SNS 186: Saturday Night Special - Interview with Brian Slade about the Benefits From a Prepared Mind in His Book Cleared Hot

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Welcome to tonight's Saturday Night special episode 186.

[00:00:06] Brian Slade: I'm Brian Slade. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent, and your treasures to live out your true calling. Having the ability to recognize what you do have control of and how it can help you deal with trauma is key.

[00:00:24] And one way to, one way to remain inspired is to listen to this podcast with Scott Maderer.

[00:00:38] And one of those things was the belief in a higher cost, right? Belief being, having a belief in something greater than us that's out there looking out for us. It's really, it's a lot easier to digest that everything happens for us, not to us.

[00:00:56] Scott Maderer: Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired [00:01:00] Stewardship Podcast.

[00:01:01] If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true calling. In the Inspired Stewardship Podcast, you'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others, and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:31] In tonight's Saturday Night special, I interview Brian Slade. I asked Brian to share with you his journey to writing Cleared Hot and how Faith played a part in that journey. I also asked Brian about his, how his relationships were affected by his deployment and some of the things he learned from that, and Brian shares what you can do to have a prepared mind and how that can help you deal with the trauma that we all face.

[00:01:57] One reason I like to bring you great [00:02:00] interviews like the one you're gonna hear today is because of the power in learning from others. Another great way to learn from others is through reading books. But if you're like most people today, you find it hard to find the time to sit down and read, and that's why today's podcast is brought to you by Audible.

[00:02:18] Go to inspired stewardship.com/audible to sign up and you can get a 30 day free trial. There's over 180,000 titles to choose from, and instead of reading, you can listen your way to learn from some of the greatest minds out there. That's inspired stewardship.com/audible to get your free trial and listen to great books the same way you're listening to this podcast.

[00:02:45] Brian Slade has held command positions in the Army and the Air Force and received the Distinguished Flying Cross Bronze Star and 14 combat air. He attended Utah State where he earned a BA and was commissioned as an [00:03:00] Army Aviation second Lieutenant. He's also earned an MA in aviation instruction. Brian currently serves as a lieutenant colonel for the Air Force Combat Search and Rescue, and Brian recently released his book, cleared Hot Lessons, learned about Life, love and Leadership while flying the Apache Gunship in Afghanistan.

[00:03:20] And why I believe a prepared mine can prevent P T S D. Welcome to the show, Brian.

[00:03:28] Brian Slade: Thanks. Glad to be here. Thanks for having me.

[00:03:31] Scott Maderer: Absolutely. I talked a little bit about your book cleared Hot in the intro, but and your story. But let's back up a little bit and unpack that journey a little bit more.

[00:03:43] What brought you. To actually want to put this book out into the world

[00:03:48] Brian Slade: lot. There's a lot of factors, but I would say the most pivotal moment, or the thing that really hit me was at one point eight years after, eight years after the deployment that this book [00:04:00] Chronicles through a cascade of crazy events and leadership actually looking out for somebody that they didn't have to look out.

[00:04:06] And that's a whole nother story. But I ended up in the middle of a Utah jazz basketball court at halftime with Senator Orn Hatch presenting a distinguished flying cross to me. And so we'd been there for the first half and the jazz had actually been winning. And so they'd been cheering it'd been pretty loud.

[00:04:25] And as I walked out there with him and they started to read the citation it was deafening and it was it was just, it was very overwhelming in a way. And at that point I realized, I'm like, look, they don't know who I am. They don't know anything. They, this isn't for me.

[00:04:43] This is for what I represent and what I represent to them is something that some I mean for a lot of different things for different people, but what they don't understand is all the background. And yeah, this is one citation for one event and, but there's a lot of events and there's a lot of learning that [00:05:00] came from those events and.

[00:05:01] And for me, they were what people would categorize as traumatic events, and they were traumatic events, but for me, they actually became foundational to what I would call a better version of myself. And so at that moment when I saw all those people, and was like, these moments, these incidents downrange have that kind of power, that kind of impact to affect this many people.

[00:05:25] With the lessons that I learned could be pay that forward, right? If it all happens just to benefit me, that seems ridiculous, right? And I didn't know book at the time. I didn't know, hey, I needed to book, I'm gonna write a book. But I was like, I needed to do something. I needed to do something with these experiences.

[00:05:42] Scott Maderer: What, so what made you actually decide that a book was the right.

[00:05:46] Brian Slade: Really just mulling it over in my head. And I'll be honest, my whole life, people are like, you need to write a book. You need to write a book. Because if you, when, if you do read the book at the very beginning, I do a little bit of background with [00:06:00] where I came from, what I, and I just had crazy experiences.

[00:06:02] It's just, I'm a magnet for it. I don't know why, but it just is. I put a couple of them in the, of back in the day, but really, there'd be an entertaining book of just my teenage years. It would be very entertaining. But I didn't feel that there were lessons. There's always lessons, but I didn't feel that they were as impactful as per se, that the engagements with the Taliban and those type of life or death situations that, that carried with them very impactful lessons.

[00:06:29] So people have been saying, write a book my whole life. And I got I don't wanna write that. That's crazy. I mean that, yeah, for somebody to laugh and have, be entertained. N not a driver for me, but when I really saw that, Yeah. Crazy entertaining. Definitely there, but also life lessons that can turn people's lives around or help people with the traumas that they're dealing with or even just have people like.

[00:06:53] Feel connected to a story that they can relate to with a lot of the vets that are out there or first responders. And what I [00:07:00] really, we tried, the goal was to write it in a way that anybody could relate to it. You didn't have to be military because trauma is trauma. Pain is pain. And how that chemical process happens inside of us is very similar to I, regardless.

[00:07:15] I know that's not a word I, regardless of actually it is now and I'm really happy because I use it all the time. But it's actually now in the dictionary. Yes. They actually added it. They finally gave

[00:07:25] up . Even if you put Lee, even if you put Lee at the end, I regardless Lee,

[00:07:28] Scott Maderer: is it still? No, I, regardless Lee is not IR regardless.

[00:07:32] So yeah. So I was really happy when I learned that last year. I was like, woohoo. Cuz I use it all the time too. .

[00:07:39] Brian Slade: But yeah, so basically the steps and the learning applies to almost everybody. Cuz we all have significant events in our life, right? And that's what I, at the very beginning of the book, I say, this is a story about my Afghanistan, and I'm gonna explain I'm gonna explain lessons learned through the traumatic events in my [00:08:00] Afghanistan, but you have your own Afghanistan, I, whatever that is, you have an Afghanistan, the lessons can be applied.

[00:08:07] So yeah, it was really the book I did was put in by a bunch of people. Finally, I was like, okay, that makes sense now. So when you think about it so we've had a lot of different people on talking about trauma in different ways. And I think at at first glance, I think a lot of times people hear that and think about trauma and my brand has inspired stewardship.

[00:08:27] Scott Maderer: I talk about stewardship and faith and these different topics like that. And it's wait, why do you then want to talk about trauma ? Because at first glance it's like those aren't connected. But you talked in the book about how some of your faith journey and your personal journey, how that kind of helped you in ways while you were dealing with the trauma and the events that you were being exposed to.

[00:08:52] What do you see as that intersection and that connection between your faith, your beliefs, your journey there and [00:09:00] trauma and how you responded to it while you were there in Afghanistan?

[00:09:04] Brian Slade: I love the question I'll have to back up a little bit on it, is when I first came back I didn't really understand why I had experienced what I would call growth from these events where others.

[00:09:17] You have the whole gambit. You have those that are stronger and better because of it. And then you have all the way to the other end where people are willing to take their lives from the same event, same events, same type of events. So same stimulus, completely different reaction.

[00:09:31] And so that's really what stirred my mind okay, there's something here. I gotta dig into this. And I went and I started talking to all the people that have glasses and PhDs and all that kind of stuff. And I was like, look what's up here? Why do I feel strong? I'm not happy about a lot of the stuff that I had was got exposed to.

[00:09:47] But it is part of what makes me. It is foundational. It's not an obstacle. And why is that? And so they said let's dig into it. Let's dig into some of the things that you were doing. And so we got into what my daily ritual [00:10:00] was down range and before, and what my background was.

[00:10:03] And so there's things you can't teach. Like I can't teach the value of the strength that you garner from having a healthy family upbringing like that. You either have that or you don't, but it isn't something that you can't overcome regardless of what you regardless of what the circumstances were.

[00:10:21] But what we did distill were several things I was doing unbeknownst to me that were actually helpful in seeing an event or experiencing an event. And how I digested that event as. As, like I say, foundational instead of a trial or an obstacle. And one of those things was belief in a higher cost, right?

[00:10:43] Belief being, having a belief in something greater than us that's out there looking out for us. It's really, it's a lot easier to digest that everything happens for us, not to us, right? And so if you don't, if you don't believe that's a [00:11:00] harder, that's a harder leap, that's a harder stretch to say it happens for me.

[00:11:04] But if you believe there is an a, a larger power that, that has our best interest at heart or harder, whatever you believe, right? It gives you an empowered perspective. Things happen for you. Like we,

[00:11:20] Scott Maderer: that this must have happened for a reason. Maybe I don't understand the reason. There's gotta be a reason.

[00:11:25] Brian Slade: And we see it all the time. People are like, oh, this grew up in this te came from this terrible background had this happen, had, and despite all odds, they became this amazing person. And I say bolony, it didn't happen despite all odds it happened because of those odds, those things that he had to over, he or she had to overcome.

[00:11:47] The things that happened to them made. They just learned how to digest those and see those as opportunities instead of obstacles. And I say that tr trials, trauma, obstacles, they're all opportunity [00:12:00] just cleverly disguised. And it's easier to believe that when you know that somebody's looking out for you, it's not happening to you.

[00:12:07] It's not punitive it's for you. It's hard on some things. Absolutely , like there's so a woman backed over her kid. I've talked to a woman who backed over her kid and she said, that happened for me. And I was like, yeah I know you don't want me to say that, but I is it tragedy?

[00:12:26] Of course. Is it heartbreaking? Of course. Now let's say what can we get from that experience? We don't relish that it happened. You don't need to do that. You don't need to be like I'm so happy that happened. I'm not happy that I had to do certain things down range.

[00:12:43] I'm not happy that I had to blow people up. I'm not happy. I had to see certain things that are be part of certain things that I was, but I'm lose friends or all of that. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm grateful for what it taught me, right? I'm grateful for that aspect. Not [00:13:00] necessarily grateful.

[00:13:01] It's weird. I'm not happy it happened, but I am grateful it happened. If that makes any sense. Yeah, no,

[00:13:07] Scott Maderer: I, I think it does. And it's so they talk a lot. You hear, I'll finish one of these sentences, I promise you hear about post-traumatic stress disorder, p T S D and people coming back with that. And then there is actually a field of study about post-traumatic growth, which is what you're talking about. The idea of sometimes that trauma can make some people grow after it and some people can have stress disorder in both cases. It's not like the stress part isn't there, and it's not like the trauma part's not there.

[00:13:37] The trauma's there, the stress is there. It's that response to it that's different. And what you're saying is there's some factors that lead to a response that's positive, that are just a, again, like you said, you grew up in a stable household. That's a plus. . Yeah, that's a, that goes in the plus column.

[00:13:56] You grew up in a less stable also that goes in the minus column. But [00:14:00] there are other things that you can actually do and take action on to help you both recover or set yourself up so that when you do have those stress events, you respond in a more positive way. Right?

[00:14:14] Brian Slade: Yes, a hundred percent. And I was doing a lot of these things without even realizing it.

[00:14:18] One of 'em was that I had that belief that was just something that I had already. So it wasn't like I had, I did nightly prayer. I don't even say it's nightly prayer. I did my, I just have conversations with the big guy. That's what I do. Like I'll just talk out loud and I believe that he is listening, and then there's times where I know he is saying stuff to me too, and and it's not a voice I don't like, I'm not saying, oh, I see angels or anything like that. I don't get a voice. I know people who say they have and I don't discard that I maybe they do get a voice. I never, I've never gotten a voice.

[00:14:50] I've definitely gotten strong feelings. I share an event. I share a story. It's called Fireflies On, it's one of the chapters in the book. And. It's really about [00:15:00] that and the power of that, because we were in a dark, dark valley in the middle of the armpit, dark is what I call it, right? You're stuck in an armpit.

[00:15:09] And I, I've heard that described otherwise,

[00:15:12] Scott Maderer: but we'll go with armpit. , please. This

[00:15:14] Brian Slade: is, this is the family show. So yes. So armpit dark's, what I go with. And so you go, we will into this valley, and when it's dark like that, the one advantage is that you can see the muzzle flash. You can see the tracer fire.

[00:15:28] You can see it very clearly because it's juxtapose blackness, right? And so I see the fight. I can see two sides. I can see blasts, I can see muzzle fly, I can see a tracer going both ways, which at that point, if this was in the Hindu Kush, in the northern Afghanistan, the Taliban fighters up there in the north typically didn't have tracer fire sometimes.

[00:15:52] Some, but not, but typically not like down south. They use it a lot, but up north very rarely. So that's one thing that maybe stood [00:16:00] out my subconscious, but I, but when I drove into this fight, I talked to the ground commander and I was like, look, I need you to verify your position so I know I can see the fight.

[00:16:10] I need you to verify your position so that I know the other position is the bad guys. Can you turn a firefly on? A firefly is just a little air strobe that most of the ground guys have on their helmets or somewhere, and they hit click it and starts flashing. We can see it under the goggles night, vision goggles.

[00:16:24] So he turns his on, boom. I got it. Yep. Got your firefly. Now just to, for added we call it personal identifica or P i d i, I can't even, yeah. The identify identifying the enemy. Make sure that we're fitting the rules of engagement. You have a laser on you. He is yes, I do. I said, can you rope the enemy?

[00:16:45] Because I'm pretty sure it's the hill above you. Like the, his position was lower and then the position that was firing was higher on a little plateau thing. And yeah, so he points up there, he ropes, it basically spins a little circle with a laser, that's what they call roping it.

[00:16:59] [00:17:00] And I'm like, okay, this is easy. I got him, I got the bad guys. We're ready to go. He says, you're cleared hot, which is the name of the book, right? We're clear to engage. So we roll in. I tell my wingman and we'll come in first. I'll hit it. You guys hit it. This is gonna be a pretty simple, straightforward engagement.

[00:17:15] The biggest difficulty was the terrain. So as we came around, I lined up, I had it in my crosshairs. I was starting to put pressure on the trigger. And here's the deal with certain weapon systems on that. Apache, if it's in the crosshairs and you're in those c, certain parameters right there, I wasn't gonna miss I would not miss, I would hit what I was aiming at, guarantee it. And I've had this really strong feeling, do not shoot. There wasn't a voice. It was just a really strong feeling. Do not shoot. Now, there was nothing in that scenario that says, don't shoot. I had the ground guy, I had positive communication. I had a laser roped on it.

[00:17:57] I had both locations separated. [00:18:00] But something inside of me, or coming from outside of me is what I would like to say. Said, don't shoot. So I released this the trigger. I said, ceasefire, break, contact. Don't engage to my number two called ceasefire on ev. Basically everybody. And I told, and I, and my wingman said what's up?

[00:18:20] And I was like, I don't know. Something's not right. I don't know, I don't have, I don't have a tangible, I can't give

[00:18:24] Scott Maderer: you a reason. , right?

[00:18:26] Brian Slade: And so what we did is we started talking to the ground commander a little bit more. He's like, why didn't you shoot blah, blah, blah. I'm like here's the deal. Do you have any other friendlies in the.

[00:18:36] He's like, yeah, we got another patrol on the other side of the valley. So Okay. Can you communicate with them and have them turn their fire fireflies on? He said, sure. So he does on his radio freak. I don't hear it. I go out over common air to ground and say, any friendlies in the vicinity of this grid zone with Patch's overhead, please turn on your fireflies.

[00:18:54] We look to where he says his patrol is and we see nothing, and then we roll back to that null [00:19:00] that we were about to blow up and it is lit up like a Christmas tree. It was friendly fire. They were engaging each other. And I told him, I was like, dude, where you guys have been shooting has fireflies all over it.

[00:19:14] And he gets a little bit cease. She's fuck. I'm like, we're all, everything's ceased. .

[00:19:19] Scott Maderer: Yeah. We're,

[00:19:19] Brian Slade: we're good.

[00:19:20] Scott Maderer: But they had been shooting

[00:19:23] Brian Slade: at each other. They'd been shooting at each other and we would've killed them. Yeah we would've killed 12 to 15. The

[00:19:29] Scott Maderer: The weapons that you were bringing in would've.

[00:19:32] No, there would've been made a mess outta the situation. There wouldn't have been

[00:19:35] Brian Slade: anyone left a lie. What I put it in the book is there wouldn't be enough parts to fill up the c cap the casket. And that's true because that weapon system would've disintegrated them. And, okay, I'm so grateful.

[00:19:48] I am so grateful that I had that feeling. But let's take that. Let's play that forward. Say I didn't do it. Say I, I pulled the trigger. I didn't get that feeling. I pulled the trigger that happened. There's, [00:20:00] that still happens for me. There's still something to learn there. Now that would've been a lesson that I would not be grateful.

[00:20:07] That'd be a

[00:20:07] Scott Maderer: traumatic event for sure. Yeah. I

[00:20:09] Brian Slade: would not be grateful for that. It happened. I, may I not be happy that it happened, but I would have to really struggle to find the lesson because Wow. That would've been, that would've been tough. But I really believe everything happens for us, not to us.

[00:20:22] Even if it went the other way. I'm grateful it didn't . I'm so glad. Absolutely. Absolutely.

[00:20:27] Scott Maderer: Yeah. You're happy. It didn't . You'd be, but even if it did, you'd still have to find the lesson from it that you could be

[00:20:35] Brian Slade: Yeah. That wouldn't be a harmful to recover from. It would be a hard one. But it's doable.

[00:20:40] It's definitely doable. Things like that have happened to people and they do have a growth from it, right? That would've been really hard for me cuz I was sick for a day and a half just at the thought of it. Sick to my stomach. Almost puked when I, I had pressure. It was like half squeezed.

[00:20:57] That's, you could've,

[00:20:59] Scott Maderer: you were [00:21:00] mere hairs away from it have been the other way. Yeah. And you still to this day don't really know from a lo again logically, cuz you said at the beginning you saw the tracer fire and Okay. Maybe subconsciously you're going, that's a little weird. But other than that, , there wasn't like anything that stood out as the real reason other than that feeling that you got from outside that you do believe is from again, a higher power, some your own faith.

[00:21:27] You ascribed that to the, to God, the universe, karma, whatever name you want to give it, that comes in from outside and says, Hey, wait, no,

[00:21:36] Brian Slade: don't do well for me at that night I kneeled down and thank God I said thank you for guiding my hand and saying it sorry, saying it powerful enough that I did it.

[00:21:50] The fog didn't, the fog didn't overwhelm

[00:21:54] Scott Maderer: it. So during during the book, you talk a little bit about being married while you were deployed [00:22:00] as well. How do you think that affected your mindset and what was going on during your deployment?

[00:22:08] Brian Slade: It's a very large part of the book is I was married to someone who later we found out was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder.

[00:22:16] So there was a lot of there was a lot of strain on our relationship. There was a lot of difficult interaction and often it was harder for me to deal with that trauma than engaging the enemy, right? harder because I didn't, I don't know if it's cuz I had more training to deal with the enemy.

[00:22:35] Nobody sat me down and said, this is how you deal in a relationship with somebody who has a mental disorder. I just did it. I didn't know what to do. I felt helpless ate a lot and and it was a I definitely had to compartmentalize. I had to have two. Lives or basically. And that one was a strain for sure.

[00:22:52] And I, I say in the book like, why is it often easier to navigate the dynamics [00:23:00] of a, an enemy who's trying to kill me? And in-kind return the favor than it is to navigate the dynamics of a unhealthy relationship. And and I, to this day, I have, I got more damage. I use P T S D I, I put damage cuz I think it can be reversed, right?

[00:23:22] So I have more, I had more damage from that than any of the stuff. So that really brings it home to people. How many people can relate to a bad relationship? How many people can relate to an abusive situation? How many people can relate to somebody with substance abuse? How many people can relate to and they can relate to that.

[00:23:41] And those, and I'm just, and I'm here to tell you, I've experienced that and the extremes of war and that was more powerful for me. For me. And in some ways it's for a lot of people, I think,

[00:23:52] probably, and so the some people will be like, ah, I've experienced trauma, but nothing like you guys.

[00:23:57] I don't know. I don't know. It's just

[00:23:59] Scott Maderer: different. [00:24:00] What do you think and so some of the things you talk about in the book that you were doing in your deployment to help you deal with trauma and one of 'em, we've already talked about faith in a higher power, and we'll talk later about some of the other ones.

[00:24:17] But do you think it was that you were able to do things actively, proactively in the deployment that you weren't either able to do or weren't doing? I don't know which in the relationship trauma. I think it was there was a very, there were things that I had in my daily ritual that were set up to prepare me for what I was doing with my mission, right?

[00:24:42] Brian Slade: And they just happened to fall in, the Tumblrs happened to fall in the right, right spot to be like, that's a good setup. That's a good pr

[00:24:50] Scott Maderer: that you're were naturally doing things that if a psychologist had come to you and said, here's things to do, they would've lined up

[00:24:57] Brian Slade: When I, that's what we found out.

[00:24:59] They're like you're doing [00:25:00] that. Oh, that's really good. Oh, that's a really healthy, that's a really And I was like, but I wasn't really doing that necessarily with the relationship. Cause I didn't see, I didn't see the psychological benefit to it. I was doing it to stay alive. And there was no fear of physical death from my relationship.

[00:25:18] And so there I wasn't applying the same. Lessons across. And I did have better training , like I had better training for that experience. And you as, I don't know if we said this on record recording or not, but I was also poisoned with testosterone. You d you don't share that stuff.

[00:25:41] You just you tuck that down deep and you just deal with that yourself, right? So nobody needs to know that. And that's covering a wound that's infected and hoping that it heals. It just it is not going to, it's gonna get worse. So you were, again, I think that's important to recognize.[00:26:00]

[00:26:01] Scott Maderer: You were doing things, not necessarily intentionally a hundred percent, but things that you were trained to do and then things that you naturally learned to do cuz they worked and so you kept doing them, yep. Over here and then, but over there with the relationship, because again, I think from a wider perspective, I think there's probably folks listening that have trauma in one part of their life that they've dealt with well and trauma in another part that is causing 'em problems.

[00:26:28] Oh, I guarantee it. I think that's part of what we need to realize from this is sometimes it's your. Your approach to the trauma as much as it is the trauma. And it sounds like you've done work after the fact. Cuz you know you're I know you're no longer in that relationship with working on, dealing with and processing it cuz you're able to talk about it now very openly and honestly as opposed to then like you said, you wanted to push it down and hide it.

[00:26:55] So what are some of the things you've done since then to help recover from the relationship [00:27:00] trauma?

[00:27:00] Brian Slade: One of the principles that we did teach us to is abbreviate the wound. Abbreviate the wound, meaning I just talked about it. Tucking it down is basically covering up an infected wound you have to get to a point where you can just it is just part of your, it's like what happened on, we. It's what hap you know, I'm just telling you what, what happened on my way to work. You, because it is part of what makes me, right? It, and a lot of times we fight with this what do people think?

[00:27:28] Or what are the what if they knew, if people knew here's the truth of the matter, I don't think people care that much, right? It they might and they might think but so what? It's so much healthier for you. That's like drinking poison and hoping somebody else dies.

[00:27:43] It's just not, doesn't make any sense. But when we're in that, we don't see it that clearly. We don't see it like, oh, this is just dumb. But I did I realized that with the war stuff, I realized I've always talked about it openly and I didn't have anything residual [00:28:00] pain from it. Yeah. Things that, ugh, that sucked, or e but it was, I couldn't even talk, I could always talk about that because I always did.

[00:28:07] And there was one point where I cl that clicked and I was like, That should be true in all aspects of your life, right? Not that you go out and share it with the world, but that you're just willing to you're willing to, if I'm in a conversation where it applies to help somebody where I've had this experience that applies to help you, it shouldn't be like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna share that.

[00:28:28] You know it. Sh Hey, you know what, this is something that, that I dealt with and this is how I dealt with it. Doesn't mean it's gonna work for you, but maybe here's something there, right? If it's something that you struggle to talk about and when it's in the right atmosphere, then it's probably not dealt with healthy in a healthy way.

[00:28:44] You probably haven't compartmentalized or filed that where it needs to be filed. Yeah.

[00:28:47] Scott Maderer: long time listeners of the show know as an example I openly will say I grew up, my father was an alcoholic. I grew up in an alcoholic household. There was a long [00:29:00] time that you, I just, I, you don't admit that because you hide that, that's not something that you talk about.

[00:29:06] Because that's how I was raised was you don't talk about that , yes. And that was dad's expectation. That was the family expectation. That was the rule. You followed the rule. Yeah. So it wasn't until many years later that I'm able to just go I still love my dad and there's things about him I admire greatly and stuff.

[00:29:24] Lessons I've learned from him that are tremendous. And then there's things that he did and said and acted on, and that I don't admire and that were negative. But it took a long time to get to a point where I could say here's the things about Dad that I loved, and here's are the things that, that I wish weren't true, but they are.

[00:29:43] And I have no problem admitting that he was an alcoholic. And I think that's a, you're right, that's a hard place to get sometimes. Yeah, you can

[00:29:51] Brian Slade: love and accept a person, but you don't have to love and accept everything that they do, every

[00:29:56] Scott Maderer: behavior they've had.

[00:29:57] Brian Slade: Yeah. Yeah. You accept them for who they are.

[00:29:59] [00:30:00] And we all have our own stuff and we all deal with it in different ways. And quite honestly, human tendency is to deal with stuff in not so healthy ways. I we lean towards alcohol, we lean towards other coping mechanisms. There, there are healthy coping mechanisms, but it doesn't seem like most of us, there are some that naturally, oh, I'm gonna go work out

[00:30:22] Alright, good for you. You didn't go to the bottle so

[00:30:26] Scott Maderer: And again, yeah, that with folks coming back from from deployment too, that they've learned to deal with it with drugs or alcohol as opposed to other things. That same sort of thing. Yep. Let's talk a little bit about, so I know you outlined a bunch of different.

[00:30:45] Things. And I love the fact that your book is more it's not as, it's not quote theory it's, here's actions, here's things you can do, here's processes and activities that you can do. And one of the ones that you talk about in the book is what you call [00:31:00] chair flying and helicopter pilot chair flying.

[00:31:03] So what was that for you back during the deployment and how did it help you deal with trauma and then how does that apply both today and to the wider to everybody else when they, because they may not be really flying a helicopter in real life. They may be doing something else

[00:31:21] Brian Slade: Yeah. So chair flying, something that you learn in flight school it's a visualization tool where they're like, look, you're only gonna get so many iterations to do this maneuver and you're not gonna. Proficient with that many iterations, but you can run a hundred of these iterations in your head and actually move your body with it and walk through it and start to connect those neural pathways so that you get smoother when you actually do the maneuver.

[00:31:45] So it's something that we learn in flight school, and I actually had what you call that's precautionary landings where you have emergencies, . I actually was called the pl king in flight school. I had four, I think 14 or 15 of 'em. I can't remember the number of real world emergencies. And I'm like, okay, [00:32:00] I'm gonna start, I'm gonna take this stuff serious.

[00:32:01] And middle

[00:32:02] Scott Maderer: note, don't fly with Brian. Got it. Okay. , or

[00:32:06] Brian Slade: if you want a good time for Oh yeah. Or maybe

[00:32:08] Scott Maderer: not, maybe fly with Brian every time. You're right. Because

[00:32:11] Brian Slade: I'm still here. So you're looking at it both ways. You're right glass half full. Anyway the, that came, that transitioned over to the war.

[00:32:21] I got into more fights than anybody. I just, I was in, in that kind of stuff. And and they made me an aircraft commander probably earlier than my capability dictated, right? It was just needs of the army. And I was like, oh, crap, I'm in now. I'm the guy, I'm in charge of this thing. So I really amped up my chair flying.

[00:32:40] I took it to another degree than what they didn't teach. I, and this is how I explain it to people. It's I'm basically took meditation, visualization and role playing and how to make a love child. And that's my version of chair flying, right? And so the first thing I do is meditation, which is, everybody's meditation is unique.

[00:32:58] I do breathing [00:33:00] exercises, right? That's, that gets, I call it fertilizing your garden cuz you're about to plant some stuff that you want to take root, right? I'm gonna plant some things in there that I want to stick, so I wanna control my mind. My, my space understand that I'm in control of all that's about to happen.

[00:33:18] So that there's not any anxiety. I never really dealt with anxiety too much, but I know a lot of people do. So this will help reduce anxiety when you're gonna picture, walk yourself through a stressful situation. And what I tell people is if you do start to go to the visualization piece, which is next, and you're visualizing in this thing, and you start to get, feel that anxiety building, go right back to the meditation, go right back to that piece, get back to right, and then push from the start again and go a little further than you did the last time.

[00:33:45] And as far as you can, but at least a little further than you, you did the last time. So the visualization piece is I'll tell a story. When we were engaging an enemy and it was dark again, it seems like it was always dark, right? We're engaging [00:34:00] the enemy. And I have in the Apache you have what's called the helmet display unit, which is a monocle over your right eye and you have.

[00:34:08] Forward looking infrared. So your picture is just on your right eye. That's all you have. And there's symbology in there for flying and weapon systems. It's all in that right eye. Your left eye is looking out at the dark abyss. You can see the instruments inside, but when it's dark, you just see darkness outside.

[00:34:26] So we're getting ready to engage a compound and I can, and we also have glass cockpit, like video, like screens inside. So my front seater is a co-pilot gunner. He's got this compound locked up and I said, go ahead, shoot it. He shoots it. I can see the flashes with my naked eye, cuz it's exploding. So I can see that with my naked eye.

[00:34:47] I can see the dirt and the dust cloud. With the f flir we're on the tar gun target line. And then all of a sudden everything goes black. Everything the screens, the sound in my ear cups goes to nothing. There's no [00:35:00] radios, there's no navigation. It's just black. The helicopter's still spinning. . Like I, I can hear the worrying, but I have no side tone in my ear.

[00:35:08] I can't talk to anybody, and it's just black. And we were diving at a target, right? So I'm like we were level, fairly level when it happened. So I just, I don't do much. I take a deep breath real quick take all the time you need. You got one second. Take a great breath. And then I grabbed the goggles.

[00:35:27] We have night vision goggles that will clip to our helmet. I flipped the helmet display unit out of my way and put the goggles down. They're not dependent on aircraft power to amplify. The ambient light. So I put those things on and it, the blackness gives way to dark green . And now I can of see again, I can see the ground, I can see the air and keep air between us.

[00:35:48] And then, and that's always a good thing when you're flying. So I pull up I see. And knowing where the ground is, I think would be important while you're flying. Yes, .

[00:35:55] Yeah, exactly. And there's enemy that we're just, we're shooting at ho [00:36:00] hopefully but basically I break contact with the enemy I roll towards.

[00:36:04] Where I think bastion is where our of the base we were gonna land at. And because I don't have a navigation system, I'm in the lead I roll and then I slow back a little bit. I did all that because of things that I had gone through with chair flying. So li and then my wingman pulls up alongside me.

[00:36:22] I know he is gonna follow me. He pulls up alongside me, I take my flashlight and I flash him. So he knows something's wrong. He knows something's wrong. He basically takes the lead a little bit. I stay right on his wing and we fly all the way back. No. No event. No event. So why do I tell that story?

[00:36:39] Because in any point in that story, it could have gone terribly wrong, right? It could have now it's like a cool story where that happened. What happened is they shot out our generator. They hit our generator. That's what happened. Okay? And and the other generator's supposed to take up the whole load.

[00:36:55] But it didn't , so I it did come back. I [00:37:00] surged a couple times and as soon as it did, I tried to like key the mic and tell somebody something, but it wasn't long enough to do it. And my co-pilot, they're we're separated, so I'm yelling at him, but he can't hear me. So I'm like, we're okay. I'm flying home whatever.

[00:37:14] But I had chair flowing, wave

[00:37:16] Scott Maderer: out the window. . Yeah.

[00:37:19] Brian Slade: So I had visualized something like losing all that stuff in the night and then, and what I would do and I knew I would grab the alternate device, the goggles. I would put that down how I would communicate. We had an s so P that I'd talk through, that would be through a flashlight.

[00:37:34] I knew he, he would do that. We w first thing first you're gonna aviate, then you're gonna navigate, then you're gonna communicate. So aviate, I kept the wings level. I got my goggles on. I separated us from the ground. I turned, navigate aviate, navigate, communicate, or aviate, communicate, navigate, whichever one.

[00:37:50] So I turned to toward where I needed to go navigate, and then I communicated as, as soon as I could with the flashlight. If you're in a to bring it home, if you're in a [00:38:00] car driving down the free, down a highway, it's just you. And you got the lights on and you got the radio blast and you're talking to somebody on the phone, and then all that just goes away and there was a turn ahead and you're at 65 miles an hour and let's just say that you're getting shot at too so that's an event where you could crash very easily.

[00:38:19] There's an event where we could have crashed very easily and I'm, why didn't we? Is because I had walked through and visualized that, those scenarios in detail how I would control my heart rate, taking a. how I would compose myself, what I would do action-wise. And when you're doing the chair flying, you go you start the emergency and you work your way.

[00:38:40] What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do? Until you hit a friction point. I'm not sure what I would do here. And then you make that decision in a one G environment that you're controlling cuz you got the meditation, you got your fertile garden, you're ready to go, there's no threat. You make that decision, then you work through it, and then you go back to start and start over and you go right through that smooth until [00:39:00] you hit your next friction point.

[00:39:01] And then you do that same process and you keep doing that till you get from point A to point b Z with no hiccups. And then if you want to go graduate level, then you start throwing in contingencies. Wav, this doesn't happen. This other thing happened when I do that, this

[00:39:15] Scott Maderer: happens, right? What if two things go wrong at the same time?

[00:39:18] What do I do that right? Yeah.

[00:39:19] Brian Slade: So then you hit those friction points and you hit that, and then you go until you get through those smoothly, until you and then the role playing part is actually moving what you can move, talking what you can talk, speaking, what you can say. Really connecting those nerves and neural connections of what this action is gonna be physically in a one G environment.

[00:39:38] Right now, how does that apply to people? How does that apply to you and me? Real simple. We'll go back to the relationship thing. Men and women, when they communicate things, they always communicate them perfectly. There's no issues. There's no there's no friction. There's none of that.

[00:39:54] n never

[00:39:54] Scott Maderer: any misunderstandings, nothing or, yeah, like

[00:39:58] Brian Slade: butter. And [00:40:00] so I do this with my current relationship, and I'm not saying it ha it works a hundred percent of the time, but it definitely makes it better. I will cheerly conversations, right? Often when I cheer, fly the conversation, I realize the conversation doesn't even need to happen, right?

[00:40:13] Because I'll walk all the way through it and be like, wow, I don't, we can just, I can just let this go. So the, there's often that's the case, but you get to your friction point, she's gonna react x way more likely. If I do this, if that happens, how am I gonna react? How am I gonna deescalate that?

[00:40:28] How am I gonna stay calm? How walk through that whole scenario. . And I notice a difference on the conversations where I do that versus the ones that I don't Sure. But

[00:40:41] when you do it enough, I also notice that even the ones that I don't, it does bleed over. Sure. It does bleed over and it does start to create a better there's, if, I don't know if you got the video where I got I took a round, my co-pilot took a round to his leg, blew his leg up, I lost my engine, and my flight [00:41:00] controls all got jammed in the very same second.

[00:41:02] I had to deal with all of those at the same time. Not exactly the same time, but within

[00:41:08] Scott Maderer: seconds with, within a short order of these events all happening at the same time. Yeah. Now

[00:41:13] Brian Slade: did I chair fly that exact scenario? No. Being in a bank, losing your engine, having your co-pilot's leg wrapped around the controls and the controls jamming up.

[00:41:22] No. I didn't cheerly that exact scenario. I cheered multiple where I lost an engine, multiple, where I lost an engine, maybe the controls together. I probably did that one. Loss of controls multiple. Where I got wounded. He got wounded. How we're gonna do that, how we're gonna talk through that. And so when it happened, I still reacted.

[00:41:41] He just reacted together. And it worked. And it worked. And it was because I credit it to chair flying, but my kid teases me all the time. He's dad, you're talking out loud. And I'm like, no, I'm just chair flying something conversation with the boss or even just interactions or whatever.

[00:41:55] And what it was also doing that I didn't realize is something called stress [00:42:00] inoculation. So we know that I was doing it to save my skin, not crash, be prepared in the aircraft, but I was also inoculating myself to that stress by visualizing that stress. I was giving myself a weakened dose of that stress and just an inoculation with virus, you put that stuff in your system when the real virus shows up, he can come and he can knock, but he can't come in.

[00:42:22] And that's the same thing with the damage or the trauma. If you've, I pictured blowing up people before I blew up people, did it look exactly the same? No, but I'd already prepared my mind for that. So when it cut a groove, it wasn't very deep and it didn't leave that much scar tissue.

[00:42:37] It's still there. I still have that memory. I still don't like that memory, but it doesn't trip me up.

[00:42:44] Scott Maderer: And I think as you said to the wider picture here the fact that you used it in a combat situation, used it there, but. Even in your day-to-day life now, you continue to use it [00:43:00] because the benefits of it far outweigh the effort of it.

[00:43:04] So there's actually a, I don't know if you've ever heard of it, but there's a scientific research paper on something called whoop, w o P, which is wish outcome, obstacle plan. The idea is I wish this would happen. This is something that would keep it from happening. Or this is the outcome I want.

[00:43:30] This is the obstacle that would keep it from happening, and here's my plan to do in response. And it's basically just a way visualizing and an active way this is what I want. I wanna have a good conversation with my girl. Here's an obstacle that could keep that from happening. And and you run those hundreds of those put a whoop on a loop, yeah. You may exactly put a whoop on a loop and they call it Whoop My life is actually what they call it. But they did research on this. They ta changed, trained people how to do that. It's a version of what you're talking about. It's a little [00:44:00] mini let's start going through this in our head of what, and the faint thing that they found is, even if they never actually hit on the obstacle they brainstormed a hundred obstacles, a hundred different things that could go wrong, but what actually went wrong was nowhere on that list.

[00:44:17] They responded a lot better. Yes. Because they'd actually already prepared their mind for thinking, oh, something's probably gonna go wrong, so they responded

[00:44:26] Brian Slade: better. Training your mind to be a gymnast. A gymnast is a gymnast. So that's what you're training it to do. It is gonna have to flip and react.

[00:44:35] Scott Maderer: Little problem solve because it's already been trained to problem solve.

[00:44:38] Brian Slade: Yeah. Yeah. That's what you're doing. You're whooping on a looping . No. Everything I'm saying, there's nothing, this is nothing new. I'm

[00:44:46] Scott Maderer: just, yeah. None of it's magic either but it's applying it, that's the thing. It's an applic that we don't

[00:44:50] Brian Slade: do.

[00:44:51] It's an application process is what it is. So visualization, that's not new. Meditation, that's not new role play. That's not new. [00:45:00] None of that's new. Those are things but it's just an application and it's a simple application that if you beco, if it becomes a habit can absolutely not only just help you deal with the difficult situations, but the ripple effects afterwards are minimized.

[00:45:15] Scott Maderer: And I think to call that out. I think one of the things that's powerful about like your book is because you're putting it in a situation that. is so life and death , and you're talking about the benefits of it in a true life and death situation. Hopefully people will hear from that.

[00:45:37] Not, oh but I'm not in that specific situation. But rather if it'll work there then surely it'll work over here where maybe it's just about asking my boss for a race. Surely I can use some of these same skills for that , you

[00:45:51] Brian Slade: know, and that's the whole reason, like you asked, why did I feel like I should write the book?

[00:45:55] That's why, cuz there's extreme situations that people will take note of. If I just [00:46:00] said, I had a difficult conversation with my wife and this is how I got through it, right? That doesn't carry the same weight because we, cuz it just isn't that extreme. It may be an extreme conversation. Yeah, . But it's just it's commonplace.

[00:46:14] Whereas these are things like people, oh I've never experienced that. I never will experience that. But it worked there and then I then bring it back home. It works there. Like you said, if it works there, it's gonna work. Here

[00:46:26] Scott Maderer: So let me ask you another question. I've got a few questions that I want to a, that I like to ask all of my guests, but before I do that, is there anything else from the book that we haven't touched on that you'd like to share with

[00:46:40] Brian Slade: the listener?

[00:46:41] Oh, there's so much, but I, the one thing I always just tell people is and this is really going out to anybody who's struggling with anything right now, if they're really like in just something they can apply right after listening to this, it you can apply that cheer flying almost immediately too.

[00:46:59] [00:47:00] But what I, if it's depression or it's anger or it's hate or it's any of these negative feelings that we have out there, I would challenge you to really look inward and look at, look and find things to be grateful for. And the reason. I say that, it sounds really cliche, I'm grateful. Okay.

[00:47:22] But gratitude and anger can't exist on the same plane. They, gratitude and hate can't exist on the same plane. Depression, gratitude and depression can share space a little bit, but it will give way. It will give way. And it's just a really simple thing. And I was talking to a guy about this and he goes, yeah, there's always something to be grateful for.

[00:47:42] And he's right. There is, there's always something to great. And he said he, this is what he said. And it was really a powerful thing because he said, yeah, like even if it's just something as simple as the sun rising in the morning. And I was like, it's funny that we think that's simple cuz if the sun didn't rise, [00:48:00] that's a big deal.

[00:48:02] That's a huge deal. We all die. So we, there's a lot of things like that in our lives that just happen that we can be grateful for, but we're not because they just happen. So unless we take that time, And really start to list things we're grateful for. And I think a great habit is be when you wake up.

[00:48:19] Three things you're grateful for. When you go to bed, three things you're grateful for that happened that day. That day, right? Or it doesn't have to be three. It could be as many as you want. One activity I've had folks do is three thi for one month every morning, write down three things you're grateful for, but you're not allowed to repeat them.

[00:48:37] Scott Maderer: Oh, it's,

[00:48:38] Brian Slade: so my son and I do this, like we do this on the way to school and it's a really cool story. My son is adopted and he's African American. And we just during January when he was six. When he was six, and he said, Hey buddy. Have you heard Martin Luther King? We call this, we call her their exercise grateful.

[00:48:55] We're really creative with the naming . But you ha you have to say three things and why? And you can't [00:49:00] repeat. You can't repeat, so he said, have you heard Martin Luther King? I said I sure has. He's said he was a great man. He sure was. He changed the world. Yes, he did. Did you know he gave a speech?

[00:49:09] I said, I do. He's can I listen to it? I said, absolutely. I pulled it up while he was driving and gave it to me and he's watching it. And it was the bridge version. It wasn't the whole thing, but it was like from the hills of Tennessee da, you and I go, he was just he's a six year old kid.

[00:49:23] He was fixated on it. He was fixated on that thing. And I love sharing this story cuz it really hits me. But basically he gets to the end. He says, I love that speech. Can I listen to it again? I'm like, sure we got time. Listens to it again. He goes, now can we do great? Yeah, we can do grateful.

[00:49:38] And I already know where he is going with this. I'm like, okay I can see where he is going for going with it. And he goes, I'm grateful for Martin Luther King. That part I expected. The next part I did not. I said, so why? Because we have to do the why. And he goes, because of what he did, I can be your son.

[00:49:57] And every time I tell [00:50:00] that story, I get goosebumps because the six year old just taught me something in gratitude. He brought Martin Luther King into my heart. I was always grateful for the man as in a superficial level, but Martin Luther King's in

[00:50:17] Scott Maderer: my heart now. Because it's, I connected it much more connected the, to the reality of the situation.

[00:50:23] Brad is, that's powerful. . It's powerful. That's powerful. That's powerful. And the fact that he connected those dots at six is, is amazing. Yeah, my yeah, I'm sorry I cheered up a little bit with that story. I knew I'm getting getting my voice back cuz I choked up. So the, let me ask a couple of the questions that I like to ask everybody on that note.

[00:50:51] So the first one is mentioned earlier my brand has inspired stewardship. I talk a lot about stewardship, and yet that's one of those words like leadership, like gratitude, like [00:51:00] all the things we've been talking about today. I've learned over the years that different people mean different things by it.

[00:51:04] So what does the word stewardship mean to you and what do you think the impact of that has on your life?

[00:51:11] Brian Slade: To me, stewardship means responsibility. It's just, it's the things that we have responsibility for and obviously it's our choice. What we put into that basket. Like you can choose to just not take responsibility for any number of things but once you've said I'm taking this role, I think stewardship comes into play.

[00:51:33] And it is just, it means that you, not only is it the responsibility, but you can't give up on that you owe it to see it through the end, to persevere until the end. And sometimes there is no end. So that just means persevere, right? So that's really what it means to me is just a resilient level of responsibility.

[00:51:53] So

[00:51:53] Scott Maderer: the other question, And this is my favorite question and it gets back to the [00:52:00] conversation we were just having about gratitude. Let's say I invented this magic machine and I was able to pluck you from where you are today and transport you into the future, maybe 150, 200 years. And through the power of this machine, you were able to look back on your entire life and see all of the connections, all of the impacts, all of the ripples that you've left behind in the world.

[00:52:21] What impact do you hope you've left in the world?

[00:52:27] Brian Slade: That is such a really low, a big question. The number one impact that I want I like that this is the closest to my heart we just talked about. I hope my son turns into the man that he can become.

[00:52:43] And I hope that part of that is

[00:52:46] Scott Maderer: because of what I've told you.

[00:52:52] Sounds like it's already working. That already happening based on the story you shared. .

[00:52:57] Brian Slade: Yeah. E everything above [00:53:00] that is gravy. Obviously. The intent in this book and the intent, I, we have other trainings and stuff that's coming from, is to help people get through the muck and come out and realize that the muck is there to empower them.

[00:53:13] It's there. Trauma can be trauma's powerful, but it's like a lightning bolt. A lightning bolt can kill you, but it can power a city. It's where you put that power it's how you use that power. So that is an impact that I'm working on, but that's secondary to my son. I selfishly my son's my number one absolutely.

[00:53:36] Scott Maderer: So what's coming next? What's on the roadmap for the rest of 2023?

[00:53:40] Brian Slade: I said a little bit, we ha we are working on more in-depth tri curriculum and also a container training. Where is it's like basically a three day bootcamp that we've, it's already exists. I've been through it and I was like, and I've seen it literally flip people people who are ready to take their lives come outta that thing and have a new lease on [00:54:00] life.

[00:54:00] And what I've really am impressed about is there's a lot of things like that, but then people go right back, right? They go right back to where they were. What I've really been impressed with this particular program is that it seems to be sustainable and we're, and so I'm copycatting it with the guy that did it.

[00:54:18] So I'm partnering up with the guy that does it and we're gonna make it specifically. This, at least my version is gonna be specifically for military and first responder types that whether they're dealing with stuff or not they are. So anybody really to go through it. I went through it and I wasn't really feel like I was dealing with stuff, but I still came out of there pretty with a whole new perspec.

[00:54:41] I I would say a bigger perspective, but when I was in there, there were guys that were they, that was their last ditch effort. They were, I'm gonna do this and if this doesn't work, I'm done. And they came out of there, and this is, this was a year, a little over a year ago. I went and I keep in truck with [00:55:00] some of these guys.

[00:55:01] It, it lasts. It's stuck. And so we're developing that for military and first responders. I'm excited about that. And then the other, another thing that's immediately shit, by the time you air this, hopefully we're out on audiobook, which was me reading it, which was a pain in my butt, talking on the podcast.

[00:55:20] I, I love, it's fun reading and not stumbling over your words and keeping the right emotion and all those kind of things. And I can tear up and there's a lot of things in that book that I had not been able to read through without having that emotion grip me. So it was a long process to get that audio book.

[00:55:38] And so when this airs, I should be out. I hope

[00:55:43] Scott Maderer: you can find out more about Brian and his book over at Cleared hot info. Brian, other than the audiobook and the new training coming out, is there anything else you'd like to share with the listener?

[00:55:55] Brian Slade: Nope. Just be your best self and the perspective is always something that you can broaden.

[00:55:59] [00:56:00] We're yeah, so yeah hit us up there or on Amazon. It's on there too or whatever. And you can send me direct messages. I'm not outta reach.

[00:56:12] Scott Maderer: Thanks so much for listening to the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode please do us a favor. Go over to inspired stewardship.com/itunes.

[00:56:39] Rate all one. iTunes rate. It'll take you through how to leave a rating and review, and how to make sure you're subscribed to the podcast so that you can get every episode as it comes out in your feed. Until next time, invest your time, your talent, and your [00:57:00] treasures. Develop your influence and impact the world.