10:45.693
But this thing that I want to do is kind of similar to what you're doing Awareness and stuff that's important, like what you do is extremely important.

01:10:46.645 --> 01:10:59.240
I sat there and watched a bunch of your videos the last couple of days, from when we were first supposed to do it, completely forgot you were on Pacific Time, so I logged on at 3 pm thinking I'm like, oh man, it's been sitting here for 30 minutes.

01:10:59.240 --> 01:11:00.389
I have that problem all the time.

01:11:00.389 --> 01:11:11.917
Sorry, and I should have known better.

01:11:11.917 --> 01:11:12.426
But and then and then I just got busy at work.

01:11:12.426 --> 01:11:18.402
But yeah, what you do is extremely important and it's I'm very glad to know you and very glad to meet you and, honestly, be part of this podcast.

01:11:18.402 --> 01:11:22.734
It's a huge honor and I want to help you any way I can.

01:11:22.734 --> 01:11:33.534
And and I think like we need more people like you to do stuff like this, because it's real, it's not just BS, it's not recapping the bachelor or the last episode of some stupid TV show with dragons in it.

01:11:33.534 --> 01:11:43.432
Like this is important stuff and and I think, um, there should be more awareness for it you know, and underlining and highlighting people like you uh is an absolute honor for me.

01:11:43.833 --> 01:11:53.047
And I know you're a humble guy and you'll think, oh, that's not me and uh get all rosy in the cheeks and stuff.

01:11:53.047 --> 01:11:54.952
But in reality, man, like you've came from almost nothing to where you are now.

01:11:54.952 --> 01:12:06.172
So it's an honor for me to interview folks like you because you're doing so many tremendous things and I really think that our society as a whole is missing out on the real heroes in our society.

01:12:06.172 --> 01:12:22.494
You know, and what you were just talking about is real A lot of people are trying to get away from mainstream media and trying to get those real, uh, authentic voices out there and they want to hear like the no BS, like unpolished, uh reality.

01:12:22.494 --> 01:12:27.055
So I I think that's a huge market, uh coming over the horizon for you, man.

01:12:27.055 --> 01:12:36.033
But listen, we've covered everything from your military time to your firefighter career, to you being an entrepreneur as well.

01:12:36.033 --> 01:12:44.297
Is there anything else before we wrap up this podcast that you'd like to mention or talk about that I didn't cover?

01:12:45.404 --> 01:12:46.890
No, I mean just for anybody.

01:12:46.890 --> 01:12:51.306
Be yourself, man, the same reason people love me or the same reason people hate me.

01:12:51.306 --> 01:12:53.211
There's no need to be two versions of yourself.

01:12:53.211 --> 01:13:00.396
You know, just be as authentic as possible, treat people the right way, do things the right way and you'll have a fulfilling life.

01:13:00.396 --> 01:13:00.765
Give it.

01:13:00.765 --> 01:13:02.569
Give everything you want to do.

01:13:02.631 --> 01:13:05.345
If you want to do a podcast, do it to the best of your ability.

01:13:05.345 --> 01:13:06.747
You know, be in.

01:13:06.747 --> 01:13:08.270
If you want to be a firefighter, be in.

01:13:08.270 --> 01:13:11.875
If you want to be in law enforcement, be in it and and just be yourself.

01:13:11.875 --> 01:13:12.195
Like.

01:13:12.195 --> 01:13:13.318
There's no need to fake it.

01:13:13.318 --> 01:13:14.378
You know, just just.

01:13:14.378 --> 01:13:23.025
I want people to be themselves and and be the real version of them and not some version they think other people want you to see, and you'll go far.

01:13:23.025 --> 01:13:23.806
Trust me, I've.

01:13:23.806 --> 01:13:26.847
I'm not the most politically correct, I'm not the most professional, I know.

01:13:26.847 --> 01:13:33.152
You know there's a time to be professional, there's a time for business and things like that, but at the end of the day, I'm still me.

01:13:33.152 --> 01:13:34.894
There's no need to fake it.

01:13:34.894 --> 01:13:37.635
But no, I had a really good time doing this man.

01:13:37.635 --> 01:13:38.456
This was very fun.

01:13:38.456 --> 01:13:39.596
Time flew for sure.

01:13:39.997 --> 01:13:41.578
But, jamal, I really appreciate it.

01:13:41.578 --> 01:13:51.447
Thank you so much.

01:13:51.447 --> 01:14:00.454
I want to make sure that I properly put the 24 media information on here, as well as your Instagram and any other social media platforms that you're on as well.

01:14:00.454 --> 01:14:08.194
So, if you're listening to this on a podcast, scroll down to the bottom, where the captions are there, and you can find the different links.

01:14:08.194 --> 01:14:11.414
If you're watching this on YouTube, same deal, just go to the bottom.

01:14:11.414 --> 01:14:16.497
There You'll find where you can get a hold of 24 Media and Jamal as well.

01:14:16.497 --> 01:14:20.889
So, man, it's been quite an honor to connect with you and I hope we get an opportunity to talk again.

01:14:20.889 --> 01:14:22.252
Man, 100%.

01:14:22.313 --> 01:14:22.993
Thank you very much.

01:14:23.876 --> 01:14:24.398
All right, folks.

01:14:24.398 --> 01:14:28.131
As always, I want you to stay tuned, stay focused and stay motivated.

01:14:28.131 --> 01:14:30.033
Warriors fall out.