Finding Purpose After Special Forces: Josh Burch's Journey :: Ep 47 Try That in a Small Town Podcast
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and connect ready to elevate your business. Book a tour today at e-spaces.com. Josh, do you have a nickname? Did they give it? What was your nickname in this? Oh, well, no, we have call signs throughout, but your call sign changes. Um,

Everybody called me Banjo on my first team because they couldn't understand what I said. Neil wrote a song called Banjo. Who's tougher, you or the SEALs? I always like to say who's smarter. For so long, we've been a part of something bigger than ourselves. And identity and being a Green Beret or a Special Operations soldier, that's who I was, but that's not who I am.

even in my role as director of people for the Honor Foundation here in Tennessee, is I'm still part of something bigger than myself. And I tell them, I don't care if it's like helping a little league soccer team, running for mayor in your town, whatever. Your leadership is needed in our community. The Try That in a Small Town podcast begins now. Try that, try that in a small town.

All right, this is Cobb. I don't know. That's it? Yes. Am I Cobb? Is it C-U-R? This is Cobb. Ring. This is Cobb. And I'm coming to you from the Patriot Mobile Studios. I got my friend, Kalo. I got Thrash. I just spilled his original glory.

I got TK to my right. This is going to be a fun episode. Hey, this is Cobb. Hey, but we got to get serious because we got a ass coming to join us tonight. Josh Birch. He Green Beret. I don't even know if I need to say any more than that. That's right. Green Beret. That's right.

I mean, that's instructor at Ranger School. Yeah. Crazy. He's done it all. He's done it all. All the movies you've seen, that's that guy. Also just an amazing person. Yeah. Yeah. And we're going to get to a lot. I can't wait for you guys to hear this, but we'll probably ask him some fun questions. We're going to get in serious. He's doing some stuff now for the Honor Foundation. He helps veterans kind of transition, figure out what they're going to do when they leave the service and get

I'm wondering if that's kind of like when Tully and I are done playing, when we're done with our music career. It's a lot like that. Is it a lot like that? It'll be very much like that. It's a lot like that. To be serious, though, to go from that, it's two different things, obviously combat and all those things, but you're at the height and you're in it, right? Yeah. So if you're on stage, if you're in battle, whatever that is, and then all of a sudden you're not anymore. What?

What? On stage or in battle? It's one or the other. Well, the whole thing, Josh, he's going to tell us about the purpose, you know, because I've looked up this guy. It's really amazing. And it's kind of the same thing. It's purpose for you, me, anybody. Like once your job is kind of done, what are you going to do? Are you going to sit in your chair and drink whiskey and smoke cigars for the rest of your life and just die out on an oxygen tank? Some people can. I don't know if that's what I'm going to do, but...

Sounds good. It is about, and I think we seriously, if we're being honest, we'd all say that.

you want to have purpose. And it's kind of like with the podcast too. It's like, you know, we want there to be a purpose. And even when we're done on stage, whenever that may be, it might be a while. Hopefully a really long time. Hopefully a really long time. Super depressing conversation. But we're anxious for you guys to hear this Josh Birch and we'll get to it right now. I was going to say, listen, we're fortunate enough to have

A lot of cool guests on here. We've been very blessed. But tonight, it's kind of like what it's all about. This guy right here was in the service for 26 years, 20 as a Green Beret. Let's go. He's currently the director of people for the Honors Foundation. It's Josh Birch. Yes, let's go, Josh. Thanks, Josh. Thank you.

And there's Josh and there's your introduction. Josh, do you have a nickname? Did they give it? What was your nickname in the service? Oh, well, no, we have call signs throughout, but your call sign changes. Um,

Everybody called me Banjo on my first team because they couldn't understand what I said. Neil wrote a song called Banjo. So I'm pretty sure hopefully you'll have subtitles for this podcast. You can probably see it in the background on his camera. So Banjo is good. No, but that's not. Yeah. My mother called me Josh. That's what I'm talking about. Whatever she says. That's a great idea. That's right. So before we get to the real reason that we're having you on, it's just a great cause. Yeah.

I got to know some of the Green Beret stuff. He wants to get right to it. I get right to it because we've got a lot of Navy SEAL buddies that we, you know, you guys are so amazing and what you do is so beyond anything we can comprehend, which I know it's hard for you guys to realize that, but the whole Special Forces family and what you guys do is so incredible. How much, a little backstory, so when did you go into the service and when did you know, okay, I'm going to be a Green Beret? Because that seems like a,

That's a good question. I'm going to get six a lot of training. It is a great question. A lot of people just go in and they want to do that later. Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, like were you going to go on the service and just do it for a year? And then what point did it be like, oh, we got something here? Well, I was born and raised right here in Tennessee. Grandparents have a farm in Manchester area. And I lived in Chattanooga area.

spent a lot of time between both those locations and uh you know i was a little bit more drawn to the the countryside because i enjoyed hunting fish and doing things like that um at 17 years old um i had asked my dad i said hey i need to tell you something you need to promise you won't tell this mom um and it was that my girlfriend was pregnant oh and uh he's like you know i want you to

Think about what you just told me and tell me how I'm not supposed to tell your mother that. But that really is. That's kind of where my head placement was at that point in my life. I dropped out of high school. I immediately went into working at a construction, doing framing jobs.

you know job hop went to work for a lumber mill where you know pulling logs off that were you know three times the size of me that was not for me I was about 150 pounds soaking wet then and you know I was went into this apprenticeship for auto body and paint and I was you know determined that that was going to be the route I was going to take but you know after spending you know six

six, seven months with some folks that had been doing paint their entire life. I was like, there's not much of a health future for me in this line of work. So I was doing some work on my grandfather's farm. We were separating fences for cattle, putting in a lot of fence posts. He asked me to come sit down on the back of his tailgate and shared Proverbs 27, 17. As iron sharpens iron, one man does another. And he said, I know you look up to me. My grandfather was like the king of my world. Always inspired to be like him.

and he said, I think you need to surround yourself with some people and inspire you to be a better version of you to be the best dad you can be. So I, you know, a couple weeks later, went and joined the military. Went in, you know, I was a, you know, basic in AIT as a combat engineer, which is essentially like explosives and demolition. And then, uh,

You know, I went to my first duty station, which is where I met that other piece of iron, iron, sharpened iron. It's not an easy task. And the gentleman I met, Joe Fancher, he became a lifelong mentor. He, you know,

he put the boot to me he was determined to make me less of a dirt bag and he did and uh so i went to ranger school uh he went to sf and i you know said i want to do that um you know i i found someone that inspired me to pull me out of where i was as a young man and uh you know it just kept that in the forefront of my mind is i want to continually try to be the best person i can be and

and surrounding myself with the best people to make me a better person. And that's how I ended up getting SF and Special Forces. And yeah. So they kind of is it, you know, like the SEALs are buddy. So they literally break you down and build you back up. Yeah. Is that what it is? That what it's like? Yeah. You know, I think in the military in general, it's, you know, people come from all over the world and you're coming together. So,

they break you down so that when you leave there, you're a soldier. You know, it's like you don't see a difference in the state they're from, the accent they have, or the accent they don't have. You know, it's just you leave there. You know, I always say it's commonplace to build bonds is when you're in suck.

you know what i mean like so when you're in misery everybody's your friend you know you're just looking for a lifeline so yeah um yeah that's uh that's kind of how it was with uh special forces assessment and selection too but there they really kind of focus on two ways you know focus on you as an individual how do you handle working by yourself and then how do you handle working as a member of a team because when you're a small team navy seals special operations special forces

You're working in a small team, so you need to be able to trust the people to your left and right. Curiosity, just because I was just a foot soldier at Fort Benning, so I did that in like 87, 89, and you said Ranger, and you were taught a Ranger school. I was a pre-Ranger instructor, yeah. To be in Special Forces, do you need to be a Ranger first? Is that the way it is, or is that just two different skill sets? No, it's two different pathways. I just happened to go to Ranger school. I wasn't in Ranger Regiment. I just went to Ranger school.

um, as kind of a stepping, it was actually my first school right out of basic training was I went to a pre-ranger and then the ranger school and before airborne, did you do airborne? I did airborne after ranger school. Okay. I was what you call a leg ranger. I was not airborne qualified for a little while. Um, but I'm, I was thankful that I made ranger school, uh, you know, that first goal because it kind of set the bar for the rest of them, you know,

I feel like it was one of the most demanding outside of a special forces qualification. Yeah. If you can do that, you can do anything. Yeah. It was just, you know, like go, go all in, you know, and you got the Rangers have that week, like the hell week with seals. Right. So that's a, can you,

How does that differentiate? That's a good question. Well, I haven't been through SEAL training. I have a lot of friends. Actually, the CEO of the Honor Foundation is a SEAL. Who's tougher, you or the SEALs? I always like to say who's smarter. Nice. No, they're great. I mean, we all give each other a hard time, but when it comes down to it, when you're overseas, you're all wearing the same flag, right? That's right. Hey, man. So is that Green Beret –

So is the next step Delta or is that just another branch? They're a different organization. So how do you make that choice? So at some point you have to make the leap to be, is it another more training to be a Green Beret after you've been a Ranger and all that stuff, right? Yeah. So the Special Forces Army, the

Going to Special Forces, the first step is Special Forces Assessment Selection, which is about 30 days. It's where they test who you are as an individual and as a member of a team through a series of events, a lot of land navigation, a lot of carrying a heavy ruck on your back and runs.

And then once selected, you attend what's called the qualification course. And that's where you're given an MOS, a job specialty. My first job was a weapons sergeant on a team.

And then you learn your job as an individual and then you're paired up with other group and you go through what we call small unit tactics, which is working as a member of a team in your MOS. And then you learn a language. My second language was Arabic. And then you go through what we call Robin Sage, which is the culmination exercise, which puts it all together. And you're a member of ODA and a.

in a mock environment. Is that a year long? It's about, about two years. I got to know what the, what the average is city boys and country boys that make it. I'll tell you, there's a lot of, a lot of country boys and just like everybody, you know, was fearful of land navigation. Cause you're, I mean, you're doing some long distance movements when I say long, I mean, you're putting a lot of miles, I mean, lots of miles, uh,

going through the woods at night. You're not allowed to use the roads, and they'll catch you if you use the roads. But I loved it. I was like, I'm in the woods by myself. No one's yelling at me. This is heaven. I could stay out here all day. But I think that gets some people who are not used to being in that environment and the different noises. Those noises put me to sleep.

Yeah. That's just incredible. The Arabic thing is blowing my mind. Like how long does that take to actually be, I don't want to say fluent, but I guess somewhat fluent. Well, like a Rosetta stone thing. So it's, it's six months long. I mean, and it depends on the language that you have, but it's six months of immersion. You're all day long. It's like college all day. I wouldn't know what that's like. Yeah.

Remember high school dropout. Yeah. But so six months, like all the time, every day, all day. Yeah. And that's what you're doing. And that's what you're doing. And then that, you know, it's not a skill. Like everything you learn throughout the course is not designed to be like,

Oh, I learned that. Now I'm not ever going to use it again. Everything that you learn, you're going to be using. Yeah, there's a purpose. Yeah, there's a reason behind it. And people are going to rely on you to have those skills. So we take it seriously. It's something that you continue to train on when you're at your unit. And actually, it becomes a little bit easier because you go on deployments. You know, the number of deployments in those locations is full immersion.

How much time did you spend over there? Oh, my wife and I were trying to do the math. I think we've been married for 22 years, and I think I may have been home about eight and a half of those, so a lot of time. Almost exclusively in that area. Oh, yeah. So each special forces...

So unlike other SOF units, Special Forces, we are assigned, each group has an area of responsibility, and 5th Special Forces Group, where I'm out of at Fort Campbell, or where I was out of, is assigned the Middle East. That's our area of responsibility. All the other groups have had to help us and participate in the Middle East, so it's not like we've been solely there, but it's just been a lot of work.

When you say soft units, is that the other branches of service? Yeah, soft. That's your unit. It's not about you, Caleb. Hey, I was actually in the Army. Special Operations Forces. It's not fair that you were in the Army, too. This is not fair. So, you know, you need to dig on the Marines. No, gosh, no. I wouldn't, no.

How long did you do that? Just two years. How long are your socks? Do you know Arabic? I don't know Arabic. No. No. No.

Now, look. You look at these guys who've not served at all. No. Making fun of somebody who hasn't. That's like on a day. No, you're making fun of it. No, I promise you I wouldn't last a day. What are you looking at me for? You've got guys that have been in for a year or two and they're dead. And you're making fun of somebody that joined the service. He's looking right at me. I couldn't make it. I wouldn't. As a matter of fact, I mean... I've got to know how many... Go ahead. No, I'm just saying we...

Years ago, we did like a USO kind of tour in the Middle East. It's kind of what you did. What year was that? When we served. When we served. We served drinks all night. Yeah, we served drinks. We served drinks all night. No, it's actually truly, it's true though. We were...

Out there in the middle of nowhere. I mean, Iraq's in the desert somewhere. Secret bases and all that. Night vision. You know, 155 degrees. And blown away by...

Truly what you guys do. All joking aside. It was a life-changing experience. It absolutely was. Just the appreciation we had for what you guys do, which actually makes me think, did you guys ever have anybody that came over and played music for you guys? Do you remember any of that? Absolutely. I remember Zach Brown Band coming. Kid Rock came. I enjoyed those. It was super cool to see people take time

I mean, and this was during Christmas. Right. You know, it's like they should be home with their family. That's exactly when we did it. And they're coming. So it was super cool. Tony and I couldn't believe how appreciative the military was. And we're like, what are you talking about? You guys are the heroes. Like, for us to come over here is nothing.

But just so much appreciation. And that's cool to hear that. Like, Zach Brown, I know Kid Rock does that a lot. Of course, Toby Keith. Yeah, he did. Three Doors Down. Yeah. Does a lot of stuff. I mean, I remember one of the coolest things, and even maybe before that, this is the late 90s, did one at Guantanamo Bay. And we were in a bar, and it was probably 20 Marines. And they were, to this day, I remember every one of their faces, they were so appreciative of

And they had so much fun. And it was like, just to give back is like Kurt said, I mean, we're musicians and songwriters and what we do compared to you guys is a, is a job in the bucket. So thank you for. Yeah.

100%. Yeah. Thanks for your service and for being here. I know we want to get to what you're doing now, but it's such an honor for us. And none of us could do anything of what you've done. We don't even know what you've done and things that you've seen, you know, but just on the, on the, for the entertainment side, before we get to what you're doing right now, movie wise, cause you've been at the highest level of combat military, all the training, the worst of the worst, best of the best. Do you have a couple of movies you would drop that are,

close to reality as you think like like full metal jacket I know that's Marines but like things like that or Heartbreak Ridge or any kind of things that you would say is kind of close to the way they communicate and talk and act as buddies or Rambo 1 through 3 that would thrill us all because we love those movies well I always blame my grandparents for allowing me to watch A-Team growing up because you know like I kind of

I'm like, man, subliminally, they were telling me I needed to be a Green Beret at five. But really, the one I will say is tried and true is Black Hawk Down. Because sometimes it's... I'll caveat that with what you see in the movies is only 5% of what we do. There's a whole lot of other things that we do to continue to support our freedoms here.

But, you know, Black Hawk Down, there's confusion. And, you know, one of the characters in there says, you know, talking about politics, he's like, you know, when bullets start flying, you know, like politics go out the window. It's all about the person you're left and right. And that's really truly what it is. That's the character being a character. So have you seen...

The documentary that just came out on Netflix. I thought that was great. Yeah. It was really, really good. Yeah. What's it called? Do you know? Black Hawk Down. Oh, it is. It's surviving Black Hawk Down, I believe is what it is on Netflix. And it's done. And the book is incredible. Yes, it really is. But the way they did that documentary for the most part, I thought was pretty true. Getting both sides of that situation from a civilian standpoint and from the American soldier standpoint, which I thought was incredible.

Yeah, 100%. Because I would have never...

In my mind, wasn't really thinking about the Somalian civilian side of that. Yeah. That could have turned into a much bigger shit show than it already was. And that's, you know, that's one of the things that you have to have on your mind constantly as a small team is you're there, you know, in special operations, we're there with an indigenous partner. We're there with a partner force and in a perfect world scenario, we go in, we accomplish a mission, we leave and they get the credit for it. Um,

But there are things that can flip the script on that real quick, and you have to have that combat maturity to be able to say, hey, look, we need to slow things down or when to know or when not to pull the trigger. That's why we have such a...

you know, grueling, um, you know, selection processes. So we have to have the right people. It's all about the right, you know, getting the right person. Yeah. Yeah. Cause it's not your basic soldier, you know, cause they, they did a study. I read a lot about Vietnam cause my uncle was in Vietnam and that your, your basic soldier, uh,

They said they just said like 15% would actually fire their weapon because if you fired, the enemy would know where you were. Yeah. But in those kind of dedicated teams, all you guys are firing. I mean, right. I mean, it's just a whole other level. And I could see why people, I mean, if you're in a combat and you're thinking...

Well, if I don't shoot, nobody's going to know I'm over here, and you might live another day. You know, I don't know. But it's kind of interesting that 85% weren't firing so that they could live. Wow. Or even when tensions are high, and you could fire knowing that you shouldn't fire because it could cause this to spin out of control. You know, that's one of the things is that operational maturity to be able to, you know, to make those decisions and trust everyone around you. That's –

Really, I mean, me and Kurt talk about it every now and then, and Jason, where we're like, after the Vegas scenario with the shooter in Vegas, really made us, I talked to a lot of my Navy SEAL buddies after that, and I said, you know what? After going through that, the amount of training you guys need to go through to accept or know what's happening was crazy to me because when it was happening, we were,

you know, such a difference. You couldn't even fathom what was happening. Right. And to know you guys run towards that or, or your mind works that way. Yeah. It was so different to what, you know, the everyday mind works like. Yeah. Well, I mean, it,

It's no different than the music industry. It's very different. No, go on. We are heroes. We are heroes. Guys like you are the reason that we wake up at 11 o'clock in the morning. You start waking up.

Oh, that'd be a great day. Draw that comparison. No, but I talk from a training aspect as, you know, understanding like, you know, when you first started playing the guitar, you weren't, you know, singing along too. You know, you were still trying to figure out where you should put your fingers for the chords. You know, we train...

because that needs to become second nature so that your brain can actually comprehend what's going on in the situation and make the decisions that it needs to make. So it allows you to understand when you're playing your instrument, like, hey, that's not in tune or we need to adjust that and be able to communicate. That's really nice of you, but it's not. That's pretty much exactly right.

I can kind of see where you're going. That's pretty much the same. So let's go on to what you're doing today. Tell him he won't even carry his own bass. Neil. Stop. Hey, listen, guys. This is a fascinating conversation with Josh Birch. Let's take a quick break for our sponsors. We've got to come back and talk about what he's doing now. It's super important, and we want to make sure we get to it. Stick with us here, and we'll be right back. Try that in a small-town podcast. ♪♪♪

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Badass. Green Bray. He is currently the director. You've got to explain to us what this is. Director of Peoples for the Honor Foundation. This is what you're doing now. You said you should be hunting and fishing somewhere, but it led you somewhere to this, right? Well, when I was transitioning from service, back up a little bit. At 18 years, I thought about retiring from the military. A good friend of mine, Jamie Kornowski, he was a command chief warrant officer of 5th Special Force Group at the time, called me in and asked, you know, like,

what's your plan? You know, you said you want to retire. And I'm like, I don't really have a plan. And it's kind of odd because as, you know, special operations, I'm always planning for whatever's next, but I didn't have a plan. And it really, it got me thinking. So I just elected to stay in. A gentleman I worked with was on terminal leave and he was,

doing contract work, which was usually the fallback plan for our folks. There was a lot of money in it.

He was killed while he was on terminal leave, and I was like, I don't want to take that path. So I decided to stay in so I could have the Air Force's finest and medevac if I needed it while we executed our plan. My wife and I came up with a strategy, which is to Dave Ramsey, Dave Ramsey, essentially pay everything off so that I could pursue my dream of hunting and fishing every day.

Sounds amazing. Well, and at 26 years, when we finally pulled the trigger on retirement, my wife said, I'm not used to you being around this much. I'm going back to work full time. That's our first real true thing that we have in common. When the tour ends, my wife's like, when do you leave again? Yeah.

Wait a minute. So we are like, we're like green berets and musicians. Exactly. You know? Well, except, except for there may be one difference. Cause I was going to ask this, but now since y'all stopped there, it's like, you know, when you get back from your missions and all that, and you're fresh off and she's glad to see you and everything. And, and, and you cry, you embraced you, all the things, a few days, a few weeks goes by. And then you're, you're just a husband and your dad and you're there.

Every night does she lay on your chest and say, thank you for being such a hero? Can I say yes? When you're taking out the trash, do you think, special forces, why am I taking out the trash? I'm a freaking Green Beret. I know who runs our house. Well, amen. She takes care of it. I mean, she, you know,

she's taking care of our kids and everything. When I always say, you know, our chaplains, when we come back, we have like reintegration training and everything. And they're like, you know, they call it passing the remote. They're like, don't, don't go in and take the remote on night one. I'm like, I just don't take the remote because I know she's going to need that remote in a few weeks. You know, I'm going to be going back to do some training or, or on another deployment. So my wife, you know, taking care of us. That's what we need. What's that? It's all so clear. We need someone to help us after tour.

Yes. To the house. I mean, it sounds like because the what's the severance? You guys watch severance is great. Reintegration. Yeah. Anyway, you do. I mean, people out there tuning your base. My wife goes in your base. She always says she goes, oh, it's treating this house like a hotel. Yes. Yes. Do you know who I am?

I mean, do you know who I think I am? Surely I'm not going to have to straighten this place up. Have you ever taken the garbage out? Oh, my gosh. Oh, come on, please. Make my son do it. In show clothes? That's why I have children. That's the whole point of this. But when you guys come back from the road with Aldine, just as a comparison, Josh,

I'm not as old. It's our deployment. We have a 45-shot deployment. Do they run to the end of the driveway, and are there tears when you guys get back? Oh, my God. Father. Oh, Father. Welcome home, Father. Thank God you're back safe. No, not a lot of that. No? Okay. Not a lot of that. I don't know if there's an exact comparison. Go ahead, Josh. What?

That's one of the things, you know, at my retirement, my daughter got up and it broke my heart. Like I haven't even given my speech yet, like my retirement, you know, like thank everyone. And my daughter got up and she said, my dad always said, you know, I'm going on a deployment. She never understood what that meant. And it didn't really click until my retirement that I never really explained what is a deployment. All she saw is

dad is going to get dropped off and he's going to be gone for six months or, or who knows how long. Um, and you know, my son was the same way, you know, there's never explained what was happening. So, you know, it was kind of, you know, they resented me a little bit for that because they didn't understand why I was leaving. They just, you know, knew that I was, I was leaving. So, you know,

fast forward to now, you know, they, they, you know, are extremely appreciative, but I've always said that I volunteer, my wife even volunteers because she married me. Um, but my kids, they were put through it, you know, sacrificially. Yep. Um, and they truly, you know, did not have any say so in it. So, so let's, we started to talk about it, but make sure we get to this because the honor foundation, what they're doing, uh,

For veterans. Please explain that. Yeah. So the Honor Foundation is a program. It's a transition program. Like,

I mentioned earlier is if you're a musician your whole life and then all of a sudden you can't be a musician anymore and you have to find out what's next, that's what the Honor Foundation does for special operations. It's a three-month course that really takes you through. Phase one is all about you as an individual, introspective look of what are your strengths, what are your preferences, because this is the first time in our military careers we've actually had like

The world's your oyster. What do you want to do? And it's the first time that our spouses and family have had a say-so in it. So we have a course that runs parallel with the Honor Foundation, which is called Transition as a Team Sport, which has the spouse do the same thing. Look at their strengths, look at their preferences, and then you put the two together. Because across my military career, I've always planned as a member of a team.

Now when it comes to transition, I don't have that team anymore. So it was like either I'm planning or, you know, my wife has her own ideas of what, you know, transitions should look like and our kids too. But we try to bring everyone together to plan. And then you have the cohort and our volunteers, you know, we –

solely rely on volunteers throughout our course to help with the networking. And then phase two is all about, you know, providing them the tools, you know, like LinkedIn, resume, mock interviews. We do business one-on-one, just like we learned Arabic and other languages. We're teaching them, you know, the business language. And, and we're not a job placement. We want to help them do whatever they want. If it's hunting and fishing professionally, then by all means, let's help them do that. Um,

But if it's opening up their own business, small business startup, whatever the case may be, we want to provide them with tools and the network to do that. And I didn't mean to interrupt, but that's a great point because I didn't really know. This isn't like a job placement service. This is just how do I get from here to here and transition into what I haven't known for 25 years. It's a structured process. And it's completely like...

rewiring your brain yeah right to enter into normalcy and and we there is another parallel that i see as you as you speak and it's we talk about this like our identity is is in music and what we do and you have an identity so how do you when that identity is changing

There's a certain amount of accepting that too. Yeah. Right? That seems difficult. The brief that we give as a recruiting brief for our fellows, we have a word cloud in it. It's all the stressors that people say that they're dealing with during transition from military. And one of the ones that is probably the different word clouds where the words are different sizes, identity and purpose are important.

Not the largest, you know, usually it's family, career, but identity and purpose are the two that kind of stand out to me. And it's because for so long we've been a part of something bigger than ourselves. And identity and being a Green Beret or a Special Operations soldier, you know, that's who I was, you know, but that's not who I am.

you know, even in my role as the director of people for the Honor Foundation here in Tennessee is, you know, I'm still part of something bigger than myself. And I tell them, I don't care if it's like helping a little league soccer team, you know, running for mayor in your town, whatever, your leadership is needed in our community. And we really encourage them, you know, to find, you know, purpose in life. So something that'll fill that cup, because looking back at, you know, and I really feel that we're,

you know, you know, suicide awareness, you know, with veteran suicide, you know, it's such a high rate. I think that part of that is purpose. Like,

You want to feel pride waking up every morning. And I think that we are on the front end of that. We're not suicide prevention. We're suicide prevention in the, on the front end. Um, so, you know, like helping them find purpose, helping them find a value in themselves and a reason to get out of bed every morning. So that, you know, that that's not even a thought. Yeah. So it's like some physical tools, but it's a lot of mental tools too, right? Absolutely. Yeah. And it's the network. I mean, uh,

Our alumni, it's not, you know, we say with honor for life. And, you know, we are, I mean, I have alumni who come in every cohort to share with the next cohort their successes and to encourage them and inspire them. And these are folks who have accomplished things that 99.9% of the population would never even want to do.

And it's like going into the normal society is like scary. It's like we just we're just there to encourage them, provide them the necessary tools in the planning process to be able to accomplish what they want to do. Yeah. And that's it's cool. We kind of kidded about being similar, but it really is like purpose is the thing. Like when you said that and reading about you, that's the most important thing, like for everybody, like at some point.

You're the job that you do. You're, you're, you're going to age out of it, you know, physically, mentally, whatever. And then what do you, what do you do? Do you just talk about the old days? And some people do, and that's fine too. Yeah.

But you're young enough to where, and we are too, that if something happened and, hey, we're not getting a lot of songs recorded or whatever, what are we going to do? Are we just going to talk about how cool we were back here when we were doing this stuff? Or do we do that? Are we Christians? Are we telling people about Jesus? Whatever that purpose is, people got to find it. And if you don't have that purpose, it's hard to get out of bed. Yeah, 100%. What's interesting is, on a side note or serious note really,

Just the other night, I texted Kurt and Jason. I said, is anybody missing the stage yet? And that just kind of clicked in my brain as we're talking about this, like how the identity. That's how we're wired right now. Like it's the same. It's for years, for forever, we're wired to perception of us, which is up there. And it's weird. Like I'm sitting around or we're.

just in town. Like, okay, I can see that being an issue. Like you guys are trained at the highest level military and that's a certain pride in that. And then when it's gone, it's like, okay, well, you know, what now? What now? Yeah. I did the same. I went through the same thing. Like,

Not the same thing that you did. But I don't want to go through the same thing. No, no, no. But it's like, okay, I'm going to wind it down here. I'm going to slow it down. I'm going to go hunting and fishing. That's what I'm going to do. Nah. I'm going to spend all my time. And play golf. Yeah. I'm going to hunt, fish, and play golf. It sounds fantastic. And then once you start doing that, you're like, wait a minute.

I can still be relevant, I think. You know? Yeah. Well, Josh... I can still make up stuff. I mean, you went through the same thing. Yeah. So what... You were saying that, like, just how Neil was saying, that was like, hey, that's what I'm going to do. So what...

What happened inside of you to say, no, I need to get involved in something like this? I went through the Honor Foundation. Oh, really? And I turned down, you know, I had so many of my mentors, you know, talking about mentorship. You know, mentorship has been part of my whole life. I mean, I went from high school dropout. I do have college now, but, you know, to a senior leader in special operations and, you

I only got there because I listened to mentors. But when it came to transition and everybody was like, hey, you need to go through the Honor Foundation. You need to go through the Honor Foundation. I was like, I don't need that. Unless they're giving me good fishing spots. We're so selfish. We're such a selfish species. I love it. I don't need it.

I went through the course and like I said, introspective look phase one was when I like they sprinkled voodoo magic on me because I started looking at who I am, what are my strengths and what are my motivators? My primary motivators, altruism, helping other people.

And I look back over my career. We do the Simon Sinek Start With Why program. And if I think about the stories, even back to when my grandfather said, you know, you need to find people to inspire you to be a better version. It's all about mentorship and helping other people. I saw that, you know, in a community in Manchester, Tennessee, where, you know, every time somebody gets sick at church, my grandma's making them a potluck to take to them or something. You know, just helping people in your community. And I'm like...

I need a reason to get out of bed. I need to be a part of something and helping other people. And then as I was going through the course, Matt Stevens, CEO, had offered me an opportunity to start a campus here to support fifth group and 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment. And I knew I had to jump on it because I'm not a believer in coincidence. You know, like,

I went through this course for a reason, and then these opportunities opened up. And, you know, I've got three jobs now. I work for the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce part-time in a consultant role, working veterans initiatives on the business side and working with the state. I work for the Honor Foundation full-time, and then I'm a volunteer at a Special Forces Association vice president where we help Gold Star family members. So I realized, like you, when I took a break,

I wasn't accomplishing the things that I wanted to accomplish. And I said, I've got this laundry list of stuff I need to do on our farms. I need pressure to accomplish this. And having that busy schedule helps me accomplish it. And guess what? You still have time to go fishing and hunting. Exactly. You still have time. Went on my first elk hunt this year. There you go. Got to harvest a bull. So it was a great experience. But, yeah. Wow.

So you're one of those amazing people that make everybody else feel bad about it. I was going to, I was going to say, just be a, for you, be, be thankful for your hardwiring. Cause, cause in your family DNA, you've got some good stuff in your mind and your heart. And,

that helps you make those decisions. Well said. I'm grateful for the folks who raised me and really, you know, like I've always said, if I owned a... And I appreciate you all having me on here and listening to some of your podcasts. You like to bring out the good in the community because I've always said, if I owned a news agency, for every bad thing that was reported...

I'd report three good things because there's a lot of good that goes on in the community. And that's what inspires people. You know, it's like, well, you were the reason people like you are the reason why we started this podcast. Amen. Yep. It's to try to give back, especially to our military and our veterans. Cause I, I really do feel like over the last few years, just a complete lack of disrespect or lack of respect for the military. I feel that, um, I feel like more, I feel like we're getting it back.

but i feel like it's important that people know what you guys go through and how hard you train but also what you do after and uh it's it's incredible thank you so much for well i appreciate it yeah josh i mean and seriously we we said at the beginning we you know we've been fortunate to have some you whatever guest on and we've been like oh that's cool that's cool but this is what it's all about this right here is what it's all about and what you do

means the world. And I can't even tell you what an honor it is for you to come here and be with us. I promise you. It's been an absolute pleasure.

Well, I appreciate it. And even with the Honor Foundation, nothing I've ever done across my career has been a me. It's been a we. And with Honor Foundation, I have two great teammates. I have Shane Minnick, who's been a longtime teammate of mine. He's, you know, Green Beret, retired Sergeant Major is just excellent, excellent individual. And then Jackie Edwards, she's a spouse of a night stalker, retired night sucker. So, you know,

I've never accomplished anything by myself. It's always been a part of a team, and I'm glad that it's continuing that way post-military. Well, we thank you for being here. Thank you very much. God bless you. All right, Jimmy.

I think that was great. You want to get to something? Yeah, yeah. So we've got, so the big thing, all right, so we're a non-profit. Yeah. We have one fundraiser here a year. Oh, let's get to it. It's Nashville Music City event. Let's do it. It's coming up. Yeah, let's get right here. Bring it back. Bring it back on.

Hey, before we go, we got to talk about the fundraiser you got coming up, right? Yes, sir. What is it? So we have one fundraiser we do here in Tennessee every year. This is our fourth annual Music City fundraiser. It's for the Honor Foundation. This year it's going to be on April 3rd at the Giotis Park event.

It's a great opportunity. How do people find out about it? Is there a website we can go to? Go to honor.org forward slash events. There's an opportunity to sign up, sponsor tables. We have a live auction. We have entertainment. It's a good night. You hear from our alumni. We have...

business leaders in the community that will speak and share, folks who have actually hired our alumni and share the positive impact they're making in their organization. So great opportunity to get involved. And if there's any other, like I said, we rely on volunteers. We have mock interviews, resume review, and we have what we call cups of coffee, which is

how we inform our fellows of different careers, help them make an informed decision on what they want to do next. So if anybody's interested in getting involved, absolutely check it out. Give it, what's the website again or how they check honor.org honor.org forward slash events or slash events. Go there and check that out. Hey, before you go, I do have to ask you, cause I know you're from a small town and you love community and paying it forward and doing right by your neighbor. Um,

did you know of the song, Try That in a Small Town? Yes, I did. Yep. Yeah. What was your thought when that came out? Because there was a lot of people that didn't like it, but I know that you're from a small town, and I've heard you talk about just that sense of community, and it kind of brought a smile to my face, and I was like, man, that's what we were trying to do. Yeah. You know, I think...

People can read whatever they want or, you know, find conflict in anything, you know. That's true. But really, like, I think the small town, what I learned from a small town is, even the small town I live in now in Coopertown, is I know more people within 8, 10 miles than I did when I lived in a neighborhood.

And it's because you rely on each other a lot more. When it snows, I know I need to go check on, you know, the elderly couple down the road to make sure they don't need anything so they don't have to get out. And I really think that's where the song resonated with me is, you know,

Like in a small town, people are a little bit closer than in a bigger city where everything is so rushed that you really don't have time to acknowledge the world around you. And that's just me personally. By the way, that was unrehearsed. That was amazing. We did.

He is taking over our podcast. I'm firing myself. Would you like to join us Thursday? Seriously, Josh, thank you for being here. It's an honor. I appreciate the opportunity. Absolutely. Thank you so much, brother. Thank you. I mean, Josh makes me want to...

Get in shape. He makes me want to plank every night before I go to bed. When you sit across from a green beret, you want to... I'm with you. You feel so inferior. Because we are inferior. You're right. I don't even feel inferior. I am inferior. I'm not sure if planks is going to...

level the playing field with if we could do a minute plank or even a 90 second plank or two minute plank like Tully said if you can do a three minute plank that's amazing and that's a whole other topic a three minute plank he can't do a three minute plank there's no way in hell but even if he could let's end this episode right now we're three minute away there's no way Tully how much Tully you can't your hair weighs too much this is about Josh Birch a retired special forces Green Beret I know right we always make it about us my favorite question was for

for whatever weird reason was what movie is most realistic. I love that. Oh, I seriously thought that was amazing. That's Caleb magic right there. Well, thank you. Well, we all love movies. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Jim, can you turn this up, please? No,

No, I really love that because we're obviously fans of all the military stuff, Rambo and all those things, which we know are sensationalized and all that. But for somebody who's actually been in combat, what do they think? What's your favorite military movie? Well, I mean, I like all of them. I like any Vietnam movie. He's a Rambo guy. I mean, Rambo, but I like Chuck Norris. I like Missing in Action. I mean, I like the old stuff too. Band of Brothers was like an OG kind of thing. That whole thing, you know, a couple times.

Just so many. Yeah, but when he mentioned Blackhawk Down, then you think of the sniper ones and all the Middle East stuff, which is because there's a lot of combat. I like a lot of news. Fun hearing his take. Incredible. Yep.

I'm yeah. Blazing saddles. And there's another great military movie. Saddles couldn't be made today, by the way. No, it could not. No, not a chance. Not a chance. I wouldn't think so. Oh my God. Listen, we got to make sure everybody, we got a lot of things to plug here. Go to the, try that in a small town.

website right you can get some of that right there come on uh follow us on all the socials make sure you go to x make sure you go to insta tiktok where else are we are we missing any facebook follow us on all that stuff alley anything alley what does that all of this what else what else do we need we don't rumble yet are we on rumble we are heck yeah

Let's get ready to do it. Oh my God. We'd love you guys. Thank you for sticking with us. And just to reiterate, seriously, we, we have a lot of guests on here. We've been incredibly blessed, but tonight, I don't know. It's what it's all about. Yeah. It's special night. Yep. Special night. And the fact that he's given back and making sure we're taking care of our veterans, it is what it's all about.

These are the Patriot Mobile Studios. Why don't I say these? No, it's too bad that we can't do the plank off on video. It's too bad. I promise you it's going to be on video. We'll figure it out. This is not going to be close. Let's explain to people. You can't do a three-minute plank. Really? No, you can't. Your hair weighs too much. It's not going to happen.

Your head will be sagging like, I can't keep my hair up. And I'm not going to say you can't do it. If you do a three-minute plank, that's impressive. That's really impressive. I want to see your abs. Well, we can't end this fast enough. Let's go. Three-minute plank. All right. Right after the golf tournament. Tech tops, everyone.

This is Try That in a Small Town podcast. Thanks for joining us, guys. Make sure to follow along, subscribe, share, rate the show, and check out our merch at trythatinasmalltown.com.