0:05

Welcome to Transacting Value, where we talk about practical applications for personal values when dealing with each other and even within ourselves.

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Where we foster a podcast listening experience that lets you hear the power of a value system for managing burnout, establishing boundaries and finding belonging.

0:22

My name is Josh Porthouse, I'm your host and we are your people.

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This is why values still hold value.

0:29

This is Transacting Value.

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Doesn't matter if we come from two different walks of life.

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I think that building relationships with people is what matters the most Trust, listen, respect Just making sure that you build that relationship, then bonds can be created.

0:49

Today on Transacting Value. And what about those times in your career, in your life, when your role changes?

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Sometimes it takes your identity with it.

0:59

You get out of the military, leave your parents' house.

1:02

After high school, you get a new job, you get a divorce, the midlife crisis, those transition points in our lives.

1:08

It's difficult sometimes to separate what that looks like from who we were to who we are now and how we can adapt, how we can overcome, how we increase resiliency and ultimately, progress in a more positive direction.

1:19

Our next contributor is not new to the show.

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In fact, he was last on in season three.

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We're bringing him back, Casey Reitz.

1:26

He's talking all about career burnout and what it's been like for him changing careers, growing through his life and, ultimately, how he's shaped into who he's become today.

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So, guys, thanks for tuning in, thanks for coming back to the show, thanks for joining us Without further ado.

1:40

I'm Porter, I'm your host and this is Transacting Value.

1:43

Casey, what's up, man?

1:46

How you doing Doing well. Thank you for having me back on. I'm excited to do this.

1:49

Whenever you guys reached out to me, I was immediately on board.

1:53

I'm glad you were, and I got to tell you when I saw your name come up on the show schedule.

1:57

The last thing I remember us talking about was you doing stand-up comedy, and so I'm really looking forward to talking more about your comedic endeavors, assuming that's still the case, is it at all?

2:10

Has it changed? It is?

2:12

It's actually not the case and it was actually a little bit coincidental that you reached out to me and that I'm going to be on this particular series of episodes, whenever I was told that the themes were going to be burnout and quitting, et cetera.

2:26

You know I've I've had a lot of burnout, not just with comedy but with a career, career changes and a lot of different things.

2:34

So I thought it was was actually pretty fitting that I would be on this particular set of episodes.

2:41

Well then I'm glad we could help you out.

2:44

Man, the thing I think that's still important hasn't really changed.

2:47

We have a lot of new listeners now, and even though they've all gained immense value and entertainment from our last conversation, that doesn't necessarily mean they know who you are.

2:57

So I'm going to give you the stage for a couple of minutes. Let's just put this out there up front so everybody knows who they're listening to, because ultimately, there's not an accompanying video to this audio right now.

3:06

So who are you? Where are you from?

3:08

What sort of things have shaped your perspective on life, man?

3:11

Like you said, my name is Casey Reitz. We met while we were in the Marine Corps together, so I'm a veteran.

3:18

Five years I did that whole thing and then I got out and ever since I got out I've been moving around from place to place trying to find out where I can fit in, and I've moved from North Carolina to Colorado, to California, to back to North Carolina and now I'm living in Birmingham, Alabama, and, like I said, I've just been trying to figure out where I fit in.

3:43

Luckily, I found a few things that have been able to stick with me in terms of community, like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

3:51

I had the comedy going for a little while.

3:53

Stopped doing that, unfortunately.

3:55

That was a good community for me, but I got a little burned out on that lifestyle.

3:59

And you know, now I'm just about to transition my career.

4:03

Actually, I start in the Birmingham Police Academy next Tuesday.

4:08

So a whole new career field.

4:12

I'm getting back into the regimented lifestyle, I guess you could say.

4:16

Yeah, wow, congratulations first of all. But you're where are you?

4:21

Late 20s, early 30s now, how old are you?

4:23

Yeah, 28. About to be 29 later this year.

4:27

Almost almost over the hill. Okay, so at this point in your life, given your weak back and crumbling arthritic skeletal system from your years in the infantry, how do you see this going?

4:39

Obviously, successfully is the goal. But like your transition, like you're the new guy again, you got to act and perform and physically do all of these things that 10 years ago were probably quite the agile specimen.

4:52

Do you feel like that's held pretty well constant?

4:56

Well, I was actually thinking about that yesterday and the day before because, like I said, I go to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Pretty common thing for me in the past year been going very consistently, you know, four to five, maybe six times a week and my body's held up pretty good.

5:13

But I've had a few nagging, you know, aches and pains.

5:16

So I was thinking about that and, um, really trying to take my recovery seriously that way, as the years go on in this new career, I can hold up Because obviously, as you know, when you go into something like this, it's going to be very physically demanding and I'm going to need to make sure that I take care of my body and I've been focusing heavily on that over the past few months, especially thinking about it over the past couple days.

5:44

A little bit. I'm not worried about being yelled at, I'm not worried about, you know, getting people getting in my face, because we've done that.

5:51

But the one thing I am a little bit nervous about is is those little nagging injuries, those little nagging, aches and pains, and I think that I'll be okay, though I have a, I'm very optimistic.

6:05

So here's something that I think is pretty cool that really more recently in my own perspective has come up where every time we feel like there's some sort of anxiety let's say performance anxiety, where I start to doubt my own capability, competency, confidence level, performance oriented isms, it's, on one hand, potentially a setback, I get nervous and I get more anxious.

6:31

But on the other hand, now as I'm, I guess, maturing and growing through life, I'm starting to realize it's not necessary to be nervous for the sake of being unprepared or lacking conditioning or whatever might have contributed to it.

6:47

I get more nervous now because it's like, not a challenge from the bottom end of my threshold, like oh, look how far back I've slid, I'm so out of shape, but a challenge from the top end of my threshold, like well, before you were more physically capable and you got through this, so it was fine.

7:02

You weren't in a position mentally in your life where you could have faced the same adversity with less physical capability, so you had to have a leg up.

7:12

It's like a golf handicap, right that's kind of a perfect way to put it.

7:16

Yeah, that's a perfect way to put it thanks, dude, I'm sure you would have come up with it.

7:20

Second, but being able to put it into a, into a place where you know like now you're a different you than you were physically, let's just say hypothetically not in as good a shape as you were, but you're also, mentally and emotionally, in a more resilient and different place.

7:38

I mean, look at all the change you brought up, moving around different States, moving around the country, different jobs, growing through your life over the last what's it been Six, seven, eight years since you got?

7:48

out yeah, five years this year, five years this month.

7:52

Happy anniversary, man. And so, over the last couple of years, having gone through all of those changes on some degree of a quest for stability, why did you settle on law enforcement?

8:03

Well, I will say that I've always had a calling to serve.

8:07

I know a lot of guys go into the military with the preemptive notion that I'm going to get out of my hometown, I'm going to get away from problems at home with either family, friends, lack of opportunity, maybe they need a vehicle to go to further their education, go to college.

8:27

For me it wasn't any of that.

8:29

For me it was. I'd never even had a an inkling to go into the military because of the fact that my dad was in the Marine Corps and he was a little bit of an asshole, you know, excuse my language, but he was a little bit of a hard ass and I didn't want to end up like that.

8:46

As you know, I'm a very outgoing person, very kind of you know, go with the flow, like to crack a joke here and there, like to have a good time, and I didn't want that part of me to change a thing for me.

9:06

For that reason now, whenever my recruiter ended up showing up at my door one summer right after I graduated high school, I kind of immediately had a calling to serve, and so that's why I joined.

9:13

And whenever I got out, that was a hole that was missing in me and I contemplated going back into the military or going into law enforcement.

9:21

But at that time there was a lot of into law enforcement.

9:28

But at that time there was a lot of um, a lot of stuff going on in the country with, you know, the whole George Floyd incident, etc.

9:32

Etc. And my family members weren't super comfortable with me going into law enforcement at that time.

9:37

You know, I can't blame them. I think a lot of the country, a lot of the young mid-20s, late late-20s population of the country was saying I'm going to get out of law enforcement because this is just not the path I want to go down.

9:49

With all this bad energy, this bad press.

9:53

I don't want to be targeted for my job.

9:56

So I steered clear of it because my family was worried about my safety.

10:01

Now I've gone throughout the past three or four years wondering what's going to be the next thing for me.

10:07

I've tried sales, I've tried performing arts, I've gone to school, I've done all kinds of different things, worked in the service industry and nothing has fulfilled me like serving did.

10:19

Naturally, the next step for me is to just get back into that role in society and be able to lay my head down at night and say, hey, I'm proud of what I'm doing for the community.

10:30

Good for you. How'd you identify that, that that was your gap, that that was the catalyst or niche item, a driver, a trigger?

10:38

How'd you identify that?

11:05

To be honest with you, I don't know if I necessarily identified that I some of those careers, but nothing has been fulfilling for me and I just recall that feeling that I got every night whenever I went home, and all the hard days and all the really bad kind of leadership that I had to deal with and all the challenges that we dealt with while we were in the Marine Corps is, regardless of all that stuff, I still enjoyed what I did and I enjoyed the feeling that I got, knowing that I was doing something that's bigger than myself.

11:36

Alrighty, folks sit tight and we'll be right back on Transacting Value.

11:40

This message is from the US Department of Veterans Affairs.

11:42

Va disability compensation is open to veterans with a disability rating of 10% or more.

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Veterans may qualify for more than $4,000 a month.

11:53

Those with a disability rating of 10% or more also get free or low-cost VA health care.

11:59

If you have a disability rating, you can apply for a rating increase.

12:04

Learn more at va. gov disability.

12:10

Regardless of all that stuff, I still enjoyed what I did, and I enjoyed the feeling that I got, knowing that I was doing something that's bigger than myself, and so it's just been something that's within me, I think.

12:44

Marine Corps reserves now, but the majority of my career on active duty has been with the Marine Corps infantry and so being able to see everybody throughout my career get out, try to find outlets or successfully or not find ways to process and deal with.

12:56

Well, now you don't have a coping mechanism.

12:59

Casey, let me ask you this man when you joined, you said out of high school let me ask you this, man, when you joined, you said out of high school, right, yeah, okay, 18.

13:09

I graduated at seven. My parents had to sign the. Uh had to sign the contract for me.

13:11

I was 17 years old oh wow, I didn't realize that yeah yeah, okay, all right, well then.

13:17

So that explains a lot, uh, I think, of your earlier immaturity.

13:20

But then, as you grew through that and you found outlets over the course of five years how to better deal with the world around you in whatever ways, you felt more comfortable in your own skin, so to speak.

13:32

Did you find that after five years you had a better perspective on how to socialize with people and deal with society, or did you feel like you were a little out of touch and things just didn't quite make sense?

13:44

I think that I had a far greater ability to socialize and to be in touch with people's emotions and what they were going through, and I think a lot of that was from making a lot of mistakes as I grew.

14:01

Like I said, I was 17 years old I signed the line and 18 when I went to boot camp, and from the time I was 18 years old until the time I was 23, almost 24, that was a pivotal growth point for me.

14:16

I made a lot of leadership mistakes.

14:19

Like I said, I had a lot of bad leadership. I had a lot of good leadership.

14:22

I was able to see what made people tick and that allowed me to be a little more in touch with the people in just general society.

14:30

I think 100%.

14:33

I feel like it's the people more often than not.

14:36

Let me say this I feel like it's the people, more than the circumstances, that cause us to feel burnt out in any of our careers or even just change careers.

14:44

But in your call it hindsight having a better feel for the pulse of how you wanted to communicate with people and have how people were acting and communicating with you, and these patterns and responses and so on, what did any of that have to do with the degree of burnout that you felt in any of these industries?

15:03

Was it more the people or was it more the circumstance?

15:07

I would say that I can't think of one time that it was the people and I know that's a little bit odd to say.

15:16

I know that a lot of people have the opposite thought process.

15:19

Hey, I love this job, but I can't deal with the team that I'm working on.

15:24

These people are just selfish and inconsiderate.

15:27

I don't. I don't like working with them.

15:29

They don't bring anything to the table for me but for me I.

15:33

I worked with so many wonderful people.

15:35

Since I've been out, I will say I had one job that I didn't really love.

15:40

The environment that I was in I stuck it out because I liked the people I was working with.

16:14

I think that for the most part in my career, even in the military, it was the people that would have made me want to stay.

16:24

Is that recreatable? That type of bond, those types of relationships with people that necessarily you don't share the perspective, with Guys you didn't go to boot camp with, for example, you have a different degree of relationship, a different depth of relationship than maybe you would with people that haven't experienced that Is that recreatable in your experience?

16:46

I don't necessarily know if it's if those bonds are recreatable in your experience. I don't necessarily know if it's if those bonds are recreatable.

16:50

Thinking back on the friends that I've had for the past 10 years that I met when I first went into the military, those bonds are not recreatable.

16:59

But having good relationships with people, it doesn't matter if I don't know you from John, from Adam, or John from Mary or whatever that saying is.

17:08

It doesn't matter if we come from two different walks of life.

17:11

I think that building relationships with people is what matters the most.

17:15

You know, trust, listen, respect, just making sure that you build that relationship.

17:20

Then bonds can be created. But those other bonds that I shared with guys, that you go through certain things with people, those bonds can't be recreated.

17:30

Okay, does that make sense?

17:32

I don't know if I answered the question a hundred percent.

17:35

Well, yeah, I think as well as it could have been answered, but, yeah, it makes a lot of sense, especially in my perspective and for anybody who's listening, where maybe that seems a little bit foreign.

17:43

Any type of a stressful environment and this is more my perspective as well, casey but any type of a stressful environment and this is more my perspective as well, casey but any type of a stressful environment that you go through individually, as a group, everybody's individually challenged to their own tolerances and thresholds, but as a collective unit, any of those stressful type environments, you have no choice but to bond.

18:05

You may pass or fail, so to speak, on an individual basis, but it's sort of that shared misery and just crawling through the muck that brings everybody together because you don't have to talk, you just know where everybody else's head is.

18:19

I don't know in my experience yet to date how easy that is to your point, casey, to recreate either, but in trying to find ways to build those commonalities or that depth and scale and scope and degree of connection in a relationship, is that possible?

18:40

And then, if you think it is, how?

18:43

I think so. I think it just goes back to relationship building.

18:46

A lot of the people that I meet I don't know if it's just me or if it's the fact that I put a lot of effort into building relationships but people seem to tell me their life's problems after I've only known them for a certain amount of time that I wouldn't necessarily deem appropriate.

19:02

But I think that that comes from the relationship building.

19:06

Those five tenets of a relationship building is trust, listen, influence, respect and care.

19:12

And and if you do those five things with with anybody, you know whether it's the bartender that you see once a month, or your partner at work that you work on projects with all the time, or you know your family members, family's friends, doesn't matter.

19:27

I mean, if you put in those, those five tenets of relationship building into practice, then anything's possible, I guess.

19:34

You're saying every time, all the time, that's demanding, I don't care all the time.

19:38

Yeah, but I don't care all the time. I don't have that bandwidth Some days I just don't care to.

19:44

You're saying that has to happen every time to build that depth of a relationship.

19:55

I think so. I don't think that you can have a very deep relationship, a very meaningful relationship with somebody if you don't care, if you're caring about my problems and I'm on the phone with you for an hour every week talking about how my job sucks, and my girlfriend did this and my mom did that, my dad is doing this and this other guy I know died, and then, oh, see you later click and hang up.

20:15

it doesn't matter what kind of Bond we have from years and years, eventually that's going to wear you down if I don't listen to you, if I don't trust you, if I don't respect you, if I don't care about you, if and I don't try and influence you in some way, then that relationship will kind of fizzle out.

20:29

It doesn't matter how far back we go.

20:31

Okay, so it can be incremental over time.

20:34

It just has to be consistent and genuine. I think is how I do view that often, but sometimes to the point you brought up and I agree burnout.

20:44

I don't know about most times, but sometimes burnout can lead to loneliness and loneliness and lead to futility and from there it just goes downhill.

20:53

It's tough to recover, in my opinion, once you feel like you're alone, even if you're not.

20:58

Once you feel like you're alone, it's tough to recover.

21:01

And so what thoughts do you have about, I don't know, pick a relationship type with a spouse, with a family member, with a coworker in a bureaucracy, with people you've never met?

21:14

Pick a relationship type. But what advice do you have to try to dig back out of that and find connection with people?

21:23

Because you mentioned those five tenets and that's great if you've got a degree of awareness what if you don't?

21:27

Where do you start? You know, like you said, you might not have any sort of awareness within those relationships, but if you feel lonely, you know you feel lonely, regardless of whether you are actually, you know, alone, whether you only have three friends but you feel like you should have 30 type deal or whether you legitimately don't have anybody to talk to.

21:49

Having that self-awareness is probably the most important thing, because if you don't have that self-awareness, well then you can't.

21:55

I can't come to you Say you're my closest friend at work and say, hey, man, I'm going through a little bit of a hard time.

22:01

And if you're my really good friend, then you'll say hey, what's going on?

22:05

That way I can come out of my own self-awareness and say I don't feel like anyone's listening to me.

22:15

I don't feel like anyone really is taking the time of day to ask me what I'm doing. I feel like I put in a lot of effort to these relationships and I'm not getting anything out of it.

22:21

At that point, if you are able to come out of your shell a little bit to those important people around you, you would hope that those people are able to bring you out of that with them.

22:32

You know you're not going to. If you're in a 12 foot hole and there's no ladder but there's a rope at the top of the hole, you still need someone to kick the rope down to help you out.

22:42

You know you're not just going to climb up on out of there on your own.

22:46

You need somebody to help you out. So having that self-awareness of recognizing a situation and presenting those problems to your friends and to your family or whoever you're comfortable with expressing those opinions and those feelings to, that's very important.

23:01

That's probably the most important thing.

23:04

Alrighty, folks sit tight and we'll be right back on Transacting Value.

23:08

Join us for Transacting Value, where we discuss practical applications of personal values, every Monday at 9 am on our website, transactingvaluepodcast.

23:16

com. Wednesdays at 5 pm and Sundays at noon on wreathsacrossamerica.

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org/ radio.

23:26

Presenting those problems to your friends and to your family or whoever you're comfortable with, with expressing those opinions and those feelings too.

23:33

That's very important. That's probably the most important thing.

23:36

Yeah, I agree, I agree. Now let's say, though, for the sake of balancing perspectives, that involves somebody else, the points you just brought up.

23:44

What if we tie this back to not involving somebody else, call it intestinal fortitude or self-driven or something to that effect, as a way to I don't know cope, when you find yourself in those problems and you start realizing or feeling like I just doing this and I'm just going through the motions.

24:03

For example, I'm getting burnt out in my job or in a bureaucratic job, let's frame it this way In a bureaucratic job, I'm trying to make all this effort to change something and it's not going anywhere.

24:14

So now I'm burnt out on the effort I'm putting in, or the effort I feel like I'm putting in doesn't match the extent of the results I'm seeing or getting back, or accolades I'm getting and getting back.

24:26

How do you deal with, maybe, the result of those types of situations Imposter syndrome?

24:32

You start lacking courage, maybe confidence, doubting that you're even doing the right thing, feelings of rejection.

24:38

What about you in your own head?

24:41

How do you recommend we work through some of that stuff?

24:43

Maybe based on the Marine Corps when you were a comedian, if nobody laughed at your jokes?

24:48

How do you deal with a rejection after you spent all this time writing them?

24:51

It can be hard.

24:55

And in terms of being burnt out with a job or being burnt out with a certain hobby.

24:59

Or let's say, you put in a ton of effort into making a podcast and only five people listen to it over the course of six months and you're thinking, well, this ain't going how I thought it was going to go.

25:14

Maybe stepping back and evaluating yourself and go back to that self-awareness part, writing down hey, what have I been doing?

25:24

What can I do differently? Taking some personal accountability for what you've been doing and trying to change something personally, if you're in a funk, if you're in a depression, well, what are you doing every day?

25:35

Take a quick step back. Hey, how does my schedule look like?

25:38

I wake up at 7 o'clock, I'm out of the door by 8.

25:41

I'm at work at 8.30. I go to lunch every day at noon and then I'm out of the office by five and then I come home and I shower and I watch TV for three hours and then I go to bed.

25:51

Well, what can you change in that schedule?

25:54

Hey, maybe I should wake up an hour earlier.

25:57

Maybe I should try and read a book. Maybe I should go on a workout.

26:02

Maybe I should try and pick up golf or a random hobby, something that might take up my time a little more than just Because obviously what I'm doing ain't working.

26:11

If these are the feelings that I have, they're not working.

26:14

So reflecting the reflection is something that I try and reflect every day.

26:19

Hey, how'd my day go? What did I do? What could I have done differently.

26:22

And obviously you don't have to reflect every single day to be successful at pulling yourself out of these kind of funks.

26:28

But if you're in a deep funk and you don't feel like you can turn anybody or this is just a personal problem that has helped me.

26:36

I've been in some funks before and evaluating what I've been doing and it's typically changing one or two small things about my day it has a very, very drastic difference, makes a big difference on the outcome.

26:50

You're talking about for the sake of progress, or just how you view the day For the sake of just how my day's going.

26:57

If you're talking about loneliness, you're talking about getting burned out, you're talking about wanting to quit, maybe feeling some sort of sadness or depression.

27:06

Taking a look back hey, your day is only so long.

27:09

What did I do? How did this week go?

27:12

If you write down how your day went for 10 days now, now you know how the last two work weeks went.

27:17

So what can I do differently for the next two work weeks?

27:20

And then, if I'm still feeling a little bit funky, how can I change up a little more?

27:25

What can I do a little bit differently? I really think, even if we're talking about personal progression or, like I said, loneliness, sadness, depression, that kind of thing or if we're talking about professional, what can I do to advance myself professionally?

27:41

Hey, I can't get promoted at work.

27:43

Well, every project that I do is typically in second or third place, and I've been doing the same sort of protocol for my projects over the past three years.

27:55

Well, maybe I need to change something in my project protocol.

27:59

Maybe I need to do a little bit something different and see how it turns out.

28:02

Hey, it might not turn out any better, it might turn out worse, but now you know that thing isn't going to work, so then let's, let's switch it up for the next project.

28:10

So I think self-reflection is is very powerful, personally and professionally.

28:16

Sure, yeah, that's sort of the funny double-edged sword about loneliness.

28:19

It's easy to think you're by yourself, but then when you are by yourself, you don't want to focus on ownership and acceptance as if you are by yourself.

28:26

But at times I think to the point you brought up at times when maybe we're not getting I don't want to say validation, but recognition of our efforts, it's easy to place on somebody else.

28:39

Okay, well, I'm doing all of these things.

28:42

How do you not notice I'm spending this much time, this much money, this much brain power however human capital gets measured on this project?

28:49

How do you not see the value and the merit in these things, as opposed to I'm spending all of this time?

28:55

Money, fill in the blank human capital metric?

28:57

How do I not see the disservice in not remarketing, rebranding, tweaking how I'm presenting these efforts, because it may very well be worth quite a bit, and I don't mean financially, I just mean worth your time, yeah.

29:12

Well, you know what A few things you said there kind of reminded me of a situation with my wife, without getting into too much detail.

29:21

She's working at this new job and she put on a event for her office for some other people around the state to come in and made a bunch of presentations and everything, and the only person that didn't give her any recognition was her own boss.

29:40

So all the other physicians in the medical field, all the other physicians and nurses and assistants and all these other people, they all said, wow, this is a great event, thank you so much for how you did, and if it wasn't, if it wasn't for you, this wouldn't have happened and just gave her nonstop praise.

29:57

But the only person that didn't give her any praise was her own boss.

30:00

That's this kind of situation where, hey, you can see that I'm doing everything I can and I'm doing a pretty good job.

30:08

Because if only one person is I don't know if they're unhappy or if they're maybe just incapable of giving you that recognition then maybe you need to realize, hey, maybe this, this is something that I need.

30:19

I need some recognition. I think it's very natural to need some sort of recognition.

30:24

Maybe that's something I need and this person isn person, isn't capable of giving it to me, and I've tried to tell her well, you need to talk to your boss.

30:36

This goes back to building a relationship. If you don't have a good relationship with that person, well then they don't know what you need.

30:40

If she went and talked to her and said, hey, this and this and that is bothering me and I feel like I need some more leadership, or I need some more recognition, or whatever the case may be, well then you see how it goes, and if it doesn't change, well then you realize that that's something that I need and this person isn't capable of giving it to me.

30:58

So maybe I need a change. So then you start working towards a change, whether in your career or your job, or lateral moves or whatever.

31:07

Yeah, but that's solved. To be able to tell somebody and say to somebody I need your fill in the blank, recognition, approval, compliments, whatever, I feel like I'm not appreciated, especially in the military.

31:19

When's the last time? Well, I guess for you it'd be a while back now, but metaphorically, when's the last time you've heard of a I don't know E3 or an O2 or whatever your respective grade bracket is?

31:29

Go up to somebody of a senior grade and say I feel underappreciated.

31:34

You get laughed out of the room. Or you probably get told to go shave, get a haircut, change your socks and then get laughed out of the room.

31:40

You know what I mean. It just it's crazy the difference that being a human makes in and outside the DoD.

31:48

And again, maybe this is infantry specific, but I've got an analogy for you.

31:52

I think that complements what you just brought up pretty well For anybody listening to this who's familiar to whatever degree, or this is a brand new concept.

32:01

Stay with me I'll break it down. But whenever you're employing machine guns in a defensive position, you want to make sure that they're mutually supported, even though that they both have an individual job to do.

32:13

Now, within each one of those machine gun positions, there's somebody behind the trigger and then there's somebody essentially calling their shots, helping them out with reloads, whatever applies.

32:18

And so let's just say, of those four individuals, two in one position, two in the other that mutual support that gets exhibited if there is an effective defense, ie they're not being shot back at because there's mutual support and suppression.

32:33

Neither one of the people on the guns, neither one of any of those four people know that they did a good job.

32:40

They collectively recognize that, hey, this is working well because it's sort of this chaining and branching of support throughout the platoon or any particular military unit.

32:49

Okay, that said, Casey, to your point for your wife, or in your experience now in more of a private sector outside the DOD, as you've gone through and grown through these different jobs and industries, have you found that there's any degree of I can see value and recognition in my job because that person can't do their job well unless I do my job well.

33:14

It's mutually supported and stacked.

33:16

Or have you found that it's a bit more respective to the industries you've been in?

33:20

I can see that I did a good job because there's a direct appreciation, value, reciprocated type response, one-to-one from that person to me about my job?

33:32

Is it something you can drive to on your own?

33:35

I don't know if you can drive to it on your own, because every example that I can think of is a mutually supporting activity.

33:43

If I'm working in a restaurant let's say I'm serving in a restaurant Well, I can't bring the customer their food unless the back of the house is making the food.

33:52

The back of the house can't make the food unless I'm efficiently ordering the food and the customer can't stay fit, or let's say Happy or whatever.

34:01

Yeah, they can't stay happy unless all of us in the front of the back are working together.

34:06

So in that respective industry it's a mutually complementing thing In sales.

34:12

If, let's say, my sales manager and I'm on a sales team, they need us to hit a certain metric before they can.

34:19

Maybe the sales team is looking for new ways to or new products to sell and the sales manager is withholding some sort of new product catalog.

34:29

Well, now I can't do my job as well because they're withholding some sort of information.

34:35

They can't ask for anything for the team to improve our calls or our lifestyle or whatever, if we don't help them achieve the goal of the team.

34:46

Let's say I have a company car and it's kind of a crapper, but I'm I'm not even hitting 70% of my goal.

34:53

Well, what's the manager going to do?

34:56

Say, oh well, if he had a nicer car he would make a hundred.

34:59

Or would it be easier for the manager to say, well, look, he's at 105, 110 for the past six months?

35:05

I mean, this guy needs a nicer car and there'll be a little bit easier to give it to you.

35:09

So I don't. I don't know if I can think of a job that I have had or have heard of people having.

35:15

That's not mutually exclusive deal.

35:19

All right, folks, sit tight and we'll be right back on Transacting Value.

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36:23

I don't know if I can think of a job that I have had or have heard of people having.

36:29

That's not a mutually exclusive deal.

36:31

Okay, well, so then, given that Maybe you can come up with an example, that's not a mutually supportive role.

36:38

Well, I appreciate the challenge, but I'm just going to stand on the shoulders of giants here.

36:42

Well, I appreciate the challenge, but I'm just going to stand on the shoulders of giants here.

36:45

To the point you brought up in those examples where the performance dictates, the call it appreciation factor.

36:50

Right, like you see, it's working well because the process and performance is going well.

36:54

If you're able to recognize that that's how it's generated, isn't that the same thing as saying you've identified that you can derive your own validation and worth from the process is going well.

37:06

So, obviously, based on that degree of insight, I'm doing well.

37:10

Is that a fair comparison, do you think, even in those industries?

37:13

I think so. I think it's. It's somewhat fair, okay.

37:17

I also don't think that, um, good performance necessarily will mean that your life will be any easier or that.

37:23

You know, for instance, the the new car scenario that I brought up for the for the salesman he might not get a new car, he might get more accounts.

37:33

So now he's got to, he's got to stretch that use of that car out a little more and take it a little bit easier, because he's not getting a new car but he's still got to go call on some new accounts.

37:42

So the success of that salesman and the appreciation might not be reflective of what is what you're accustomed to, if that makes any sense.

37:53

That's a great point. Yeah, I think sometimes, as we're trying to find our way through the world and again, this is my experience, maybe only, but in the DOD, in the infantry, it's a lot easier to see that you're doing your job well because things are going smoothly.

38:08

But that doesn't necessarily translate and I think even in your case, casey, almost firsthand, coming into the DOD fresh out of high school, you're not taught, you're not issued, you're not necessarily even explained any of these types of coping skills self-worth, self-reliance, self things.

38:28

It's rely on the team, stop being an individual.

38:31

In fact, in some cases I don't want to say it's punished, but it's admonished.

38:34

There's a negative connotation to it.

38:36

He's being an individual.

38:39

When you're in boot camp, you can't even say the word I.

38:41

Exactly, you got to say this recruit because you're a part of this team of recruits.

38:46

Yeah, so it's from day one you're like, hey, you're no longer a I.

38:51

Yeah Well. I think, to a degree too.

38:53

Starting through that process of dehumanization helps as a warfighting function, because it's difficult to look at somebody if you have to and shoot them, for example when you view them on equitable terms, and then those moments, hesitation causes other people to die and depending on your side of the conflict I think it was Dan Grossman, something Grossman on killing he talks a lot about the psychology of war and how dehumanization and training is necessary.

39:24

But then you've got to rebuild from that point, because what happens next?

39:28

You've got a bunch of dehumanizing infantrymen, and I'm not talking about the knuckle-dragging, cranny eaters, I'm talking about the ones that don't know how to socialize Right, and then get out and try to go work at Winn-Dixie and try to be any other number of things.

39:43

Not that it causes problems for society, but it can cause problems for those individuals because then it's internalized.

39:49

You're like I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I'm doing exactly like I was supposed to, I'm following the rules, I'm doing exactly like my training accounted for, but without a degree of introspection.

39:57

I think it complicates things. And so, casey, I think this is probably, for the sake of time, my last question.

40:02

But when we're talking about introspection and we're talking about building a degree of self-awareness.

40:06

You had mentioned five tenets earlier for building deeper relationships and working through, even from a foundational perspective, starting to build deeper relationships.

40:16

What about with yourself? How do you start or how do you recommend starting to increase self-awareness and better a relationship with yourself?

40:26

It's an interesting question because I feel like, like you mentioned, especially in our fields, you were kind of dehumanized from day one until the day you got out, basically, and there was no, they didn't give you any tools to say, hey, this is how you need to re-assimilate into society, because society is not like this.

40:48

Yeah, no.

40:49

I'm not going to say that the military failed me by any means, but I could guarantee that a lot of people would feel that way because they didn't re-assimilate into society properly.

41:00

Maybe my childhood allowed me to, you know and I'm thinking about dealing with problems I'm just kind of like a that's life kind of person and we got to move on.

41:12

We got to. We just got to keep going, because this thing ain't going to stop.

41:16

The clock is going to do what it does and that's just keep on ticking.

41:19

And if I stop here, well then I'm just going lose ground.

41:22

But in terms of um, personally accepting who you are and making sure that you can, I don't know, maybe a self-love is a bad term, but trying to accept yourself for who you are, who are you?

41:35

Who are you? You know, a lot of veterans don't even know who they are because, like they went into the military, they're 17, 18, 19 years old.

41:42

You don't know who the hell you are at 18 years old.

41:45

I know I didn't, and when they got out they were that same kind of person because they went from being an 18 year old to basically a killing machine, if you want to say that, but just a machine who follows orders and and does this and that and the other thing, and then he gets out and well, I have no true life skills anymore.

42:05

I still have no true life skills.

42:07

I'll say it's not even anymore. It's a thing I still don't.

42:11

So to be honest with you, just accepting who you are and maybe trying to grow who you are and then not putting too much equity on mistakes that you make and then not putting too much equity on mistakes that you make Maybe that's a good way to build some self-worth is to not put a ton of equity on mistakes.

42:31

I heard a guy talking about how this is a guy at the bar I was having a drink and he was just talking to me and, like I said, people tell me things that I have no business hearing.

42:41

But he was telling me that his family he hadn't talked to his family because of some sort of drunk mistakes he made and his family pretty much said like hey, we don't want to talk to you for a while until you stop acting this way.

42:55

And essentially he didn't do anything egregious.

43:00

He didn't kill anybody or maim anybody or put anybody in the hospital.

43:04

He had some sort of DUI issue and I mean, of course we're in a bar and this guy's drinking, so maybe he's not the best example to talk about, but I think he put a lot of equity on his mistakes and I'm sure that if he reached out to his family, they would just say hey, you know, as long as you're fixing yourself, we would love to have you in our lives.

43:21

They would just say, hey as long as you're fixing yourself. We would love to have you in our lives.

43:23

I feel like maybe a lot of veterans put a lot of equity on the mistakes they make, especially towards the end of their careers or during their careers or when they first get out, and they carry that load with them.

43:34

And it's really unnecessary to carry that load with you. You're not some sort of criminal.

43:38

You don't have a baggage of, you've never been to prison.

43:41

You aren't some sort of sexual predator or something outlandish.

43:46

You made a few mistakes, whether that's you yelled at your boss or you failed a class in college or you flunked out of college because of X, y and Z, you weren't doing the work or whatever kind of personal issues you were having, and putting a ton of equity on that stuff isn't going to help you move forward and it's not going to help you accept who you are.

44:06

That's a great point.

44:08

And maybe the easiest place to start if even that doesn't seem within reach, is just, you know, you're sort of of mice and men.

44:15

What was it, lenny? Right, you just take it really simply.

44:18

Maybe I like carrots, I don't like broccoli, and you just make it a zero or a one.

44:25

I like people who are friendly.

44:32

I don't like people who smell bad or whatever, and maybe that's where it has to start to begin some degree of self-awareness Cause if you don't think about it, and if you don't talk about it, you're probably never going to, and if you don't, it makes it really difficult to deal with a lot of those stressors and a lot of that potential social conflict that can come out of it.

44:49

Casey dude, we're actually out of time.

44:51

I wanted to get a little bit more into managed expectations, but I think we're in a pretty good trajectory here and I really appreciate you taking some time out of your evening to be able to talk and obviously, come back onto the show.

45:04

It was a totally different flavor than the last time in season three and I love hearing your perspective.

45:11

Man, for that matter, are you open to having people reach out if they want to get in touch with you, or do you want them to reach out here to the show and we'll get in touch with you, or just just reach out, just reach out to the show.

45:22

I'm a little bit more of a closed down because of the career field I'm going into and whatnot, so I don't really have any social medias really anymore.

45:31

So I'm low key.

45:39

For anyone wanting to reach out to Casey, reach out to us at the show. We'll get in touch with Casey.

45:41

If you guys want to hear more about him, his opinion, see what's going on in his life Totally cool and obviously to get him back onto the show, feel free to send us some comments, send us some emails, track us down on social transactingvaluepodcast.

45:51

com.

45:53

You can leave a voicemail there, which is a pretty sweet feature, and then we'll get that.

45:57

I want to move it from there and forward on some messages.

46:00

If you guys got comments about our conversation and you want to get them on the air and we can address them in future talks as well.

46:05

Even a voicemail is the simplest way to do that.

46:07

Casey, I appreciate your time, man, your perspective and just the opportunity to sit out again and catch up on the air.

46:13

So thanks for your time.

46:19

Well, thank you, and if I know we're talking about, you know self-worth, self-respect, managing your expectations, burnout and whatnot.

46:27

Just be a good human. If you are a good person, if you care about people and you're not out there doing bad things and taking advantage of people, then good things will come to you and like, like I said, reflection, like you were going to touch on managing some expectations, making sure you're not putting too much pressure on yourself.

46:48

Things will come around and I think that's probably some of the most important things when, especially when you're transitioning out of the military or transitioning from one career to another, the world doesn't sit on your shoulders.

47:00

You know you're just a part of this thing. So try and be a good person and do what you can to make the world a better place.

47:07

Well said, all of our listeners new listeners to the show, current and continuing listeners to the show.

47:13

Thank you guys for tuning in and listening to our conversation in April Core Values, where we're talking about quitting and recovery and burnout.

47:20

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47:23

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47:28

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47:36

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